Facebook: Imperial Ambitions

Facebook：帝国野心

 

Mark Zuckerberg prepares to fight for dominance of the next era of computing

马克·扎克伯格准备为争夺下一个计算时代的统治地位而战

 

Not since the era of imperial Rome has the “thumbs-up” sign been such a potent and public symbol of power. A mere 12 years after it was founded, Facebook is a great empire with a vast population, immense wealth, a charismatic leader, and mind-boggling reach and influence. The world’s largest social network has 1.6 billion users, a billion of whom use it every day for an average of over 20 minutes each. In the Western world, Facebook accounts for the largest share of the most popular activity (social networking) on the most widely used computing devices (smartphones); its various apps account for 30% of mobile internet use by Americans. And it is the sixth-most-valuable public company on Earth, worth some $325 billion.

 

自罗马帝国时代以来，“竖起大拇指”这一手势就成为了公开且有力的权力象征。成立仅十二年之后，Facebook已成为一个伟大的帝国，人口众多、财富无数、领袖魅力非凡，且影响力和影响范围令人难以想象。这一全球最大的社交网络拥有16亿用户，其中十亿每天平均使用时间超过20分钟。在西方世界，Facebook在最广泛使用的计算设备（智能手机）上的最受欢迎的活动（社交网络）中所占份额最大；它各种各样的应用占美国人移动互联网使用的30%。它是全球市值第六大的上市公司，价值3250亿美元。

 

Even so, Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s 31-year-old founder and chief executive, has even greater ambitions. He has plans to connect the digitally unconnected in poor countries by beaming internet signals from solar-powered drones, and is making big bets on artificial intelligence (AI), “chatbots” and virtual reality (VR). This bid for dominance will bring him into increasing conflict with the other great empires of the technology world, and Google in particular. The ensuing battle will shape the digital future for everyone.

 

即便如此，31岁的Facebook创始人及首席执行官马克·扎克伯格（Mark Zuckerberg）仍有更宏伟的志向。他计划用太阳能供电的无人机发送互联网信号，以连接贫困国家尚未连入数字世界的人，他在人工智能（AI）、聊天机器人和虚拟现实（VR）上押下重注。对统治地位的竞逐会令他和科技世界其他伟大帝国之间的冲突不断增加，尤其是同谷歌之间。今后的战斗将为每个人塑造数字化的未来。

 

Empires built on data

数据上的帝国

 

Facebook has prospered by building compelling services that attract large audiences, whose attention can then be sold to advertisers. The same is true of Google. The two play different roles in their users’ lives: Google has masses of data about the world, whereas Facebook knows about you and your friends; you go to Google to get things done, but turn to Facebook when you have time to kill. Yet their positions of dominance and their strategies are becoming remarkably similar. Unparalleled troves of data make both firms difficult to challenge and immensely profitable, giving them the wealth to make bold bets and to deal with potential competitors by buying them. And both firms crave more users and more data – which, for all the do-gooding rhetoric, explains why they are both so interested in extending internet access in the developing world, using drones or, in Google’s case, giant balloons.

 

Facebook打造多个引人瞩目的服务吸引大量用户，继而将用户的关注卖给广告商，以此取得成功。谷歌也是如此。这两大公司在其用户的生活中扮演着不同的角色：谷歌拥有关于这个世界的大量数据，而Facebook了解你和你的朋友；你用谷歌是为了完成任务，但要打发时间时你会找Facebook。然而它们的统治地位和战略正变得越来越相似。无与伦比的数据宝藏让两家公司都难有敌手，且获利颇丰，它们的财富足以掷下豪注并且通过收购解决潜在竞争者。这两家公司渴求更多用户、更多数据，用冠冕堂皇的说法，这解释了为何它们都对在发展中国家扩展互联网连接兴趣浓厚，Facebook使用无人机，谷歌则使用巨型气球。

 

The task is to harness data to offer new services and make money in new ways. Facebook’s bet on AI is a recognition that “machine learning” – in which software learns by crunching data, rather than having to be explicitly programmed – is a big part of the answer. It already uses AI techniques to identify people in photos, for example, and to decide which status updates and ads to show to each user. Facebook is also pushing into AI-powered digital assistants and chatbot programs which interact with users via short messages. Next week it is expected to open up its Messenger service (which can already be used to do things like order an Uber car), to broaden the range of chatbots. And Facebook’s investment in VR – it bought Oculus, the cheerleader of this emerging field, for $2 billion in 2014 – is a bold guess about where computing and communication will go after the smartphone.

