Chapter 306 - 306: Drinking Poison to Quench Thirst

As for why the Dream Country Company's app could be openly released and downloaded in Huaguo.

The reason was very simple.

Huaguo needed Jin dollar foreign exchange.

Or rather, the three nations of East Asia all needed Jin dollar foreign exchange.

Homo Sapiens Company allowed for a limited opening of its cultural and entertainment markets, so the three nations of East Asia had to grant Homo Sapiens Company equal treatment.

It couldn't be a one-way street, could it?

There's no such thing as a free lunch in this world.

Therefore, eight of Homo Sapiens Company's internet subsidiaries and eight of its cultural and entertainment subsidiaries charged into the East Asia Region as a group.

Within days, the news of Dream Country's use of AI for art sent unimaginable waves of panic through the illustration and comics industries in the East Asia Region.

Peng City.

The software R&D center of the Penguin Company.

Zhou Juncai, the head of the R&D center, was standing in front of a computer with several software development programmers.

One programmer's fingers were flying across the keyboard.

They quickly broke through the Dream Country app's firewall, only to be left completely dumbfounded. The app contained nothing useful at all.

The asset database and AI program they were so desperate to examine were nothing but empty shells.

The reason was quite simple. The Dream Country app could only run while connected to the internet. This was because its AI and asset library weren't located in the app itself, but in a supercomputing center in Luzon.

Otherwise, with such a massive database and powerful artificial intelligence, the meager computing power and storage space of a personal computer wouldn't even make a dent.

The Dream Country app's function was, in reality, just that of a chat program and an email client.

Previously, the Penguin Company had been secretly gloating. They had earned tens of billions of Jin dollars from Homo Sapiens Company through various games, web series, videos, music, comics, and novels.

They never expected retribution to come so swiftly.

The AI art technology of Dream Country was a world apart from the shoddy AI art generators on the market. The gap in their computing power and databases was simply too vast.

Fortunately, however, comics were not the Penguin Company's core business.

The ones who truly wanted to cry but had no tears were the webtoon operating companies in South Korea and the manga companies in East Japan. They were already feeling the terror of the Homo Sapiens Company.

When AI-generated comics could be updated daily like web novels, and at a very high quality, the demise of traditional comic companies and artists was only a matter of time.

The Dream Country Company had 1,200 professional comics staff in its native Southeast Asia, and it had recently hired another 700 in regions like East Asia and An Nan.

A massive number of comic works were being launched in quick succession.

Meanwhile, two other cultural and entertainment subsidiaries under the Homo Sapiens Company, which also had comics divisions and the same AI art technology, were also expanding their ranks.

The entire comics market in Asia was now almost completely saturated with comics from the Homo Sapiens Company, and they were also spreading to Europe and America.

Although Europe and America were extremely hostile toward the Homo Sapiens Company, they had not blocked it online. After all, openness is a two-way street.

If European and American internet companies blocked the Homo Sapiens Company, then the Homo Sapiens Company would naturally not allow their companies access to its internal network.

Recently, America's Black Ship had been collaborating with internet companies like Google, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, and Wikipedia to prepare a "boomerang plan."

The key to this plan was that the Homo Sapiens Company's internal internet had to be open. Otherwise, forget a boomerang; even a javelin would be useless.

Unfortunately for them, America didn't know the true situation inside the Homo Sapiens Company.

As the Homo Sapiens Company became more formalized, its previous method of secretly recruiting "New Human" employees had now become semi-public. Under the guise of selecting managers and outstanding staff, it was rapidly expanding the scale of its New Human workforce.

For Black Ship to try and incite the Homo Sapiens Company's employees and create internal conflict was nothing but wishful thinking.

This was also why the Homo Sapiens Company dared to fully open its connection to the international internet.

It was a solid monolith; there was nothing to fear.

...

In truth, the Dream Country Company's AI technology wasn't just limited to comics. It could also be applied to animation, movies, TV series, novels, and games.

Many comic artists, illustrators, video creators, web-novel authors, and special effects artists flocked to join Dream Country's system.

Although for the first six months they could only earn a base salary of 500 Jin dollars, with other bonuses, it came to around a thousand Jin dollars in total.

But for these freelancers, having a guaranteed income from the high-welfare Homo Sapiens Company wasn't bad at all.

Although many had no intention of moving to the Homo Sapiens Company's Southeast Asia Headquarters, and the benefits for external employees were much worse, at least if they contracted a serious illness, they could fly to the hospital at the Southeast Asia Headquarters for relatively inexpensive treatment.

Full of enthusiasm, Luo Xuan created 18 chapters in just over a week.

His work, "Mirror Man," which had been released for over a week, only gained access to certain regions. Even within the Homo Sapiens Company, this comic was classified as a Category II work, only permissible for adults.

But its performance was quite good, accumulating 420,000 subscriptions in one week.

Every ten thousand subscriptions earned a reward of 1 Jin dollar.

In reality, external employees like Luo Xuan who were unwilling to move to the Homo Sapiens Company's headquarters were at a significant disadvantage. For the same work and quality of output, Luo Xuan earned at least 50% less, and the benefits were also skimped on.

After all, the Homo Sapiens Company had no supporting facilities in Huaguo, so it could only give these external employees a comprehensive monthly subsidy of 150 Jin dollars to cover food and housing.

The small house Luo Xuan rented cost 500 yuan a month. If he was frugal, the 150 Jin dollars was enough to cover food, utilities, and his phone bill.

Huaguo was also in desperate need of Jin dollar foreign exchange. For people like Luo Xuan who earned Jin dollars but hadn't left the country, the government would open special tax-free accounts for them to exchange their earnings into Huaguo yuan for free.

Although they knew this wasn't a sustainable solution, according to the latest statistics, the number of the Homo Sapiens Company's external employees in the East Asia Region had already surpassed 126,000.

And this number was still on the rise.

This situation harbored great risks. After all, the Homo Sapiens Company was a ruthless entity that would eat you alive, and doing business with it was like asking a tiger for its hide.

But for the sake of Jin dollar foreign exchange, the East Asia Region could only drink poison to quench its thirst.

Currently, East Asia's sources of Jin dollar foreign exchange were the cultural and entertainment industries, the sale of precious and rare metals, re-export trade, overseas remittances, the wages of external employees, and local specialty products and crafts.

Clearly, none of these channels for foreign exchange were very reliable. Originally, they could have relied on electronics and appliances to secure some orders.

But later, because they cooperated with America, the Homo Sapiens Company ended up developing its own optoelectronic chips and new appliance industries. Not only did they lose a market, but they also gained a powerful competitor.

The saying "trying to steal a chicken only to lose the rice" described the situation perfectly.

Now, they could only rely on these minor industries and selling resources to earn Jin dollars.

The people of East Japan, however, took an unconventional approach. They went straight to their "godfather," America, playing the victim in hopes that America would protect East Japan's economy.

Faced with the powerful Homo Sapiens Company, America naturally didn't want to lose East Japan, its bridgehead in Asia. Thus, it could only grit its teeth in secret and increase its support for East Japan, including selling a batch of shale oil, shale gas, and grain to them at low prices.

It was true that the crying child gets the milk.

South Korea also ran to North America to plead poverty.

While a certain great power could only bear the burden on its own.

Now, all parties were re-evaluating their positions and adjusting their strategic directions amidst a fragile equilibrium.