我怎么看内容的未来（极客公园张鹏对话）

How I See the Future of Content (GeekPark Dialogue with Zhang Peng)

> Outlet: GeekPark (transcript of a dialogue with Zhang Peng, written up by Ji Yun) · 2014-06-12 · [Original link](https://www.geekpark.net/news/206170)
> Only his own answers are kept. Prompts marked (Q) are the editor's one-line summaries, not the interviewer's wording.

**(Q)** Why did this copyright dispute happen, and what do the critics want?

Behind the dispute there's actually a huge "gap" (间隙): people understand value differently. I've found that some traditional media really do still center their thinking on print media itself; they aren't thinking about doing networking well, or gaining more users through the mobile internet, which is actually a great pity. Of course, we also see cases where some traditional media's new media centers work very well with us, and they want more links to their content.

This time I found that print media had no clear demands; self-media were clearer instead. They've changed quite a lot; some applied to join after seeing the criticism. Because of the influence of traffic, because they can find more readers. Our media platform now allows ads, and media that join can put in a WeChat introduction link.

One clear demand of theirs is that if Toutiao becomes the content gateway on mobile in the future, it must distribute more of the benefits to content providers, and that if we really become very powerful, we shouldn't be a big shop that bullies its customers. I think this demand is reasonable.

**(Q)** How is this storm connected with changes in the media environment?

The PC era was actually like this too: you'll find many websites get fifty or sixty percent of their traffic from search engines. Though they had websites, the gateway was Baidu. The change now on the mobile internet is driven by the demands of industry transformation. A phone won't have hundreds of reading apps installed, so the gateway effect is more concentrated. Actually in this process we've found that the new media that rose in this round of going mobile are actually very welcoming toward us, such as 51 Qiche and Dongqiudi, and we've helped them a great deal.

**(Q)** By help, do you mean putting their content in Toutiao and bringing them traffic?

Yes, there are many companies that benefited like this. Niuche got five million US dollars of investment, at a valuation of over three hundred million yuan. We've seen many companies about a year old valued at several hundred million yuan; I suspect traditional media people haven't even seen this. If they had, they should do something similar, like Dongqiudi doing football, Niuche doing cars... I feel we're in two contexts, living in two worlds.

Some people are full of anger, but is their aim to make their new media good, do they want to grow better on the mobile internet? They haven't said. We don't know how to respond either.

**(Q)** Have traditional media proposed that you buy content by the piece?

Dayoo.com has proposed it.

**(Q)** What if all traditional media made demands on that basis?

For this approach of wanting us to buy content directly rather than link to content, we'll consider it according to market conditions. If new media provide this content, we may choose to cut the link. If the content is very high-quality and very exclusive, we can also consider reaching it through business cooperation. Of course we may offer richer, more efficient forms of business cooperation so that content providers profit.

What we can feel is that new online media are rising fast; they want more links to their own sites and more cooperation on product and technology. The focus of our discussions is more on how to reach more of this mutually beneficial cooperation, not simply selling content to me. Because that way, the content side feels that once the content is sold it has nothing to do with them; that's not an ecosystem approach, and essentially we don't want to go in that direction.

**(Q)** Why are you worth so much?

I didn't much want to talk about this before, but today I think I can say how we see our own value.

Toutiao hopes to become the tool that helps users worldwide discover valuable information faster in the mobile internet era. This will create huge user value and social value, because we've changed the efficiency of information distribution. For example, we saw a Toutiao share on Weibo by a Tsinghua professor, saying we recommended to him lots of machine learning content he needed. No media could provide this before; it's hard to make a print magazine called Machine Learning because it's too narrow, and even if such a magazine were made, the people who'd want to read it probably couldn't get it this conveniently. And Toutiao can understand his needs right away and link it to him. This is a huge improvement in user value, and a huge change to the content ecosystem.

In the course of bringing social and user value, we will certainly generate our commercial value in future. So the background to our valuation isn't taking advantage of traditional media's content copyright, but the huge user value and social value I just described.

We have no intention of "plundering" copyright, because the costs saved couldn't support the core value at all. Toutiao's core value is that when the mobile internet brought a change in the medium of information, it triggered a huge rise in the efficiency of information distribution; this major opportunity has the backdrop of the times.

