Lin Yu’an poured a glass of whiskey, sat down in front of the huge oak desk, and opened the laptop connected to the Starlink satellite.

He glanced at the time—Wiseman, December 24th, 11 PM.

He calculated the time difference; at this time, on the other side of the earth, it should be 4 PM on December 25th in Guangzhou.

For friends back home, the afternoon on Christmas Day should be relatively relaxed.

He initiated a voice call on WeChat, and after a few system tones, it was connected.

"Hello, Brother An? Damn, it really is you!" A still hearty voice came through the headphones, full of great surprise, "Do you know how I’ve spent these fifty days! Everything over there... is going well, right?"

On the other end of the line was Old Mao’s voice, the first few words as eager as before.

"It’s me, Old Mao. Just returned to the civilized world, everything is good." Lin Yu’an’s voice was very calm, he took a sip of whiskey, sharply catching the fleeting pause in the other person’s words.

"That’s good, that’s good..." Old Mao seemed to sigh with relief, but that previous warmth quickly faded like the receding tide. The other end of the line fell into a brief silence, and the atmosphere became somewhat subtle.

Lin Yu’an did not speak, just quietly waited. He knew that some things always needed someone to speak first.

As expected, when Old Mao spoke again, his tone carried a professional fatigue and helplessness: "Brother An... you should have seen the messages I sent before. This matter... sigh, how to say it, Bilibili’s situation this year is too complicated."

Lin Yu’an’s mouth curved in a barely noticeable arc. He knew that the friend Old Mao had already logged off, and the person he was talking to now was Bilibili’s operator, Old Mao.

He took the initiative to break the stalemate, going straight to the point, "Regarding the exclusive contract, I respect the platform’s decision."

"Sigh, Brother An, hearing you say that makes me feel even worse..." Old Mao let out a long sigh, as if the pressure accumulated for a long time finally found a release, "This... it’s really not aimed at you. The platform this year has completely turned upside down."

He paused, his voice full of weariness: "Do you remember when the company went public in Hong Kong again this March? Since that day, everything changed. Previously we benchmarked against YouTube, talking about community culture, content ecology."

"Now, the analysts at the Hong Kong Stock Exchange are watching our financial reports, user growth, commercialization capabilities every day! The pressure on the stock price is too great!"

"In order to make the financial reports look good, the company parachuted several VPs (vice presidents) from Alibaba, Byte, those places, all hard-hitters in traffic monetization."

"My former direct leader, the one who supported us in making documentaries, has already been transferred to handle some innovation projects, to put it bluntly, has been sidelined."

"The ones in charge of us now, all they talk about is data models, monetization funnels, they don’t understand our passion for content creation."

He lowered his voice, with a hint of self-mockery: "To put it bluntly, it’s like a beautiful female streamer’s livestream room, where the revenue of a mid-tier female streamer surpasses the incentives of our entire wilderness section for a month. These are the numbers, in the eyes of the new leadership, monetization is everything."

"In the coming years, live streaming will be one of Bilibili’s absolute priorities, so our type of content section’s exclusive contract slots have been completely slashed, all to recruit other streamers."

"Not to mention that esports division, it’s purely a bottomless pit for spending, so... from a strategic perspective, this year our entire wilderness section doesn’t even have a single exclusive slot, let alone any extra resources for support."

Old Mao’s tone was filled with unwillingness, but more so with a sense of helpless acceptance of reality: "Damn it, even the support plans for several top creators under me have stopped, I’ve got a mortgage to pay, and my options are just hoping the stock price looks better."

"Your ’Life Below Zero’ actually has pretty good data on the site, but its monetization channels are too singular. Besides attracting users to buy premium memberships, a large number of ’clip accounts’ have diluted your traffic, resulting in comprehensive returns far less than a livestream with ’thanks to the supporter captain’."

"The new leadership’s KPIs, if unmet, forget about the year-end bonus, the whole department might be optimized. Brother An, I... I really can’t help you get better conditions."

"I understand, it’s just the logic of capital." Lin Yu’an’s tone showed no sign of disappointment.

"Old Mao, you don’t need to feel bad, you’re just executing the company’s decisions." Lin Yu’an said lightly, "This past year or so, collaborating with you, and the editor Li Ang has been very enjoyable, but all good things must come to an end."

"With only a few months left on the contract, I wasn’t planning on signing any platform exclusives again, nor with MCNs, just uploading videos across all platforms to earn some basic revenue. In terms of content, I want it to be purer."

"That’s good too..." Old Mao also seemed to really breathe a sigh of relief, his tone lighter, "Your pursuit of freedom shouldn’t be shackled by the petty matters of the platform, from a personal perspective, I absolutely support you."

"By the way." Lin Yu’an seemed to remember something, "Archaeopteryx brand’s friendship is about to expire too, right? Bilibili’s business is the third party. They probably won’t renew either, this year, my commercial exposure has been too little."

"Hmm... yes, our business department tried, the probability isn’t high..." Old Mao said honestly.