社交媒體還有救嗎？

I don’t need to tell you that something is wrong with social media.

用不著告訴你社交媒體出了什么問題。

You’ve probably experienced it yourself. Maybe it’s the way you feel while scrolling through your Twitter feed — anxious, twitchy, a little world weary — or your unease when you see a child watching YouTube videos, knowing she’s just a few algorithmic nudges away from a rabbit hole filled with lunatic conspiracies and gore. Or maybe it was this month’s Facebook privacy scandal, which reminded you that you’ve entrusted the most intimate parts of your digital life to a profit-maximizing surveillance machine.

你自己很可能也經(jīng)歷過。這也許是你刷Twitter時的感覺——焦慮不安、有點(diǎn)厭世;也許是你看見一個孩子在看YouTube視頻時的不安，你知道她距離充滿瘋狂陰謀和血腥的兔子洞僅有幾個算法之遙;也許是本月Facebook的隱私丑聞，它在提醒你，你把自己數(shù)字生活中最私密的部分托付給了一個追求利潤最大化的監(jiān)視機(jī)器。

Our growing discomfort with our largest social platforms is reflected in polls. One recently conducted by Axios and SurveyMonkey found that all three of the major social media companies — Facebook, Twitter and Google, which shares a parent company with YouTube — are significantly less popular with Americans than they were five months ago. (And Americans might be the lucky ones. Outside the United States, social media is fueling real-world violence and empowering autocrats, often with much less oversight.)

民意調(diào)查表明，我們對最大的幾家社交平臺感到日益不滿。Axios和SurveyMonkey前不久的一項(xiàng)調(diào)查發(fā)現(xiàn)，與五個月前相比，三家主要社交媒體公司——Facebook、Twitter和谷歌(它與YouTube隸屬于同一個母公司)——在美國的受歡迎程度明顯下降(美國人可能是幸運(yùn)的。在美國以外的地方，社交媒體助長現(xiàn)實(shí)世界中的暴力，賦予獨(dú)裁者們權(quán)力，通常受到的監(jiān)管更少)。

But it would be a mistake to throw up our hands and assume that it has to be this way. The original dream of social media — producing healthy discussions, unlocking new forms of creativity, connecting people to others with similar interests — shouldn’t be discarded because of the failures of the current market leaders. And lots of important things still happen on even the most flawed networks. The West Virginia teachers’ strike and last weekend’s March for Our Lives, for example, were largely organized on Facebook and Twitter.

但如果我們攤攤手，認(rèn)為這是無可奈何的事，那就錯了。社交媒體最初的夢想是制造健康的討論，釋放新的創(chuàng)意形式，把興趣相似的人聯(lián)系起來，這一切不應(yīng)該因?yàn)楫?dāng)前市場上領(lǐng)先企業(yè)的失敗而被拋棄。甚至在缺陷最多的網(wǎng)絡(luò)上，仍有很多重要的事情在發(fā)生。例如西弗吉尼亞州的教師罷工，以及上周末的“為我們的生命游行”(March for Our Lives)，它們主要是在Facebook和Twitter上組織起來的。

The primary problem with today’s social networks is that they’re already too big, and are trapped inside a market-based system that forces them to keep growing. Facebook can’t stop monetizing our personal data for the same reason that Starbucks can’t stop selling coffee — it’s the heart of the enterprise.

當(dāng)今社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)的主要問題是，它們已經(jīng)太過龐大，被困在一個以市場導(dǎo)向的體系中，被迫繼續(xù)擴(kuò)張。Facebook無法停止將我們的個人數(shù)據(jù)變現(xiàn)，就像星巴克無法停止銷售咖啡一樣——它是這個企業(yè)的核心。

Here are three possible ways to rescue social media from the market-based pressures that got us here.

市場壓力已把我們帶到如此境地，下面有三個辦法，或許能將社交媒體從中解救出來。

Give Power to the People

把權(quán)力交給人民

In their book “New Power,” which comes out next week, Jeremy Heimans and Henry Timms write about the struggle between centralized, top-down institutions, which represent “old power,” and decentralized, bottom-up movements, which represent “new power.”

杰里米·海曼斯(Jeremy Heimans)和亨利·蒂姆斯(Henry Timms)在他們將于下周出版的《新勢力》(New Power)一書中提到了集中的、自上而下的機(jī)構(gòu)所代表的“舊勢力”與分散的、自下而上的運(yùn)動所代表的“新勢力”之間的斗爭。

Facebook, they write, is an example of a new power institution that serves old power interests. It harvests the creative output of billions of people and turns it into a giant, centralized enterprise, with most users sharing none of the economic value they create and getting no say in the platform’s governance.

