Is Luo Yonghao paranoid or a liar?

Author | Xiao Man

He is a contradiction, a one-in-a-million genius and a patient.

This is Cao Wei’s evaluation of Luo Yonghao, a “former copywriter at Smartisan Technology.”

"Contradiction" is the best evaluation of Luo Yonghao so far, surpassing any label attached to this name.

Just as there are a thousand Hamlets in the eyes of a thousand readers, there are also a thousand different Luo Yonghaos in the eyes of a thousand viewers. The fundamental reason for discussing Luo Yonghao is his idealism.

Is Luo Yonghao a paranoid idealist or a liar in the guise of idealism?

The most frequently used word in articles about Luo Yonghao is "idealism." In a sense, Luo Yonghao seems to have become the spokesperson for idealism.

Luo Yonghao also boasted about this, and later explained it as "making the world less cruel and unnecessary."

Luo Yonghao's output of idealism began at New Oriental.

In the job application letter of Luo Yonghao that circulated on the Internet, in more than 6,000 words, in addition to listing the ways in which he matches the position, Luo Yonghao also expressed his personal ideals and feelings.

Regardless of whether the job application letter was true or false, the result was that Lao Luo became one of the English lecturers at New Oriental. The podium of New Oriental became the first stage for Lao Luo to output his idealism.

In the classroom, in addition to the established English teaching, Luo Yonghao is also good at conveying values ​​through the guise of humor and incorporating "idealistic content" into it.

Later, these values ​​outside of teaching became the "Lao Luo Quotations" that were repeatedly circulated on the Internet.

I hope that those Chinese people who like to teach young people the saying "the tallest tree catches the most wind" and who think they are very mature will one day understand this fact: some birds come into the world to do what they should do, not to avoid bullets.

When we fight for our beliefs and ideals, we must know that we are fighting for the ideas and principles we believe in, not for the sake of giving something to the people who think they don't need it... Many times, people with ideals are able to continue to persevere, not necessarily because they are strong, but because they think clearly.

When I face the ugly reality that exists everywhere, I often feel bored and life is meaningless for a short time. But the difference between me and those fools who become cynical after "seeing through life" is that I will redouble my efforts to try to change reality.

These words were later recorded by Luo Yonghao in his autobiography "My Struggle".

Luo Yonghao has become a spiritual idol.

If Luo Yonghao's idealism during this period was still at the verbal level, then after leaving New Oriental, Luo Yonghao began to put it into action.

In 2006, Luo Yonghao founded NiuBo, an Internet blog site.

Note: The picture shows the blog standards of Niubo.com.

Niubo.com has some shadows of Luo Yonghao, which can be seen from its blog standards (see the picture content for details). Not only that, Niubo.com also has the courage to "never delete posts" and the pursuit of "absolute freedom of speech".

In less than a year, NiuBo.com attracted writers such as Liang Wendao, Chai Jing, and Han Han to open accounts, and its PV (page view) exceeded one million.

Despite its promising start, NiuBo.com closed down three years later. Luo Yonghao's first venture after leaving New Oriental ended in failure.

After NiuBo.com, Luo Yonghai also started other entrepreneurial projects such as an English institution. However, the most successful one, and the one that best reflects his idealism, was Smartisan Technology, which he founded in May 2012.

From an English teacher to the technology industry, these two "irrelevant" fields have been connected for Luo Yonghao. In response to other people's confusion, Luo Yonghao explained:

I have had a craftsman complex of "creating things" since I was a child, and what I love most as an adult is digital products. The technology industry has infinite possibilities, and it is far more interesting to develop my career by improving the quality of human life than to enjoy life.

In Luo Yonghao's view, founding Smartisan Technology is a responsibility - "to make Smartisan a success, and to acquire Apple, which is inevitably declining, and to revive it, is my unshirkable responsibility for the rest of my life."

However, at present, it seems that the possibility for Luo Yonghao and Smartisan Technology to realize this vision is slim. But it is undeniable that Luo Yonghao has injected passion into Smartisan Technology and has truly fought for this vision.

Luo Yonghao believes that the ideal mobile phone product should have a considerate and user-friendly design, a nice-looking interface, and should ideally be usable without reading the manual.

