A Small Media Kingdom - 3

This summer had been flying by in a blur.

The moment break started, Eunsol and Lee Naye—who'd insisted on getting part-time jobs no matter how much I told them not to—would drag me out every time they managed a few ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠days off. We even took Yun Jiyeon and Kim Sua along for about a week in Guam.

If Yun Jiyeon and Kim Sua hadn't been so busy, we probably would have traveled a lot more on our own. But Kim Sua was a trainee with a packed schedule, and Yun Jiyeon was preparing for a future that had nothing to do with being this house's housekeeper, so both of them barely had free time.

Still, today we were all gathered in one place, watching TV.

Not a regular broadcast—we were watching the premiere of The Cat Cries Meow through the Witch app on the smart TV.

The production company and investor names filled the center of the screen, followed by the notice below them.

Wasn't there a better slogan than that?

I wasn't exactly thrilled with it, but the line that would promote Witch going forward had been chosen by employee vote, so I decided to leave it alone.

"So? How was it??"

I hadn't even appeared in it, and I hadn't made it myself—yet I was ridiculously nervous. I felt like an elementary school kid waiting for a report card.

"It's fun."

"Yeah! Sol thought it was super, super fun!"

"I thought it was entertaining too. A little childish for someone in their thirties, but not so cringey that you can't watch it."

"Oppa! Unnies! Is that oppa really Oppa's and the unnies' friend?!"

"Yep! Jinwoo and Sol are really close~"

"Then get me his autograph!"

"Got it. Sol will grab a hundred of Jinwoo's autographs for you~ Heehee."

"Woooow~~ Unnie's the best!"

Thank god. The reaction was good.

And the finished product had turned out far better than the version I'd watched in my previous life. In particular, the OST—the one they'd agonized over the most during post-production—fit the drama's atmosphere perfectly.

"Huuuuh…"

The tension drained out of me, and a sigh of relief slipped free.

Bzzzt!! Bzzzt!!

My phone started buzzing like mad. I picked it up and headed into my room.

"What's going on?"

"Yeah, it did."

Of course the person calling was Jeong Hana, the writer of the drama.

"I'm happy too."

"I really am happy."

"Over…?"

"Ah…"

Coming to the house?

I really didn't want to put Jeong Hana and the others in the same room. A vaguely ominous feeling settled over me.

"The house is out. Let's do the celebration at the studio."

"I don't know. When are you free?"

"I'm not free right now."

She dumped everything she wanted to say and hung up.

She wanted to see me?

This was the same person who'd treated me like a ghost every time I showed up at the studio?

I still couldn't get a read on what kind of person she was. But one thing was certain—she was extraordinary. She wrote incredibly well.

Over the past week, three episodes of The Cat Cries Meow had dropped. Episode one alone pulled 470,000 views—and the numbers were climbing even faster now than they had ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠in that first explosive surge.

Of course, the press and money had played a part. I'd commissioned promotional review videos from countless YouTubers, and Yang Sang-ho's True Story had practically wallpapered the internet with articles. Other online news outlets started copying the coverage one after another, interest exploded, and the view counts shot through the roof.

"It's fine. How are the new sign-ups looking?"

It sounded massive, but in absolute numbers it was still under four thousand. The baseline for new sign-ups had been that abysmal.

But this was only the beginning. Now we had to convert the people who'd signed up just to watch The Cat Cries Meow into paying members.

That wouldn't be easy right away. We weren't any different from the other OTT platforms they already used. If anything, compared to Metflix—with its mountain of overseas titles—we had far less to offer.

For now, the priority was branding Witch into as many people's heads as possible.

"Mr. Yang, I think we can stop running the spam articles now."

"Then drop the article the day after the rankings come out. We'll start our own promo to match."

On September 1st, the first day of the second semester, I sat down in the lecture hall and immediately heard a buzz of chatter. Park Seongmin, of course, was right in the middle of the fuss.

"Did you see this article?!"

"What article?"

"That audition show that wrapped yesterday! The rankings were rigged! After I voted for them every single day…!"

"Did the person you were rooting for get cut?"

"No, they made it."

"……"

"Th-that's not the point! The point is the rankings were rigged!"

"Then watch one that isn't rigged."

"One that isn't…?"

I casually held out my phone. Naturally, it was a promo article for the new audition program—backed by Dawon Media, produced by Future Studio, starring Lime Entertainment trainees, and airing on Witch.

"The Project 32…?"

"They're picking just five debut members out of thirty-two. No ranking votes or anything—and since they're all trainees from the same agency, there's no room for rigging."

"I didn't know this existed… You act like you don't care, but you're really into girl groups, huh?"

"Being interested in pretty girls is just a guy's natural instinct, isn't it?"

"Are the trainees on this show pretty?"

