When countless media tried to contact Simon to verify the authenticity of a series of revelations, in the following days, the Hearst Group continued to use its own media platform to release a number of heavyweight gossips related to Simon, including that Catherine was actually Simon's lover, and that Simon He had an affair with the wife of an action actor, the Westeros system interfered with the 1993 New York mayoral election, and so on.
Unfortunately, most of them may be true, but the Hearst Group has been unable to produce much substantive evidence.
No evidence is tantamount to slander.
In a society like the United States, defamation is a very serious crime.
Of course Simon won't sit still.
While quietly mobilizing the Westeros system's legal team to collect information that could lead to prosecution, the Westeros family's public relations team also mobilized with all their strength to resolutely fight back against the revelations from the Hearst Group's media.
Not only that, the Westeros Company also issued a tough ultimatum to other large media forces in the United States. In this incident, as long as you side with the Hearst Group and participate in the heckles, you will always be the enemy of the Westeros system in the future. Once you choose a range of enemies, there will be only confrontation and no cooperation in the future, and the Westeros system will no longer offer any possibility of reconciliation.
In the face of Simon's strong and unyielding stance, not to mention the several established paper media groups that are currently negotiating cooperation with Eagle, many other traditional media forces quickly stopped following the trend at first.
Unlike the complete rift between the Westeros system and the Hearst Group, other media forces know very well that if they participate this time, they will really leave no room for themselves.
Even some established media families don't quite understand what the Hearst family is up to.
After all the recent turmoil, even if the Westeros couple really turns against each other, triggering a divorce war and seriously damaging the vitality of the Westeros system, will the Hearst family be able to benefit from it later
However, there are always too many unreasonable things in this world.
Probably the Hearst family thought that such a move would allow Simon Westeros to taste the power of the century-old media family in controlling public opinion like many enemies of the Hearst family in the past. From then on, he would retreat and even actively seek compromise.
However, it is no longer a hundred years ago.
Obviously, the Hearst Group originally wanted to use its own media platform to take the lead in triggering a public opinion storm against Simon Westeros, just like the large-scale manipulation of public opinion many years ago during the heyday of the Hearst family. In this way, however, when other relatively powerful large media companies in North America have ceased operations, the Hearst Group has suddenly been exposed naked.
Most of the public think that they are very smart and can see the essence of many things.
When they discovered that the media platforms attacking Simon Westeros had all become Hearst Group media, other paper media either remained neutral and watched the excitement, or were still saying good things for Simon Westeros. Hearst The credibility of the group's revelations suddenly dropped sharply.
Simon Westeros' handling of the tax evasion incident of "waist semen" and "leg semen" that was initially exposed even aroused the favor of many netizens, mostly women, on the Internet.
After the two lovers were arrested by the IRS, the young super tycoon did not rush to publicly deny that he had removed himself due to the media revelations. It is conceivable that this must be a common practice among many other rich and famous people. However, Simon Westeros publicly asked his legal team to bail the two girls out in less than an hour, and then generously paid the back taxes for the two girls.
Not only that, in order to prevent the two women from being harassed by the swarming media, Westeros immediately sent their own private jet to pick them up from New York.
Not to mention lovers, even many husbands may not be able to do this.
Isn't it natural for a man who can bring a real sense of security to any woman to have many lovers
As for the Hearst family.
The whole story has been clearly exposed on the Internet.
Such a media family, which was once notorious for relying on exaggeration and incitement, does not keep its business commitments, but still relies on its own media resources to retaliate. Such despicable behavior has no need to continue to exist.
Including Doris Fetcher, who has been constantly exposing the privacy of her former employer during this period, she has also been dug out by the media.
Not only was this waitress who once enjoyed generous treatment from the Westeros family ungrateful, but she was caught red-handed selling her employer's privacy to the Hearst Corporation and was therefore forced out. This time, she was clearly out for profit. Does a woman who stirs up trouble still have any credibility
When Doris Fetcher was interviewed by a local TV station owned by the Hearst Group, she tearfully revealed her experience of being kidnapped by the mafia-like Simon Westeros and thrown to the remote Tierra del Fuego in Latin America, where she almost died. , but what I gained was not sympathy. Instead, many people expressed their happiness on the Internet.
