????現(xiàn)在新聞出版界已經(jīng)開始彌漫恐慌的氣氛?！都~約雜志》稱，走進(jìn)《紐約時(shí)報(bào)》的辦公室，你就會(huì)感受到人們對(duì)這次合作的焦慮。因?yàn)槲覀円呀?jīng)知道，當(dāng)Facebook失去對(duì)某個(gè)事物的興趣時(shí)，它會(huì)面臨怎樣的后果——凋零和死亡。這樣的事情就曾經(jīng)發(fā)生在Zynga等社交游戲公司身上。Zynga的研發(fā)和推廣也離不開Facebook的大力推動(dòng)，它一度也是一家市值幾十億美元的大公司，后來突然就跌下了神壇。2012年，在Facebook的建議下，《衛(wèi)報(bào)》和《華盛頓郵報(bào)》等出版商也推出過一系列“社交閱讀應(yīng)用”，現(xiàn)在它們也早已蹤跡難尋。

????那些應(yīng)用與如今的“instant articles”之間存在很多共同點(diǎn)。首先它們也允許用戶在Facebook的一個(gè)應(yīng)用內(nèi)閱讀新聞全文，也的確有幾百萬用戶注冊(cè)了相關(guān)應(yīng)用。但后來Facebook改變了它的算法，這些文章和應(yīng)用出現(xiàn)的頻率大大降低，讀者群幾乎一夜之間就大大縮水。

????對(duì)于出版商來說，最大的風(fēng)險(xiǎn)并不是Facebook會(huì)故意摧毀或腐蝕新聞業(yè)的根基，或是向新聞媒體開戰(zhàn)（不過我的同事艾林?格里菲斯認(rèn)為，F(xiàn)acebook與新聞業(yè)關(guān)系緊張是事實(shí)，而Facebook對(duì)新聞進(jìn)行審查的情況也并不鮮見）。最大的風(fēng)險(xiǎn)是，F(xiàn)acebook會(huì)搶走新聞媒體與讀者的關(guān)系，而當(dāng)Facebook隨后轉(zhuǎn)頭追求其它東西時(shí)，它會(huì)在不經(jīng)意間摧毀新聞公司的業(yè)務(wù)模式。這種可能令丹?吉爾摩等Facebook觀察家們深感擔(dān)憂。

????短期看來，F(xiàn)acebook的“instant articles”對(duì)于一些媒體公司是件好事。但作為一個(gè)整體，新聞業(yè)所面臨的后果要壞得多。

????— Dan Gillmor (@dangillmor) ，2015年5月13日。

????湯普森和很多觀察人士認(rèn)為，新聞界在這個(gè)問題上幾乎沒有選擇的權(quán)力，只能被迫與Facebook共舞。這也就是為什么此次合作比經(jīng)典的“浮士德式交易”還要令人悲哀。由于新聞業(yè)自身的僵化無能，加上數(shù)字媒體市場(chǎng)的大浪淘沙，新聞業(yè)已經(jīng)失去了他們對(duì)讀者的控制——盡管他們和廣告商都在不遺余力地吸引讀者。

????這就是為什么說所有的好牌都在Facebook手里。它的平臺(tái)、勢(shì)力范圍、用戶群以及對(duì)廣告商的吸引力，是大多數(shù)新聞公司根本無法復(fù)制的。即便像《紐約時(shí)報(bào)》這樣的媒體“大?！?，用戶每月平均花在它的網(wǎng)站上的時(shí)間還不到20分鐘，也沒人想要付費(fèi)使用它的新聞應(yīng)用，其付費(fèi)墻收入的增長(zhǎng)也在驟然變平。誰知道他們的未來在哪里？

????Facebook拋來的橄欖枝，無疑會(huì)對(duì)任何一家加盟的新聞公司都起到幫助作用（反過來也會(huì)刺激其他媒體公司繼續(xù)加盟）。風(fēng)險(xiǎn)則是Facebook將獲得更多的好處。要知道，F(xiàn)acebook是一家“一切向錢看”的公司，沒有任何證據(jù)表明它真正理解和在乎“新聞業(yè)”本身的意義。因此人們有理由懷疑，它是否是一個(gè)可信的新聞來源，至少它是否比發(fā)布新聞內(nèi)容的媒體本身更可信。

????新聞消費(fèi)者是否能從此次合作中獲益呢？答案顯然是肯定的——至少對(duì)于Facebook的用戶來說?；蛟S那些動(dòng)作緩慢、低效、笨拙的新聞提供商也不值得我們?yōu)橹疄I。那么，一個(gè)由Facebook掌控新聞渠道的世界會(huì)是什么樣子？且讓我們拭目以待。（財(cái)富中文網(wǎng)）

????譯者：樸成奎

????審校：任文科

????One big reason why there is trepidation in news-publishing circles—New York magazine said there was “palpable anxiety” in the Times newsroom about the deal—is that we already know what happens when Facebook loses interest in something: it withers and dies. That’s what happened with the social games that companies like Zynga developed and promoted through Facebook, a multibillion-dollar business until it suddenly wasn’t. It’s also what happened with the “social reader” apps that publishers like The Guardian and The Washington Post came up with in 2012 at Facebook’s behest.

????The similarities between those apps and the current “instant articles” arrangement are many. The apps allowed users to read entire articles inside an app within Facebook, and millions of readers signed up to do so. But then Facebook changed its algorithm so that these articles and apps didn’t show up as frequently, and readership plummeted overnight.

????The risk isn’t that an evil Facebook suddenly tries to destroy or pervert the causes of journalism, or goes to war against media entities (although the network’s relationship with news is troubled, as my colleague Erin Griffith points out, and censorship is not uncommon). The big risk is that Facebook plunders the relationship that news companies have—or should have—with their readers, and then destroys their business model almost accidentally, while it is in pursuit of other things. That’s the kind of thing that concerns Facebook-watchers like veteran journalist Dan Gillmor:

????Facebook “instant articles” will be good for a few media orgs in the short run. But journalism will be far worse off as a whole.

????— Dan Gillmor (@dangillmor) May 13, 2015

????Thompson and others are right when they say that news companies don’t really have any choice but to play ball with Facebook, which is why this is actually much worsethan the classic Faustian bargain. As a result of their own incompetence and/or inflexibility, combined with the shifting sands of the digital-media market, they have lost their grip on the audience that both they and advertisers are trying to reach.

????That’s why all the cards are in Facebook’s hands. It has the platform, it has the reach, it has the users and it has something to offer to advertisers that most news companies can’t hope to replicate. Publishers like The New York Times have websites that users spend less than 20 minutes on in the average month, apps that no one wants to pay for, and paywalls whose growth is flattening sharply. What does the future hold for them?

????What the social network has to offer is unquestionably going to help any of those publishers who sign up (and that in turn will create an incentive for others to do so). The risk is that it will wind up helping Facebook more, and that eventually Facebook—a for-profit company that has shown no evidence that it actually understands or cares about “journalism” per se—will become the trusted source of news for millions of users, rather than the publications that produce content.

????Do news consumers ultimately benefit from this deal?Clearly they do, or at least the ones who use Facebook do. And perhaps we shouldn’t shed too many tears for slow, lumbering, inefficient news providers who have failed to adapt. But what does a world in which Facebook essentially controls access to the news look like? We are about to find out.