Chapter 372: The Watershed Between Eastern and Western Music Scenes

"Tsk, you're quite peaceful hiding here."

Hong Kong, Mandarin Oriental Hotel, 24th floor, gym.

Wearing wristbands and a waist support, Zhou Yi gritted his teeth while deadlifting; the extreme weight that shot up in an instant made him roar involuntarily—the weight that Fan Xiaopang felt was enough to crush her to death slammed heavily onto the gym floor, emitting a dull thud.

"What do you mean by 'hiding here'? I've been living here since I arrived in Hong Kong, okay?"

Zhou Yi's heart was beating at an extreme speed; after unloading the heavy burden, he panted several times before taking the water bottle the woman threw to him, smiling as he unscrewed the cap, took a sip, held it in his mouth for a while, and then swallowed: "Besides, isn't this just delivering news to them?"

Hearing this, Fan Xiaopang couldn't quite hold it together: "You Warner Bros. bought out the front pages of all the high-circulation newspapers in Hong Kong; how is that 'delivering news'?"

If you didn't say it was a long-planned scheme, no one would believe it, after all, newspaper pages are scheduled in advance.

Warner Bros.' decision to grab the big fish and ignore the small ones was also quite cunning: for the small newspapers, you can say whatever you want; after all, they are small newspapers for a reason; we only want the big newspapers with high circulation—

Even the famous Ming Pao in Hong Kong, for the first time ever, published Zhou Yi's "travel check-in photo" with his hands in his pockets as if he had no rival, sparking a debate over Duan Yu. Of course, this time more people felt he wasn't suitable for playing Duan Yu.

The reason was simple: the act of buying out the entire Hong Kong edition was something Duan Yu wouldn't do.

More martial arts fans unanimously believed that, given Zhou Yi's behavior of pretending to be cool, he might be more suitable for the works of Gu Long next door.

No acting skills? No problem, you can go play Ximen Chuixue; both are the number one pretenders in the world; you just need to keep a straight face with no expression, and fans will come licking the screen howling at that time.

Some even called for rich ladies to take action immediately, striving to knock Zhou Yi out with money. It doesn't matter if the rich ladies are older; you can strive to become the next Auntie Ximen.

"This is absolutely here to cause trouble."

Zhou Yi, having removed his wristbands and waist support, wiped his sweat with one hand and scoffed at the "fan initiative" Fan Xiaopang handed over.

Sitting on the butterfly machine, Fan Xiaopang laughed without any decorum: "This is the expectation of your die-hard fans."

"I never expect the expectations of those die-hard fans."

Zhou Yi looked utterly disgusted.

Even Auntie Ximen didn't care; you call this a die-hard fan?

If this isn't a hater, then I'll write my name Zhou Yi backwards.

"Your fans would be hurt hearing you say that." Having casually mimicked the butterfly machine chest press that Zhou Yi taught her, feeling a bit of pain in her shoulder, Fan Xiaopang finally gave up, patted her bottom, stood up, and stopped playing.

She still had to go to the victory celebration with Zhou Yi tonight; if she got injured, she'd have nowhere to cry.

She knew that a little bitch who liked to pretend to be pure had apparently actually hooked up with Zhou Yi.

But she couldn't ask Zhou Yi about this alone; after all, she didn't have the status or position to do so yet.

"It's just the two of us here; if you don't speak and I don't speak, how can this news get out?" Zhou Yi, with a towel hanging around his neck, sat casually on a barbell plate, working his neck.

Before he finished speaking, a pair of quite fleshy calves appeared before his eyes—

Subconsciously looking up, Fan Xiaopang was smiling as she leaned down, using her right index finger to lift his chin: "That's hard to say. What if I want to be this Auntie Ximen?"

Eye to eye, Zhou Yi let the woman's index finger trace his cheek, a subtle curve forming at the corner of his mouth: "You're still far from it."

"One day I will achieve this goal."

"Looks like the World Cup has made you quite swollen."

Zhou Yi's eyes held a hint of amusement: "But your money probably isn't even enough for my pocket change."

"People always need a goal; how will you know if it works unless you try?"

Fan Xiaopang was still spouting her grand dreams: "As long as I become more and more famous, my endorsement fees and acting fees will rise with the tide, and surpassing you will be just around the corner."

"As for those art films and art romance films you want to act in, there's no damn way to get famous."

Zhou Yi sneered, curling his lip: "Putting aside other things, that 'Left Turn, Right Turn' you asked me about sounds far-fetched to me; don't look at it being invested by Warner Bros., Warner Bros. is famous for messing around in movies."