他們寫道，F(xiàn)acebook就是一個為舊勢力服務(wù)的新勢力機(jī)構(gòu)。它收獲了數(shù)十億人的創(chuàng)造性成果，把它變成了一個集中的巨大企業(yè)，但大多數(shù)用戶并沒有獲得自己創(chuàng)造的經(jīng)濟(jì)價值所產(chǎn)生的任何利益，對這個平臺的治理沒有任何發(fā)言權(quán)。

Instead, the authors ask, what if a social network was truly run by its users?

這兩位作者問道，如果一個社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)實(shí)質(zhì)上由其用戶來運(yùn)營又會如何呢?

“If you’re contributing economic value to something of this much social consequence, you should share in the value you’re creating,” Heimans told me.

“如果你為產(chǎn)生如此龐大社會影響力的東西貢獻(xiàn)了經(jīng)濟(jì)價值，那么你應(yīng)該分享你創(chuàng)造的價值所產(chǎn)生的利益，”海曼斯在接受我采訪時說。

Nathan Schneider, a professor of media studies at the University of Colorado, had a similar idea in 2016, when he proposed that Twitter users band together to buy the platform from its shareholders and convert it into a user-run collective, similar to the way a local credit union is run. People who made valuable contributions to the network, such as employees and power users, would receive bigger stakes and more voting power. And users would have a seat at the table for major decisions about the platform’s operations.

科羅拉多大學(xué)(University of Colorado)的媒體研究教授內(nèi)森·施奈德(Nathan Schneider)在2016年也有過類似的想法，他建議Twitter用戶聯(lián)合起來，從股東手中買下該平臺，把它轉(zhuǎn)化為用戶運(yùn)營的集體企業(yè)，類似于地方信貸協(xié)會。那些對該網(wǎng)絡(luò)做出巨大貢獻(xiàn)的人，例如員工和有影響力的用戶，將獲得更大的利益和更多的投票權(quán)。用戶將對該平臺運(yùn)營的重大決策擁有發(fā)言權(quán)。

Create a Social Federation

建立一個社交聯(lián)盟

Another radical approach would be to make social networks work more like email — so that independent apps could seamlessly work together with one another, across a common protocol.

另一個激進(jìn)的辦法是讓社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)變得更像電子郵件，這樣獨(dú)立的應(yīng)用之間就可以通過共同的協(xié)議無縫連接。

Instead of one big Facebook, a federated social network would look like clusters of independent nodes — Mombook and Athletebook and Gamerbook — all of which could be plugged into the umbrella network when it made sense. Rather than requiring a one-size-fits-all set of policies that apply to billions of users, these nodes could be designed to reflect users’ priorities. (A network for privacy hawks and one for open-sharing maximalists could have different data-retention rules, and a network for LGBT users and one for evangelical pastors could have different hate speech rules.) If a node became too toxic, it could be removed without shutting down the entire network.

加入聯(lián)盟后的社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)不是一個大的Facebook。它可能看上去像是聚在一起的獨(dú)立節(jié)點(diǎn)——Mombook、Athletebook和Gamerbook——所有這些都可以在合適的時候接入這個綜合網(wǎng)絡(luò)。這些節(jié)點(diǎn)不必?fù)碛幸惶走m用于數(shù)十億用戶的一刀切政策，它們的設(shè)計可能就反映了用戶的重點(diǎn)。(面向主張保護(hù)隱私的網(wǎng)絡(luò)和極力支持公開分享用戶的網(wǎng)絡(luò)可能有不同的在數(shù)據(jù)保留規(guī)則;面向 LGBT用戶的網(wǎng)絡(luò)和面向福音派牧師的網(wǎng)絡(luò)可能有不同的仇恨言論規(guī)則。)如果一個節(jié)點(diǎn)的不良影響太大，可將其移除，而不用關(guān)閉整個網(wǎng)絡(luò)。

“Email is the most resilient social network on the internet,” Schneider said, “and the thing that allows it to adapt is that it’s an open protocol, and people build apps on top of it, and we evolve how we use it.”

“電子郵件是互聯(lián)網(wǎng)上適應(yīng)能力最強(qiáng)的社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)，”施耐德說，“它是一個開放協(xié)議，人們在它的基礎(chǔ)上開發(fā)應(yīng)用程序，所以它能夠適應(yīng)各種環(huán)境，而我們也逐步形成了使用它的方式。”

Versions of this kind of network already exist. Mastodon, a decentralized Twitter-like social network, has gotten more than 140,000 registered users since its debut in 2016. And various social networks based on the blockchain — the ledger system that underlies virtual currencies like bitcoin — have sprung up in recent months.

