1
导读
感谢思维导图作者
Tracy，女，设计爱好者，推理烧脑粉
2
听力|精读|翻译|词组
Big tech’s $2trn bull run
科技巨头的2万亿美元牛市
英文部分选自经济学人20200222期Leaders版块
Big tech
科技巨头
Big tech’s $2trn bull run
科技巨头的2万亿美元牛市
Investors think the techlash is over. That judgement is premature.
投资者认为“技术抵制”已成过去，但这个判断还为时尚早。
In 2018 a new word entered Silicon Valley’s lexicon: the “techlash”, or the risk of a consumer and regulatory revolt against big tech. Today that threat seems empty. Even as regulators discuss new rules and activists fret about the right to privacy, the shares of the five biggest American tech firms have been on a jaw-dropping bull run over the past 12 months, rising by 52%. The increase in the firms’ combined value, of almost $2trn, is hard to get your head round: it is roughly equivalent to Germany’s entire stockmarket. Four of the five—Alphabet, Amazon, Apple and Microsoft—are each now worth over $1trn. (Facebook is worth a mere $620bn.) For all the talk of a techlash, fund managers in Boston, London and Singapore have shrugged and moved on. Their calculus is that nothing can stop these firms, which are destined to earn untold riches.
2018年，硅谷的字典里出现了一个新词——“技术抵制”，指消费者和监管机构对科技巨头公司的抵制。而如今，这种风险似乎已经不复存在。甚至当监管机构制定新规，隐私权问题愈演愈烈之时，美国五大科技巨头的股价在过去一年上涨了52%，令人瞠目结舌。这些公司的总市值增长了近2万亿美元，几乎相当于整个德国股市的市值。五巨头里有四家的市值超过了一万亿美元，分别是谷歌、亚马逊、苹果和微软（脸书市值仅为6200亿美元）。对于有关“技术抵制”的所有话题，波士顿、伦敦和新加坡的基金经理们都耸耸肩并继续工作。他们认为，科技巨头们注定会拥有无尽的财富，谁也挡不住。
注 :
Techlash，是technology和backlash的混成词，对大型科技巨头公司的批评与抵制
This surge in tech giants’ share prices raises two worries. One is whether investors have stoked a speculative bubble. The five firms, worth $5.6trn, make up almost a fifth of the value of the S&P 500 index of American shares. The last time the market was so concentrated was 20 years ago, before a crash that triggered a widespread downturn. The other, opposite concern is that investors may be right. The big tech firms’ supersized valuations suggest their profits will double or so in the next decade, causing far greater economic tremors in rich countries and an alarming concentration of economic and political power.
科技巨头的股价飞涨引发了两大担忧。其一，投资者是否已经引发了投机泡沫。这五大巨头的总市值高达5.6万亿美元，几乎占了标普500指数美国股票价值的五分之一。上一次股票市场出现财富如此集中的现象还是在20年前，之后就引发了股市的崩盘。其二，与第一种担忧相反，投资者的判断或许是对的。科技巨头超乎寻常的估值表明，其利润在未来十年内将翻番，从而在富裕国家引起更大的经济震荡以及经济和政治权力的集中。
The question of a bubble is a reasonable one. Tech cycles are an integral part of the modern economy. The 1980s saw a semiconductor boom. Then, in the 1990s, came PCs and the internet. Each cycle fades or ends in a bust.
对投机泡沫的质疑是合理的。科技周期是现代经济的一个重要组成部分。20世纪80年代见证了半导体的兴起。紧接着，20世纪90年代迎来了计算机和互联网。每一个科技周期都在投机泡沫的破裂中衰弱或消亡。
Today’s upswing got going in 2007 with the launch of the iPhone. By 2018 it, too, seemed to be showing its age. Sales of smartphones were stagnating. Data scandals at Facebook crystallised anger about the tech giants’ flippant approach to privacy. Global antitrust regulators were on the alert. And the loss-making antics of flaky tech “unicorns”, such as Uber and WeWork, evoked the kind of speculative froth often seen at the tail end of a long boom.
当前科技周期的上升期始于2007年iPhone的发布。到了2018年，市场略显疲态。智能手机的销量陷入停滞；脸书的数据丑闻，激起人们对科技巨头轻率处理用户隐私方式的愤怒；全球的反垄断监管机构紧跟其后。同时，像优步（Uber）和众创空间（WeWork）这些所谓的高科技“独角兽”企业的亏损，让人们不禁联想繁荣背后的投机泡沫。
In fact, at least for the biggest tech giants, today’s valuations are built on more solid foundations. Together, the five biggest firms have cranked out $178bn of cashflow after investment in the past 12 months . Their size has yet to slow their expansion: their median sales growth, of 17% in the latest quarter, is still as impressive as it was five years ago.
