Qvod officially returns to the familiar taste but not the original formula

Qvod, I believe everyone is very familiar with it. It has accompanied hundreds of millions of young Chinese netizens through their youth. However, three years ago, due to Qvod's rapid development (it once occupied more than 70% of the domestic player market share) and its own lack of content supervision, it was secretly reported by a friendly company, resulting in a fatal lawsuit.

On September 3, 2016, the Kuaibo case, which lasted for more than a year, was finally settled. Kuaibo was fined 10 million yuan for the crime of disseminating obscene materials for profit. The company's founder Wang Xin was sentenced to three years and six months in prison and fined 1 million yuan. After the case was concluded, Kuaibo gradually disappeared from the public eye, and only some former loyal users would insist on writing "Give me back Kuaibo" under every news article about the competitor.

Qvod is a collective memory of most Chinese netizens, and its sudden collapse has left behind many sighs and resentment.

However, three years later, it has returned again, still created by the original Qvod team, but with a new name - Xinhua Yunfan. The company was registered and established by the original Qvod team on November 4, 2014, more than half a year after Qvod was blocked. The company's business scope includes multimedia technology development, mobile multimedia broadcasting and television, and radio and television digitization. A few days ago, Xinhua Yunfan also held its 2017 annual meeting. People familiar with Qvod attended the annual meeting, and the company's CEO delivered an annual summary report with the theme of "Don't forget your original intention."

In fact, Xinhua Yunfan had already launched the official Chinese version of Qvod 5.0 player in June 2016, and simultaneously launched it on AppStore and major Windows app stores. Fengguandian downloaded the Qvod software for two platforms to experience it.

The iOS version of Qvod 5.0 is still a bit useless. After downloading, it will push two or three ads directly, and these ads cannot be turned off during live broadcast, and you can only force quit the software. When you open it again, Qvod will prompt "Unlock Qvod player with five-star praise", but Fengguandian can only watch ads and cannot unlock the player after jumping to the AppStore and giving a five-star praise. And most of its 12334 reviews on the AppStore reflect the problem of being unable to unlock.

After trying to experience the iOS version of Qvod without success, Fengguandian had to download and experience it on the PC. Simply searching for "Qvod 5.0" on Baidu will reveal a large number of download portals, and Fengguandian chose a channel from a download center. However, after completing the installation and trying to experience it, he found that he was forced to install two games, "God of Fighting" and "Sand City Hegemony", as well as three Tencent apps, "Computer Manager", "Software Management", and "Clean Up Garbage", and there was no prompt to install other apps during the installation process. Friends who are used to using Windows computers may be used to this, and Fengguandian is glad that he was not forced to install a "family bucket".

Skipping over these unpleasant things, Fengguandian, with a nervous mood, finally clicked on QVOD after more than three years of absence. However, the moment he clicked on it, he suddenly felt a little rejected in his heart.

The design of the entire interface is somewhat similar to that of three years ago, giving people a sense of déjà vu, but the design is a bit rough when put into the level of three years later. In addition, although the software icon and interface design of Qvod 5.0 are somewhat similar to the previous ones, the content is no longer the original formula.

Qvod 5.0 integrates a media library of Yunfan search, which contains the latest movies, TV series and variety shows. For example, in terms of variety shows, popular variety shows such as "Where Are We Going, Dad 4", "The Brain 4", and "Happy Comedian 3" all provide resources. In order to avoid copyright issues, Qvod 5.0 adopts the same approach as other players to provide users with the original source of the video. In other words, Qvod does not directly upload content, but is only a centralized display platform for content.

In addition to regular video content, Qvod 5.0 also integrates a game lobby, which is a game distribution platform launched in cooperation with 2144 Games to recommend popular web games to users, such as "Legendary Era" and "Grave Robbers' Chronicles". In addition, Qvod has also created its own live broadcast platform - "Yunfan Show".

As for a topic that many netizens are concerned about - whether it is still possible to search for Japanese short films based on their serial numbers, Fengguandian found after many attempts that "no relevant content could be found."

It can be seen that although the returned Qvod 5.0 still looks the same as before, the content has completely changed. Of course, this is a problem that any domestic Internet player and video website needs to face. If Qvod wants to return, it must say goodbye to the past "colored content".

Xinhua Yunfan CEO stressed at the annual meeting that "the sudden closure of Qvod made us not fully prepared to deal with it at the time. However, our common goal made us resolutely choose to start a new business." However, this new business venture showed their eagerness to realize their ambitions.

For Kuaibo, its greatest value may be these two words. In other words, it is a big IP. As long as it returns, it will inevitably attract a large amount of traffic, and traffic is a prerequisite for monetization.

Therefore, we can see that the iOS version of Qvod 5.0 pushes two or three ads to users as soon as the screen opens, and they cannot be closed manually, which is completely unfriendly to the user experience. The PC application installation is forcibly bundled with two games, "God of Fighting" and "Sand City Hegemony", as well as three Tencent applications. As an application, its own distribution capabilities can make Xinhua Yunfan a lot of money. In addition to distribution, Qvod 5.0 also integrates online games and live broadcast platforms, which are big money-makers in themselves.

Faced with such a fast broadcast, are you still willing to continue to be a member?

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.