Chapter 75: Earth Channel
Chapter 75: Earth Channel
< Earth Channel >
The Korean broadcasting and gaming industries.
In both fields, Kim Shin's influence was being felt in a major way.
“I heard Producer Ryu Jae-han moved to Rainbow.”
“Really? I heard Hye-jin is moving soon too.”
“What kind of offer did they get to suddenly jump ship like that?”
“Salary and benefits are a given. But they're letting them create any program they want, so I guess they're leaving without hesitation.”
Recruiting talented producers, writers, and staff with high salaries.
Rumors were spreading far and wide that Dream Art Rainbow would focus its business on OTT platforms like YouTube and Netflix.
“Will they even make a profit? It seems like a structure built for losses.”
“I doubt the domestic OTTs will even cover the production costs. Even Netflix only pays about 110% of the production budget.”
“Why worry when the richest man in South Korea is backing them? With talented staff, they can just keep supporting them until they turn a profit.”
“I heard the treatment of their employees is top-notch. They say if you launch one hit program and then move, your salary jumps three to five times.”
“The incentives are even crazier. They say they give a certain percentage of the program's profits to the production team.”
Those who hadn't yet moved watched with interest, envying the producers who had already joined Dream Art Rainbow.
‘What if it fails...?’
‘Just because it's Kim Shin doesn't mean he can succeed every time. Since he's so rich, couldn't he just boldly abandon it if he doesn't see potential, even if it means taking a loss?’
‘For now, it's better to stay at a stable company.’
Production companies and broadcasting stations were watching with even greater interest.
They acknowledged, to some extent, the composition and skill of Dream Art Rainbow's staff.
It was true that the Korean broadcasting industry had its limits due to a narrow market and profit-sharing models.
Even if they broke through using overseas OTT platforms, they were only paid a little more than their production costs, so they were bound to struggle.
“We know broadcast and film production best. Kim Shin's method is unreasonable.”
“It would be great if we could just acquire them once they've grown to a decent size.”
Cable broadcasting stations with financial leeway were secretly coveting Dream Art Rainbow.
Just as various media outlets were taking an interest in Kim Shin and his activities, news broke.
- [Headline] Earth Resource Confirms Entry into the Broadcasting Platform Market.
Earth Resource, the Silicon Valley company with Kim Shin as its CEO.
It was reported that they had confirmed their entry into the broadcasting platform market as a new business venture.
It would be a hybrid of personal broadcasting and video platforms, combining movies, variety shows, dramas, and music content.
An insider confirmed their plan to handle all types of content.
They have already completed technical checks by hosting a gaming tournament...
They thought he was just producing variety shows and dramas, but to think he would create his own broadcasting platform!
Although Earth Resource's corporate value exceeded several billion dollars, it was a meaningless fact.
Kim Shin was unlikely to sell his shares, and the company's history was short.
A company growing at an insane pace in a very short period.
Earth Resource, which had succeeded in every field it entered, was now throwing down the gauntlet in the broadcasting platform market.
“It... makes sense.”
“It's not like they need to be assigned a frequency like in the old days. There's no reason it can't work.”
“The synergy would be insane, right? Earth Resource's cloud system itself operates at a very low cost.”
“Its popularity in Korea is guaranteed. Dramas or movies. If they just land one massive hit...”
“Aren't the existing platforms like Wavve and TVING all going to go under?”
The gaming industry was also in shock.
The gaming league was immensely popular, and a system was in place where various teams competed both domestically and internationally.
- A huge welcome.
- The league is going to get even more active.
- How much are they planning to invest?
- They say they're aiming for the championship.
- They don't seem to know much about the gaming league. It's not a place where you can just invest money and get results.
- I heard they've budgeted 50 billion won for player salaries.
- Are they insane?
- Vice President Oh Myeong-woo said in an interview with a reporter that he would show them the power of his friend's money.
- They announced they would properly compensate players based on their treatment, popularity, and skill.
- This is what happens when a super-rich guy gets obsessed with gaming instead of soccer.
* * *
Movies and broadcast content were all about money.
Trying to do anything cost billions of won as a starting point.
That's why it was a business venture not easily attempted.
“Let's set the monthly subscription fee at 3,000 won or 1 Source Coin.”
“Are you serious?”
I was busy hiring employees to build the broadcasting platform.
Although we were hiring staff from American broadcasting stations and the film industry, I personally led the preparations for the platform launch by holding meetings.
Catching up to Netflix and YouTube from the start was impossible.
‘Their unrivaled competitiveness comes from their user base and the power of the fresh content that accumulates daily.’
Objectively speaking, matching their overall competitiveness was out of the question.
As a latecomer, I had to make the most of popular Korean content while also setting a low price point from the get-go.
Alex from the finance team expressed his concern.
“It will be difficult to turn a profit with such a low subscription fee.”
“We're bound to incur losses proportional to our investment. In that case, it's better to increase our user base quickly.”
“That's true.”
I decided to endure the financial bleeding to expand our market share.
I suspected this kind of investment and management style was only possible because I, the CEO, owned 100% of the company's shares.
Even if we operated at a loss, it would all be my loss.
It was enough to bring tears to my eyes, but I needed to be bold for the sake of the business.
“Eddie.”
“Yep.”
“You have to minimize the network costs at least.”
“Don't worry about that. With the new data center online and the improved mining system, we have plenty of spare capacity.”
I decided to hire programmers and proceed with AI development as well.
As videos accumulated on the channel, we would need to recommend content tailored to each customer's tastes.
Discovering good content and channels was crucial.
“Let's support all Asian languages.”
“Of course.”
We would support Korean and English, of course, as well as various other Asian languages.