Therefore, Smartisan Technology first developed a mobile phone ROM (called Smartisan OS), and then launched its first hardware product, Smartisan T1.

During the product development process, according to Tang Lala, a former employee of Smartisan Technology, "Luo Yonghao was very paranoid."

In terms of details, even the wallpaper of the mobile phone must be selected personally; in terms of design, the gap between the button and the front screen must be 0.15 mm; the plastic frame and the glass front screen and back panel must be the same color; the hub (the device used to wrap the data cable when leaving the factory) must not have more than three black spots...

This kind of "meticulous" attitude towards products may be the craftsman spirit that Lao Luo wants to interpret.

"I'm not in this for winning or losing, I'm just serious," these were the words that appeared on the screen at the end of the T1 press conference. The accompanying picture was of Luo Yonghao himself, who transformed himself into a focused craftsman, polishing an object in front of a window through which a beam of light was shining.

The T1 phone did incorporate Luo Yonghao's understanding of mobile phone design, but its sales were not satisfactory, with only 250,000 units sold (in comparison, Xiaomi's mobile phone shipments at that time were 61.12 million units).

And this failure is inseparable from Lao Luo’s fault.

Hammer's success and failure are both due to the same point. It pursues perfection too much, and its ideal is particularly beautiful. You know that there is a certain gap between engineering and idealism.

Ma Ning, a former RF engineer at Smartisan Technology, said so.

Later, Smartisan Technology also launched mobile phones such as Nut Phone, Smartisan T2, and Smartisan M1. However, from a market perspective, Luo Yonghao and Smartisan Technology's "mobile phone" shows attracted many people to watch but few people to pay for them.

Smartisan Technology's development was declining day by day. In June 2018, Smartisan Technology's capital chain broke. After the factory stopped working, a large number of stagnant materials gradually appeared. At the same time, the financial debt figures were increasing, from 200 million to 300 million, 400 million, and finally 600 million.

By 2019, Smartisan Technology's mobile phone business could no longer be maintained and was acquired by ByteDance. Luo Yonghao became a CEO due to too much debt.

But has Luo Yonghao fallen?

not at all.

In the article "Confessions of a 'Deadbeat' CEO", Luo Yonghao stated that he would not file for bankruptcy liquidation and would continue to assume the debt and move forward.

Starting a business is difficult, and the process is bound to be embarrassing and awkward, but no matter how much blood, sweat, shit, and urine you have, as long as you stay on the battlefield, everything is possible...

Behind this sentence is actually the self-persistence of an idealist in the face of bleak reality.

After temporarily leaving the mobile phone battlefield, Luo Yonghao did not stagnate, but continued to open up new battlefields.

He entered the e-cigarette field and designed e-cigarettes for "Xiaoye". However, just after the start, a ban on e-cigarettes once again put an end to Lao Luo's entrepreneurship.

Later, Luo Yonghao became Sharklet's global partner and "chief con man", but was frequently questioned by professionals because of the product characteristics.

From then on, he became the current “e-commerce live streaming salesperson”.

In March this year, Luo Yonghao announced his entry into the field of e-commerce live streaming. For a time, there was a frenzy of discussion about whether Luo Yonghao still had idealism.

Luo Yonghao did not shy away from this and frankly admitted that he did live streaming to make money to pay off his debts.

Although his idealism has been questioned, Luo Yonghao, who pays off his debts through live streaming, still has his own persistence.

For example, after reporting the wrong discount for butterfly cakes, you have to pay the difference at your own expense;

For example, it is said that "to have the radiation protection effect, you need to drink 500 times the amount of tea";

For example, after the PPT incorrectly stated the price of Liby dishwashing liquid, Liby sent a text message to inform customers of the cashback...

In addition to live streaming to sell goods, Luo Yonghao’s most recent update was to endorse the "Tsinghua and Peking University Online School" and gave a speech during the college entrance examination entitled "Life, More Than One College Entrance Examination."

Among them, Luo Yonghao mentioned, " The college entrance examination is not a foregone conclusion in life. There are many "college entrance examinations" in life. We should be full of hope and have the courage to start over again."

It is not difficult to understand that these words were spoken to the current college entrance examination candidates and also to himself.

Despite repeated failures and despite the habit of "doing one job and then changing jobs", Luo Yonghao always has the courage to start over and is always full of ideals.

