Post-Medium Publishing
September 2009 Publishers of all types, from news to music, are unhappy that consumers won't pay for content anymore.
2009 年 9 月 从新闻到音乐的各种类型的出版商都对消费者不再为内容付费感到不满。
At least, that's how they see it.
至少，他们是这么看的。
In fact consumers never really were paying for content, and publishers weren't really selling it either.
事实上，消费者从来没有真正为内容付费，出版商也没有真正销售内容。
If the content was what they were selling, why has the price of books or music or movies always depended mostly on the format?
如果内容就是他们销售的内容，为什么书籍、音乐或电影的价格总是主要取决于格式？
Why didn't better content cost more?
为什么更好的内容不花更多的钱？
[ 1 ] A copy of Time costs $5 for 58 pages, or 8.6 cents a page.
[ 1 ] 一本 58 页的《时代》杂志售价 5 美元，即每页 8.6 美分。
The Economist costs $7 for 86 pages, or 8.1 cents a page.
《经济学人》86 页售价 7 美元，即每页 8.1 美分。
Better journalism is actually slightly cheaper.
更好的新闻实际上要便宜一些。
Almost every form of publishing has been organized as if the medium was what they were selling, and the content was irrelevant.
几乎所有形式的出版都被组织起来，就好像媒介就是他们所销售的东西，而内容是无关紧要的。
Book publishers, for example, set prices based on the cost of producing and distributing books.
例如，图书出版商根据图书的生产和发行成本来定价。
They treat the words printed in the book
他们对待书上印的字
the same way a textile manufacturer treats the patterns printed on its fabrics.
就像纺织品制造商处理印在其织物上的图案一样。
Economically, the print media are in the business of marking up paper.
从经济上讲，印刷媒体从事的是对纸张进行标记的业务。
We can all imagine an old-style editor getting a scoop and saying "this will sell a lot of papers!" Cross out that final S and you're describing their business model.
我们都可以想象一位老式编辑得到独家新闻并说“这会卖很多论文！”划掉最后一个 S，你就描述了他们的商业模式。
The reason they make less money now is that people don't need as much paper.
他们现在赚的钱减少的原因是人们不再需要那么多的纸张。
A few months ago I ran into a friend in a cafe.
几个月前，我在一家咖啡馆遇到了一位朋友。
I had a copy of
我有一份副本
the New York Times , which I still occasionally buy on weekends.
《纽约时报》，周末我仍然偶尔购买。
As I was leaving I offered it to him, as I've done countless times before in the same situation.
当我离开时，我把它送给了他，就像我以前在同样的情况下做过无数次一样。
But this time something new happened.
但这一次发生了新的事情。
I felt that sheepish feeling you get when you offer someone something worthless.
当你向某人提供毫无价值的东西时，我感受到了那种羞涩的感觉。
"Do you, er, want a printout of yesterday's news?" I asked.
“呃，你想打印昨天的新闻吗？”我问。
(He didn't.) Now that the medium is evaporating, publishers have nothing left
（他没有。）现在媒体正在消失，出版商已经一无所有
to sell.
出售。
Some seem to think they're going to sell content—that they were always in the content business, really.
有些人似乎认为他们要出售内容——他们实际上一直从事内容业务。
But they weren't, and it's unclear whether anyone could be.
但他们没有，而且还不清楚是否有人可以。
Selling There have always been people in the business of selling information, but that has historically been a distinct business from publishing.
销售 一直有人从事销售信息业务，但从历史上看，这一直是与出版截然不同的业务。
And the business of selling information to consumers has always been a marginal one.
而向消费者出售信息的业务一直是边缘业务。
When I was a kid there were people who used
当我还是个孩子的时候，有人用
to sell newsletters containing stock tips, printed on colored paper that made them hard for the copiers of the day to reproduce.
出售包含股票提示的新闻通讯，这些新闻通讯印在彩色纸上，使当时的复印者难以复制。
That is a different world, both culturally and economically, from the one publishers currently inhabit.
无论是在文化上还是在经济上，这都是一个与出版商目前所处的世界不同的世界。
People will pay for information they think they can make money from.
