Black Screen
On Weibo, the buzz surrounding the Annual Celebrity Rankings rapidly escalated, quickly overshadowing the #TMYLiveShow# event.
On the current Weibo hot search list, the top two spots were occupied by the Celebrity Rankings and the comprehensive coverage of TMY's debut performance.
This was expected since, despite TMY's growing popularity, she was still just an ordinary electronic music producer, recently entering the public's view. On the other hand, the Celebrity Rankings held immense significance for the entire entertainment industry. While not exclusively for celebrities, there was no doubt that the biggest beneficiaries were the various stars in the entertainment circle.
And though TMY's popular, her popularity did not exceed the popularity of all other celebrities.
As many of TMY's fans watching the live stream opened the Celebrity Rankings page, they were greeted by a clear list, with each prominent name in its rightful place.
The rankings were extensive, to an almost overwhelming degree. It was enough to make one dizzy at first glance.
The entire list was divided into six sub-rankings:
Elite Ranking: 15 individuals
S-list Ranking: 50 individuals
A-list Ranking: 170 individuals
B-list Ranking: 500 individuals
C-list Ranking: 700 individuals
D-list Ranking: 1000 individuals
Newcomer Ranking: 3000 individuals
As a result, fans of various celebrities seemed to face the challenge of finding their idols' names among the extensive lists. It became a test of their visual acuity and endurance.
But obviously, perseverance paid off. After a diligent search, fans finally found Miaoyi's ranking and immediately shared it, providing a direct link for other fans' convenience.
[TMY: Real Name: Tang Miaoyi, China's emerging electronic music producer/DJ, Rating: B-list lower level, China Domestic Ranking: 577.]
[Jing Qiuhua: Member of the T/A electronic music group, emerging singer in China. Real Name: An Qiuying, Rating: C-list high level, China Domestic Ranking: 842.]
(A/N: The rankings count all people above. So TMY would be 577 overall, but 342 within B tier.)
Instantly fans of TMY and Jing Qiuhua exploded with excitement. After finding these rankings, they flooded various platforms enthusiastically, and it seemed they were all thrilled beyond measure.
"TMY and Jing Qiuhua received high ratings, which is a good achievement."
"It's satisfying, not bad."
With one in the B-list lower level and the other in the C-list high level, it was apparent that they had achieved a decent result.
If Miaoyi had immediately known about it, she might have laughed or felt indignant. After all, in the previous world of Earth, the terms "B-list" and "C-list" were used to demean artists. Therefore, in Miaoyi's old mindset, she would have associated these terms with the B-list and C-list of the Earth world.
However, in this reality, those terms held different meanings. Their rankings were already considered impressive.
Being in the B-list lower level and C-list high level, Miaoyi and Qiuying's positions were indeed high. After all, in this world, the population of China was substantial, with billions of people, and it was one of the fastest-growing economies. When considering the sheer number of people striving to be on the list, both of them had come out over hundreds of thousands of people to make it to where they are.
And being that high up in the rankings was an honour in itself. Mainly because of the 15 individuals in the Elite grade, more than 12 were powerful CEOs and world leaders, including the leader of China itself, with only three being celebrities.
Surpassing so many talented people in such a short time was nothing short of a miracle. At this moment, countless eyes in the electronic music community were stunned.
In a small group of people in the electronic music industry, they were discussing matters related to TMY.
"Have you checked TMY's ranking?"
"I did, and all I can say is that she has some presence."
"She started two months ago but is already B list? Why didn't she directly enter the A-list? What about the future?"
"I'm watching the live stream, but it's so laggy!"
"Me too, the number of viewers in the live stream keeps fluctuating."
"It's terrifying. It was already so hot, and now they were announcing the rankings. We have more to look forward to."
- - - - - - - - - -
With the release of the Celebrity Rankings, TMY and Jing Qiuhua secured their spots, and their achievements were incredibly remarkable. This was a significant event in the electronic music community.
As a result, the live show that had already attracted attention received a sudden surge in popularity.
One could consider it as compounding attention. After the release of the rankings, a new group of people would undoubtedly notice the name TMY.
At this moment, the number of viewers in the live stream reached 7,041,007!
