Chapter 1 After Sending Away Liang Qingfan

After sending Liang Qingfan off, Pei Qian continued to review the work reports sent by various departments.

Since most projects were still in the development phase, there weren't many obvious clues to be found, so Pei Qian just skimmed through them.

The crucial moment before project completion and product release hadn't arrived yet. For Pei Qian, he could at least slack off for a little over a month.

Just then, Pei Qian flipped to a report and noticed a department he hadn't paid attention to in a while.

You An'an's Useful App.

"Hmm, truly a department with a low profile, but one that is dutiful and truly capable of easing my worries!"

After reading the work report sent by Yu An'an, Pei Qian couldn't help but sigh.

Since the establishment of the Useful App, Yu An'an had been diligently pushing forward related work.

First, starting from Handong University, from the fields of poetry and ancient texts, gradually expanding to other universities and other professional fields in the country.

Afterward, the Useful App also cooperated with Rabbit Tail Live, selecting those young scholars with clear thinking and good eloquence from these cooperative efforts, recommending them to Rabbit Tail Live to give lectures to ordinary audiences, mainly to popularize some basic knowledge.

At the same time, the content of these lectures would be edited and subtitled by specialists and retained on Rabbit Tail Live in the form of public lectures for everyone to watch repeatedly.

From its creation to the present, the form of the Useful App had basically been fixed, and the next task was to constantly fill it with content.

But this was by no means a task that could be completed overnight.

Although it was a knowledge-based website, the knowledge within it required many scholars to input it bit by bit. Professionals in various fields also needed Yu An'an and others to connect them one by one.

In short, this was a knowledge website, but completing it was a huge amount of manual labor.

So far, the initial field of ancient poetry had reached a relatively high degree of completion. The data and content related to those famous poems could completely meet the needs of most ordinary people.

As a website mainly aimed at ordinary people, the Useful App didn't need to be as profound as academic journals, at least not yet.

Therefore, so far, the completion rate in this field could be roughly written as 80%.

But this didn't mean that the personnel in related fields had completed 80% of their work. It only meant that this section had basically achieved its initial goals.

But in addition to these famous poems, there were also a large number of less famous poems, articles, and even the same article, with the progress of academic research, its analysis was constantly being added, deleted, and upgraded.

Related young scholars could continue to enrich the content, or expand in a specific direction, and this work could be lifelong.

In addition, Yu An'an was also expanding to other fields, but this expansion method seemed a bit disordered.

This couldn't be blamed on him. After all, the purpose of creating the Useful App was to "collect all useful knowledge and popularize it to the general public in an easy-to-understand manner."

But there were too many directions to choose from, and Yu An'an was somewhat at a loss. Now, most of his time was spent building frameworks, promoting multiple fields simultaneously.

Pei Qian was very satisfied with the current situation of the Useful App.

Its presence wasn't very strong. Although this software had already begun to be officially launched and operated, and Tengda Life App and Rabbit Tail Live and other industries had imported a large group of users for it, the number of active users was still a long way from being "popular."

Although many students were using it, they were ultimately a small group, and both their time and spending power were very limited.

And for others, even if they wanted to consult relevant information, the Useful App would be a very practical software, but this need didn't often arise.

For ordinary people, logging in two or three times a year was already pretty good.

This was also consistent with Pei Qian's initial estimate: the Useful App would be a grand and long-term project, and in the early stages, it was harmless.

Of course, the linkage between the Useful App and Rabbit Tail Live did create a certain amount of heat, but this heat mainly flowed to the Rabbit Tail Live side, which didn't help the Useful App much.

Although the popularity wasn't high, the Useful App did spend a lot of Pei Qian's money.

Yu An'an was very dutiful in spending all of his monthly funding, leaving not a single penny, and from time to time, he would submit a report and apply for additional funding.

"Great, in that case, let's allocate a little more funding!"

"Yu An'an, you say you're so capable, why did you want to create the Tengda Life App in the first place? You should have come to do the Useful App a long time ago."

"Hmm, deciding to let Yu An'an take the lead in developing the Useful App was definitely the most correct decision I've ever made!"

"...In addition to the funding, I also have to answer his question slightly."

In this report, Yu An'an not only introduced the current situation of the Useful App but also raised a question.

Specifically, he hoped that President Pei could give him some directional advice.

What direction should the Useful App choose next?

Because there were so many fields that could be done, Yu An'an didn't have choice phobia, but he was still having a difficult time choosing.

