"Quora is indeed an excellent product that fully explores the deep needs hidden in users' hearts."
Zhou Xin has a love-hate attitude towards Zhihu, because it is a very successful product in its early days and the entire ecological content is extremely interesting.
But by 2020, Zhihu has become completely useless to him: tasteless to eat, and a pity to throw away.
Quora Zhou Xin is also an in-depth user, but the difference is that with the explosive growth of the number of users, Quora has a bottom line and does not recruit members for the sake of revenue.
Of course, what Zhou Xin didn’t know was that Quora also launched something similar to Zhihu Salt Membership in 2021, called Quora+.
Answers posted by users in the paywall can only be viewed by users who have purchased Quora+.
Yanxuan membership was officially launched in 2019. It is difficult not to think that Quora is plagiarizing Zhihu’s model.
Therefore, in 1999, Zhou Xin was able to completely dominate Quora's ecology. He was very happy because he believed that in his plan, Quora would not become like Zhihu in future generations.
“People have questions all the time, and it’s hard to get an answer to a lot of them without going through it yourself, and even I have questions.
Compared with ordinary people, when I have a question, a secretary will come to help me find the question. Even if he doesn't know, he will get the answer through various means.
I was still asking Trish yesterday why Quora was so successful. She couldn't give me a satisfactory answer herself, so she launched a questionnaire in our internal forum.
Then she would put together a comprehensive report for me. "Bill Gates said.
As early as the 1980s, Microsoft had an internal BBS called "Microsoft Conference", and later they created more internal forums.
This kind of internal forum was initially used to discuss technical issues, but later it could not avoid the consequences of deviation.
“The vast majority of people do not have such conditions, but they will also have problems, and they may even have no fewer problems than me.
Quora solves everyone's needs very well, but now Quora is not open to everyone for registration. When it is open for everyone to register, it will definitely be an indispensable part of the Internet ecosystem. "
Bill Gates made an appointment to meet Zhou Xin this time at a coffee shop called Java City, a coffee chain that originated in California in 1992. It was Bill Gates' favorite coffee shop at the time.
In the spacious and bright coffee shop, Zhou Xin admitted that he felt a little overwhelmed by such compliments from the world's richest man.
But then he thought about Bill Gates' investment in Riot Games, and the return rate had exceeded 300%. Zhou Xin felt that it was right for the other party to praise him.
Zhou Xin saw that the other party had not yet picked up the coffee cup, and knew that Bill Gates had not finished speaking.
"So will Quora accept Microsoft's acquisition? Five hundred million dollars, five hundred million dollars in one week, this is a good price." Bill Gates raised five fingers.
Zhou Xin shook his head and said, "I'm not short of money now."
Bill Gates raised his forehead and said: "Sometimes geniuses are always so annoying. They have many wild ideas and can create extraordinary products.
But usually they are so good that they don’t lack start-up capital.
This is also the dilemma of investment. The better the project, the less money it will have.
Does Quora accept investment?
When it comes to investment, I cannot accept the structural design of different shares with different rights like NewPay. Only the investment institutions on Wall Street can accept this approach.
If it's investment, I can give you a higher valuation. "
Zhou Xin replied: “I can consider selling Quora to Microsoft, but not now.
I still have some unfinished ideas, and the value of Quora is far from being estimated at US$500 million.
Quora is definitely a product as good as GEOCities, so prepare your cash. "Zhou Xin looked confident.
In the mainly black and white and gray lobby of Java City Cafe, Bill Gates was a little surprised. He was surprised that the other party was actually willing to sell Quora to Microsoft, even if it was not now.
Now we have entered May 1999. At this time, the atmosphere of the entire Nasdaq is no different from adding fuel to the fire. An Internet company can be listed on Nasdaq.
Not to mention high-quality projects like Quora.
Take China.com as an example. It was established in May 1999 and listed on Nasdaq in July 1999. Listing this company is like picking up money.
Wouldn’t it be nice to be in charge of your own business? Or maybe there was some loophole in it that he wasn't aware of.
Because whether it was Riot Games or NewPay, Zhou Xin never agreed to sell to Microsoft.
Microsoft plans to make a big splash in the field of console games, so it has been coveting Riot Games, the most dynamic gaming community currently.
As Riot Games' position in the hearts of game enthusiasts gradually becomes stronger, there have been voices within Microsoft saying that they want to acquire Riot Games. After all, Bill Gates owns 40% of the shares.
"It is a good thing that young people are confident. Internet services are the icing on the cake for Microsoft. We can do without Internet services.
But for other Internet companies, Internet services are their only living space.
If Yahoo cannot acquire Quora, then Yahoo will definitely copy your products. "Bill Gates said.
He is right. The reason why Microsoft develops MSN, IE browser, and later Xbox is, in the final analysis, a process of self-expansion after a company has reached a certain scale and has no rivals in its original field.
In terms of performance growth and corporate development planning, corporate executives must explain to investors that they can only develop in the direction of Internet services.
Bill Gates: "Yahoo is just one of them. There are many other Internet companies that will flood into this market. How can you ensure that Quora will still be in the position it is now?"
Zhou Xin asked rhetorically: "Rist Games is also facing similar competition. Why does Riot Games still maintain its dominant position and its dominant position is getting stronger and stronger?"
Bill Gates retorted: "The importance of game forums and trivia communities are not the same. Yahoo only invests 10% of their energy in Yahoo Games.
But in the field of knowledge question and answer community, they will invest most of their energy.
From what I know about Jerry, he should have been unable to sleep. "
Zhou Xin smiled and said: "Jerry asked me to chat tonight, and I probably also talked about Quora.
Still the same, I am confident that I can defeat any challenger in this field, we will wait and see! "
Zhou Xin's self-confidence made Bill Gates couldn't help but sigh that it's great to be young. Even he, at Zhou Xin's age, was not so capable of causing trouble.
"Okay, if you can occupy a monopoly position by then, that is, defeat other competitors in the field of knowledge question and answer, then I will increase the price of Microsoft's acquisition of Quora by 10%."
Zhou Xin shook his head: "No, when the time comes I need you to agree to another request of mine, a request that is definitely not excessive."
