Job Analysis Template 1: Fill & Download for Free

You specified the 300MM USD budget is strictly to make a movie. Therefore, we need to assume marketing and distribution are an additional expense. I’ll assume the fictional studio distributing this mythical movie have the capital to properly market and distribute the film globally; that’s an additional 200MM USD. My job may be to make a 300MM USD movie, but I need to keep in mind this is a HALF BILLION DOLLAR project. That’s how much it will cost to break even. This mythical movie will need to gross more than ONE BILLION DOLLARS to break even.Not make a profit. Break even.Why so much? Because movie theaters keep 50% of the box office. Some countries, like China, keep far, far more. You want to put your movie in someone else’s theater, they get more than just the popcorn money. Therefore, the rule of thumb is 2:1; for every dollar you spend (including marketing! Marketing isn’t free!) you need to earn two more just to break even.But, don’t take my word for it. I study Stephen Follows. He is an amazing researcher who has spent the past few years applying statistical analysis to the film industry and publishing his findings. His most relevant study involves tentpole movies with a 100MM USD budget. I suggest going to his website and reading it; its counterintuitive and mind-blowing to see the cold-hard, stupid reality of mega-budget movies. And in this fictional case, I’m not making a mega-budget movie…I’m making a mega-mega-budget movie. I’m making one of the most expensive films in the history of the world.According to BoxOfficeMojo, there are only 41 movies that have grossed more than 1B USD globally at the box office. That’s a mighty small number. What this means is, you’ve found me a group of dumb, wealthy, narcissistic investors who want to bet the house on a mathematical long-shot, regardless of genre or subject matter.“But, Harry…what if its a known property? Doesn’t that assure profitability?” Stop right there. Star Wars movies can lose money. “Solo: A Star Wars Story” was “only” budgeted at 200MM but lost 50M as critics trashed it and audiences yawned. According to Collider, only eight Marvel movies have grossed more than 1B in the box office which means even a proven Marvel property is risky if it were budgeted at 300MM USD. One of their minor characters like Ant-Man can’t get close to earning 1B. It doesn’t matter what “known property” you choose. At lofty budgets like this, what you are proposing is a massive gamble. The Wizarding World, Pixar sequels, James Bond even Disney’s reboots of their beloved animated films all struggle to earn 1B USD. The one exception is James Cameron’s Avatar. No one knows the actual budget. But, he didn’t just make a movie; he invented an entire field of technology, convinced the world to install 3D projectors and then hurt his reputation when 3D failed just like it did in the 1950’s.Movie stars? We don’t have movie stars anymore, not in the traditional sense. There are no actors who can open a movie strictly based on their name. Tom Cruise can only open a Mission: Impossible film. Daniel Craig can only open a James Bond movie. Robert Downey, Jr. can only open an Iron Man or Sherlock Holmes movie. We now live in the era of Situational Stars; they have some of the powers of a 20th century movie star, but only while cast in a particular role. Once removed from that role, their ability to compel an audience to show up evaporates.And that means no matter who you are, who you cast or what you make, with a 300MM USD budget, the probability is in favor of losing money, not making it. Statistics just aren’t on the side of such profligate spending.And, if you think making a profit for the investors shouldn’t factor into the decision then you’re stupid, short-sighted and selfish. Because I want to make more movies as a career, the easiest way to get financing on my next film is to make a profit for my investors on this film. I don’t want to have a reputation of a filmmaker who wastes money. And I don’t want the stink of a box office bomb to harm my reputation with the general public.Therefore, I’m going to give you several scenarios:1: The literal, stupid, bet-the-house, profligate answer.2: The safer, still-betting-the-house answer.3: The trilogy answer.4: The build-a-new-studio answer.5: The take-over-an-industry answer.With each of these answers, at least one feature film is being made. In only one scenario am I making a single, idiotic, over-budgeted 300MM USD motion picture.1: THE LITERAL, STUPID, BET-THE-HOUSE, PROFLIGATE ANSWERUnderstanding that this is probably a career-ending motion picture, then I’m going to dedicate a year of my life to finish an original sci-fi concept. It’s the kind of thing that Hollywood thinks they like until they read the script. It’s a space-fantasy epic. But, the moment some Hollywood suit reads the script, they’ll be freaked out because the characters are fully realized, there are lengthy dialogue scenes, there are themes that challenge conventional beliefs in our culture, the science is plausible and there aren’t arbitrary action sequences every 15 pages.I’m not going to describe the plot on Quora…why bother? It’s