Huang He's actions were by no means wrong. In fact, very few people could have pulled off what Boss Huang did. After all, there are very few capitalists like Boss Huang who possess both immense wealth and abundant resources.
However, Huang He's approach created a significant vulnerability: he could not compel these celebrities to sign contracts with him, stipulating that they could only establish their online presence on Facebook. These celebrities were, after all, showing him favor. If Huang He had insisted on exclusive contracts, it would have transformed from a show of favor into a formal business collaboration, which would have required Boss Huang to pay.
The celebrities who had been officially announced, such as the Four Heavenly Kings of Hong Kong and Taiwan and Zhang Rong, were all major stars in the Chinese entertainment industry in 2000.
If you collaborated with them on the basis of personal favor, they wouldn't ask for a single cent. But if it came to signing contracts, it would be impossible to do so for less than three million.
Their market value dictated this. Signing a low-priced contract with you would diminish their own worth, something absolutely unacceptable for film and television stars and a universally recognized principle within the capital circles. Boss Huang could not alter these rules.
Therefore, rather than formal contract collaborations, it was more advantageous to gain favor freely. While this might seem foolish, it was the reality.
Furthermore, in his previous life, Weibo had never paid any signing fees to the celebrities on its platform. This instilled in Boss Huang a natural perception that these platforms didn't require payment. Celebrities should proactively join such platforms, and Huang boss's invitation was already a form of recognition.
Thus, this vulnerability was presented to Brother Ma. Before his discussion with Zhang Zhidong, Brother Ma had already dispatched three teams. One headed directly to Hong Kong, another to Shanghai, and a third to Beijing. The team heading to Hong Kong was personally led by Tengda's Vice President, Li Dan, to negotiate with all the celebrities in Hong Kong, especially those who had already created accounts on Facebook, requesting them to sign with Tengda and establish their personal spaces on Tengda's future website.
Of course, everyone at Tengda understood that their influence could not compare to Jiangnan's. If they went empty-handed, these celebrities would never change their stance.
Therefore, Li Dan brought fifty million RMB to Hong Kong. Faced with such substantial financial backing, she believed they would make wise decisions.
Li Dan's first target was Zhang Rong, but she missed him. Zhang Rong was reportedly in South Korea participating in a music program.
This left Li Dan slightly disappointed. However, Zhang Rong was not insurmountable. She shifted her focus to the foremost of the Four Heavenly Kings, Andy Lau.
However, Andy Lau was also not in Hong Kong; he was out filming. But Andy Lau's team came forward to communicate with Li Dan. In fact, securing Andy Lau's team would be just as effective.
"Of course, there's no problem!" Andy Lau's team readily agreed upon learning of Li Dan's intentions. Since they had already joined Facebook, joining another similar website presented no issue, especially since the other party was willing to pay for the contract. This was a windfall that only a fool would refuse.
However, when Li Dan's team proposed signing an exclusive agreement, requiring them to leave Facebook after signing and even delete their entire Facebook space account, Andy Lau's team began to hesitate.
Even a fool could see that doing so would completely offend Boss Huang. Would offending such a wealthy individual bring about significant negative repercussions for their artist's future?
"That's unlikely. With the status of Andy Lau, the foremost of the Four Heavenly Kings, would he fear a Huang He?" Li Dan scoffed. "Huang He is indeed wealthy and seems to have an entertainment company, but as far as I know, Huang He is just a newcomer to the entertainment industry. He has no notable works within the industry, nor does he have extensive connections. Offending him would be no big deal; at most, you'd refuse to appear in the dramas or films he produces."
"Does he have the ability to blacklist Mr. Andy Lau?"
"While ordinary minor celebrities might reluctantly pass up such opportunities, would a distinguished superstar like Mr. Andy Lau be concerned about such matters?"
"I believe the opposite is true. Given Mr. Andy Lau's stature, Huang He will definitely need to invite Mr. Andy Lau to act in the future. So, even if he harbored some resentment, he would still shamelessly invite Andy Lau to act and stage a reconciliation. What's the big deal?"
"We are all in the same circle, and we understand each other's disposition very well. As long as there's money to be made, what is a little face worth?"
"Moreover, I feel pity for Mr. Andy Lau. Huang He and Jiangnan Group have leveraged big stars like yourselves to create immense buzz, making his Facebook website the largest social networking site nationwide overnight. Who knows how much money he has made from using you celebrities, yet he hasn't given you a penny, only offering empty favors. What is that? Isn't that exploiting you?"
"Conversely, we at Tengda Group are very practical. As long as you sign with us, you will immediately receive a signing bonus of up to three million yuan. Furthermore, Mr. Andy Lau will not need to exert any effort; he only needs to upload a few photos and post a few lines of text daily. These tasks don't even require Mr. Andy Lau's personal attention; all that's needed is for your team to have someone simply manage it. This will have no impact on Mr. Andy Lau's schedule or lifestyle."
"Imagine, in the past, for Mr. Andy Lau to earn five million yuan, he would have to work his fingers to the bone in a film crew for at least several months."
"But now, it only takes a team member to move their fingers. Mr. Andy Lau can still use this time to film, attend various commercial events, and so on. Isn't this a pie falling from the sky?"
