180120-Leaders-Taming the titans馴服巨人

(用有道雲翻譯的，本來已經完成了90%，可是刷新時筆記出錯，中文全部丟失，不得已重新翻譯，浪費了時間)

Google, FB and Amazon are increasingly dominant. How should they be controlled?

谷歌，臉書和亞馬遜的市場主導地位在逐漸增強。應該如何監管這類公司？

Not long ago, being the boss of a big Western tech firm was a dream job. As the billions rolled in, so did the plaudits: Google, FB, Amazon and others were making the world a better place. Today these companies are accused of being BAADD-big, anti-competitive, addictive and destructive to democracy. Regulators fine them, politicians grill them and one-time backers warn of their power to cause harm.

曾幾何時，成為Google，fb和亞馬遜這些西方科技公司巨頭的老闆，日進斗金，名利雙收是很多人的理想工作。科技巨頭讓我們的世界變得越來越好。今天，這些公司是因為「BAADD(big-體量巨大，anti-trust-行業壟斷，Addictive-用戶成癮以及destructive to democracy)而飽受詬病。監管部門對其罰款，政客嚴格監管，趙軍的支持者們，也因為他們體量巨大，而警告它們容易帶來危害。

Much of this techlash is misguided. The presumption that big businesses must necessarily be wicked is plain wrong. Apple is to be admired as the worlds most valuable listed company for the simple reason that it makes things people want to buy, even while facing fierce competition.Many online services would be worse if their providers were smaller. Evidence for the link between smartphones and unhappiness is week. Fake news is not only an online phenomenon.

• techlash 技術限制
• plain 平的，徹底的

大部分的技術限制都是誤導。認為大公司必然圖謀不軌的設想，更是大錯特錯。蘋果之所以稱為世界上市值最高的公司，萬人仰慕，其原因很簡單，因為它能夠製造出，即使面臨激烈競爭，消費者也願意買單的產品。很多線上服務供應商，如果體量變小的話，他們的服務也會大打折扣。沒有明顯的證據表明智能手機跟不開心有直接聯繫。假新聞也不是線上獨有。

But big tech platforms, particularly FB, Google and Amazon, do indeed raise a worry about fair competition. That is partly because they often benefit from legal exemptions.Unlike publishers, FB and Google are rarely held responsible for what users do on them; and for years most American buyers on Amazon did not pay sales tax. Nor do the titans simply compete in a market. Increaslingly, they are the market itself, providing the infrastructure (or "platforms") for much of the digital economy. Many of their services appear to be free, but users "pay" for them by giving away their data. Powerful though they already are, their huge stockmarket valuations suggest that investors are counting on them to double or even triple in size in the next decade.

• benefit from legal exemptions法律豁免

但是大型科技公司，尤其是臉書，谷歌和亞馬遜，確實引起了人們對於公平競爭的擔憂。部分原因在於，它們經常能夠從法律豁免當中受益。與傳統出版機構不同，臉書和谷歌幾乎不需要對用戶的行為負責；而且很多年以來，美國亞馬遜的用戶在線上購物時，也無需支付消費稅。這些平台也不是簡單地在市場中競爭，逐漸地，他們會成為市場本身，為數字經濟提供大部分基礎設施（或"平台"）。看起來很多服務都是免費的，但是用戶卻"支付"了交易相關的的數據。儘管他們的體量已經足夠大，高企的市場預期顯示，在今後的十年內，投資者仍然希望他們的股價翻一番，甚至翻兩番。

There is thus a justified fear that the tech titans will use their power to protect and extend their dominance, to the detriment of consumers(see page 18). The tricky task for policymakers is to restrain them without unduly stifling innovation.

• justified合理的
• detriment 危害
• unduly 過分地
• stifling窒息

因此有理由相信，科技巨頭會利用現有的優勢，維護現在的主導並拓展主導地位，甚至損害消費者的權益。對於監管者來說，最棘手的問題在於如何做到既能限制他們，又不至於抑制創新。

The less severe contest 越來越緩和的競賽

The platform have bacome so dominant because they benefit from "network effects". Size beget size:the more sellers Amazon, say, can attract, the more buyers will shop there, which attracts more sellers, and so on. By some estimates, Amazon captures 40% of online shopping in America. With more than 2bn monthly users, FB holds sway over the media industry. Firms cannot do without Google, which in some countries processes more 90% of web searches. FB and Google control two-thirds of Americas online ad revenues.

