Hollywood Rhapsody

"I think you can ask Ian about the salary. After all, he is the big housekeeper you strongly recommend to me. Now he should be more clear about the company's accounts than me. Do you have any notes in our wallets? If so Let’s buy everyone a dozen sodas!” Sarah leisurely kicked the ball to Ian, the butler in the group chat.

As Prophecy.com is on the right track, the company has also recruited several new employees. Currently, all employees of Prophecy.com, including Allen, are students at Harvard. Sarah suspects that they are all good friends of Allen, and that It's the kind of technical nerd who doesn't have a girlfriend, so they always get together to tease her big boss when the TV series airs on Tuesdays, and Ian is one of them.

In Sara's opinion, Ian, who has never met him, is more introverted and kind, because she has never seen this guy say a word to tease her. In fact, Ian has said no more than five words so far. Ten sentences, and the sentences are concise and concise, as expected of a double-study student in the Department of Mathematics and Finance. Sarah guessed that this person must be a shrewd miser in reality, which is why he even cares about words when chatting.

Sure enough, Ian, who rarely spoke, quickly replied with two words: "No money!"

"Impossible! How could we not even have money to buy soda?" Allen immediately protested, and Sarah could guess the way he screamed into the phone.

"Wait a minute, allow me to ask a question, why do we buy soda? Obviously beer tastes better!" Rudy Hayward, a newly recruited web designer, probably couldn't stand Alan's IQ short-circuit, and reminded him not to get entangled Good for soda!

So everyone asked Sarah whether she was planning to abuse the employees?Said that he had never seen such a stingy boss, even reluctant to buy a beer.

"According to the "Underage Drinking Prohibition Law", your boss is not allowed to drink alcohol, so sorry, I choose to refuse to provide this employee benefit that I can't even enjoy." Sarah finished typing this line, still remembering Followed by a little girl who folded her arms arrogantly and turned her head. That cute little look made the employees on the other end lose their temper instantly.

In a private residence in Cambridge, several older boys looked at each other and laughed helplessly at the same time.

"That's the downside of having an underage boss." David Kosterlitz, another top computer science student, shook his head and sighed, but he obviously didn't feel any dissatisfaction because of this, on the contrary, he was in a good mood.

"In fact, I want to say that this is the benefit of working with an underage beauty boss. Inadvertently, it always gives me the illusion that I am in love. You can see how cute the little animation of turning your head is! I guess I will be very happy after working with Sarah for a long time. It's hard to find a girlfriend you like." Rudy said as he glanced at Alan and Ian.

"Don't look at me, although this little girl is my goddess, but since I noticed Ian's thoughts, I quit willingly." Allen waved his hand quickly to show his position, but he was immediately unconvinced when he received the disdainful eyes of his partner Raising eyebrows, "What? Do you think I'm inferior? Come on, raise your hand and count, who of you has the confidence to compete with Ian for a girl?"

Ian chuckled, continued to look at the financial statements on the computer screen, and chose to ignore the boring actions of a few guys.

Facing Alan's provocative question, none of the other three raised their hands. They looked at the handsome blond boy, then at each other, and silently silenced.

As if he had won a battle, Allen raised his chin and poked Ian, encouraging him: "Look! Don't be shy, everyone is optimistic about you. With such a handsome face, even if you are the same as Leonardo DiCapriobi, you are not bad at all, but compared to your talent and charm, as long as you don't always have a poker face, the girls you have a crush on on campus have already pounced on you... In other words, is it because you don't love The reason for laughing? Afraid of fascinating too many girls?"

"..." Ian narrowed his blue eyes, put a hand on top of Alan's head very calmly, and turned his noisy mouth 90 degrees together with Alan's gossip-filled matchmaker's face. He had to look at the computer screen, "Get down to business! It's almost ten o'clock, and your underage boss needs enough sleep."

"OK! OK! I won't say you have misophobia in the future! You are a sullen and caring top ten employee!" Alan winked at the other three partners and whistled, obediently getting involved in the work discussion.

