It was already the end of October, and it was less than ten days before the release of the first film of the Firefly system at the end of the year.
Firefly Group will release a total of three films at the end of the year, "Teddy Bear" on November 13th for Thanksgiving, "Elizabeth" on December 4th and "Tea Boy" on December 11th.
Needless to say, "Teddy Bear" is a project Eric has personally paid attention to.
"Elizabeth" is a biopic of Elizabeth I that Firefly cooperated with British Working-Title film company last year, starring Cate Blanchett, the main goal is to hit this year's Oscar.
Although Working-Title, which is controlled by Polygram, has become a film company under the Seagram Group and Universal Pictures due to Seagram’s acquisition of Polygram Group, Julia also rejected Working-Title at the beginning. Title's "Notting Hill".
However, the production and distribution rights of "Elizabeth" were finalized before Seagram acquired Polygram, and all aspects of cooperation have not been affected.
The final "Tea Boys" is Adam Sandler's next comedy after "The Wedding Singer," which did well this Easter. Speaking of it, December 11th is a period when the film market is relatively deserted between Thanksgiving and Christmas. It is not a good time, but fortunately, the production cost of "Tea Boy" is only 23 million US dollars, so there is not much pressure to pay back. .
In addition to the three films of Firefly Group, MGM's "Mission Impossible 3" on November 20 and "Fast and Furious" on January 1 next year; Fox's "The Horse Whisperer" on November 6 and December 18 "Star Wars Episode 1" on November 13, Columbia's "Deadly High School" on November 13, and "Little Mom" on December 25, just these nine films of the Firefly system have squeezed the entire year-end schedule. Be full.
For the other three, Universal will release two films, "The Great Hand" and "The Sixth Sense of Life and Death", and Paramount will also release two films, "Star Trek 9: Uprising" and the 2D hand-painted animation film "Mulan". Warner has only one medium-produced romance film "Electronic Love Letter", which seems to be relatively down-and-out.
As for the films released by other second- and third-tier film companies, they are basically not within the scope of attention of the Big Seven.
With the initial completion of the tide of media group integration, a group of second- and third-tier film companies that stood out in the 1980s, such as New Line, Miramax, Orion, Carlock, etc., were either absorbed by major film companies, or were on the verge of bankruptcy. Again. The new batch of independent film companies that can attract the attention of the seven major studios, such as the former Lions Gate, Summit, etc., are still in their infancy, and they do not pose any threat to the major studios at all.
At the same time, the integration of traditional media giants has been completed, and new Internet media is in the ascendant. It can be said that the recent years are definitely the most powerful period for Hollywood media. Moreover, there is no doubt that the Firefly system, which controls more than half of Hollywood, has become the undisputed super-dominant of the North American media industry.
As the absolute controller of the Firefly system, after annexing Columbia Pictures again, Eric has been under the close attention of media from all walks of life recently.
Eric naturally didn't have the energy to care about these things. When he returned to Los Angeles, he got into the post-production studio of Firefly Studios and began to focus on the preliminary arrangement of the footage of "Gravity".
However, although Eric could not be contacted directly, these media quickly found another explosive news point, that is Caroline who suffered a foot injury.
The shy little tour guide back then, now Eric Williams' "Little Pepper", has a high degree of education from Cambridge and Harvard, a noble aristocratic blood, and a perfect and exquisite appearance... This is simply a firefly The best candidate for the queen of the empire.
The topic was brought up, and naturally there was another 'stocktaking' of the women around Eric, overt and secret hearsay and speculation, and it was very lively for a while, and some tabloids even brought the topic to the two little guys.
Over the years, Eric has never deliberately concealed the news that he already has two children. Ordinary people can get relevant news as long as they pay a little attention. However, out of consideration for the safety of the two little guys, Eric's bottom line for all media is that they must never disclose sensitive information such as the photos, names, and addresses of the two children.
Although Eric is a public figure, he is also a super rich man with strong social influence. In a society like the United States, the consequences of offending the capital are much greater than offending the powerful. Many politicians and even the president often have various scandals, but few rich men on the Forbes list are covered by the media. Entanglement can be seen.
