A perfect life begins with changing the timeline.

Today, Li Mu took office... no, he went to attend the Internet Conference and only did two things.

First and foremost, fairness, fairness, and [beep] fairness are key to building connections.

As he spent more years as a journalist, he truly came to realize the meaning behind what his older brother had said back then.

This circle is essentially a network of personal connections.

With connections, you'll never lack news.

The second thing is to see if there are any "peers" who are involved in both the internet and media industries, get to know a few more, chat with them, and get to know each other better.

So, after getting into Ding Lei's Mercedes in front of NetEase, the two drove towards Shenzhen.

This Internet Information Forum is being organized by Shenzhen itself, and this year marks its third edition.

Li Mu guessed that someone from his workplace would also come for an interview, but he didn't ask. After all, he was there as a guest today.

After Li Mu got on the bus, Ding Lei, who was holding a magazine in his hand, greeted him with a smile:

"Good morning, Mr. Li."

"Good morning, Mr. Ding...working so hard?"

He pointed to the magazine in the other person's hand and made a joke.

Out of courtesy, Ding Lei closed the magazine after Li Mu got into the car, but Li Mu noticed the magazine's name on the cover:

Southern Agriculture.

He was stunned.

It's not that I'm surprised by this magazine... although at first glance the name sounds like it's from the Southern Media Group, but it isn't. When I was in school, as journalism students, before we knew which area we would specialize in, we would read newspapers and magazines from all walks of life to practice being a reporter or editor.

He also studied "Southern Agriculture," a magazine published by the Agricultural Academy of Sciences in Sichuan and Chongqing.

But this name does easily lead people to mistakenly believe it belongs to the Southern School.

What surprised him was... why would an internet guru like you read books on agriculture?

Shouldn't one take out the latest Wall Street newspaper in the morning, drink coffee, and then... (The sentence is incomplete and lacks context, so it's left as is.)

He was taken aback:

"An agricultural magazine?"

"yes."

Ding Lei smiled and replied:

My personal hobbies.

"Farming?"

"It should be called aquaculture."

At this point, he seemed to have become interested in chatting and said to Li Mu with a smile:

"Li Ji, do you know what my ultimate dream is?"

"...How about opening a breeding farm?"

"Ha, pretty much. When I retire, I'll rent a piece of land, raise some pigs, cows, sheep, and the like, and live a pastoral life surrounded by green hills and clear waters every day."

A hint of longing appeared in his eyes:

"Escape this city, stop facing concrete and steel every day, work at sunrise and rest at sunset, retreat to the mountains and forests and live a life free from worldly affairs..."

"...Was Mr. Ding's hometown a rural area?"

"Uh, no, that's not it. My dad is the deputy director of Fenghua Food Factory, and I grew up in the factory area."

"Then the case is solved?"

Li Mu shook his head with amusement:

"I advise you not to have too high expectations for animal husbandry. I'm from a rural area, and I used to herd sheep and raise pigs when I was a kid. Putting aside everything else, cleaning the pigsty in the summer is enough to give you a hard time. Pigs are actually quite clean, contrary to what many people think. If they can, they are very protective of their living environment. But because we can't let them exercise often, otherwise they won't gain weight, we have to keep them locked up... which means they'll smell really bad."

Imagine, poop, pee, and the stench of animals all huddled together in that tiny pigsty. In the summer, with temperatures reaching 30 or 40 degrees Celsius, the evaporation effect amplifies the stench… You step inside, and it hits you in the face. If you don't throw up, you're incredibly resilient. And back then, my family only had two pigs… According to your logic, the combined stench of pig, cow, and sheep manure… well, you can imagine.”

"..."

Ding Lei was speechless.

I thought to myself, "What you're saying is really disgusting."

"Then I'll raise chickens."

"Don't even mention chicken coops. Let me be blunt, no matter what you raise, ask yourself first if you can stand the smell of manure..."

"This... is a little difficult. In my hometown, many people eat the stinky vegetable stalks with their rice since I was a child. But I can't eat them, I can't even take a bite... I prefer milder flavors."

"Then you should raise sheep. At least sheep can poop outside."

"Hahaha……"

The two of them made their way to Shenzhen in this relaxed and casual conversation.

When we arrived at the venue of the Shenzhen Information Forum, it was only a little past 8:30.

The meeting started at 9:30. As soon as the two got out of the car, staff came over to meet them and took them to get their name badges.

After Li Mu gave his name, a name tag was quickly handed over.

After Ding Lei also put on the NetEase CEO badge, he glanced at Li Mu's chest and suddenly paused.

"Li's..."

"Um?"

"...hao123???"

Ding Lei's eyes weren't big to begin with, but the way he was trying to widen them was somewhat comical.

But you could also tell he was genuinely surprised.

Li Mu glanced down and smiled:

"Didn't I tell you, Mr. Ding?"

"..."

Ding Lei was speechless and couldn't help but mutter:

"You and Bingbing really keep your mouths shut!"