Sarah didn't know that the five subordinates in Cambridge were concerned about her ownership. She just looked at the website statistics and Ian's financial analysis provided by Alan and the others, and seriously thought about the next step. How to develop: "Personally, I really want to eat IMDB. Although its database has yet to be perfected, it has great potential value. With the popularization of the Internet, movie fans will hope to know as much as possible about various aspects of movies. However, there is no authority in the field of summary, statistics and rankings in this area.”

"Do you want to be that leading authority?" Allen asked a very stupid question, because he received four disgusted looks as soon as he sent out the words, including Ian who rarely expressed his expression.

Immediately afterwards, Sarah also rolled her eyes and made up the knife: "Is there still a need to ask this question? I want to make Prophecy.com an authoritative website for movies in Hollywood, the United States, and even the world. In a few years, people will raise It has become a habit to come to Prophet.com to choose which movie to buy during the movie season. If you want to know the star dynamics, Prophet.com can tell you everything. If you don’t know which movies are classic, Prophet.com’s score ranking is the compass.”

"In addition to movie fans, we can also provide box office statistics, box office forecasts, and even award predictions to film companies. Because we are the prediction network that successfully predicted the Titanic explosion and the Oscars, this is not well utilized. We are the biggest idiots!" Sarah considered the feasibility while typing, "You can try to build a mathematical model to make statistics on important factors such as movie matching, keywords, stars, etc., and use credible data Judging whether a movie has development potential and whether it meets the moviegoing tastes of current moviegoers..."

After Sarah finished the long statement, the chat interface was silent for five seconds. Even the most active Allen looked at the computer screen with his mouth wide open. It took him a long time to look around at the other partners, and sighed in a daze. : "What an ambitious girl! How did she think of this? Did she dream about it? Hey, guys, I have a hunch that the glorious era of the prophecy network is coming!"

When everyone nodded in awe and excitement, Allen gloated and looked at Ian, who had never spoken, with sympathy and excitement in his tone: "Brother, do you feel pressure? Can you handle such a girl?"

To Allen's surprise, Ian didn't stay silent this time. His beautiful blue eyes flashed brightly, and he stared at the screen as if he could see the beautiful girl sitting on the other side through it, with the corners of his lips pursed Slowly rising, he smiled and murmured in a low voice: "I never thought of controlling her, I'm just glad I didn't miss her..."

"WHAT? OHMYGOD! I must have been dazzled just now!" Alan rubbed his eyes and quickly confirmed to the other partners, "Did you see it just now? Ian, Ian with a paralyzed face, he can actually smile so...so... "

gentle……

That's right, Allen thought of this word that could not be applied to Ian, which made him dare not say it for a long time, as if saying Ian was gentle was as ridiculous as predicting that a comet was about to hit the earth, but just now For a moment, he did see that the phobia patient was gradually being healed from facial paralysis because of a girl!

And Sarah on the other end was wondering, is there something wrong with her words?Why doesn't everyone respond?

"Hello? Are you still there?" Sarah sent several puzzled expressions in succession before waiting for responses from several employees.

"Of course, we're all there, just marveling at the sheer size of your plan, which is clearly where Prophecy is headed for the next few years, and we're high-fiving with a talented boss."

"Countless banknotes are already flying towards us, hahaha, I really want to see what the prediction network will look like in a few years!"

"Yes, I can't wait!"

Seeing the exaggerated compliments from several employees, Sarah raised her brows and smiled sweetly: "So, are you all impatient to work overtime?"

"...that's not sure," Allen replied bluntly.

"I heard that the weather in Los Angeles has been good recently." Rudy talked about him from left to right.

"Ahem, I heard that the school will implement a policy of turning off lights and electricity at night!" David tried to coax the little girl nonsense.

"..." Ian and another partner kept silent kindly.

And Sarah directly ignored the poor-mouthed subordinates: "Who will come up with a merger and acquisition plan and tell them that Prophecy.com appreciates the selfless spirit of IMDB volunteers, and tell them that Prophecy.net will not profit from the database, and we will build the most perfect It is a huge paradise for movie fans, and their spirit of sharing will be reflected to the greatest extent on Prophecy.com. Who will do this plan?"

