The founder of the Chinese internet, currently undergoing rescue in the ICU

Wen|RunranEdit|JiangjiangTianya still cannot log in normally. Due to IDC's arrears and server downtime, Tianya Community, once popular and known as the "First Internet Community in China," has had to go into live streaming rooms to sell in order to raise 3 million yuan in restart funds

Wen|Runran

Edit|Jiangjiang

Tianya still cannot log in normally.

Due to IDC's arrears and server downtime, Tianya Community, once popular and known as the "First Internet Community in China," has had to go into live streaming rooms to sell in order to raise 3 million yuan in restart funds.

Restart Tianya Tiktok live broadcast room/source: restart Tianya Tiktok live broadcast screenshot

But it is precisely because of this sale that more people have a deeper understanding of the "end of an era". Some netizens exclaimed, "It's like being sent to the ICU for live crowdfunding rescue.

Everyone is missing Tianya, but no one has yet been able to save Tianya.

Live streaming, seven days and seven nights

On May 28, 2023, a live streaming event called "Reboot Tianya" was launched. At 8:00 p.m., Song Zheng appeared in the Tiktok live broadcast room on time, and explained the seven days and seven nights of live broadcast, raising 3 million yuan to "restart Tianya"Original intention.

Restart Tianya Tiktok account/image source: restart Tianya Tiktok screenshot

Song Zheng, former executive editor in chief of Tianya Community, the first employee of Tianya, and also the organizer of this event.

When Tianya was suspended from operation, he obtained authorization from its CEO Xing Ming to raise 3 million yuan through a special method such as live streaming and sales to save Tianya's life and restore normal access to Tianya.

Live streaming with goods has become a "lifeline" for many people.

Luo Yonghao has successfully achieved the goal of "true transmission" through live streaming e-commerce; After the drastic changes in the education industry, Yu Minhong also preferred live streaming and sales, turning the tide against the wind; Even Li Yapeng, who left the entertainment industry and "lost every business", also wanted to make money and repay his debts through live streaming after incurring huge debts.

From this perspective, live streaming sales are the most direct and easy to make rich industry, but from the perspective of Tianya's self rescue this time, it is not that easy.

This is a voluntary activity organized by former employees and old users, and it is said that from making a decision to the start of the live broadcast, there was only a short 18 day preparation time.

Therefore, the entire live broadcast opening on the evening of May 28th can be said to be both hasty and chaotic. In the first 6 minutes, Song Zheng's voice couldn't be heard clearly by netizens, and what was received in the microphone was from other staff membersNoise.

Because they are all beginners, they can only write and communicate during live streaming/Image source: Weibo @ Chao News

Prior to this, these people had almost no exposure to live streaming products and were all "amateur players".

Even the former fans of Tianya, many of whom have just downloaded Tiktok, don't even know how to place an order to buy things in the studio - there is a deep sense of sadness and powerlessness.

Song Zheng originally wanted to invite some well-known celebrities to the live broadcast room, but he said it was difficult to find and the progress was slow.

Song Zheng reflected and said, "Tianya itself is a platform created by countless grassroots participants. Why can't we just tell grassroots stories? It's not just celebrity celebrities who deserve attention

So he decided to invite some "Old Tianya" to listen to their stories about Tianya - a seven day and seven night oral history of Tianya.

Among them, Song Zheng also connected Xing Ming on-site, but Xing Ming did not show his face throughout the entire process, and the camera only displayed a background image of "Tianya Community". As a result, the comment section became restless, believing that the CEO did not take it seriously and that restarting was not sincere.

Not only is the format of the live chat not well prepared, but the hosts also appear very unfamiliar with the product links, which have not been listed yet.

Within 3 hours, the highest number of viewers in the "Reboot Tianya" live broadcast room was only 1000, and the number one Reboot Tianya commemorative T-shirt was ordered with less than 200 units sold.

Restart the commemorative T-shirt/image source in Tianya Tiktok's window: restart the live screenshot of Tianya

Through two days of live streaming, Song Zheng gradually figured out some of the gameplay in the live room and actively requested to turn off Meiyan. On May 30th, the "Reboot Tianya" live broadcast room, Xiaohuangche, had links to nearly a hundred products, and the live broadcast screen was also filled with various products.