an original concept and I’m not wasting it on your profligate butt.Would it do well in the box office? I believe so. Would it gross 1B? Statistically, the chances are unlikely, no matter what the story is. So, this was me making my one original masterpiece at a budget level so ridiculously extravagant that my film career is now over. But, I got to make the movie!The sarcasm may not make the point clear enough; the act of making a 300MM movie is actually a bullet to the head. It will not be judged strictly as a piece of art. It will not stand on its own in a vacuum. It will be judged, at least partially, on how much it cost and how much it earned.So, now that I’ve made this one movie, I guess I retired to the Hollywood Hills and leach onto other people’s dreams for the rest of my life…or, I go make wine in Napa…or, I teach. What I won’t be doing is making another movie. No one will let me.2: THE SAFER, STILL-BETTING-THE-HOUSE ANSWERIn this scenario, I’m still spending 300MM USD to make a single motion picture. But, I’m trying to reduce (perceived) risk by rebooting a known property. There is no statistical analysis supporting that this actually reduces risk, particularly at this astronomical budget level. However, it would make my studio overlords who forked over 300MM feel better.There are many projects that fit into this category. Proven box office hits like The Matrix, Big Trouble in Little China, Blade, Escape from New York could all kinda-sorta justify a big budget because of how massive the world-building can be for these cinematic universes. But, the entire time I’d be working on the movie, I’d be thinking “This was already a great film. What the hell am I doing?”I don’t want to redecorate someone else’s beautiful living room. It was already good. How the hell am I going to make The Matrix better than the original?Slightly riskier and more artistically rewarding would be to remake something that had an amazing concept but was never fully realized. “Good-Bad Movies” benefit the most from a full reboot. Logan’s Run, Night of the Comet, Resident Evil or Stargate (be honest; it sucks!) would be fun to remake. Each of them has a compelling concept, a rich universe but were made by hack filmmakers who didn’t understand character development, nuanced dialogue or human emotions. I’d much rather remake one of these movies.But, in each of these scenarios, I’d be kicking myself for the waste. None of them need to be 300MM. No motion picture requires a 300MM USD budget. In fact, budget and creativity have a negative correlation above 50MM USD.So, instead…3: THE TRILOGY ANSWERInstead of shooting one film, I shoot for about 150 continuous days and deliver a full trilogy of finished movies. Superficially, this sounds like each film has a 100MM USD budget. In reality, they each benefit from the “halo effect.” Sets, costumes, actors, music and visual effect templates are used in all three films.I’m not shooting back-to-back motion pictures. I’m budgeting and scheduling them as a single, massive shoot. If five scenes from the first film, two from the second and three from the third all take place in Set A, then I’m shooting everything for Set A at the same time. That’s better than shooting back-to-back. And even if a UPM said “Obviously, this is how we should do it.” It isn’t done often enough.This is how you take a 300MM USD budget and make it look like 600MM USD.And, because I’m spending reasonable amounts on each film, I can afford to be more creative. I can afford to take what Hollywood perceives as risks. And its much, much easier for each film to break even (although, go back to Stephen Follows website; 100MM USD films need to gross 400MM in the box office to break even.)4: THE BUILD-A-NEW-STUDIO ANSWERWith 300MM USD, I could build a completely new kind of movie studio. Loosely based on Jason Blum’s business model, I’d scale it up from a production company model to a full studio model.Buy about 1000 acres outside Minneapolis, Indianapolis, Milwaukee or another mid-sized Midwest city. The cost of farmland continues to fall and in most midwest states, the cost of an acre is below $5,000. So, 5MM of my budget, or roughly 1.75%, purchases land within a thirty minute drive of a major midwest city. Keep in mind, we’ll only be developing about 20 acres for Phase One, but we want to learn from the lessons of DisneyWorld and buy up all the property around the studio for future development.Build ten sound-stages. All of the sound stages will be partially underground, like the Santa Fe Studios stages. This reduces energy consumption. All will have solar panels on their roofs, further reducing the cost to operate the sound stages.Purchase enough gear for an in-house grip & lighting department capable of servicing at least five feature films. Most of the vehicles are fully electric, with only 1–2 ICE (gas guzzler) vehicles for long-distance location shoots. All the lighting is modern LED lights like Anthem One. The gear emphasizes modern advancements like nestable apple boxes, collapsible 10X10s and carbon fiber c-stands.Build several backlot locations, like Universal Studios but with a twist. Robert Rodriguez convinced 20th Century Fox to