令人不安的角色 警惕亚马逊的垄断力量

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

巨型在线零售商亚马逊()力量太强大了，而且它运用这种力量时，对美国造成了伤害。

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.

当然，我也知道这样说有点唐突，我只是想把中心思想直截了当地提出来，因为谈论亚马逊的时候，人们往往会纠结于次要问题。

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，批评这家公司的人有时候会把它描绘成即将掌控整个经济的巨兽。这样的说法未免过于夸张——亚马逊都没有在整体上主导在线销售，更别说整体上主导零售业了，它可能永远都不会主导零售业。但那又怎样？亚马逊还是在扮演一个令人不安的角色。

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.

与此同时，替亚马逊辩护的人，常常会离题万里地赞颂在线卖书（这对许多美国人来说的确是好事），或者称赞亚马逊的客户服务——如果你好奇的话，我可以回答你，我的确有亚马逊的Prime账户，而且经常用。但话又说回来，这又怎样？问题并不在于新技术是不是好事，甚至不是亚马逊对技术的有效运用是不是好事。毕竟，约翰·D·洛克菲勒(John D. Rockefeller)和他的商业伙伴经营石油生意也很在行，但是标准石油(Standard Oil)拥有的力量仍然太强了，公众采取行动制约这种力量也是至关重要的。

And the same is true of Amazon today.

同样的说法今天对亚马逊也是成立的。

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.

如果你没有关注最近亚马逊的新闻，我来介绍一下：今年5月，亚马逊和大型出版社阿歇特(Hachette)之间公开爆发了一场纠纷，并演变成了商业大战。亚马逊要求从阿歇特销售图书的收入中抽取更多分成，阿歇特不愿意提高抽成，于是亚马逊开始干扰这家出版社的销售。亚马逊网站并没有完全禁止销售阿歇特的图书，而是开始拖延配送、提高价格，甚至还会把顾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.

你或许想说，这只是做生意，和标准石油被拆分之前的做法没什么区别——拒绝通过不愿向该公司给予优惠折扣的铁路输送石油。可是重点当然也是这个：我们这个国家当时决定，有些商业行为太过头了，于是“强盗大亨”(robber baron)的时代结束了。现在的问题是，我们愿不愿意撤销那个决定。

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.

亚马逊真的有“强盗大亨”似的市场控制力吗？谈到书，它的确有。亚马逊压倒性地控制了在线图书销售，市场份额与标准石油在1911年被拆分前，在精炼石油产品市场上的份额相当。即使参考总体的图书销量，亚马逊也能以极大的优势占据头把交椅。

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.

目前亚马逊还没有尝试压榨消费者。实际上，它为了强化主导地位，一直在系统性地保持低价。它所做的实际上是利用市场地位挤压出版商，即压低自己为买书付出的价钱，于是就有了与阿歇特的冲突。用经济学术语说，亚马逊并没有，至少现在还没有，像典型的垄断企业那样运作，即卖家利用市场控制力来提高价格。但它的确是一个垄断买方——有能力压低价格的占据主导地位的买家。

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.

而在这一方面，它的力量的确强大，实际上比其市场份额数字所显示的还要强大。图书销售在很大程度上依赖于公众的关注和谈论，正因为如此，出版方才会让作者疲于奔命地参加活动推介新书。你买书是因为听说过这本书，因为其他人在读，因为它成了议论的话题，因为它登上了畅销榜。而亚马逊所拥有的，就是扼杀公众关注效应的实力。多花一些精力，肯定可以买到你听说过，但亚马逊不卖的书。但如果亚马逊不卖那本书，你听说那本书的可能性本身就会小很多。

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

那么，我们能信任亚马逊不会滥用这种影响力吗？阿歇特出版社的纠纷已经解答了这个问题：不，我们不能。

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.

并不只是钱的问题，尽管钱是一个重要的问题：通过挤压出版商，亚马逊最终会伤害作者和读者，但还有影响力过度的问题。

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.

可以明确地说，亚马逊对阿歇特图书施加的惩罚本身就很恶劣，然而执行这种惩罚的方式却有一种有趣的选择性。上个月，《纽约时报》的Bits博客记录了两本阿歇特的书受到不同对待的情形。一本是丹尼尔·舒曼(Daniel Schulman)的《威奇托之子》(Sons of Wichita)，书中讲述了科赫(Koch)兄弟的故事；另一本是保罗·瑞安(Paul Ryan)撰写的《前进之路》(The Way Forward)，瑞安是米特·罗姆尼(Mitt Romney)竞选总统时的搭档，也是众议院预算委员会(House Budget Committee)主席。亚马逊表示，两本书都享受亚马逊Prime服务，瑞安的书可以享受通常的免费两日配送。《威奇托之子》呢？周日时显示“通常需要2至3周送达”。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.

于是这又把我们带回了关键的问题。别告诉我亚马逊为消费者提供了他们想要的，也别说什么它现在的地位是辛苦赚来的。重点在于，它的力量是不是太强了，它有没有在滥用这种力量。这两个问题的答案都是肯定的。