Li Dan indeed possessed a silver tongue and quickly swayed Andy Lau's team. However, it is said that when the matter was presented to Andy Lau himself, he was somewhat resistant, but he couldn't withstand his team's repeated persuasion.
At this time, Andy Lau had just established Yingyi Entertainment Co., Ltd., transforming from a simple artist into a company owner responsible for the normal operation of the entire company. Therefore, regarding financial matters, he could not act solely based on his emotions.
Furthermore, Andy Lau was promoting his "Asian New Director Project," investing over ten million Hong Kong dollars to support six new directors in shooting films, which also consumed a significant portion of Andy Lau's funds. Hence, Andy Lau's company was in dire need of money.
It is worth noting that one of the films shot by these six new directors was titled "Crazy Stone."
Ultimately, Andy Lau agreed to his team's request and completed the signing with Li Dan, becoming the first contracted artist on their website.
With Andy Lau's contract secured, Li Dan began to sweep the entire Hong Kong market.
Li Dan's decision to target Andy Lau first was because Andy Lau was considered the face of the entire Hong Kong and Taiwan entertainment industry at that time, the elder brother, and the shield for everyone.
Once Andy Lau chose to offend Facebook and Huang He and opt for collaboration with Tengda, other artists who had previously collaborated with Facebook had no psychological barriers. With Li Dan's generous financial offer, they immediately chose to sign with Tengda.
After all, Andy Lau was the first to sign. If Huang He decided to cause trouble, he would have to deal with Andy Lau first; they were merely accomplices.
Moreover, if all the artists in Hong Kong signed with Tengda, Jiangnan Group would likely abandon any thoughts of causing trouble, unless they intended to never use any Hong Kong or Taiwan artists for their film and television productions for the rest of their lives.
This was impossible, as if there were a ranking of popular celebrities in China at that time, the top ten superstars would all be artists from Hong Kong and Taiwan. Jiangnan would absolutely not make such a foolish move.
Therefore, those artists who had previously logged into Facebook unhesitatingly chose to abandon Facebook and sign with Tengda instead.
So, what was Boss Huang He doing at this time?
He had already arrived in South Korea.
It was now December 12, 2002, and the second World Cyber Games (WCG) was about to open on December 20th. The players from Jiangnan Electronic Sports Club, a subsidiary of Jiangnan Group, had practically taken over all the WCG spots. The entire Jiangnan Electronic Sports Club represented the entire Chinese delegation.
However, this was not the sole reason for Boss Huang's arrival in South Korea. The real reason was that on December 15th, before the WCG commenced, a Warcraft III China-USA arena match, long anticipated by players from both countries, would unfold in South Korea.
While the timing might have been somewhat tight for American esports players, a month was sufficient to assemble all the strong players from the United States and conduct a public national competition to select five participants for this China-USA arena match.
This match was not considered a significant event by Americans, as they participated in numerous competitions. Apart from Warcraft III players, very few Americans cared about this particular match.
But in China, it was entirely different. Due to the immense influence of the Warcraft III National Finals, when Blizzard's president personally extended a competition invitation to Chinese Warcraft III players via telephone on stage, it immediately stirred up a massive wave across the nation.
Indeed, around 2002, Sino-US relations were also in a rather poor state. After all, the harm inflicted upon the Chinese people by the Americans was something that many Chinese people could not forget.
However, to speak objectively, the United States was in a position of comprehensive advantage at the time, and China could not find any area where they could defeat the Americans. The Chinese were in a state of complete inferiority, which led to the emergence of countless subservient intellectuals who believed from the core of their being that America was great.
But the majority of ordinary Chinese people yearned to defeat America. Therefore, when a match initiated by the Americans appeared, all Chinese people collectively erupted.
Whether they were gamers or not, when they heard the news, they became fans of the Chinese delegation, waving their fists and roaring with the determination to defeat those Americans and prove that China was not inferior to any country or any nation in the world.
Driven by this sentiment, the match garnered an unimaginable level of attention domestically. Not only gaming-related media but also many traditional and official media outlets began to report on it.
The most notable aspect was that CCTV Sports Channel dispatched a live broadcast team to South Korea to provide live coverage of the entire match.
Yes, you read that correctly – live coverage of the entire match, not just snippets of exciting moments extracted from over ten hours of recorded gameplay to form a brief news report, as had been the case before.
It was to be a live broadcast from start to finish, similar to a football match, covering the entire arena match process, which was expected to last approximately three hours.
This meant that the Sports Channel would have to dedicate almost an entire afternoon's programming to this match, a phenomenon unprecedented in the history of Chinese game esports, and one that had not even occurred in 2021.
The outcome was that the confrontation between China and the United States had materialized ahead of schedule.
Of course, a significant reason for this scenario was that Huang He had guaranteed someone that the Chinese team's strength completely crushed the American players and that the Chinese team was destined to win this time. This was a great opportunity to boost national confidence; otherwise, this matter might not have been so successful.
After all, if the team lost in front of the entire Chinese population, the blow would be too great. Therefore, this time, the Chinese team absolutely had to win.
Huang He himself also went to South Korea to oversee the operations, ensuring that the Chinese team would win this competition!