Regarding the future, Luo Yonghao said this:

For the next half of my life, or should be the second half of my life, I hope I can continue to do what I want to do without embarrassing so many innocent stupid people.

Luo Yonghao continues to move forward with his "idealistic" sentiment, regardless of failure or change. "Continue to do what you want to do" is the path to his ideal country.

"Liar", "seeking personal gain under the banner of idealism", "just for the money", "boast", "clown", "pretentious", "ugly eating", "much ado about nothing", "only good at talking", "histrionic personality"·······

In the eyes of another group of Internet viewers, the other Luo Yonghao is not likable.

The root of the criticism also lies in idealism - the belief that they are pursuing personal gain under the banner of idealism.

At the beginning, Luo Yonghao, who opened the door of New Oriental with this 6,000-word self-recommendation letter, left this comment on his former employer Yu Minhong after leaving in 2005:

If you are a businessman and you are purely in it for money, there is certainly nothing wrong with making money in an open and honest way. But it is hypocritical to always wear the cloak of idealism and portray yourself as noble and pure. I hate hypocrisy.

The same words are also people's evaluation of Luo Yonghao.

In 2006, Luo Yonghao founded NiuBo.com. As mentioned above, NiuBo.com is different from other blog sites. It can be said that it is the most thorough embodiment of Luo Yonghao's idealism.

Later, this idealism that was widely praised and followed gradually disappeared under the cover of interests; or in other words, Luo Yonghao did not take off the coat that was originally put on by the public and used it as a cover for pursuing interests.

After Niubo.com, Luo Yonghao also tried to start "Lao Luo English" and make movies, but they all ended in failure.

What really caused a public reaction was that he said he wanted to take over from Jobs and become the "Chinese version of Jobs."

Not only that, Luo Yonghao also publicly criticized the unsatisfactory design of iPhone 6 and Apple Watch on social platforms, and lamented that Apple has become a township enterprise.

However, Luo Yonghao was later "slapped in the face" because the design of M1 was too similar to iPhone 6.

In May 2012, Smartisan Technology was launched.

From the product perspective, it is undeniable that the T1, T2 and other mobile phones initially released by Smartisan Technology embodied Luo Yonghao's persistence in his idealism, but the final sales volume showed that the market did not buy it.

Later, between design and market, Luo Yonghao chose the latter.

I told him, either you keep the “black gauze hat” and not look like the iPhone, but people will say you are ugly and won’t buy your phone; or you change the “black gauze hat” and even though you will be criticized for looking like the iPhone, you will still be able to sell your phone.

This was the multiple-choice question that Wu Dezhou, former head of hardware at Smartisan Technology, threw to Luo Yonghao before the launch of M1.

Although the sales of M1 have increased compared to the T series, Smartisan Technology has not turned the corner.

When Smartisan Technology was on the verge of collapse, Luo Yonghao was still working on projects such as TNT Workstation and Chatbao. The frequent failures of the projects were incompatible with Luo's claim that he wanted to make good products.

For example, at the Bird's Nest launch event, during the TNT product demonstration, when Luo Yonghao issued the "file manager" command, TNT tried twice before it responded. Some commands even had to be shouted five times before they worked.

Later, it is not difficult to predict the development path of Smartisan Technology. Its capital chain broke and its mobile phone business was difficult to maintain, so it was taken over by ByteDance.

After temporarily leaving the mobile phone market, Luo Yonghao's path of choice has become more "secular".

Although the mobile phone business was sold, Smartisan Technology is still under Luo Yonghao's name and has not declared bankruptcy. Luo Yonghao led Smartisan Technology into the e-cigarette trend and designed for Xiaoye e-cigarettes.

Unfortunately, after the official announcement of the sale, the State Tobacco Monopoly Administration and the State Administration for Market Regulation issued the "Notice on Further Protecting Minors from Electronic Cigarette Harm."

Before Luo Yonghao could stay in the e-cigarette trend for long, the trend stopped.

Later, Luo Yonghao took over the Sharklet project and became the global partner of this technology. He also held an investment promotion conference for this project with the theme of "The Old Man and the Sea"; but in the eyes of netizens, this was just another press conference to sell emotions.