這樣的網(wǎng)絡(luò)已經(jīng)存在了。類似于Twitter的去中心化社交網(wǎng)站Mastodon自2016年首次亮相以來，已經(jīng)吸引了超過14萬注冊用戶。最近幾個月，基于區(qū)塊鏈(一種賬目系統(tǒng)，是比特幣等虛擬貨幣的基礎(chǔ))的各種社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)如雨后春筍般涌現(xiàn)。

Put Expiration Dates on Social Graphs

為社交圖譜設(shè)置有效期

A single friend of mine once remarked that the major difference among dating apps like OKCupid, Tinder and Bumble wasn’t the way they were designed or the companies behind them — it was how long they had existed.

我的一個朋友曾經(jīng)說過，像OKCupid、Tinder和Bumble這樣的交友應(yīng)用之間的最大區(qū)別不是它們的設(shè)計方式，也不是它們背后的公司，而是它們存在了多長時間。

New apps, she said, were more likely to attract interesting and smart people who were actually looking for dates. Older apps, by contrast, were eventually overrun with creeps and predators, no matter how well built they were.

她說，新應(yīng)用更有可能吸引到那些有趣、聰明、真的想交友的人。相比之下，舊應(yīng)用最終會被討厭鬼和掠食者淹沒，不管它們設(shè)計得有多好。

A similar theory might apply to social networks. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram and Snapchat all had plenty of issues in their early years, but they were by and large cleaner, with fewer types of exploitation and malicious behavior. Today, the enormous size and influence of these platforms have made them irresistible honey pots for bad actors, and many of our “social graphs” — Facebook’s term for the webs of digital connections we create — are clogged with years’ worth of clutter.

類似的理論可能也適用于社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)。 Facebook, Twitter、YouTube、Instagram和Snapchat早期都有很多問題，但它們總的來說都更干凈，利用和惡意行為的類型更少。如今，這些平臺巨大的規(guī)模和影響力讓它們成了壞家伙無法抗拒的蜜罐，我們的很多“社交圖譜”——Facebook創(chuàng)造的術(shù)語，指的是我們創(chuàng)建的數(shù)字連接網(wǎng)絡(luò)——充斥著多年積累的雜亂。

In a blog post last year, venture capitalist Hunter Walk proposed an interesting idea: a legally mandated “start over” button that, when pressed, would allow users of social networks to delete all their data, clear out their feeds and friend lists, and begin with a fresh account.

在去年的一篇博客文章中，風(fēng)險投資人亨特·沃克(Hunter Walk)提出了一個有趣的主意：設(shè)置一個法律授權(quán)的“從頭開始”按鈕，按下這個按鈕時，社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)的用戶可刪除自己的所有數(shù)據(jù)，清空消息和好友列表，從一個全新的賬戶開始。

I’d go even further, and suggest that social networks give their users an automatic “self-cleaning” option, which would regularly clear their profiles of apps they no longer used, friendships and followers they no longer interacted with, and data they no longer needed to store. If these tools were enabled, users would need to take affirmative action if they didn’t want their information to disappear after a certain number of months or years.

我想再進(jìn)一步，建議社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)給用戶提供自動“自我清理”的選項(xiàng)。這項(xiàng)功能會定期清理用戶不再使用的應(yīng)用上的個人資料，不再互動的朋友和粉絲，以及不再需要存儲的數(shù)據(jù)。這些工具被啟用后，如果用戶不希望自己的信息在若干個月或若干年后消失，就必須主動采取行動。

Making social graphs temporary, rather than preserving them forever by default, would undoubtedly be bad for most social networks’ business models. But it could create new and healthy norms around privacy and data hygiene, and it would keep problems from piling up as networks get older and more crowded. It might even recapture some of the magic of the original social networks, when things were fresh and fascinating, and not quite so scary.

讓社交圖譜變成暫時的，而不是默認(rèn)的永久保存，這種做法無疑對大部分社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)的商業(yè)模式都不利。但它可以形成新的、健康的隱私和數(shù)據(jù)衛(wèi)生規(guī)范;在社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)變舊、變擁擠的過程中防止問題堆積。它甚至還能重新帶回社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)創(chuàng)立之初的一些魔力，那個時候，一切都還新鮮迷人，沒有這么可怕。