Yangcheng Evening News reporter Xu Zhangchao
Recently, the well-known training institution Wanmen University has attracted attention due to a suspected thunderstorm.
A reporter from the Yangcheng Evening News learned from an interview that consumers who purchased Wanmen University's lifetime VIP membership service were removed from the WeChat group, and the mobile app and official website operated by the company could no longer log in normally. The Haidian Branch of the Municipal Public Security Bureau has been involved in the investigation.
Can the paid knowledge products under the banner of lifelong education still be trusted?
What hidden worries have been exposed in the field of knowledge payment in recent years?
How will the future develop?
The reporter conducted relevant investigations and interviews with students, industry practitioners and industry experts who paid for knowledge.
The student was kicked out of the group chat founder Tong Zhe lost contact
At 6:00 a.m. on March 22, Xiaowei, a third-year student at a university in Guangzhou, was removed from the WeChat group chat by the assistant of the "VIP Group for Life at Wanmen University" without any announcement or notice.
On the same day, Xiao Chen, who was engaged in computer teaching in elementary schools in Shenzhen, found himself removed from the 3,600-hour scholarship group.
There are not a few consumers like Xiaowei and Xiaochen who have purchased lifetime VIP services. They purchased the lifetime VIP scholarship class launched by Wanmen University in October 2021.
According to public information, "Wanmen VIP" includes two types: one-year system and lifetime system. The price of one-year VIP is 6,498 yuan, and the lifetime VIP is 21,999 yuan.
In 2021, in the name of the ninth anniversary, the "Upgraded Scholarship Class" will be launched. After paying the fee to join the program and the study time reaches 3,600 hours, you can get cash back. The registration fee for non-VIP students is 19,999 yuan, and the cash back is 19,999 yuan after completion; lifelong For VIP students, the registration fee is 9,999 yuan, and 9,999 yuan will be refunded after the completion. In addition, the tuition fee of the previous life-long VIP registration will be refunded.
"Relying on Wanmen University's CET-4 and CET-6 English courses, I passed CET-4; my classmates borrowed my account to use it and successfully obtained the teacher's qualification certificate." On March 29, college student Xiao Wei told the Yangcheng Evening News reporter that she was In 2017, I came into contact with Wanmen University when I searched for Japanese course materials on the Internet. By 2019, I saved 15,000 yuan, and then I bought a lifetime VIP in Tmall's Wanmen Education flagship store. In December 2021, I spent 9,899 yuan on Huabei. Newly launched scholarship class.
She has not yet called the police because she is afraid her family will know.
"The price of online courses for children at home is not low." Xiao Chen, a teacher in Shenzhen primary school, told reporters that he initially collected computer information on the Internet and tried relevant courses from Wanmen University. Lifetime VIP service.
In October 2021, after repeated marketing by Wanmen University customer service Xiao Wanjun, taking into account the help of video courses in primary and secondary schools for children, Xiao Chen paid the registration fee of nearly 10,000 yuan for the scholarship class to join the learning challenge activities.
Xiao Chen and Xiao Wei both stated that after being suddenly removed from the WeChat group by the administrator, Wanmen University’s mobile application software and official website could not be logged in.
The information pushed by Xiao Wanjun, the customer service of Wanmen University, shows that in March 2021, 27,300 students have joined the lifetime VIP.
If calculated on the basis of lifetime VIP fees, the amount involved is as high as 600 million yuan.
But at present, Tong Zhe, the founder of Wanmen University, has lost contact with him, and was questioned by consumers to run away with money.
The reporter called the Beijing headquarters of Wanmen University, but there was no reply as of press time.
Was there a plan for "running with money"?
Why did Wanmen University explode?
Wanmen University disbanded its lifelong VIP group on a large scale, and its founder Tong Zhe disappeared. A large number of users set up a rights protection group on the Internet, and tried to defend their rights through channels such as police and complaints from black cats.
In fact, the reporter noticed that the lifetime membership system of Wanmen University was launched in 2018, and it has not lasted for 4 years so far.
A reporter from the Yangcheng Evening News learned from some consumers that the Haidian Branch of the Beijing Public Security Bureau has filed a criminal case according to the company's alleged illegal absorption of public deposits and issued an order for investigation.