Besides work, Fan Xiaopang had come to Hong Kong this time to get his reference opinion—

There was no choice; thanks to her agent's powerful hype capabilities, although the only film and TV dramas she could currently put forward as a serious flag-bearer were The Lion Roars in the Eastern Palace and Young Bao Qingtian, she at least had some confidence.

Riding the wind of Zhou Yi's MV, she now dared to lean on Chen Niangniang.

Precisely because of this, she had now become the darling of various film and TV dramas, with scripts dropping non-stop.

"At least it's a movie invested by your Warner Bros.; you shouldn't even get the name wrong, right?" Releasing her grip, Fan Xiaopang was somewhat at a loss for words: "This is Director Du's movie."

"Even if Zi Mou or Kai Zi came, it wouldn't work."

Zhou Yi chuckled softly, cracked his knuckles, which emitted a "click-click" sound: "My evaluation is that it's not as good as that 'Supreme Beauty' you mentioned."

Supreme Beauty, the chief producer was the one surnamed Han, a model-level background character in Huayu.

As a co-production, given this person's nature, naturally the female lead was set on the currently very popular Fan Xiaopang, sending an audition invitation to her agent.

"Really? I read the script; the plot of Supreme Beauty is quite chaotic..."

Although she wasn't great at studying, she could still tell when some historical accounts or adaptations were too outrageous. In the current era, she really felt this drama would flop. But helplessly, she had to give face to Old Master Han, so she could only accept.

To play Wu Zetian in Supreme Beauty, she had even started preparing to gain weight under the planning of the team hired by her agent, making her now somewhat insecure about her looks.

If Zhou Yi hadn't expressed twelve thousand percent approval for her decision in a physical way, she might have suspected her looks had suffered a Waterloo in her career.

"In this day and age, fictionalized drama is what's hot."

Zhou Yi smiled, the words behind him not yet out of his mouth, when the next second, the suddenly ringing phone interrupted his thoughts—

It was Sun Yanzi calling.

"Yo, is the Twin Stars checking up on you?" Fan Xiaopang, whose looks and figure were inferior to Sun Yanzi's, who had managed to bind herself to Zhou Yi through the Twin Stars and was now becoming more and more famous, was getting a bit cocky—

Her personal assets couldn't compare to Zhou Yi's, but could they not compare to Sun Yanzi's?

She was no longer that humble little maid in Taiwan back then!

She didn't believe Sun Yanzi's records could earn as much money as Zhou Yi, let alone that she basically only got the portion distributed as a singer.

"If she's the one checking up, what you should do right now is leave, not stick to me." Zhou Yi looked amusingly at Fan Xiaopang sticking to him and pressed the answer key—

The next second, Sun Yanzi's fake crying voice made his body tremble, and the phone almost fell from his hand—

"Waa! Zhou Yi, I'm finished!"

???

"What? Did your family cut ties with you? They don't want you anymore?"

"Go to hell, can't you wish me some good things?"

Sun Yanzi, who had only pretended to cry for three seconds, immediately stopped her fake wailing and began to criticize Zhou Yi's vicious thought: "It's my album, my album!"

"What's wrong with your album?"

Zhou Yi was somewhat puzzled.

"Leave" had just launched simultaneously in Taiwan and the mainland, hadn't it sold very well?

"Piracy has appeared!"

"That's a funny thing to say; haven't you had plenty of piracy before?"

"It's not like before; this time it's just like abroad. Do you have a computer now? Open your computer, then search Baidu Mp3..."

Sun Yanzi's tone was somewhat depressed: "Everyone's songs have been integrated together. Now, whatever song the audience wants, they just go to this page to search, and an Mp3 download link will automatically pop up."

"..."

Damn, I've been so busy for a month with my feet not even touching the ground, I almost forgot about this.

Zhou Yi slapped his forehead, wincing with a bit of sighing: "Then looking for me won't help either."

November 15, 2002, the mainland Baidu Mp3 search function officially went viral after being online for nearly half a month.

As a sharp tool used by Baidu Company to increase its own traffic, this search page directly helped the huge netizen group in the mainland obtain a music download model with absolutely no other costs besides internet fees.

At the same time, it also added the final handful of dirt to the grave of the declining physical music market.

Meanwhile, in the United States, Apple Inc.

After hitting a wall repeatedly, Jobs, who had been brought back to preside over the situation, finally set his sights on a name—

"Help me contact Warner, contact Spike Zhou. He has great insight into the Internet; he should be able to understand our music store model. As long as we are willing to give up some profits, he is very likely willing to join our music store."

(End of this chapter)