Text | Liu Dongfeng Editing | Zhang Guangkai
Wu Wenhui withdrew from the shareholders of Reading Literature, and an era began to end.
Wu Wenhui is an epoch-making figure in China's online literature industry. In 2013, when Wu Wenhui's team left Reading to join Tencent, he wrote on Weibo: "An era is over. "At that time, China's online literature ended the barbaric growth period of chaos and began to enter the era of payment. In 2020, Wu Wenhui's team left again to read articles, and Chinese online literature entered the era of free reading.
Wu Wenhui
Recently, Shanghai Yuewen Information Technology Co., Ltd. added industrial and commercial changes, and Ningbo Meishan Bonded Port Area Yuebao Investment Co., Ltd. withdrew from the ranks of shareholders, holding 34.62% of the shares before withdrawal. At present, the legal representative of the company is Cheng Wu, which is wholly owned by Shenzhen Litong Industrial Investment Fund Co., Ltd., an affiliate of Tencent.
Observer.com learned that Wu Wenhui, the former CEO of Yuewen, is a major shareholder of Yuebao Investment, with a shareholding ratio of 83.88%, Shang Xuesong and Lin Tingfeng holding 5.37%, and Luo Li and Hou Qingchen holding 2.69%. These people are all the founders of Reading Group, Wu Wenhui is the former CEO of Reading Group, Shang Xuesong is the former president, Lin Tingfeng and Luo Li are the former senior vice presidents, and Hou Qingchen is the former vice president. The withdrawal of Yuebao Investment also means that the relationship between Wu Wenhui's team and Yuewen has completely ended.
Previously, with works such as "Breaking the Firmament", "Choosing Heaven", and "Full-time Master", Reading Wen once became a "giant" in the online literature industry. Data shows that Tencent Literature formed after the annexation of Shanda Literature once accounted for 62% of the market share.
Now, affected by policies and the external competitive environment, according to the latest financial report, Reading has declined revenue for the first time in five years since its listing. The data shows that the decline in reading in the past year has reached 61.35%.
After Wu Wenhui retired from the executive of Reading Literature, Reading entered the "Chengwu era", and the "Chengwu era" focused more on the development of the IP industry. Although Wu Wenhui has long been "disappearing" from reading articles, the imprint of Wu Wenhui is everywhere.
The past continues to repeat itself, and the only thing missing from the online literature rivers and lakes is "Wu Wenhui".
"The Godfather of Web Literature" Wu Wenhui
Wu Wenhui was first a lover of online literature, and then became a successful businessman, in the process he became the godfather of the online literature industry.
When Wu Wenhui left Reading in 2020, he once sighed in the circle of friends: "In the past eighteen years, countless swords and shadows, but finally won a place for Chinese online literature in Chinese and world culture, and finally won enough for the grassroots writers who were despised as scorned back then to proudly face the manuscript fees of their wives and children. ”
For a long time in the past, online literature was regarded as a cancer, and web writers could not enter the hall of elegance.
At the beginning of the century, the Heart of Darkness (Wu Wenhui), together with Baojian Feng (Lin Tingfeng), Tibetan Sword Jiangnan (Shang Xuesong), Yi (Hou Qingchen), Dark Left Hand (Luo Li), and No. 5 Ant (Zheng Hongbo) jointly established the "Fantasy Literature Association" forum, which was the predecessor of the "Starting Point Chinese Network".
On the one hand, Wu Wenhui's team concentrated the web novels scattered in all corners at that time in one place, and on the other hand, used the web literature payment model to open up the business path of web literature. Through this path, authors use real money to motivate authors to create, and also support the operation of the platform. On the other hand, this money also allows authors to provide readers with better quality works.
Web literature is a way of survival for some authors. Tang Jiasanshao was laid off before he came into contact with the online literature, and the online literature provided him with income. "At that time, I also liked novels very much, and I just needed support in life, so sometimes I almost moved my pen, it was a whole day, and I needed money!"
