标题翻译：因其巨额财富和巨大权利,科技巨头亿万富豪上热搜
Extraordinary hearing will see some of the richest men in history called to account for their firms’ market dominance
不同寻常听证目睹史上一些最富有人,要求对其公司垄断做出解释
some of the richest men in history representing the most valuable companies ever created will be grilled by Congress on Wednesday , as US authorities get increasingly serious about whether tech giants Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Alphabet have become too powerful.
随着美国政府日益严肃看待美国科技巨头亚马逊、苹果、脸书、Alphabet是否太强大,周三,国会会质问史上最富有人，他们代表史上创造的具有价值的公司。
The extraordinary hearing will see Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Apple’s Tim Cook, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg and Google owner Alphabet’s Sundar Pichai called to account for the market dominance of their companies – dominance that many say was achieved through anti-competitive business practices.
听证会会看到亚马逊的Jeff Bezons,苹果Tim cook,脸书Mark Zuckerberg和Google母公司Sundar Pichai,要求他们对他们公司市场主导地位做出说明--许多人说他们的市场主导地位是通过不正当竞争企业手段取得的。
When the US House judiciary committee gavels into order its upcoming antitrust hearing the four star witnesses will represent more than $275bn in combined personal net worth – and more than $4.8tn in market value.
美国众议院司法委员会下令即将举行反托拉斯听证会.四家明星出席人代表着个人净值加到一起超过2750亿美金— 市场价值超过48000亿美金。
Wednesday’s hearing follows more than a year of investigation by the House antitrust subcommittee, whose chair, representative David Cicilline, began a broad inquiry into the market power of the tech giants after the Democrats retook control of the House in 2018.
周三听证会,国会反托拉斯委员会已经做了1年多调查,主席David Cicilline做为代表,对科技巨头市场垄断做了大量询问.2018年民主党重新获得国会控制。
The House investigation, along with separate moves by the Federal Trade Commission and justice department, represents the first time that federal regulators have taken a hard look at the tech industry since the Microsoft case in the 1990s. Over the intervening decades, a new generation of tech behemoths have come to dominate even more aspects of the economy with little if any scrutiny from regulators in the US.
国会调查和联邦贸易会员会和司法部门的独立行动表明国家管理机构对科技行业严格调查,这是自1990年微软案件后的首次。在几十年中,新一代科技巨头已经主导经济很多方面。
The issues at question are complex and important; the questioning at congressional hearings often is not. When Pichai last testified before the House, one congressman asked him a question about his granddaughter’s iPhone, giving Pichai a chance to point out that, dominant as Google may be, it is not responsible for Apple products.
争议问题是复杂和重要的.国会听证会上质疑往往不是这样的.在Pichai在国会前最后列出证据的时候,一位国会议员问了一个关于她孙女苹果手机的问题,Pichai有机会讲话,像google一样处于主导地位,这不是苹果产品的问题。
Here’s a preview of some questions these titans of technology should face on Wednesday:
预览这些科技巨头在周三应该面临的一些问题。
Jeff Bezos, Amazon
亚马逊 Jeff Bezos
Amazon is not only the largest retailer in the world, but the largest cloud computing company as well. The company has grown even larger by running a marketplace where third-party companies can sell their products, for a fee. Many critics argue that Amazon should not be allowed to both run the marketplace and compete within it, comparing the situation to Amazon being both player and referee – an unfair advantage over the other team. Why should it be allowed to maintain this advantage?
亚马逊不仅是世界最大的零售商,也是最大的云技术公司.该公司经营免费让第三方公司在他们搭建的市场商售卖产品.许多批评员认为应该不让亚马逊即经营市场又内部竞争,把这个状况比做亚马逊即是玩家又是裁判。对其他团队来讲,是不公平优势。为什么让他拥有这个优势？
For years, third-party sellers that use Amazon’s marketplace have suspected that Amazon uses sales data to launch competing products under its own private labels. Last year, an Amazon executive testified under oath that Amazon does not do this; but in April, the Wall Street Journal reported that it was “standard operating practice”. Did Amazon’s executive lie?
数年来,使用Amazon的第三方卖家怀疑亚马逊利用销售数据,用他们自己的私有标签发布竞品。去年,一位Amazon高管宣誓作证亚马逊没有这样做.但是在4月,华尔街日报报道这是正常运营操作.亚马逊高管撒谎了？
Amazon is a provider of cloud computing services, and some of its customers are also its competitors. Does it ever use data from its cloud customers to inform decisions about competing products?
亚马逊是一家云技术服务提供商,而且它的一些客户也是它的竞争对手.它不曾使用它的云客户数据为制造竞品做决策吗？
Amazon is also an investor. Has Amazon ever used its role as a startup investor to inform the development of competing products?