Clearly, Fan Bingbing hadn't mentioned it to him either.

"Was that famous navigation website founded by Li Ji?"

"No, actually I'm just an investor. The creator of that website model is named Li Xingping. Two years ago, I started making some investment choices, mainly focusing on the internet. I met him through an introduction. At that time, he had just quit his job at an internet cafe and was thinking about starting his own business, so he contacted me. When I took a look, I thought the website was pretty good, so I invested."

"...How much did you invest? What's your shareholding percentage?"

"Haha, Mr. Ding."

As soon as Ding Lei finished speaking, he heard someone call his name. He turned around and saw a very handsome guy walking over.

"Hmm, Mr. Li, hello, it's been a long time."

Ding Lei greeted the other person, shook hands, and then suddenly turned to look at Li Mu.

He first glanced at Li Mu's name tag, then a strange look flashed in his eyes.

Then he introduced Li Mu to him:

"Li Ji, this is Robin Li, the founder of Baidu."

Then, naturally, he introduced Li Yanhong:

"This is Li Mu, co-founder of hao123."

Li Mu was taken aback, and Li Yanhong's expression was similar. After hearing Ding Lei's introduction, Li Yanhong immediately looked at Li Mu's name tag.

Upon seeing the line of text above, a glint of light flashed in his eyes, but it quickly disappeared, and he proactively extended his hand:

"Hello, Mr. Li, I am Li Yanhong."

"Call me Li Mu, or Li Ji, it's fine. Mr. Li, our identities overlap too much, we need to distinguish between them."

Li Mu shook hands with him.

I was a little surprised. I had been wondering when Baidu started contacting hao123 this year, and I never expected to run into them here.

After hearing Li Mu's words, Li Yanhong asked with some puzzlement:

"Mr. Li...is Mr. Li a reporter?"

"Yes, that's why I call you General Manager Li, and you can just call me Manager Li."

"Haha, okay, Li Ji, hello."

"Hello, Mr. Li."

After the two finished greeting each other, Li Yanhong asked Ding Lei:

"Hasn't Pony arrived yet?"

"I don't know, I just arrived too."

Are you giving a speech today?

"Yes, Shenzhen City wants me to give a speech, both Pony and I are going to give one. But one is in the morning and the other is in the afternoon."

"How about we grab dinner together tonight? I'll organize it, you invite the guests?"

Li Yanhong seemed to be quite familiar with Ding Lei, and upon hearing this, Ding Lei responded with a sound of agreement.

"OK."

"Okay, I'll ask the others first. Li Ji, shall we exchange contact information? I don't have any business cards with me, let's exchange phone numbers."

"Okay, sure."

Li Mu was somewhat surprised by his initiative, but readily agreed. After exchanging phone numbers, Li Yanhong greeted him.

"See you in a bit, I'm going to ask the others."

Li Mu nodded in acknowledgment, and after the other party left, he heard Ding Lei laugh:

"Haha, Li Ji and he are competitors."

"What do you mean? He's a search engine, I'm a navigation engine, there's a pretty big difference, isn't there?"

Li Mu pretended not to know.

Ding Lei shrugged:

"At first glance, the differences seem quite significant, but your businesses overlap considerably, don't they? Besides... Li Ji, your Alexa rankings aren't low at all. Wow, I really misjudged you; you hid it so well. I always thought you were just a reporter, I never imagined... we're in the same line of work!"

The Alexa ranking he mentioned is a global internet traffic and click-through rate ranking done separately by the Alexa search engine, which can be used as a reference template for global website traffic.

It is published twice a year, once in June and once in December, to rank websites by traffic for the first half of the year and the whole year, respectively.

As of June this year, hao123 was ranked 88th globally.

Yes, you read that right, it's 88.

It ranks only behind the three major portal websites: NetEase, Sina, and Sohu.

In response to Ding Lei's amazement, Li Mu asked in return:

"And what about them?"

"Baidu didn't even make the top 100; I didn't see its name. But... Li Ji, we're friends, so I'll be frank. In my opinion... its potential is actually higher than yours."

Li Mu glanced at him and smiled:

"Because of Google?"

"Yes, who would have thought... Google, which was so underestimated last year, would soar to this level this year. This also demonstrates the enormous potential of Chinese search engines, and the website you invested in, Mr. Li... is actually too easy to replicate. There aren't any technical barriers. However, the smartest thing about hao123 is that, I don't know who gave him the idea, he reached a cooperation agreement with the installation software company..."

"That's what I think."

Facing what could be considered the "secret weapon" that had supported hao123 to its current scale, Li Mu showed no modesty and stated directly:

"This idea came from me. Two years ago, after I received the national report on internet growth, I suggested this to Li Xingping. I told him to partner with several domestic system installation companies, and he initially paid some fees. But later, as pirated systems spread... naturally, those copied systems set hao123 as their homepage. So..."

"...Li Ji".

Hearing his words, even Ding Lei, who owns such a massive company as NetEase, couldn't help but say:

"You've been hiding it really well."

"Ha~"