Therefore, so far, all parties have tacitly abided by the red line set by Eric. This time, the discussion about the two little fellows finally flowed to Eric's personal wealth inheritance. Although it is still half a year before the release of the Forbes rich list list next year, the statistics of the net worth of rich people from all walks of life in the American media are actually happening all the time.
Many media have speculated that once Yahoo is successfully listed, combined with Eric's net worth growth this year, his personal wealth is likely to hit a new high, exceeding the unprecedented 200 billion US dollars.
Such a terrifying wealth, even if it does not increase in the future, according to the current federal law, if it is to be passed on normally in the future, it will still need to pay an inheritance tax of hundreds of billions of dollars. Although destined to have nothing to do with me, this topic has attracted many people to talk about it. After all, the one-time tax payment exceeds 100 billion U.S. dollars. Just thinking about it makes many even completely irrelevant people feel distressed.
In the end, some media and politicians who advocated the reduction or cancellation of inheritance tax took the opportunity to jump out and join the discussion on this topic.
Firefly Studios.
The date of Yahoo's listing is approaching day by day, and Eric can't leave for the time being. Several executives of Yahoo and Chris rushed over today to discuss some details of Yahoo's listing.
In the office LOFT in the digital field, sitting in the rest area near the glass curtain wall on the second floor, during the greetings before entering the topic, everyone inevitably chatted about the topics surrounding Eric recently.
Eric held a cup of coffee in his hand, leaned on the back of the chair, and said to Chris, Ian Grenier and others: "Actually, I think that if I can spend all the money before I die, then It's the best state, and I don't have to leave a penny to the IRS. As for the children, I still hope that they can support themselves."
"This is a daunting task," Chris said with a smile: "Even if you don't count the profits generated every year, if you can live to be a hundred years old, you need to spend every day from now on. Lost $8 million."
"8 million dollars," Eric said, looking at the only woman among them, "Tina, you women are better at spending money, help me think about it, how can I spend 8 million dollars every day?"
After Jeff Locke left, Tina Brown, who was personally selected by Eric at the beginning, was gradually promoted to one of Yahoo's new Big Three in the past few years. Mitnick tied.
Hearing Eric's question, Tina Brown thought about it. After a while, she smiled and said, "This, you have to let me try it first."
Eric immediately showed an exaggerated vigilant expression: "Then I'd better ask someone else."
Everyone laughed.
After a few small talk, a few people can get down to business.
When Yahoo went public, one of the more difficult problems it faced was the digital music copyright lawsuit with the five major record companies.
In the first half of the year, due to the impact of Internet piracy on the physical record industry and the rise of the Fireflyer player, the five major record companies launched a large-scale lawsuit against Internet piracy, and by the way Yahoo was also the target of the lawsuit .
Perhaps because of Yahoo's impending IPO weakness, the five major record companies have a very tough attitude towards reaching an out-of-court settlement with Yahoo.
"The five major record companies still insist on three main conditions," said Ian Grenier: "The first is to strengthen the filtering and even blocking of pirated music resources by portal websites and search engines, and the second is to open up the five major record companies. Separately set up a digital music store authority for Fireflyer players, the last item is compensation, although the compensation amount has been lowered, but the other party still demands $20 million in cash compensation.”
Eric wondered: "If an agreement is reached on the first two items, they should have achieved their goal. Why insist on 20 million US dollars in compensation? This may be a huge sum of money for individuals, but for the five major record companies For me, it’s just a small amount of dispensable money, right?”
Chris said: "This should be the insistence of the lawyer appointed by the other party."
Eric understood immediately.
The main reason why the status of lawyers in the United States is so high is that they make too much money. The saying that the economic base determines the superstructure is absolutely true. For example, in the infringement lawsuits involving these large companies, without mentioning the fixed litigation fees of millions of dollars, once the huge compensation is obtained, the lawyers can directly extract 30% or even more of it.
Rubbing the smooth surface of the coffee cup in his hand, Eric asked, "So, what do you mean now?"
