Rebirth 2010: I taught Mr. Lei how to make a mobile phone

Chapter 759 The "Gold" Content of the Words "Other Shore"
As long as you cooperate with the other side, even the clumsiest pig can be carried away even without a favorable trend! — One of the Laws of the Chinese Internet

It is widely believed that Robin Li's biggest mistake was getting rid of Hailong.

After all, the search business is still Baidu's cash cow. Such an operation has not yielded any reform results, but has instead crippled itself, which is extremely unwise.

Chen Mo's view is exactly the opposite of the outside world's. In his opinion, this is precisely what he admires about Li Yanhong. In his view, Li's biggest problem is not his vision or ability, but the strategic indecisiveness caused by the lack of effective communication and unified discourse.

Now, Brother Li has abandoned Dongmin first and then killed Hailong. This is a manifestation of his decisiveness after awakening, and it is also the basis for Chen Mo's cooperation with him.

A man who dares to divorce is destined for unstoppable forces and boundless freedom.

A divorced man may lose a wife, but he gains countless friends.

As August drew to a close, with an order from Chen Mo and Li Yanhong, Biyuan and Baidu jointly issued a statement:
Building a Technology Trust Ecosystem: Beyond and Baidu Reach Deep Technology Mutual Trust Cooperation

"To promote the healthy development of the internet industry and drive technological innovation and security trust, Beyond and Baidu have officially reached a strategic cooperation agreement based on the principles of equality and mutual benefit."

The two sides will engage in in-depth cooperation in areas such as data sharing, technological security, and artificial intelligence.

Following the announcement, Baidu's stock price surged 16%, recovering all the losses caused by the changes.

Since Baidu and Beyond announced their cooperation, the two parties have been releasing updates on the latest developments of their collaboration almost daily, just like the evening news, on time.

On the first day, it was announced that in order to improve the search experience, the two parties will share search data sources, and Baidu Search will integrate the AI-powered question-and-answer module from the other party.

The following day, it was announced that the two parties would jointly develop an intelligent driving system;

On the third day, it was announced that Beyond Research Institute and Baidu Academy of Sciences would jointly establish the "Beyond Research Laboratory," focusing on the exploration and application of cutting-edge AI technologies.

At the same time, both parties will also establish an open platform, formulate industry standards, and call on domestic technology companies to participate.
This series of actions subtly reveals the pioneering spirit of those in the field of AI.

Netizens widely praised this, saying it demonstrates the vision and responsibility that technology companies should have.

The topic that has generated the most discussion is not artificial intelligence, because it is too far removed from people's lives, nor is it Baidu search, because people are already used to it.

The most talked-about topic on various platforms is #BaiduTiebaIsBack#.

In the early days of the Chinese internet, on that digital wilderness that had not yet been fully tamed by capital.

Netizens migrate between various forums like nomads.

Tianya Forum embodies the patriotic sentiments of intellectuals;

Artistic youths gathered under the sycamore trees, composing poems and appreciating the moon.
Hupu Sports echoes with the passionate shouts of straight men;
Mop.com has become a secret garden for anime and manga enthusiasts;

Renren.com was weaving the prototype of China's first generation of social networks;

This was a golden age in the truest sense, a time when "all things under the frosty sky compete freely".

After 2008, Baidu Tieba gradually became the most dynamic cultural source on the Chinese Internet.

This open, plaza-style community, with its unique inclusiveness, has attracted countless content creators and enthusiasts, becoming an undisputed no-man's-land in the Chinese internet world.

During its golden age, Baidu Tieba was hailed as the "Louvre of Baidu".

You can find almost anything that interests you here.

In the realm of celebrity worship, almost every celebrity's fan forum has a large number of posts used for promotion and popular science. The depth of content and organizational scale of celebrity fan forums far surpasses that of later platforms such as Weibo and Xiaohongshu.

Top-tier online forums such as Li Yuchun Bar, Li Yi Bar, WOW Bar, Ruozhi Bar, and Sun Bar have developed their own unique culture and have repeatedly made outstanding contributions to producing annual buzzwords.

"Brother Chun is a real man, a true hero." "D8 sets out, leaving no grass alive!" "Jia Junpeng, your mother is calling you home for dinner." "Mommy me!"
The ability to create memes is often a reflection of the activity level of a community. Even later, many Spring Festival Gala regulars did not have the ability to create memes themselves like Benshan, and could only copy popular phrases from Tieba.

The popularity of these memes is based on Baidu Tieba, a massive community with over 15 billion registered users and over 2200 million Tieba forums.

Even now, despite its decline, Tieba still possesses a unique structure and rules.

Unlike Weibo's KOL ecosystem and Zhihu's elite atmosphere, and also different from short video platforms that rely on algorithms to build their ecosystems, Tieba has a completely decentralized architecture.

This design ensures that the forum belongs entirely to everyone involved, from the selection of the moderators to the members who post, without being constrained by Baidu.

Anyone can create their own Baidu Tieba (forum) and discuss any topic there.

On Baidu Tieba, there was no hierarchy among users, only a level used to indicate activity. The completely free environment and virtually barrier-free posting rules made Tieba the undisputed "number one community" on the Chinese internet for a long time—a presence larger than Beijing's Tiantongyuan residential area.

