Stop me if you've heard this one before: An untested social media company with no revenue gets a mind-blowing offer. Against all advice, the cocky, twentysomething CEO refuses to sell. Meanwhile, competitors come out of the woodwork with lawsuits claiming their ideas were ripped off.
如果您以前听过这句话，那就当我没说：一家未经考验，没有任何收入的社交媒体公司获得一个令人晕眩的的报价。不顾所有人的建议，那位自命不凡，二十出头的CEO拒绝出售。与此同时，不知从哪儿冒出来的竞争对手突然发起诉讼，言之凿凿地声称他们的创意被窃取了。
The parallels between Snapchat, the upstart "sexting" service, and social media behemoth Facebook (FB) in its early days are uncanny. We all know how well Zuckerberg's long bet paid off (not to mention how thoroughly he vanquished those dastardly Winklevoss twins). Could Snapchat's future be just as bright?
迅速崛起的“色情短信”服务商Snapchat与早期的社交媒体巨头Facebook具有令人不可思议的相似性。我们现在都知道扎克伯格早早就投下的赌注获得了多大的成功（更不必说他还彻底击败了卑劣的文克莱沃斯孪生兄弟）。那么，Snapchat能否拥有同样光明的未来？
Here's a look into social media's crystal ball for 2014. Will Snapchat catch fire? Will those annoying Promoted Tweets keep invading your Twitter stream? Will your boss finally learn to tweet? These five trends are poised to shake up the industry and the way we use social media in 2014:
现在，我们来预测一下社交媒体领域在2014年将发生哪些事情。Snapchat会火起来吗？哪些烦人的“推广消息”(Promoted Tweets)会不会持续不断地入侵你的Twitter信息流？你的老板是否将终于学会如何使用Twitter？这五大趋势有望撼动社交网络世界，以及我们在2014年使用社交媒体的方式：
The rise of ephemeral social networks
“阅后即焚”社交网络的兴起
Regardless of whether or not you think Snapchat is worth the $3 billion Facebook offered it, one thing is clear: There's an appetite out there for so-called ephemeral networks, where content literally vanishes seconds after being received. And, contrary to popular perception, this isn't just about sexting and X-rated selfies (though it definitely is about that, too). As content on the major networks becomes more corporate and commoditized, Snapchat and services like it restore some of the fun and spontaneity to social media. Just like a real-life interaction -- where ideas flow freely and you generally don't worry about everything being recorded for posterity and broadcast to the world -- SnapChat and networks like it offer a channel for genuine, unfiltered exchange. And the kids really like it. While Facebook's own CFO officially acknowledged last month that teen use of his network is declining, the number of teens on SnapChat -- at least anecdotally -- is exploding.
无论你是否认为Snapchat配得上Facebook开出的30亿美元报价，有一点确定无疑：所谓的“阅后即焚”（内容被接收数秒后自动消失）社交网络拥有广阔的市场应用空间。此外，与流行的看法相反，Snapchat传播的内容不仅仅是色情短信和限制级的自拍照片，尽管它也的确是传播这类信息的最佳平台。随着主流社交平台的内容变得越来越商品化，以Snapchat为代表的“阅后即焚”平台在某种程度上重新恢复了社交媒体本应具备的趣味性和自发性。就像现实生活中的互动交流一样——创意自由流动，一般不用担心一切事情都被记录下来留给子孙后代观瞻，传遍整个世界——SnapChat提供了一个真实的、未经过滤的交流渠道。孩子们真的很喜欢它。Facebook公司自己的首席财务官上个月已正式承认，青少年使用Facebook的次数正在下降.而据坊间传言，驻足于Snapchat的青少年数量正在呈爆炸式增长。
Learn to tweet. Your boss expects it
你的老板有望学会使用Twitter
You know the old guy who's been at the company forever and still can't figure out email? If you don't get up to speed on social media in 2014, you'll be that guy. Compared to last year, there are 13 times as many jobs advertised on Indeed.com that mention the use of social media. "We are seeing an increased demand for social savvy candidates across the business -- from human resources to product to customer service, " Amy Crow, Indeed's communication director told Quartz earlier this year. Not only are departments like marketing, sales, and customer service expected to be on Twitter (TWTR) and Facebook, teams as diverse as R&D, logistics, and HR are increasingly using internal networks like Yammer to streamline operations. Social media has grown so critical to the workplace, in fact, that major universities are beginning to offer certificate programs for socially inept corporate types to get up to speed.