事实上，至少对于这些科技巨头们来说，当前的估值是建立在更加坚实的基础之上的。在过去12个月的投资之后，这五家最大的科技企业的现金流达到1780亿美元。就这样的体量，他们的扩张速度并没有减缓：最近一个季度的销售额，中位数增长了17%，依然和五年前一样令人印象深刻。
Consumers say they care about privacy but act as if they care much more about getting stuff, and preferably without having to pay for it in cash. Since the end of 2018 the number of people using Facebook’s services (including Instagram, Messenger and WhatsApp) has risen by 11%, to 2.3bn. Regulators have punished tech firms for tax, privacy and competition misconduct, but so far their efforts have been like bringing a pea-shooter to a gun fight: the fines and penalties they have imposed amount to less than 1% of the big five’s market value, a tolerable cost of doing business. And the agonies of some of the unicorns, and their biggest backer, SoftBank, have only demonstrated how hard it is to replicate the scale and network effects of the big five.
虽然消费者很关心隐私，但实际上他们更在意得到的东西，最好是不必花钱。。自2018年末以来，脸书（包括Instagram, Messenger 和 WhatsApp）的用户人数已达23亿人，增长了11%。尽管监管机构已经就税务、隐私和竞争三方面的不当行为对这些科技公司进行了处罚，但目前来看，他们的做法不过是隔靴搔痒： 监管开出的罚金数额还不到“五巨头”市值的1%，成本小可以接受。而一些独角兽企业以及他们背后最大的支持者软银（SoftBank）的苦恼，又证明了想复制出五大科技巨头的规模和网络效应是多么不容易。
Meanwhile, the size of the opportunity is vast. As our special report in this issue explains, many parts of the economy have yet to digitise. In the West only a tenth of retail sales are online, and perhaps a fifth of computing workloads sit in the cloud with the likes of Amazon and Microsoft. Big tech operates globally, giving it more space to expand, especially in emerging economies where spending on digital technology is still relatively low.
同时，五巨头的发展机会巨大。正如本报这期的特别报道中所述，很多经济领域尚未实现数字化转型。西方国家仅有十分之一的零售行业进行线上销售，大概五分之一的计算工作是在亚马逊和微软等公司的云端完成。放眼全球，科技巨头还有更大的发展空间，尤其是在数字技术方面支出相对较低的新兴经济体中。
The trouble is that if you think that tech firms will get much bigger and diversify into more industries, from health care to agriculture, it is logical to assume that the backlash against them will not fade away but, eventually, get bigger.
问题在于，如果你认为科技公司规模将不断扩大，并向医疗保健和农业等其它领域进军，那么可以合理地推测出，对他们的抵制不会消失，反而会更大。
As big tech’s scope expands, more non-tech firms will find their profits dented and more workers will see their livelihoods disrupted, creating angry constituencies. One crude measure of scale is to look at global profits relative to American GDP. By this yardstick, Apple, which is expanding into services, is already roughly as big as Standard Oil and US Steel were in 1910, at the height of their powers. Alphabet, Amazon and Microsoft are set to reach the threshold within the next ten years.
随着科技巨头涉足的领域扩大，越来越多传统企业的利润减少，更多工人的生计受到威胁，从而产生愤怒的选民。一个粗略的规模衡量方法是把他们的全球利润与美国GDP进行对比。以此为准，目前进军服务业的苹果公司（Apple）已经达到标准石油（Standard Oil）和美国钢铁（US Steel）1910年鼎盛时期的规模。而谷歌（Alphabet）、亚马逊（Amazon）和微软（Microsoft）未来10年内也会达到这一水平。
When recession strikes it will fuel new resentments. Big tech could face a storm that few have yet paid much attention to. The big five firms employ 1.2m people and are now by far the biggest investors in corporate America, spending almost $200bn a year. Their decisions about whether to squeeze suppliers, slash investment or attack weaker rivals will prove as controversial as those of carmakers when Detroit still ruled in the 1970s, or even of Wall Street in 2007-08. Big tech’s role in politics is already toxic; social media and videos influence elections from Minnesota to Myanmar.
