The cause was an article on wechat titled “A hornet’s nest valued at 17.5 billion yuan is a ghost town made up of zombies and marines?” It explodes. It explodes. This article mainly said that, by using some technical means and comparing the comments in detail, it found that many of the comments of Hornet’s nest were copied from Ctrip, elong, Meituan, Agoda, Yelp, etc., indicating that the number of hornet’s nest water army is not small.
How could a hornet’s nest sit still in the face of such naked criticism and accusations? In a statement posted on Weibo this morning (Monday), The company mentioned several things: first, it has checked and dealt with all kinds of false information on its platform; Second, the proportion of malbee.com data in the total content is relatively small, and the proportion of fake data is even less. Third, Hornet’s Nest will continue to better serve users and crack down on all kinds of fake review information.
Of course, this is certainly not the end of the story, and perhaps it is only the beginning. It is worth noting that, in the above article continues to go hot, some people said to continue to eat melon to watch the drama, some people as hornet’s nest users stand out to support Hornet’s nest, more people said that the comments on the content of each other “handling” has been the industry normal.
I think, rather than whether the hornet’s nest is full of “water army” this matter, more worthy of attention should be “review content handling” this matter itself.
Comment content, question data, etc., are you familiar with? Yes, as long as you are connected to the Internet, you can encounter such information at any time, and many times it is not easy to identify. Nowadays, most people have even become accustomed to it and have begun to compromise with it.
The original sin of the Internet
Wang xin once said in court: “Technology is not guilty.”
The cry is echoed by many, but back to the old question: technology is not guilty, but what if the people who use it are wrong?
What’s even scarier is that this group of tech-savvy, tech-savvy people can’t avoid making mistakes, because they’re people, not technology. Throughout today’s Internet enterprises, giants or start-up companies worth while, a little pick pick, more or less can find all kinds of fancy “black history”.
Take the review data mentioned in the Hornet’s nest case for example, major e-commerce platforms that were once inundated with questionable comments are bound to bear the brunt. Perhaps there are many consumers will have such a picture: when you read the product review, see all praise, tone and statement are exactly the same.
To this day, we can still see some kind of “problem comment” news in certain reports. Who would have thought that the information derived “water army” should also have an industrial chain, and seems to be very stubborn. Perhaps one of the most flattering things for consumers is to be able to leave a store without a second thought after accidentally spotting a flaw in a review.
Not only e-commerce, but also OTA, where Hornet’s nest is located, problematic comments have appeared or were posted on the websites of major companies. For example, in the CCTV 315 Gala in 2016, there was a grey industrial chain of 1000 yuan on platforms such as Dianping. As early as 2012, Ctrip was suspected of “group purchase data fraud” behavior; In an investigation by the China E-commerce Research Center last year, platforms such as Qiongyou.com and Weibang also had problems with fake sales.
In order to explore why problem information appears, the importance of trust in transactions is probably an important reason, and problem comments are those so-called enabling factors for consumers to generate trust and transaction. In the CASE of THE OTA industry, for example, when most users see a variety of positive reviews for a travel deal, they are likely to close the deal quickly.
It can be said that in the Internet era, no Internet enterprise is completely “real” from beginning to end. In the development process of many years, no matter for what purpose, active or passive involvement, problem information has been imprinted on the road they have gone through.
However, one thing needs to be clarified is that the existence of problem review data is not necessarily the original intention of the enterprise. E-commerce blockchain technology to crack down on counterfeits and launch intelligent audit system… These efforts to root out problematic information cannot be ignored by us consumers.
But Internet companies may be guilty of their original SINS, thanks in large part to human nature and in small part to technological shortcomings. One thing we can be sure of, at least, is that in the struggle of Internet companies to shed their original sin, we are fortunate enough to be safer and less hurt.
Internet river’s lake dark war ruyingsuixing, hornet’s nest is not alone
The reason why the hornet’s Nest issue has aroused great heat is not only because hornet’s nest itself is a large and influential platform (according to Beidar Consulting, the number of active hornet’s nest users in the second quarter of 2018 reached 13.844 million, ranking the fourth), but also because the topic of “ghost cities” is so attractive to the public. When these hidden objects in the dark were brought to the table for dissection, everyone wanted to see them.