Third Young Master of the Tang family
In 2012, he applied for the Guinness World Record with 100 consecutive months of continuous updates and a total of 260 million readers. He was also the first web writer to be elected to the Writers Association. In 2017, with a royalty income of 120 million yuan, Tang Jiasanshao topped the list of rich online writers for five consecutive years.
At ChinaJoy's "First Domestic Online Literature Game Copyright Auction", the cumulative auction price of the mobile game adaptation rights of 6 works such as "Heroic Barbarism" and Dreamer "The Legend of the Great Sage" reached a cumulative auction price of 28 million yuan, the highest 8.1 million yuan, the lowest 1.6 million yuan, and the average price of 4.67 million yuan.
After the online literature was recognized in China, Wu Wenhui's team shifted its attention to overseas markets in 2017. That year, like Reading Article, it was also Douyin that year. Unlike Douyin, Chinese online literature had already taken root overseas before the article arrived.
In 2017, Reading's starting point Chinese launched an overseas version - WebNovel. Wu Wenhui's purpose is not only to output web literature, but also to export local IP and create "Chinese-style Harry Potter". Although in just a few months, Webnovel launched a large number of martial arts, fantasy, romance and other works to become the website with the most works, but soon Webnovel encountered a dilemma.
Unlike Douyin, which can be used in the world to recommend algorithms, the domestic web literature operation model simply does not work overseas. As the core of the business model of web literature, serialization needs to be updated quickly in order to meet the needs of readers who are constantly chasing and changing. However, the lack of translation talents and the difficulty of controlling translation efficiency make the update speed of online articles extremely slow. Webnovel has only updated more than 200 novels a year after its launch, which cannot be compared with the huge volume in China.
In 2018, Wu Wenhui changed his strategy and changed his content output strategy to model output. Webnovel has moved the business model and author support model of Chinese web literature abroad. In just over a year, it attracted 12,000 authors from different countries and created 19,000 works. In 2019, Wu Wenhui proposed that web literature has entered the 3.0 era, and Reading has cooperated with Transsion and Singapore Telecom to deeply cultivate overseas markets and localize web literature.
According to the financial report, at the end of 2018, Webnovel had 12,000 overseas authors and 19,000 original English works. In 2019, the number of authors and works rose to 52,000 and 88,000, respectively. The epidemic has allowed Webnovel to accumulate more fans overseas, and the cumulative number of visitors to Webnovel at the end of 2019 was 36 million at the end of 2019 and reached nearly 100 million by June 2021.
Reading has authorized more than 800 online literary works for digital and physical publication to many overseas countries, and works such as "Son-in-law", "Red Heart Sky Survey", and "Earth Era" have been collected by the British Library.
And when the free model hits, the "godfather of web literature" seems to be powerless.
The glory period of web literature
Without Wu Wenhui, it would be hard to imagine the current state of China's cultural industry.
In 2020, Wu Wenhui said when reading the article, "As a founder, it's like seeing your 'child' finally come of age. And at this moment, like many 'parents', we must not only accompany the 'child' to grow up together, but also take a step back in time, learn to let go, and let the 'child' start a new life course. ”
Reading texts in adulthood seems to be more powerful. Hou Xiaonan, president of Reading Group, said in August 2022 that the turnover of the game adaptation of "Douluo Continent" has exceeded 10 billion yuan, and the single statue of Medusa of "Breaking the Firmament" was sold out in 40 minutes, and the GMV exceeded 5 million yuan. Last year, Reading launched the TV series "Qing Yu Nian" and "Zhao Son-in-law", which became explosive content.
Most of these IPs are products of the Wu Wenhui era, and the success of these IPs is inseparable from the founding members' deep understanding of the web novel itself. Yang Chen, vice president of Reading, was also a popular writer on Qiqi Chinese before he became an editor. After serving as an editor, Yang Chen opened a public account to teach the author how to study readers, how to learn routines, how to structure articles, and how to write good endings.
Readers can satisfy their desires from plots such as counterattack, rebirth, crossing, and domineering president, but if the understanding of the web novel is limited to this, it is too shallow.