 

现在的任务是利用数据提供新的服务，以新的方式赚钱。Facebook在人工智能方面的赌注是对“机器学习”的认可，即软件通过分析数据学习，而不需要精确编写程序。例如，它已经利用人工智能技术来辨识照片中的人像，也用这一技术确定向每个用户展示什么样的状态更新和广告。Facebook还在推动由人工智能支持的数字助手和聊天机器人程序，它们通过简短的信息与用户互动。下周它计划开放Messenger服务（它已经可以用来做一些事情，例如从优步叫车），并且拓宽聊天机器人的适用范围。Facebook在虚拟现实上的投资是对计算和通信在智能手机之后将何去何从的大胆预测，它于2014年以20亿美元收购了这一新兴领域的领头羊Oculus。

 

But Facebook faces rivals in all these areas. Google is using AI techniques to improve its internet services and guide self-driving cars, and other industry giants are also investing heavily in AI – though with the deepest pockets and the most data to crunch, Facebook and Google can attract the best researchers and most promising startups. Facebook lags behind Amazon, Apple, Google and Microsoft when it comes to voice-driven personal assistants; when it comes to chatbots, it faces competition from Microsoft and a host of startups eager to prove that bots are the new apps. And its push into VR – which Mr Zuckerberg sees as a stepping stone to “augmented reality” (AR), where information is superimposed on the real world – pits it against formidable rivals, too. Microsoft has jumped straight to AR with its HoloLens headset, its most impressive product in years, and Google, already active in VR, has invested in Magic Leap, a little-known AR startup.

 

但是在所有这些领域Facebook都有对手。谷歌正利用人工智能技术提升其互联网服务、指引无人驾驶汽车，其他业界巨头也不惜重金投资人工智能，不过Facebook和谷歌钱袋最鼓、有最多数据可供分析，因此能吸引到最优秀的研究人员和最具潜力的创业公司。在由语音控制的个人助理领域，Facebook落后于亚马逊、苹果、谷歌和微软；而在聊天机器人领域，它的对手是微软以及诸多急于证明机器人是新应用的创业公司。虚拟现实领域被扎克伯格视作“增强现实”（AR）的踏脚石，AR即信息被叠加在真实世界上的技术。进军这一领域也让Facebook和强敌正面交锋。微软凭借其多年来最引人瞩目的产品HoloLens头盔直接挺进AR，而在VR领域已十分活跃的谷歌已经投资了Magic Leap，一家鲜为人知的AR创业公司。

 

The scale of Facebook’s ambition, and the rivalries it faces, reflect a consensus that these technologies will transform how people interact with each other, with data and with their surroundings. AI will help devices and services anticipate your needs (Google’s Inbox app already suggests replies to your e-mails). Conversational interfaces will let you look things up and get things done by chatting to a machine by voice or text. And intelligent services will spread into a plethora of products, such as wearable devices, cars and VR/AR goggles. In a decade’s time computing seems likely to take the form of AR interfaces mediated by AI, using gestures and speech for inputs and the whole world as its display. Information will be painted onto the world around you, making possible new forms of communication, creativity and collaboration.

 

Facebook的雄心壮志及其面临的竞争反映出一个共识，即这些技术将转变人与人之间、人与数据之间、人与周围环境之间的互动方式。人工智能会帮助设备和服务预测你的需求（谷歌的Inbox应用已经能对如何回复电子邮件提出建议）。会话接口能让你通过语音或文字与机器对话来查阅信息和完成任务。智能服务将扩展到太多产品中，如可穿戴设备、汽车和VR/AR眼镜等。十年之内，计算看似有可能采取增强现实界面，以人工智能为媒介，用手势和语音进行输入，将整个世界作为它的显示器。信息将被叠映在你周围的世界之上，让新形式的交流、创造与合作成为可能。

 

This is the ambitious vision that Facebook, Google, Microsoft and other technology giants are working towards. But along the way there are certain to be privacy and security concerns. Crunching all that information to provide personalised services looks a lot like surveillance, and will cause a backlash if consumers do not feel they are getting a good deal in return for handing over their personal details (as the advertising industry is discovering to its cost) – or if security is inadequate.

 

这是Facebook、谷歌、微软及其他科技巨头为之努力奋斗的恢弘愿景。但沿途必定会有隐私和安全问题。分析所有信息以提供个性化的服务看起来很像监控，并且如果消费者感觉在提交个人详细资料后并没有获得大量回报（广告业吃过苦头后正在明白这一点），又或者安全性不足，会引发激烈反对。

 

Power from the people

人的力量

 

There will also be worries about concentration and monopoly, and the danger of closed ecosystems that make it hard for people to switch between services. Facebook’s plan to offer free access to a limited subset of websites was blocked by India’s telecoms regulator, which argued that it was “risky” to allow one company to act as a gatekeeper. And Germany’s competition authority is investigating the way Facebook handles personal data. As its dominance grows, Facebook can expect to face more such cases, as Microsoft and Google did before it.

 

也有人会担心集中、垄断以及封闭式生态系统的危险，让人很难在各种服务之间切换。Facebook提供免费接入一些指定网站的计划被印度电信监管部门阻拦，它们认为让一家公司来把关“太过危险”。德国的竞争主管机构正在调查Facebook处理个人信息的方式。随着其统治地位的不断加强，可以预见Facebook会遭遇更多此类情况，正如微软和谷歌所经历的那样。

 

Striking a balance between becoming ever more intimately entwined in billions of peoples’ lives, making huge profits as a result and avoiding a backlash will be one of the biggest business challenges of the century. Even in ancient Rome, emperors could find that the crowd suddenly turned against them. So applaud Mr Zuckerberg – and fear for him, too.

 

既能和数十亿人的生活更紧密地交织在一起，又可借此获得巨额利润并且避免强烈反对，如何在其间取得平衡将成为本世纪最大的商业挑战之一。即便是在古罗马，帝王们也会发现民众会突然转而反抗他们。所以为扎克伯格鼓掌，也为他担忧吧。

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