**(Q)** What is the core of the change in reading that the mobile internet brings?

Every change of medium brings huge change, and we've found the mobile internet medium has some characteristics:

First, it's personal: your device can be carried with you, and it can learn rich information about you.

Second, it's real-time: everyone is connected in real time, which also greatly raises the speed of information transmission; it will never be that today's content is published the next day. So once content appears that someone is interested in, it should reach them right away.

Third, more precise. Because we know user information, the subsequent distribution of information can be more precise, and the change this brings is that content will be more flourishing and more vertical.

**(Q)** Will content be infinitely subdivided?

This trend is more and more obvious. Dongqiudi only covers football, Wanbiao Shidai only covers watches; before, because of distribution costs, they couldn't stand on their own. Now, whether by following or by recommendation, once distribution becomes more efficient, more vertical content will rise.

I feel this very strongly myself, because we work with many online media and can see them growing very fast. I hope everyone who can create good content steps across this gap (空隙); for those who can't, the future is dark.

**(Q)** Will content be distributed piece by piece, like iTunes?

That's right, content will also flourish in "single-track mode", because in this era the smaller the granularity of distribution, the more effective it is.

And the problem you mentioned, not knowing readers' interests, not knowing readers' characteristics, will also be solved. For example, if a media outlet joins via links, we'll tell it the audience characteristics and distribution of each of its articles, as well as the outlet's audience characteristics and distribution, and we'll calculate this article's score 灯 [Note: 「得分灯」 is so in the original, probably 「得分等」 (score, etc.).] in this field. So in the mobile era, the problem you describe will be greatly reduced and become infinite possibility.

**(Q)** Will authors become more famous than media outlets?

Yes. Apart from some big fields, organizations in some fields are getting smaller. Organizations getting smaller and becoming personal are the same thing; becoming personal is the extreme of getting smaller. Content transmission can get smaller, and so can content-producing organizations; what they write gets more and more specialized and focused. Getting smaller has another advantage, because users' information needs are clearer. The chain reaction of the change in medium changes the granularity of information transmission, and changes the size and organization of content-producing organizations.

**(Q)** As organizations get smaller, does the role of support staff shrink too?

I know traditional media fairly well: 1/3 reporters and editors counts as normal. Now in the new media crowd this ratio has changed greatly; if they mainly produce content, perhaps 80% are producing content, while things like distribution and advertising are handled by external systems. This shows that content production depends on fewer and fewer things, which is also where the trend toward smaller and personal comes from.

**(Q)** Is the overall cost of the loop from production to transmission shrinking?

Yes. That's exactly the trend.

**(Q)** If good content can spread without relying on media, how will the form of media change?

I think this is a more exciting future. Because it's more valuable to more users, more valuable information will certainly be spread. And good content and useful information will thereby reach users more directly.

Actually, for media, the organizational form needs to change. Distribution ability used to be an important ability in media organizations; now distribution ability is increasingly being replaced. I think this can't be changed; it's been replaced by technology. So I think in future media organizations should focus more on creating content, creating content that the non-institution itself can produce (非机构本身能产生的内容). New media are required to focus more on creation; I think it's a return to the proper role of the content creator.

Good content is the core of value, not the media organization itself.

**(Q)** Is the only value left to media their ability to create content?

That's how it is.

**(Q)** Will the people who really create content see a spring?

This will be very, very obvious. Actually you can already see that some well-known journalists who strike out on their own can surpass an institution in a short time; maybe they haven't monetized yet, but they're already influencing readers.

This era lowers the requirement for some of the abilities of "media". Before, if my distribution ability was good, my requirements on article quality could be lower. But now the value of content is almost the only important factor. So I've always held the view that people who create content must be our best partners; we'll encourage people who create better content, and build a sustainable ecosystem.

**(Q)** Do you want media to see that this is an irreversible trend?

The trend is irreversible, and it's not only us pushing it; you can count WeChat public accounts and Weibo too. I believe that within the next two years most users' content needs will be met by new online media, whether sports' entertainment (体育的娱乐), technology, lifestyle or health; this trend is very obvious.

In this trend, I'm relatively more optimistic about online media that rose directly without relying on traditional media. Among the cases I see, those doing well, getting good investment, even monetizing well, all appeared directly in the form of new online media; that's a fact.

And we're really not taking away media's future, but creating new media business models together. For example, compared with WeChat public accounts, we prominently display brands and links, allow ads to be shown, allow showing a WeChat account to introduce yourself, or adding product purchase links directly. At the same time we're also willing to explore new cooperation models with media.

