Reborn in 08, a heretical cultivator starting a business

Chapter 236 Wang Junshan's Evil Cultivation Operation: A Decisive Strike at Taobao!

"What's even more serious is that the public actually believes these word games!"

Wang Yufei was filled with righteous indignation:
"Initially, many of the posts were made by paid trolls, but now many early-morning users who steal vegetables are also posting and forwarding them."

"They don't think things through at all; they just believe whatever they hear or whatever they see."

"No wonder so many rich people fall for such an obvious scam as memory foam pillows, let alone ordinary people."

Wang Junshan was also quite convinced: "There's nothing we can do. This world is just a huge makeshift operation. Expecting every netizen to be intelligent is too difficult."

"Not to mention now, even ten years from now, it's impossible."

As early as 1985, Gustave Le Bon used the term "the crowd" in his book "The Crowd" to accurately define the characteristics of the masses—irrationality and susceptibility to manipulation.

When Wang Junshan first saw this term, he thought it was excessive.

They believe that the general public is still intelligent, and that only a minority are irrational, easily swayed mobs.

However, his experience of living two lives changed Wang Junshan's attitude.

There are people with high IQs and independent thinking abilities, but they are few; 30%-40% would be considered good.

On the contrary, more people fit the description of a 'mob'—irrational and easily swayed.

This has always been the case, from ancient times to the present.

Every era has its share of irrational groups that are easily swayed.

Even ten years from now, it will still be the same.

This is why fraud organizations can easily succeed, those selling health products can make a fortune, and even the parent company of Pop Mart can reap huge profits and become a super giant!

Even when their official streamer confessed to exploiting fans, there were still many naysayers who tried to whitewash them!
This situation wouldn't have arisen without a large enough mob.

However, it is precisely because there are enough rabble that a small number of rational individuals can remain untainted and make a fortune.

After all, if you're rational and I'm rational, neither of us is easy to fool, so who do we make money from?

When a person's understanding is limited, their wealth will flow to XXX through various means.
Ten years later, this phrase will be incredibly popular.

Wang Junshan never expected to change this situation, nor did he believe that he could make the public more rational.

This is unrealistic; even if a god came along, it wouldn't be realistic.

Even anti-fraud apps can't do that!

More importantly, if everyone were rational enough and had a high IQ, then we'd be doomed.

Life becomes difficult for intelligent people.

At that time, it is estimated that the vast majority of companies will not be able to profit from the market and will not be able to make money!
"Cognitive habits are very difficult to change, especially group changes."

Wang Yufei also agreed with this point: "The other party made it during the morning rush hour, and everyone knows about it. With so many people forwarding it, it's difficult for us to remove it from the trending topics!"

Wang Junshan sighed: "Since they've already made a move, it must have been meticulously planned and carefully arranged. I reckon it's not just Weibo now, but other platforms are probably reporting on it too!"

"Even if we remove the trending topics on Weibo, it won't make a difference. On the contrary, it will show that Weibo is unfair and ruin its future!"

"Yes, their intentions are truly despicable, absolutely despicable! I wonder who did this; they're trying to destroy Vipshop!"

Wang Yufei was shocked: "Fraudulently claiming a 2% subsidy is one thing, but using wordplay to accuse us of fraudulently claiming a 10% subsidy is far too serious."

"What's worse is that we're caught in a dilemma, unable to cope."

Wang Junshan's expression turned cold: "As for who did it? Just look at who benefited the most after Vipshop's incident."

"Chairman, you mean...Alibaba?"

Wang Junshan smiled coldly: "90% of it was their doing."

"So how do we deal with this? We probably can't remove it from the trending topics, but doing nothing is even worse."

"We cannot wait for clarification from relevant departments; we must handle the crisis as soon as possible."

“The investigation is lengthy, taking at least half a month, a month, or even two months.”

"If the official investigation takes a month and even if it is eventually clarified that Vipshop's subsidy fraud only accounts for 1%, it will be too late."

“Vipshop will be criticized to death this month, and we will suffer heavy losses.”

"More importantly, even if it's only 1%, it's still fraudulent subsidy claim, and you won't be able to clear your name later."

"The public will forget or even ignore 1% of the things that happened, and only remember Vipshop's subsidy fraud."

"More importantly, a lot of unexpected events will happen this month, events that are completely detrimental to us."

"We must save ourselves; we can't wait for an investigation. But we can't remove the trending topics from the search results. What should we do?"

Wang Yufei's analysis is correct; waiting for the investigation will render everything useless.

Investigations take time.

The daylilies will be cold by then.

Wang Junshan smiled faintly: "Since the trending topics can't be removed, they can be changed!"

"Change the trending topics?" Wang Yufei was taken aback, then instantly understood Wang Junshan's meaning, and was overjoyed:

"Yes, we removed the trending topics because Weibo is unfair, but we can change them!"