finance a full distopian sci-fi backlot. I’ve walked it; its massive. It was also stunningly affordable. People within Troublemaker claim it cost about 4MM USD to make. Not bad for a location that can be used again and again and again with minor redressing and post-production alterations. Obviously, we’ll have a chunk that feels like New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, a Wild West section as well as a Sci-Fi Distopian and Fantasy areas.Build a six-story office building in the middle of the studio lot. Unlike Hollywood, which resisted vertical efficiency, this building would be tall enough for corporate offices, post-production, a commissary, screening rooms, temporary/flexible office space and everything else thats currently spread across massive campuses in the traditional 1920’s-style Southern California (inefficient) studio. A single, integrated building is easier to service, clean, air condition, heat, electrify and secure.Connect all of this with underground tunnels equipped with electric golf carts and charging stations. While each of these midwest cities have perfectly lovely springs, summers and falls, they have brutal winters. An underground tunnel system resolves this problem.Build a four-lane highway connecting this studio to whatever midwest city is approximately 10 miles away. I probably won’t have to build a 10 mile highway. The most likely scenario is buying 1,000 acres within 1–2 miles from an interstate highway and only needing to construct the 1–2 miles of additional roadways to connect to the existing highway system. That’s about 4MM USD per mile in rural America.And, all of this will be designed with a Phase Two and Phase Three in mind. So, there will be space for more sound stages, an expansion of the backlots and adding additional stories to the six-story central offices, if necessary.My estimate is that all this can be done for about 150MM. You’ll disagree. I don’t really care; I did my homework and you’re making a decision based on gut-instinct, fear (false evidence appearing real) and a lack of imagination. Unless you’re from the Midwest, you don’t understand how inexpensively things can be done here. And, anyone can pay retail; the trick to any major project like this is how to control the budget and not overspend, which is one of my skills.So, that leaves me half of my budget. With that, I hire writers, directors, producers, cinematographers and permanent crew from everywhere but Hollywood. They’re employees, not freelancers. They’re paid a living salary with good benefits. They’re incentivized by a transparent budget model with 10% profit sharing in each motion picture. There is no need to unionize because we’re not abusing people and everyone is earning a living wage. And unlike Southern California, they can afford to buy homes and send their kids to good schools in a place without wildfires, smog and the nation’s worst housing crisis.The studio hires slowly at first, carefully scaling up. In Year One, just 1–2 small budget horror films are made at the still-in-construction studio. Each movie follows the Jason Blum model; 5MM budget with a 10MM marketing campaign. We’re both making the movie and distributing the movie, which means we’re capturing about 50% of our box office gross in the US and 20–30% internationally.For the first few years, we play it safe; horror, suspense and faith-appropriate (but not faith-based) motion pictures that can be made for 5MM, marketed for 10MM and earn about 50–75MM in the box office. Slowly scaling up to ten motion pictures a year would result in a potential annual EBITS (not including merchandising and ancillary markets) of about 500 - 750MM USD. I think a business like this can be operated for less than 300MM USD annually.Phase two is using the visual effects artists working on our low budget horror films and turning them into an internal visual effects team capable of doing big budget effects (but at modest prices.) In-house directors, writers and producers would be required to study with the VFX artists and develop projects that look like 50MM but can be done for 10MM. We’d never, ever want to compete with the tentpole model of the studios, because that’s a suicidal bet-the-house business model that discourages creativity and risk…the very elements that are necessary to create amazing films.But, our goal would be to blur the line as much as possible. Many visual effects are easy to do and inexpensive. What was impossibly expensive four years ago is now a plug-in. We don’t need to have bleeding-edge visual effects; we need high-quality visual effects used appropriately in a beautifully written screenplay with stellar acting.With that model, I think I could beat Hollywood at its own game, slowly building a Midwest Movie Studio that grosses about 1–2B a year within 10 years, always being profitable and never releasing a movie until it is truly ready.I’m leaving out years and years of research. Company culture concepts. How to hire better artists. How to inculcate a studio against narcissism, greed and group think. Covering all of this in detail would take a year to write.5: THE TAKE-OVER-AN-INDUSTRY ANSWERBut, the final version of this is the