Chapter 2450: Not guilty of piracy

After a long conversation, Boss Ma basically agreed to Zhou Buqi’s proposal.

However, there are two prerequisites.

1. PayPal successfully spun off from eBay and went public;

Second, Zhou Buqi can really get control of PayPal.

From Zhou Buqi's point of view, this is a sure thing.

If PayPal and Alipay can reach a strategic cooperation, it will be a good thing for both parties. It is originally an overseas market and a domestic market, and they are almost inseparable.

Both parties develop in their respective territories and there is no competition.

This is the main premise for cooperation.

As long as the cooperation is achieved, Zhou Buqi can feel at ease, even if he has found a direction for PayPal's long-term future development. He is also somewhat unfamiliar with the place overseas, especially knowing almost nothing about PayPal. It is difficult for him to stand on the front desk to lead PayPal. It is enough to stand behind the scenes and provide some strategic guidance.

Moreover, his boastful remarks just now were not entirely half-bragging and half-joking.

What Alipay does in China is really dangerous.

The movement is a bit too big.

Once something happens in the future, it may be cut off from the middle, and the architecture of Boss Ma’s Internet financial system will fail.

This is somewhat of a pity.

There is no ambition, but no way to realize it.

Putting PayPal into operation would at least leave him a way to continue to develop his business ambitions, allowing him to rely on PayPal to continue to do things that he failed to do with Alipay.

When he really gets to that point, Boss Ma will be able to feel the loyalty of Boss Zhou.

Next, Zhou Buqi accepted Boss Ma's invitation and walked around Alibaba's headquarters, receiving a warm welcome from everyone.

Zhou Buqi couldn't resist the kindness, so he laughed and said: "If anyone wants to work at Ziweixing, you can send your resume to our company and we guarantee that the interview will be arranged quickly and efficiently!"

When he was about to leave Ali, Boss Ma said another thing, "By the way, do you know about anti-piracy?"

Zhou Buqi asked: "What's the matter?"

Boss Ma said angrily: "You are almost becoming a professional pirate!"

Zhou Buqi was a little confused, "What do you mean? What kind of piracy are you talking about? Literary piracy? Ziweixing has the largest library of genuine literature in the country. Music piracy? Video piracy? The largest copyright holder in the country is Jieyu Media. Who am I to pirate?”

Boss Ma said: "Let's not talk about anything else, let's just talk about film and television piracy. There are three major piracy platforms in China, one is Baidu Video, one is Weidian Video, and the other is Kuaibo."

"I go!"

Zhou Buqi was stunned.

He really didn't expect that Weidian Video would become a product as famous as Qvod.

Boss Ma said: "The video streaming industry is so hot now, and several major platforms are fighting like crazy to grab the copyright. Because they can't afford the film and television rights, even Tudou can't survive, so they merged into Youku. The result is great, Others spent more than a billion to buy the genuine film and television copyrights, but you have pirated them without spending a penny."

Zhou Buqi had a black line on his forehead, "I don't know about this at all."

Actually, you don’t need to know.

You can basically guess it.

There are currently two major search platforms in China, one is Baidu and the other is Weidian. After so many years of development, Baidu dominates on the PC side and Weidian is king on the mobile side.

Each has its own advantages.

The competition is fierce.

This means that neither party can give in.

Just like when two masters with similar martial arts fight, whoever has less bottom line will win. The one who behaves like a gentleman is usually the loser. Users like to watch free pirated content, so pirated resources have become a very important search requirement on search engines.

This is very difficult.

If Baidu has similar resources but Weidian does not, this will greatly weaken Weidian's market competitiveness.

Therefore, Ziweixing’s Toutiao Literature has the largest library of genuine literature in the country, but also has the largest library of pirated literature in the country because of its search engine business.

As a result, many authors will be very critical if they don't know the reason, scolding the platform for being too ugly and deliberately piracy of their literary works, which seriously infringes on the rights of authors.

The film and television industry is even more serious. Other video streaming platforms have spent at least several hundred million or more than one billion to purchase genuine copyrights, only to have them stolen...

Whether it is legally or morally, it cannot be justified.

There is an even more important point.

That is, the country has introduced new major policies to protect the legitimate rights and interests of film and television content.

Boss Ma said: "I have heard that several domestic streaming media platforms are joining forces to fight against you pirate manufacturers..."

"What pirate manufacturer?" Zhou Buqi interrupted him angrily, "Don't speak so harshly. I was just careless and didn't pay attention to this business. I am the largest genuine copyright holder in the country, what else can I do? Stealing from yourself?”

Boss Ma said: "Anyway, it's up to you. If there is a collective crusade, it will bring you industry infamy. Don't blame me for not reminding you. You have to solve it quickly. If after the Spring Festival, there will be proposals at the two sessions, That’s trouble.”

This is well intentioned.