**(Q)** Can you describe cases of Toutiao's cooperation with content providers?

Take Xueqiu: it certainly has an independent user base in its vertical downstream; it needs its client to maintain heavy users, but it can draw traffic from us.

Maybe smaller, like Mahua FunAge (开心麻花): its goal is to spark conversation, it doesn't need to build a big website, and it can publish its behind-the-scenes clips and trailers through us, and put the ticket purchase link in.

This brings a very important change to the ecosystem: once creation and distribution are easier, atypical media will also emerge. Actually I call this part self-media; I think "self" doesn't mean person, me Zhang Yiming as an individual; it's self. Many think self-media are those individuals who comment on everything every day; actually we think not. Mahua FunAge is the real self-media: without going through a third party it can express its own views and put out clips and trailers. Also Rong360 is typical self-media, telling people some financial consumer knowledge. And the charity "Veterans Return Home" (老兵回家) is also typical self-media. [Translator's note: "person" and "self" are in English in the source.]

This brings a richer ecosystem; content won't disappear in future, and we think it will be even richer.

**(Q)** Is the definition of media changing?

Yes. In future, government agencies and Mahua FunAge are just as much content creators. This change is very good for them: posting photos and WeChat posts has greatly boosted Mahua FunAge's brand, greatly expanded its ticket-buying user base, even directly increased ticket-purchase traffic and the number of orders. They don't look at the issue from a copyright perspective; for them copyright doesn't even exist.

Because before, for media, there were only newspapers, magazines or websites, and if they didn't have many users, they had to turn copyright into money. But for many companies, if what they do isn't the so-called media business model, copyright actually means nothing; content is instead a way of using information to release greater value.

For example, as long as the Mahua FunAge brand is kept, and the clip and ticket purchase link are kept, I believe what they want is for this content to spread as far as possible.

**(Q)** Will you charge content providers in future?

Many people have actually asked us this, and we're very clear: no. That's exactly why I find this dispute so baffling: on one side some people ask us for copyright fees, on the other side others worry whether we'll charge them...

**(Q)** What will you do to get traditional media to look ahead?

I think in this dispute we really did some things not so well. The change we'll make in future is that we can't just think things through ourselves and then run with our heads down. We should share our ideas with everyone, help everyone recognize the changes of mobile internet new media, and push for a shared understanding across the whole chain.

Second, we'll provide more tools and better technical support, so that more people who want to create content can create it more easily, speeding up new media's leading role in content.

Third, we'll tell everyone more about the successful cases of Toutiao's cooperation with media. Before maybe only we knew; now we've also set up a Toutiao media commentary account on Weibo, and we'll publish good examples, all kinds of data and all kinds of systems for everyone to know. At the same time we'll explore new cooperation models together.

We hope all 媒 [Note: so in the original; probably the character 「体」 is missing (媒体, media).] with ideals for the future can look to the future like us, and from the angle of helping users discover valuable information better and spreading information better, build this together. We actually welcome media whether they once criticized us or praised us; we welcome cooperation with all of them equally.

**(Q)** When do you plan to launch the monetization system?

We'll definitely put attempts in this area into practice within the year.

**(Q)** What forms might it take?

As our platform, we'll certainly give content providers their own choice. Ads, for example, are the most basic way, because they don't need to do anything; we show and click ads, and ad formats should also get richer.

And Mahua FunAge also wants to sell tickets, so we make it easy to jump to the ticket link, and we'll work better with Alipay to complete their ticket purchases.

Events and services too. For example, an investment and financing platform's service brings projects to its platform; for a car media outlet, we can bring test drives. The key thing is that you have to preserve the content creator's ability to display the services they want to provide, shown on their page, whether payment or test drives, whether purchases or ads.

So we'll do the most basic layer, ads, provide some tools so they can bring more services on, and in the end we'll certainly preserve their full right to control and choose for themselves. What we want to do is provide tools that help them display well to users the services they want to monetize.

**(Q)** Will new forms of media earn mainly from new business models?

Yes. New business models themselves also come from changes in commercial technology. Before, you couldn't complete a purchase in a newspaper, so there was no possibility of e-commerce; once new technology and new media rose, you click through and can place an order. I truly feel media need to think seriously about the new business model possibilities this trend brings.

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