most interesting. Take #4 but build it in either Lagos, Nigeria, Oaxaca, Mexico or Chennai, India. Deliberately make movies for multiple markets. It is racism and racism alone that separates America from making movies in Africa, India or Mexico. “But, what about the language barrier?” Both Nigeria and India speak English. Spanish is easy to learn. And in this day and age, Americans need to get over their laziness about other languages; I speak Mandarin, I’m acceptably proficient in Spanish (my business partner, who speaks fluently, would disagree) and English. Besides, the whole world manufacturers its goods in Southeast Asia and rarely speaks those languages with fluency.Building a studio of this magnitude in Nigeria would be 1/5th the cost. And there is no rule that says the movies would have to be strictly Nigerian. Although, we’d be foolish to not make movies for the Nigerian market; it’s a 2B USD industry. The Indian film market is massive. And Mexico can serve as a hub for the Spanish speaking world.Personally, I’d like to do #4 and #5 sequentially. #4 would be the first ten years and #5 would be a sister studio, built to take advantage of lower labor rates and create indigenous cinema for its community with its best and brightest minds. If there is a skill gap, the employees can train back in Minneapolis. And the two together would be a global force, capable of producing content for the English, Hindi and Spanish speaking worlds.And with a facility of that size, the local competitors wouldn’t be able to compete. And while that might smack some as modern-day colonialism and exploitation, I believe that as long as local artists are employees, artists and filmmakers-in-residence, it isn’t exploitative at all. It’s up to those filmmakers to prove they have the chops, but in this mythical dream scenario, we’ll be happy to provide them with the training and opportunity. And that isn’t out of some hippy-dippy liberal sentimentality. Its good business, because the audience always wants to see themselves reflected in the characters on screen so employing local filmmakers, actors and artisans only helps us maximize a movie’s box office potential…as long as those artisans are fully trained and ready to deliver.So, this is how I’d spend your genie-and-the-lamp 300MM USD. What I hope is you stop associating budget with quality. Because, the nature of this question demonstrates the kind of idiotic bias that has ruined the film industry.Good Will Hunting, The Usual Suspects, Searching For Bobby Fischer, Get Out, Whiplash, A Star Is Born, Moonlight and hundreds of other incredibly well-made, profitable movies were done for relatively small budgets. Abundance is the enemy of creativity. There is a sweet spot where one is restricted just enough to be forced to be excellent at this craft…and I believe it is about 5–10MM USD.Not 300MM USD.300MM USD? That’s the path towards mediocrity and the dream of idiot fanboys who think spending money is the same as being good at one’s craft.

This virus happened not because the Chinese wanted it to happen.The virus happened because of evolution. Nature threw the dice and this time, natural selection has created SARS-Cov-2.Should China be penalized for creating a mess in the world? I don’t think we should do it. This is not intentional. Scientific researches all around the world cannot find a link that the virus was man-made, and that existing evidence says they are instead natural.How is it that its natural?(Source: COVID-19 coronavirus epidemic has a natural origin)The novel SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus that emerged in the city of Wuhan, China, last year and has since caused a large scale COVID-19 epidemic and spread to more than 70 other countries is the product of natural evolution, according to findings published today in the journal Nature Medicine.The analysis of public genome sequence data from SARS-CoV-2 and related viruses found no evidence that the virus was made in a laboratory or otherwise engineered."By comparing the available genome sequence data for known coronavirus strains, we can firmly determine that SARS-CoV-2 originated through natural processes," said Kristian Andersen, PhD, an associate professor of immunology and microbiology at Scripps Research and corresponding author on the paper.In addition to Andersen, authors on the paper, "The proximal origin of SARS-CoV-2," include Robert F. Garry, of Tulane University; Edward Holmes, of the University of Sydney; Andrew Rambaut, of University of Edinburgh; W. Ian Lipkin, of Columbia University.Coronaviruses are a large family of viruses that can cause illnesses ranging widely in severity. The first known severe illness caused by a coronavirus emerged with the 2003 Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) epidemic in China. A second outbreak of severe illness began in 2012 in Saudi Arabia with the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS).On December 31 of last year, Chinese authorities alerted the World Health Organization of an outbreak of a novel strain of coronavirus causing severe illness, which was subsequently named SARS-CoV-2.