October 14th, Friday…
At Fish-Catching Internet Cafe’s Handong University branch…
Qiu Hong wanted to return to tidy up his own business before returning to officially join Tengda Corporation as the person-in-charge of the Destitution Plan.
After taking a photograph with two passionate fans, Pei Qian sipped his coffee and thought about his plan for the future.
This cycle was going to be relatively shorter. That meant incurring losses would be slightly easier than before.
It was not because Pei Qian had become an expert at it but because he had very shrewdly plugged the gaps in the System.
The System allowed for him to leave one project incomplete every cycle. Pei Qian very cleverly split Mission and Choice into two parts: the game itself and the CG movie based on its storyline. The parts were split between Tengda Games and Fei Huang Workspace respectively.
That way, the two departments that generated the most profits were dealt with at once. One would spend two hundred million yuan while the other would spend three hundred million yuan. That was enough to delay the project until the next settlement.
Thus, Pei Qian’s primary source of stress was not this cycle, but the next.
Still, that meant that the pressure he would face in the next cycle would rapidly increase, and so he had to start planning for the next cycle now.
Just as Pei Qian was thinking about this, a man with a long face entered.
“Brother Qian!” Ma Yang grinned and sat across from Pei Qian.
Pei Qian switched off his laptop and handed it back to the waiter. “What’s the matter?”
Ma Yang grinned. “Brother Qian, I’m here to report to you about Dream Realization Ventures!”
Pei Qian became intrigued. “Hmm? Tell me about it.”
Before this, Ma Yang had won the Best Employee Award, and the Dream Fund was purely based on the five hundred million yuan that he had earned for the company.
Ma Yang had also said that he wanted to publicize this fund on Weibo to help others realize their dreams. However, Pei Qian did not hear any updates on it subsequently. Since Pei Qian had been busy incurring losses, he had not had the energy to follow up with Ma Yang either.
Now, he had the time, and so he had to listen to Ma Yang’s thoughts.
At the scale that Tengda Corporation was operating at now, the Dream Fund was no longer considered a huge amount. Still, Pei Qian cared about how the Dream Fund could be used to test out loss-incurring business models.
Once the new business could successfully incur losses, Pei Qian could ramp up its scale!
Ma Yang happily said, “Brother Qian, I have already set up a verified account on Weibo.
“This is what I’m thinking:
“Dream Realization Ventures is working hard to realize others’ dreams as well, but it’s still limited at the end of the day. There are many more people with dreams that cannot be communicated to Dream Realization Ventures!
“Thus, I decided to log onto Weibo to search for people with dreams and use my Dream Fund to help them realize their dreams.”
Pei Qian nodded. “Yes, it’s good that you’re thinking like that! However, how exactly do you plan to operate?”
Ma Yang answered, “It’s very simple. I’ll post on Weibo.
“I’ll post the fact that I’m helping others to realize their dreams and then start gathering dreams. If any dreams move me, I’ll invest varying sums from the Dream Fund to realize them!”
Pei Qian paused. “What exactly do you mean by varying sums?”
Ma Yang answered, “From ten thousand yuan to a hundred thousand yuan. Exactly how much I invest would depend on the contents of the dream.”
Pei Qian fell silent for a short while.
He faintly sensed that there was a huge problem with Ma Yang’s current business model.
There didn’t seem to be any possibility of profit.
When Dream Realization Ventures invested in a project, there was a possibility of incurring losses or generating profit because the System would not prohibit anything that could possibly make money.
However, Old Ma’s current business model coupled with his IQ… it was no different from sending money to random online friends.
Yet, the System was not prohibiting it?
Of course, the System controlled the spending of money to varying degrees. For example, at the very beginning, Pei Qian had been in charge of the System Funds, and so the System had been stricter. Since the Dream Fund had already been handed over to someone else, the System would be laxer.
Even then, they could not misuse the funds.
If Old Ma decided to use all the Dream Funds as his own pocket money, the System would not allow it.
Why would the System allow Ma Yang to distribute money in this manner, then?
After some consideration and after drawing from his experience with Upwind Logistics, Pei Qian drew a reasonable conclusion: Old Ma’s actions will bring himself, Tengda Corporation, and Dream Realization Ventures a certain amount of publicity.
In other words, Ma Yang would be spending money on reputation.
Since Ma Yang would be giving each person varying amounts from ten thousand yuan to a hundred thousand yuan, the System deemed it reasonable. Thus, it did not prohibit such spending.
Pei Qian glanced at Ma Yang and fell into deep thought.
Ma Yang’s long face looked confused. He had no idea why Brother Qian was thinking for such a long time, but he didn’t ask any questions either. Instead, he remained quiet and sipped his coffee.
Once again, Pei Qian considered if it would be worth it to spend money on buying fame.
If it had been someone else, he would have concluded in the negative.
Fame seemed intangible and illusory, but Pei Qian had already lost out because of it many times.
The phrase ‘attention economy’ had become popular in the Internet age. So many people had become interested in being Internet celebrities because there was always a way to cash-out attention.
Tengda’s businesses had had low chances of succeeding, but the high amount of attention had turned its losses into profits.
