nt among their group, which Su Can’s presence somewhat altered, hence his slight resistance.Having a deep understanding of Su Cen's mindset, Weiwei didn't overly concern himself with this. In recent d...Chapter 55: From the Future

The Republic officially connected to the Internet on April 20, 1994. In the five years since then, the network has maintained a relatively rapid growth rate. However, during these five years, the internet developed at an astonishing pace, but excessive enthusiasm in speculative activities and bubble-chasing behaviors generated a significant amount of economic bubbles.

In 1999, the Internet era was marked by a frenzied spending spree within a bubble economy. Many well-known internet brands were caught in cycles of fundraising, spending heavily, going public, and then more spending. On the surface, it seemed like web-based products and services were flourishing, but in reality, an attempt to dominate the real economy with virtual economy would inevitably lead to failure.

Su Cen's current goal is not to dominate this era of the internet. In fact, within China’s domestic Internet environment where information highways are not yet mature, it would certainly require ample time and effort to rise to prominence in such an arena. Being able to sell a browser for $10 billion like Netscape was only possible due to Microsoft's rash spending behavior during this era.

Su Cen currently does not plan on investing his precious second chance at life into this internet bubble, hoping for the best luck and standing atop that 10% after the collapse of over 90% of internet derivatives by the end of the century. Furthermore, he lacks the capital to engage in such spending activities.

He has more urgent matters to attend to.

A commentary titled "When the Nightingale Ceases Singing" was published through major portals and forums of this era, including Sina, Sohu Community, Yahoo Community, and Waterwood Tsinghua BBS, which were popular among domestic internet users at that time.

At the same time, an anonymous person using the pen name "From_future," hiding their address, sent this article to traditional media outlets such as 'Half-Month Talk,' 'Current Affairs (College Student Edition),' 'China Youth Daily,' 'City Report,' 'Provincial Daily,' and 'Fuzhou Times.'

On the first day, things were very quiet on the internet. This commentary did not stir up much of a reaction, with many people simply hitting the "Support the Original Post" button without adding any value.

However, someone had already noticed that the article spread several times over on the second day. Many people started openly discussing various situations pointed out in this comment piece. The reply threads quickly jumped from around 10-20 floors on major websites to over two or three hundred.

But most of what came through were negative comments, suggesting that the web user "FFO" who claimed to be from the future was merely seeking attention and creating confusion, without truly understanding the nature of NATO's war. From an international humanitarian aid perspective aimed at rescuing a human crisis, NATO’s intervention in Kosovo could be considered justifiable. The strikes were only against some well-known military targets of Serbia. As for the article mentioning that NATO would seek extreme solutions due to losing face after failing to fulfill their promise of resolving the conflict within a week, this was likely an overstatement.

"Serbian authorities show no signs of surrendering while NATO's bombing of Yugoslavia intensifies day by day. By targeting key facilities vital to the country’s livelihood in an attempt to incite public unrest and topple Milosevic, NATO’s objective has failed. With NATO finding itself stuck between a rock and a hard place, with no way out, any further large-scale bombings of civilian facilities will result in significant casualties among civilians and trigger anti-war sentiments around the world, thus tying NATO's own hands. Knowing this situation well, the NATO authorities might resort to some 'alternative methods'. By attacking the spiritual pillar that sustains Serbia’s resistance, they aim to dampen morale and achieve an easy victory! Well, China’s embassy would be a good target."

This statement in the article provoked a direct attack from a graduate student netizen from Peking University named "Red Giant": "This is pure nonsense! Resorting to alternative methods I’m very curious about what kind of 'alternative method' NATO will use, such as bombing China’s embassy as mentioned in the article. That's utter rubbish!"

A Tsinghua student also chimed in: "Embassies have always been considered sacred territories representing national sovereignty under international conventions and are inviolable. I think any country knows very well what consequences would ensue if its embassy were attacked. No matter how ruthless NATO’s attacks on Yugoslavia become, they will always know where the red lines lie and be aware of their forbidden zones; hence, drawing such conclusions only makes one look ridiculous!"

Others also expressed agreement: "We are from the Drama Club at China Central Academy of Drama. While people might think we girls can only perform on stage, in fact, we pay close attention to international politics. We support FFO’s viewpoint. Anyone who has read Tolstoy's monumental work War and Peace would know that sometimes extremely absurd events could be formed 'rationally' under certain circumstances, which is clearly the case with Yugoslavia now—anything can happen here. What FFO did was merely sketch out a psychological transfer in wartime, so why aren't you facing it head-on"

"We are from Zhejiang University’s College of Media and International Culture. As one saying goes: 'Any seemingly stupid thing must have its praiseworthy aspects.' We don’t agree with this foolish conclusion but appreciate the author's ingenuity and reasoning, making us almost treat a hard military novel as genuine commentary. He fits the Tom Clancy route well; will there be another Red October Hunt"

Young scholars from prestigious national universities engaged in debates around this article to a certain extent, while discussions among various institutions and small groups naturally followed.

