经济学人32:信息追踪环境的变化

 　　Business.

　　商业。

　　Microsoft and privacy.

　　微软与隐私政策。

　　Change of track.

　　信息追踪环境的变化。

　　Data on people's online behaviour are worth both paying for and arguing over.

　　记录用户在线行为的数据不仅引来买家，也带来争议。

　　AN OLD saw has it that half of all advertising¹ budgets are wasted-the trouble is, no one knows which half. In the internet age, at least in theory, this fraction can be much reduced. By watching what people search for, click on and say online, companies can aim "behavioural" ads at those most likely to buy.

　　老话说得好，砸向广告的投资中，一半都打了水漂——问题是，无人知晓打水漂的到底是哪一半。在互联网时代，这一比例理论上可被大幅压缩。通过观察用户在线的搜索、点击和评论行为，公司能够向那些最可能买账的用户投放"关于行为的"广告。

　　In the past couple of weeks three deals and a quarrel have illustrated² the value to advertisers (and their suppliers of software) of such fine-grained information. The first deal came on May 23rd, when Oracle³ said it was buying Vitrue, which helps firms run their marketing⁴ on social media, for a reported $300m. On June 5th it added Collective Intellect, which analyses what people say about companies on Facebook, Twitter and so forth⁵, for an undisclosed sum. A day earlier Salesforce.com, a cloud-computing company mustard-keen on social media, had said it would pay $689m for Buddy⁶ Media, a competitor of Vitrue's. Buddy should fit in with Radian 6, which, like Collective Intellect, monitors social media—and for which Salesforce paid $326m last year.

　　在过去的几周，三笔生意和一席争吵共同道出了这些精确的信息对于广告商的价值（还有他们的软件供应商）。第一笔生意来自5月23号。当时甲骨文公司宣布正在收购帮助企业在社交媒体上做营销的公司Virtue，媒体公布的报价为3亿美元。在6月5日，它又将用于分析用户在Facebook, Twitter等社媒上用户对公司发表的评论的Collective Intellect软件纳入收购计划，收购金额没有公布。日前，对社交媒体极其感兴趣的云计算公司Salesforce.com公布将以6.89亿美元的价格收购Vitrue的竞争者Buddy Media。Buddy 可以使用Radian 6软件，后者像Collective Intellect一样可以对社媒进行监控，Salesforce去年为这款软件出价3.26亿美元。

　　The quarrel is the latest round in a long-running argument. Should advertisers assume that people are happy to be tracked and sent behavioural ads? Or should they have explicit⁷ permission? Many people give scarcely a thought to being electronically snooped on as they browse⁸, but some object furiously.

　　在长期的争辩中，最后的一个环节便是争吵。广告商可以认为用户乐于被跟踪并被发送广告吗？或者他们需要显式的授权？很多人浏览时根本不介意被电子跟踪，但也有人言辞激烈的提出了反对。

　　In December 2010 America's Federal Trade Commission proposed adding a "do not track" (DNT) option to internet browsers⁹, so that users could tell advertisers that they did not want to be followed. Mozilla's Firefox, Microsoft's Internet Explorer and Apple's Safari¹⁰ all offer DNT; Google's Chrome is due to do so this year. In February the FTC and the Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA), a consortium of trade bodies, agreed that the industry would get cracking on responding to DNT requests. In the European Union a new rule requires websites to ask before using "cookies" to gather data about users' behaviour.

　　在2010年12月，美国联邦贸易委员会建议将"禁止跟踪"（DNT）选项加入到互联网浏览器中，从而用户能够通知广告商他们不想被跟踪。Mozilla的火狐浏览器，微软的IE浏览器以及苹果的游猎（Safari）浏览器都提供了DNT选项；谷歌的铬黄（Chrome）浏览器在今年也将提供同样的功能。二月份，联邦贸易委员会与行业协会数字广告联盟（DAA）达成共识：该行业将尽快对DNT请求做出回应。在欧盟，一项新规定也要求网站用"cookies"收集用户行为数据前发出请求。

　　On May 31st Microsoft set off the row. It said that Internet Explorer 10, the version due to appear with Windows 8, a new incarnation of the software firm's operating system, would have DNT as a default.

　　5月31日，微软率先做出了行动。据称将随该公司最新操作系统Windows 8一起面世的Internet Explorer 10浏览器将把DNT作为默认选项。

　　Advertisers are horrified¹¹. Human nature being what it is, most people stick with default settings. Few switch DNT on now, but if tracking is off it will stay off. Bob Liodice, the chief executive of the Association of National Advertisers, one of the groups in the DAA, says consumers will be worse off if the industry cannot collect information about their preferences. People will not get fewer ads, he says. "They'll get less meaningful, less targeted ads."

　　广告主一阵恐慌。"保持原样"是人类本能，很多用户都坚持使用默认选项。没有几人会将DNT选项打开，但跟踪一旦被关闭它就将保持关闭状态。DAA内的组织，国家广告联盟（Association of National Advertisers）主席Bob Liodice说：如果广告行业不能收集消费者的偏好信息，他们的情况将更糟。他说用户看到的广告数量不会减少，但是"他们收到的广告将更没有意义，更缺少针对性。"

　　It is not yet clear how advertisers will respond. Getting a DNT signal does not oblige anyone to stop tracking, although some companies (including Twitter) have promised to do so. Unable to tell whether someone really objects to behavioural ads or whether they are sticking with Microsoft's default, some may ignore a DNT signal and press on anyway.