The number of viewers in the live stream suddenly skyrocketed, with more people joining the grand event. Those watching the live stream were even more ecstatic as if they had discovered a new continent.
But some people were on the verge of tears.
They were the staff members of Modu-Panda Live...
"Hurry! Find servers for streaming!" The technical team leader anxiously checked the status of the live stream server supporting TMY's performance. They immediately issued the command, feeling extremely worried about the precarious situation.
"But, boss, we don't have any spare servers left." A team member who was rushing around reported helplessly.
Without hesitation, the leader immediately said, "Then go and temporarily borrow servers from other channels. Remember, don't let the live stream crash..."
"Re... report, boss. The live stream has crashed."
"..."
The live streaming room of TMY's debut was caught off guard by a sudden influx of massive traffic, which left Modu-Panda Live's technical team in a state of unpreparedness.
Even before the live streaming began, the technical team of the platform had anticipated various situations. They allocated many idle servers and borrowed some servers from other channels, such as the gaming channel, to handle the load and traffic.
However, no one could have anticipated that the situation would escalate to such a fierce extent. The entire live-streaming room, unable to handle the influx of traffic, officially crashed.
At the moment before, when the live streaming room was bustling with activity, it suddenly went black with a "beep~" sound. The screen turned completely dark, with only a thick layer of chat messages floating around. The interface displayed a string of text: "Apologies, the host has lost connection. Please come back at a later time~"
... All the fans watching the live streaming, dancing and celebrating, were stunned.
Huh? Is it broken?
The sound of millions of internet viewers moving at once to check their routers filled the streets.
But unfortunately for the poor staff of Modu-Panda, their internet was working fine...
The feeling of a good song abruptly pausing, especially if you were dancing beforehand, is, with no exaggeration, the worst.
At this moment, the paused viewers bombarded the live chat.
"What the hell is going on?? We were at the exciting part, what happened??"
"My screen went black. Am I the only one??"
"Oh, damn it, super admin, come out and explain!!!"
"????????"
"Why can't I see the screen?! What's going on!! It's pitch black, and I haven't even seen my goddess Qiuhua yet! Panda, what the hell!"
"Hey, admin, get hit by a falling anvil!!"
"Not only the screen but the sound is also gone!"
Suddenly, the thick layer of comments was filled with rage. All the viewers who were watching the live streaming were caught off guard. And with millions of people going crazy together, it was an extraordinary scene, not to mention that the data in TMY's live streaming room was almost entirely real, without any inflated numbers.
Therefore, in Panda's eyes, the scene could only be described as:
"Uh oh."
In such a sudden situation, Panda Live staff would try to solve the problem as quickly as possible. For example, at this moment, a super admin floated into the live streaming room, trying to explain the reasons and calm the crowd.
"I am super admin number 404 of Panda: I apologize to all the friends and viewers in the live streaming room. Due to technical shortcomings on our platform, we made an estimation error and were unprepared. The server has crashed, but please remain calm. Our programmers are urgently working to resolve this unexpected incident. Once again, we sincerely apologize to everyone..."
Compared to regular users and titled users, the super admin's comments had one significant difference - the font was an exclusive golden colour, which can be said to be very cool and eye-catching. Moreover, it was pinned at the top, so everyone knew what was happening immediately.
But obviously, no one bought it...
"What the hell, are you dismissing it so casually?"
"We're losing big here. When will you fix it? We'll lose a lot because of this!"
"No, didn't you guys hype it up before? Why would you take on this job without the capability? Let Hai Xian or Miao Ya handle it!"
The attempts by the Panda platform to alleviate the situation ended in failure.
Some staff members of the technical team, including the super admin, felt somewhat speechless and frustrated when they saw this barrage of comments.
No, what do you mean we lack capability?
Brothers, who could have predicted this situation? Your TMY is so amazing that we couldn't have anticipated it, okay!
But these were just silent complaints. What needed to be done still had to be done. Soon, the technical team had to reallocate some servers that were in use and temporarily dismantle one wall to patch up another. Because they were professionals, their actions were not considered slow. Within maybe two minutes, the live-streaming room was back to normal.
However, as soon as the live streaming room's screen recovered, the music playing at the scene was clearly no longer the previous song.