(A/N: I’m highlighting this one so people who doubts that they haven’t been informed earlier can have their answer)As of February 20, 2020, nearly 167,500 COVID-19 cases have been documented, although many more mild cases have likely gone undiagnosed. The virus has killed over 6,600 people.Shortly after the epidemic began, Chinese scientists sequenced the genome of SARS-CoV-2 and made the data available to researchers worldwide. The resulting genomic sequence data has shown that Chinese authorities rapidly detected the epidemic and that the number of COVID-19 cases have been increasing because of human to human transmission after a single introduction into the human population.(A/N: I’m highlighting this one so people who doubt that they haven’t been informed earlier can have their answer, and also to make everyone knows this is an international cooperation and that it was already running, long before the world went mad.)Andersen and collaborators at several other research institutions used this sequencing data to explore the origins and evolution of SARS-CoV-2 by focusing in on several tell-tale features of the virus.The scientists analyzed the genetic template for spike proteins, armatures on the outside of the virus that it uses to grab and penetrate the outer walls of human and animal cells. More specifically, they focused on two important features of the spike protein: the receptor-binding domain (RBD), a kind of grappling hook that grips onto host cells, and the cleavage site, a molecular can opener that allows the virus to crack open and enter host cells.(From The new coronavirus was not man-made, study shows)More specifically, the authors of the new research looked at two components of spike proteins: the receptor-binding domain (RBD), which latches onto healthy host cells, and the cleavage site, which opens up the virus and allows it to penetrate the host cell.To bind to human cells, spike proteins need a receptor on human cells called angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2).The scientists found that the receptor-binding domain of the spike protein had evolved to target ACE2 so effectively that it could only have been the result of natural selection and not of genetic engineering.Furthermore, the molecular structure of the backbone of SARS-CoV-2 supported this finding. If scientists had engineered the new coronavirus purposely as a pathogen, explain the researchers, the starting point would likely have been the backbone of another virus in the coronavirus family.However, the backbone of SARS-CoV-2 was very different than those of other coronaviruses and was most similar to related viruses in bats and pangolins.“These two features of the virus — the mutations in the RBD portion of the spike protein and its distinct backbone — rule out laboratory manipulation as a potential origin for SARS-CoV-2,” explains Andersen.Josie Golding, Ph.D., who is the epidemics lead at the Wellcome Trust, a research charity based in London, United Kingdom, did not participate in the study but comments on its significance.She says the findings are “crucially important to bring an evidence-based view to the rumors that have been circulating about the origins of the virus (SARS-CoV-2) causing COVID-19.”“[The authors] conclude that the virus is the product of natural evolution,” Goulding adds, “ending any speculation about deliberate genetic engineering.”This is an illustration of the relationships the virus has on known viruses from before.a, Mutations in contact residues of the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein. The spike protein of SARS-CoV-2 (red bar at top) was aligned against the most closely related SARS-CoV-like coronaviruses and SARS-CoV itself. Key residues in the spike protein that make contact to the ACE2 receptor are marked with blue boxes in both SARS-CoV-2 and related viruses, including SARS-CoV (Urbani strain). b, Acquisition of polybasic cleavage site and O-linked glycans. Both the polybasic cleavage site and the three adjacent predicted O-linked glycans are unique to SARS-CoV-2 and were not previously seen in lineage B betacoronaviruses. Sequences shown are from NCBI GenBank, accession codes MN908947, MN996532, AY278741, KY417146 and MK211376. The pangolin coronavirus sequences are a consensus generated from SRR10168377 and SRR10168378 (NCBI BioProject PRJNA573298).(Sources:Evidence of recombination in coronaviruses implicating pangolin origins of nCoV-2019Viral Metagenomics Revealed Sendai Virus and Coronavirus Infection of Malayan Pangolins (Manis javanica))So now that the virus is natural and not manmade, China can still be penalized for how it performs in the current pandemic…The question now is how China performed?There are those who said that China should have informed everyone sooner. But then how early should the Chinese have done it?To answer the last question, I will establish a timeline. I will make the timeline as objective as possible, taking both angles from both sides.Nov 17: According to a report quoted by SCMP on 13 March 2020, a 55-year-old man, a confirmed case of the novel coronavirus, may have contracted the disease on 17 November 2019 but the case was not recognized at the time. No scientific paper has yet been