章 13: Animated Series

A few days had passed, and David blinked at the script on his hand.

Finally, after brainstorming the relevant characters and drawing a rough sketch of their images, David completed the core content of a popular animated series.

This will only be the first of many scripts he will write. Only that this is very important, so David had to prioritize it.

That's right, what David was focusing on at this moment was one of the most popular animated TV series of all time, an ultimate gold mine in animation history: SpongeBob SquarePants.

SpongeBob SquarePants is about the adventure of a talking sea sponge who works at a fast-food restaurant and lives in an underwater pineapple.

There's also SpongeBob's best friend Patrick and many more cool characters that managed to entertain people all over the world for decades.

As one of the longest-running animated TV series, its popularity has made it a huge success, giving the entire Spongebob franchise a value of $8 billion.

SpongeBob SquarePants was the highest-rated animated series to air on Nickelodeon. It is watched in over 170 countries, offered in 24 different languages.

Through the years, SpongeBob SquarePants had reportedly generated more than $13 billion in merchandising revenue for Nickelodeon.

How can David pass up the chance to get a hold of this series?

Even if he isn't capable of starting this series himself, he can at least register it to prevent anyone from stealing his idea.

Although he can't say that he remembers every episode of the series, he still knows SpongeBob's general content.

SpongeBob's success is accredited to the entertaining characters and the wonderful storyline of the series. He was confident that he could recreate the same high-quality show for the viewers.

Of course, this would need the assistance of many screenwriters. David can't make up stories on his own.

In his memory, he could recall most images and voices of the relevant characters of SpongeBob. There will be no issues on this front.

He may not know every related personnel behind the show, but how could he not know SpongeBob SquarePants' creator?

Stephen Hillenburg was a marine biology instructor at Orange County Marine Institute. His passion for marine life and other life experiences led him to create one of the best animated series ever to be made.

Now, he should already be working on Nickelodeon as a director of a cartoon series, and this would soon lead him to create this popular animated series.

However, in this life, David will be the creator of SpongeBob SquarePants.

How can he not be happy?

This is SpongeBob SquarePants!

The influence it can bring him will reach far away to all parts of the world. Also, it will bring him an unimaginable amount of revenue in the future.

Of course, with the condition that he can successfully launch it. But with his rapidly multiplying investments, he will only need time.

David's purpose today is to register the copyright of this series. Thomas, his lawyer, was already notified about this and agreed to come over.

After looking over the content and making sure that it was David's actual work, he spoke about different ways to register the series.

Soon, David decided to register the copyright in every major region to prevent any abuse of loopholes. Normally he doesn't need to. Registering in the United States is enough, but David decided to do it anyway.

Because he has the financial capability, this won't be difficult and would safeguard his interest until he could finally start the project.

Luckily, the content doesn't need to be very detailed. As long as the content includes the names, drawings and images, and the story outline, it is already fine.

And once the copyright registration is finally completed, SpongeBob SquarePants will only belong to him and him only.

This move can be considered cutting off the future path of others, but for David, does it really matter?

This work is mine now, thank you very much.

...

Soon after, David finally went back to his relaxing life.

Charlize Theron, his assistant, took care of the house and his groceries.

Sometimes David went out with Allen to clubs to fish for some ladies. David even brought some home a couple of times and played around the house, much to the cleaner's dismay.

Soon, the time has entered March, and it has been another month since Yahoo was relaunched.

This past month was the most beautiful time for them. Even the two founders couldn't help but cheer in happiness for the company's massive success.

Only David was calm throughout all this. He was already expecting this, after all.

Well, when Yahoo finally goes public, that will be the time to celebrate. For now, it's not yet the right time.

"You have time to call me at this time. You seem to be in a good mood recently."

"David, your predictions are right! This month, we have reached our goal of one million dollars in revenue! Did you hear that? One million revenue in a month!"

Jerry Yang cried happily on the phone and excitedly spoke about some other reports on the company.

"What are you calling for this time? Do you have some other things to say?"

"Yes! A few groups of people have come to inquire about investments, and some wanted a full acquisition. Obviously, we rejected right away."

"... Wait for me, I'll book a flight right away, and we can talk about it."

"Of course, come fast! We will definitely have a good chat with these investors!"

After finishing the phone call, David smiled and lay back down on his inflatable bed on his pool.

Venture capitalists are always looking for opportunities. They might lack other things, but money will be the last thing they lack. He knew that it would only take some time before someone would knock on their door.

"Is there anything good? Why did you call me?"

David quickly called Thomas to tell him about the news.

"Thomas, there's news from Yahoo. It seems like we will begin a round of financing soon."

"Wow, this is great news. Do we go now?"

"Tomorrow. We will be going tomorrow."

The next morning, David and Thomas walked out of the airport and stopped by their hotel for a hearty breakfast. At noon, they made their way towards the company.

In the car, David thought about the next round of financing. This month can be said to be the most beautiful performance the company had achieved so far, and he knows that this is only the beginning.

In the next few months, there should be a significant increase in revenue, and the number of users will continue to grow and grow.

Yahoo gave the best first impression to its users. Now, as long as you are on the internet, you should know what Yahoo is and how it works.

Your friends know Yahoo, and your family also knows Yahoo. It was starting to spread everywhere, slowly being part of people's lives.

Every day hundreds of thousands of people search for news and other information on the website. Most contents are refreshed daily, offering many updated contents.

In other words, the current Yahoo is mature enough to hold users on its site, which is the early version of the peak Yahoo in his mind.

Unconsciously, they had also become a model for their competitors.

Unfortunately, Yahoo later made continuous strategic mistakes, and with the creation of Google, Yahoo's market share slowly got eaten away.

Will it happen again this time? Maybe? Because the peak of Yahoo is just too high for David not to sell his stake. Also, there is really no way for him to stop the dot-com bubble from bursting.

If he rides the ups and downs of the wave at the market crash, he is set to lose tens of billions from Yahoo stocks alone.

But if he pulls out at the right time and makes enough preparation, he will gain an unimaginable amount of money while others can only cry for their losses.

Maybe he can convince the two founders to sell their stake at that time? Well, there's no point in thinking about this for now.

First, let's focus on the present.

"We're here."

David locked his gaze at the familiar building at the corner of the street.