http://publishingperspectives.com/20...exploiting-ip/
Quote:
Earlier this year Tencent finished the acquisition of Shanda Cloudary, the pioneering Chinese self-publishing and digital literature platform, which includes well-known online literature sites such as www.qidian.com and chuangshi.qq.com. The acquisition was priced at RMB 5 billion ($800 million), according to Sina Tech.
Shanda, launched in 2008, was innovative in a number of ways, not the least of which was enabling Chinese writers to freely publish online and monetize their work through micropayments from readers as well as rights and licensing deals. As of 2010, it commanded 71.5% of the Chinese reading market (according to Iresearch).
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It would be funny if Tencent expand its literature subsidiary (China Reading Limited) to the West. It could disrupt Amazon Kindle.
Step 1: Buy out Wattpad or create its own literature web site
Step 2: Provide royalties for its popular web writers (monetize through subscription, donation and ad revenue)
Step 3: Gain more readers. Attract some full-time genre fiction writers who are writing for trade publishers or self-publishing.
Step 4: Rinse and repeat
If Digital Reading is the future, then Web Novel Publishing (with royalties) is superior than Kindle Publishing.