With the rapid development of reading media, digital reading has increasingly become an important part of reading for all. On April 23, the First National Reading Conference Digital Reading Sub-Forum and the 8th Digital Reading Annual Conference were held in Beijing, at which the "2021 China Digital Reading Report" was released.
According to the report, the overall scale of China's digital reading industry will reach 41.57 billion yuan in 2021, with a growth rate of 18.23%; by the end of 2021, about 34.4686 million works will be on the shelves, an increase of 11.06% over 31.036 million in 2020, of which about 32.0462 million online literary works, far exceeding other forms of works.
The Digital Reading Sub-Forum of the First National Reading Conference and the 8th Annual Conference on Digital Reading
"For online literature and literature, we believe that creators are the source of reading for all. On the one hand, in the past, we have continued to build a writer's ecology and activate the writer's creative power. On the other hand, we also actively protect intellectual property rights, safeguard the productivity of writers, and consolidate the sustainable foundation of reading for all. Cheng Wu, CEO of Yuwen Group and vice president of Tencent Group, said in an interview with Nandu reporter.
As long as it is a good book, it can release charm on digital platforms
Judging from the "Report", online literature has become the main force in digital reading, and is playing a role in promoting reading for all in its unique way. "When I was young, I liked to read on paper, Chinese and foreign masterpieces, four masterpieces, Jin Yong Gulong, especially loved to read Jules Verne's science fiction novels, "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea", "Captain Grant's Daughter", "Mysterious Island", "Around the World in 80 Days" and so on. But today's young people and children, they have become accustomed to reading through various Internet media and electronic products, through mobile phones, iPads, computers. Talking about the change in the way the people read, Cheng Wu told Nandu reporters.
According to the report, in 2021, the scale of digital reading users has reached 506 million, with a growth rate of 2.43%; the per capita number of electronic readings is 11.58.
Cheng Wu, CEO of Yuwen Group and Vice President of Tencent Group
Essentially, digital reading is a more convenient form of reading. The digital platform is equivalent to an endless cloud library, where readers can find both traditional reading materials and online literature. Cheng Wu revealed that in 2021, the most popular traditional reading material on the reading platform is "Analects", with 30 million readers on the site, and more than 80% of readers are under the age of 30.
"Contemporary young people have a strong interest in traditional Chinese culture, but how to present it in a more convenient way and in a more vivid form is crucial. In the comment area of our Analects, there are people who answer questions, people who learn new things from the past, and the wisdom of thousands of years ago and the young people of the present collide with each other, and I think this is a particularly good new form. Cheng Wu told Nandu reporters.
Four famous works such as "Dream of the Red Chamber", "Journey to the West", and "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", as well as the works of modern and contemporary masters such as Lu Xun, Lao She, Yu Hua and Chen Zhongzhong, are also popular on digital platforms. "These fully show that as long as it is a good book, no matter which historical period the work is, it can release its charm on the current digital reading platform and be loved by users."
In addition to providing classic and good books that have been washed through the years, using the form of online literature to create masterpieces that reflect the life of the times, and satisfying the spiritual and cultural needs of readers with a steady stream of good stories, is an important means to promote digital reading and even reading for the whole people.
In Cheng Wu's view, "the core of testing a good story is whether readers can resonate and empathize." The user's emotional verification is the foundation of a good book. It is reported that in 2021 alone, the Reading Group's starting point reading APP launched a number of "double million" books with more than one million subscriptions and more than one million reviews, such as "Naming the Night", "Starting from the Red Moon", and "Stargate". Cheng Wu said: "We think these head works are very typical representatives, condensing the reader's emotions and testing by the market. ”
The "Z generation" pluralistic aesthetic promotes the blossoming of online literature
In terms of the age of digital reading users, according to the report, 44.63% are users aged 19-25, 27.25% are users under 18 years old, and Generation Z has become the main force of digital reading.
Similarly, among the new writers who read in 2021, more than 80% of the writers after 95 are post-95. Tianrui Shufu, who has won the Galaxy Award twice, and Mei Shiniang, a writer who won the special prize of the Realist Theme Online Literature Competition, are also excellent post-95s. In 2021, 60% of the new readers of the starting point reading APP will be post-95.
"The addition of young creative forces and fresh blood can bring more vitality and more possibilities to a system and an ecology." The diversified aesthetics of Generation Z have promoted the blossoming of a hundred flowers in the field of online literature and literary and artistic creation. Cheng Wu said.