人们愿意为他们认为可以从中赚钱的信息付费。
That's why they paid for those stock tip newsletters, and why companies pay now for Bloomberg terminals and Economist Intelligence
这就是为什么他们为这些股票提示新闻通讯付费，以及为什么公司现在为彭博终端和经济学人智库付费
Unit reports.
单位汇报。
But will people pay for information otherwise?
但人们会为信息付费吗？
History offers little encouragement.
历史并没有提供多少鼓励。
If audiences were willing to pay more for better content, why wasn't anyone already selling it to them?
如果观众愿意为更好的内容支付更多费用，为什么没有人将其出售给他们呢？
There was no reason you couldn't have done that in the era of physical media.
在物理媒体时代，你没有理由不能做到这一点。
So were the print media and the music labels simply overlooking this opportunity?
那么印刷媒体和唱片公司是否只是忽视了这个机会呢？
Or is it, rather, nonexistent?
或者说，它根本不存在？
What about iTunes?
iTunes 怎么样？
Doesn't that show people will pay for content?
这难道不表明人们会为内容付费吗？
Well, not really.
嗯，不是真的。
iTunes is more of a tollbooth than a store.
iTunes 与其说是一家商店，不如说是一个收费站。
Apple controls the default path onto the iPod.
Apple 控制 iPod 的默认路径。
They offer a convenient list of songs, and whenever you choose one they ding your credit card for a small amount, just below the threshold of attention.
他们提供了一份方便的歌曲列表，每当你选择一首歌曲时，他们就会从你的信用卡上收取一小笔费用，刚好低于关注的门槛。
Basically, iTunes makes money by taxing people, not selling them stuff.
基本上，iTunes 通过向人们征税而不是向他们出售东西来赚钱。
You can only do that if you own the channel, and even then you don't make much from it, because a toll has to be ignorable to
只有当你拥有该频道时，你才能做到这一点，即使如此，你也不会从中赚到太多钱，因为通行费必须是可以忽略不计的。
work.
工作。
Once a toll becomes painful, people start to find ways around it, and that's pretty easy with digital content.
一旦通行费变得痛苦，人们就会开始寻找解决方法，而这对于数字内容来说非常容易。
The situation is much the same with digital books.
数字图书的情况与此大致相同。
Whoever controls the device sets the terms.
谁控制了设备，谁就制定了条款。
It's in their interest for content to be as cheap as possible, and since they own the channel, there's a lot they can do to drive prices down.
让内容尽可能便宜符合他们的利益，而且由于他们拥有频道，因此他们可以采取很多措施来降低价格。
Prices will fall even further once writers realize they don't need publishers.
一旦作家意识到他们不需要出版商，价格就会进一步下跌。
Getting a book
得到一本书
printed and distributed is a daunting prospect for a writer, but most can upload a file.
对于作家来说，印刷和分发是一个令人畏惧的前景，但大多数人都可以上传文件。
Is software a counterexample?
软件是反例吗？
People pay a lot for desktop software, and that's just information.
人们为桌面软件付出了很多代价，但这只是信息。
True, but I don't think publishers can learn much from software.
确实如此，但我认为出版商不能从软件中学到很多东西。
Software companies can charge a lot because (a) many of the customers are businesses, who get in trouble if they use pirated versions, and (b) though in form merely
软件公司可以收取很高的费用，因为（a）许多客户都是企业，如果他们使用盗版版本，他们就会遇到麻烦；（b）尽管只是形式上的
information, software is treated by both maker and purchaser as a different type of thing from a song or an article.
信息，软件被制造者和购买者视为与歌曲或文章不同类型的事物。
A Photoshop user needs Photoshop in a way that no one needs a particular song or article.
Photoshop 用户需要 Photoshop，就像没有人需要特定的歌曲或文章一样。
That's why there's a separate word, "content," for information that's not software.
这就是为什么有一个单独的词“内容”来表示非软件信息。
Software is a different business.
软件是一个不同的行业。
Software and content blur together in some of the most lightweight software,
在一些最轻量级的软件中，软件和内容模糊在一起，
like casual games.
比如休闲游戏。
But those are usually free.
但这些通常是免费的。
To make money the way software companies do, publishers would have to become software companies, and being publishers gives them no particular head start in that domain.
为了像软件公司那样赚钱，发行商必须成为软件公司，而作为发行商，他们在该领域并没有什么特别的领先优势。
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