中国左右社交媒体4巨头未来
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现在请大家畅想一下未来，未来你有可能真的能够“戳一下”你的Facebook好友（这话略恶心），Twitter有可能将成为大规模紧急事件时的信息发布工具（这个很酷），而人们在登陆Google+的时候不用再担心：“大家开始用Google+了吗？”（好吧，我们实在是忍不住要吐槽一下。但是我们真的在用Google+，所以你可以把我们拉到你的圈子里。） 如果你觉得这些情形有些牵强的话，那么或许你考虑得还不够长远。目前的几大社交网络无论是通过大型收购，或是小步快走地提升服务品质，总之都是在以每周、每天甚至是每小时的速度改良自己的产品。《财富》杂志邀请一些专家畅谈了他们眼中的几大社交网络五到十年后会变成什么样子，他们的回答惊人地现实。 3月25日，Facebook宣布将以20亿美元收购Oculus VR公司，这个消息如果不是全年最大的新闻，至少也是当月最大的新闻，它让社交媒体界着实又火了一把。同时这笔交易标志着Facebook的产品路线图将出现重大转折，很多权威人士都在猜测，Facebook会不会借此在社交网络和虚拟现实技术之间搞某种“跨界”。 纽约社交出版平台RebelMouse公司的创始人兼CEO保罗•贝利指出：“这笔收购表明，Facebook有意通过收购‘下一个重大成果’来保持竞争优势。”贝利认为，通过收购，Facebook未来将成为像维亚康姆集团（Viacom）或赫斯特集团（Hearst）这样同时持有多个品牌的公司。他还说：“我发现，Faceobook正在利用自己的市值为像Instagram或WhatsApp这种收购来的品牌创造更大的市值。在这一点上，它比其他公司做得都好。” 但是从内部来看，Facebook可能会由于多个目标相互竞争而重新分裂整合。波特兰的Little Bird公司是一家提供社交影响力分析和研究的机构，该公司技术总监迈克尔•琼斯指出：“Facebook以前要比现在有乐趣得多，也理想主义得多。现在他们上市了，所以这个公司面临着需要快速增长和赚钱的巨大压力。”琼斯认为，Facebook的这种“大分裂”可能会持续好几年，公司的一半将会朝着产生收益的方向发展，另一半则继续追逐Facebook原本的真人参与、连接世界的理念。 阿拉巴马州伯明翰市的Sterne Agee公司的股票研究总经理阿尔温德•巴哈蒂亚指出，Facebook收购Oculus RV公司后，可能同时有助于实现增加收入和连接世界这两个目标。巴哈蒂蒂亚认为，Facebook五年内将会在广告市场上攫取一块更大的蛋糕，它的图形搜索业务也会增长得更大，而且在电子商务领域也会占据更多地盘。再加上WhatsApp和Instagram这些附属网络，Facebook将有能力运行自己的平台，而不是“寄居”在Android或iOS平台上。 巴哈蒂亚认为：“他们在移动平台上是一支被忽视的力量，他们希望成为下一个Android，而唯一能实现这个目标的方法就是要从零做起，所以这就是为什么他们要整合虚拟现实技术。” Google+ Facebook收购Oculus VR这一手似乎是从谷歌那里学来的，谷歌在今年一月以３２亿美元的价格收购了智能家居制造商Nest Labs公司。因此，目前看来，这两家公司已经陷入了一场技术冷战。虽然在这场战争中最吸引人眼球的是各种硬件，但也不要忽略了这两个网络本身的交锋。 贝利认为，虽然Google+很可能活不到五年或十年以后——至少是在Google+这个名字下，但是它的用户群还会继续依赖与这个网络有关的其它谷歌工具。他指出：“由于这一点，谷歌拥有了最重要的社交网络。而它最活跃的工具就是Gmail。”另外随着Android的日益成熟，谷歌的Hangouts、Talk和Voice等工具也将变得越来越重要。“与现在的水平相比，他们无疑将变成一头巨兽。” 琼斯也对Google+的前景感到乐观，他认为Google+在未来五到十年内将达到临界点——不管到那时它是否还叫Google+或是换成其它什么名字。琼斯说：“迄今为止，从一个品牌的角度看，Google+可以说是一座鬼城。我看过了很多用户参与度的指标，现在还没人能破解Google+的秘密。”不过他也没有忘了谷歌的应用和服务，他表示谷歌的YouTube、Drive、日历和Gmail等应用是让很多用户留在Google+的关键因素——尤其是随着谷歌收集的数据越来越多，从情绪分析、搜索到智能分析电子邮件和预约几乎无所不能，这些应用也将越来越重要。 |
Imagine a future where you'll be able to physically reach out to poke your Facebook friends (gross), where tweets are the de facto mode of communication for large-scale emergencies (cool), and where people log into Google Plus for more than just wondering, "Are people using Google Plus yet?" (Okay, okay, we couldn't help ourselves with that one -- but really, we actually are, so put us in your circles already.) If those scenarios seem far-fetched, perhaps you're thinking too near-term. Whether it's through major acquisitions or seemingly minor service enhancements, the major social networks are making changes to their products on a weekly, daily, even hourly basis. Fortune asked a few experts to daydream about where these networks might be five and 10 years down the line. Their responses were surprisingly realistic. Breaking the biggest news of the month, if not the year, Facebook (FB) set the social scene ablaze with its March 25 acquisition of Oculus VR, valued at approximately $2 billion. A sharp turn in Facebook's product road map, the purchase has pundits imagining all sorts of crossovers for the social network and virtual reality technology. "The Oculus purchase further shows how Facebook will be obsessed with staying relevant