While the remark about Huang He’s seclusion had been quite startling, everyone present was still in good spirits. After all, it was clear that Jiangnan Group intended to support the entire sci-fi industry. If they could truly cooperate with Jiangnan Group, their entire lives would ascend to a new level.
Setting aside other benefits, consider Xiao Qian. He was originally just an ordinary company employee, not from a formal literary background.
His writing was mediocre at best. One couldn’t say it was unreadable, but it was essentially a factual account. A couple of years ago, if this fellow had appeared before them, the people present probably wouldn't have even given him a second glance!
But what had Xiao Qian become now?
He was hailed by the media as the foremost fantasy writer, known as China’s Tolkien, the male JK Rowling, the youngest titan of Chinese literature, and the best-selling novelist in Chinese history. Under the frenzied praise of the media, he was just short of becoming the number one figure in Chinese literature.
Of course, no one in the literary circles thought highly of him. Even the Writers Association hadn't sent him an invitation to join.
Naturally, this fellow was self-aware enough not to apply to join any writers association. He remained out of step with the traditional literary circles, essentially being completely ostracized.
Logically, Xiao Qian, being ostracized, should have fallen into despair. However, he recently appeared on the Hurun Writers List, a ranking of writers' incomes that debuted this year. Xiao Qian's name was at the very top, with an income of 300 million RMB, looking down on all his peers.
And this was all documented income, entirely from legitimate novel royalties and revenue shares from television dramas and movies. Even more exaggerated was the revenue share from blind boxes.
After the TV drama "Journey to the Misty World" became a huge hit, the related blind boxes also became explosively popular across the country.
Firstly, the pricing of this set of blind boxes was different from Jiangnan’s usual 10 yuan per box; it was 30 yuan per box, immediately distinguishing it in terms of price.
However, the ordinary version was a set of "Journey to the Misty World" totaling 24 volumes. It wasn’t too bad a deal, as a single volume of "Journey to the Misty World" also cost 30 yuan when sold publicly.
But this particular set of "Journey to the Misty World" was different. It was specially printed, with newly designed covers and illustrations. It also included a movie character bookmark, making this set of "Journey to the Misty World" much more valuable for collectors than the ordinary version.
Consequently, a complete set of 24 volumes of "Journey to the Misty World" was sold on the network for a high price of 1000 yuan on the Jiangnan Mall, significantly more than simply buying the blind boxes. This was just for the ordinary version, with the same probability of obtaining it. And with a total of 48 million copies, or 20 million sets, sales were still explosive.
Not to mention the rare version in this set of blind boxes, which was a collection of four volumes of "Journey to the Misty World" side stories created by a famous beautiful comic artist invited by Jiangnan Group. It was even rarer.
The final deluxe version was truly extraordinary. It was a limited edition of 10,000 copies of the 49th volume of "Journey to the Misty World," featuring Xiao Qian’s personal signature on the first page.
Although the content did not involve the main story, it included various images, behind-the-scenes stories, and even a data disk containing 100 minutes of unreleased television drama footage.
Even the data disk itself was custom-made, designed to resemble Xiao Qian’s spatial bracelet. With a capacity of 10GB, it was a colossal storage capacity for a data disk. It was impossible to obtain such a high-capacity data disk through normal channels.
Furthermore, the bracelet had a jade casing and was exquisitely designed, allowing it to be worn directly on the wrist, making it extremely valuable for collection. In fact, on websites, such a data disk had been auctioned for 50,000 RMB, even more expensive than the 49th volume, yet it was difficult to find.
Judging by the release quantity, this set of blind boxes had sold for over 300 million yuan in total. Based on the profit sharing, Xiao Qian would receive a staggering 40 million yuan in income.
But the merchandise for "Journey to the Misty World" didn't stop there. With the explosion of popularity of "Journey to the Misty World," Jiangnan Group seized the opportunity to establish Jiangnan Group Brand Operations Company, entrusting the operation of all prominent IPs under Jiangnan Group to this company.
This company was solely responsible for the external licensing of various literary, television drama, and film IPs held by Jiangnan Group. The entire process was remarkably simple and smooth; one didn't even need to have a face-to-face meeting with any of the company's employees.
As long as one had a Jiangnan account, activated a Jiangnan wallet, and directly accessed the company's website, entered relevant company information, and paid the required fees, they could obtain the IP authorization for corresponding products. They could then directly print various IP-related character images on their own product packaging.
Of course, this only applied to the simple use of IP images. For more in-depth collaborations, such as joint promotions, one would still need to contact and coordinate with the company's employees for marketing.
However, even these could be completed entirely online, without any offline meetings. The entire process was astonishingly fast.
