If you happen to do business with Chinese people, you've probably been receiving a lot of e-mails mentioning the word, “CNY” lately. Don't mistake CNY with the Chinese Yuan. At this time of the year, it simply means the Chinese New Year. Chinese people are quite zealous about the CNY, and I always tie this zeal to two factors:
- The link between the Chinese New Year tale & the fireworks, and
- The “Red Envelope” a.k.a. the “Lucky Money”
The link between the Chinese New Year Tale & The Fireworks
A long long time ago, there was a monster named “Nian” (translation is “the Year” in Chinese) who lurked in the mountains and dined on human flesh on the first day of every year. As a result, on New Year’s Eve people would worship the heaven and the ancestors, praying that they wouldn't meet the monster Nian. The Chinese would turn all the lights out to have a banquet with their family, filled with different kinds of food as their last meal.
On one New Year's Eve, as everyone hid from the monster by staying indoors, a stranger wandered into the streets and asked people for a place to sleep that one night. Everyone turned him away except for one old grandma. In return, the stranger promised that he would protect the grandma from the dangerous monster.
With a red piece paper glued on their gate, the stranger and the grandma remained safe while the monster started eating everybody else. Soon the monster found them, but was unable to approach their house as he was afraid of the color red. Later on, his hunger defeated his fear, and the monster shouted again as he jumped into their lawn. And as the fireworks began, the monster ran out to the mountains and disappeared.
The next morning people found out that grandma was still alive, and they asked her how she managed to survive. She told them about the weak spots of the monster.
Lesson Learned: Next time, when you see your Chinese neighbors playing with fireworks, don’t complain and give them your lighter!
The “Red Envelope” a.k.a. The “Lucky Money”
If you ask 10 Chinese kids in the street why they're so excited about the CNY, they would tell you that it's because of the “Lucky Money”.
So what’s the “Lucky Money”?
In addition to the monster “Nian,” there was a bad spirit called “Sui” (which means “the age” in Chinese) who had been harassing Chinese kids for a long long time. On New Year’s Eve, the spirit would touch the forehead of the kid to give him a high fever and turn him into an idiot.
When an old couple finally had a kid, they treasured their child and tried to hide him from the bad spirit. They gave their son eight coins wrapped in red paper, and he slept with them under his pillow to avoid the bad spirit. Later on, with the help of a spooky breeze, the candle was blown out and the spirit revealed itself. As its hand was about to touch the kid’s forehead, a strong golden beam stroke it, and the spirit disappeared! It turns out that those 8 coins were the symbols of “the eight immortals,” protecting that family. When people found out about this, it became a tradition to put “lucky money” (which can exorcise the bad luck) into a red envelope and hand it to the ones you love to show your good will and best regards.
Since kids nowadays don’t really know this story and only focus on the cash inside the envelope, after the traditional greeting “Kung Hei Fat Choi” (May prosperity be with you), they add on another one: “Lai See Dou Loi” (then gimme a red envelope!).
Conclusion: The next time the Chinese New Year comes again, bring your lighter and fireworks with you, knock on your friends' door with a red envelope in your hand, and just shout this out and enjoy the year: “Kung Hei Fat Choi, Lai See Dou Loi!”
Co-Authored by William Chen
Today was an interesting day for me personally as Cornell University's David Skorton and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg named Cornell and Technion of Isreal the winners of Bloomberg's highly publicized competition to create a "game-changing" applied sciences and technology campus. My wife, her father, and myself are all Cornell graduates. My mother-in-law and sister-in-law were Ithaca College graduates. My wife and I met in Ithaca during graduate school, and like many Cornell graduates, our life is now is now centered in NYC. We use Cornell-New York Hospital for our family healthcare base, and I started a Silicon Valley start-up with technology from the Cornell Research Foundation. In a nutshell, Cornell is a big piece of our lives, but it is almost 5 hours away (when there is no snow!), and now it begins over on Roosevelt Island where Katie and I used to park our car to save money when we were first married.
