Chapter 130 - A Public Apology
Xia Peifeng followed up after charging Chu Ling with plagiarism.
Firstly, he posted his copyright certificate on social media.
They were registered in his hometown. Since he was from a small town, Hu Lai was unable to find them when she first verified whether the songs were original. Hence, Hu Lai and Chu Ling felt it was safe to use those songs.
Secondly, Xia Peifeng posted videos of him humming these songs on his secondary social media account.
After he wrote the pieces, he did not release them right away in an alb.u.m, but he wanted to share them with the public, so he hummed them on his secondary social media account without showing his face.
Since very few people knew about his secondary account, the videos did not get a lot of attention and only a minority of people had heard it.
Everyone could see that the videos were posted way before "Ultimate Singer-Songwriter" was even aired.
Now that Xia Peifeng had proven owners.h.i.+p of the songs, Hu Lai quietly deactivated the comment function on Chu Ling"s social media account. She also removed all the links for his alb.u.m. All the preorders for "Sing" were canceled.
Deng Yufei was badly affected by this incident. After painstakingly acc.u.mulating some popularity, everything was gone. However, it could not compare to the damage dealt on Chu Ling.
Chu Ling had become a superstar owing to his good looks and had access to great resources. He had countless fans to begin with, so even after losing a lot of fans from the plagiarism incident, he continued to have a ma.s.sive following of diehard fans. All he needed was good opportunities to stay at the top, but he lost everything overnight.
They were hardly interested in learning the truth from Deng Yufei. Instead, they had to focus on maintaining his good image.
The talent agency was unable to convince Xia Peifeng to change his mind about the lawsuit.
Chu Ling had no choice but to apologize publicly on social media: [I am sorry for disappointing you. I desperately wanted to produce good songs, but I was too busy, so I used five of Little Raindrop"s pieces. I even made arrangements for four of those songs to be accredited with my name. I should not have taken a shortcut and abused your support and trust by claiming her work for my own. This is the first time I have done this, and I will make sure this is the last. I sincerely hope you can forgive me.]
[From now on, I will cease to appear on any programs, including "Ultimate Singer-Songwriter". I will go back and work hard on being a singer-songwriter and hone my skills so as not to disappoint you in the future.]
Chu Ling"s post was worded evasively and did not directly apologize to Xia Peifeng at all. He even pushed the blame to Deng Yufei and claimed it was his first time doing this.
The moment he posted this so-called apology, his fans softened up on him. Despite his mistakes, he continued to have a ma.s.sive following.
It was so important to have good looks in the entertainment industry. His fans naturally kept shouting in support.
[Chu Ling, don"t be sad!]
[Everyone makes mistakes! Chu Ling, don"t be hard on yourself!]
[No one is perfect. Chu Ling, you don"t have to feel so guilty about it.]
[It is never too late to change your ways!]
[No way. I am sure Chu Ling has done nothing wrong. The talent agency must have done this to him! It should be held accountable!]
[I think so too. The talent agency must have done this to Chu Ling! How could he have done it if the company did not force him?]