Wu Wenhui, who is a lover of web literature himself, has a deeper thinking about content. Wu Wenhui once said in an interview, "Once I saw an article in the newspaper that Chinese about the 10 topics that I am most concerned about now. I took it and compared it with our novel rankings, and it really corresponded. Education, medical care, corruption, you will see everyone's perception and reflection on society as ordinary people. ”
Shao Yanjun, associate professor of the Department of Chinese of Peking University, said that the best works in online literature are not only not inferior to Jin Yong in terms of literary brilliance, but also have a full-bodied immediacy. Their reflections on the system and the path of civilization are all based on China's current situation, which cannot be replaced by reading Jin Yong's novels.
With the improvement of the quality of web literature, the producer shifted his attention to the web literature industry. At the beginning of 2011, after the TV series "Palace" was a hit, Hunan Satellite TV purchased Tong Hua's novel "Step by Step" serialized by Jinjiang Original Network. Previously, Hunan Satellite TV adapted the online novel "Good Period Like a Dream" into a TV series.
Wu Wenhui put the expansion of the IP industry chain on a daily basis. He once said at the 2014 Online Literature Industry Summit that the development direction of Tencent Literature is "full reading ecology", including a large-channel original aggregation platform, a 2.0 version of the original ecology and a complete IP operation system developed by pan-entertainment.
"Langya List"
After Wu Wenhui settled in Reading Article, he carried out system linkage with Tencent and successively developed IP such as "Langya List", "Heaven Choice", "Chu Qiao Biography", and "Fusha".
At the same time, Wu Wenhui mentioned the concept of "IP full-chain service", saying that today's IP sales are no longer simply a single sales behavior, including the collection and collation of IP data in the early stage to assist content adaptation, and the publicity and diversion after film and television have also become a part of today's IP services.
After the retirement of the founding team represented by Wu Wenhui, can the future helm of Reading continue to pay attention to content quality?
At least from the data point of view, online literature is no longer the only business focus of reading articles. According to the financial report, the proportion of the online business of reading articles in the overall business has decreased year by year, from 75.4% in 2020 to 58.5% in 2021 and 56.4% in the first half of 2022. In contrast, copyright business has risen from 24.6% to 43.6% today.
According to the Beijing Business Daily, the trigger for Wu Wenhui's departure to read the article was that "there is disagreement within the reading article because of the promotion of free reading." Free is not the right path for reading. It is easy to increase the number of users, but it is not easy to do a good job of user retention, and the quality of works is the biggest obstacle.
Wu Wenhui has always been skeptical of the free reading model, in his opinion, the income brought by the advertising sharing model cannot be compared with the income obtained by the head author from the paid share, and in addition, free reading that pays more attention to the traffic effect will make the content shallower and faster, and it is difficult to form high-quality classic IP works.
However, an industry insider said: "The performance of Reading in the first half of 2019 was not satisfactory, mainly due to policy reasons rather than the competition of free reading." Of course, investors will want to be more responsive and dynamic to new trends, and rightly so. ”
After taking charge of the reading article, the new team rejected Wu's previous achievements, "We recognize some structural problems that have accumulated in the past few years. These problems have gradually reduced the company's market share and weakened the company's competitive advantage, which is the root cause of this unsatisfactory performance. ”
To this day, reading articles still oscillate between free and paid. According to the financial report, in the first half of 2022, the number of free users of reading articles increased by 1 million, while the number of paying users decreased by 1.2 million year-on-year. However, the specific source of these free users, the other party did not reply when the observer network asked to read the article.
Find the next Wu Wenhui
People have to relive the problems that Wu Wenhui faced.
As early as the beginning of the century, when web literature was just commercialized, in order to earn clicks and maximize profits, many writers wrote to cater to the taste of readers, and similar writing modes and content made the quality of works unguaranteed.
Today, the problem has become even more serious. Since the free model relies heavily on traffic monetization, platforms prefer algorithmic recommendations in order to obtain revenue from advertisers. As a result, it is difficult for this mechanism to attract top creators and it is even more difficult to produce high-quality works.
Some web writers told Observer.com that for authors, updating 1W words every day at the starting point is the best, and these words have just passed on some free web literature platforms, and some authors use AI intelligence to write novels in order to produce themselves, and after determining the chapter outline, the material library and sample database can be linked.
