評論
打印
Buzzfeed and online news
Buzzfeed與在線新聞
Which media company are you?
你是哪種媒體公司？
How a young company plans to take on the news Leviathans
一家年輕的公司該如何計劃成為新聞業霸主
WHEN Arianna Huffington sold her online-news firm for $315m in 2011, people gawked at the price tag. Now BuzzFeed, a hipper digital news firm co-founded by Jonah Peretti, a Huffington Post alumnus, has one-upped her. On August 10th Andreessen Horowitz, a venture-capital firm, said it was investing $50m in BuzzFeed, reportedly valuing the eight-year-old website at $850m, half the market value of the New York Times.
當Arianna Huffington在2011年以3.15億美元的價格賣掉她的在線新聞公司時，人們被這個價簽驚呆了。如今，BuzzFeed—家由赫芬頓郵報員工Jonah Peretti聯合創立的新潮的數字新聞公司，比她更勝一籌。8月10日，一家風險投資公司Andreessen Horowitz稱其正拿出5000萬美元對BuzzFeed公司進行投資，據報道，成立八年的BuzzFeed網站的估價為8.5億美元，約為紐約時報市值的一半。
Perhaps the investment is not so extraordinary. According to comScore, a research firm, BuzzFeed had around 75m unique visitors in June—more than the websites of the Times and other bigdailies. It makes money through “sponsored content”—which often looks remarkably and deliberately like a normal article, but is commissioned by advertisers. “Which Barbie Doll Are You?” was one of Buzzfeed's quizzes earlier this year . It was paid for by Mattel, Barbie's maker.
或許這一投資并非如此令人意外。根據一家研究公司comScore的數據，BuzzFeed 在6月擁有約7500萬獨立訪問者，這個數字超過了時報等其他大型日報網站的獨立訪問量。它通過發布“贊助內容”來賺錢，這些“贊助內容”通常很引人注目且看起來很像普通的文章，但是實際上是由廣告方委托發布的。BuzzFeed 今年年初的一個調查問卷—“你是哪種芭比娃娃？”就是由芭比娃娃的制造商—美泰花錢委托發布的。
BuzzFeed is only one of several new-media firms making headlines. Others include Business Insider, Quartz and Vice. These firms know how to present stories slickly on screens and to create a buzz for their wares on social media.
在這些新型媒體公司中，BuzzFeed 是唯一一家上頭條的。這些新型媒體公司還包括Business Insider， Quartz 和Vice。這些公司熟知如何將故事巧妙的呈現在屏幕上，并在社交媒體上為其商品制造話題。
It'sSilicon Valley. They say we're toast
這里是硅谷。他們說：我們完蛋了。
It is rare for venture capitalists to invest in the news business, especially at a time when many owners of newspapers are selling them, from Gannett (publisher of USA Today) to Tribune Company (the Los Angeles Times). Perhaps Silicon Valley has so much cash that money is flooding all the way toNew York. But venture capitalists also seem to see an opportunity for new firms in a business mostly controlled by veterans.
風險投資者鮮少投資新聞業，尤其是在這個眾多報業擁有者紛紛出售其報紙產業的時期，從Gannett報業集團到論壇報業集團。
Surprisingly, BuzzFeed is starting to look a bit like an old-media organisation itself. It plans to hire more journalists, opening outposts around the world this year. But Mr Peretti does not see any tension. “What you see in the history of media is that companies start out doing small, lower-cost ways of content and then move up the chain,” he says. BuzzFeed could yet go from producing “listicles” to listing on the stockmarket. But it still needs to answer the question, “Which Media Company Are You?”
令人驚奇的是，BuzzFeed正開始看起來有點像一家傳統媒體機構。它計劃今年雇傭更多的記者，在全世界部署前哨。但Peretti先生沒有感到任何壓力。他說“你們在媒體歷史中看到的是媒體公司一開始使用低檔的低成本的方法從事媒體工作以及隨后升級產業鏈”。 BuzzFeed 還能通過開發listicles功能進而使公司上市。但是“你是哪種媒體公司？”—這個問題依然需要解答。
