The huge electoral vote gap of 370 to 163 leaves no room for maneuver.
Bush quickly acknowledged his defeat and congratulated Bill Clinton in Washington.
The Clintons were in Little Rock, Arkansas.
When Bush Sr. admitted his defeat, Bill Clinton immediately delivered a victory speech, reiterating a series of campaign promises and stating that his first priority after taking office was to restore the U.S. economy. This attitude is in sharp contrast to the image of Bush Sr. who does not care about the economy.
Therefore, the next morning, North American stock markets showed a clear rise.
Although the winner has been decided, the dust of this election has not yet completely settled.
In the final tally of votes, Bill Clinton's support rate was 43%, George Bush's support rate was 38%, and the last third-party independent candidate, Ross Perot, did not win a single electoral vote. , but the billionaire’s popular vote approval rating is also as high as 19%.
Ross Perot suddenly withdrew from the election in July when the candidates of the two parties were completely finalized, leaving enough room for the two final candidates to perform. Then he suddenly appeared again in October and pointed the finger at George Bush. The joints in this , absolutely cannot be described as a coincidence.
Unlike the huge gap in electoral votes, Bill Clinton's popular vote lead was only 5% ahead of George Bush's, and the gap in this regard was not obvious.
Without Ross Perot's share of 19% of the vote, most of which came from the same conservative camp as George H.W. Bush, the outcome of this election would have been difficult to predict.
After this election and for many years to come, neither party in the United States dared to ignore the interference of independent candidates in the presidential election.
Or even take it a step further and begin to actively exploit this interference.
In Simon's memory, in the showdown between George W. Bush and Gore in 2000, the Republican Party responded in kind and used independent candidates to split Gore's votes. In the end, Bush Jr. barely won with a very controversial margin. victory in the general election.
On the other hand, Internet media has completely become a new force that can influence the direction of public opinion in the election.
The key to why media families such as the Hearst family and the Newhouse family are so courted by the upper echelons of the federation is that they control huge media resources and have the right to speak to influence the direction of public opinion.
After a long period of integration and evolution, it has been difficult to change the power structure of traditional TV media and paper media. These old media families originally thought that they would prosper for a long time, but the sudden arrival of Internet media caught many people off guard.
Although traditional TV networks such as ABC and established media giants such as Hearst Group have begun operating their own consulting websites in the past two years, in order to avoid affecting their core business, they have invested very little in Internet media platforms and cannot compete with them at all. Competing with the information business of Igret Portal.
The most critical point is that the Igret Portal also controls the interface to the entire World Wide Web.
Today's World Wide Web is basically equivalent to the entire Internet for ordinary people.
Relying on the barrier-level weapon of browser software, as long as the public uses the Internet and opens the browser software, the first thing that pops up is the Igret portal.
Like many navigation websites in Simon's memory, the Yigrit Portal, at least a simple portal website framework, is very easy to copy, but the more core ones, such as email technology, search and hospitality technology, etc., are not so easy to follow. Yes, it will inevitably involve technology patent issues.
Moreover, because of preconceived notions, Yigrett Company developed the IE browser and used the Yggrit portal as the homepage, and it is a homepage that cannot be changed at all. This is taken for granted by many people.
If you copy a portal website, according to the normal logic of most people, it is natural for you to be blocked by Ygrit Company.
All in all, although the number of Internet sites has shown an exponential growth trend, the Yigrit Portal is already the overlord of the Internet industry that is difficult to shake. Websites run by other companies not only use the technology from Ygrit, but if they want to get more traffic, they must also find ways to join the navigation page of the Ygrit portal.
All in all, Internet media, a new media force, is basically in the hands of the Igrit Company, which is one level up, or in the Westeros system.
In the last month of the election, the company did not disclose the specific effects of the Yigret portal's obviously biased reporting on Bill Clinton, and the outside world can only speculate on this.
However, on the day of the election, real-time coverage of the first town in New Hampshire to start voting even affected the London crude oil futures trading market. Although there may be some influence from CNN, this most intuitive The effect of controlling public opinion cannot be ignored by anyone.
Simon had just watched Clinton's victory speech in San Francisco, and the incoming president expressed his gratitude through Joseph Schlapp in less than half an hour.
The timing is too sensitive and it is not suitable for the two of them to talk directly.
Not only that, Clinton also sent word that he would arrange a visit to Silicon Valley as soon as possible after taking office next year.
Visiting Silicon Valley is actually an attitude and a promise.
When Bill Clinton was only one of the candidates, the Westeros System, which was betting directly, began to help clean up some of Bill Clinton's messy affairs. Clinton's statement at this time is enough to show that the Westeros System has been doing this for more than a year. Your efforts were not in vain.
The Clintons have been able to dominate American politics for decades largely because they are very trustworthy and will try their best to fulfill the benefits they promise. Therefore, compared with the Kennedy family and the Bush family, which have experienced generations of management, After finally reaching the top, the couple built a very large political network almost from scratch, and later almost became the first husband-wife president in American politics.
In the final stage of the election, the White House also acted aggressively in the face of the Yigrit Portal's stance. It also claimed through the Department of Justice that it would launch an antitrust investigation into the IE browser software.
However, as Bush Sr.'s defeat was determined, things also changed very subtly.
The Bush family has very mature political literacy, and the defeat of Bush Sr. does not mean the end of the Bush family's political life. Therefore, the other party also knows very well that offending Simon Westeros too much will not be harmful to itself. benefit.