For a traitor, it would be too cheap to throw her away to Tierra del Fuego.
It should be thrown directly to the Antarctic to feed the penguins.
Therefore, after all this going on, the impact of the whole thing on Simon is probably that the stock prices of a series of listed companies in the Westeros system have fluctuated again due to market concerns about the possible divorce of the Westeros couple.
However, when some hedging capital realized that the short contracts they sold were immediately absorbed by the market, and the capital associated with the Westeros system was still generously lending the stocks of various subsidiaries, they immediately suppressed the idea of large short selling.
In March 1994, which was about to pass, the ups and downs in the technology stock market had frightened many short-sellers who had suffered huge losses.
Sensitive trends in the hedging field were quickly transmitted to the stock market.
Even if exact information cannot be obtained from within the Westeros system, due to the conservative nature of the market, in the last few trading days of March, although the stock prices of listed companies such as Cisco and AOL, which are the core of the Westeros system, fluctuated, they did not The downward trend in the first half of March reappeared.
Many sensitive people even realized that Simon Westeros deliberately did not clarify.
Because March is the last delivery month of the first quarter, many hedging contracts will be delivered in the near future, and there are also a large number of new positions that need to be established.
The market remains uncertain, which is the best state to attract capital to take risks.
If the Westeros couple publicly clarifies that there is no rift in their marriage, whether true or false, the stock prices of companies such as Cisco will tend to stabilize, and many hedge funds that have just suffered heavy losses in the fluctuations of technology stocks in March will inevitably become more cautious. I won’t rush into the market again.
This is indeed the case.
In recent days, Cersei Fund Management has liquidated approximately US$5 billion in long stock contracts, while continuing to establish a new long position of US$2 billion. The total long position in technology stocks is still as high as US$9 billion.
At the same time, as of March 31, the total book size of Cersei Fund Management Company has increased from US$5 billion at the beginning of the year to US$6.7 billion now. The book profit in the first quarter alone reached US$1.7 billion, a growth rate of As high as 34%, this has exceeded the one-year return rate of many hedge funds.
This momentum continued. In 1994, Cersei Fund Management Company, which continued to be net long in technology stocks through large and low leverage bets, was still expected to bring investors no less than 100% of the full year's net income.
The operational trends of Cersei Fund Management, coupled with this lesson in March, have caused more and more hedge funds to turn to net long positions in technology stocks. This is why Cersei Capital’s recent long positions in technology stocks have shrunk from US$12 billion. to US$9 billion.
There are fewer and fewer short sellers, and no one is taking orders for long contracts. Cersei Capital’s operation team is already preparing to operate directly through the stock spot market.
As the Nasdaq technology stock sector continues to rise, if you buy technology stocks directly at this stage, as long as you can suppress your greed and exit at the right time, you can also get very generous returns.
Generally speaking, under the strong suppression of the Westeros system, the storm provoked by the Hearst Group did allow the public to see some unknown sides of Simon, but if it is said about the Westeros system The substantive impact is basically equivalent to none.
Users did not refuse to use the World Wide Web because of Simon's negativity, and audiences did not stop watching Daenerys Entertainment films because of Simon's scandal. The capital market continued to pursue Westeros concept stocks, and various subsidiaries of the Westeros system The momentum for the first quarter remains strong.
As for Simon's personal reputation, as a person with a strong and cold heart, the harassment from the outside world over the years has never really changed his state of mind.
The public is always forgetful.
When the trend passes, what more people see is a figure standing at the top of the world pyramid that everyone can only look up to. Even if they still have negative thoughts, it is difficult to say that this kind of thinking is based on true moral principles. Or just pure jealousy.
Friday, April 1st.
April Fool's Day.
On this day, the Hearst Group was still using its own media platform to launch tireless attacks on Simon. In the morning, the Eagle Group suddenly released an industry news that was like an April Fool's Day joke. The content is about the first web social game "Happy Farm" in the history of the Internet, which was opened last Friday. This is the first practical application of Flash animation technology independently developed by Yigrit Company in the field of online games.