However…
Would the attention be of any use on Old Ma?
With an image, EQ, and intelligence like Old Ma’s… could he really become an Internet celebrity?
Pei Qian highly doubted it.
Even if Ma Yang could trade cash for fame, people would only like him for his money and not his personality. Once he stopped distributing cash, people would stop paying attention to him at once.
After chewing on the problem for such a long time, Pei Qian decided that he could give it a try. No matter how he looked at it, the transaction seemed worthwhile.
At that point, Pei Qian nodded. “Yes, go for it!
“Old Ma, that’s a very ambitious idea. I support you!”
Ma Yang, who had been anxiously waiting the entire time, suddenly grinned. “I knew you would support me, Brother Qian! I will make some preparations and upload the first Weibo post, then!”
Pei Qian quickly stopped him. “Hold on. Don’t be anxious. I think you should look further into the details of your business model.
“How about this? Let me give you a couple of tips.”
Ma Yang nodded profusely. “Please, go ahead, Brother Qian!”
After a moment’s thought, Pei Qian said, “First, you can do anything you want on Weibo as long as you do not link yourself with Dream Realization Ventures.
“I’m mainly worried that people harboring improper motives would come and cheat you of your investment money. We have to keep the two projects very separate.
“Second, we’ll reserve the cash for unsuccessful people. Anyone with more than a thousand followers would not be allowed to claim the sum.
“Last, don’t keep giving out money. Spend some time with your followers as well, by playing games with them, livestreaming with them, and so on.
“That would help you close up the gap between your fans and yourself.”
Ma Yang nodded once again and said, “That makes sense! Brother Qian, I’ll get to work, then!”
Pei Qian could not help but smile.
Alright, everything looks good now!
Pei Qian’s three requests minimized any chances that Ma Yang had of becoming popular and generating profits.
Actually, doing this was plainly trading cash for popularity. Many others had done the same before.
However, most people would choose to give money to those with many followers since they would be more influential. With the same amount of money, one could earn far more popularity.
How much influence could one generate by distributing money to those with less than a thousand followers? Most people wouldn’t do this.
What’s more, once Ma Yang became famous, Dream Realization Ventures might end up in the spotlight as well. What if people with profitable projects came knocking then?
Thus, Ma Yang had to do his best not to share the attention with Dream Realization Ventures.
Doing a livestream would squash Ma Yang’s chances of success all the more.
Those who understood gaming knew that Ma Yang’s standard was horrible. Even DGE athletes suffered trying to carry him.
Once fans saw his gaming standards, they would probably rush to go to his home and slaughter him. People would stop following him as soon as they could.
The most amazing thing about it all was that Ma Yang would not even notice a thing. Instead, he would continue to feel extremely good about himself.
In short, Pei Qian had done everything he could to minimize the chances of generating profits!
If Ma Yang failed to become popular no matter what he did, Pei Qian would be overjoyed. He would have yet another money-burning tree!
Although it would be a small one, it would still help Pei Qian with getting rid of money.
He was disappointed in Ma Yang when it came to investing.
However, Old Ma was still Pei Qian’s most trusted right-hand man when compared to the other people around him. Thus, Pei Qian decided to give Ma Yang another chance in the Internet celebrity industry.
October 15th, Saturday…
Pei Qian woke up naturally in the morning. At once, he grabbed his cell phone and accessed Weibo.
Ma Yang should have uploaded his post on Weibo in the morning. Pei Qian wanted to see how the feedback was.
Ma Yang’s account was easy to find. Pei Qian just had to search Ma Yang’s name, and the one with the verified symbol was him.
Once Pei Qian clicked his profile, he was dumbfounded.
He only had three followers?
This must have been Old Ma’s original Weibo, and most of his followers must have been bots.
Pei Qian quickly found the post that Ma Yang had uploaded at 7 AM.
“I’ll fulfill all of your dreams. Please describe your dreams and leave your account number or QR code. I’ll send a Dream Fund over randomly.”
Pei Qian checked again and confirmed that it was already past 10 AM. Yet, after three hours, the post only had ten-odd shares and twenty-odd comments.
What’s more, most comments were short and did not provide any information whatsoever.
“What’s the meaning of this, scammer?”
“Isn’t there a verified symbol? He’s an employee of Tengda Corporation.”
“Pui, couldn’t an employee of Tengda Corporation buy a few more followers? This must be a new account.”
“He must be a manual laborer.”
“I have dreams. Pick me! Pick me!”
“This feels suspicious. Don’t leave your account details. Be careful not to be scammed!”
Pei Qian almost scoffed.
Ma Yang’s own verification said ‘Employee of Tengda Corporation’. That did not seem very legitimate.
The verification did not seem impressive at all!
Moreover, Ma Yang’s Weibo account had few followers to begin with, and he chose to upload the post in the morning when traffic was the lowest. He didn’t even arrange for anyone to share his post. Of course, it would not be influential at all.
The most ridiculous thing was that Ma Yang’s post looked extremely simple. It was not enough to ignite any desire in readers.
It was no wonder that everyone thought he was a scammer. He had done an even worse job than scammers!
Pei Qian was glad. Old Ma had not disappointed him indeed!