Chapter 4: The Italian Sun Newspaper

The first task Gao Da assigned to Luo Lun was to own a legitimate newspaper.

Whether by purchasing an existing newspaper or starting one from scratch, Gao Da only required a result.

In order to demonstrate his capabilities to Gao Da, Luo Lun took this task very seriously.

In just two days, he investigated the existing newspaper organizations in Italy and screened out those with potential that could possibly be acquired.

Il Sole 24 Ore (The 24-Hour Sun Newspaper)—this was the list of newspapers Luo Lun finally provided.

This was a newspaper founded last year, currently only having a certain degree of popularity in the business circles of Milan.

But this newspaper persisted until later generations, and even became one of the top ten newspaper media outlets in Italy.

Being able to achieve such results meant that the potential of this newspaper was beyond doubt.

This also meant that Luo Lun, who selected this newspaper, had an absolutely unique and excellent eye for talent.

After determining the acquisition target, the next task Gao Da gave Luo Lun was to properly acquire this newspaper named The Sun Newspaper.

This also reflected the benefits of having subordinates to command; at least Gao Da did not have to personally do certain things despite his status as a Prince.

The path to acquisition was relatively smooth.

At this time, The Sun Newspaper was ultimately just a small newspaper, and the founder could not possibly resist the temptation of Gao Da's offer to buy it at a premium.

From proposing the acquisition of the newspaper to obtaining all the shares of The Sun Newspaper, it took Gao Da less than four days.

Unfortunately, precisely because The Sun Newspaper was currently still a small newspaper, the number of newspapers that could be sold daily was only about 1, 00 copies; this sales volume was difficult even to support the newspaper itself.

However, Gao Da's goal was not to make the newspaper profitable immediately. The role of a newspaper was not to earn that little bit of money; Gao Da's goal was to have cheaper and more popular newspapers fill the streets of Italy to increase his control over public opinion in Italy.

Whether continuing to stay in Italy or seeking the opportunity to become the King of Spain in the future, the experience in the newspaper industry could allow Gao Da to complete the laying of an opinion empire more smoothly.

After controlling public opinion, it would become much easier to do whatever he wanted. At least with the support of the public, Gao Da would occupy the initiative.

But having said that, compared to other small and medium-sized private newspapers, the The Sun Newspaper controlled by Gao Da still had many advantages.

At least by relying on his status as an Italian Prince, Gao Da could publish some content that was not easy to get approved, such as political news that the public cared about more.

This was not the era of later generations where newspapers had no sales at all. If there was good news and content, it was still very simple for a newspaper to expand its sales and achieve profitability.

As Gao Da's only subordinate at present, Luo Lun naturally took charge of the Italian The Sun Newspaper without hesitation and was fully responsible for the expansion of The Sun Newspaper.

Gao Da formulated several plans for Luo Lun.

First, within the next two years, the daily sales of The Sun Newspaper should be increased from 1, 00 copies to at least 7, 00 copies.

Considering that the location of The Sun Newspaper was Milan, a prosperous city in northern Italy, and it could also radiate to Turin and Genoa, which were relatively close, such a sales requirement was actually not high.

The second requirement was that The Sun Newspaper must become one of the well-known newspaper media in northern Italy and have a certain degree of credibility among the people.

If the content published by the newspaper could not be believed by the public, then there would be no need for the newspaper to exist.

After all, the primary purpose of achieving opinion manipulation was to make the public believe in the opinion, which was also one of Gao Da's expectations for Luo Lun.

There was also the goal of making The Sun Newspaper profitable within two years and controlling as many newspapers as possible.

Although Gao Da's original intention was not to make money through newspapers, since this industry could be self-sufficient, Gao Da would certainly use the funds for more important places.

As for founding or acquiring more newspapers, it was naturally to strengthen the power of public opinion in Gao Da's hands.

In Gao Da's layout, The Sun Newspaper would focus on reporting political news and international events in the future, while some small newspapers could fill the void of entertainment news and various gossip.

After all, if a newspaper with high credibility were to report some lace news and gossip, it would definitely destroy the credibility of the newspaper.

While Luo Lun was diligently executing Gao Da's tasks, Gao Da was already contemplating while looking at the existing map of the Kingdom of Italy.

Although the fragmented Yapingningbandao had basically been unified into a complete Kingdom of Italy, there were still two places that had not returned to the embrace of Italy.

The Venice region in the north was still controlled by the Austrian Empire, and Rome, the most important city for Italy, still belonged to the Papal States.

Although the Papal States looked like the soft persimmon, unfortunately, Falanxi stood behind the Papal States.

France at this time was not the surrendering party mocked in World War II, but the Falanxi Empire bathing in the afterglow of Napoleon.

Because Germany had not yet been unified, France at this time could be said to be the hegemon of Western Europe and the number one land power in Europe.

With the support of France, the Papal States were able to continue to hold Rome, which also forced the capital of Italy to remain in Florence.

However, Gao Da was not in a hurry about this.

Historically, the process of the Kingdom of Sardinia unifying Italy could be said to be a "lying win," and it had not experienced any difficult battles at all.

The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, the largest country in southern Italy, was rotten and was easily eliminated by the Thousand-man Group led by Garibaldi.

And the size of the states in central Italy was completely disproportionate to the Kingdom of Sardinia, and they had no qualifications to resist in the face of the general trend of unification.

The two truly hard bones were completely gnawed by hugging the thigh of Prussia. The Austro-Prussian War relied on Prussia to attract the attention of the Austrian Empire, and the Venice region was recovered.

The Franco-Prussian War relied on the French to guard against the Prussian army, and Rome was successfully taken over.

The two bones that looked very hard to gnaw were easily bitten off just like that; although it was the Prussian army that bit off these two bones, the one that got the benefits was indeed the Kingdom of Italy.

Gao Da still had a certain understanding of this period of Prussia's rise.

As it happened, this year was exactly 1866, which was the stage when the Austro-Prussian War broke out.

If it followed the historical trend, the Austro-Prussian War should break out in half a year, Prussia would accelerate the unification of Germany, and Italy would also recover the Venice region in the north.

Facing such an important historical node, Gao Da naturally could not let the opportunity slip away in vain. Although it was impossible to directly interfere in the Austro-Prussian War, as a participant in the war, it was no problem for Gao Da to change the historical process just a little bit.

The new book sets sail, seeking recommendation votes, seeking collections, seeking follow-up reading, seeking investment!

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(End of this chapter)