From the official opening at 9 o'clock in the morning last Friday to 9 o'clock in the morning on April 1, within 7 days, "Happy Farm" was directly recommended on the home page of the Ygrit portal, relying on the Facebook social network with a large user base, just In just one week, it gained 6.97 million game players.
6.97 million, what is this concept
There are only a handful of popular Nintendo console games in recent years, all of which have sold more than 5 million units.
Therefore, apart from 'miracle', it is difficult to find other more appropriate words to describe a social game that has already gained 6.97 million users in just one week after its release.
Of course, some people immediately realized the difference in this game.
"Farm Farm" is a free social game. Although it has an in-app purchase system, most users can play it without spending any money. Therefore, this disadvantage seems to have been immediately overtaken by the real sales of console games.
According to the generally high selling price of stand-alone games of 60 to 70 US dollars, if the sales volume is also 6.97 million, the concept will be completely different.
However, the Yigrit Portal also announced the first-week revenue of this first-ever Flash social game.
In seven days, not only did the number of players increase by 6.97 million, but through the relatively simple fertilizer props of "Happy Farm", in just the first week, the game brought revenue of US$2.61 million to Yigrit Company. Income.
US$2.61 million seems to be a small amount. When converted into console game cartridge sales, it is only about 30,000 to 40,000 boxes.
But no one can ignore the fact that this is only the income of "Happy Farm" in the first week of its opening.
Even without considering the continued increase in the number of users of "Farm Farm", if the weekly revenue of US$2.61 million is maintained, theoretically, the game's total annual revenue will reach US$135 million.
At $135 million, this is no longer a revenue scale that most console games can match.
However, the actual total revenue of "Farm Farm" must far exceed the US$135 million figure.
Because this social game, which has just been open for a week and has already shown a phenomenal trend, is still in the early stages of its user base continuing to explode.
In a press release from the Igret portal, officials predict that the total number of users of "Happy Farm" worldwide is expected to reach 50 million in the next two years, and the forecast annual revenue is as high as 300 to 400 million US dollars.
Although the article also admits that the life cycle of social games may be short, only two years at most, but the average annual revenue is 300 million to 400 million U.S. dollars in two years. Needless to say, based on the total revenue of 700 million U.S. dollars, regardless of development Whether it's EA as a business or Facebook as an operator, they are definitely making money.
You know, a well-known Facebook game blogger later revealed that the budget expenditure of "Happy Farm", a social game with a development cycle of only two months, was mainly the salary of the development team, and the overall production cost was even less than 1 million US dollars. .
The budget expenditure of less than 1 million US dollars was exchanged for a huge income of 700 million US dollars in two years. This can already be described as a money grab.
With the official report of Ygrit Company, many users who were not too interested in "Happy Farm" have clicked into the game direct interface of Ygrit portal. Users who did not originally have a Facebook account even came here specifically for this game. The game has opened its own social platform.
Both online portals and traditional media were attracted by the sudden popularity of this game in a short period of time following this report from the Yigrit Portal.
Then, when media reporters were collecting information to prepare relevant reports for the next day, more and more people realized that the root of the success of "Farm" may not lie in the game itself. Of course, for players, this web game integrates leisure and social networking, and it is also the first web game to use the Flash animation technology of Igret Company. It is very interesting and playable, but it succeeds The fundamental reason is that Yigrit Company has almost monopolized the huge user base of Internet portals.
In recent years, industry analysts who have been paying attention to the Internet industry have been curious about how the Yigret portal can monetize its huge user base. After all, in the past few years, the main source of income of the Yigret company has always been software sales. Although the rapidly growing advertising business and e-commerce both rely on the huge user base of Igret, the connection is not too direct and close after all.
This has led some media to even predict that as the scale of Internet users continues to increase exponentially and faced with rapidly expanding huge operating costs, Igret may have to take the initiative to allocate its own exclusive network interfaces in order to reduce costs. .
Or the previous MSN portal and AOL portal were opened for this reason.
Now, a social game with a production budget of less than 1 million US dollars, as soon as it was released, directly proved the huge commercial potential of Yigrit's huge user scale.
