I’m in Hollywood

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On the night of the 69th Academy Awards, in addition to the more than 50 million viewers who watched the awards ceremony directly through abc TV in North America. According to subsequent statistics, worldwide, the number of viewers who followed the results of the Titanic awards through overseas TV broadcasts, Internet news live broadcasts, and various other means exceeded a staggering 1 billion people.

Therefore, the news that Titanic won 13 awards at the 69th Academy Awards, breaking the Oscar's historical record of winning awards, spread around the world almost as soon as the results were released that night.

In a world where winners are king, whether the outcome is controversial or not, the fact that Titanic created the Oscar myth is a foregone conclusion.

Stimulated by the news that Titanic won a big win at the Oscars, from March 21 to March 27, the box office figures of Titanic in North America and even the world's film market rose across the board.

In North America, the box office of Titanic rebounded again in the 14th week compared with the 13th week, closing at 25.1 million. The cumulative box office in North America reached 517 million US dollars, continuing to refresh the box office record created by itself.

The overseas box office performance is even more dazzling. This week, the number of overseas ticket warehouses of Titanic has increased significantly to 68. At the same time, stimulated by the news that Titanic has created an Oscar-winning record, many early release The box office figures of the box office countries have rebounded significantly, and the box office figures of the overseas box office countries that have been released in the past two weeks are even more dazzling.

After preliminary statistics, the overseas box office of Titanic in this week reached 236 million, which very well fulfilled the media's prediction that the overseas box office of Titanic will exceed 200 million this week.

At the same time, the global box office figures of Titanic also reached a staggering 1.332 billion US dollars, which directly raised the global box office record from 1 billion to 1.3 billion US dollars, and no one could predict that the ultimate limit number would be. how many.

Easter in 1997 was March 31st, which means that in the next week, most of the western countries will usher in the Easter holiday.

Although the length of Easter holidays varies in different countries, there is no doubt that this popular schedule will once again boost the global box office of Titanic. Even if the North American box office will drop significantly after the Oscars, the strong overseas box office is likely to push the global box office of Titanic to a height of 1.5 billion US dollars in the next week.

While Titanic continues to attract the attention of hundreds of millions of people, after more than a month of intensive publicity, the date when Firefly Electronics will release the world's first mp3 player fireflyer on April 2 is also approaching.

Although it is a completely unfamiliar brand-new music player product, this mp3 player has already had a strong response all over the United States under the promotion of Firefly Electronics' generous distribution of 10,000 fireflyers for free. After the fireflyer's trial lottery event ended, users who still wanted to acquire this player posted their purchase information on the newly emerging trading platform on the Internet, and some even raised the price of a fireflyer to 12 million US dollars.

Traditional music player manufacturers have naturally seen the strong threat that fireflyer players pose to walkman, CD players and other players. The media also began to publicize the threat of fireflyer, a device that easily spreads pirated music, to the record industry, and even called on the Recording Association of America to sue Firefly Electronics to directly ban the production and sales of mp3 players.

In this case, Madonna Ciccone, the American pop diva, after the Oscars,

The negotiation with Warner Records about the digital distribution rights of personal records has instantly attracted the attention of countless media.

The news that Madonna approached Eric at the Vanity Fair party soon spread, and Warner Records understood the intentions of Madonna and Eric, who was hiding behind her back.

The Yahoo Music Store had not previously acquired the rights to sell music online from any of the five major labels.

Therefore, the major record giants also have a hunch that if Madonna succeeds, many of their first-line singers will make similar demands. At that time, Yahoo will be able to take various strategies to defeat these singers who hold digital distribution rights alone, and record companies will fall into an extremely passive situation.

Warner Records rejected Madonna's application for negotiation of digital distribution rights for the first time, and Warner Records President Roger Eames stated at a press conference that in order to prevent digital music sales, which are very easy to spread The bad behavior of piracy, Warner Records will stop at all costs some acts of some singers trying to claim digital distribution rights, the digital distribution rights of music should not exist.

But while Warner Records has a tough stance on the surface, it's far from being the case in private.

In 1992, Madonna's career was at its peak. Therefore, although the Cowboy Records she established that year was still affiliated with the Warner Records Group, she herself had a lot of independent control, and at the same time held all Madonna's ownership for a few years. The distribution rights of the album.

In other words, even if Warner Music Group does not agree with or even recognize the concept of digital distribution rights, with Madonna's ability to control Cowboys, the company can still independently license Yahoo Music Store to sell Cowboy's Madonna's records released in recent years.

The reason why Madonna started negotiations with Warner Records was just to get back the digital distribution rights of her multiple albums from her debut to 1992, because the copyright of these albums did not belong to Cowboy Records, but was still in their hands. in the hands of Warner Music Group.

The resolute and rude attitude of Warner Records also aroused the rebellious psychology of this stubborn and hot singer.

On the same day that Warner Records president Roger Ames issued a statement, Madonna publicly stated that she would cooperate with the Yahoo Music Store to sell three albums held by Cowboy Records online, and claimed that she would give Warner Records the ownership of the digital distribution rights to Warner Records. file a lawsuit.

If it is an ordinary first- and second-tier singer, Time Warner may also use threats such as refrigeration to make them retreat.

But at the level of Madonna, because the two parties are almost completely in a position of equal cooperation, the restraint of the relevant contract on Madonna is also very small. Therefore, these tricks against ordinary singers have been difficult for her to work. . The executives of Warner Records can only sing the red face and the white face in turns, trying to make Madonna give up the idea of ​​​​collaborating with the Yahoo Music Store.

Of course, Firefly Electronics and Yahoo will not remain indifferent. Under Eric's advice, Firefly Electronics and Yahoo also actively offered various favorable conditions to Madonna.

While keeping a close eye on the music industry, after the Oscars, Eric's work got busy again.

Although there are still two months to go before the summer season, the promotion work for the summer season film has already started in full swing.

In addition to a series of live-action blockbusters such as 007: Casino Royale and Jedi Men 2, this summer will have three animated films released at the same time, which are produced by Pixar. Finding Nemo, Ice Age by Blue Sky Studios, and The Lion King 2 by Paramount Animation.

Obviously, these three big animated films are very closely related to the Firefly Group, and, as the first sequel to The Lion King that has created a global box office miracle of 900 million US dollars, The Lion King 2 is undoubtedly one of the three films. The most powerful one.

When the schedules of the three animated films were announced one after another, Viacom chairman Summer Redstone even publicly declared with confidence that The Lion King 2 would kill both Finding Nemo and Ice Age. (To be continued.)