"Insanely pretty. Check them out. You can watch their individual intro videos on Witch, and on YouTube too."

"Witch??"

"It's way better than Metflix. I'm a premium member myself."

"Really…? I just use Met…"

"Tsk tsk tsk… That's why girls don't like you."

"Wh-what does that have to do with anything?!"

"It has everything to do with it, my friend. If you want to be popular with girls, sign up for Witch Premium. Content is Witch—you still don't know that?"

"Content is… Witch…?"

Damn. My old salesman habits were slipping out without me noticing. Still, I'd successfully locked in one more premium customer at twenty thousand won a month. I had no idea which part of that pitch had actually convinced him.

Originally I'd planned a simultaneous YouTube release, but the Witch staff had pushed hard for an exclusive drop on the platform alone. Still, to spark interest and ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠drive promotion, we put the trainees' individual intro videos and a few cookie clips up on YouTube as well.

The early response wasn't as hot as I'd hoped. Without the national-producer, viewer-voting format, interest and engagement were inevitably cut in half.

But from here on out, I'd start feeling the return on every won I'd spent.

Dozens of trainees I'd paid agency after agency to bring in. Looks, skill, talent, raw charisma—each of them started pouring out their own appeal and pulling people's attention. Sweat-soaked effort, shared joy, tears shed in secret—we showed the real, unscripted lives of trainees without forced drama, and the response turned genuinely good.

"Ahh… Finally, I can breathe…"

Today I finished liquidating all of the ACM ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠stock I'd invested in back in mid-April—$54 million worth. The profit came out to roughly $160 million.

A mere 197% gain, sure—but money makes money, and the absolute return was staggering. What would have been 1.97 million won on a million-won investment became, on $54 million, about 94 billion won in profit. That was after subtracting the principal and taxes. Add the principal back in and you were looking at roughly 167 billion. The exchange rate had ticked up a little in the meantime, padding the haul even more.

At last, my barely-scraping-by cash flow had room to breathe.

"Alright. Time to split this up."

Over the course of a month, I'd bought into three stocks.

One of them was a company called Claxis. Market cap around 260 billion won, but free float was only 25%. That meant only about 64 billion won of stock was actually available to buy—and even that barely traded. Over the past month I'd managed to scrape together roughly 10 billion won's worth.

By comparison, Gaji Solutions had a market cap of about 98 billion, but free float was a full 70%. Roughly 69 billion won of stock was tradeable, and volume was healthy, so I'd swept it up like a maniac. The price spiked for a while, but after that I collected slowly and managed to lock in about 23 billion won's worth.

The last one was MKW. Market cap around 500 billion, free float a comfortable 63%, volume not bad either. Of the 326 billion won floating on the market, I'd scooped up about 40 billion.

Total spent across the three stocks: 73 billion. Remaining capital: 94 billion.

Of that, I poured 70 billion into Dawon Media to inject cash into the subsidiaries, and decided to let the remaining 24 billion sit for another two and a half months or so.

There was a company I planned to invest in the moment January 2019 hit.

And when that time came, it would finally drop.

The Korean Joseon-era zombie drama—Emperor.

A simultaneous release with Metflix, but on a cheaper subscription plan. Plus the meticulously prepared, country-by-country localization work we'd been grinding on. Looking purely at Emperor's target audience, our competitive edge in Korea and across Asia was clearly a step ahead of Metflix.

"Then how about we push that edge a little further?"

"Ah, sorry. President Jeong—there's a film that just wrapped shooting called Parasite. Lock down an exclusive deal for Witch."

"Exactly. Swallow it whole before anyone else gets their spit on it."

The proud Korean film that would become the first non-English-language picture to win Best Picture at the notoriously snobbish Academy Awards. An exclusive deal on that would put us another step ahead. Sure, exclusivity would cost—but approaching now, when no one could even guarantee a box-office hit, we might swallow it for a steal.

"Oh—and lock down an exclusive on A Ruthless Job too. Before it opens. We'll go with whatever release window they want on our side."

Going forward, every K-content hit—domestic and international—would only be available on Witch.

…Okay, that might be overselling it a bit. Let's revise that to content produced by Future Studio.

"Sorry for calling so late."

"The scripts coming in from Future Studio have been sparse lately. If you've got anything backed up, send it over fast. I'll point out exactly which ones we have to lock down."

Hit movies. Dramas that would be loved at home and abroad. I swept them all up before any investor, production company, broadcaster, or OTT platform could even get close. Production schedules varied, but each one would premiere exclusively on Witch right when it had originally blown up.

And through Won Chaeyoung, I was also cherry-picking famous songs and buying them up one by one.

Piece by piece, my treasure vault was filling up.

In time with the flow of years, I would release them to the world one after another.

And then it would take shape.

My own small media kingdom.