On the night of the 69th Academy Awards, in addition to the more than 50 million viewers in North America who watched the ceremony directly through ABC television. According to subsequent statistics, the number of viewers around the world who followed the results www.biquge.info of the "Titanic" award through overseas TV broadcasts, Internet news live broadcasts and other ways exceeded 1 billion.

Therefore, the news that "Titanic" won 13 awards at the 69th Academy Awards and broke the Oscar history record quickly spread throughout the world almost as soon as the results were released that night.

In this world where the winner is king, whether the result is controversial or not, the fact that "Titanic" created the Oscar myth is a foregone conclusion.

Stimulated by the news of "Titanic's" victory at the Oscars, "Titanic" was popular at the box office in North America and even the world film market in the week from March 21 to March 27.

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

The performance of the overseas box office is even more eye-catching, this week, the number of overseas box office warehouses of "Titanic" has increased significantly to 68 again, and at the same time, stimulated by the news that "Titanic" has created an Oscar award-winning record, many box office figures of early box office countries have rebounded significantly, and the box office figures of overseas box office countries released in the last two weeks have been even more eye-catching.

After preliminary statistics, the overseas box office of "Titanic" reached 236 million this week, which very well realized 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 figure of "Titanic" also reached a staggering $1.332 billion, directly raising the global box office record from $1 billion to $1.3 billion, and no one can predict what the final limit number will be.

Easter in 1997 was celebrated on March 31, which meant that most of the Western countries would have an Easter holiday the following week.

Although the length of the Easter holiday 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 overseas box office with full momentum is likely to push the total global box office of "Titanic" to a height of $1.5 billion 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 new music player product, Firefly Electronics' generous distribution of 10,000 Fireflyers for free has generated a strong response across the United States. After the Fireflyer's trial raffle ended, users who still wanted to get the player posted their purchase information on the newly emerging trading platforms on the Internet, and some even speculated the price of a Fireflyer to $12 million.

Traditional music player manufacturers naturally see the impact of the FireFlyer player on the Walkman, CD players and other players pose a strong threat, while obtaining the Fireflyer prototype through various channels for disassembly and research, under the instigation of some traditional manufacturers, many media have also begun to promote the threat of Fireflyer, a device that is easy to spread pirated music, to the record industry, and even called on the American Recording Association to sue Firefly Electronics and directly ban the production and sale of MP3 players.

In this case, American pop diva Madonna Ciconi opened negotiations with Warner Records on the digital distribution rights of her own record after the Oscars, which instantly attracted the attention of countless media.

Later, the news of Madonna's contact with Eric at the "Vanity Fair" party quickly spread, which also made Warner Records understand the intentions of Madonna and Eric, who was hiding behind her scenes.

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

Therefore, the major record giants also have a hunch that if Madonna is allowed to succeed, many of their A-list singers will make similar demands. At that time, Yahoo will be able to take various strategies to break these singers who hold the digital distribution rights alone, and the record company will be extremely passive.

Warner Records immediately rejected Madonna's application for negotiation of digital distribution rights, and Warner Records President Roger Ames even said in a press conference that in order to prevent the vicious behavior of digital music sales, which is very easy to spread piracy, Warner Records will stop at all costs certain behaviors of some singers who try to claim digital distribution rights, and the digital distribution rights of music should not exist.

However, while Warner Records is very tough on the surface, it is far from the case in private.

In 1992, Madonna's career was in full swing, so the cowboy record label she established that year, although still affiliated with Warner Records, she herself had a lot of independent control, and at the same time controlled the distribution rights of all Madonna's records for a few years.

In other words, even if Warner Records does not agree or even recognize the concept of digital distribution rights, with Madonna's control over cowboys, the company can still separately license Yahoo Music to sell the records released by Madonna, a cowboy, in recent years.

The reason why Madonna started negotiations with Warner Records was only to get back the digital distribution rights of many of her records from her debut to 1992, because the rights of these records did not belong to Cowboy Records, but were still in the hands of Warner Records.

Warner Records' resolute and brutal attitude also aroused the rebellious psychology of this stubborn and fiery music diva.

On the same day that Warner Records president Roger Ames made a statement, Madonna publicly stated that it would work with Yahoo Music Store to sell three albums held by Cowboy Records online, and at the same time claimed that it would file a lawsuit against Warner Records over the ownership of digital distribution rights.

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

But at Madonna's level, because the two sides are almost completely in a position of reciprocal cooperation, the constraints of the relevant contracts on Madonna are very small, so these tricks against ordinary singers are difficult for her to work on. Warner Records' executives could only take turns singing red and white, trying to discourage Madonna from working with Yahoo Music Store.

Of course, Firefly Electronics and Yahoo will not remain indifferent, and under Eric's instructions, Firefly Electronics and Yahoo are also very active in offering Madonna all kinds of favorable conditions.

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

Although there are still two months to go before the summer file, the promotion of the summer film is in full swing.

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

Obviously, these three animated movies are all very closely related to the Firefly Group, and as the first sequel to "The Lion King" that created a global box office miracle of $900 million, "The Lion King 2" is undoubtedly the strongest of the three films.

When the schedules of the three animated films were announced one after another, Viacom chairman Sommer Lei Shidong even confidently declared that "The Lion King 2" would kill "Finding Nemo" and "Ice Age". (To be continued.) )