亚马逊也是一位投资公司.亚马逊曾经用它初创投资人的角色为开发竞品提供信息吗？
The coronavirus pandemic has led to a surge in demand, driving Amazon’s business to near peak holiday season levels. Have Amazon executives discussed taking advantage of the pandemic to move into new markets or extend its dominance of existing markets?
信管病毒引发需求激增,驱使Amazon业务接近圣诞节水平高峰。亚马逊高管讨论利用病毒机会进入新市场或者扩大现存市场主导性。
Tim Cook, Apple
There are 900m iPhone users in the world, and the only way they can download apps to their phones is through the App Store, which Apple controls. Apple gets to decide which apps can be in the store, and takes a substantial cut of their sales. How does that gatekeeping affect consumers?
全世界9亿手机用户,他们下载APP到他们手机的唯一方式是通过APP商店,是App控制的。苹果判定哪个APP可以进入商店和从他们销售额中大量抽出。这个守门员是如何影响客户的？
Apple has repeatedly copied features from third-party apps, incorporating them into its operating system and rendering them obsolete. Why should that practice continue to be allowed?
苹果公司反复模仿第三方APP功能,整合到它的操作系统里边和展现出他们过时的.为什么这中行为继续被允许？
Last month, the developers behind the email app Hey went public with a chilling complaint: that Apple was requiring it to use its in-app payment tools – and fork over a 30% commission – or the app would be booted from the App Store. Why does Apple deserve such a large cut of other companies’ revenues?
上一个月,Hey邮件APP的开发者公开犀利指责：苹果公司要求它使用他们APP内支付工具支付30%的佣金,否则这个APP被踢出APP商店.为什么苹果值得从其他公司收入中巨大抽成。
Sundar Pichai, Google
Google had $162bn in revenues last year, but that number hardly captures its dominance in products such as maps, email, web browsing and more. It all stems from the first product, search: Google handles more than 90% of all search queries worldwide. How is this a healthy competitive market?
Google去年营收1620亿美金,但是这个数字很难说明它在地图,邮件,web流量器等产品中的主导地位.一切源于第一产品,搜索：google处理全世界所有搜索查询超过90%。这怎么会是一个健康的竞争市场？
Google’s dominance in search gives it unprecedented power to shape the information that reaches billions of people around the world. And Google has at times struggled to ensure that that information is of high quality. How does the company plan to improve search results? And should a single company have that much power in defining what the world gets to read?
Google的搜索地位让她拥有了绝无仅有的力量,塑造全世界数10亿人接触到的信息。并且Google有时很难确保信息是高质量的.公司打算怎么提高收索结构？应该让一个公司这么大的力量,决定世界看到的什么信息？
Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook
For a time, the number of people using Facebook was larger than any other category of humans on Earth other than followers of Christianity; then Facebook grew even bigger. In recent years, Facebook has acquired Instagram, WhatsApp, Onavo, Oculus, CrowdTangle and Giphy. It tried to acquire SnapChat, then copied its most popular feature. It recently launched copycat versions of rivals Houseparty and TikTok. Is there a rival social media app that has gained popularity in recent years that it did not either acquire or copy?
有段时间,使用Facebook的人数比地球上任何其他一类人群数量都多,除了基督教信徒,然后Facebook生长的更大。最近今年,Facebook收购Instagram，whats app，Onava,Oculus，crowdtangle和Giphy，它试图收购Snap chat，然后仿制它的最受欢迎的功能.它最近发布了纺织品,类似竞争对手Housseparty和TikTok。有一个竞争对手社交媒体APP在近年流行,它没有收购或者仿制的吗？
On 26 June, amid a growing ad boycott over Facebook’s failure to curb hate speech, Zuckerberg reassured employees that “all these advertisers will be back on the platform soon enough”. What made him so confident that advertisers would have no choice but to return to the platform, whether or not it fixed the hate speech problem?
六月26日,越来越多广告商抵制,因Facebook没能抑制仇恨言论。Zuckerberg让员工放心,所有广告商会很快重返平台。是什么让他如次自信广告主别无选择直能重返平台,它是否已经纠正仇恨言论问题？
Facebook has responded to criticism of its record on hate by pointing to the vast amount of content published every day claiming that it automatically deletes nearly 90% of hate speech before anyone flags it. If Facebook is too big to prevent its product from being used to incite genocide and mob violence, isn’t it too big to exist?
Facebook回应了仇恨言论破纪录的批判,它指出每天大量内容发表,称在还没有标记的时候,自动删除了仇恨言论将近90%。
原文:www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/jul/28/bezos-zuckerberg-us-tech-billions (英译汉素材）