And the prices were quite reasonable. For simple IP image authorization, the cost varied depending on the product type, company size, product category, and quantity. The cheapest option was around 3000 yuan to obtain an IP authorization.
The most expensive ones were around 1 million yuan. For instance, the marketing department of Caoshanhu Toothpaste tried purchasing an IP image authorization online. Indeed, it only cost 1 million yuan, and as a result, all Caoshanhu Toothpaste tubes were emblazoned with Li Qiang's character image.
This situation led to an abundance of related IP image authorizations on the market. At the same time, many pirated versions were also trying to blend in, thereby driving down the overall price of IP authorization.
However, this, in turn, reduced the likelihood of piracy appearing.
Many companies were not unwilling to use genuine IP for promotion, but the cost and complexity of acquiring IPs from well-known enterprises were too high, and many small businesses were reluctant to engage in such matters.
But when the process was simplified to the point where it could be completed solely with a computer, and these small businesses could obtain genuine authorization for just a few thousand yuan with a very simple process, why wouldn't they?
After all, Jiangnan Group had employed a unique strategy in combating piracy. It was rumored that Jiangnan Group had designated a market supervisor in every city. The job of this supervisor was to frequent various malls and supermarkets across the city daily, searching for any products featuring Jiangnan Group's IP images, and then scanning the authorization QR code on the product.
This QR code was bound to the IP when Jiangnan Group sold it. The QR code was very small, about the size of a fingernail. Once an enterprise purchased IP authorization, they would receive an authorization QR code.
This QR code was required to be printed on the product packaging. The supervisor would simply scan the QR code with a mobile network-enabled device and immediately obtain all the information about the QR code to check if it was indeed a genuine authorization.
If it was discovered that no authorization was obtained, or the QR code was fake, or there was no QR code at all, Jiangnan Group would immediately initiate legal proceedings. Jiangnan Group's legal department now had to handle thousands of legal-related matters daily, prompting the relevant departments to establish a dedicated court within the park to cooperate in handling legal issues within legal and compliant frameworks.
Therefore, once piracy was discovered, it would immediately face concentrated attacks, akin to a hail of bullets.
Thus, many pirated enterprises could evade detection by changing their factory locations, breaking themselves into smaller units, and similar tactics. However, for the sake of a mere few thousand yuan in authorization fees, hiding and fleeing like this would be too disadvantageous.
Therefore, unless it was an enterprise that operated entirely in the shadows, normal businesses would opt to purchase IP authorization cheaply. After all, for a small enterprise, IP authorization was only a matter of a few thousand or tens of thousands of yuan.
When the IP authorization fees reached over 100,000 yuan, it generally involved medium-sized enterprises. These enterprises had established operations and could not simply disappear.
Many people might not know that through this dedicated IP authorization enterprise and platform, Jiangnan Group had earned a colossal revenue of over 5 billion RMB in the first half of 2005. Of this, the IP authorization revenue belonging to "Journey to the Misty World" reached 1 billion yuan.
As the author of "Journey to the Misty World," Xiao Qian also received tens of millions of yuan.
With all these revenues combined, Xiao Qian’s income in the first half of 2005 reached approximately 300 million RMB, making him the undisputed king among all writers, ten times higher than the second-ranked Zheng Yuanjie.
It is worth mentioning that Zheng Yuanjie also had not joined the Writers Association at this time. Thus, a rather peculiar situation emerged on the income rankings.
Namely, the top two on the writers’ income ranking were both non-professionals outside the Writers Association, earning more than ten times the combined income of the remaining eight. This led many authors to exclaim that times had changed, and human hearts were not what they used to be.
Coincidentally, it also made everyone envious.
Ahem, I've strayed quite far from the topic. In any case, with Xiao Qian as an example, everyone present was filled with expectations for cooperation with Mr. Huang. What if their works were favored by Huang He and adapted like "Journey to the Misty World"? Wouldn't that be an instant elevation?
“Mr. Huang, could you take a look and see if any of our works might be worthy of adaptation by Jiangnan Group!” someone asked. This person had received the Readers’ Choice Award, which was a very ordinary award. His work was also just so-so, and he knew himself that he was unlikely to have the opportunity to cooperate with Jiangnan Group.
Therefore, he asked without any reservations, and his question ignited the burning desire in everyone’s hearts. Thus, all of them looked at Huang He with fervent gazes.
“There are three books that can be adapted! If these authors are willing, we can sign contracts on the spot!” Huang He said directly. The entire venue immediately erupted in a frenzy, and even the writers themselves became passionate. The opportunity for instant wealth was right now!