"We discussed it at length," Ian Grenier said. "We were too concerned about the potential impact of this lawsuit on Yahoo's IPO. But if we agreed to the conditions of the five major record labels, it would not only greatly hurt Our potential interests in digital music sales. At the same time, this kind of compromise is completely against the core spirit of openness and sharing of the Internet platform. Therefore, we do not plan to reconcile, but try our best to publicize The concept of Internet openness and sharing guides media and public opinion. As long as the IPO can be successful, the five major record companies will no longer want to gain any initiative in front of Yahoo.”
Ian Grenier's remarks seemed very righteous.
However, if you think about it carefully, if you can really reverse the trend of the public opinion, then Yahoo can immediately transform from a shameful copyright infringer to a righteous messenger who fights against stubborn and conservative music copyright owners and seeks open sharing for the public. The statement is actually more shameless, but it can definitely cater to the mainstream Internet values.
The key to this matter still needs the publicity and cooperation of the public media.
Although the Firefly system is relatively weak in the traditional paper media, it has a powerful energy unmatched by any other media force in the more influential TV media. As for the emerging Internet media, it occupies 70% of North American portals Yahoo's portal, which has a large share of website traffic, is even more reserved for the Firefly system.
Now that it was proposed at this time, Ian Grenier and others obviously already have a detailed campaign plan, and there is naturally no obstacle for the group to cooperate. Everyone discussed this plan in detail for a while, and Eric also personally made it on the spot I made a phone call to Murdoch, hoping that several mainstream newspapers controlled by News Corporation can cooperate in this matter.
Speaking of which, only the twentieth-century Fox film company that Murdoch handed over to Elizabeth from News Corporation can be counted as part of the Firefly system, and the FOX TV network only has a relatively close alliance with the Firefly system. Other larger parts, such as the huge print media networks in the UK, Australia and North America, and the TV networks in the UK and the Far East, remain firmly under Murdoch's own control. After a lifetime of hard work, it is naturally impossible for Murdoch to let go of these powers, and Eric has never thought of such a good thing.
However, the current Firefly system controls more than ten times the assets of the entire News Corporation. Murdoch also knows the benefits of maintaining a cooperative relationship with the Firefly system. When he heard Eric's request on the phone, he was naturally full of enthusiasm. agree to come down.
After finalizing this matter, everyone discussed the details of the last equity incentive plan before Yahoo's IPO. Ian Grenier, Steve Mitnick, and Tina Brown left in a hurry. One went to New York to discuss with ABC and FOX high-level executives about the specific details of publicity campaigns, one rushed to San Francisco to inspect Yahoo’s Silicon Valley branch, and finally Tina Brown flew back to the Boston headquarters to sit in charge. It has been less than a month since the IPO, and the three of them are very busy.
After talking about everything, it was already evening, and Ian Grenier and the others were sent away in the parking lot. Chris was not in a hurry to leave, and spread out on the concrete road in the studio park with Eric.
"Actually, regarding the issue of wealth inheritance, Eric, your assets are too large, and you should make plans now. You don't really want to obediently hand over half of your wealth to the federal government one day, or even At that time, it was impossible for Xia Xia and Kevin to get half of it."
In all fairness, Eric naturally didn't want to do this. He still doesn't have any sense of belonging to the country he lives in, and naturally he doesn't have a strong sense of social responsibility.
If possible, in fact, the joke he just made with Chris and the others about spending all the money before they died is what he said in his heart. In his bones, he has always maintained a very pessimistic attitude towards wealth inheritance. After all, I have been instilled in my memory with too many concepts such as being rich for three generations, and it is difficult to determine whether there will be a prodigal son among my descendants.
For Chris, Eric didn't hide anything, and expressed his scruples very seriously.
"This is not a problem," Chris said with a smile: "Look at the Morgan family and the Rockefeller family now. It has been a hundred years. Although they have moved behind the scenes, they are still brilliant. This is not the case of these families How wonderful your descendants are, do you know why?"
"kindness?"
"Because these families are all passed on through foundations or trusts. Even though the founders of these families have passed away for many years, through the strict family trust fund rules set up from the beginning, the wealth inheritance of these families still follows With the will of those old guys, no descendant can change it. Moreover, as long as there are enough outstanding talents among the descendants of the family, these families can re-prosper on the basis of the original deep heritage. In this regard, you can let Caroline and the others Collect some information for you."