　　现在还不清楚广告商将作何反应。收到DNT选项的企业并没有义务停止跟踪，不过包括Twitter在内的一些企业已经承诺会在收到该选项后停止追踪。由于不能区别用户是真的反对关于行为的广告还是没有更改微软提供的默认选项，有些广告商会忽略DNT信号，不管不顾地追踪信息。

　　Also unclear is why Microsoft has gone it alone. After all, it has an ad business too, which it says will comply with DNT requests, though it is still working out how. If it is trying to rile Google, which relies almost wholly on advertising, it has chosen an indirect method: there is no guarantee that DNT by default will become the norm. DNT does not seem an obviously huge selling point for Windows 8-though the firm has compared some of its other products favourably¹² with Google's on that count before. Brendon Lynch, Microsoft's chief privacy officer, blogged: "We believe consumers should have more control." Could it really be that simple?

　　同样不清晰的是，为何微软一枝独秀地采取了行动。毕竟它也有广告业务，据称这些业务也将响应DNT请求，尽管该公司正在研究如何做到这一点。如果它想激怒几乎全靠广告业务运营的谷歌公司的话，那么它选择的方法可不太直接：没人保证DNT将成为规范。而且DNT看起来也不会成为Windows 8的巨大卖点——尽管微软为了自家利益，以此为标准将旗下的其他产品与谷歌做了比较。微软的首席隐私官Brendon Lynch在博客中写到："我们坚信消费者应该有更多的控制权"。事情能这么简单吗？

1 advertising   

n.广告业；广告活动 a.广告的；广告业务的

参考例句：

• Can you give me any advice on getting into advertising? 你能指点我如何涉足广告业吗?
• The advertising campaign is aimed primarily at young people. 这个广告宣传运动主要是针对年轻人的。

2 illustrated   

adj. 有插图的，列举的 动词illustrate的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• His lecture was illustrated with slides taken during the expedition. 他在讲演中使用了探险时拍摄到的幻灯片。
• The manufacturing Methods: Will be illustrated in the next chapter. 制作方法将在下一章说明。

3 oracle   

n.神谕，神谕处，预言

参考例句：

• In times of difficulty,she pray for an oracle to guide her.在困难的时候，她祈祷神谕来指引她。
• It is a kind of oracle that often foretells things most important.它是一种内生性神谕，常常能预言最重要的事情。

4 marketing   

n.行销，在市场的买卖，买东西

参考例句：

• They are developing marketing network.他们正在发展销售网络。
• He often goes marketing.他经常去市场做生意。

5 forth   

adv.向前；向外，往外

参考例句：

• The wind moved the trees gently back and forth.风吹得树轻轻地来回摇晃。
• He gave forth a series of works in rapid succession.他很快连续发表了一系列的作品。

6 buddy   

n.（美口）密友，伙伴

参考例句：

• Calm down,buddy.What's the trouble?压压气，老兄。有什么麻烦吗？
• Get out of my way,buddy!别挡道了，你这家伙！

7 explicit   

adj.详述的，明确的；坦率的；显然的

参考例句：

• She was quite explicit about why she left.她对自己离去的原因直言不讳。
• He avoids the explicit answer to us.他避免给我们明确的回答。

8 browse   

vi.随意翻阅，浏览；(牛、羊等)吃草

参考例句：

• I had a browse through the books on her shelf.我浏览了一下她书架上的书。
• It is a good idea to browse through it first.最好先通篇浏览一遍。

9 browsers   

浏览器

参考例句：

• Three-layer architecture is a model made up of browser, web server and background database server. 这种体系结构是由Browser、Web Server、Database Server组成的浏览器／Web服务器／后台数据库服务器三层模型。 来自互联网
• Another excellent approach is to abandon the browser entirely and, instead, create a non-browser-based, Internet-enabled application. 另一个非常好的方法是干脆放弃浏览器，取而代之，创建一个不基于浏览器，但却是基于互联网的应用。 来自About Face 3交互设计精髓

10 safari   

n.远征旅行(探险、考察)；探险队，狩猎队

参考例句：

• When we go on safari we like to cook on an open fire.我们远行狩猎时，喜欢露天生火做饭。
• They went on safari searching for the rare black rhinoceros.他们进行探险旅行，搜寻那稀有的黑犀牛。

11 horrified   

a.(表现出)恐惧的

参考例句：

• The whole country was horrified by the killings. 全国都对这些凶杀案感到大为震惊。
• We were horrified at the conditions prevailing in local prisons. 地方监狱的普遍状况让我们震惊。

12 favourably   

adv. 善意地，赞成地 =favorably

参考例句：

• The play has been favourably commented by the audience. 本剧得到了观众的好评。
• The open approach contrasts favourably with the exclusivity of some universities. 这种开放式的方法与一些大学的封闭排外形成了有利的对比。