History, fairy tales, and fantasy were once the mainstream themes in the field of online literature, and in recent years, with the addition of Generation Z creators, online literary works with realistic themes have risen dramatically. According to the "2021 Research Report on the Development of Chinese Online Literature" released by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, in the past five years, the compound growth rate of online works with realistic themes has exceeded 30%, which is one of the fastest growing categories. Among the readers of realistic theme works, more than 40% of them are post-95. Since new technology is part of Gen Z's life, science fiction is another category that is on fire. Once unpopular science fiction online articles, now among the five major categories of online literature, explosive models are frequent, and the Z generation accounts for more than 60% of readers.
Cheng Wu specifically mentioned another characteristic of Generation Z, "preferring and being more adept at self-expression, and preferring to participate in interactions." He revealed that in 2021, readers of the starting point reading APP created new chapter reviews and paragraph reviews in a total of 170,000 works. In 2021, the word "China" appeared 300,000 times in reader comments.
"Generation Z young people have a strong sense of identity and a strong sense of national pride in traditional Chinese culture, which promotes, inspires and inspires people to create more good works that can show the style of the times and can show more of the hopes and thoughts of young people today." Cheng Wu said.
But he also believes that every generation of young people has something in common. At the beginning of 2022, during the broadcast of the TV series "Human World", the figures of the post-90s, post-95s and even post-00s often appeared in the bullet screen, which made Cheng Wu very emotional. "We and Zhou Zhigang after the 20s, and Zhou Bingyi in 49 years, and Zhou Nan and Feng Yue in 73 and 74 years, including the current Generation Z, all have in common, that is, we have the benevolence, righteousness, wisdom and faith that flow in our lives, education and blood, and the warmth, kindness, and compassion that flow in our humanity." And authors and readers of different eras, through the creation of universal human emotions, is a "particularly moving thing".
The governance of online literature piracy still faces many challenges
When it comes to digital reading and online literature, copyright protection is an inevitable topic. Cheng Wu said frankly that copyright protection has always been the focus of the group's work, in recent years, reading articles in cooperation with national law enforcement, has smashed more than 60 pirate websites, through complaints to remove tens of millions of infringing links, while cooperating with the competent departments to break thousands of pirated APP, for more than 1,000 works to file rights protection lawsuits.
But he also admitted that the governance of piracy in online literature still faces many challenges, especially with the development of the piracy industry chain and new technologies, the low cost of breaking the law and the high cost of rights protection are the core difficulties of online literature and infringement.
In 2021, reading 10 key books, a total of more than 200,000 pirate sites were found, and the number of infringing links reached 1.6 million.
"As an enterprise, what we are most saddened about is to see many excellent writers, especially many writers who write realistic themes and writers who write relatively niche and innovative themes, and these backbones have greatly affected their income and creative mentality because of the infringement of piracy." In the incomplete statistical survey of the article, the number of writers affected by piracy in 2021 will reach 60,000, and there are probably nearly 10,000 works that cannot be continuously changed because of piracy. Cheng Wu said.
In his eyes, the fight against piracy has reached an urgent stage. It is reported that this year, Yuwen Group officially upgraded copyright protection to the company's vital strategic height, and will invest 10 times manpower and resources to explore the ecological co-governance of copyright protection.
"Technological breakthrough and national co-governance will be two important directions." Cheng Wu introduced. On the one hand, under the upgrading of various technologies such as artificial intelligence and encrypted watermarking, an intelligent anti-piracy middle platform has been established and the attack and defense system has been comprehensively strengthened. On the other hand, in response to the needs of writers, we should unite the industry and gather a wide range of readers and authors to build a "Sunshine Reading - National Anti-Piracy Alliance" to promote the public collection and handling of infringement clues.
Only under the ecological co-governance of government leadership, participation of the whole people, and technological empowerment, and with concerted efforts, can the phenomenon of piracy in the field of digital publishing and digital reading be better curbed, and the innovation and vitality of China's cultural industry can also go to the next level.
Before taking over the reading, Cheng Wu was friends with many writers on the platform, and after taking over, all the writers on the platform became his "partners". He said: "Creation is difficult, it requires the talent of one thousand miles, day after day of hard work, the need to endure loneliness, to withstand failure." However, because of piracy, some writers' income is affected, their creative mentality is affected, and they even give up creation, which makes us miss a lot of potential excellent writers' works. ”
He believes that one of the most important things for China to become a cultural power is to protect creators in various fields. "If their creative talents and the ecology of their creations can be better protected, there will be a steady stream of better works, and only then will they be able to achieve cultural power and cultural self-confidence."
Nandu reporter Huang Qian