Entertainment mogul: Starting his business with the internet

Chapter 403 The Red Envelope is Here!
In the corridor of Donghai Tangren Film and Television Company, Cai Yinong and Hu Ge were about to push open the door to the First Sister's office.

Suddenly, a burst of infectious laughter came from inside the house, clearly indicating that the people inside were immersed in joy.

The two knocked lightly on the door and entered.

Liu Shishi's eyes crinkled with laughter as she bent over with joy. Cai Yinong teased, "Shishi, even if you're preparing for a wedding, you don't need to be this happy, do you?"

"Sister K, Lao Hu, please have a seat!" Liu Shishi greeted them warmly with a beaming smile. "I was just watching a super funny short video."

Hu Ge sat down at the desk, looking curious: "What video are you watching so intently?"

The first sister pressed the pause button with great interest and explained: "It's the 'Men's Diary' that was launched on Toutiao Video a while ago. The content is a bit vulgar, but the jokes in it are really interesting."

"The popularity of 'Men's Diary' is very high. The first episode has garnered 8.2 million views in 24 hours, and netizens have left more than 20,000 comments."

"This show features a lot of product placement for cars, fast-moving consumer goods, and beauty products, making it a very successful commercial operation," Cai Yinong added, adding that she had specifically studied "Men's Diary" beforehand.

It's surprising that a 15-minute episode of a web series can achieve such great results. It can only be said that the film and television industry is undergoing an unprecedented transformation under the wave of internet innovation.

These words piqued Hu Ge's interest: "Then I'll have to find time to take a look."

Liu Shishi belatedly realized what was happening and asked, "Old Hu, weren't you filming 'American Dreams in China'? Has filming wrapped up?"

"My scenes are not as many as Huang Xiaoming's and Deng Chao's, and they have already been filmed."

"Congratulations on the completion of another major production."

Hu Ge shook her head slightly and sighed, "This time filming 'American Dreams in China' has been very fruitful. Huang Xiaoming and Deng Chao are indeed well-established and powerful male stars."

He seems humorous and easygoing in everyday life, but once he gets into character, his acting power far surpasses mine. So, after the promotional period for *Xuan-Yuan Sword* ends, I plan to go to the Donghai Drama Center to continue honing my acting skills.”

"Old Hu, you're doing a play again? I'll have to come support you another day. K-sister, has 'Xuan-Yuan Sword' been scheduled for release yet?"

"Yes, it's scheduled for July 10th on Hunan TV's Golden Eagle Theater."

The eldest sister tilted her head playfully: "So after I finish the promotion of 'Xuan-Yuan Sword', I won't have any work left, right?"

“If you don’t take on any roles, you’ll naturally have more free time.” Cai Yinong smiled wryly, secretly worried.

In the second half of the year, Tangren's top female lead focused on preparing for her wedding; the top male lead was determined to devote himself to stage plays, and the company could only pin its hopes on a few new generation actors such as Naza, Jiang Jinfu, and Lin Gengxin.

"I almost forgot to congratulate you, Shishi! Happy wedding!"

Cai Yi-nong also enthusiastically asked, "Do you need any help with the wedding preparations?"

The eldest sister smiled broadly: "With a professional wedding planner handling everything, my husband and I don't have to worry too much."

Upon hearing this, Cai Yi-nong seemingly casually probed, "The wedding has been all over the internet for the past few days. Have the bridesmaids and groomsmen been chosen?"

"The bridesmaids have all been booked. As for the best men, I'm not sure if my husband has made any arrangements."

Hu Ge jokingly offered himself up: "If we're short-handed, I'll be Chairman Song's best man."

The eldest sister didn't think much of it. She and Hu Ge have been friends for many years: "I'll ask my husband to see if he's chosen a groomsman yet. I hope he's not too busy with work and forgets about it."

After saying that, Liu Shishi picked up her phone and first sent a WeChat video call invitation, but no one responded after a long time. She then tried calling, but still couldn't get through. She dialed several times in a row, but no one answered.

My husband always carries his phone with him during the day, and even when attending important meetings or foreign affairs receptions, he will hand the phone over to his secretary or bodyguard for safekeeping.

Surprised, Liu Shishi quickly called her husband's secretary, and this time the call was answered quickly.

"Hello, Madam."

"Is the gentleman at the company? I haven't been able to reach him all day."

Jian Ning immediately replied, "Madam, Chairman Song is at the company today, attending an important meeting."

Because this is a confidential internal meeting, all attendees must hand in their mobile phones. If you wish to contact him, you will need to wait until the meeting ends. If you have an urgent matter, I can go to the meeting room to get him.

Upon hearing that her husband had important business to attend to, Liu Shishi quickly replied, "Don't bother him."

The woman spread her hands: "He's in a meeting. I'll ask him another day when I have time."

"Chairman Song's affairs are of utmost importance."

