8:30 PM.
Matthew trudged ho with heavy steps.
As a lawyer, his work was busy every day.
And the only free ti he had was to read novels and scroll through the news.
Even the video ga console he loved playing in college had long been thrown into the storage room, covered in dust.
That day, as usual, while eating takeout, he clicked into the Yahoo website to browse the pages.
Suddenly, an ad on the Yahoo hopage caught his attention.
Novels?
Websites?
Like sothing similar to Amazon?
Matthew snorted to himself internally: What are people who build these kinds of websites thinking? In a physical bookstore, you can at least flip through a book to see if it suits your taste.
Online bookstore?
How can you tell anything just from a synopsis and book reviewers’ recomndations?
Books are so expensive, isn’t it just a waste of money if it doesn’t et your taste?
But despite his thoughts, he clicked into the website called wangwen.
Anyway, it was just to look at the book covers.
If a cover piqued his interest, then he would go to a physical bookstore tomorrow, flip through the content, and decide whether to buy it or not.
He would never buy a book online that he couldn’t even flip through.
But after entering the website, he was slightly surprised at the site’s layout.
It wasn’t like Amazon where you just see a book cover, reviews, and then click to buy.
Most of the books on this website could be viewed directly?
So, how did it make a profit?
Was it violating copyright?
Matthew’s professional curiosity was piqued.
He looked at the most prominent cover on the website and hesitated for a mont before clicking on it.
Book Title: "Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone."
Author: JK Rowling.
He had never heard of it.
Matthew shook his head and continued to scroll down.
The story starts with a little boy who’s a wizard and adopted by his aunt’s family?
He shifted his gaze from the computer screen to the "A Song of Ice and Fire" on the table.
Another fantasy novel?
What’s with this year, all these books about magic and wizards?
But since it was free, he continued reading.
Harry was bullied, and a segnt of inner monologue made Matthew frown.
What, quite a strong "I’m a Great Mage" vibe?
He wouldn’t buy such books in a store.
He kept reading.
Harry was recruited to a Magic School, got on a train, and t a male and a female companion.
A passage read, "The wheels of fate began to turn"...
Well,
It was a bit adolescent, but it inexplicably resonated with him.
And then, the fantasy world described in the book seed kind of interesting.
Bizarre transfiguration, mysterious ntors, a villain whose na must not be said.
It’s just that the word count is a bit excessive; pointless scenic descriptions took up too much of one Chapter.
Matthew shook his head and muttered to himself, "This book couldn’t be published; it would waste too much paper."
Finally, Harry was about to compete in the Magic School tournant.
Win after win got Matthew quite stirred up.
He was eagerly flipping through the pages, about to face off against the school’s prodigy.
And then...
A paynt request?
Fuck,
What kind of trick is this?
Matthew wanted to stop reading, but he was incredibly itching to know what happened next.
Oh well,
Let’s see how much it costs?
He clicked the paynt button, and the page displayed $0.05.
cents?
Can’t even buy a pack of gum with that.
Without a second thought, Matthew paid and continued to read.
Harry, after a fierce battle, had defeated the genius of the school.
Next, it was ti to see how the rest of the school would react with surprise.
Matthew clicked the mouse excitedly.
And then...
Another paynt?
Damn it, damn it, damn it!
Matthew was so angry he almost smashed his mouse but, after thinking for a mont, he reluctantly made the paynt.
And to avoid the paynt screen popping up constantly, he bought $5 worth in one go.
Just like that, five dollars, five dollars, five dollars...
At midnight.
After finally finishing "Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone," Matthew realized in his heart that he had actually spent $25?
And he didn’t even get a physical book?
No, that’s not acceptable.
Can’t just suffer a loss like that.
Matthew thought for a mont, then clicked into the book ranked second on the hopage, "Arcane Throne."
The hardcover of this book was priced at $40; he figured he would read so free Chapters to make up for so of his losses.
So, two hours later.
Matthew stared blankly at the computer screen, muttering to himself, "That’s it? What cos next?"
"I can pay."
This sort of thing happened to many people accustod to surfing the internet.
And this also led to so of the comnts under the novels becoming: Hurry up and write, I can pay...
At this mont, Wang Jian, Tom, and Dorsey looked at the website’s backend data, their faces full of joy.
It was late at night, yet the website’s traffic was still growing.
And the number of paying readers for "Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone" continued to increase.
After pondering for a mont, Wang Jian felt that so issues needed to be resolved.
Otherwise, there would be significant risks in the future.
He clapped his hands, and when Tom and Rossi turned their heads to look at him, he said, "I think, our website should beco more official."
"You have all put in a lot of effort during the website’s founding. I hope we can work together to make wangwen bigger and stronger."
"So, I propose that the three of us beco partners, as co-founders of the website."
"As for the percentage of shares each person holds in the website, we can put that forward and discuss it together."
Dorsey said excitedly, "Are we at the stage of Jobs’s garage and Dell’s storeroom now?"
Tom and Wang Jian looked at each other and smiled at the sa ti.
But where there is joy, there is also sorrow.
In the Amazon Chairman’s office, Bezos looked at wangwen with his brows deeply furrowed.
He had always believed the website had potential but wasn’t truly worried.
After all, the rights to books from major publishers were in his hands.
And this small website only attracted authors who got rejected elsewhere to publish their works.
One could imagine that the overall quality of these rejected works surely was lower than that of published books.
So, in a content-is-king book market, they surely could not compete with his Amazon.
But who could have anticipated that the young Asian would carve out his own path?
He broke up the novel content to sell it pieceal, offering a certain amount of free content before charging.
This tactic had erased the inconvenience of buying books online in one stroke.
It was even more convenient than physical bookstores.
Because with physical books, you can’t buy them one Chapter at a ti, especially not for such a cheap price as 5 cents.
But Bezos could not follow suit because of book copyright issues.
Unconsciously clicking his mouse, Bezos navigated away from wangwen to a new website.
He looked closely.
It was a shopping site mainly for individual sellers, eBay.
Bezos stared at the screen for a long ti and finally smiled.
"Just book sales, how big could the market possibly be?"
"Having big ambitions is actually a good thing."
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