Tianya Community was filed for bankruptcy
The crumbling Tianya Community is on the verge of complete death. The
Tianyancha app shows that on February 26, Tianya Community Network Technology Co., Ltd. added a new bankruptcy review case . The applicant is Zhang Xin, and the handling court is the Intermediate People's Court of Haikou City, Hainan Province.
According to Tianya Community’s response, the applicant is a former employee who was owed wages. In fact, any creditor can apply, but it is of little significance. The company is still making efforts and preparations for restarting.
Although Tianya’s response seems calm, its so-called restart has been going on for nearly a year and there is still no substantial progress.
In April last year, Tianya Community stated that due to liquidity difficulties, the arrears of telecommunications IDC fees had reached millions of yuan, and access to Tianya Community was temporarily suspended.
At the end of May 2023, Song Zheng, the former executive editor of Tianya Community, and many Tianya netizens launched an "Seven Days and Seven Nights, Restart Tianya" live streaming fundraising event, hoping to raise 3 million yuan for Tianya Community. To pay for the telecommunications equipment room and restore server access to Tianya Community.
However, the results of this live broadcast were not satisfactory, with sales of only 360,000 yuan. Taking into account the income from rewards in the live broadcast room, only 3.1499 million yuan was raised in the end .
Then, Tianya tried to normalize live streaming and . On June 9 last year, the official Weibo of Tianya Community posted a message saying "Uncle Ya is going to live broadcast to bring goods", and released the QR codes of Tianya's official fan group and Tianya e-commerce suppliers.
Since then, Tianya has continued to move. Information from Tianyancha shows that in July 2023, Tianya Community established Tianya Selection (Chengdu) Technology Co., Ltd., and in October it applied to register the advertising sales trademark "Tianya Zhenxuan" . It seems that it will resume the self-rescue path of Dongfang Selection .
At the end of November last year, there was news that Tianya Forum was expected to live broadcast on Douyin, Taobao, and video accounts in December, making a firm strategic transformation to live broadcast e-commerce and creating a social membership-based e-commerce. In December, Tianya Community founder Xing Ming said that it is expected that Tianya will officially restart on March 1, 2024, the 25th anniversary of the founding of Tianya Community, and plans to launch the official version of "Tianya Shentie". Can
’s live streaming of goods really save Tianya?
Live streaming cannot save Tianya
Judging from the currently known information, it is difficult for Tianya to turn around by relying solely on live streaming.
First of all, Tianya did not choose the right platform and focused mainly on Douyin .
Tianya was established in 1999 as a forum for the "barbaric era" of the Chinese Internet. It was active before 2010. The netizens at that time were mainly those born in the 1970s and 1980s. The main users of Douyin are those born in the 1990s and 2000s. The overlap between the two main audience groups is not high, so it is difficult to "recall" Tianya's old users in a short period of time.
Moreover, what will send Tianya to his grave is precisely the short video streaming media represented by Douyin. Before the emergence of short videos, text media was still the mainstream communication method on the Chinese Internet. Even if Tianya is no longer popular, you can still feel the sentiment of the forum model. It is difficult for users of short video platforms to sympathize with Tianya's plight. At least Douyin does not have the communication soil of Tianya.
Secondly, Tianya’s product selection capabilities are insufficient and it relies too much on netizens to “generate electricity for love”.
Take the most famous "Restart Tianya" live broadcast as an example. The products on the live broadcast room are all popular products, such as household necessities, snacks, etc., without any Tianya characteristics, and it is difficult to arouse the purchase desire of ordinary passers-by. We can only rely on sentimental old users to “generate electricity for love”.
Later, Tianya gradually found out about it and put on the shelves some related products with Tianya logo or phrases, such as mugs, commemorative cards, etc. This time the route was right, but the price was a bit high. A T-shirt with the 18th anniversary Tianya logo sold for 168 yuan, which even Tianya netizens who use love to generate electricity found it difficult to accept.
Tianya obviously didn't realize that all it had was a little traffic advantage. If it really wanted to sell well, it would have to rely on its products to speak for itself.Just like Oriental Selection has been out of the circle, it is still committed to supplementing the supply chain and making good products through self-built factories. In the game rules of the live broadcast e-commerce industry, IP is just a fuse, and it cannot be "detonated" without excellent products.
More importantly, Tianya has lost its biggest advantage - content.
The reason why Tianya is popular is because of the creators who are full of literary thoughts, such as Mingyue, Kong Ergou, etc. But they have no attachment to Tianya. Tianya is just a third-party platform. For a long time, Tianya has not paid attention to the IP generated by Tianya, missing the opportunity for transformation.
Just as Xing Ming, the founder of Tianya, said: "The most fatal thing about Tianya's genes is that it is not sensitive to business or even a little repellent. This is the reason why Tianya community has survived, and it is also the main reason why it has not been profitable for a long time."
Because it is not bound to those Tianya "great gods", the content produced by Tianya does not belong to Tianya, and its own value is greatly reduced. Without content, there is no traffic, and without traffic, there is no sales. Today, all that is left of Tianya is the empty shell of its name.
It can be said that from the moment Tianya decided to transform into live streaming and sell goods, it was doomed to fail.
Not everyone can become Oriental Selection
In recent years, countless established companies like Tianya have tried to transform into live broadcasts to bring goods. One of the big motivations is seeing the success of Oriental Selection.
Indeed, as a successful case of transforming a traditional industry into e-commerce, the miracle of Oriental Selection has given many people confidence. But what they ignore is that the success of Oriental Selection contains a lot of accidental factors , among which Dong Yuhui is the biggest variable. Without Dong Yuhui's explosive breakout, it would be difficult for Oriental Selection to reach its current heights.
In addition, not every company is like New Oriental, which can give Dongfang a broad trial and error space for and . You know, when Yu Minhong founded Oriental Selection, he gave Oriental Selection a trial period of five years, but a series of coincidences allowed it to complete the transformation ahead of schedule. However, ordinary companies have far less financial resources than New Oriental and have no time for trial and error.
In addition, live broadcast e-commerce may not be suitable for all companies, and the current market environment is not the same as two years ago. When Dongfang Selection entered Douyin to bring goods, Douyin e-commerce was in a stage of rapid growth, and it was exactly the time when a head anchor was needed to decorate the facade. But now the ecology of Douyin e-commerce is basically stable, and it will no longer give traffic to "unknown people".
Moreover, in addition to live e-commerce, there are other routes that can be taken. For example, the recently popular short drama is a potential route. If Tianya can adapt those "magic posts" from the past into short plays, the hope of becoming popular is far greater than the live broadcast of goods. Of course, making short plays is also more difficult and risky, which is a big challenge for Tianya.
From an objective standpoint, the lifespan of an Internet product is ultimately limited. Communities such as Sina Blog, Tencent Weibo, and Xiami Music are all destined to be closed down, and the same is true for Tianya.
If there is no hope of self-rescue, the sooner you accept the reality, the sooner you will be relieved.
author | Fengqing