For hornet’s nest this matter, I observe a detail, whether it is the first explosion, or some relevant hot online articles in the afternoon, in fact, more or less point to the valuation of this point, some people wrote doubts hornet’s nest investors due ability, some people said hornet’s nest after the event to be greatly discounted valuation.
But the hornet’s nest launched from 2006 to now, has experienced too many round, star investment company, not a few of these, the financing the latest news is on August 17, 2018, a foreign media report said: “two people familiar with the matter, the hornet’s nest in a new round of financing to raise up to $300 million, this round of financing for the company’s valuation for $2 billion to $2.5 billion.”
Combined with all this, so far the hornet’s nest may have been, as its statement says, the victim of an organised attack. Meaning, the opponent is to knock off the hornet’s nest valuation, but the hornet’s nest did not do anything wrong, so the opponent can only take the industry common comments on the hornet’s nest to start.
Of course, I hold such a view there is an important reason, is the Internet all kinds of public relations on the dark war, is unpredictable, but also can kill in invisible. Only this time, the hornet’s nest is a sure thing.
Through the baptism of time, it has become common sense for the public to know who is the enemy and who is the ally of the high-exposure tycoons. But this time, it is not clear who is pulling down the hornet’s nest, and perhaps never will be.
Coming back to the matter, what was the hornet’s nest doing wrong? Is the comment on the problem not completely filtered out? Or is it the fact that there are problems with the platform itself?
Even if the answer to both questions is yes, labeling the hornet’s nest as a negative actor is a step too far for the industry’s common problems.
In terms of content, Hornet’s Nest starts with content. Massive UGC and tourism big data have always been the most important differentiation advantage of Hornet’s nest. In a statement today (Monday), Hornet’s Nest noted that reviews accounted for only 2.91 percent of the data, and that the problematic information was very small. From this point of view, the hornet’s nest obviously will not take a high risk to destroy the core competitiveness, their own dismantling, this is not in line with common sense.
In short, no matter how the trend of this dark war, hornet’s nest has been put together first, the opponent standing in the dark, but also to use how many tricks, hornet’s nest will face what kind of challenges, are unknown.
Internet river’s lake win decision: careful, step by step
Remember the battles between Tencent and Toutiao, Alibaba and JD.com, Didi and Meituan… Internet companies, from top to bottom, from big to small, seem to have fallen into a “vicious circle”. They are either on the way to war or are already immersed in war.
Take the hornet’s nest, which now faces the prospect of a huge storm. Build high ground, or flee as quickly as possible? But this is something that all Internet companies need to think about when they face this kind of situation, because if they slack off, they can be completely defeated, or even eliminated.
The first supreme principle is do no wrong, do the right thing. In this case, the hornet’s nest needs to step up its efforts to crack down on problematic information.
Since hornets’ advantage lies in the vast amount of high-quality UGC content, it has a bounden responsibility to maintain the security and quality of this content. I believe that after the storm, the hornet’s nest will further enhance vigilance, because if it is not good enough, it is likely to be taken by opponents as weak points to attack. You can never err on the side of caution.
Enterprises, to grow cannot avoid competition, competition will naturally bring war with other enterprises. In the Internet age, competition for users has become the main fuse. In this case, whether it is to respond to all changes with the same, or to strike first, the purpose is to win, to cut the opponent under the horse or no blood.
But either way, it’s best to go small. Hornet’s nest involved in the dark war of the Internet river’s lake, often opponents have been set up behind the attack node, strong attack or outsmart worth while, are just the means to maximize the probability of victory.
Having said so much, it is not that there is no object for reference. Looking at those big enterprises, from the ground-breaking shoots to the towering trees, the obstacles they have had and the obstacles they have crossed are all excellent learning objects.
Article/Liu Kuang public number, ID: Liukuang110, this article first kuang Venture capital network