• network effects網路效應。可以看做是「馬太效應」的線上版本
• beget引起

平台之所以能有今天的主導性地位，是因為得益於網路效應。大體量正是得益於大體量：亞馬遜能夠吸引的賣家越多，就會有更多的買家來這裡購物，反過來又會吸引更多的賣家進來，如此循環。統計顯示，亞馬遜佔據了美國線上消費的40%。臉書在媒體行業佔據主導地位。公司的運營離不開谷歌，在某些國家，谷歌搜索引擎佔據份額達到90%以上。臉書跟谷歌佔美國線上廣告業務的2/3。

Americas trustbusters have given tech giants the benefit of the doubt. They took for consumer harm, which is hard to establish when prices are falling and services are "free". The firms themselves stress that a giant-killing startup is just a click away and that they could be toppled by a new technology, such as the blockchain. Before Google and FB， Alta Vista and MySpace were the bees knees. Who remembers them?

• trustbusters反壟斷機構
• the benefit of the doubt疑罪從無
• topple顛覆
• the bees knees<口>極好的

美國的反壟斷機構把科技巨頭判定為"疑罪從無"。他們很難找到損害消費者權益的證據，因為（服務）價格正在下降，並且很多很多免費。科技巨頭自身聲稱，只要點擊滑鼠的瞬間，就可能有跟巨頭搶生意的創業公司誕生，同時，科技巨頭也很容易被像區塊鏈這樣的新技術所顛覆。在谷歌跟臉書誕生之前，遠景和my space公司都是行業內的佼佼者，但現在誰還記得他們呢？

However, the barriers to entry are rising. FB not only owns the worlds largest pool of personal data, but also its biggest "social graph"-the list of its members and how they are connected. Amazon has more pricing informaiton than any other frim. Voice assisants, such Amazons Alexa and Google『s Assistant, will give them even more control over how people experience the internet. Chinas tech firms have the heft to compete, but are not about to get unfettered access to Western consumers.

• social graph社交圖譜，意思是網路上的人們相互之間的聯繫，比如同學、同事等等
• heft重量，體積
• unfettered 毫髮無損的

然而，進入科技領域的壁壘正在逐漸增加。臉書不僅擁有世界上最大的個人資料庫，同時還擁有最大的顯示用戶之間關係的社交圖譜。亞馬遜擁有著比其他任何公司都多的價格信息。語音助手，比如亞馬遜的Alexa和谷歌助手，會加強科技巨頭們對體驗互聯網用戶的掌控。來自中國的科技公司也有資本密集競爭，但是，要讓西方用戶接受，還有很多困難。

如果任由這種趨勢發展下去，一旦科技公司的活力減弱，消費者也會受到影響。換公司能夠融到的錢越來越少，大部分的創業點子，都被大公司收購，無論怎樣，利潤都會進入大公司的口袋。

The early signs are already visible. The European Commission has accused Google of using control of Android, its mobile operating system, to give its own apps a leg up. FB keeps buying firms which would one day lure users awahy: first Instagram, the WhatsApp and most recently tbn, an app that lets teenagers send each other compliments anonymously. Although Amazon is still increasing competition in aggregate, as industries from groceries to television can attest, it can also spot rivals and squeeze them from the market.

• in aggregate整體上
• attest證明

有些初期的跡象已經顯現出來。曾經因偏袒自家應用操縱手機操作系統而起訴谷歌。臉書在馬不停蹄的收購公司，擔心有一天用戶的注意力會被其他產品所吸引：先是買了instagram，其次是WhatsApp，最近又購買了青少年彼此匿名讚美對方的應用tnb。儘管總體上來說，亞馬遜仍然在促進競爭，這一點從零售業到電視領域都能看出來，但是它也可以隨時鎖定對手，並它們擠出市場。

The rivalry remedy 對抗治療

What to do? In the past, societies have tackled monopolies either by breaking them up, as with Stardard Oil in 1911, or by regulating them as a public utility, as with AT&T in 1913. Today both those approaches have big drawbacks.The tranditional tools of utilities regulation, such as price controls and profit caps, are hard to apply, since most products are free and would come at a high price in forgone investment and innovation. Likewise, a full-scale break-up would cripple the platforms economites of scale, worsening the service they offer consummers.And even then, in all likelihood one of the Googlettes or Facebabies would eventually sweep all before it as teh inexorable logic of network effects reasserted itself.