The Cornell NYC Tech Campus @ Roosevelt Island is expected to spur economic growth, job creation, and high-tech entrepreneurship in NYC and Skorton and Bloomberg were on Morning Joe today to speak about this new campus:
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Now when you look at this model closely, much of what has been set in motion by Cornell has actually been executed by The Rulli Brothers of Film Annex and myself - at least at the early stages.
Francesco Rulli and Tommaso Rulli are visionary entrepreneurs who were attracted to New York City from their native Italy by the Batmanish-Gotham City excitement of New York. They have built a number of lasting businesses that now find NYC as a home, with Film Annex being the latest. Cornell University and myself can learn alot from The Rulli Brothers, who some in the business world may classify as "high school graduates from Italy". Trust me, they should not be underestimated. Sure, I can add certain business disciplines to Film Annex that may have been missing, but without a vision and a tenacity to execute on that vision, you end up with a nice story, but not a real business.
With a first meeting in January 2011 with Cornell in place to examine Film Annex's relationship with the new Cornell NYC Tech Campus, keep an eye out for further announcements between Film Annex and Cornell's NYC Tech Campus.
Below is Tommaso Rulli speaking about Film Annex China, which is the first thing that Cornell should be interested in because of the two billion potential viewers.
Mike Sweeney
mws@filmannex.com
Watch more on Film Annex
Over on Eren Gulfidan's Film Annex Blog there is an article about the recent agreement between the Associated Press (AP) and Metan Development in China. It states:
"The Associated Press and Metan Development Group have signed a deal to provide entertainment programming content for Mandarin-speaking audiences, extending AP’s reach to digital and broadcast markets in mainland China. Los Angeles-headquartered Metan Development Group has established a programming deal to produce short-form and long-form AP entertainment content in Mandarin for multiple platforms. Metan will develop original programming using AP content. Metan will be responsible for content distribution via television, online and mobile platforms throughout mainland China."
Larry Namer, President/CEO of METAN, stated in the press release: 
“We are delighted to partner with the world’s most prestigious and widely respected news organization to develop localized content for Mandarin-speaking audiences. The collaboration marks the first time AP content will be distributed in China in a magazine show-style format. Together, we will deliver AP’s compelling entertainment news footage to Mandarin-speaking audiences in mainland China and around the globe."
In November, Film Annex announced its, partnership between Film Annex and METAN Development Group for the promotion and distribution of METAN's flagship series Hello! Hollywood on the web. With Film Annex already working in China and translating its content into Mandarin for the Chinese, I asked Francesco Rulli about next steps for Film Annex in China. Francesco Rulli stated:
"Larry Namer has proven again to be a leading point of reference and connection betwee
n English and Mandarin speaking global communities. Film Annex and The Associated Press share a similar vision with METAN about the growth of the Mandarin speaking audience. We are now exploring film and written content opportunities in China and I continue to look forward to working with METAN and their new partnership with AP."
NOT REALLY, but here is an interesting article by Sean Corner at Yidio titled:
A Sign The Internet Has Won? TV Ownership Declining
"It's the first in Nielsen Media Research existence - which dates back to 1970 - in which the group reports that television set ownership among American households has declined.
The annual "Television Audience" report released this week predicts that homes owning a television will fall from 115.9 million in 2011 to an estimated 114.7 million in 2012. Ownership of a television set has leveled off as the economy has declined the last several years, according to Entertainment Weekly, though the actual number of American households to be sampled has increased."
Sean Comer states later in the article:
"That's without even taking into account how many networks put the most recent episodes of their shows online absolutely free, and that many shows are also made available gratis via Hulu even without a Plus membership."
So I asked Francesco Rulli the Founder of Film Annex what he thought:
"It triggered my attention. Imagine if viewers and writers realize that they can actually join Film Annex, create their own WebTV, and generate substantial revenues leveraging our Open Film Library with over 5000 professional titles? Its time to turn the table and make Entertainment and Advertising an income source for the viewers and not a cost."