The reporter’s statistics found that there were 5,892 search results related to Wanmen on Black Cat’s complaints, most of which involved Wanmen University running away, scholarship classes, membership refunds, etc., and several rights protection groups had more than 1,000 people. .
According to public information, Wanmen University has over 13 million registered users and over 1,700 courses in total.
How did Wanmen University, which once advertised lowering the threshold of education and was committed to achieving educational equity, got into the current predicament?
On March 29, a reporter from the Yangcheng Evening News contacted Ms. Chu, the former head of the Wuhan Branch of Wanmen University.
Ms. Chu told reporters that Tong Zhe initially uploaded his recorded college physics courses on Renren. In 2014, he started to set up a company after receiving an investment of US$2 million from Renren. After 2016, he began to record elementary, middle and high school courses for commercialization.
"In the beginning, the sales of the courses were not good. Someone inside the company proposed to sell the courses in a package. After they proposed, they sold well, so they started to go this way." Ms. Chu said.
"Wanmen University later recorded a lot of courses in small languages, such as Biblical Hebrew, but they were taken off the market without any feedback." Ms. Chu told reporters that because of some disagreements with Tong Zhe, she will be in 2020. has resigned.
"At present, this matter must have been planned for a long time. For example, from the scholarship class activities that we did last year, sensitive people should be able to smell something unusual. Now, the hope of compensation may be a little slim." Ms. Chu said.
In addition, according to media investigation reports, Tong Zhe, founder of Wanmen University, often calls on employees to raise funds to buy houses at work. There are mainly two ways: one is to let employees hold the real estate on behalf of Tong Zhe, and Tong Zhe pays the holding fee at one time; Let the employee subscribe for the new house he purchased by the number of square meters, and distribute dividends after the price increases.
At present, it is unclear how many employees participated in the fundraising to buy the house.
Is the prospect of knowledge payment worrying?
Experts say support momentum is still there
Does the explosion of Wanmen University mean that the prospect of the paid knowledge industry is worrisome?
The reporter noticed that 2016 was called "the first year of knowledge payment". Wanmen University, one of the representatives of knowledge payment, launched live broadcast courses and special training courses in 2016, and started the content charging model. In 2018, it launched a lifetime program. VIP membership pays.
In the past few years, the knowledge payment industry has also continued to develop. Just recently, Beijing Siwei Creation Information Technology Co., Ltd., the "Knowledge Payment One Brother", disclosed the sixth edition of the GEM IPO prospectus, once again breaking through the Shenzhen Stock Exchange and impacting the "Knowledge Payment First Share". ".
And almost at the same time, the Wanmen University deletion group incident also brought "knowledge payment" to the forefront.
During the interview, the reporter found that some consumers are trying to restore the Wanmen VIP lifetime membership group and back up Wanmen university course videos through resource sharing and other means; to continue with some lessons.
According to iiMedia Research, since 2015, the number of paid knowledge users in China has increased from 48 million to 418 million in 2020, and will reach 477 million in 2021.
What is the prospect of the paid knowledge market?
Zhang Yi, CEO and chief analyst of iiMedia Research, said in an interview with a reporter from the Yangcheng Evening News that there are indeed some chaos in the knowledge payment industry, such as anxiety about sales, exaggerated effects, excessive marketing, and confusion in the charging model. In recent years, a lot of knowledge There have been some problems in paying institutions, but consumers' demand for paid knowledge and paid information supports the development of this industry to a certain extent.
"The willingness of consumer groups to pay for knowledge is the main reason for the rise of the entire knowledge payment industry. After the development of the mobile Internet, knowledge payment transactions have been realized." Zhang Yi said that the previous capital's involvement in the field of knowledge payment further boosted the entire industry. The popularity of the Internet of Things, the weakening of capital support and various products with different quality and bad names in the name of payment have made the payment of knowledge in recent years seem to be a bit of a "trend".
Zhang Yi said that as society enters more and more subdivided fields, the thirst for knowledge in the workplace and other fields will not weaken.
A lot of knowledge acquired in university education needs to be further deepened, and the depth and professionalism of free product offering must be limited, which can only meet entry-level needs, and users also need to filter out effective information from massive information. .
He said that the market demand for paid knowledge will inevitably continue to give birth to the continued growth of this field.