In two years, the total revenue is expected to be US$700 million. According to the sharing rules unearthed in the industry, Igret will first take 20% of the total revenue as operating expenses. In fact, there may still be as much as half of the water. , the remaining 80% is shared equally between Ygritte and EA, a developer affiliated with Daenerys Entertainment.
Taken together, Igret can earn more than US$400 million from an estimated total revenue of US$700 million. Even after excluding all expenses such as marketing operation costs and subsequent taxes, the net profit is expected to be no less than US$200 million, on average. Net profit of US$100 million per year.
Previously, among the 1993 "Fortune" magazine's top 500 American companies announced in March, there were only 129 companies with annual net profits exceeding US$100 million.
For Ygritte, this is just a benefit from a social game.
Now that the success of this model has been proven, will Igret launch only this one game
Of course it's impossible.
It is conceivable that the future will only consist of online games. Relying on its terrifyingly huge user base, as long as it is operated properly, it can bring a steady stream of huge profits to Yigrit Company.
For Simon, who flew from Los Angeles to San Francisco on Friday because of "Farm Farm", the game's popularity was both unexpected and expected.
Historically, "Farm" can be said to be the first social game to be copied by a North American game manufacturer and achieve great success.
China's "Farmville" was launched in 2008 and achieved phenomenal success. Then in 2009, Zynga, a game studio in the United States, followed suit and launched "Farmville". This copycat game relied on the rapidly growing Facebook platform. , in just two months, it became the first social game on Facebook with a total number of users exceeding 10 million.
In the following years, the peak number of players of "Farmville" once exceeded 80 million, bringing a large amount of revenue to the developer Zynga.
In its most prosperous period, Zynga relied on the income from "Farmville" to hold grand rave parties every week. The company also provided international travel for all employees and built a headquarters building worth hundreds of millions of dollars in San Francisco. Compared with a certain company that was used by Tencent Zynga, a struggling studio that spent millions to buy out the operating rights of "Farm", enjoyed a moment of glory. Its subsequent IPO also gained popularity in the market, and its market value once exceeded US$5 billion at its peak.
This time, the new "Happy Farm" led by Simon himself relies on the Internet interface that Igret Company has almost monopolized. It is also the first Internet social game developed using the new Flash animation technology. It has more than 20 million active users in a single day. The home page of the Yigrit portal attracted nearly 7 million players in just one week, which did not exceed Simon's expectations.
In the past, the user base of "Farmville" reached 80 million at its peak. This time, for "Happy Farm", Simon's prediction of the global maximum user base of 50 million for the Yigrit operation team is not far-fetched.
In the first quarter that has just passed, the number of World Wide Web access users in North America has exceeded 52 million, and the number of Internet users has reached 85 million. The number of Internet users worldwide has also approached 150 million.
It is estimated that by the end of 1994, the number of Internet users in North America alone will reach 115 million, and may be close to 200 million globally.
Going back to 1995, with the large-scale explosion of overseas Internet users, the number of global Internet users may even reach 400 million.
This is the basis of "Happy Farm"'s 50 million users around the world.
On the other hand, the current Internet is just like the television industry in the era of public television monopoly.
Because video entertainment models such as cable TV and streaming media have not yet emerged, the major public television networks in North America often have phenomenal TV series such as "Seinfeld" that ended with more than 70 million viewers. This was completely unimaginable in the era of rapid development of cable TV and streaming media.
Similarly, the current Internet and entertainment content are far less rich than those in the "Farmville" era. At that time, there was already "World of Warcraft" and YouTube. The production level of stand-alone games was close to the movie level. Smartphones were also starting to become allies. Users at that time There are so many other options for entertainment.
Right now, at least until other social casual games come out, there's only Hay Day.
Not only that, the phenomenal success of "Farm" is obviously non-replicable. Neither China nor the United States, the two manufacturers that pioneered phenomenal farm games, have ever broken their own records with subsequent products.
Therefore, in Simon's view, the peak user scale of 50 million players is not impossible to reach even in North America, let alone the world.
When the user scale of a game is large enough, even if only a small number of people contribute a small part of the revenue, taken together, it will be beyond the reach of many ordinary best-selling games.