Zhou Buqi took the situation seriously and said, "Okay, I understand, I will handle it."

On the way back to the Magic City from Hangzhou.

Zhou Buqi called Zhang Yiming and criticized him rudely, "Micro Video? What does this mean? I told you that Ziweixing will not do video streaming at this stage!"

Zhang Yiming said: "This is not a streaming media platform, it is a playback software..."

"Stop playing with me on the edge!"

"Ok, I see."

"Hollywood has filed a lawsuit with the United Nations several times. Others don't know, but you still don't know? How many times have I told you that there will definitely be policy adjustments in the country, and there will definitely be more sanctions. Supervision of genuine film and television content. Is it ridiculous that you are still engaging in piracy here?"

Zhou Buqi was a little angry.

Zhang Yiming explained: "Weidian Video does not provide pirated content, it is content shared between users. We only provide a software and a platform."

This technical logic is actually the same as Qvod.

Each user is a node.

A new user can download pirated content from other nodes, and then becomes a new node, providing download resources for the next new user.

The product logic is the same as the search platform.

In the past few years, Baidu and Weidian have been sued many times.

Most have won their cases.

The court held that Baidu and Weidian did not provide pirated content. They were just platforms that aggregated some content on the Internet.

The collected content includes both genuine content and pirated content.

Those who infringe are the producers of pirated content, not content aggregators like search engines.

Therefore, these search platforms that provide pirated content are not guilty.

This reason is actually very far-fetched.

It's a bit protectionist.

The state is protecting Baidu and Weidian so that they will not be defeated by foreign Google. When Google withdraws from the domestic market, a lot of relevant precedents have appeared, and they have been applied for many years, so it will be difficult to change them.

Now, Baidu Video and Weidian Video launched by Baidu and Ziweixing are using this kind of product logic to engage in piracy.

Weidian Video does not provide pirated content.

Pirated content is shared between users, and the platform does not bear responsibility.

This is a bit too naive.

Still thinking about taking advantage of loopholes every day?

Zhou Buqi said: "Don't think about legal logic with simple thinking. China is now centered on economic construction. How big is the video streaming industry? There are several listed companies with a market value of billions of dollars. .How much value can be created by several pirated software? Have you picked up the sesame seeds and lost the watermelon? Within the framework of economic protectionism, we must protect the development of genuine video streaming platforms and severely crack down on piracy!"

The so-called economic construction as the center means that everything is centered on economic development.

Everything else must give way.

Social problems such as rampant counterfeiting, food health, environmental pollution, severe smog, etc. are actually all caused by this, and we must make concessions for economic development.

If the number of genuine products is tens of billions and the number of pirated products is only several billion, then of course we must crack down on piracy at all costs to protect those tens of billions of products.

If the genuine ones are worth billions, and the pirated ones are tens of billions... then the genuine ones should rest for now, piracy is not guilty.

Baidu has a market value of tens of billions of dollars. If you want to sue Baidu for piracy and infringement... you can, first you have to prove that playing with genuine products can create greater economic value than playing pirated versions.

Nowadays, the domestic genuine video streaming industry is booming, and it is already a business worth tens of billions or even hundreds of billions of dollars.

This is hard power.

Who can still attack the tower?

Isn't that the same as seeking death?

The core reason for Kuaibo’s death was not the dissemination of video content inappropriate for children.

Zhang Yiming was criticized a lot and made a decisive decision, "Then stop this business, um... just cut off the Weidian Video business."

Zhou Buqi said: "Stop it now!"

"Where's Baidu?"

"Don't worry about them, they are slow to react... you have to peel off a layer of skin."

"Well... there is one more thing." Zhang Yiming came to the key point, "What about the network disk?"

Zhou Buqi raised his eyebrows, "Network disk?"

Zhang Yiming said: "Both Baidu Video and Weidian Video are not considered core products, and their combined share cannot compare with Kuaibo. Baidu and Weidian's real efforts in film and television piracy are actually the network disk business. It’s Baidu Netdisk and Weidian Cloud Disk.”

"Well……"

Zhou Buqi doesn't have much to say.

Zhang Yiming continued: "Now more and more users are watching long videos online through cloud disks. Searching is simple, sharing is easy, the space is larger, and it can be cross-platform, which has great advantages. This is also the cloud disk business The core competitiveness.”

Zhou Buqi coughed and said, "Don't touch the cloud disk business yet."

The cloud disk industry is not comparable to those simple pirated audio and video software.

Dropbox, a foreign cloud disk manufacturer, has just over 50 million users and a market valuation of US$10 billion.

Both Baidu Netdisk and Weidian Cloud Disk have more than 100 million users. What is the valuation?

Such a big deal cannot be overturned by the genuine video streaming industry, and the two sides can start a long-term tug-of-war.

As long as the cloud disk business can create enough value, piracy is not a crime.