Network Literature Is A Gold Mine

In 2008 the president of Shanda Networking, Chen Tianqiao invited Hou Xiaoqiang to join Shanda Literature. After talking for only several minutes, Hou, a person who always follows his instinct, made the final decision without any hesitation. Now, Chen has become a loyal reader of Shanda Literature, and Hou is striving for Shanda “Chinese Novel Dreamworks”. 

Daily News: At the current film festival, Shanda Literature joins its efforts in the promotion of “Copyright Project Pitching”. Would you please say something about the purpose of this program? 
Hou: The work of Shanda Literature is mainly made up of two parts, copyright acquisition and operation. Our copyright operation is carried out mainly by way of websites, pay-to-read mobiles, and selling game adaption right. The purpose for us to join this program is that we hope Shanghai International Film Festival, the largest platform for film in Asia, can popularize our excellent works.

Daily News: What plans do you have for the future of Shanda Literature?
Hou: First of all, we will remain our focus on the copyright operation of novels; secondly, we will continue our dedication to Chinese literature; finally, we are planning to become more industrialized. In other words, we would like to create a Chinese novel dreamworks and a copyright operation centre.

Daily News: What is a mature copyright operation platform like? Would you please describe it to us?
Hou: It is a platform like Hollywood, where many works of fine quality gather and tremendous writers sign their contracts. All this is carried out automatically by some mechanisms. Therefore, our work at present, is of pioneering nature, actually. That is, to create more successful works, explore more operation channels and follow some successful commercial examples.

Daily News: What are the differences between traditional writers and network writers according to your understanding?
Hou: Network writers have their own advantages in terms of imagination. As for the writing skills, traditional writers are more up to the standards. Actually they can learn from each other. As a literature criticizer, I see no disparity between the best works written by network writers and traditional writers.

Daily News: Does the future of Chinese literature rest in network literature?
Hou: I do not think it is a good idea to distinguish network literature from non-network works. The network, a platform and a gold mine as well, needs to be explored and smelted. We hope that this platform will not leave out any excellent works.

Daily News: Does Tianqiao Chen need to pay for reading?
Hou: For sure. He is our loyal reader now. By the way, he strongly recommends one book titled Officialdom, which he thinks is the best one of its kind.