After the press conference, doubts were heard from all sides. The black technology that Luo Yonghao frequently praised at the press conference was repeatedly "slapped in the face" by experts after the press conference.

The highlight of the Sharklet project always remained at the launch conference on December 3, 2019; and this launch conference, which was all thunder and no rain, once again added to Luo Yonghao's negative image.

After the successive failures of e-cigarettes and shark pattern technology, Luo Yonghao turned his attention to the e-commerce live streaming trend.

Regarding this choice, netizens bluntly said, "Lao Luo has finally become the person he hates."

It is impossible to confirm whether Luo himself hates this appearance, but there is no doubt that he entered the live broadcast industry because he values ​​this new trend and is looking for gold.

Between idealism and money, Luo Yonghao always has a self-consistent explanation:

"I never feel that there is any irreconcilable contradiction between idealism and money";

"Don't make money, make friends";

"A good business is based on money. Money is a foundation, and there are higher pursuits above money."

In the eyes of netizens, these are just the hypocritical cloak of idealism.

It is not to say that idealism cannot have the pursuit of money, but the root of the problem lies in whether idealism is higher than interests, or the pursuit of interests is higher than idealism.

Judging from Luo Yonghao's haphazard entrepreneurial path, it is more like the latter.

Dropped out of high school, studied English and joined New Oriental, then founded Niubo.com, Lao Luo English, made movies, moved to Hammer Technology, Chatbao, moved to Shark Pattern Technology for e-cigarettes, and now live broadcasts to pay off debts, endorse "Tsinghua and Peking University Online School" and the subsequent talk show...

Taking leaving New Oriental as the starting point, Luo Yonghao has been in business for nearly 15 years.

When he first founded Smartisan Technology, Luo Yonghao compared himself to Steve Jobs and claimed that he wanted to change the world. But in reality, he did not become a trend maker but just a trend follower; to be more specific, he was a person who followed the wind.

I dare not assert that Luo Yonghao has no dreams, but the question remains: does Luo Yonghao still have dreams?

In a recent interview, Luo Yonghao explained his idealism as "making the world less unnecessary cruel"; this answer is very consistent with his "literary persona".

However, any vague words need to be attached to concrete actions to have real meaning.

As for Luo Yonghao's actions, is it Smartisan Technology that is trying to prove "Made in China"? Is it Xiaoye Electronic Cigarette that "does not make exaggerated publicity"? Or is it the shark pattern black technology that was discovered by "discerning pearls"? Or is it the current trend of e-commerce live broadcasting?

So far, the choices made by Luo Yonghao have never clearly pointed to his ideal destination, but they all point to the same practical purpose, namely, profit.

In fact, in the early days of founding Smartisan Technology and before he started his own business, most people were willing to believe in Luo Yonghao's idealism.

Otherwise, Luo Yonghao’s quotes wouldn’t be all over the Internet; otherwise, his followers wouldn’t go from classroom to press conference; otherwise, Hammer fans wouldn’t say “you are responsible and serious, we will help you win”...

But later, the idealistic Luo Yonghao seemed to have disappeared in the real world.

In the interview where he explained "idealism", Luo Yonghao also answered another question - do you still want to convey idealism and export values?

Of course, this has always existed. It has always existed.

Should we believe this answer?

If we define Luo Yonghao by the standard of success, he is undoubtedly a loser; after all, he has failed in too many things.

Measuring Luo Yonghao by the definition of failure, he is undoubtedly a successful person; after all, he has never really fallen.

Is Luo Yonghao a loser or a winner? Is he a practitioner of idealism or a compromiser? Is he a "madman" who pursues idealism from beginning to end or a "genius" who is good at disguising himself?

These questions all have a definite option - A or B; but in Luo Yonghao's case, the answers are vague and it is difficult to give a clear definition of the options; no matter which side is chosen, there are factual basis to refute it.

Luo Yonghao is not a legend, but he is indeed the representative of the majority of people - the representative of those who waver between "persisting in pursuing dreams and compromising with reality." When we judge Lao Luo, we are actually examining ourselves.

Luo Yonghao is certainly idealistic, or he once was, but he is also compromising and bowing his head step by step. However, is this kind of bowing his head a path to realize idealism, or a factor that kills idealism?

This issue of ideals and compromise is actually the problem we face.

Well, your answer is .