Simon was chatting with his female assistant, and Sophia, who was also free, walked towards them from a short distance away, but frowned slightly.
Noticing the worry in Sophia's expression, Simon asked, "Is something wrong?"
Sofia stood next to Simon, looked at the crowd on the catwalk, nodded and said: "Colombe Pringle, the editor-in-chief of French Vogue, and I made an appointment to attend this party. In the evening, he suddenly said that he was unable to attend because of something unexpected. Come here. "Paris-Match" magazine just called, and the 8-page 'Gucci Night' special section that was originally negotiated has also been cancelled."
Music sounded in the hall at this time.
The catwalk on the T stage begins.
This is a performance catwalk with the theme of Audrey Hepburn's "Roman Holiday". Gregory Peck, the leading actor of "Roman Holiday" who will be awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Cannes Film Festival, was also specially invited to attend.
Simon looked at the gorgeous clothes and decorations in the venue and asked, "Is there any more?"
"Several A-list models in the industry in recent years, including Claudia Schiffer, Linda Evangelista, Naomi Campbell and Christy Turlington, have declined our party invitations. . Moreover, this party is not the most important thing. I am worried that we may not be able to invite these models to participate in the catwalk during Fashion Week in September."
Simon was not surprised when he heard Sophia talk about these situations.
The scale of the luxury goods industry is also limited. Gucci has been aggressively regrouping in recent months, and other luxury brands will naturally feel threatened.
Gucci's recovery in North America has not encountered any obstacles because of the support of Daenerys Entertainment. However, in France, where luxury brands are concentrated, local leaders such as Dior, Chanel, Hermès, and Louis Vuitton will obviously not allow Gucci, an outsider, to enter their territory. Call for the wind and rain.
Waving to the passing waiter, Simon brought two glasses of red wine and distributed them to the two women beside him. He also took a glass before continuing to say to Sophia: "So, what are you going to do?"
Sofia took the red wine and took a sip. She thought about it and said, "If the situation is only in France, it won't be a big problem."
"You handle the media matters yourself. As for Fashion Week in September, I just saw Cindy Crawford and Helena Christensen. If those supermodels you mentioned are not willing to participate in our catwalk, then Just find other people, it is impossible that all models will be unwilling. Moreover, it is nothing more than to increase exposure. When the time comes, we can invite more celebrities and the effect will be the same. This aspect happens to be our advantage."
As the two chatted, the catwalk on the T stage ended, followed by a charity auction.
The auction item is a batch of the latest Gucci satchels that the models just carried on the catwalk, and the proceeds will be donated to a charity organization dedicated to solving the problem of hunger in Africa. Simon had never heard of the name of this organization, so he felt he was on the right track, so he spent $200,000 to take a picture of an exquisite white satchel.
The charity auction is over, and tonight's party is coming to an end.
Although some French media temporarily canceled their cooperation with Gucci, early the next morning, a large number of media from various European countries reported on this grand Gucci Night event.
Simon is clear about his mascot’s mission.
If just showing up at the party does not bring any benefit to the guests who came specifically for him, others will not show up next time. Therefore, some entertainment media also timely reported that Simon Westeros and a certain star had a good chat at the Gucci night party, and that the two parties may cooperate.
Releasing such rumors is not just a gimmick.
While filming "Batman" in Melbourne, Simon vaguely had similar thoughts.
Hollywood will expand around the world in the next few years, which will inevitably cause resistance from overseas film markets.
If Daenerys Entertainment can invest in the production of a batch of overseas films every year, it will not only quickly enrich its film library resources, but also win the favor of European, Australian and even Asian filmmakers. Moreover, controlling a large number of film projects affects the career prospects of many filmmakers, and it can also bring a hidden power to Daenerys Entertainment.
In addition, compared with those film investors who often lose all their money at a glance, Simon II's prophetic advantage also ensures that he can relatively accurately select projects that can bring profits.
Daenerys Entertainment is still in the accumulation phase, and Simon is not eager for the project.