The matter was also covered by an online portal interviewing experts. The expert laughed and said: "The author of the commentary piece does show some skill and accurately analyzes the current situation. However, its conclusion is too shocking and seems to be seeking attention. It may have been written by a professional political commentator; however, if you want to boost sales and popularity, it’s better to stick to solid facts and conclusions based on reality! Lastly, I hope this netizen truly comes from 'the future', so that I could know whether the stock market will continue its漲停(tight stop) trend tomorrow."

The China Youth Daily was the first to publish an online commentary that had recently gone viral, which sparked further discussion. Many people commended the increased openness of domestic media today, allowing more diverse voices to be heard. Soon after, the provincial newspaper published this commentary, which it already had a draft copy of. Following suit, the Xiahai Daily also "reprinted" this report, leading to even more debate.

Very quickly within Shishi No. 1 High School, students who subscribed to The Current Affairs Report (University Edition) didn't forget to bring this book to school.

"When the Nightingale Ceases Singing—what a poetic title! Who is this FFO" After receiving the book from her desk mate, Li Lumei with a lollipop in her mouth carefully read through an article that everyone was passing around.

Within Shishi No. 1 High School's academic atmosphere, it wasn't uncommon to privately share good novels, articles, and even magazines among students. This environment actually fostered certain reading trends within the school, such as The Triple Gateway (a novel by Han Han), some martial arts novels by Jin Yong or Gu Long, comics, and sentimental essays.

"This article has been selected by The Current Affairs Report as one of the funniest articles for this year! This FFO is currently the hottest topic on the internet!" Vice班長 Wang Xuebing couldn't help but feel proud. His magazine was passed around by half a class, which boosted his confidence.

"Some people say he's a journalist in Yugoslavia who writes reports and opinions in domestic media. Others claim he's an expert in international affairs who wrote the article to gain fame! There are also rumors that he's truly a mysterious person from the future as suggested by his username, although this theory is more likely just idle speculation." A male student ranked around fifth in their class said; he usually paid close attention to news.

Xue Yiyang's family did not have a computer and rarely had an opportunity to voice opinions in such situations. He was completely unaware of what was trending on the internet today.

Su Cun couldn't help but feel reflective; compared to his later time, where the internet was hundreds of times larger and information exploded daily with various炒作 (promotion/hype), a commentary like his would likely be drowned out in the flood of strange posts. However, given that it was 1999 when people were still innocent on the internet, Su Cun hadn't anticipated the heated discussions his article had sparked.

"I think this is well-written. According to what's written here, NATO decision-makers might have taken extreme measures for psychological warfare against Yugoslavia, and mistakenly bombing China’s embassy could be a devastating blow to their morale."

Wang Xuebing and some of the boys laughed, "This is merely a woman's perspective. Such immature ideas would be taken seriously by no one. This is also why there are still people supporting this nonsensical FFO online. Bombarding an embassy of another country, what kind of behavior is that I don't think it needs explanation. Is NATO afraid that Yugoslavia won’t surrender and thus doesn’t consider the possibility of dragging other countries into war, leaving them no way out Therefore, this article was annotated by the chief editor of Youth Daily with 'Let's just read it for fun.'"

Ma Xiao nodded beside him as well. "It has also been selected as the number one ridiculous political commentary of the year."

A few girls immediately changed their minds, "Oh, so that’s how it is! But upon careful consideration, this conclusion does seem a bit exaggerated."

Chen Lingshan suddenly smiled and looked at Su Can with a mischievous gaze. "So, what's your take on this"

All eyes turned to Su Can. He had recently been performing exceptionally well in class tests, which was rather scary. Moreover, his actions often left many students amazed. To some extent, they couldn’t understand him at all, so people were very interested in hearing what he thought about the matter.

**S [Shenzhen Municipal No.1 High School] had a reputation for fostering intellectual discourse due to its status as a national key high school.

But Su Can did not wish to engage in this discussion, sighing and saying with a smile, "I support the FFO simply because it addresses an important topic." Of course, if he didn't support himself, wouldn’t that be slapping himself in the face

The people who had been looking forward to his response could not help but look disappointed. Wang Xuebing and even students ranked fifth and seventh in class were staring at him with a mix of suppressed laughter, clearly quite pleased with Su Can's mediocre performance.

(To be continued)vil."This statement infuriated Tang Wu so much that she wanted to punch him. Then Su Cen looked at her. For a moment, Tang Wu felt like she had forgotten where she stood on this playground amidst thou...