Here a few examples of producers, filmmakers and VBloggers that now partner with Film Annex:
http://www.filmannex.com/webtvs/revenue
and here a few Endorsements from revenue partners:
http://www.filmannexcorp.com/blog/bid/106628/Larry-Namer-of-METAN-Develpment-on-Film-Annex-China
and
http://www.filmannexcorp.com/blog/bid/105981/Abel-Ferrara-on-Partnering-with-Film-Annex-for-Hard-Cash
As Film Annex moves to the "VBlog" business model which combines Blogging with embedded videos and film, we constantly look to attact "Influential" Bloggers to the Film Annex platform. At Film Annex, we use a proprietary Blogger Search Tool and we currently search on topics focused on politics and current events. These current events and politics change each day, and we change our input system with the events taking place. Our lists grows in different ways each week.
We then score a Blogger's "Influenter Score" which is based on:
- Mining of a year’s worth of blog postings across the internet (using most frequent bloggers to engage with first);
- The technology allows us to not just determine which blogger posted about our keywords recently, but how often they do so over time;
- We blend this with traffic and influence data that allows us to develop a target list of high-potential influencers in a specific industry.
Sample target weighting traffic and influence data would include:
- Weighting how much influence the Blogger's site has (traffic and inbound links);
- Keyword frequency, and
- Number of sites linking back to the blogger's page.
The number of online conversations occurring around the blogger or the Bloggers blog generates a second, equally interesting target list.
Our Analyzing Program is currently tracking over 50 million active legitimate blogs (around 110 million counting all blogs including spam, 60% of which are filtered before being analyzed). We then determine "Authoritative Blogs", which measures how they relate to the subject or a specific company. The more relative/important to the company or subject matter the higher authority a Blogger has.
Finally, we identify and contact "Influential Blogs", or influential bloggers that have a following/influence in a specific industry.
Thus, if we contacted you for partnering opportunities, you have simply developed a following that gives us the potential to "Send Checks" in the words of the legendary writer and producer Larry Namer or produce "Hard Cash" in the words of world famous filmmaker Abel Ferrara in their endorcement videos for Film Annex and Film Annex China:
Larry Namer on Film Annex China
Abel Ferrara on "Hard Cash" from Film Annex
Abel Ferrara is an American film screenwriter and director. He is best known for The Driller Killer (1979), Ms. 45 (1981), King of New York (1990), Bad Lieutenant (1992) and The Funeral (1996).
In this video, Abel Ferrara explains how he has been working with Film Annex for the past years through his website www.AbelFerrara.com, which is a Film Annex WebTV. He also encourages filmmakers to use the Internet which he believes is now the place to show films, raise money and connect with other professionals from the industry.
Watch more on abelferrara.com
Film Annex is looking for writers and Bloggers who are able to influence, inspire, and inform 
our readers and watchers.
Why Blog on Film Annex? Simple, we pay you!
By Blogging with Film Annex, you will:
- Be paid on a per Blog and/or revenue share model,
- The Film Annex revenue model is 50% to content creator, 50% to Film Annex,
- Have a personal WebTV where you can build your Brand with film,
- Have every Blog translated into Chinese for no charge, thus extending your reach through Film Annex China,
- Benefit from Film Annex traffic which is currently ranked #172 by Quantcast in the United States and has 10.2+ million uniques visitors per month.
- Other potential benefits:
- Free studio time at our office, where you can do video interviews and talk about your work, passion, anything that will interest your audience.
- Other sponsorship opportunities to financially support your work.
It had been documented by existing Bloggers on Film Annex that using films from the Film Annex Open Film Library to support your writing, revenues are estimated to increase 200% or more.