However, this also led to different online forums engaging in "bombing" behavior in order to protect their respective idols and cultures. The war between Diba and Li Yuchun's forum can be seen as a microcosm of the fighting styles of these two forces, and it was also referred to by some neutral netizens as the first generation of internet cesspools.

Unfortunately, everything changed starting in 14. Faced with revenue pressure, Baidu launched an aggressive commercialization transformation, appointing Hu Yue, the former deputy general manager of Baidu Maps, as the general manager of Tieba, and subsequently began a series of "foundational" updates.

Baidu Tieba forums, including those for medicine, education, regions, and enterprises, are priced accordingly and sold to operators or enterprises.

Each Baidu Tieba forum is priced according to the potential traffic and clicks it generates, ranging from tens of thousands to millions of yuan.

At the same time, Baidu Tieba is also experimenting with in-feed ads, which appear in Tieba banners and between posts.

In an effort to accelerate the mobile transformation, some companies have even forced users to choose between flipping through pages and replying, opting instead for downloading the app for further actions – a self-destructive approach.

Many users find it hard to accept that a playground painstakingly built by a group of enthusiasts over many years is merely a piece of traffic "land" with transactional value in Baidu's eyes.

The end result was a massive loss of users from Tieba. The creators of Tieba in its early days are now scattered in various places, becoming Weibo KOLs, Zhihu influencers, Xiaohongshu bloggers, online writers, and so on.

Ironically, when daily active users were at their peak, Tieba failed to find the right time to make a profit; instead, after daily active users gradually declined, Tieba began to make a profit by exhausting its resources.

But in every netizen's youthful memories, Tieba (Baidu's online forum) is an indispensable piece of the puzzle.

First, he was dismissed by Hu Yue, the general manager of Tieba (Baidu's online forum). Countless forum members were overjoyed and flocked to the "Hu Yue Bar" to offer their congratulations, saying that "this spy sent by the enemy has finally left, and the sky over Tieba is clear again."

Subsequently, the cooperation on Baidu Tieba's outsourcing was terminated, and the advertisements were taken offline.

According to a post on Zhiyan, many of the current employees in charge of Tieba are former Tieba enthusiasts. The current person in charge of Tieba was also a former moderator of a large Tieba. He endured hardship for ten years before finally gaining power.

For these digital natives, even surrounded by new platforms such as short videos and social e-commerce, they still steadfastly guard their "homeland" of Tieba.

This kind of dedication is just like the unwavering loyalty of middle-aged gamers to classic games.

Even though games like Legend of Mir, World of Warcraft, and even League of Legends have aged, you can still see countless middle-aged men in internet cafes and live streams playing Legend of Mir, World of Warcraft, and League of Legends while dealing with life's challenges.
Legends will always be the classic 1.75 version, World of Warcraft will always be the classic 60s version, and if you can't master the mechanics of League of Legends, then just play ARAM.
This is the power of sentiment.

The charm of Baidu Tieba lies in this: it abandons the information cocoon of algorithm recommendation, skips the elite threshold of other platforms, and returns to the most authentic form of the Internet, which is a pure communication zone based on interests.

This back-to-basics community ecosystem is experiencing a rebirth after the growing pains of commercialization.

With Baidu's strategic adjustments and the advancement of the "Tieba Revival Plan," the platform's daily active users have steadily rebounded from their lowest point to tens of millions.

Generally speaking, when companies undertake sweeping reforms, both management and employees will experience a painful period of upheaval. Even if the direction is correct, they will need to go through a long period of dormancy and wait for the right opportunity to make a comeback.

The larger the company, the more pronounced this pattern becomes.

As an internet giant, Baidu should have been no exception, but its cooperation with the other side of the strait has made everything different.

Robin Li foresaw that the collaboration would improve Baidu's predicament, but he did not expect the effect to be so significant—it seemed as if everything was starting to go smoothly.

Whether it's the control of discourse, the internal atmosphere, the public opinion environment, or the stock market performance, everything has far exceeded expectations.

He even had a sudden thought: if he had surrendered earlier, could he have avoided the pain of "divorce"?

He then shook his head and chuckled, realizing that he had reversed cause and effect.

Putting everything else aside, the capital market has given the most honest answer as to the effectiveness of Baidu's series of adjustments and changes.

Baidu's stock price continued to climb, and JPMorgan Chase upgraded Baidu's rating from "hold" to "hold" with a target price of $210, $30 higher than the current price of $180.

The stock price not only recovered its losses but also hit a new 52-week high.
Baidu has not only recovered from its previous losses, but has also made an extra 10 billion RMB during this period.

It is no secret that while the other side adheres to the principle of not seeking financing or going public, its strategic partners have benefited from this.

Li Yanhong knew very well that relying solely on Baidu's own adjustments would not achieve this level of success; at best, it would only result in slightly less loss.

Looking back on Chen Mo's past, Robin Li discovered that the companies he collaborated with all exhibited remarkable vitality:
Xiaomi, JD.com, and even DJI, once an unknown company, now almost dominate the drone industry.

Is this the true value of the words "the other shore"?
What will the future hold for Baidu, which has opened its doors to the other side and is now cooperating sincerely?

What role will it play in the AI ​​era?
He was looking forward to it.
(End of this chapter)