God's Imitator

[Now, please have Company 17 Limited choose the business field.]

In the external venue, a new round of market research began.

Fu Chen looked at the four options on the big screen and leaned toward the microphone, ”Arts.”

[It is known that there are 13,000 cinemas nationwide. For a province with 60 million people and net population inflow, what is the possible number of cinemas?]

Li Renshu looked toward the players from Community 8 across from them.

Unlike last time, they had changed people.

That scruffy, unkempt uncle Jiao Hongtao hadn’t come.

The person who came with Tian Fan was a woman wearing black-rimmed glasses who looked like a workplace elite.

[Community 8, Yang Hui].

Fu Chen once again looked helplessly at Li Renshu, ”Any ideas? If there’s no other reference data, we can only divide the population by some rough estimate.”Li Renshu didn’t immediately start discussing, but said, ”Wait a moment, let me try to negotiate with them first.”

There was a microphone on the table, so as long as you leaned close to it, the other side could hear.

”Interested in cooperation?

”From the game rules, this game isn’t completely zero-sum because there’s an additional investment mechanism.

”No one can guarantee 100% accuracy on estimation questions like this, so additional investment is inherently high-risk behavior. Any deviation would result in total loss.

”However, we can also take turns winning.

”When it’s your turn to choose the research field, our side will deliberately fill in a number with a large margin of error that absolutely cannot win, and your side can confidently add an additional 20,000 investment.

”And vice versa.

”This way, we don’t need to do those complex calculations or worry about estimation errors. It’s the choice that maximizes returns.”

Fu Chen’s eyes lit up, this was indeed a good method.

However, Tian Fan across from them shook his head.

”This does seem like a win-win approach, but don’t forget, if either company goes bankrupt, the game ends immediately.

”As for both companies working together to survive the economic winter? That should be a very difficult condition to achieve, and it would seriously affect our returns.

”I still prefer to have you go bankrupt as soon as possible to end the game.”

Li Renshu frowned, ”Are you sure you can always answer questions correctly?”

Tian Fan’s attitude was resolute, ”I’m sure.

”We can add additional investment and answer all questions correctly, so we don’t need to cooperate with you at all.”

The negotiation was unsuccessful.

Obviously, Tian Fan from Community 8 was extremely confident about this game segment and didn’t want to give up half the returns.

Li Renshu wasn’t too disappointed, in games you must be mentally prepared for any unexpected situations.

”It’s fine, let’s proceed according to the normal game flow.

”This game makes it almost impossible to guess the standard answer. We’re all guessing within a certain range, we just need to be more accurate than the other side.”

Fu Chen began thinking, ”13,000 cinemas, so on average that’s one cinema per 100,000 people.

”60 million people, roughly 600 cinemas.

”So we fill in... 700?”

Li Renshu shook her head, ”That’s still too few. This is a province with net population inflow, so it must be an economically major province.

”I lean toward 900, or 800.”

Fu Chen thought about it, ”Then 900? Let’s guess a bit higher.”

Li Renshu fell into thought, ”Although intuitively speaking, 900 should be about right, I also feel that in densely populated developed provinces, the number of cinemas might not necessarily be much higher.

”I remember seeing some data: if it’s the same area, cities have more stores than counties, but if it’s the same population, counties have more stores than cities.”

Fu Chen was stunned, ”Huh? How so?”

Li Renshu explained, ”For example, if one store can serve 10,000 people, then in a county, even if a large area doesn’t have 10,000 people, there must still be one store, right?

”But in a city, maybe this area has 12,000 people, exceeding the store’s capacity, but if another store were opened, each would only have 6,000 people, which might result in losses, so no one would open a second one.

”So in economically developed areas, because the population is more concentrated, the number of stores per 10,000 people would actually be lower than average.

”This is counter-intuitive data, so I remember it.

”If we consider it this way, offsetting things, might this number be lower than we expected?”

Fu Chen frowned, ”You mean that in an economically developed province, because the population is dense, cinemas can serve more people, so compared to sparsely populated areas, there would actually be fewer cinemas?

”Mainly large cinemas?

”That doesn’t seem right, it’s too counter-intuitive, I find it hard to accept.

”But I think 800 isn’t few either, I can accept this number.”

Li Renshu wasn’t certain either. After thinking for a moment, she said, ”Then let’s fill in 800.”

She input the number 800 on the tablet computer.

Since they weren’t particularly certain, they still didn’t add additional investment.

[Company 8 Limited’s market research results are closer to the actual situation, seizing this business opportunity and receiving a reward of 30,000 minutes of visa time.]

[Since Company 8 Limited added an additional investment of 20,000, they will receive an extra reward of 20,000 minutes of visa time.]

[This market research activity has ended. Please both parties leave and wait for the next business opportunity to appear.]

Fu Chen made a regretful sound, ”Ah...”

The arts field was his choice, and the number was his guess, so he felt very frustrated.

What was worse, the big screen wouldn’t announce the correct answer.

So Fu Chen and Li Renshu had no way to know whether this 800 was guessed too high or too low.

The two stood up somewhat dejectedly and returned to their company’s office area.

...

”Fu Chen, Renshu! I discovered a new game mechanism!”

The two had just swiped their ID cards through the turnstile when they saw Xu Tong hurrying toward them.

She noticed that both Fu Chen and Li Renshu’s faces didn’t look good, and asked, ”What happened, was this market research also unsuccessful? What was the question?”

Fu Chen sighed, ”I originally thought questions in the arts field would be about guessing songs, guessing movies, and such.

”I didn’t expect it to ask us to guess how many cinemas a province with 60 million people has.”

Xu Tong’s eyes widened in shock, ”I was just about to tell you about this!

”During the time you were away, I stayed at the computer the whole time.

”Then I discovered that those virtual employees provide specific data information through pop-ups!

”I received three different pieces of information in total, and one of them was related to cinemas!

”Let me think, it said:

”Among the top three provinces by number of cinemas, the average number of cinemas is 1,200.”

Hearing this data, Li Renshu fell silent.

She thought seriously for a moment, then sighed, ”I understand, we guessed too low.

”The correct answer should be around 1,000.

”I shouldn’t have thought about convenience stores at all.”

Xu Tong was somewhat curious, ”How much did you guess?”

Fu Chen, ”800.”

Xu Tong was very surprised, ”Ah? But that was quite close, wasn’t it? How can you be sure you guessed too low?

”The data from the computer was about the top three provinces by cinema numbers. A province with 60 million people probably wouldn’t make the top three, right? I remember major population provinces all have populations close to 100 million.

”800 seems quite reasonable.”

Li Renshu explained, ”No, there are very few provinces with net population inflow, especially among provinces with relatively large populations. Net population inflow means this must be an economically very developed province.

”Even if it’s not in the top three for cinema numbers, it should be close to third place.

”Since the top three provinces average 1,200 cinemas, then provinces around third or fourth should normally reach about 1,000.

”This data is much higher than the average calculated by population.”

Fu Chen was somewhat puzzled, ”But then how do you explain that store issue you mentioned earlier?”

Li Renshu was very frustrated, ”That’s completely different.”