Film Annex is different from YouTube and many other publishers out there. First and foremost, we are one of the leading video platforms visited by 1.5 million users every day. Our content includes feature and short films by acclaimed filmmakers like Abel Ferrara, videos by leading organizations like NATO and the White House, political commentary, sports videos, animations, you name it.
We want your voice added to our platform!
At Film Annex:
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We only show/promote professional content;
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You will work and get paid by the best advertising networks;
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We do not, under any circumstance, endorse amateur user-generated content;
At Film Annex, we recognize that writers are the most valuable content providers on the web and that written content is priceless. We simply pay our contributors more than our competitors do because we have low overhead, no debt and no outside investors. We'd like to invite you to our platform where you can have your own blog and share our wealth with you. How?
All your blogs will be published on your free Web TV channel that is given to you upon signing up. This gives you the following:
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You will be able to match your blog content to the videos in our film library that contains over 5000 titles.
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You will receive 50% of the advertising revenues generated on your Web TV. 10 times more than YouTube and much much more than what you'd get paid on Huffington Post as they do not pay most of their contributors.
Don't forget: Videos are forever, and they will be a great addition to your valuable text. Visit our Web TV page to see what kind of revenues are contributors are making: www.filmannex.com/webtvs/revenue.
The Film Annex Philsophy = $$$
Watch more on Film Annex
For additional information on our business model, please see:
In a good sign for the Film Industry, The American Film Market (AFM) had a very strong showing in Santa Monica last week. AFM is a premiere global marketplace where Hollywood’s decision-makers and trendsetters all gather under one roof. Unlike a film festival, the AFM is a marketplace where production and distribution deals are closed. In just eight days, more than $800 million in deals were closed.
The American Film Market is produced by the Independent Film & Television Alliance, www.ifta-online.org.
The 2011 American Film Market (AFM) had more than 90 new buying companies, with buyer registration tracking up 10 percent and general attendance tracking higher versus 2010. Chinese buyers were up more than 50% and from Germany up more than 30%.
Tommaso Rulli, Head of Asian Operations for FilmAnnex.com stated:
"We are pleased to see the industry numbers for Chinese Films begin to follow the opening of Film Annex China. We look forward to advancing the market for online films in China and we offer our Film Annex China Blog as a place to follow Chinese related events in the film industry. In 2012, it will be a key place where we deliver our vision for Film Annex China."
Watch more on Film Annex
A total of 415 films screened at the American Film Market event in Santa Monica for 8,000-plus industry leaders.
AFM exhibitors continually present the most acclaimed films of the coming year; notably, 18 of the past 31 “Best Picture” Academy Award®winners were sold at the AFM. This year’s market showcases, among others, Adrien Brody, Steve Buscemi, Jackie Chan, Glenn Close, Chace Crawford, Aaron Eckhart, Peter Facinelli, Michael Fassbender, Ice Cube, Catherine Keener, Keira Knightley, Diane Kruger, Melissa Leo, Blake Lively, Matthew McConaughey, Viggo Mortensen, Carey Mulligan, Elizabeth Olsen, Giovanni Ribisi, Seth Rogen, Rachel Weisz, Michelle Williams and Michelle Yeoh. A complete list of films and the screening schedule is available at www.TheFilmCatalogue.com or its mobile site, www.TFCgo.com.
As the world's power balance shifts towards the East, many Western businesses are re-inventing themselves in China. You might have an amazing website with great content and have plenty of English-speaking visitors. But, wouldn't you want the world's fastest growing country to see what you have to offer to your audience as well? Whether you're an entrepreneur with a smart start-up idea or a popular blogger, having Chinese-language content on your website will open the doors to:
- New ventures
- New partnerships
- A new following
- A new revenue source and more.
Film Annex is now offering a new service that will make the above a reality for your business. Send us your English language text, and we will translate it to Chinese for $.10 per word! Anything from website descriptions to blogs is welcome. Questions?
FilmAnnex.com is now building our proprietary films with titles, content, written descriptions, and subtitles in Mandarin. Check it out:
Watch more on Film Annex