After a few casual words, the three got down to business. With less than a month until the broadcast of "Xuan-Yuan Sword," Tangren Media was about to launch a full-scale promotional campaign.

Cai Yinong has high hopes for "Xuan-Yuan Sword," hoping to replicate the ratings success of "Chinese Paladin 3" and "Scarlet Heart" and lead Tangren Media to new heights.

After more than half an hour of discussion, the three finalized a publicity plan: to promote the film on major internet platforms and hold several fan meet-and-greets offline, thus simultaneously promoting the film through a combination of online and offline methods.

With everything settled, Cai Yinong was about to get up and leave when he suddenly remembered something: "Shishi, yesterday we received two more invitations from jewelry brands to collaborate. They want to sponsor the jewelry and gold ornaments for your wedding with Chairman Song."

"My wedding doesn't need any brand sponsorship!" Liu Shishi waved her hand impatiently. If the wedding of Asia's richest man still needed brand sponsorship to provide gold and silver jewelry, it would be a disgrace to the whole world.

Cai Yinong nodded quickly: "I understand, I'll refuse them for you."

"Sister K, which jewelry brands have sent invitations?"

"Cartier, Bulgari, Tiffany, Piaget... basically all the world's top luxury jewelry brands have expressed their intention to cooperate, as have domestic brands such as Chow Tai Fook and Chow Tai Seng."

Liu Shishi thought for a moment and said, "Sponsorship is indeed unnecessary, but if you have any nice jewelry designs, you can send me pictures and I'll pick out a few sets to buy."

Cai Yinong replied, "Okay, I'll have the brand send over some jewelry sample images."

Meanwhile, Song Ci was presiding over an important meeting in the company's confidential conference room.

The attendees were a distinguished group, including Wu Yi, the newly appointed president of WeChat, Lin Haifeng, president of EasyPay, heads of cloud computing and big data centers, experts in online payment and security from Tenda Group, and a host of top technical personnel.

The richest man sat in the main seat, looking solemn: "WeChat red envelopes will completely change the payment habits and social interactions of Chinese people."

It is destined to become an important milestone in the development of mobile payment and internet financial technology, and its value to the entire group's business landscape is immeasurable.

Therefore, the group will deploy its best personnel in the second half of the year to ensure the successful development of WeChat red envelopes.

Wu Yi looked solemn. This was the first strategic task he had taken on since becoming the president of WeChat, and there was no room for error.

Success would secure his position as president of the group's core department; failure would likely mean packing his bags and leaving. He immediately declared, "Chairman Song, rest assured, I'm willing to pledge my life and guarantee that the development of WeChat red envelopes will be completed within six months."

Song Ci nodded slightly, quite satisfied with Wu Yi's firm attitude, but the key to the project was not there.

His gaze fell on a technician, and he said earnestly, "Mr. Zhang, a red envelope is essentially a transfer of funds."

You are a leading expert in online payments, and I would like you to lead the technical aspects of this project. Please let me know if you need any manpower.

Zhang Ke, Chief Technology Officer of Yipay, pushed up his slightly sloping glasses and replied unhurriedly, "Chairman Song, as the saying goes, one person's plan is short-sighted, but many people's plans are long-sighted."

The WeChat red envelope project is a massive undertaking, and I don't have a clear plan for completing it right now. Please allow me to discuss it with Engineer Li and Engineer Tang.

Song Ci nodded in agreement, granting the request.

Zhang Ke then turned to the team: "Everyone, let's focus on the core technology requirements of WeChat Red Envelope."

According to Chairman Song's plan, when users open red envelopes, the deduction of the red envelope amount and the deposit of funds into the account must be executed atomically; any disconnect in any step could trigger financial risks.

Zhang Ke's insightful and concise remarks sparked a lively discussion in the conference room, with technical team members sharing their opinions on key issues.

"No matter how high the concurrency, the amount already claimed and the remaining amount must always be kept accurate and in real time."

"Yes, we absolutely cannot allow the phenomenon of people still being able to grab more red envelopes after they've all been given out;"
The issue of funds being sold out before they've been fully distributed, or errors in the calculation of amounts, concerns product reputation and user trust.

"When multiple users claim the same red envelope at the same time, the processing needs to be isolated to avoid errors in the amount due to issues such as dirty reading and phantom reading."

Song Ci listened attentively, occasionally adding and emphasizing: "The security of funds and the consistency of business logic must be guaranteed to be error-free. This is the lifeline of WeChat Red Packets."

During the intense brainstorming session, Zhang Ke had a flash of inspiration: "The key to overcoming these technical difficulties lies in adopting distributed transaction solutions or carefully designing local transaction reconciliation mechanisms..."

Li, an engineer from the big data center, immediately responded: "I agree, what Engineer Zhang said is very true."

The underlying database logic must employ strong consistency. Simultaneously, a full-chain fund reconciliation system must be built to ensure that every penny is traceable.

