令人不安的角色 警惕亞馬遜的壟斷力量

, the giant online retailer, has too much power, and it uses that power in ways that hurt America.

巨型在線零售商亞馬遜()力量太強大了，而且它運用這種力量時，對美國造成了傷害。

O.K., I know that was kind of abrupt. But I wanted to get the central point out there right away, because discussions of Amazon tend, all too often, to get lost in side issues.

當然，我也知道這樣說有點唐突，我只是想把中心思想直截了當地提出來，因爲談論亞馬遜的時候，人們往往會糾結於次要問題。

For example, critics of the company sometimes portray it as a monster about to take over the whole economy. Such claims are over the top — Amazon doesn’t dominate overall online sales, let alone retailing as a whole, and probably never will. But so what? Amazon is still playing a troubling role.

比如，批評這家公司的人有時候會把它描繪成即將掌控整個經濟的巨獸。這樣的說法未免過於誇張——亞馬遜都沒有在整體上主導在線銷售，更別說整體上主導零售業了，它可能永遠都不會主導零售業。但那又怎樣？亞馬遜還是在扮演一個令人不安的角色。

Meanwhile, Amazon’s defenders often digress into paeans to online bookselling, which has indeed been a good thing for many Americans, or testimonials to Amazon customer service — and in case you’re wondering, yes, I have Amazon Prime and use it a lot. But again, so what? The desirability of new technology, or even Amazon’s effective use of that technology, is not the issue. After all, John D. Rockefeller and his associates were pretty good at the oil business, too — but Standard Oil nonetheless had too much power, and public action to curb that power was essential.

與此同時，替亞馬遜辯護的人，常常會離題萬里地讚頌在線賣書（這對許多美國人來說的確是好事），或者稱讚亞馬遜的客戶服務——如果你好奇的話，我可以回答你，我的確有亞馬遜的Prime賬戶，而且經常用。但話又說回來，這又怎樣？問題並不在於新技術是不是好事，甚至不是亞馬遜對技術的有效運用是不是好事。畢竟，約翰·D·洛克菲勒(John D. Rockefeller)和他的商業夥伴經營石油生意也很在行，但是標準石油(Standard Oil)擁有的力量仍然太強了，公衆採取行動制約這種力量也是至關重要的。

And the same is true of Amazon today.

同樣的說法今天對亞馬遜也是成立的。

If you haven’t been following the recent Amazon news: Back in May a dispute between Amazon and Hachette, a major publishing house, broke out into open commercial warfare. Amazon had been demanding a larger cut of the price of Hachette books it sells; when Hachette balked, Amazon began disrupting the publisher’s sales. Hachette books weren’t banned outright from Amazon’s site, but Amazon began delaying their delivery, raising their prices, and/or steering customers to other publishers.

如果你沒有關注最近亞馬遜的新聞，我來介紹一下：今年5月，亞馬遜和大型出版社阿歇特(Hachette)之間公開爆發了一場糾紛，並演變成了商業大戰。亞馬遜要求從阿歇特銷售圖書的收入中抽取更多分成，阿歇特不願意提高抽成，於是亞馬遜開始干擾這家出版社的銷售。亞馬遜網站並沒有完全禁止銷售阿歇特的圖書，而是開始拖延配送、提高價格，甚至還會把顧客引向其他的出版商。

You might be tempted to say that this is just business — no different from Standard Oil, back in the days before it was broken up, refusing to ship oil via railroads that refused to grant it special discounts. But that is, of course, the point: The robber baron era ended when we as a nation decided that some business tactics were out of line. And the question is whether we want to go back on that decision.

你或許想說，這只是做生意，和標準石油被拆分之前的做法沒什麼區別——拒絕通過不願向該公司給予優惠折扣的鐵路輸送石油。可是重點當然也是這個：我們這個國家當時決定，有些商業行爲太過頭了，於是“強盜大亨”(robber baron)的時代結束了。現在的問題是，我們願不願意撤銷那個決定。

Does Amazon really have robber-baron-type market power? When it comes to books, definitely. Amazon overwhelmingly dominates online book sales, with a market share comparable to Standard Oil’s share of the refined oil market when it was broken up in 1911. Even if you look at total book sales, Amazon is by far the largest player.

亞馬遜真的有“強盜大亨”似的市場控制力嗎？談到書，它的確有。亞馬遜壓倒性地控制了在線圖書銷售，市場份額與標準石油在1911年被拆分前，在精煉石油產品市場上的份額相當。即使參考總體的圖書銷量，亞馬遜也能以極大的優勢佔據頭把交椅。

So far Amazon has not tried to exploit consumers. In fact, it has systematically kept prices low, to reinforce its dominance. What it has done, instead, is use its market power to put a squeeze on publishers, in effect driving down the prices it pays for books — hence the fight with Hachette. In economics jargon, Amazon is not, at least so far, acting like a monopolist, a dominant seller with the power to raise prices. Instead, it is acting as a monopsonist, a dominant buyer with the power to push prices down.