In terms of product selection, it can be said that everything is sold, including Tianya Surroundings, signature books, mineral water, tea, Wangwang Xianbei, as well as data cables, garbage bags, and Golden Throat Treasure. Song Zheng said, "I'm not very good at bringing goods, and I'm not familiar with these products. I have everything to eat, drink, wear, and use. Let's see what you need

In the live broadcast room, there are constantly fans asking how much more is left than 3 million. Song Zheng's answer was also very candid. In the past two days, he achieved a profit of over 100000 yuan and lamented that he had set his goal too high, far from 3 million yuan.

Restart Tianya's sales/image source: Tiktok screenshot of restart Tianya

As we can see, this live streaming room did not attract too much attention online. As of 10:00 p.m. on May 30, "Restart Tianya" had only 24000 fans on its Tiktok account, and the vast majority of video likes were just a few dozen.

Song Zheng is very eager for controversy and also looks forward to being seen in the live broadcast room. He even imitated the Ice Bucket Challenge and held a relay race in the live broadcast room, requiring fans to create videos and share their vows to restart Tianya, and nominated three friends to participate.

In this era where meticulous polishing may not necessarily lead to instant success, can such traditional marketing activities be immediately remembered?

Nowadays, the sense of existence in Tianya is too weak.

The "Hometown" from Prosperity to Extinction

Tianya has been established for 24 years and is the "spiritual hometown" of many people.

Netizens say they haven't been to Tianya for a long time, and Song Zheng says he too. "You've been away from this hometown for a long time, and you won't go back, but you hope it's always there. Otherwise, you'll feel very uncomfortable.

In 1999, Xing Ming was spirited and founded Tianya Community in Hainan with the "20 million yuan profit from stock trading". That period was also when Chinese internet giants such as Tencent and Alibaba emerged one after another.

Xing Ming/Tuyuan: Qianfeng Network

The former Tianya, known as the "largest Chinese internet community in the world", had most of its early users coming from universities, media, and research institutions. There is a strong knowledge atmosphere in the community, with many unfamiliar and fresh viewpoints. Users chat and build tall buildings, and if they are not satisfied, they can resist the moderator.

In this process, Tianya has gained popularity among countless people, and phenomenal online literary works such as "Ming Dynasty Things", "Ghost Blows the Lantern", and "Get Rid of the Tumors" were also born here.

At its peak, the registered users of Tianya Community exceeded 130 million, forming a unique network culture of Tianya.

Due to its powerful users and high-quality content, Tianya was once a hot topic in the eyes of capital.

In 2004, Sina and Sohu had hoped to acquire Tianya Community, but Xing Ming refused. From 2005 to 2006, Tianya successively received investments from IDG, Qingke, Lenovo, Google, and Jiangnanchun, and planned to go public overseas.

For the issue of commercialization, Tianya only began to consider it when it started financing in 2006.

Before 2011, Tianya not only had a strong popularity but also significant advertising revenue. But in 2012, Tianya went from prosperity to decline, and in 2006 and 2011, Tianya failed to go public from overseas markets to the ChiNext board.

In 2014 and 2013, the net cash flow generated from operating activities of Tianya Community was -25.7153 million yuan and -18.8064 million yuan, respectively. Xing Ming responded at the time that Tianya's losses were caused by the large R&D expenses invested in the company's early transformation, as well as the impact from new social platforms such as Weibo and WeChat. At that time, Tianya launched membership based advertising and precision advertising, but none of them made a breakthrough.

In 2014 and 2013, the net cash flows generated from operating activities of Tianya Community were -25.7153 million yuan and -18.8064 million yuan, respectively. Source: Tianyancha

There is no way, Tianya can only rely on the New Third Board financing.

In August 2015, Tianya was listed on the New Third Board at an issuance price of 13.33 yuan per share. Subsequently, it underwent a second additional issuance, with a market valuation of over 2 billion yuan.Due to the failure to timely disclose the 2015 annual report, Tianya's transfer was suspended only 6 days after landing on the New Third Board.

