Rock and Roll: Glorious Years

So he first asked someone to hire online trolls to stir up some controversy and slightly shift the focus of public opinion, and then began to formulate a new cooperation plan for Rolling Stone.

However, just as he had prepared his explanation and was ready to call Chen Shuting in person, Bian Lang's video of challenging Canon in D with a new account was released, followed by a statement from Rolling Stone Studio.

The comments from those netizens made him want to slap himself twice.

"I give Rhythm a perfect score for this move, forcing Bianlang to achieve legendary status abroad and showcasing our national strength!"

"Bianlang was already banned as a cheater on Rhythm before he even got on Crazy Scale. Isn't that obvious?"

"Heh, who's being arrogant here? Rhythm Master really doesn't know his place. A production fee of 30,000 and a production time of 45 days—is that how you want to collaborate? China Dream got it done in less than a day, and they only want 30% of the profits..."

"Heh! It's just that their egos are biased. Wouldn't it be better to support domestic games? They're perfectly good Chinese rock music, but they have to go and fawn over foreign games. This song already has hundreds of thousands of downloads, do they really need another 3 yuan for production costs?"

"Hehe! How much is it per piece? Count me in!"

"If I were to personally fund support for domestically produced games, that wouldn't be out of the question, unless it's a game about fighting the Japanese!"

"If it takes someone else one day, you, the rhythm master, 45 days. If it were me, I would also choose Crazy Scale."

"Those who know, know; it's an egg-shaped game..."

Qi Hongtu deeply regretted hiring these "dedicated" online trolls. He immediately called to stop the work before finally dialing Chen Shuting's number.

After a few rings, he adjusted his tone and said, "Is this Mr. Chen from Rolling Stone Studio? I am..."

He was as arrogant as he was in the previous email, but he was now extremely humble. In return, he received a nonchalant reply from Chen Shuting: "President Qi, please prepare the new proposal and send it to my email first. Our studio is closed on Sundays. I will check and reply to you as soon as I start work tomorrow."

Hearing the busy tone after the call was disconnected, Qi Hongtu cursed both Kuixing Studio and Rolling Stone Studio.

"You guys are fighting and I'm the one who suffers! This..." After saying that, he could only hold his breath and continue to work on the solution on the computer.

An hour later, the planning department sent Yang Meng's phone number, saying that Yang Meng might be with Bian Lang. Qi Hongtu thought for a moment and sent a WeChat verification request to this junior colleague from another department whom he had never met.

After waiting a few minutes without getting through, he sent another message: "Xiao Yang, if it's convenient for you, could you help me find out what Rolling Stone is saying? As long as they're willing to sign a copyright license agreement, we can discuss all the terms."

People these days don't usually pay attention to text messages, and Yang Meng is no exception. Besides, she's currently trying to persuade Bian Lang to license other Rolling Stone songs to her for charting on Crazy Scale. It's an honor for her own country's songs, and especially for songs she loves, to be recognized by fans abroad. It's much more interesting than messing around with those generic 1645 pop songs in the company's copyright library!

But Bian Lang wouldn't budge: "Let's talk about it after we've settled things with the overseas publishers. Ultimately, releasing this game is about promoting the songs. If we can't get overseas distribution channels, and all the songs are just hanging on Crazy Scale but we can't download the original versions, wouldn't that be a joke? Having one song on it now is enough. Besides, I haven't released any of my other songs domestically. If I release them overseas directly, I'm afraid even more people will criticize me for being biased." Bian Lang clearly understood the priorities on this point.

Chen Shuting doesn't have many resources for exporting her songs, while Pan Jianhu did have them before, through the overseas distribution channels of Goose Egg, but now that incident has made it impossible.

Having said all that, Yang Meng couldn't say anything more. It wasn't until she got home that evening that she discovered the text message Qi Hongtu had sent her. After accepting his friend request on WeChat, she typed and deleted in the chat box several times before finally pressing the send button:

Mr. Qi, I'm so sorry, it's my day off today and I didn't bring my work phone with me, so I only just saw your message. I don't know much about copyright matters. Rolling Stone is busy preparing for the music festival and doesn't seem to care much about our company's situation.

