Chapter 678

Instagram's launch ceremony was very simple.

After confirming the opening of the website, we opened a few bottles of champagne in the office building of instagram team, and the staff began to open the website. In order to protect their own interests, igritte company has various explicit or implicit restrictions on users' recommendation of other websites on its own platform.

Now, instagram, which has nothing to do with igritt's equity, has just been launched. What it gets is the treatment of the company's direct investment website at the level of its own daughter.

On the other hand, Simon left instagram headquarters and went to Tinkerbell with C girl.

The popularity of personal computers and digital cameras is the most basic condition for instagram to develop.

However, neither is a problem now.

In the first half of 1994, global PC shipments reached 26.3 million in the first six months of this year, compared with 20 million in 1990. Although the rise of the Internet in the world has led to the increasing proportion of overseas PC shipments, at this stage, North American PC shipments still account for 41% of global shipments, reaching 10.9 million units.

It is estimated that in 1994, the global PC shipment will be about 55 million, of which North America will not be less than 22 million.

The number of PCs in the world has exceeded 230 million.

In terms of digital cameras, in the first half of 1994, tincobail's digital camera shipment reached 3.27 million units, still successfully holding more than half of the global consumer digital camera market share, accounting for 53% of the market. It is estimated that the annual shipment is expected to reach 8 million units.

At the same time, worldwide, the total shipment of consumer digital cameras in 1994 is expected to be about 16 million.

As the world's largest consumer electronics market, the popularity rate of digital cameras in North America, like the growth of video recorders in recent years, far exceeds that of overseas countries, with 16 million digital cameras, of which more than 70% are in North America, reaching 11 million.

Even if we don't talk about the accumulation in the past few years, we don't consider the overseas users for the time being. It's just that the 11 million digital camera users in North America increased in 1994, which is enough to ensure instagram has a broad user base.

What's more, as long as instagram can be popularized, which in turn stimulates user demand, the shipment of digital cameras will only further increase next year, and the two complement each other.

Simon arrived at the headquarters of tincobail company, and was first taken by C girl to check the digital camera prototype of tincobail company.

The company has applied for a full range of trademarks in advance, and still starts with "I", which means "record". Tincobail's digital camera series will be named IREC.

It's easy to remember.

"We have tried CD, flash memory, tape and other storage media. In the end, it is the same as what our boss said. At this stage, the only suitable storage solution for us is micro hard disk. However, although the prototype has been completed, there are still many problems to be solved. At the same time, we need to wait for the hard disk manufacturers to develop a micro hard disk with larger storage capacity. Therefore, IREC will be released as early as next autumn, when we can launch IREC with 250m storage capacity, and the cost can be controlled within a reasonable range. "

In dinkober's lab, c-girl introduces Simon as he plays with the apparently rough prototype of the digital camera.

Simon took a video with IREC prototype in his hand. When he played it back directly on IREC small screen, he obviously felt stuck. This is probably one of the problems c girl said.

Claire also asked people to bring a new IBM laptop, connect IREC to the USB interface of the laptop, and begin to transfer the video file Simon just shot.

This IREC adopts 240p video definition, which is enough to meet the needs of users at this stage.

The one minute video just shot, according to the definition standard of 240p, is only 2.2m in size.

The 2.2m MP4 format video will be transferred by USB in ten or twenty years, which is absolutely just a flash. This time, however, Simon found the problem again. The usb1.0 standard has been popularized since last year, and the transmission speed is only about 90K per second.

At this stage, it takes about 25 seconds to transmit 1 minute of 240p video.

In this way, if one hour's video is transmitted, it may take half an hour, which greatly affects the user experience.

Claire, who is close to Simon, is obviously satisfied with this. Noticing the change of men's expression, she said: "the 1.5mbps transmission speed of usb1.0 standard can meet the needs of users at this stage. Theoretically, the transmission speed is equivalent to 180K per second. However, due to hardware reasons, we can only achieve half of the transmission speed for the time being, and we can make further progress when the product is launched next year One step optimization. "

Simon nodded.

Indeed, the road has to go step by step.Compared with the USB standard in memory, it took shape in 1995, which is very advanced.