Of course, the remarks about investigating the IE browser that were just made last month cannot be swallowed directly. However, the day after the election, news came from the White House that the Igret Portal has been trying to obtain the White House press conference interview. The qualifications suddenly passed the review.
Prior to this, as a newly emerging new media platform, the White House had been refusing to issue a White House press pass to Yigret Portal for various reasons.
Whether you are qualified to interview at the White House press conference is an important manifestation of the influence of the American media.
Although he also had a premonition that the White House's sudden move might have some intention of instigating traditional media and the Igret portal to target each other, Simon still admired Bush's crispness.
Actually it is.
The results of the general election have been released, and if Bush Sr. still insists on holding on to the small White House press card, it can only delay it for another three months at most.
Passing at this time involves both provocation and temptation.
Testing whether there is the possibility of wooing the Yigrit portal, even if the Yigrit portal is not required to directly switch to the Republican Party, as long as it remains neutral when needed in the future, it is still a gain.
True and false, false and true.
Faced with the White House's temptation, the Igret portal subsequently published a news article about the current president in important sections in response.
On the other hand, with the end of this election, Simon also predicts that next year will be a year of greater explosion for the Internet industry.
Influenced by Simon's big butterfly, the graphical interface browser software was launched three years in advance. The Igret portal has just been launched, and the business model is already close to the level around the new century, whether it is functions such as email or online consultation. Content businesses such as these have quickly reached a level that is rich enough to attract ordinary public users, thanks to the Westeros system’s massive, almost money-burning investment.
For Americans today, they spend about US$30 per month, which is roughly equivalent to the price of subscribing to one or two newspapers on a daily basis, but the services they receive far exceed the content and information that one or two newspapers can provide. This is undoubtedly Very cost effective.
And, most importantly, as one of the most developed countries in the world, the American public has strong spending power.
In the country where Simon once lived, the penetration rate of video recorders and DVD players was not very high throughout their entire life cycle, from their birth to their decline. But in the United States, the household penetration rate of both video recorders and DVD players once reached more than 80%.
The same goes for personal computers and the Internet.
In the original timeline, the graphical interface browser was born in 1993, Yahoo was founded in 1995, and then the Internet began to explode.
From 1995 to 2000, in just five years, the number of Internet users in the United States reached 110 million, far exceeding the Internet penetration rate in other countries.
Now that the software and hardware foundations have been perfected, Simon has spared no effort in investing and has advanced the development process of the Internet industry by three to five years.
It is estimated that by the end of 1992, the number of World Wide Web access users in the United States will reach about 28 million, and the specific number of Internet users covered will exceed 40 million.
From the beginning of efforts in 1990 to the end of 1992, it also only took three years.
Supported by strong consumption power, by 1995, the number of Internet users in the United States is likely to be close to the level in 2000.
Of course, on the other hand, because of Simon's "stimulating growth", the capital market's response to the Internet industry is still somewhat slow.
In the original timeline, from 1999 to 2000, the last two years of the Internet bubble, technology stocks experienced an irrational super explosion. This time, capital has not yet followed up on the industrial explosion. Although technology stocks have begun to be popular, they have not yet reached the stage of take-off.
However, this time point is still next year.
The main reason is the European currency crisis that just passed.
It’s just that the British government invested more than 20 billion pounds in order to maintain the pound exchange rate. This money will not disappear out of thin air. In addition, countries such as Italy, France, and Spain have suffered heavy losses in this crisis, and all this money has been Obtained from international hot money, mainly from the United States.
Just as the Asian financial crisis in 1997 brought large sums of money to push up North American Internet technology stocks, this time, the large sums of money gained from international hot money will naturally instinctively look for investment channels with greater appreciation potential.
Europe has begun a new round of economic recession, and Asia has become Japan's back garden.
Therefore, the new technology and Internet industries in North America seem to be a perfect fit.
It was already the end of the year, and after the election, Simon still stayed in San Francisco, discussing the company's development plan for next year with senior executives of Ygritte.
First, we need to further open up.
E-mail technology licensing with Microsoft and AOL has been negotiated, but a third party that has nothing to do with the Westeros system has not yet been found.
At this stage, almost all important new technology companies related to the Internet are related to the Westeros system.
If it is simply authorized to a weak third-party company, the other party is likely to be acquired by established giants such as IBM in a blink of an eye. Even if this can be locked in the technology licensing agreement, licensing the technology to a company that is too weak is actually worse than not licensing the person at all.
Therefore, the tentative decision is only made by Microsoft and AOL.
As for what the outside world thinks, they can only let the other side do it.
At the same time, in discussions in recent years, Igret has once again decided to place some relatively basic patents into the World Wide Web Consortium Foundation, completely free of charge and open to the industry.
Simon is actually also considering Yigret to give up some non-core businesses in order to give other Internet companies enough room for development.
However, at this stage, Igret still supports most of the services of the entire Internet platform. Whether it is email, online forums, software stores, personal blogs, etc., it is not suitable to give up.
Even if it has to be abandoned, it will only happen after the listing.
To be more precise, it is best to wait until after the Internet bubble bursts. By then, Igret Portal can naturally get rid of many non-core businesses on the grounds of streamlining its business.
At this stage, if there is one more business, the stock price will increase by one point in the future.
There is also the issue of splitting, which also involves future listing issues.
Although Jeff Bezos and Carol Bartz, two powerful managers, often have conflicts, they both unanimously expressed opposition to Simon's request for a breakup.
Igret's basic services and network services are generally complementary to each other.