該怎麼監管呢？過去社會上針對壟斷公司，要麼是拆分開，像1911年標準石油公司那樣，要麼是私進行公有化，就像1913年對美國電信公司那樣，今天這兩種方法來看都會有很大的弊端。因為大部分服務是免費的，並且監管過度抑制投資和創新，這（導致）傳統的公有化措施，比如控制利潤和價格的監管方式很難實施。你比如說大規模的拆分會嚴重削弱平台的經濟規模，使得提供給用戶的服務大打折扣。即使監管成功了，由於網路效應一直在發揮效應，從谷歌和臉書分拆出來的小公司，也會橫掃市場。

The lack of a simple solution deprives politicians of easy slogons, but does not leave trustbusters impotent. Two broad changes of thinking would go a long way towards sensible taming the titans. The first is to make better use of existing competition law. Trustbusters should scrutinese mergers to gauge whether a deal is likely to neutralise a potential long-term threat, even if the target is small at the time. Such scrunity might have prevented Facebooks acquisition of Instagram and Googles Waze, which makes navigation software.

由於沒有簡單可行的方案，使得政客的選舉變得很難，可對於反壟斷機構來說，他們並不是無計可施。有兩種方法可以長久有效的馴服巨人。第一種是用好現行的競爭法。反壟斷機構應該認真審查兼并案，判斷其是否能夠做到從長遠角度中和威脅，即使當時來看，目標體量並不大。此類監管可以防止臉書收購instagram和谷歌收購導航軟體公司Waze。

To ensure that the platforms do not favour their own products, oversight groups could be set up to deliberate on complaints from rivals-- a bit like the independent" technical committed" created by antitrust cast against Microsoft in 2001. Immunity to content liability must go, too.

為了防止平台偏袒自家產品，應該成立處理來自於競爭對手投訴監管組--與2011年反壟斷機構調查微軟案成立的技術委員會類似。內容豁免法案也必須取消。

Second, trustusters need to think afresh about how tech markets work. A central insight, one increasingly discussed among economists and regulators, is that personal data are the currency in which customers actually buy service.

第二，反壟斷機構需要重新刷新對科技公司運行的認知。經濟學家和監管者討論頻率越來越高的核心觀點為個人數據就是在數字時代，消費者用來購買服務的貨幣。

Through that prism, the tech titans receive valuable information-- in return for their products. Just as America drew up sophisticatd rules about intellectual property in the 19th century, so it needs a new set of laws to govern the ownership and exchange of data, with the aim of giving solid rights to individuals.

從這個角度來看，技術巨頭們獲取的信息很有價值--因為他們可以把信息用來更新產品。就像美國在19世紀起草了針對知識產權的複雜法規一樣，為了維護個人的利益，數據的擁有和交換也需要法律監管。

In essence this means giving people more control over their information. If a user so desires, key data should be made available to competitors, in return for a fee, a bit like the compulsary licensing of a patent.

In essence本質上，其實.

其實這種方法給人們賦予了針對信息更多的掌控。在用戶的強烈建議下，關鍵數據可以為競爭者者所用，但要支付一定的費用，這有點像強制專利認證。

Such data-sharing requirements could be calibrated to firms size: the bigger platforms are, the more they have to share. These mechanisms would turn data from something titans hoard, to suppress competition, into something users share, to foster innovation.

此類數據共享需要根據公司的規模進行調整，平台規模越大，他們理應分享更多數據。這種監管機制能夠把數據從巨頭們積聚的方式，變成公開競爭，用戶分享，鼓勵創新的工具。

None of this will be simple, but it would tame the titans without wrecking the gains they have brought. Users would find it easier to switch between services. Upstart competitors would have access to some of the data that larger firms hold had thus be better equipped to grow to maturity without being gobbled up. And shareholders could nolonger assume monopoly profits for decades to come.

這些方法實施起來都會面臨一些困難，但是它可以在不傷害科技巨頭利益的前提下，馴服他們。用戶也可以很自由的在不同服務之間切換。對於大公司獲取的數據，後來的競爭者也可以有機會接觸得到，從而能夠避免被兼并，為公司進一步成長打下了基礎。同時，投資者因為押寶到了巨頭公司，就可以連續幾十年高枕無憂的情形也一去不返了。