I have read the statistics in advance. With the vigorous promotion of westero system, USB interface began to be promoted at the end of last year. In the first half of this year, Tinkerbell released U disk as a turning point. Now, the proportion of PC manufacturers' latest personal computers with USB interface has exceeded 20%, and next year, the proportion will exceed 50%.

Not only that, including the personal computers without USB interface in the hands of home users at present, if you want to use the USB function, you don't need to replace the expensive PC equipment, just need to purchase a transfer interface worth dozens of dollars.

Since USB began to be promoted at the end of last year, igrit, Microsoft, Intel and other companies have set up venture funds to invest in USB peripheral products to support start-ups to develop hardware products such as mouse and keyboard with USB interface.

With the popularity of USB interface, the digital cameras, digital music players, digital cameras and other products planned to be released next year will be converted to the use of micro hard disk and USB transmission format.

However, the current floppy disk digital camera will still be upgraded next year. In addition to the icam-50, the icam-40s floppy disk version will continue to be released next year as a transition.

After seeing the IREC prototype, Claire took Simon through some other products under development.

Including the iBook, which has not been leaked at this stage.

This is a concept that Simon has given for a long time. IBook is also one of the earliest trademarks that tincobail hoarded.

Apple released its first Newton tablet last year, the predecessor of Apple's iPad, with a very advanced touch screen design.

It's a pity that Apple didn't pinpoint the positioning of this product, just used it for personal digital assistant. And because of the high price of this product, which is up to $900, there are few users.

In fact, even e-book readers already have similar products in the market at this stage. However, due to the limitations of storage capacity and content resources, there is basically no good development.

Tincobail's iBook, which is quietly researched and developed by tincobail, has no plan to launch a finished product in the near future. The main reason is that the price of small LCD screen is too expensive at present, and it can't be as delicate as a book for the time being.

Plan, the real launch of this product, at least until 1996.

Simon also hopes that this product can be integrated to a certain extent, cooperate with the digital music player, and even further, increase the function of digital camera, and adopt the touch screen design.

At that time, it will be the prototype of tablet computer.

In the lab, after listening to Simon's idea, Claire said, "if so, our product may be more expensive than Apple's Newton tablet, and not many people can afford it."

The reason why the electronic products used to be able to achieve the level of 1000 yuan is that the development of the whole electronic industry system has led to a sharp drop in the overall cost.

At this stage, it is far from that.

For example, flash memory.

In the first half of this year, tincobail launched the U-disk with flash memory chip, with the capacity of 8m and 16m respectively, breaking through the capacity limit of 1.44M floppy disk. However, compared with the price of less than $2 per floppy disk, the price of 8m U disk is $39.99, and that of 16m U disk is $99.99.

The reason why the next generation ICAM does not consider more stable flash storage is the cost.

However, with the rapid increase in demand, it is expected that the 1996 icam-60 will be able to launch a flash storage version at a reasonable price.

In fact, the cost of micro hard disk is not low at the present stage, but compared with flash memory, micro hard disk has a capacity advantage. The digital camera of micro hard disk version planned to be launched next year has a capacity of 150m. Compared with the image size at the present stage, it is estimated that up to 3000 photos can be stored, and users will not be bothered by insufficient space.

Simon put down his iBook prototype, which has no touch function and can only be operated by pressing buttons, and said to Claire, "if you think about it, this is an inevitable trend, isn't it? Tincobail doesn't need to be too advanced. However, since it has taken the lead, it should ensure that it can always be one step ahead of other manufacturers. "

Claire knew that his boss would not casually say this to others, and nodded solemnly to take note.

So I stayed in tincobail until more than 11 o'clock.

I had lunch with John Chambers at noon, went to see the construction of igritte Park in mountain view in the afternoon, and attended a conference call of AOL.

At more than five o'clock in the afternoon, Simon got on the plane back to Los Angeles.

Boeing 767 cabin.

Girl a came to the study in the front cabin of the plane with a thick stack of documents, handed the documents to Simon, and said: "d just called. By 5 pm, the number of instagram registered users has reached 370000, and it is expected to exceed 1 million this weekend."Although Simon didn't intervene too much in person, he could roughly understand what happened just by listening to what Alison said.

