Heh, 'A Chinese Ghost Story' was written by me. That guy attacking 'A Chinese Ghost Story' is basically attacking me. Do you think I'd tell you that?
After casually replying that he just didn't like him, the phone beside him suddenly rang.
Glancing at the caller ID, it was Wuyue again.
"I say, Wuyue, this time I didn't wake you up, right?"
Huang Yifan said as he picked up the phone.
"White Boss, you're joking. Last time was just a joke."
"I was joking too."
"Hahaha, White Boss really has a sense of humor. Actually, I'm calling today to invite you to participate in Lingdian's Writing Training Camp."
"Lingdian Writing Training Camp?"
"Yeah. It's an event organized by Lingdian for writing exchange and training. Most of the participants are authors from Lingdian Chinese Web. The focus is on improving writing skills and sharing experiences. Of course, we'll also share data collected by the platform, like writing statistics, market trends, reader age groups, and so on."
"Sounds pretty good."
Huang Yifan nodded.
Exchanging writing experience wasn't particularly important to him.
Over the past few days, he had figured something out. Coming to this world, his most important goal wasn't to become some top-tier elite author or to write the most incredible works, but to spread and promote the five thousand years of Chinese culture from his previous life. Of course, in doing so, it was also necessary for him to raise his own status and influence. Otherwise, for certain classics and philosophical works, without sufficient standing, it would be impossible to spread them across the entire Huaguo.
What interested Huang Yifan more was the "writing data" Wuyue mentioned.
What is writing data?
It's not about techniques or experience. Put simply, it's user data.
What kind of books do readers like?
What are their tastes?
What styles do different age groups prefer?
These are all innate user data.
If you go against this data and write something readers aren't interested in, for example, insisting on writing wuxia when the market for it is already dead, then no matter how well you write it, few people will read it. Unless your work is so extraordinary that it revives the entire genre.
On the other hand, if you follow this data and write what readers enjoy, like the currently popular fantasy genre, then even if your writing is average, the massive audience means people will still read it. And if your work is even slightly better, you can achieve greater success and recognition than in other genres.
That is writing data.
It has nothing to do with writing techniques, yet it still greatly affects a work's popularity.
Although Huang Yifan was somewhat interested in writing skills, he cared far more about market direction and reader data.
Just like now, if he hadn't understood that readers like satisfying, fast-payoff stories and simple, noob-style writing, how could there have been 'How a Bad Guy Is Made' or 'The School Belle's Bodyguard'?
Still, if this were his previous life, Huang Yifan would have rushed to attend such a training camp immediately. Unfortunately, thinking about his current identity as just a high school student, he shook his head. Better to wait a few years. Maybe he could attend university, or even in his senior year of high school. But right now, as just a first-year student, wouldn't his presence shock everyone?
"Well, Wuyue, I've been pretty busy lately. I might not have time."
"Ah, no time?"
Wuyue sounded a bit troubled and said, "Actually, White Boss, with your level, whether you attend or not doesn't really matter. I don't think many authors at Lingdian could offer you much guidance. To be honest, inviting you this time is mainly to ask for your help."
"Help?"
"Yes."
"What kind of help?"
"I'm not sure how to explain it. Let me start from the beginning. I believe you know that Huanyue and Lianheng recently used the national censorship issue to poach many of our authors. Writers like Badao have all been taken. Lingdian already had a weak foundation, and after this wave of poaching, we've been badly hurt. Inviting you to this training camp is to ask if you could help us by sharing your experience and techniques in writing noob-style novels with everyone, including the authors attending."
"I see."
Wuyue's sincerity made Huang Yifan pause.
He was aware of Lingdian's current situation. After all, he had personally experienced the mass deletions when Lingdian was hit.
Now that Lingdian had suffered heavy losses, as one of its authors, he didn't want to see it decline either.
Forget it.
He'd go.
No matter what, he was still a Lingdian author. Helping Lingdian was, in a way, helping himself. Besides, Lingdian had the courage and vision to heavily promote him, a mere one-star author. Supporting a platform like that wasn't wrong. And he believed that if he helped them now, Lingdian would remember it and offer him even greater support in the future.
So, setting aside concerns about his age, he agreed, "Alright, I'll attend when the time comes."
...
After receiving Huang Yifan's manuscript, Ji Ziping, editor-in-chief of 'Youth Literature', immediately arranged for the article titled "All Under Heaven Bustle for Profit; All Under Heaven Stir for Gain" to be published.
Of course, Ji Ziping fully understood that this was essentially an attack piece, even a scathing one. But the thing was, its level of sophistication was incredibly high. Not to mention the opening line, "All under heaven bustle for profit," even the discussion about prose needing "a loose form but a unified spirit" was insightful and held strong literary value. A piece like this, even if it were a battle manifesto, he would still publish it.
As for the aftermath, the author Nianhua would likely see his reputation plummet from the backlash. But Ji Ziping didn't care. After all, Nianhua had chosen to attack a competing author during a personal interview for his own benefit. Now that he had run into someone willing to stand up against him, he would just have to endure the consequences. Let him experience the methods of a true master and learn how to behave.
'Youth Literature' was a weekly publication, and this latest issue just happened to include Huang Yifan's article.
By the afternoon of the next day, the magazine had already been distributed across sales channels nationwide.
And when readers turned to Huang Yifan's piece, "All Under Heaven Bustle for Profit," many slammed the table in excitement, shouting, "Good! Good! Good!" Such writing only became more flavorful and philosophical the more one read it.
That very night, because of this article, the 'Youth Literature' forum was flooded by passionate readers, completely overwhelmed with posts.
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