Zhi Ling joined the Google team. Such an Oriental beauty was easily accepted by everyone. As for whether she could truly establish herself, that would depend on her future achievements.
KPCB's investment progress with Overture and Google was not very fast. There were significant differences in their demands, and the mutual adjustment was difficult. Especially since He Zhengcheng was not short of money, it was hard for KPCB to acquire shares at a low price.
The emergence of Music Player perhaps changed a lot. Overture established its own forum to collect user feedback and made improvements based on it. Of course, some fundamental principles could not be compromised, such as making pirated music downloads easier, which was absolutely not allowed on Music Player.
"We do not support piracy!" This was Overture's unified response.
This answer was somewhat like burying one's head in the sand, because Music Player could convert CD music into MP3 format and then share it with other users via software, email, and forums. Initially, this software only circulated in universities, but it quickly spread to society, and because it consumed enormous bandwidth, some schools banned the software.
The market quickly saw the emergence of imitators, such as Sean Fanning and Sean Parker's Napster, as well as Gnutella, Napigator, and Wrapster.
These software, more or less, had many improvements, such as completely lifting restrictions on pirated music. However, Music Player still had more stable services, was more concise and easy to use, and was an excellent music player.
Even if piracy was somewhat troublesome, it was still more attractive. Of course, the most important thing was the emergence of forums, which gave everyone more places to discuss. The initial mode of playlists also appeared, but the download sources in the playlists were prone to becoming invalid, and users still had to search for them themselves.
"Are we really going to transition into a legitimate music sales platform?" Shi Hongwen asked.
"Of course, this is business. Otherwise, it's piracy, and we can't keep doing piracy," He Zhengcheng replied.
"But if we sell legitimate music, our current users might quickly disappear," Shi Hongwen said.
"Users disappearing is better than shutting down due to legal lawsuits," He Zhengcheng countered.
"What's your plan?" Shi Hongwen asked.
"I'm thinking that we encrypt all legitimate music, and everyone can only play the downloaded music on our player. Of course, we also need to create an authorization method to license MP3 device manufacturers. Any company authorized by us can use Music Player to import user-downloaded music files into their players," He Zhengcheng explained.
"That's great! This is a good method," Shi Hongwen exclaimed.
"Of course, it's very complex. We need more manpower," said Patriarch George, one of their partners.
"I also agree. Since it's convenient to download and use legitimate music, there's no need for us to support piracy," Yul Smith added.
"So, fundraising is essential. It's just that they currently can't accurately value us. How much is our huge user base truly worth, and how many users will remain after legitimization? These are all problems we must face," He Zhengcheng stated.
"And negotiating with music companies is also a complex issue," Shi Hongwen pointed out.
"You know that too?" He Zhengcheng asked in surprise.
"Nonsense, am I that stupid?" Shi Hongwen retorted.
"Then why did you choose this direction for entrepreneurship? If we had done PayPal, it wouldn't have been so troublesome," He Zhengcheng mused.
"You still can't forget your third-party payment idea. For so long, no one has developed it, so the market must not need it," Shi Hongwen said.
Well, the need for this was indeed not great at this stage, but the market was developing rapidly, and third-party payments themselves could create demand. This kind of thing was hard to explain to them, as these people hadn't considered it from the perspective of merchants and users; looking purely from a platform perspective, they naturally concluded that it wasn't needed for now.
"When we have time, we'll help you develop it," Yul Smith offered.
"Forget it, you'll develop it and I'll be the only one using it," He Zhengcheng said.
"No, we'll use it together. You can use it to transfer money to us," Patriarch George chimed in.
"..." That was truly shameless.
The three of them didn't chat for long. The task of software development and improvement was heavy, and funds were a bit tight. To go legitimate, they first had to secure servers, but who would invest such a large sum of money?
Money wasn't the most important thing. The key was that this idea really needed to be executed, and a CEO without capability truly couldn't pull it off. Moreover, it required strong public opinion and legal support. Let's take Webvan as an example; this company would go public in the second half of this year, but its qualifications did not meet the listing conditions. However, with the support of companies like Sequoia Capital and Goldman Sachs, it still managed to get listed.
Venture capital was not that easy to do. Why did Russia's venture capital magnate, Yuri Milner, make such huge concessions? It was precisely because he didn't have enough resources on Wall Street.
Therefore, introducing a strong collaborator was indispensable, otherwise, legal lawsuits could ruin Overture.
So, in order to gain better living space, his entanglement with KPCB continued.
"Someone is looking for me, who is it?" He Zhengcheng received a call from Ji Jiasheng; someone wanted to meet him.
"Huang Qifu, a tenured professor at MIT, and a partner at Long-Term Capital Management," Ji Jiasheng replied.
"Why is he looking for me? Is it because…" He Zhengcheng was a bit worried, wondering if his appearance had caused the company even greater losses.
In these past few months, he had been busy with his own affairs. Long-Term Capital Management had long been carved up by several major investment banks on Wall Street. It was said that $5 billion had been injected this time, and it seemed to be making substantial profits now.
A black swan is always a black swan. If it survives, the market will return to normal. It was just a pity that, reportedly, all the original shareholders of Long-Term Capital Management were out.
Although not completely empty-handed, it wasn't far off. Anyway, these people were lucky not to have gone bankrupt.
Fortunately, they were out of money; otherwise, who knows if they would have been targeted by hired assassins.
"It's not as serious as you think. He just wants to meet you, the person who first discovered Long-Term Capital Management's crisis," Ji Jiasheng reassured him.
"How did he find you? Am I not in America?" He Zhengcheng asked.
"How would he know that? We haven't publicized it!" Ji Jiasheng said.
"Oh! Do I really have to go see him?" He Zhengcheng asked.
"It doesn't hurt to meet him," Ji Jiasheng advised.
"Then I'll go meet him," He Zhengcheng agreed.
"Are you coming back for Chinese New Year?" Ji Jiasheng asked.
"Of course I'm coming back. Why haven't you been back for so long?" He Zhengcheng replied.
"Things here are complicated. We'll talk when you get back!" Ji Jiasheng said.
"Oh!" He Zhengcheng hung up the phone. He had no impression of this Huang Qifu at all, so he seemed to be a relatively low-key person.
"Low-key, who said that?" Daisy Green asked.
He Zhengcheng called Daisy Green at Goldman Sachs for advice, and unexpectedly received a surprising answer.
This Huang Qifu, after graduation, had taught at MIT and Stanford University, became a tenured professor at MIT at 34, a full professor at the Sloan School at 35, and received a distinguished professorship at 36. After leaving MIT at 39, he also received the title of J.C. Penney Professor of Finance.
His book, "Foundations of Financial Economics," which he spearheaded at 35, is still a classic textbook in global financial economics. He was a good friend and both a student and peer of two Nobel laureates, Merton and Scholes... Well, the life of an academic prodigy was difficult for him to comprehend, and the central banks of various countries were not his desired goal.
"His relationship with our boss, Kozan, is extraordinary. If you want to cooperate with him, you must consider it carefully!" Daisy Green warned.
Damn, there really was a whole bunch of messy stuff. It turned out that Huang Qifu had once "betrayed" Goldman Sachs' boss, Kozan...