Shaking his head and smiling, Simon picked up a document from girl a and said, "D is a little anxious."

In just three days, the number of users has exceeded one million. Even if instagram has the strong support of the westrow system behind the scenes, all kinds of problems are enough to make this small company, which has been established for only three months, in a hurry. If it affects the user experience, it will be even worse.

However, on the other hand, the number of users has exceeded one million, which means that the company is very valuable for the new technology industry that has been boiling at this stage.

After this weekend, if D girls want to cash in, they will ask for $20 million directly, and there will definitely be a lot of people scrambling for it.

In contrast, the girls only invested more than one million dollars in the early stage, and in a few months, it was dozens of times of return.

Alison listened to Simon and said, "d just said on the phone that she wants to get more support from igritte by transferring part of her shares."

Simon asked with a smile, "how much?"

A girl said: "20%."

Simon nodded and said, "you talk to Jeff about this yourself. I don't care."

If we consider from the perspective of pure interests, it is best for instagram to sell its shares directly to westero. After all, the current igritte company is no longer 100% owned by westero system. If we transfer the shares to westero, Simon can also let igritte give instagram sufficient support.

However, to do so is somewhat to break the rules.

Binding interests is the most solid foundation for cooperation.

Simon is also more likely to be in business.

Instagram has received wide attention since its launch because of Simon. However, it is not at a loss to transfer part of its equity to igrit.

Now, countless small companies in Silicon Valley want to cooperate with igritte, and they often have no choice.

After that, Alison saw Simon open the box office report of the past box office week and said, "there's another thing about EA's video game Warcraft: humans and orcs.". "

Simon didn't look up, just, um.

Allison continued: "according to preliminary statistics, the sales volume of this real-time strategy game in the first week of its launch is about 76000 sets, with sales reaching $3.8 million. EA has directly recovered the cost, and it is expected that the shipment volume of this game in the whole sales cycle will reach about 1.5 million sets, breaking the total sales volume of the first generation of sand dune magic castle of the same type of 1.1 million sets."

Warcraft: man and orc costs $49.99, which is the common price of video games in this era.

It is estimated that the total sales of 1.5 million sets will mean about 75 million US dollars.

In contrast, the development cost of this game is only about $2 million, which is totally profiteering. It's more profitable than drug trafficking, and it's legal.

Simon's memory of the first generation of "Warcraft" has been a success, but the total sales volume is only about 300000 sets.

However, just like this, Blizzard, which has just changed its name, has won the general attention of the industry. The most important point is that the success of the first generation of "Warcraft" also allows Blizzard to have more sufficient funds to develop its sequel, and the second generation of "Warcraft" has thus reached a phenomenal sales volume of 2.5 million sets.

This time, the sales volume of the first generation of Warcraft is expected to exceed one million, which can be said to be the result of the upgrading of the production and distribution specifications of the game by silicon and nerve key studio with the support of EA.

The game industry is the same as Hollywood. For the same film, the seven major studios and the second and third tier independent film companies operate separately. The box office will never be the same level.

In the original prospectus, danelis entertainment took the game business as the next important growth point of the group.

In the past half a year, EA has maintained its vigorous development in console games. Meanwhile, EA has also launched the phenomenal online game happy farm. Now, another PC game "Warcraft: humans and orcs" is a great success, which is undoubtedly another good news for the share price of Denise entertainment.

With the continuous expansion of the video game market, as long as we can maintain the current market position, only the video game business in the future is expected to support the market value of Denise entertainment at the level of 100 billion US dollars.

In my memory, the market value of Disney group just hit the threshold of $200 billion at its peak.

For Simon, it's definitely not the ceiling.

Although the current market value of danilisi entertainment is over 100 billion US dollars, it is very exaggerated for many people, but in Simon's view, it is not difficult for danilisi entertainment to break through the scale of Disney. In the future, as long as it reaches the extreme in the fields of TV, games, music and streaming media, each of them is expected to reach 100 billion US dollars.