Chapter 1103 Give Laos and America some spiritual civilization construction
It is often said that the three major financial centers are New York, London and Hong Kong.
Singapore has been ranked fourth all year round, and around 2022, it will finally surpass Hong Kong and join the top three - Shanghai ranks sixth. Singapore has also become a popular choice for domestic wealthy immigrants.
Evening, Marina Bay Sands Hotel.
It cost 4 billion pounds to build and is known as the world's most expensive hotel. It features a 57-story outdoor swimming pool, which is three times the length of the Olympic swimming pool. You can swim while overlooking Singapore.
Yao Yuan just took a dip in the swimming pool for a while. Well, it was a dip. He returned to his suite, changed into loose casual clothes, and sat quietly to wait.
Not long after, Jiang Chao led two guests in.
"Yao!"
"Leon!"
He first hugged Doug Leon of Sequoia Capital, Hugelive’s major shareholder and board member.
"Let me introduce you to Jeff Ass!"
"first meet!"
"Nice to meet you!"
Yao Yuan shook hands with him. He was a white man with glasses and reddish hair. He was wearing jeans and a shirt, giving him a very casual look.
Jeff Yas, whose ancestors were engaged in finance for three generations, is well-known on Wall Street and has a net worth of US$28.9 billion.
But what he is best at is not finance, but his close relationship with the "Growth Club". The "Growth Club" is a political group in the United States whose core demands are: reducing taxes and balancing national finances.
Then someone asked, you just want to appeal?
This has to mention a major feature of Lao America: political donations!
The role of the "Growth Club" is to receive political donations that favor the Republican Party in order to lobby congressmen and thereby influence policy.
"Allow me to congratulate you. I heard that TikTok's monthly active users have exceeded 300 million. Your long videos have achieved great success. I didn't expect the short videos to be even more surprising."
Jeff Yas complimented first, and Yao Yuan corrected him: "To be precise, in the first quarter of this year, TikTok has grown by 180 million users. Our globalization strategy is very smooth. This year's goal is 500 million monthly active users."
"Then am I watching the rise of a giant with my own eyes?"
"Haha! To be honest, after all my years in the investment world, products like TikTok are rare!"
Doug Leon smiled and said that all the shareholders of Hugelive, including him, have been very happy recently. It was undoubtedly a wise decision to support Yao Yuan in making short videos.
At first, I thought that 100 million users would be enough, and 200 million would be the best. Who knows, just like riding a rocket, short videos have quickly captured many users around the world with their powerful magic, and are still growing rapidly.
This is incredible. I am looking at it reaching the level of Facebook and YouTube, and shareholders have also increased their support.
"I like to make friends, especially friends with good people..."
After the business exchange ended, Jeff Yas got to the point and said: "Mr. Yao has created quite a business miracle in both China and the United States. I think we will develop a beautiful friendship, but before that, I have to ask the usual question
One sentence."
He leaned forward, stared into Yao Yuan's eyes, and asked, "What do you need from me? What can you give me?"
Have you watched too much "The Godfather"?
So average?
Yao Yuan complained in his heart and said with a smile: "Although we are growing rapidly, we are still a young product. TikTok has three profit models: advertising, live broadcasting, and e-commerce.
Live broadcasting and e-commerce have not yet been vigorously promoted, and advertising has begun to take shape. It is estimated that the revenue this year will be 200 million US dollars. This is far from Facebook's revenue of 10 billion, but everyone can see that with the current development trend, TikTok will catch up sooner or later.
By then, we will face many enemies.
Whether it's business or politics.
There is a saying in China, which is to prepare for a rainy day. I need friends, especially friends in the government, to deal with various crises that may arise.
In return..."
He paused, looked at Doug Leon, and said with a smile: "TikTok is a subsidiary of Hugelive and has not introduced any financing yet. Mr. Yas is well-known in the investment community and I believe it will be a great help to us."
"I understand what you mean, very good, we really have a wonderful friendship!"
Jeff Yas is very satisfied.
To put it bluntly, Yao Yuan wants to make political donations to the congressmen through him, and accordingly, he will let Jeff Yas join the team to make money together.
Doug Leon is here to represent the opinions of other shareholders.
The two parties discussed the conditions and found that both were acceptable. Then they discussed in detail and after a heated exchange of words, TikTok would give 8% of the shares. Jeff Yas also told a lot of "secrets" about political donations.