"Ian!" Allen replied without hesitation, and when Ian raised his eyebrows and looked over, he quickly added, "Compared with us computer science geeks, Ian is obviously better at negotiating, remember what I once said If so? Ian is definitely an expert in business cooperation and negotiation!"

Ian looked back, although he didn't smile, but Allen knew that this guy was satisfied with what he said.

And Sarah also agreed, she crossed one item on the to-do list, and continued: "Then who will be in charge of the fan community section? What do you think of the few concept sketches I drew?"

"Those sketches are so great that they can be directly used as web pages. I am very interested in this part." Rudy took the initiative to lead the construction of the fan community.

"Then the remaining people will be responsible for the improvement of the crystal ball chat software in the end! Do you have any feedback on the current software? How is the promotion work in the university going?" Sarah looked at the chat interface on the computer screen, Biting my lip, I suggested, "I'm not an expert in technology, but as a young girl, I'm not satisfied with the aesthetics of the interface. The software icon looks like a quail egg from a distance. To be honest, it's ugly!"

"..." Rudy, who was in charge of designing the crystal ball icon at the beginning, was hit with a sap, and he hung his head amidst the laughter of his partners.

But Sarah's next proposal made Rudy's eyes shine: "How about using the shape of an owl? Has anyone read the British novel? The magician uses the owl as a stationery and writes the content on the parchment. This idea We can use it. After all, we are a prophecy network endowed with magical colors. The icon is made like an owl holding parchment or a crystal ball. Some magician elements are added to the chat interface. Cloaks and golden quills are fine. Witch riding The flying broomstick is also good, it is mysterious and full of childishness..."

Sarah couldn't help but talked too much. After she typed a few hundred words, she suddenly realized that she had almost said the "skin" of the chat software in the future. This requires a lot of design, which is obviously not the current employee The scale can be done.So she braked the car embarrassingly, and explained embarrassingly: "I will improve these later! I believe that the beautiful chat software and lively and interesting expressions will attract many young users, but for now we still focus on practicality first! Satisfying the communication needs of movie fans, allowing them to get what they want at once on Prophecy.com, no need to download MSN for offline communication and interaction.”

"That's right, since we launched the chat software, there have been fewer and fewer people exchanging emails on the website. They can directly log in to Crystal Ball with their accounts on Prophecy.com, so why bother sending emails!" Allen said. He even added with divergent thinking, "I suggest adding a link to personal information on the chat software. When you chat with a person, you can click on the other person's personal information to know which movie he is following recently and which movie he sent Crystal ball, another shot at which movie, isn't this kind of personal information interesting?"

"Great proposal, Alan, I'd give you a raise for this idea!" Sarah immediately praised the innovative employees, and was delighted to find that her small team of geniuses never lacked for ideas, and sometimes didn't need them at all She used the experience of later generations to teach, and everyone has made great strides in pioneering and innovating.

It’s like developing a chat software belonging to Prophecy.com. This is David’s idea. After seeing too many movie fans leave contact information for each other under a certain movie, he suddenly thought why don’t we make a chat software ourselves?Instead, do you want to make a wedding dress for MSN and email tools for free?Although Sarah thinks that it is most important to focus on the website first, she has to admit that David's idea is great, so the chat software belonging to Prophecy.com was born, and the response is not bad!

Allen, who was praised, smiled idiotically at the computer screen, and raised his eyebrows proudly at the other friends by the way.

As the night darkened, time passed quickly amidst pleasant discussions.

What makes Sarah speechless is that although she herself is still talking, the employees under her have already said good night to her in unison. Looking at the chat interface, "Go to bed early, good night", "Have a good dream, good night", "Don't be late for school, good night", "You are still growing, sleep more is good, good night", "Good night"... Sarah just felt dumbfounded, and a weird illusion of "my family has five older brothers" arose in her heart.

But despite complaining in her heart, Sarah obediently obeyed the advice of her "brothers", turned off the computer, kissed little Noah who had fallen asleep too early, and glanced at the handsome Leon on the bedside, and fell asleep beautifully.

