收購Snapchat失手 Facebook再戰私密社交江湖

Snapchat has some new competition in the market for selfie photos that disappear after a few seconds.

在“閱後即焚”式的自拍照片分享應用市場，Snapchat又迎來了新的競爭對手。

On Tuesday, Facebook introduced Slingshot, an app for sharing messages and images with friends that vanish soon after they view them. With the new service, Facebook is challenging Snapchat, a startup that popularized the idea of disappearing messages and has quickly become one of the technology industry’s darlings.

本週二，Facebook推出了一款名爲Slingshot的新應用，用戶可利用它與好友分享信息和圖片，而這些信息和圖片在對方看過之後很快就會消失。Facebook旨在通過這項新服務來挑戰新創公司Snapchat。後者普及了“閱後即焚”式的信息分享理念，而且已經很快發展成爲業界爭相追逐的新寵。

Slingshot puts its own spin on socalled ephemeral messsaging by requiring anyone who receives a photo to respond to the sender. If they don’t, they are unable to open the original image and instead can only see a pixelated screen and nothing more. The reasoning is to ensure people engage with one another and don’t simply receive photos without contributing. Of course, this is also serves Facebook’s interest by increasing use of the service.

Slingshot的獨特亮點在於所謂的短暫信息傳送機制，即要求接受圖片的其他用戶必須先回應發送者。如果不迴應，接收者就無法打開原始圖片，只能看到像素化的圖片僅此而已。這個功能可確保用戶雙方交流互動，而不只是簡單地接收別人的圖片。當然，隨着Slingshot用戶數量的不斷增加，這項功能也符合Facebook自身的利益需求。

“With Slingshot, we wanted to build something where everybody is a creator and nobody is just a spectator,” Facebook said in a blog post introducing the new product. “When everyone participates, there’s less pressure, more creativity and even the little things in life can turn into awesome shared experiences. This is what Slingshot is all about.”

“每個人都是創作者，沒有人是旁觀者，我們希望藉助Slingshot來構築這樣的氛圍，”Facebook在一篇介紹這一新產品的博客文章中這樣寫道。“當每個人都參與其中時，壓力就會減輕，創意就會越來越多，甚至生活中微不足道的小事也能轉化爲令人驚歎的分享體驗。這就是Slingshot的全部意義所在。”

The Slingshot crew even took the time to mention (read: take a swipe at) Snapchat in its introductory message: “We’ve enjoyed using Snapchat to send each other ephemeral messages and expect there to be a variety of apps that explore this new way of sharing.” But Facebook feels it can take the game up a notch. “With Slingshot, we saw an opportunity to create something new and different: a space where you can share everyday moments with lots of people at once,” the post said.

Slingshot的開發人員甚至煞費苦心地在介紹信息中提到（實質上是抨擊）了Snapchat：“我們欣賞利用Snapchat來彼此發送短暫信息的做法，我們期望未來能出現各種各樣探索這種全新分享方式的類似應用。”但Facebook認爲Slingshot可 以將這場競爭遊戲提升一個檔次。“有了Slingshot，我們等於看到了創造出與衆不同全新交際空間的機遇。在這個空間中，大家可以與很多人即時分享每一天的精彩瞬間，”Facebook在博文中這樣寫到。

Users can also send videos from a smartphone camera, add a message commenting on a photo, or draw an image in response.

Slingshot用戶也可以發送智能手機拍攝的視頻，還可以在照片上添加評論信息或者以繪圖的形式進行回覆。

Facebook FB 1.86% had offered to buy Snapchat for $3 billion last year, but the company’s young founders rejected an acquisition. It seemed like an astounding decision at the time considering Snapchat had no revenue. But Facebook didn’t get angry it decided to try to get even. Some may even consider Slingshot to be a kind of Snapchat 2.0 or Snapchat clone.

去年，Facebook 曾出價30億美元，希望收購Snapchat，但這家公司年輕的創始人們拒絕了這個收購提議。鑑於Snapchat並無任何收益來源，因此當時的決定非常出人意料。但Facebook並沒有動怒它決意嘗試以實際行動來報復，於是Slingshot便應運而生。有些人甚至認爲Slingshot就是Snapchat的2.0版或複製版。

The new app joins a cast of others already owned by Facebook including the chatting app Messenger and Instagram, a popular photo and video service. Facebook also recently acquired the messaging service WhatsApp for $19 billion.

除了Slingshot之外，Facebook旗下的應用陣營還包括聊天應用Messenger以及大受歡迎的照片和視頻服務應用Instagram。最近，Facebook又以190億美元的價格收購了通訊服務應用WhatsApp。

Facebook’s success with Slingshot is hardly assured considering it has failed in the past to make much headway in the messaging space. Last month, it shut down a Snapchatlike app called Poke a year after its release.

考慮到Facebook在信息傳遞領域的大力開拓上曾有過失敗的經歷，因此現在我們還很難說Facebook推出的Slingshot一定能取得成功。就在上個月，Facebook纔剛下架了去年才發佈的類Snapchat應用Poke。