The U.S. Congress is divided into the Senate and the House of Representatives, corresponding to senators and representatives.
Senators have great power. For example, Jeff Yas has long supported a Republican senator named Rand Paul, and each political donation starts at a million dollars.
He also supports a congressman, which is less, and can be spent with tens of thousands of dollars.
Of course, it depends on the specific influence. Some congressmen have great influence, so they need to increase the amount of money...and it is not given directly to individuals. The congressmen have their own political committees, which are dedicated to accepting bribes, ah, donations.
oops!
Yao Yuan sighed repeatedly after hearing this, what a talented person!
Lao Mei: We are not corrupt!
Because we have legalized corruption...
…
Yao Yuan's task this year is to adjust, adjust, some special adjustment!
There are industrial adjustments and ideological adjustments.
Domestically, in the next few years, China will usher in a large wave of films with the main theme and the Resistance to U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea, many of them bad, but few of them good.
The trilogy "Operation Red Sea" and "My Motherland and Me" are not too ideological, and the filming is okay. But films like "The Eight Hundred" and "King Kong River" are very awkward.
How to twist it differently?
To put it simply: not only do they not believe it themselves, they also don’t believe that others will believe it.
Most of the works expose a flaw: they only promote the fearlessness of our soldiers, but do not explain why they are fearless.
These screenwriters and directors either don’t understand, don’t want to, or don’t dare!
In the past few years, only one movie, "Li Yannian, a Man of Literary and Martial Arts" explained the ideological work clearly: Why do we fight? For whom are we fighting? Only by running away the American devils can we live a good life...
Externally, continue to use long and short videos to output content.
We have prepared many programs for long videos, as well as short videos. In addition to live broadcasts and vigorous promotion of goods, Yao Yuan also wants to bring richer spiritual civilization construction to the American people.
…………
Hengdian has Hengpiao, and Los Angeles has Luopiao.
Every year, countless young and beautiful men and women come here to pursue their dreams.
Lucy is one of them. She has studied acting seriously. She is in her early 20s, has a hot figure and fair skin. She has been living in Los Angeles for more than a year. She has only played a few supporting roles and usually works as a waiter in a restaurant.
Recently she was lucky enough to get a second female lead.
I was overjoyed at first, but after the audition I felt calm, because this is a mini-series, each episode is 2 minutes, 80 episodes, and it will be broadcast on TikTok.
But she is still here, making money and not being shabby.
Today, Hugelive’s studio.
In the dressing room, Lucy was putting on makeup while reading a script. It was called "The Double Life of My Billionaire Husband." She didn't understand why the name was so long, but she felt that it faintly exuded a mysterious oriental power.
It is said that the heroine's parents divorced when she was young, and her father found an evil stepmother. The evil stepmother also had an evil daughter - the character of Lucy.
Her family had a marriage contract with another family. In order to borrow money from her stepmother to treat her mother's illness, the heroine agreed to replace her sister and marry the son of that family, the hero.
The male protagonist is uneducated and has no skills, he eats, drinks, whores and gambles, but he actually has a secret identity.
All the actors were minor players before, but their images are very good and their basic skills are passable. 99% of the crew are foreigners, but the director is a Chinese.
"Look here! Look here!"
When everyone was in place, the director took a loudspeaker and shouted in English: "Today is our first day of work. We plan to shoot about 15 episodes. If we catch up a little bit in the front, it will be easier in the back. We must complete 80 episodes of material in a week."
So everyone needs to work overtime..."
As soon as the word overtime was uttered, someone protested: "But our contract does not stipulate this, I can go to the labor union and complain to you!"
"Your contract also stipulates that we have the right to adjust the schedule on our own!"
The director was so confident that he pointed at the other person and scolded him: "If you want to act, stay, if you don't want to act, get out. If you don't do it, others will do it!"
"..."
These people are all at the bottom of Hollywood. Their poverty and desire for opportunities have left them with no courage to fight, so they have to endure.
We made some arrangements and started shooting right away.
The heroine, a part-time model, has fair skin, long legs, and a good temperament. She put the medical bill on the table and said, "Dad, can you lend me $50,000? Mom needs treatment, and we really have no money."
The father wanted to borrow it, but what was the role of the vicious stepmother? She scolded her directly: "George, are you still thinking about your ex-wife? Don't forget that you have been eating from me and using my family's power for so many years.