"Change the trending topic 【#Vipshop is defrauding subsidies, with rural appliance subsidies defrauding up to 10%#】 to 【Vipshop is defrauding subsidies by 1%, and offline rural appliance subsidies defrauding up to 10%】!"

"Then we will issue another statement saying that an internal investigation has begun, strongly condemning the 1% subsidy fraud, and submitting the relevant information to the regulatory authorities!"

"In this way, we did not remove the trending topic, but we clarified the facts."

"We will minimize the risk; a 1% risk is nothing to worry about. The estimates from relevant departments will not be investigated in detail."

"On the contrary, public attention will shift to offline subsidy fraud."

"Relevant departments will also conduct in-depth investigations into offline subsidy fraud, as these are the hardest-hit areas."

"We won't delve too deeply into Vipshop's situation; on the contrary, we think that a mere 1% is already a remarkable achievement, and we might even increase our support for them!"

"After all, the purpose of the home appliance subsidy program in rural areas is to stimulate the economy, and Vipshop's 1% subsidy fraud is within the acceptable range."

Wang Junshan smiled faintly: "It can be changed like this, but it's not enough."

"We also need to bring Alibaba along!"

"???"

Wang Yufei was dumbfounded, his expression becoming quite interesting: "Chairman, is this appropriate?"

"We don't have enough evidence, what if..."

Wang Junshan smiled faintly: "Does Alibaba have any evidence to support its claim that we fraudulently obtained 10% subsidies?"

"They disregarded martial ethics first, so let's use evil cultivation methods to destroy them!"

"First do this... then do this..."

"wonderful!"

"Absolutely awesome!"

"I'll get on it right away!"

Wang Yufei was thrilled and immediately took action.

Wang Junshan hung up the phone, closed his eyes, and went back to sleep.

Shen Huaijin, who had already woken up, turned over and hugged Wang Junshan tightly, her face full of worry:
"Is the situation serious? Do you need to go to the company? I'll take you there!"

Wang Junshan waved his hand: "It's alright, it's only five o'clock, let the bullets fly for a while."

"Is it appropriate?" Shen Huaijin was still uneasy.

But Wang Junshan remained calm: "Suitable, of course it's suitable, we've only just begun."

With sufficient countermeasures in place, Wang Junshan didn't take the matter to heart at all.

He decisively pulled Shen Huaijin into his arms and continued sleeping.

Alibaba headquarters.

A room full of high-level executives gathered together, with Weibo's trending topics displayed in real time on a large screen.

The trending topic, "#Vipshop is defrauding subsidies, with rural appliance subsidies reaching up to 10%," is right in the middle. Ning Fengze is in a good mood: "Chairman, it's ranked 30th on the trending list and it's still rising. It's been more than half an hour. I guess Weibo already knows about it, and Wang Junshan knows about it too, but they haven't suppressed it. It seems they don't plan to remove it."

Jack Ma smiled and said, "They're trending all over the internet, how could we dare to remove them?"

"Wang Junshan is probably like an ant on a hot pan right now, running around in circles in a panic."

Zhao Deyu also chimed in, "It seems so. But they'll probably do something, won't they? They can't just do nothing. It's just that no matter what they do, it'll be difficult."

"Removing the trending topics is not an option, but not removing them is even worse."

"Under this kind of overt strategy, future technology is caught in a dilemma, a dead end!"

“That’s right, it all depends on whether Wang Junshan will sacrifice the pawn to save the king, or sacrifice the king to save the pawn!” Jack Ma said with a smile.

"But no matter what choice is made, this time Future Technology will be completely passive and suffer heavy losses."

"However, we cannot be careless and must keep a close eye on things."

"Correct."

However, no sooner had the words left his mouth than the trending topics changed:

"They've risen another five places."

"Wait, why has the content changed?"

Ning Fengze couldn't help but speak up, his face immediately turning extremely ugly:

"Future Technology has made its move."

"Hmm?" Jack Ma frowned, looked closely at the big screen, and his face turned ashen.
"Vipshop is defrauding customers of 1% in subsidies, while offline home appliance subsidy programs are defrauding customers of up to 10%!"

"!!!"

"Fake!"

Jack Ma's face instantly turned ashen: "They didn't remove the trending topic, they didn't suppress it, they actually modified it!"

"Wouldn't this completely whitewash Vipshop's image?"

"A 1% subsidy fraud is not serious to begin with. Compared to the 10% subsidy fraud rate offline, it's not only not serious, but actually quite good!"

"What a brilliant move! He not only cleverly resolved the trending topic crisis but also managed to clear his name!"

"Damn it, all our painstaking planning over this long period of time has been foiled?"

"Fake!"

Other Alibaba executives were also furious.

Ning Fengze was so angry that he slammed his fist on the table:

"Bastard!"

