IQiyi has been a bit busy lately. Topics such as "iQiyi being sentenced to 41 days of compensation for its golden VIP membership" and "iQiyi shutting down the number of online users" have taken turns to make headlines, and doubts about its "falling behind" and "falling behind" continue to emerge.
According to media reports, the previously widely publicized "iQiyi's restriction on screen mirroring case" was recently brought to trial. The court ruled that the plaintiff enjoyed high-definition screen mirroring rights of 720P and 1080P before July 15, 2025, and iQiyi platform compensated the plaintiff with 41 days of VIP membership time.
On July 3rd, a netizen discovered that when watching a drama on the iQiyi platform, it was impossible to see how many people were watching it at the same time. Subsequently, the topic of "iQiyi turning off the number of online users" became a hot topic on Weibo.
In response, iQiyi customer service stated that due to feature upgrades and optimizations, the number of people will not be displayed temporarily. In order to increase the sense of companionship, some videos will still display the specific number of people, please focus on the front-end display.
The questioning of iQiyi's "falling behind" and "falling behind" in the competition for long video platforms is also constantly emerging. In terms of dramas, in the first half of the year, "Flowers", "Travel with Phoenix", "Two Years of Celebration", and "Story of Roses" made Tencent Video "four consecutive hits". Youku, which has long been considered to be left behind, recently fought a turnaround battle by virtue of the cool drama "Ink Rain and Clouds". In contrast, although iQiyi also produced high scoring mini dramas such as "My Altay", "The Windrunner", and "South to North", it has disappointed many users and members in terms of the richness of content, the number of broadcasts, and the degree of discussion on the Internet.
In terms of variety shows, last Friday, the official launch of Miwei Media's new program "Happy and Wonderful Night" sparked a lot of discussion, and many viewers' beloved familiar faces returned. Whether in terms of program format or competition schedule, it can almost be equivalent to the third season of the "Annual Comedy Competition", but the broadcasting platform has changed from iQiyi to Tencent Video.
The most fiercely competitive summer film and television season of the year has already begun, and users are still waiting for iQiyi's "big move".
Ma Dong "transferred" to Tencent
iQiyi Holding Hands with Stephen Chow
"Why did you come to Tencent Video again this time?" At the beginning of the first episode of "Happy and Wonderful Night", Huang Bo, as a representative of the audience, asked the host Ma Dong a question that the audience also had doubts about. Ma Dong easily resolved it by saying "Are they all Party A?".
In fact, it is understandable for film and television content producers to choose to cooperate with different video platforms. Miwei Media has previously collaborated with Penguin Film and Television to create the "Temptation of Dinner" series of programs, which were exclusively broadcasted on Tencent Video. In the open day event before the broadcast of "Amazing Night", when faced with the question "Is Tencent providing better conditions than iQiyi?", as the founder of Miwei Media, Ma Dong mentioned several key points in the positive response. Firstly, iQiyi and Tencent Video are important video platforms and major players. Secondly, the platform faces pressure to develop and compete, which is not easy for everyone. Thirdly, as a content provider, Miwei provides different products to different platforms in the market.
And this time, Mi Wei Media once again teamed up with Tencent Video, sparking numerous discussions from the outside world, mainly due to Ma Dong and Mi Wei's deep ties with iQiyi for many years. After leaving CCTV in 2013, Ma Dong joined iQiyi as the Chief Content Officer. In 2014, "Strange Story" hosted by Ma Dong and exclusively broadcasted by iQiyi became a phenomenal hit. In 2015, Ma Dong stepped down as the Chief Content Officer of iQiyi and founded Miwei Media. In the following decade, iQiyi and Miwei teamed up to create several popular variety shows, including "Strange Talk", "Strange Conference", "Band's Summer", and "Annual Comedy Competition".
The Annual Comedy Contest can be said to be the hottest comedy variety show in recent years. The first two seasons (referred to as "Yixi" and "Erxi" by netizens) were exclusively broadcasted on iQiyi in 2021 and 2022, respectively, but they "broke their promise" in 2023. Previously, it was widely rumored that the third season of "Happy Night" and "Annual Comedy Competition" ("San Xi") would be broadcast on Tencent in the second quarter and on iQiyi in the third quarter. However, from Tencent Video's already launched "Happy Night", the presentation format, format and content, guests and contestants of the program are very similar to the previous "Annual Comedy Competition". Therefore, many viewers and netizens believe that "Happy Night" is just a name change for "San Xi".