published about such pre-December cases.Dec. 1: The earliest date of symptom onset, according to a study in the journal Lancet.Dec. 10: Wei Guixian, one of the earliest known coronavirus patients, starts feeling ill.Dec. 16: Patient admitted to Wuhan Central Hospital with infection in both lungs but resistant to anti-flu drugs. Staff later learned he worked at a wildlife market connected to the outbreak.Dec. 27: Wuhan health officials are told that a new coronavirus is causing the illness.Dec. 29: Local hospitals in Hubei report the first four cases of a “pneumonia of unknown etiology.”Dec. 30:Ai Fen, a top director at Wuhan Central Hospital, posts information on WeChat about the new virus. She was reprimanded for doing so and told not to spread information about it. The Chinese angle is here. (Jesus Christ, please Google, don't make me spend half an hour just to find an archived web page).Wuhan doctor Li Wenliang also shares information on WeChat about the new SARS-like virus. He is called in for questioning shortly afterward. For the details from the two sides please check the Western version and Chinese version. (Wow, looking for the Chinese angle is hard).Wuhan health commission notifies hospitals of a “pneumonia of unclear cause” and orders them to report any related information.Dec. 31:Wuhan health officials confirm 27 cases of illness and close a market they think is related to the virus' spread.Chinese authorities alert WHO about a string of pneumonia-like cases in Wuhan.CCTV local media in Wuhan made a report on the ongoing pneumonia epidemic. Also here.Jan 1:The seafood market (Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market) that was identified as a suspected center of the outbreak is closed.Wuhan Public Security Bureau brings in for questioning eight doctors who had posted information about the illness on WeChat. Chinese version for Dr Li is here, and the other doctors here.An official at the Hubei Provincial Health Commission orders labs, which had already determined that the novel virus was similar to SARS, to stop testing samples and to destroy existing samples. The Chinese angle is here and a forum is also here. (Seriously google, make it easier for me to find what I’m looking for.)Jan. 2: Chinese researchers map the new coronavirus' complete genetic information. This information is not made public until Jan. 9. (Sorry I don’t have money to see wsj articles).Jan. 7: Xi Jinping becomes involved in the response.Jan. 9: China announces it has mapped the coronavirus genome.Jan 10: WHO issues its first guidance on the novel coronavirus. The review tool.Jan. 11–17: Important prescheduled CCP meeting held in Wuhan. During that time, the Wuhan Health Commission insists there are no new cases.Jan 11: The first two patients in Shenzhen city transferred into negative pressure room in Third People's Hospital of Shenzhen City due to matching lab test result, symptoms, and epidemiology and are being listed as suspected cases. The cases were not confirmed at the time, because requirement from the Chinese government at the time was that first case in each individual cities need to be submitted to provincial CDC, verified by national CDC, and then evaluated and confirmed by a specific diagnostic team in national CDC. Report here. (3rd hour of making this thing. I just give up)Jan 12:In China, more than 700 close contacts of the 41 confirmed cases, including more than 400 healthcare workers, had been monitored, with no new cases reported in China since 5 January. Report here.The WHO published initial guidance on travel advice, testing in the laboratory and medical investigation. Report here.Jan. 13:First coronavirus case reported in Thailand, the first known case outside China.The USCDC announced that the genome had been posted on the NIH genetic sequence database, GenBank. Report here.Jan. 14:WHO announces Chinese authorities have seen "no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the novel coronavirus."WHO refuses to rule out human-to-human spread in China's mystery coronavirus outbreak. NCOV-19 has limited human-to-human transmission but could spread wider. WHO full report here.Wuhan implements screening measures for travelers leaving the city at airports, railway stations, and other passenger terminals.(Ok…..)Jan 15:A second death occurred in a 69-year-old man in China on 15 January..The WHO published a protocol on diagnostic testing for 2019-nCoV, developed by a virology team from Charité Hospital.The patient who becomes the first confirmed U.S. case leaves Wuhan and arrives in the U.S., carrying the coronavirus.China, U.S. sign phase-one trade deal. Chinese report. US report.US-China Phase 1 Trade Deal copy here.Jan 16: Japan reports its first case, a man in his mid-thirties who did not visit the seafood market.Jan 17:A second man, aged sixty-nine, dies in Wuhan.Thailand reports its second case, a seventy-four-year-old woman.Jan. 18:The Wuhan Health Commission announces four new cases.Annual Wuhan Lunar New Year banquet. Tens of thousands of people gathered for a potluck. Chinese version here.Jan. 19:First confirmed cases were reported in China, outside Wuhan, one in the southern province of Guangdong