During the period of listing on the New Third Board, the situation on Tianya did not improve. In 2016, Tianya Community implemented an additional issuance, with plans to raise funds ranging from 54 million yuan to 210 million yuan. But Tianya Community, without fulfilling the filing procedures, used some of the subscription funds of the subscription objects in advance to pay employee salaries, telecommunications custody fees, fiber optic fees, etc.

Tianya Fundraising/Source: New Third Board News

In April 2019, Tianya officially delisted on the New Third Board.

At that time, Tianya publicly stated that the delisting was voluntarily applied for by the company. After delisting, the company will seize the opportunity in the Chinese capital market under the trend of registration system, officially launch an IPO plan, and actively prepare for the Science and Technology Innovation Board to seek better development after laying out technological innovation and upgrading business models on social platforms.

The product of the Internet era is both powerful and extremely fragile. The network environment is undergoing drastic changes, and community content cannot be accepted. Competitors are rising, and losing users' Tianya means losing high-quality content.

At the same time, a large number of literary works and writers have been poached by other websites, and paid reading and publishing have little to do with Tianya.

The decline of Tianya is inevitable, and the business situation naturally deteriorates. Most of the revenue of Tianya community comes from advertising, but advertising revenue has also been declining. At this moment, talking about actively preparing for the sci-tech innovation board is like talking about dreams.

'Vegetables' Waiting for Rescue

Without money, everything has become very bad.

In early April 2023, Tianya became a "vegetable" due to years of arrears of over 10 million yuan in server fees to Telecom.

Regarding this, Song Zheng once revealed on Weibo: "Tianya is not dead, just completely paralyzed. IDC owes money and the server has been stopped. Due to a lawsuit, the domain name has also been frozen by the court

Song Zheng Weibo/Image Source: Screenshot of Weibo

Tianya Community reported that this serious liquidity crisis was caused by the failure of investment in building a mobile Internet Advanced Business Park in Chengdu, which led to a serious setback in the transformation of mobile Internet, further triggered chain reactions such as bank loan failure, high compensation for employee resignation, and caused the overall liquidity crisis of Tianya Company.

Recently, Tianya Community Network Technology Co., Ltd. was listed on the list of abnormal operations by the Haikou Market Supervision and Administration due to inability to contact through registered residence or business premises.

Tianya has been listed in the list of abnormal operations by the Haikou Market Supervision Administration/Source: screenshot of the National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System

According to Tianyancha Information, there are currently 6 executed person information in the company entity of Tianya Community, with a cumulative executed target exceeding 146 million yuan.

At the same time, the company and Xing Ming also have dozens of consumption restriction orders. In addition, the company has also involved hundreds of cases, including disputes over reputation rights and infringement of the right to online dissemination of work information.

In the live broadcast room, Song Zheng repeatedly emphasized that the funds raised of 3 million yuan are used to restore the permissions of Tianya server, so that users can restore access and save the memories they want.

Restoring access may not be too difficult, but it's not easy for Tianya to survive.

In its public response on May 27th, Tianya Community also made plans for its path after "rebirth": while shouldering the "global Chinese online home", it focuses on mobile devices; Launch digital human assistant or digital avatar services based on the accumulation of big data from Tianya users; And provide membership based social e-commerce services, as well as combine the opportunities of Hainan Free Trade Port to strictly select global consumer boutiques for Tianya users and provide membership based social e-commerce services.

Doing AI and e-commerce shows that Tianya also wants to actively follow the times.

Last July, Tianya also launched the "Tianya Yuanzhuan Plan", where each Yuanzhuan has a unique identification number that can be collected as digital collectibles and circulated through legal and regulatory means.

Tianya Yuanzhuan Plan/Image Source: Sohu @ Tianya Community

But none of these businesses have been able to spark water.

Tianya, which is raising funds from multiple sources, is still waiting for rescue.

In the live broadcast room, Song Zheng and "Lao Tianya" were both shouting, "Zhang Yiming, why don't you take Tianya away

If they cannot save up to 3 million yuan in seven days and seven nights to achieve the goal of restarting, Song Zheng said they will continue to do so.

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