Many hands make light work, and with the ideas gradually becoming clearer, Zhang Ke's development strategy suddenly became clear: "Okay, let's use the TCC model to solve the first problem."

Tang, an engineer at the cloud computing center, raised a new challenge: "Ultra-high concurrency and extremely low latency are more difficult to solve on-site than security issues."

According to the chairman's description of the application scenarios, during the peak period of the Spring Festival red envelope campaign, the number of user requests that flood in instantly is astronomical. The system needs to handle millions of concurrent requests per second for grabbing, sending, and querying red envelopes.

Furthermore, the time lag between the user clicking "Open Red Envelope" and the display of the result must be controlled within milliseconds; otherwise, the user experience will be extremely poor.

At this moment, Song Ci lightly tapped the table, his voice resounding: "I approve your use of the Tianwen-1 supercomputer to conduct a million-level concurrent extreme stress simulation test."

Tianwen-1 is a supercomputer built by Tengda Group at a cost of 15 billion yuan in the East China Sea Cloud Computing Center and Big Data Center.

Composed of 140 million processors, it can provide 12000 quadrillion floating-point operations per second.

It is normally used for large-scale distributed computing such as core data processing and advertising optimization for Tenda Group, and is currently the world's leading supercomputer.

Zhang Ke breathed a sigh of relief. The chairman authorized the use of the Tianwen-1 supercomputer for the WeChat red envelope project. With its supercomputing power, the project development difficulty was undoubtedly reduced significantly.

Li Gong excitedly suggested, "With the computing power of Tianwen-1, I think it would be better to adopt database sharding and table partitioning, as well as strategic caching logic."

Mr. Tang, can cloud computing support automatic scaling of server architecture during peak hours?

Tang Ze, chief engineer of the cloud computing center, said confidently: "The group's cloud computing technology is among the world's leading, and its microservice architecture is elastic and scalable, which is sufficient to meet the traffic changes of WeChat red envelopes at different times."

As a world-class internet giant, Tenda Group boasts a wealth of talent and demonstrates its formidable technological prowess.

After a series of intense brainstorming sessions, the core technical framework of WeChat Red Envelope has taken initial shape and is ready to be implemented step by step using algorithms.

Song Ci's insight was sharp: "WeChat Red Envelope integrates high concurrency, financial-grade security, real-time computing, and payment systems, requiring cross-domain collaboration. Zhang, how many people are needed to build the development team?"

After a moment's thought, Zhang Ke replied, "Chairman Song, I've roughly estimated that if we want to successfully develop WeChat red envelopes by the end of the year, we'll need a professional team of 20-25 people."

Among them, there are 3-4 front-end development engineers who are responsible for the red envelope sending and receiving interface, animation effects, and weak network compatibility optimization.

Backend development will require 8-10 people, focusing on distributed architecture, implementation of the red envelope algorithm, and integration with the payment system.

There are also payment and security experts... test and operations engineers... algorithm and data engineers...

Zhang Ke had a clear vision, outlining the personnel configuration, core responsibilities, and required technologies for each individual.

Song Ci made a quick decision: "Okay, I will arrange the personnel you need within a week. General Manager Wu and General Manager Lin, you must ensure that the logistical support is in place."

Then, looking at the two group presidents, he solemnly instructed: "Once I have gathered the technical personnel that Engineer Zhang needs, they will all go to the Donghai Cloud Computing Center for closed-door development."

During this period, everyone is required to sign a confidentiality agreement, live and eat at the company, and absolutely no information about the entire project must be leaked.

Wu Yi and Lin Haofeng quickly said, "Don't worry, Chairman Song, we will do our best to protect and support the technical team."

"The success or failure of the WeChat red envelope project is crucial to the group's future development, so I'm entrusting it to you all!" Song Ci took a deep breath; the WeChat red envelope project was of paramount importance to the group.

Tenda is just one step away from becoming an internet empire. If the project succeeds, it will solidify Tenda's absolute core position in the fintech world.

After the meeting, Song Ci retrieved his cell phone, saw the caller ID, and immediately dialed back: "Honey, the meeting just ended. What's up?"

Liu Shishi's gentle voice came from the other end of the phone: "Honey, your meeting lasted for more than four hours. Remember to balance work and rest."

"Occasionally."

"It's nothing important, just asking if you've decided on your best man yet?"

Song Ci chuckled and replied, "I've just decided on Si Cong and A Hao. I haven't thought of who the other two will be yet."

“I was just talking about this with Sister K and Lao Hu. If you don’t have anyone to choose, Lao Hu can step in.”

Song Ci wasn't too concerned about the choice of best man and readily agreed, "Sure!"

Liu Shishi said tenderly, "Honey, I'm going to the Magnolia Awards ceremony tomorrow night and I'll be back the day after tomorrow. Take good care of yourself!"

(End of this chapter)