如果经济不景气，将会激起新的民愤。科技巨头可能面临一场尚未引人注目的风暴。五巨头雇佣了120万名员工，是美国企业中最大的投资者，年投资额高达2000亿美元。上世纪70年代底特律汽车城鼎盛之时的汽车制造商，或是2007至08年的华尔街都曾面临如今五巨头遇到的难题。是否压榨供应商、是否削减投资金额、是否打攻击较弱的势竞争者，这些决定都会引起诸多非议。科技巨头的角色已经危害政治；社交媒体和网络视频影响了从美国明尼苏达州到缅甸的选举。
All this means that, far from having peaked, anger may be in the foothills. Executives hope that slick lobbying will protect them. But even today, the picture outside America is not of inaction but a tumult of regulatory experiments. China keeps its internet giants under tacit state control and wants to rely less on Silicon Valley, including Apple, which is already dealing with the covid-19 virus and other headwinds there. At least 27 countries have or are considering digital taxes. India has cracked down on e-commerce and online speech. The European Union (EU) wants individuals to own and control their own data, an approach this newspaper favours, although it may take years of innovation to create a system that is easy for consumers to use and profit from. This week the EU proposed curbs on artificial intelligence. Even in America, trustbusters may limit big tech’s ability to gobble up startups, a strategy which has been instrumental to the success of Alphabet and Facebook in particular.
这一切意味着，愤怒还远未达到顶峰，或许才刚刚开始而已。高管们试图用巧妙的游说来保护自己。但即使在今天，美国以外的地区也并不是无所作为，在各种监管试验下显得混乱。此处敏感，翻译省略，并希望减少对包括苹果公司在内的硅谷的依赖，苹果也已经在着手应对2019冠状病毒（Covid-19）等因素带来的不利影响和其他不利因素。至少有27个国家已经或正在考虑征收电子税。印度压制电子商务，限制网络言论。欧盟（EU）则希望个人能拥有并控制自己的数据，本刊支持这种做法，尽管要建立一个消费者易于使用并从中获利的系统可能需要多年的创新。本周，欧盟提议限制人工智能。即使在美国，反垄断团体也可能限制科技巨头吞并初创公司，这一吞并战略对谷歌和脸书的成功起到了至关重要的作用。
Just when you thought platforms were back in fashion
这句话留给读者，欢迎留言
The $5.6trn market value of tech’s formidable five is a testament to some of the most commercially successful companies ever created. But it also assumes that they will get a lot bigger even as the world stands by and watches placidly. Until today, big tech has been largely unscathed. The bigger it becomes, the more reason there is to doubt this can continue.
五巨头的总市值达到5.6万亿美元，使其跻身有史以来商业上最成功的公司行列。这也预示着，当全世界都袖手旁观时，五巨头的规模也会不断变大。迄今为止，他们仍毫发无损，而且变得越大，我们就越有理由怀疑这种情况是否能够持续下去。
翻译组：
Stephanie，女，翻译系小狮子一只
Yuqing，女，摄影爱好者，肖战女朋友
Mai，男，经济学博士，世界那么大，我想活得久一点
Desmond，男，即将读研，悬疑剧、恐怖片和三国杀爱好者
校对组：
Neil, 男，外贸民工，经济学人铁粉
Wesley，男，英语老师，经济学人铁粉
Hannah，女，英语教书匠，经济学人粉丝
Carole，女，经济硕士，在成为经济学人铁粉的路上
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观点|评论|思考
本次感想
VeRy，男，电气民工，经济学人资浅爱好者
我们终将被自己淘汰，无论是好、
还是更坏。
我们终将被自己淘汰，哪怕曾经船上聚会，
也不管有没有真正地得到过他们的爱。
你说你梦到自己前生是位皇帝，
所以这辈子注定会了不起。
你说你不再爱前妻，
所以答应携着我的手看遍这虚伪的大地。
他们私底下，
说你没穿衣裤，
你说这没关系，你并不介意，
因为我们终将被自己淘汰。
我们本已被自己淘汰，因为我们的愚蠢，
以及不思悔改。
但为何我们还残喘于此，你百思不得其解。
你打破了头皮，
想看看这脑壳里头究竟是些什么玩意。
我笑着说，如果如此就能知晓，
那前人怎会想不到？
所以我想帮你补上窟窿，
你说这没关系，你并不介意，
因为我们终将被自己埋葬。
我们早已被自己淘汰，因为我们不想缅怀过去，
只要看向未来。
我说你钙里钙气，
你说那是你儿时不敢表达的心意。
虽然你犹豫了半天，但还是拨通了领导的电话，
并牢固了你们的关系。
你想要辩驳几句，哑着嘴却没有任何话语。
我爱你，
爱着这份将被淘汰的天真，
爱着这份本已被淘汰的天真，
爱着这份早已被淘汰的天真。
你说你讨厌天真，你很介意，
因为我们的生活还得继续。
身边熟睡着妻子和女儿，
她们那么安详，似乎这世间只有幸福。
你说这都是假象，明天一早...我
用嘴唇堵住了你，
因为我比较迷信，
因为我比较善良。
4
愿景
小组
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