However, the Australian branch's investment in Peter Jackson's new film, and if it can sign several more directors this time, it is actually equivalent to laying out the plan in advance.
After completing his mission as a mascot, Simon left Cannes and flew to Geneva, a city on the border of France and Switzerland.
Geneva is the second largest city in Switzerland. The European Research Institute for Particle Physics (CERN), which was jointly invested by more than 20 countries, is located here.
Tim Berners-Lee was a computer engineer at the institute at this time.
Coincidentally, Simon came up with the idea of looking for Tim Berners-Lee at a very precise time.
According to the information Simon received, Tim Berners-Lee submitted a project plan to CERN senior management for the first time in March this year, proposing to use hypertext technology to connect the computers in all laboratories in the institute. Once this project Completed, it can even be further expanded to the whole world.
Tim Berners-Lee's plan received support from many people. However, because CERN is a physics research organization, the top brass of the institute did not approve the project. However, Li did not give up. After two months of re-preparing the plan, he was preparing to resubmit his bill recently, and Simon came to him.
Simon initially found him through a paper published by Tim Berners-Lee on Hypertext Markup Language.
After arriving in Europe, Jennifer made an appointment with Tim Berners-Lee to meet, and the revised plan in the other person's hand was directly transferred to Simon.
It's sad to say that Tim Berners-Lee, who is revered by the industry as the father of the Internet, spent several months on this planning document. Most of the budget was just to purchase a NeXT computer worth $6,500.
Yes, it is the high-performance personal computer developed specifically for universities and research institutions after Steve Jobs left Apple.
The city of Geneva surrounds the southern end of the vast Lake Geneva.
As the most livable city in Europe, Simon naturally did not miss Geneva when purchasing real estate. His residence here is located on the shores of the scenic Lake Geneva in the northern suburbs of the city, covering an area of more than 3 acres and also has a private dock.
Arriving in Geneva on the weekend morning, Simon spent the next three days talking with Tim Berners-Lee about various ideas about the Internet.
Tuesday, May 23rd.
After finishing her work in Cannes, Sofia came back from Cannes in the afternoon. When she walked into the living room of this lakeside mansion, she saw Simon and a middle-aged man in his thirties standing in front of a whiteboard talking quickly. The whiteboard was filled with all kinds of nouns that she couldn't understand at all. and symbols.
There are various books and materials everywhere in the living room, as well as two open computers. Although the placement of these things is not messy, it does not match the surrounding luxurious decoration.
Jennifer was next to the sofa looking at a printer that kept spitting out data.
Sofia noticed Jennifer's figure and roughly understood why basic order could be maintained in the living room.
Simon walked over and said hello to the female assistant. Simon also saw her arrival, but he just looked at her and continued to discuss with the middle-aged man.
"Creating such a website can be used to list the directory of sites that have joined the Internet, making it easier for users to search for Internet content more intuitively. In addition, we can also provide forum services through this website for users to communicate in various aspects. Of course, we will also More services can be added, such as search, communication, etc.”
"According to your idea, Simon, we must continue to promote commercialization, otherwise we will not be able to support the operation of such a website. We have been discussing this issue for three days. I am not resistant to commercialization, but if this is the case, there will definitely be Competitors join in and create different standards, which fragments the Internet and is inconsistent with our goal of connecting the world."
"Anyone with a little foresight can see that the fragmentation of the network is not in everyone's interest, and even if that happens, all parties will eventually move towards a compromise. And, Tim, I think we We are fully capable of avoiding this situation from happening, because we have no competitors yet. It is like building a road. If many people realize a goal and start building the road at the same time, for their own interests, many people will definitely appear. A different road. However, we are the only ones who want to build this road now. If we can build the road before others realize it, and provide a reasonable degree of free passage, I believe we are willing to spend the money and labor to build another road. There shouldn’t be many people there.”