"I never expected Wang Junshan to play like this. Now our entire plan is ruined!"

"Exactly! We thought we could play a word game and make everyone believe that Vipshop was cheating on subsidies by 10%, thus smearing Vipshop. In that case, even if there is an official investigation, it will take a month. Within a month, we can completely destroy Vipshop."

"Now look what happened, the plan has gone bankrupt as soon as it started."

"We've been planning this for so long, and Wang Junshan has cracked it so easily!"

"How can we proceed?"

Zhao Deyu's face turned ashen: "We can't let this go. We need to have people post more and push the original topic back up."

Ning Fengze nodded: "That's one way, even if it costs more money."

Jack Ma, however, was somewhat worried: "But I'm afraid Wang Junshan might pull some other tricks, making it difficult for us to push the original trending topic back up."

"Once the arrow is released, there's no turning back; we have no choice but to give it a try!" Ning Fengze couldn't help but say.

"Alright then," Jack Ma sighed.

Ning Fengze decisively issued instructions and spared no effort to bring the topic of "Vipshop fraudulently obtaining subsidies, with rural appliance subsidies reaching as high as 10%" back to the top of the trending searches.

For this, Alibaba is willing to pay more, of course through overseas institutions.

Soon, this topic became popular again.

However, before it could even trend on the hot search list, it was discovered by Weibo's operations department, which promptly reported it again.

"Hehe, Alibaba still won't give up." Wang Yufei laughed.

"Then what do we do?" Zheng Yan asked. "Should we just ban it? What about those other accounts?"

"Hmm... I'll ask the chairman."

Wang Yufei called Wang Junshan again to explain the situation.

"Oh? They've brought up the original trending topic about wordplay again?"

Wang Junshan smiled and said, "Okay, you guys change it. Replace all the original trending topics with the new ones."

"Add the popularity of the original trending topic to the new trending topic."

"Huh?" Wang Yufei was dumbfounded: "Chairman, this kind of thing is not a good thing after all. Shouldn't we suppress it a little and keep the new trending topic around 25th? If we keep adding to it, it's easy for it to reach the top ten, or even the top three!"

"Especially now that the 315 hype has died down, there's no more explosive news."

"It's easy to reach the top by fraudulently obtaining subsidies by 1%."

Wang Junshan smiled faintly: "No need, it'll be on the trending list, top three it is. This just shows that Weibo is fair and impartial. Even if our sister company Vipshop is cheating on subsidies, we will expose it. There is no manipulation."

"Besides, it's only 1% of the subsidy that's being fraudulently obtained, so it doesn't matter."

"Don't forget, the other platforms are all just playing word games by Alibaba to make the public think we're fraudulently obtaining 10% subsidies!"

"The fact that the Weibo post about the 1% subsidy fraud making it into the top three trending topics is actually a form of clarification!"

"I see." Wang Yufei suddenly realized and immediately went to do it.

Soon, the online trolls hired by Alibaba discovered that their posts, which were supposed to be "[Vipshop is defrauding subsidies, with rural appliance subsidies reaching up to 10%]", had all been changed to "[Vipshop is defrauding subsidies by 1%, and offline rural appliance subsidies are defrauding up to 10%]!"
Automatic conversion!

Even if you change it back, it won't work; it will automatically replace by default!
The Grand Admiral of the Navy was completely dumbfounded.

The only thing we can do is tell Alibaba about this.

"What?" Jack Ma's lips twitched: "Weibo changed all our posts?"

"Damn it, wouldn't that just be helping Vipshop whitewash its image?"

"Okay, really okay!"

Ning Fengze was also helpless: "That's Wang Junshan's plan. We can't play the trending topics game anymore."

"And if it actually made it to the top of the trending topics list, it would actually help to whitewash Vipshop."

"It's only 1%, the government doesn't care, the public doesn't care, and they even support it!"

Jack Ma nodded: "That's right, we absolutely cannot help them whitewash their image. Immediately notify everyone to delete all the posts. Abandon Weibo, and let's continue to work on other platforms!"

"Okay!" Ning Fengze quickly gave the order.

A group of online trolls rushed to take action, only to find that they couldn't delete it at all.

Instead, there are new prompts:
[The system has detected abnormal activity on your account and it has been temporarily locked. Please contact Weibo customer service to appeal.]

All the accounts are now useless; they've all been locked!
It can't be deleted.

This infuriated Ning Fengze: "Damn it, damn it all!"

"Where is freedom of speech when Weibo operates like this?"

"How abominable!"

However, just as Ning Fengze was cursing and swearing, a new news item surged to the top of the trending topics list:
[#70% of Taobao products are counterfeit#]

Seeing this, Jack's face turned deathly pale, and he broke out in a cold sweat.

"70% of the products on Taobao are counterfeit!"

"How could this be trending on social media?!"

(End of this chapter)