We also decided to officially support widely used languages like French and Spanish.
Given the nature of the internet, there was no need to limit the scope of our business.
“How about we also allow payments with the coins supported for trading on our website?”
“Eddie. That's a good idea.”
I decided to leverage the global popularity of Korean content to establish a foothold in the market, then pursue expansion while gradually reducing our losses.
The broadcasting platform was a difficult business due to formidable competitors, but it seemed like it would be incredibly fun if it succeeded.
Once the business grew, we could produce our own movies and dramas.
Instead of just waiting for fun movies to be released, we could create truly amazing content ourselves.
‘Creating culture with money.’
Just using money for payments couldn't be called being truly rich.
Living luxuriously was, you could say, the basic requirement of being rich.
I felt the joy of running a company and creating new things.
‘And there's one more thing I'd like to have.’
I scanned the people sitting in the conference room, my gaze landing on Oh Myeong-woo.
“Myeong-woo.”
“Yeah.”
Lee Jong-yeop differentiated between work and home when addressing me, but I didn't expect the same from Oh Myeong-woo.
In the first place, the fact that we were simply friends was far more important than his title of Vice President.
“Let's contact a lot of game companies. You know, the ones you bought shares in or negotiated with using Source Coin.”
“There are about twenty of them now.”
“How about running games through the broadcasting platform?”
“Are you aiming for a game distribution platform?”
“Music, movies, dramas, broadcasts. It would be great to add games to the mix.”
A significant portion of personal broadcast content is gaming.
Couldn't we distribute games by running them on a web server via the cloud?
“I'm all for it.”
“Eddie. Can you support it?”
“Of course. Perfectly! As expected, Kim Shin had a wonderful plan all along!”
What started as a broadcasting platform seemed to be expanding significantly, but in the end, it all shared the common thread of content distribution.
‘Since I don't know what the users will like, I might as well include everything.’
If it weren't for these early days, viewers' perceptions would have already solidified, making it difficult to add new features, wouldn't it?
“I'd like to name the broadcasting platform Earth Channel. Our goal will be to handle all the content on Earth.”
“Sounds good.”
The heads of the business divisions followed with their enthusiastic approval.
Eddie, who was said to be difficult to deal with, was incredibly optimistic about my words, and both Allison and Oh Myeong-woo responded enthusiastically.
Despite the Coin Business Division generating significant revenue, we still hadn't appointed a person in charge.
Functionally, the system Eddie had built was working well, so there were no issues.
‘I need to hire an exceptionally talented person for the Coin Business Division.’
I intended to support everything from listing new coins on the exchange to analyzing various coins.
The coin market, despite its market size exceeding one trillion dollars, had no laws or regulations.
The role of exchanges was inevitably significant, but so far, they had taken no responsibility.
Exchanges made enormous amounts of money by issuing their own coins, yet they passed all investment losses onto the investors.
‘Since I made a fortune with coins, I should run a proper business.’
* * *
To participate starting from the spring league, I needed to press forward quickly with the Earth gaming team.
To do that, I needed to hire a general manager. A suitable person to entrust with the role would be...
- Kim Shin: Sang-gi. How have you been?
- Kim Sang-gi: Of course! Just slacking off hard at work.
I only used the Korean app occasionally, mostly to contact Arcor employees.
As soon as I sent the KaTalk, a reply came back.
Kim Sang-gi and I started at the company at the same time.
He had an easy-going personality, and we were close.
- Kim Shin: I heard you were a pro gamer for a little while back in the day?
- Kim Sang-gi: Yeah. For two years in middle school.
I remembered hearing that he had dropped out of school to be a gamer and had a really tough time passing the GED late and getting into college.
- Kim Shin: Have you ever thought about becoming a gaming team's general manager?
- Kim Sang-gi: General manager? Are you serious?
- Kim Shin: Yeah.
In practice, the coaches and managers would handle the team's operations, player training, and game preparations.
The general manager would be in charge of overall support and making important decisions.
It would be great if they had extensive knowledge of the gaming world, but what I really needed was someone I could trust.
Kim Sang-gi, who started with me, had been with me for four years since our days as entry-level employees.
A friendly, agreeable personality.
He was always studying up on the latest technology and had a keen interest in it.
- Kim Shin: You like games, right? I just thought maybe you'd want to give it a shot.
- Kim Sang-gi: If you're asking seriously, I'll answer. My trainee days have always been a lifelong regret for me.
- Kim Sang-gi: But while I haven't accomplished much, I'm a bit old to just quit my job and chase a dream.
Thirty-two years old.
It was an awkward age to switch to a completely different industry.
- Kim Shin: I'll give you a decent salary. And as long as you don't cause any public scandals, I won't fire you based on performance.
- Kim Shin: Even if you step down as GM, I'll let you work in the front office.
- Kim Sang-gi: A decent salary? Do you get paid hundreds of millions for a GM job?
I figured Kim Sang-gi's salary and incentives were probably still similar to what I made when I was at Arcor.
In Silicon Valley, you had to pay even a single developer two or three times the salary of an Arcor employee.
- Kim Shin: I'll give you 300 million.
- Kim Sang-gi: Per how many years?
- Kim Shin: That's the annual salary.
- Kim Sang-gi: The salary for one year?
I should be saving on unnecessary labor costs, but to me now, it was pocket change.
Besides, if I was going to create a gaming team, I didn't want to be stingy with support.
- Kim Shin: I'll give the entire team incentives based on their league ranking. And if you win the championship, there will be a huge reward.
There was a moment of silence.
- Kim Shin: Are those terms not good enough?
- Kim Sang-gi: No, hold on. I'm writing my resignation letter right now.
- Kim Shin: Huh?