“…”
“…”
Sophia listened to the conversation between Simon and Simon with a vague understanding, while curiously picking up a piece of information that Jennifer had just compiled.
Looking down, this is a development plan for a literal scripting language. After reading a few pages patiently, I roughly understood that this scripting language is used to add dynamic functions to HTML web pages.
As for what an HTML web page is, Sophia also has a little knowledge.
Simon and Lee continued their discussion for more than an hour until the whiteboard was filled with notes and it was almost evening before they stopped.
After formally introducing Sophia, Tim Berners-Lee left the lakeside villa with a thick piece of information compiled by Jennifer. After three days of discussion, he and Simon had confirmed a lot of things, and promised Simon to quit his job as soon as possible and rush to North America to preside over the operations of the new company that was about to be established.
Ygritte.
This is the name of a web technology company that Simon is about to launch.
Ygritte, Ygritte.
Or, Simon thinks it would be more pleasing to the eye to translate it as 'Igret'.
Following 'Daenerys', 'Melisandre' and 'Cersei', 'Ygret' will become the fourth 'woman' under the Westeros company.
Simon has even come up with a slogan for the company similar to Google's 'Don't-be-evil'.
A rather nasty slogan.
That's right.
'You-know-nothing! '
Such a super versatile slogan, there is absolutely no need to shamelessly remove the slogan just because you want to do evil in the future.
As for the meaning, when the Ygrit Company rose, people full of romantic fantasy spirit would definitely be able to give various implicit philosophical interpretations. Simon would never explain that this was just a red-haired female savage accusing her lover of being stupid.
In the confirmed plan, Simon will invest US$10 million and hold 90% of the shares of Yigrit. As head of the company, Simon gave Tim Berners-Lee 10% of his shares. Calculated based on the investment ratio, this 10% shareholding is worth millions of dollars.
Moreover, as long as Igret can develop to the scale expected by Simon, although Tim Berners-Lee's shares will be diluted in the subsequent financing process, it will definitely be a very huge sum in the future. of wealth.
According to the plan discussed in the previous three days, Tim Berners-Lee will resign from his job at CERN and rush to San Francisco to preside over the establishment and operation of Igret.
Simon would rather hope that Yigrett Company can be established in Los Angeles, but this is not rational. With Silicon Valley as its backing, the company can more easily obtain the technology and talent support it wants.
The first step after the establishment of Igret will be to complete the creation of various network standards based on Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), and apply for a complete set of Internet technology patents in advance, just like Qualcomm's layout in the 3G era. .
Simon didn’t plan to follow Qualcomm’s example and build patent barriers to block roads and collect money. At least in the early days of the development of the Internet, he didn’t have such an idea. Patent barriers are built just to seize the initiative as much as possible after the rise of the Internet era.
While improving technical standards, Igret will also start to develop two pieces of software, one for web design and for the developer community, and the other for a graphical interface browser for ordinary users.
These two software tools will become the sharpest weapons for Igret to seize opportunities in the Internet era.
In Simon's plan, the graphical interface browser will always be free, and the web design software will be free in the early stage. In the later stage, it may be divided into a normal free version and a professional paid version depending on the situation.
Earning profits from selling software to maintain the operation of Ygriet Company was also a business model that Tim Berners-Lee recognized more during the discussion between the two. Limited by the limitations of the times, Tim Berners-Lee obviously could not predict it. Simon casually mentioned that the plan to create a website directory was the top priority in his plan.
In the original time and space, the most famous "website directory" in the early days of the Internet was named Yahoo. At the peak of the Internet bubble, the company's market value exceeded US$100 billion.
Moreover, compared to Yahoo, which declined rapidly after the Internet 1.0 era, Simon has set a sustainable development path for the Ygritte portal, instant messaging, email, and search engines. Simon knows the huge development potential of these businesses. but.
Even if Igret falls into the trap of a large company and cannot flexibly transform in the future, Simon, who can clearly judge the development trends of the industry, can continue his layout in the Internet industry by investing in other technology companies.