and two in Beijing.Wuhan reported 136 additional laboratory-confirmed cases, bringing the total number of laboratory-confirmed cases in China to 201. A new death was also reported in Wuhan, bringing the total number of fatalities in China to three.Jan. 20:The first case announced in South Korea. Report here.Zhong Nanshan, a top Chinese doctor who is helping to coordinate the coronavirus response, announces the virus can be passed between people. Report here.China announced that the virus was human-to-human transmissible after two medical staff were infected in Guangdong.Scientists from the China CDC identified three different strains of the 2019-nCoV confirming that the original nCoV-19 had mutated into two additional strains.Singapore were diagnosed with the Wuhan coronavirus upon returning home: one from Malaysia, two from South Korea and two from Singapore. Report here.Jan. 21:The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirms the first coronavirus case in the United States.CCP flagship newspaper People’s Daily mentions the coronavirus epidemic and Xi's actions to fight it for the first time.China's top political commission in charge of law and order warns that “anyone who deliberately delays and hides the reporting of [virus] cases out of his or her own self-interest will be nailed on the pillar of shame for eternity."WHO makes field visit to Wuhan, China. Report here.Wuhan Institute filed to patent the use of Gilead's remdesivir for the treatment of novel coronavirus. Report here.WHO Situation Report 1.Jan 22:New data showed indications of the current rapid spread of the disease and an increase in the rate of transmission. Report hereOfficials announced a quarantine of the greater Wuhan, China area to commence on 23 January 2020 at 10:00 a.m. No traffic would be allowed in or out of the city.WHO Situation Report 2.Jan. 23:Wuhan and three other cities are put on lockdown. Right around this time, approximately 5 million people leave the city without being screened for the illness.First meeting of Emergency Committee regarding the novel coronavirus outbreak. WHOBack to the question. How early should the Chinese have done it?Depends of which side of the divide you are.Me, who is in the positive side says China did fast. Really fast. If you ask me what can I say, I would say kudos to the Chinese. They did it the earliest they ever do, given the knowledge they have of the situation.China’s response to the outbreak of Covid-19 has been exceedingly transparent, swift, effective and lifesaving.However, the narrative has been hijacked by a few Western media outlets to propagate a cover-up using nitpicked events that were twisted to fit their narrative.The reason it has been succesful is because it aligns with pre-existing Western biases about China’s government being untrustworthy liars.No amount of re-writing history will change the objective reality that China faced an entirely new virus, had to do all the discovery from scratch, and still had the fastest and most aggressive response. And nothing will change how the entire western world, despite having all the homework done for them, still failed to react until thousands or tens of thousands of cases emerged.(From Did China really coverup the virus? A myth debunked - Asia Review)I have plenty of WSJ articles here, but I can’t read them. No seriously, why would I pay them my food money? I dont even earn that much, and now I’m jobless. I do read NYT too.But…If you read something like, I kind of think otherwise. I dont know about you though.I also agree with WHO. WHO has been supportive in this on my view. My view. I don’t you though. But WHO did a good job for me.And I also agree on how they portrayed China on this.Even Bill Gates agree.Should China be penalized? Why should we penalized them.Look at this graphs.This is the United States.This is Italy.This is Spain.This GermanyMy country, the PhilippinesThis is IndiaNoticing something?Let me tell you then. Almost 6 weeks, the world witnessed China. And for six weeks, alarms in Beijing are crying out loud. Beijing held off the pandemic and delayed it for 6 weeks.6 weeks for the world to prepare.Some did manage to do something.This is South KoreaAnd this China.South Korea used the time China had gave them. And they were successful.Now, you will argue with me and tell me: But China caused it.They didn’t. Its all in the data.Your Question: Should China be penalized for creating a mess in the world?My Answer: I will congratulate the Chinese for their astonishing achievement. I think were lucky coronavirus hit China first. It gave some the time to prepare. Imagine the total pandemonium if it started somewhere else. Penalizing the Chinese should be the last thing in our minds.That’s all. (Wew, that 5 long hours of research).A message to Google. I really appreciate your service, shoving to my face and into my throat… I mean giving me pages after pages of reference when it is from Western sources but please, if I’m looking for Chinese reference, please don’t bury it. Page 10 in google search is like being in a remote jungle. And when I search its full name or title (word by word arrangement), don’t give me unrelated stuff. Thank you.