The "brothers" on the other end had another half an hour of discussion before the meeting ended. The school is only 10 minutes away. The living room was tidy, and the interesting thing was that he didn't throw away the scattered draft papers on the table, but read each one and collected the valuable ones.

Holding a cup of coffee and walking into the study room on the second floor, Ian took down a file folder with "Prophecy" written on it from the bookshelf, and added the minutes of the meeting that he had just sorted out into it. When he closed the file folder, he paused, feeling a little dazed. ——Although it has only been a month since I joined Prophecy.com, this folder is already very thick. Even Ian and others are a little surprised by the thickness. He didn't expect that he just came up on a whim. After sorting out the ideas in private, there will be such a large amount!

The coffee on the table gradually ran out of heat, and Ian sat with the folder for an unknown amount of time until the ringing of the mobile phone broke the silence of the room.

Ian quietly listened to the voice on the other end, and wrote a few words in his notebook from time to time: "So, the mathematical modeling failed?"

"It can't be regarded as a complete failure, because it requires a lot of data as a basis, and uncertain factors including current events, public opinion and even the weather will affect the accuracy of box office predictions, so our model construction is not perfect, but I have to admit that this is a very interesting one. project.” The person on the other end of the line was reluctant to accept the word “failure.”

But in Ian's view, compared with Sarah's zero-error box office prediction, their modeling can indeed be labeled as a "failure"——

Not enough data base?Ian felt that this reason was not valid, because Sarah would not spend a lot of money to buy materials from box office statistics companies like him.

Current events, public opinion, and even weather factors put into mathematical models?Ian also disagrees with this reason. He doesn't believe that Sarah will be able to find out the news and current affairs of the past few years or even decades.

Model build not perfect?There is no doubt about this statement, but as a top student in the Department of Mathematics, Ian can't figure out what kind of mathematical magic Sarah, who is only 17 years old, used to complete the box office prediction, especially including Titanic who has no rules to follow. The miracle of the box office, did she create a new algorithm?When mathematics and computers collide, many impossibilities become possible, but can 17-year-old Sarah do this?Or is there a magical teacher hiding behind her?A mathematician, computing and business guru?

"Sarah Stern..." Ian murmured softly. This girl seems to have magical powers. She seems to be a little too smart, like a mysterious elf hidden in the vast sea of ​​stars, which makes people unable to control being attracted and unable to extricate themselves. At the same time, he was driven by strong curiosity, wanting to know more, wanting to know everything about this girl.

The phone was picked up again, Ian's eyes changed several times, and finally a series of numbers was broadcast.

The author has something to say:

The following part of the box office forecast has nothing to do with the main text, you can choose not to read it:

Box office prediction is a very mysterious thing. Even with big data now, even Google’s box office prediction is not very accurate, so Sarah’s memory in the article is accurate to the decimal point, but she has never predicted an accurate number , just say that the order of magnitude makes people know that Sarah guessed it at a glance, so as not to be too scary, some scientists really caught Sarah and analyzed it.

In order to write the article, Dai Lin also checked some information, everyone has different views on the box office forecast——

In the early stage of filming, forecasting is still quite necessary. Considering audience demand, market capacity, box office appeal of the production team, director, stars, the story itself and other factors, we can judge whether the film is worth investing in and whether it is worth starting shooting. .

But after the filming is completed, predicting the box office is a bit of a pain. Anyway, Dai Lin thinks that the film has been shot. Even if the forecast is spent, the cost will be thrown out. No matter how sooner or later the film will be screened, predicting the box office is just a calculation. Whether it can make money, whether it will lose money, and when it will be released, the substantive impact on the box office should not be great.

For example, Google has made a prediction model that can predict the box office a week in advance with an accuracy of 92%, but what is the use?It is said that it has certain guiding significance for network marketing?Maybe there is!But Dai Lin thinks that no matter how you market a bad movie, it is still a bad movie!Even if the advertisement can fool people, the audience will feel blocked when they see it, and they will feel that they have been deceived and fooled, and they will not believe it next time.

..............................

PS: Someone guessed that Jude Law was the father of the child, and I was dumbfounded on the spot, but I still want to sigh—"My dear, you sound so reasonable!"