I was too impulsive before, and I sent that OA without considering the consequences. Is it too late to retract it now?

Qi Hongtu was furious when he saw the reply. The OA system had been up for days, and he himself wouldn't believe that no one else had seen it. Now that he was making the young woman take it down, who knew what kind of rumors would spread about it at the company tomorrow.

The feud between the composer and the copyright department has been going on for a long time, but it wasn't caused by him alone. That's just how the company operates. So he understands the complaints in Yang Meng's words, especially since he's asking for a favor now.

Thinking of this, he quickly replied with a voice message: "Xiao Yang, how about this, I'm flying to Kunming tomorrow morning, can you help me intercept them... Consider it a big favor I, Lao Qi, owe you..."

Seeing the once aloof and arrogant head of the copyright department now groveling before her, Yang Meng felt a surge of exhilarating satisfaction, as if she had finally gotten her revenge. At the same time, she sighed, "It really takes someone like Teacher Bian. If it were someone else, they'd probably give up completely after seeing that agreement. Even if they didn't, they wouldn't have the ability to fight the company!"

……

However, things did not develop in the direction Yang Meng had predicted. Qi Hongtu did not appear in Chuncheng the next day as he had promised, and Chen Shuting had not received the new cooperation agreement from the Rhythm Copyright Department for a long time.

Although the online discussion continues, the company is acting as if nothing has happened.

In the afternoon, Rhythm Master's official Weibo account released a statement, which essentially stated that Rolling Stone Studio's unilateral disclosure of the agreement's contents had caused extremely negative impacts on Rhythm Master's corporate reputation and image. The statement demanded that Rolling Stone Studio delete the relevant content, issue a public apology to Rhythm Master, and reserved the right to pursue further legal action.

This sparked even more heated discussions online. Some continued to criticize Rhythm Master for being shameless and accusing him of being the one to accuse others. Others, however, sided with Rhythm Master, arguing from a moral high ground that Rolling Stone was essentially forcing a change of leadership.

Looking at this lukewarm statement, Bian Lang couldn't help but quip, "As expected, having a big corporation as a backer makes all the difference; they're got guts now."

Bian Lang understood this; most of the major internet companies in his previous life operated this way. Otherwise, why would their legal departments be kept idle? But he couldn't apologize, nor could he let the matter pass.

Chen Shuting laughed and said, "If it were me, I would have done the same. If this agreement gets leaked, we've essentially exposed their dirty secrets. Before long, I reckon other independent musicians who have had similar experiences will jump out to support us!"

"Yes, I'll call my brother-in-law. We can't just let this go."

When Zhang Fan received Bian Lang's call, before Bian Lang could even speak, he said directly, "I already know about it. I'll pick Qinqin up from school first. After that, should I go to the music store or the CD shop to find you?"

"A DVD store!"

Knowing that his little niece was coming along, and recalling how close the original owner of this body was to the little niece, Bian Lang asked Zhou Ketong to go out and buy some snacks that the child liked.

When Zhou Ketong returned, she happened to run into an old lady selling flowers at the door. She glanced at the lifeless state of the shop and bought a bunch of sunflowers to take inside. She went to the glass room halfway up the mountain, got a Nordic-style white tin tube, filled it with water, stuck the sunflowers in it, and placed it on the cashier's counter.

Before 5 p.m., Zhang Fan led Zhang Qin to Paradise Records. Seeing his little niece's unhappy expression, Bian Lang squatted down, opened his arms, and said, "Qinqin, Uncle bought you some snacks. Shall we go eat some?"

"No, I won't eat! Uncle, this weekend is our end-of-term talent show, and I don't like the song the teacher chose for me. Uncle, can you teach me to sing rock?" Five-year-old Zhang Qin saw Bian Lang and rushed up to him, bumping into his arms.