High position, I have achieved everything for you!"
At this time, Lucy appears.
"Isn't this my poor and destitute sister?"
"Click!"
As soon as he said something, the director stopped, walked up to the confused Lucy, and said, "Why didn't you?"
"Director, I think this modal word is too exaggerated, so you don't need to use it. Haha."
"No, no, you must add Aha, so that the character image will be fuller."
The director then taught the heroine, "You didn't express enough just now. You have to act pitiful and stubborn. You have to act like Yiping is asking Lu Zhenhua for money... I don't understand. It doesn't matter. I'll give it to you when you're done. Go back and finish it off."
Specialize in research.”
Continue shooting.
Lucy didn't dare to disobey the director, so she pinched her nose and let out a sarcastic cry: "Aha~ Isn't this my poor and down-to-earth sister?"
When she finished saying this, her heart roared, and her dream of performing was shattered.
Not to mention, the filming process was the most painful, with the mentally retarded character settings, the illogical story development, the bloody dramatic conflicts, especially the lines.
In English, there can be several words to describe the same meaning.
In layman's terms, there are low-level vocabulary, common vocabulary, and high-level vocabulary. And this script is all low-level vocabulary at the elementary school level, and the sentences are very straightforward.
The director said this was to cater to the broad masses of people with dyslexia (illiteracy).
Time passed quickly, seven days passed in the blink of an eye, and the filming was completed on time.
Lucy's scalp felt itchy and she felt like her brain was growing. However, when she saw that her reward was a total of 3,600 US dollars, she firmly hoped to do more of this kind of work.
There's no harm in doing it except losing your brain.
…………
The filming was completed in 7 days, followed by post-production for half a month, and then put online for streaming. This is the process of the short play.
Yao Yuan is testing the waters.
I registered a company in the United States to produce short plays, and also established a website to translate domestic online texts.
The cultural export you think: Confucius Institute.
Actual cultural output: Internet articles, short plays, Pinduoduo, live streaming, Li Ziqi, Ming coins, birthday lotus lanterns, a plum blossom cut, subject three, my surname is Shi...
If you want the public to accept it, it must have entertainment attributes.
These things are popular among hundreds of millions of users in China, and they are also popular overseas. It is just because of certain long-term thoughts that they feel unable to use them.
Facebook headquarters.
Zuckerberg frowned and stared at the computer. The stiffness of his facial muscles seemed to make his face grow longer and shine like a layer of grease.
""The Double Life of My Billionaire Husband"?"
"Aha~ My poor stupid sister!"
“What the hell is this??”
He pinched his nose and finished watching one episode, only to feel physically uncomfortable. He glanced at the catalog again, and found that there were 80 episodes, and charges started from episode 13.
"Who would pay to see something like this?"
Zuckerberg tried to click on episode 13 and read the comments. Most of them were "It's like shit, but I can't stop", "Hahaha, it made me happy all day" and "I just couldn't help but watch it."
…
At least over a hundred people paid, and although it was a small number, it was obviously just a test of the waters.
Today, Facebook has just escaped from the vortex of collusion with Russia and data leakage, and has been fined US$5 billion, the largest fine in history.
Once you pay the money, the matter is over.
Zuckerberg is preparing to regroup and save the wildly falling stock price, but he judges that TikTok, which is growing rapidly, is his biggest enemy.
He called a meeting with senior executives to discuss the skit.
"It is obvious that TikTok is experimenting with a revenue project, and it is aimed at those low-culture groups. They know that what they film is rubbish, but it is a pity that those guys like rubbish."
“Won’t this affect the overall environment of TikTok?”
"You forget, they rely on algorithms. If you don't like it, they won't recommend it to you."
"That's what worries me the most!"
Zuckerberg brought the topic back and said: "Facebook's advertising revenue can reach more than 10 billion US dollars a year, and it relies on targeted advertising.
The accuracy of TikTok's algorithm is comparable to ours, but they are more convenient and more direct. I admit that I have despised short videos before, but if they are given enough development time, they will definitely be a powerful enemy!"
Zuckerberg slammed the table and said: "Gentlemen, this is a war, we are going to start..."
"mark!"
At this moment, a staff member suddenly interrupted him and said: "You should take a look at this, we may fall into the whirlpool again!"