by buying the next big thing," says Paul Berry, founder and CEO of New York City-based social publishing platform RebelMouse. Through this and other acquisitions, Berry thinks Facebook will become a brand-holding company in the future, similar to Viacom or Hearst. "I see them, better than anyone else, using their market capitalization to create even bigger market cap for the Instagrams or WhatsApps," he says. But internally, Facebook may split over dueling objectives, says Michael Jones, CTO of Portland, Ore.-based Little Bird, a company that provides social influencer analytics and research. "[Facebook] used to be a lot more fun and idealistic, and now that they're public, there is extreme pressure upon that organization to grow up quickly and to monetize," he says. This "great divide" will continue on for years, as half of the company drives toward generating revenue while the rest pursues the founding ideals of authentic engagement and connecting the world. But both the connections and revenue may come as a result of the Oculus purchase, says Arvind Bhatia, managing director of equity research for Birmingham, Ala.-based Sterne Agee. In five years, Bhatia expects Facebook to grab a much larger piece of the advertising market, graph search to become bigger, and the company to make more inroads in e-commerce. Then, with its ancillary networks like WhatsApp and Instagram, Facebook will be able to run its own platform, rather than operate through Android and iOS. "They are being bypassed on the mobile platform," Bhatia says. "They want to be the next Android, and so the only way to do that was to start from scratch, and that's what they're doing with this virtual reality technology." Google Plus Facebook's Oculus acquisition seems like a page out of Google's (GOOG) book, similar to the search giant's purchase of Nest Labs for $3.2 billion in January. As a result, it appears the two companies are now in a tech-fueled cold war. And even though the hardware is getting all the headlines in this fight, don't overlook the networks themselves as battle's front lines. While Google Plus may not survive the next five or 10 years -- at least not under that name -- its user base will live on in the tools connected to the network, Berry argues. "Because of this, Google has the most important social network, and the most active one in Gmail," he says, adding that Hangouts, the former Talk, and Voice will be even more important as Android matures. "They will become absolute monsters, compared to what they are now." Likewise, Jones is optimistic, saying Google Plus will reach its tipping point in the next five or 10 years -- whether it's under the same moniker or not. "Thus far, from a brand perspective, it's been a ghost town," he says. "I've seen a lot of metrics about engagement, [but] nobody has cracked the code over Google Plus." But he doesn't take Google's apps and services for granted either, citing YouTube, Drive, Calendar, and Gmail as keys to making the social network relevant -- especially with Mountain View's ever-growing collection of data -- from sentiment and search to insights from e-mail and appointment mining. |