This inevitably led to dissatisfaction among many fans who could only watch the live streaming, and Panda Live's mistake was destined to receive criticism.
- - - - - - - - - -
And now, the debut stage has been going on for almost half an hour.
If an aerial or overhead camera could capture a close-up of Miaoyi on the DJ stage at this moment, it would be easy to notice that Miaoyi's energy has significantly decreased compared to the beginning. Her movements have slowed, and she can't jump as high as before. Her forehead and nose are drenched in sweat due to her poor cardio, and the high atmosphere performance.
In this debut performance, strictly speaking, there are six songs, including "With You, Friends" and the opening song, "Faded."
As for the other songs, it goes without saying that "Levels" and "Solo Dance" are among those numbers, which Miaoyi had planned to use in the two weeks she spent preparing.
In the past half hour, Miaoyi has performed all four songs.
"With You, Friends" was used as the opening countdown for ten minutes, and this move can be said to be completely successful, achieving the effect Miaoyi envisioned. The audience reacted very well to it, and their emotions were stirred up, setting the stage for a better follow-up.
Next was the fusion of classical singing, piano and electronic music with Song Ziyin, "Faded,"
After that was the third song, "Levels."
This song, from Avicii, could be considered a textbook-level electronic song. Of course, she used Avicii's original 5-minute version, as the transition between songs was made trivial by design. Plus, the long build-up of the song was enough to push the audience's excitement to another "Level."
(A/N: Get it? Level? HAHAHHAHAHAHAAHHAA)
After the third song, Miaoyi didn't immediately proceed to the fourth solo performance. Instead, she went into a long live DJ show and improvised several segments, showcasing her surprising live skills.
This was another explosive point that many people didn't expect.
Just imagine, a girl who looks like she's in her teens, standing on the DJ stage, wildly DJing, improvising on the spot. The audience could even hear the rhythmic ticking of the metronome...
Tang Miaoyi's improvisations were truly spontaneous, without any prior preparation.
Then, the formal performance continued.
The fourth song was "Solo Dance." At this moment, An Qiuying finally appeared wearing a black dress, fulfilling the expectations of countless people. Both TMY members were now in front of the public, officially unveiling their most mysterious face and subjecting it to scrutiny.
Using "Solo Dance" to continue the show was an issue she struggled with initially, as she felt the song carried a much different feel compared to the rest of the performance.
But, as she was running out of time with only two weeks to prepare, she had to modify the song significantly, in order to be more suitable for a live audience like this.
And in the end, it worked better than expected. The crowd showed no signs of losing energy, so Miaoyi considered her modifications a success.
The only regret Miaoyi had was not being able to invite the dancers from "Street Dance of China" over.
You see, "Solo Dance" is not only the theme song but also the promotional song for this street dance reality show. Miaoyi's classmate, Lin Ruofang, has been there since the preliminary rounds and made it into the top 25.
It's not that Miaoyi didn't have the idea to invite the dancers, nor that the production team of the Tianyou program disagreed. After all, even their director came to the scene and is currently sitting in the VIP seat. If Miaoyi really spoke up, it wouldn't be a matter of minutes.
The real reason was the progress of the "Street Dance" program. It happened to reach the 24-hour team dance competition, and all the remaining contestants, including the MV, put everything aside and focused on choreography...
So after careful consideration, Miaoyi decided to forget about it and not disturb them.
Afterwards, Miaoyi switched to "Closer," both due to her fading energy, and to smoothly transition to the following song. Due to its lower speed and bpm, it was perfect for fading into her next song choice.
After "Closer," they concluded the performance with "Countdown," giving everyone a big surprise.
Renowned high-A-tier Chinese actress Xia Zilan was invited to the scene.
This was primarily to serve as publicity for both the upcoming song, and the film Xia Zilan was working on. Though, it served as a calming finish to the show, which allowed the energy within the makeshift stadium to resolve smoothly.
Finally, the entire debut lasted for 45 minutes and officially came to an end.
This first live performance by TMY ended perfectly, carrying countless gazes and attention, officially wrapping up.
But, as the saying goes, sometimes the curtain falling doesn't mean it's over. While It is destined to be a grand celebration, it is also the prelude to a massive storm...