你肯定知道，那个似乎永远都待在公司的老家伙现在依然不会使用电子邮件。到了2014年，如果你跟不上社交媒体的新潮流，你就跟那个老家伙没什么两样。今年发布于招聘信息搜索引擎Indeed.com的招聘广告，提及社交媒体使用技能的是去年的13倍。Indeed公司传讯总监艾米?克劳今年初接受数字经济新闻网Quartz采访时说：“从人力资源到产品开发，再到客户服务，企业各个部门对精通社交媒体的求职者的需求正在急剧增加。”预计将出现在Twitter和Facebook上的不仅仅是市场、销售和客服等部门，研发、物流和人力资源等差异巨大的团队也越来越多地使用Yammer等内部网络以简化操作流程。事实上，社交媒体已经发展为职场技能的重要一环，就连各大高校现在也纷纷面向不善社交的企业开设认证项目，帮助它们适应日新月异的社交媒体世界。
Social customer service kills the dreaded phone tree
社交客服将杀死可怕的电话树
The ability of customers to air their dirty laundry to the world via Twitter and Facebook has already changed the customer service game. A 2012 Nielsen survey shows more than half of all customers now turn to social media for redress; meanwhile, some 81% of Twitter users expect a same-day response to questions and complaints. But this fall, things got even more interesting: On Sept. 2, British Airways passenger Hasan Syed spent an estimated $1,000 to purchase several promoted Tweets blasting the company for losing luggage. With paid social media now in customers' arsenal, 2014 may mark the beginning of the end of abysmal customer service at major airlines, credit card companies, banks, and other repeat offenders, characterized by endless phone wait times and those automated "phone trees" (i.e., "Press 1 for English, 2 for Spanish, 3 to waste your entire afternoon on hold ...").
客户通过Twitter 和Faceboo向世界传播“糟糕经历”的能力已经改变了客服世界的生态。尼尔森公司(Nielsen)2012年的一项调查显示，超过一半的客户现在通过社交媒体寻求补救措施；与此同时，在Twitter上提出问题或抱怨后，大约81%的用户提出当天就能获得回应。但在今年秋天，事情变得更加有趣：9月2日，英国航空公司(British Airways)乘客赛义德?哈桑斥资大约1,000美元，购买了几条“推广消息”，猛烈抨击这家航空公司弄丢了他的行李。鉴于有偿社交媒体推广现已成为客户的新武器，从2014年开始，各大航空公司、信用卡公司、银行和其他累犯提供的糟糕透顶的客户服务或将走向终结。无穷无尽的电话等待时间和那些自动化的“电话树”（比如，“英语服务请按1，西班牙语服务请按2，您整整一个下午都需要等候接听请按3”）或许将被扔入历史的垃圾桶。
Social media finds you as you browse
社交网络内容将出现在谷歌搜索结果页面
From the beginning, social networks have been effectively walled off from the Internet. The treasure trove of content on Facebook, for instance, doesn't generally show up on Google (GOOG). But does it have to be that way? Wouldn't it be convenient to see Twitter search results automatically displayed alongside a standard Google search, for example? And why, for instance, don't the latest tweets about a restaurant pop up when you're searching Yelp (YELP)? The competing interests of different networks sends this content behind proprietary walls, but a number of tools offer creative ways to bridge the gulf. (Full disclosure: My company has developed one such tool.)
从一开始，社交网络就被有效地隔离在互联网之外。比如，Facebook的海量内容通常不会显示在谷歌( Google )搜索结果之中。但是否非得是这种情形？比方说，Twitter搜索结果自动出现在一个标准的谷歌搜索显示页面，岂不是更方便？再比如，当你搜索Yelp时，为什么关于某家餐厅的最新Twitter消息没有显现出来呢？由于利益相悖，不同社交网络往往把各自的内容封锁在专利保护墙之内，但也有不少工具致力于创造性地弥合这道鸿沟。需要说明的是，本文作者的公司已经开发出了这样一种工具。
Get ready to see ads from the neighborhood pub on Twitter
准备接收附近酒吧发布的微博广告吧
Native social media ads -- the ones that appear right in your Twitter and Facebook streams -- exploded in 2013. Love 'em or hate 'em, they're only getting bigger in 2014. This year, expect some significant, if slightly creepy, advances in location-specific targeting. Twitter, for instance, just unveiled a feature enabling paid Tweets to be targeted by zip code. You walk into a neighborhood, for instance, and suddenly Promoted Tweets for the local watering hole, dry cleaner, and McDonald's (MCD) pop up in your Twitter stream. This kind of "geo-fencing," which Facebook has had since 2011, enables businesses to court nearby customers who might actually want to get ads offering special deals, in-store specials, etc. The upside: more relevant ads and promos you can actually use. The downside: more ads.
本地社交媒体广告，即那些恰好出现在你的Twitter和Facebook信息流之中的广告，在2013年爆炸式增长。2014年，无论你爱也好，恨也罢，这类广告的规模只会变得越来越大。，尽管听起来有点让人毛骨悚然，但特定位置定位技术预计将在来年出现显著改进。Twitter刚刚推出了一项面向特定邮政编码区域发送有偿消息的功能。比如，当你走进一个社区，当地酒吧、干洗店和麦当劳(McDonald's)发布的“推广消息”就会突然闪现在你的Twitter信息流之中。自2011年来，Facebook一直在采用这种“地理围栏”技术。它能够让商家招揽临近的客户，这些客户实际上可能也想获得提供特别优惠和特价商品的广告信息。好处是，你可以获得更多相关的广告和推销信息。缺点同样是，更多的广告。