【朝花夕拾】-【经济学人】每日打卡-Europe takes o

节选自【经济学人】 April, 2019

Europe takes on the tech giants

翻译练习：青澄青果

【朝花夕拾】-【经济学人】每日打卡-Europe takes on the tech giants

America has seen itself as the land of the new-and Europe as a continent stuck in the past. Yet if you want to understand where the world's most powerful industry is heading, look not to Washington and California, but to Brussels and Berlin. In an inversion of the rule of thumb, while America dithers the European Union is acting. Europe could soon pass new digital copyright laws. And the EU is pioneering a distinct tech doctrine that aims to give individuals control over their own information and the profits from it, and to prise open tech firms to competition. IF the doctrine works, it could benefit millions of users, boost the economy and constrain tech giants that have gathered immense power without a commensurate sense of responsibility.

美国一直自视为新大陆而视欧洲为沉湎过去的大陆。不过要想了解全球最有影响力的科技行业的发展方向，目光不能只停留于华盛顿和加利福尼亚，而是要放远看看布鲁塞尔和柏林在干什么。让人大跌眼镜的是在美国还犹豫不决时欧洲已经开始动手了。欧洲很快会通过数字版权保护法。而且也率先制定保护个人信息及收益权规则，迫使科技企业直面竞争。如果规则奏效，将使用户受益、拉动经济同时制约那些手中拥有巨大权力却拒绝承担相应责任的科技寡头。

【朝花夕拾】-【经济学人】每日打卡-Europe takes on the tech giants

Western regulators have had showdowns over antitrust with tech firms before, but today's giants are accused not just of capturing huge rents and stifling competition, but also of worse sins, such as destabilising democracy and abusing individual rights. As AI takes off, demand for information is exploding, making data a new and valuable resource. Yet vital questions remain:who controls the data? How should the profits be distributed?

虽然西方立法者多次与科技寡头展开反垄断的较量，如今对它的指控不仅是攫取利益、遏制竞争那么简单，而是更为严重的诸如破坏民主践踏人权的恶劣行径。人工智能大行其道，对于信息的需求大增，使得数据成为新的有价值的资源。关键的问题是：谁有权控制数据？数据产生的效益如何分配？

【朝花夕拾】-【经济学人】每日打卡-Europe takes on the tech giants

A key part of Europe's approach is deciding what not to do. For now it has dismissed the option of capping tech firm's profits and regulating them like utilities, which would make them stodgy, permanent monopolies. It has also rejected break-ups:thanks to network effects, one of the Facebabies or Googlettes might simply become dominant again. Instead the Eu's doctrine marries two approaches. One draws on its member's cultures, which, for all their differences, tend to protect individual privacy. The other uses the EU's legal powers to boost competition.

欧洲的解决方法是先确定哪些为不可为。迄今已经否决了像管理公用事业单位那样管理公司和对其盈利进行控制的方法，因为这可能导致公司运营平庸化或者仍然保持其垄断寡头地位。欧洲也放弃了拆分法，基于互联网的作用，一个被拆分出来的“脸书孩”或者"小谷歌“可能会迅速成长为另外一个寡头。欧洲代之以采取了另外两种方法。一是借助于各个成员国的文化（虽有不同）注重保护个人用户隐私权的特点。另外一个手段是利用法律的手段来促进竞争。

The first leads to the assertion that you have sovereignty over data about you: you should have the right to access them, amend them and determine who can use them. This is the essence of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), whose principles are already being copied by many countries across the world. The next step is to allow inter-operability between services, so that users can easily switch between provider, shifting to firms that offer better financial terms or treat customers more ethically.

通过第一个手段可以确立个人用户对于个人信息的主权地位，只有用户个人有权利接触、修改和决定谁来使用的问题。这也是【通用数据保护条例】的实质，其原则已经为全球众多国家所接受并复制。下一步是不同服务之间转换的可操作性问题，用户可以自由选择，选择那些收费更合理或者更遵守商业道德准则的供应商。

【朝花夕拾】-【经济学人】每日打卡-Europe takes on the tech giants

Europe's second principle is that firms cannot lock out competition. That means equal treatment for rivals who use their platform. The EU has blocked Google from competing unfairly with shopping sites that appear in its search results or with rival browsers that use its Android operating system. Germany has changed its laws to stop tech giants buying up scores of startups that might one day pose  a threat.

欧洲的第二个准则是任何公司不能排除市场竞争。这意味着对于使用其平台的竞争者也要一视同仁。欧盟因此禁止了谷歌所采取的一系列不正当竞争手段，诸如其针对出现在搜索结果里的网上销售网址以及借助于谷歌安卓操作系统的浏览器竞争者所采取的不当竞争行为。德国已经修改了法律，禁止科技巨头大量收购未来可能威胁其业务的新兴企业。

Europe's approach offers a new vision, in which consumers control their privacy and how their data are monetised. The result should be an economy in which consumers are king and information and power are dispersed. It would be less cosy for the tech giants. The European approach has risks. It may prove hard to achieve true inter-operability between firms. So far, GDPR has proved clunky. The open flow of data should not cut across the concern for privacy. The other big risks is that Europe's approach is not adopted elsewhere, and the continent becomes a tech Galapagos, cut off from the mainstream.

欧洲的方法带来了新的视角，消费者可以掌控个人信息的隐私性以及决定如何运用个人数据盈利。随之而来的经济模式是消费者为王，信息和受益由消费者和运营商进行分配。对于科技巨头来说日子就不那么好过了。同时欧洲的方法也有其风险。一者是在不同供应商之间切换的可操作性。目前来看，【通用数据保护条例】的执行反馈不尽理想。开放的数据信息不应该凌驾于信息隐私权保护之上。另外一个风险是世界其他国家和地区未必采取同样的措施，欧洲大陆可能会成为与主流世界隔绝的孤岛。

【朝花夕拾】-【经济学人】每日打卡-Europe takes on the tech giants