目前亞馬遜還沒有嘗試壓榨消費者。實際上，它爲了強化主導地位，一直在系統性地保持低價。它所做的實際上是利用市場地位擠壓出版商，即壓低自己爲買書付出的價錢，於是就有了與阿歇特的衝突。用經濟學術語說，亞馬遜並沒有，至少現在還沒有，像典型的壟斷企業那樣運作，即賣家利用市場控制力來提高價格。但它的確是一個壟斷買方——有能力壓低價格的佔據主導地位的買家。

And on that front its power is really immense — in fact, even greater than the market share numbers indicate. Book sales depend crucially on buzz and word of mouth (which is why authors are often sent on grueling book tours); you buy a book because you’ve heard about it, because other people are reading it, because it’s a topic of conversation, because it’s made the best-seller list. And what Amazon possesses is the power to kill the buzz. It’s definitely possible, with some extra effort, to buy a book you’ve heard about even if Amazon doesn’t carry it — but if Amazon doesn’t carry that book, you’re much less likely to hear about it in the first place.

而在這一方面，它的力量的確強大，實際上比其市場份額數字所顯示的還要強大。圖書銷售在很大程度上依賴於公衆的關注和談論，正因爲如此，出版方纔會讓作者疲於奔命地參加活動推介新書。你買書是因爲聽說過這本書，因爲其他人在讀，因爲它成了議論的話題，因爲它登上了暢銷榜。而亞馬遜所擁有的，就是扼殺公衆關注效應的實力。多花一些精力，肯定可以買到你聽說過，但亞馬遜不賣的書。但如果亞馬遜不賣那本書，你聽說那本書的可能性本身就會小很多。

So can we trust Amazon not to abuse that power? The Hachette dispute has settled that question: no, we can’t.

那麼，我們能信任亞馬遜不會濫用這種影響力嗎？阿歇特出版社的糾紛已經解答了這個問題：不，我們不能。

It’s not just about the money, although that’s important: By putting the squeeze on publishers, Amazon is ultimately hurting authors and readers. But there’s also the question of undue influence.

並不只是錢的問題，儘管錢是一個重要的問題：通過擠壓出版商，亞馬遜最終會傷害作者和讀者，但還有影響力過度的問題。

Specifically, the penalty Amazon is imposing on Hachette books is bad in itself, but there’s also a curious selectivity in the way that penalty has been applied. Last month the Times’s Bits blog documented the case of two Hachette books receiving very different treatment. One is Daniel Schulman’s “Sons of Wichita,” a profile of the Koch brothers; the other is “The Way Forward,” by Paul Ryan, who was Mitt Romney’s running mate and is chairman of the House Budget Committee. Both are listed as eligible for Amazon Prime, and for Mr. Ryan’s book Amazon offers the usual free two-day delivery. What about “Sons of Wichita”? As of Sunday, it “usually ships in 2 to 3 weeks.” Uh-huh.

可以明確地說，亞馬遜對阿歇特圖書施加的懲罰本身就很惡劣，然而執行這種懲罰的方式卻有一種有趣的選擇性。上個月，《紐約時報》的Bits博客記錄了兩本阿歇特的書受到不同對待的情形。一本是丹尼爾·舒曼(Daniel Schulman)的《威奇托之子》(Sons of Wichita)，書中講述了科赫(Koch)兄弟的故事；另一本是保羅·瑞安(Paul Ryan)撰寫的《前進之路》(The Way Forward)，瑞安是米特·羅姆尼(Mitt Romney)競選總統時的搭檔，也是衆議院預算委員會(House Budget Committee)主席。亞馬遜表示，兩本書都享受亞馬遜Prime服務，瑞安的書可以享受通常的免費兩日配送。《威奇托之子》呢？週日時顯示“通常需要2至3周送達”。呵呵。

Which brings us back to the key question. Don’t tell me that Amazon is giving consumers what they want, or that it has earned its position. What matters is whether it has too much power, and is abusing that power. Well, it does, and it is.

於是這又把我們帶回了關鍵的問題。別告訴我亞馬遜爲消費者提供了他們想要的，也別說什麼它現在的地位是辛苦賺來的。重點在於，它的力量是不是太強了，它有沒有在濫用這種力量。這兩個問題的答案都是肯定的。