At present, information about the third season of the Annual Comedy Competition can still be found on the Douban platform, showing that it was produced by iQiyi and co produced by Miwei, and will be broadcasted in 2024. The poster of the program reads "iQiyi's self-made variety show, please stay tuned". However, iQiyi did not include the appearance of "Three Joys" in the film list released in April this year. Instead, it was replaced by the S+level new comedy IP "King of Comedy Singles Season", sponsored by Stephen Chow.
It is worth noting that Tencent Video previously focused on talk shows, while iQiyi focused on sketch comedy, creating popular series. Now that the two platforms have switched, iQiyi has set its sights on talk shows, and Tencent Video has started sketch comedy. However, whether it can continue to be popular is still unknown.
The success of "Fury" is difficult to replicate
What other episodes can be played?
Besides variety shows, dramas have always been the core content of competition on long video platforms. Although Mango TV and Bilibili occasionally produce high-quality products, in the drama track, the main focus is still on the battles between "Teng Aiyou".
In the first half of this year, Tencent Video, the top student, continued to lead the way, starting with the explosive opening of "Flowers", followed by "Walking with Phoenix" and "Celebrating the Year 2", and finally the recently concluded "Story of the Rose", successfully achieving success; quot; Four consecutive explosions; quot;。 Previously, Youku was considered to be the "tail of a crane" among the three major long video platforms. However, last month, the revenge drama "Mo Yu Yun Jian" opened low and rose high, quickly becoming popular and eventually experiencing a huge explosion, becoming the fastest Youku drama to surpass 10000 in popularity in 2024.
In contrast, although iQiyi's first quarter broadcasts of "Chaser of the Wind" and "Traveling South and North" had some popularity, the second quarter mini drama "My Altay" received unanimous praise from fans and sparked tourism in the Altay region of Xinjiang, but it did not achieve the same high popularity and discussion as dramas such as "Flowers", "Celebration of the Year 2", and "Mo Yu Yun Jian".
From the release of iQiyi's film list in April, it can be seen that there is sufficient supply of various types of dramas, such as ancient puppet dramas, modern life dramas, spy dramas, and suspense dramas. However, based on the effects already aired, many "explosive" dramas have not achieved the desired results. At the end of 2023, iQiyi Scream Night awarded the "Audience Attention Actress Award" to Yang Mi. However, in the first half of this year, two TV series starring Yang Mi, "Harbin 1944" and "Fox Demon Little Red Girl: Moon Red Chapter", which aired on iQiyi platform, were highly anticipated before airing, but received widespread negative reviews after airing.
As the earliest platform to establish a theatrical brand effect, iQiyi Mist Theater has released many popular suspense dramas such as "The Hidden Corner" and "The Silent Truth". However, last month's "The Invisible Youth" aired under the gimmick of Zhang Songwen and Rong Zishan, and did not generate much hype. The Love Theater "Yan Xin Ji" has now aired 30 episodes, and there are still 10 episodes to end, but all data is lower than expected.
Member subscription and advertising are the main revenue sources for long video platforms, with user payment being the core. Previously, many parents' video platforms were frequently searched because of the rising price of members, shrinking rights and interests and other issues, which aroused extensive roast from users. However, good content is the source of the development of the platform. Past experience has proved that users are still willing to pay for high-quality content. Taking Tencent Video as an example, in the first quarter of this year, thanks to the broadcast of popular TV series such as "Flowers", the number of paid members of Tencent Video increased by 8% year-on-year, reaching 116 million, and the revenue of paid members increased by 12% year-on-year.
The concept of "content is king" has also been fully validated on the iQiyi platform. In 2022, dramas such as "The World" and "Canglan Jue" gained popularity, driving a significant increase in the number of iQiyi members. In early 2023, the phenomenal explosion of "Fury" set a historical record for iQiyi's total revenue and membership service revenue in the first quarter of that year.
Due to a high base in the same period last year, iQiyi's revenue in the first quarter of this year was 7.9 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 5%, ending its five consecutive quarters of revenue growth since the fourth quarter of 2022. The decline in revenue is mainly due to the poor performance of the core member business. In the first quarter, iQiyi's member service revenue was 4.8 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 13%. At the same time, iQiyi learned about Netflix's operations and will no longer disclose its membership size starting from this quarter.
Now that the second quarter has passed, competition for the summer season has begun. Faced with the decline in the first half of the year, fans and fans of various celebrities shouted that iQiyi should quickly "lift up" the upcoming dramas. From the list of films, iQiyi also has a lot of inventory, including "Journey to the West in the Tang Dynasty", "Four Directions Pavilion", "Big Dream Returns", and "Fox Demon Little Red Girl - Bamboo Industry Chapter". However, which one can stand out in the platform battle and achieve a big breakthrough, and whether it can help iQiyi win a comeback is still unknown.
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