Pei Qian gently rubbed his chin, considering for a moment.

According to his idea, he definitely hoped that Yu An'an would dabble in everything, but nothing would stand out.

Like a forest, if one tree grew particularly tall and broke the world record, it would soon attract attention; but if all the trees grew at an average rate, no one would notice that the forest was growing taller as a whole at an extremely fast pace.

In this way, he could minimize the possibility of the Useful App becoming popular, and delay this time node as much as possible to burn more money.

But he couldn't say it too directly, that would seem very strange, he had to express it in a different way.

After considering the wording, Pei Qian replied, "Don't be bound by a single direction; observe more, and appropriately chase some hot topics, but they can't be common hot topics on the internet."

Although this statement seemed a bit vague, Pei Qian felt that he had expressed what he wanted to express. Whether or not he could understand it depended on Yu An'an's comprehension.

Don't be bound by a single direction, meaning that Yu An'an could spread out a bit, dabble in many fields, but none of them would be too prominent, causing unnecessary attention.

Observing more and chasing some hot topics was actually hoping that Yu An'an wouldn't delve too deeply or get too entangled in one field. He should chase a hot topic when he saw one, and switch when there was a new hot topic. He should dabble in every field, which could further reduce the possibility of the Useful App's success.

Of course, chasing hot topics would inevitably bring a problem, that was, catching the heat.

So Pei Qian added an extra sentence, telling Yu An'an not to chase common hot topics on the internet, it was best to choose some small hot topics.

These hot topics were numerous and miscellaneous, quite fragmented, and wouldn't catch much heat, which was Pei Qian's ideal choice.

In this way, even if the Useful App developed, it would mostly continue to run astray to a niche platform, instead of suddenly becoming popular.

It could be said to be multiple insurance.

Pei Qian carefully smoothed it over again, feeling that this hint was quite scientific and shouldn't have any absurd misunderstandings, so he clicked the [Send] button.

"Alright, today's work is over, off work, off work!"

Pei Qian stretched his back, preparing to eat something good to reward his hardworking self.

...

At the same time, Yu An'an was racking his brains in front of the computer.

A person who originally didn't have choice phobia was about to be forced to have choice phobia by work.

With the development of the Useful App, there were more and more ways to choose.

Although Yu An'an had already fully launched the knowledge construction in various fields through cooperation with universities, there had to be a specialized direction like the previous ancient poetry.

But Yu An'an had screened out at least a dozen fields that could be used as specialized directions, and how to choose was a headache.

So, he mentioned it in the work report, hoping that President Pei could solve his confusion.

Although President Pei would definitely be able to solve the problem, President Pei was busy after all, and might not be able to take the time.

Yu An'an didn't have too much hope for this.

Just then, he received a new work email, and it was actually President Pei's reply!

"Sure enough, no matter how indifferent it seemed before, President Pei will definitely step in at the right time when I need guidance the most!"

Yu An'an was overjoyed and immediately clicked to view it.

"Two sentences in total, without directly saying which direction to choose..."

"As expected of President Pei's consistent style, he provides guidance but doesn't say it too specifically, restricting the person in charge's play."

"More information still needs to be dug out by myself, so that I can improve my ability to think independently and keep up with President Pei's thinking."

Yu An'an began to seriously ponder the deep meaning behind President Pei's two sentences.

"Don't be bound by a single direction, it must be in response to the current overall strategy of the Useful App. As a platform dedicated to providing professional knowledge in all fields, the overall framework must be built in the early stages, and then it will be gradually improved."

"This coincides with what I'm currently doing, and it can be regarded as an affirmation and support of my work."

"Then the key should be in the latter sentence."

"Appropriately chase hot topics, but don't chase common hot topics on the internet."

"What does this mean..."

Yu An'an frowned slightly, vaguely realizing that this should be the key to the problem.

After all, there was a key point in the method of interpreting President Pei: wherever there is something unreasonable, there must be a deep meaning.

On the surface, this seems to be encouraging Yu An'an to chase those less famous hot topics.

But this doesn't make sense!

Because the act of chasing hot topics is itself for the sake of popularity. If you want to chase popularity but don't chase the biggest popularity, isn't that like eating x and not even getting it while it's hot?

"Ahem, I can't think of President Pei like that." Yu An'an quickly stopped his dangerous thoughts.

So President Pei definitely didn't mean that, but had another deep meaning.

Yu An'an began to analyze seriously.