Some senior web readers once told Observer.com that even the works ranked low on websites such as Qiqi and Xiaoxiang have more content and plots than the head works of free platforms. Some users also said that some free reading platforms are like turning pirated websites into apps, with the same number of advertisements and the same water content, relying on the edge and using free to attract readers.
In addition, the problems faced by Cheng Wu during the implementation of the "Great Reading Plan" were also experienced during the Wu Wenhui era.
As early as 2011, a literary editor said in an interview with China Newsweek that 99% of the current (2011) online literary works do not meet the requirements of film and television companies. First of all, today's online novel charging model is that the more words the online writer earns, the more the online writer earns, so many works often have a word count of millions, but "the story has no tension, too many characters, very protracted, and a lot of moisture", and the works suitable for film and television adaptations are not too long, probably only within 500,000 words.
The above-mentioned literary editor bluntly said, "A lot of content is not so harmonious, not to mention film and television, even physical publishing is quite difficult."
At present, the number of new writers has reached 300,000, 600,000 new works, and 16 billion new words. Although the data is considerable, less than 1 in 10,000 IP has real development value.
Even if it is a head IP, its incubation quality may be uneven. Despite the fire of "Douluo Continent", "Wudong Qiankun", which is read the same amount, was coldly received. The data shows that the TV series adapted from this work has a premiere rating of only 0.33% on Dragon TV, and a Douban score of only 5.0, which also affects the sale of subsequent derivatives.
In addition, despite having high-quality works such as "Qing Yu Nian", "Son-in-law" and "Hello, Li Huanying", Sunray Media's revenue dropped from 3.236 billion yuan in 2019 to 1.217 billion yuan in 2021, and its revenue in the first half of 2022 was only 970 million yuan. In addition, in the first half of 2022, Sunray Media achieved a net profit attributable to Reading of Articles of RMB210 million, compared to RMB290 million in the same period last year. This has also become the main reason for the decline in the gross profit of Reading.
Nowadays, with the stricter environment, the difficulty of Sunray IP development has begun to increase. After the end of the first season of "Qing Yu Nian", the second season has not started for a long time. In the first half of 2022, Sunray Media produced only 1 film.
However, short videos bring hope to the development of web novel IP. Due to the low cost and short cycle of short videos, platforms such as Mi Read use their ups and downs and fragmented content to choose short videos for marketing. Previously, "Crooked Mouth God of War" once attracted attention with "Son-in-law + Crooked Mouth = Top", and its popularity continues to increase on various platforms. Web literature + short video has also become a paradigm.
These skits gradually gained a high level of attention. Mi Read content marketing director Lei Ailin said in 2022 that the most played drama is the first part of the "Little Sweet Wife" series, which has reached 560 million+ views and rushed to Kuaishou's hot search many times. The highest single episode is 120 million views, and in the entire short drama industry, the average number of views of a drama is also millions.
Lei Ailin also said that in the second half of 2021, we will find that whether it is on Weibo or popular variety shows such as "Mao Xuewang", there are many hot searches about our dramas, indicating that our dramas are actually slowly covering first-tier cities.
Although the media is constantly changing, the history of online literature is constantly repeating itself, and there is constantly new hope.
As early as 2020, when Wu Wenhui stepped down as an executive of Reading, Wang Chao, founder of Wenyuan Think Tank, bluntly told Beijing Daily from the right to speak, "Although Wu Wenhui has great appeal in the field of online literature, Tencent is the major shareholder of Reading. The management represented by Wu Wenhui has no support in the board of directors in terms of discourse. Wu Wenhui's departure may be difficult to make a big splash in the field of online literature." And this time, Wu Wenhui's team withdrew from the shareholders of Reading Literature even quietly.
Nowadays, the online literature industry is once again competing for hegemony, and paid platforms and free platforms, short drama platforms and long-form drama platforms all have their own audiences and have a certain right to speak. The web article is still waiting for Wu Wenhui.
This article is an exclusive contribution of Observer.com and may not be reprinted without authorization.