数据终端业务和媒体业务矛盾重重：彭博社必须找到新出路

    你也许觉得Bloomberg的日子非常惬意——无论是彭博社，还是其同名创始人迈克尔•布隆伯格。前者是一家年营收额高达90亿美元的数据和媒体公司，它拥有的人力和财力足以让其他媒体公司嫉妒得发抖，后者则是备受尊敬的纽约市前市长，一位名副其实的巨头级人物。然而，尽管彭博社获得了成功，但公司内部却遭遇了认同危机，这是其创始人最终需要应对的难题。

    美国政治新闻网Politico最近发表的一篇文章，概述了这种认同危机的某些层面，比如，自布隆伯格回归这家媒体巨头之后，许多重量级人物相继离职。前任CEO丹•多克托洛夫欣然放弃他的职务，将其让给了这位被他称作“神”的创始人。而传奇作品《彭博之道》(Bloomberg Way)的创作者马特•温克勒也选择离开。这本书是专门面向该公司最重要的终端业务撰写的，是一本类似于信徒教条的新闻采编手册。

    不过彭博社内部的紧张局势与任何员工都没有关系，甚至与那个名字写在彭博社大楼上的人也没有关系。尽管这家公司规模庞大、实力雄厚，但它面临的最大挑战与其他媒体没有多大区别：核心业务正在失去生机，其主要原因是来自互联网的竞争，所以彭博社必须设法完成业务转型。而时间所剩无几。

    传统观点认为，庞大的彭博社数据终端业务堪称一株摇钱树，其地位稳如泰山，大多数经纪人和基金经理宁愿放弃他们的长子，也不愿放弃彭博终端。每台终端的价格是一年2万美元，而彭博有超过32万台终端。不过随着廉价甚至免费的商业数据来源持续涌现，这一优势开始减弱。而从社交层面上看，数据终端通过公司内部通讯系统提供的内容也面临着来自Slack和Twitter等媒体的压力。

    作为回应，彭博社耗费了大量资金来开展免费的网络业务，并特意招募著名经理人助其一臂之力，比如Atlantic Media的贾斯丁•史密斯和乔什•泰兰基尔。该公司还斥巨资引进人才来撰写《彭博商业周刊》、彭博视角（Bloomberg View）和其他产品。不过正如Politico的文章所指出的那样，这一切也造成了新员工之间的紧张感，其中许多人并不遵从“彭博之道”和老员工的指导。

    “在这样一家过于看重秩序和稳定的公司，不和的苗头开始滋生：新闻社和《彭博商业周刊》之间矛盾重重，不过更明显也更重大的分歧出现在立足数据的终端新闻和布隆伯格本人特别推崇的高品位内容之间。事实证明，彭博社的双重目标——通过为终端提供数据来赚取数十亿美金收入，以及为更广泛的世界创造重要的新闻作品——并不总是符合多克托洛夫设想的‘良性循环’。它们有时候会产生矛盾。”

    彭博社内部还有大量守旧派——实际上，彭博内部什么都很多。他们不仅有大批专门写证券市场消息的记者，还有许多只报道证券市场某一特定方面的记者。彭博社有超过2400名编辑，他们针对某些特定话题的编辑团队，比Business Insider等网站的所有采编人员加起来还多。根据一名华盛顿特区分部的员工泄露的备忘录，彭博社就像商业新闻领域的BBC，公司内部充满了牢骚。

    长远来看，彭博社最大的困境与其竞争对手路透社没有多大不同。路透社一直在经受煎熬，它面临的压力更大，因为其数据业务不如彭博社那么赚钱。路透社也试图依托网络建立媒体运营平台，花费了数百万美元招聘作者和编辑，投资了数千万美元购买新的内容系统——然后新上任的首席执行官停止了该项业务，声称其回报不足以收回当初的投资。

    You might think it would be easy being Bloomberg—either the company or its eponymous founder, Michael Bloomberg. The former is a $9-billion data and media business that has enough staff and money to make every other media company vibrate with envy, while the latter is the well-respected former mayor of New York City and a mogul in every sense of the word. But there is an identity crisis festering at the heart of the company, despite its success, and that’s something its founder will eventually have to deal with.

    A recent article by Politico outlines some of the aspects of this identity crisis, including some of the significant departures that have taken place at the media giant since Bloomberg returned. Former CEO Dan Doctoroff willingly gave up his spot to the man he refers to as “God,” and Matt Winkler—the architect of the legendary “Bloomberg Way,” a cult-like approach to journalism designed for the all-important terminal business—also headed for the exit.

    But the tension at the heart of Bloomberg doesn’t really have anything to do with personnel, and it may not even have anything to do ultimately with the man whose name is on the building. Despite its size and power, the biggest challenge for the company isn’t all that different from what other media companies are facing: Its core business is slowly fading, due primarily to competition from the Web, so Bloomberg has to figure out how to transition from that business to a different one. And time is running out.

    The classic view of Bloomberg is that its vast, money-spinning data-terminal business is almost unassailable, thanks to the fact that most brokers and fund managers would rather give up their first-born than go without their Bloomberg machine. Each terminal costs $20,000 a year, and there are more than 320,000 of them. But that hold is weakening as cheaper—and even free—sources of business data continue to proliferate. And the social aspect that the terminal provides via its internal messaging system is also under pressure, from things like Slack and Twitter.

    In response, the company has spent a lot of money building up its free web operations, by hiring high-profile managers like Justin Smith from Atlantic Media and Josh Tyrangiel, and bringing in expensive talent to write for Bloomberg Businessweek, the Bloomberg View site and other parts of the empire. But as the Politico piece points out, all of that has also created a lot of tension between the new hires, many of whom don’t follow the “Bloomberg Way,” and the old guard.

    “In a company that obsessively valued order and stability, fault lines were emerging: between the wire service and Tyrangiel’s shop, but more broadly and significantly, between data-driven terminal news and the highbrow content Bloomberg personally desired. The twin aims of making billions of dollars by churning data for the box and producing important work for the wider world, it turned out, were not always part of the ‘virtuous cycle’ envisaged by Doctoroff. They were sometimes at odds.”

    There are also an awful lot of those old guard—in fact, Bloomberg has an awful lot of everything. Not only are there are dozens of reporters who just write about the stock market, there are dozens who just write about one specific aspect of the stock market. With an editorial staff of more than 2,400 people, Bloomberg has topic-specific teams that are larger than the entire writing staff of a site like Business Insider. It’s like the BBC of business news, and it’s filled with discontent according to a leaked memo from one member of the Washington, D.C. bureau.

    In the long run, Bloomberg’s larger dilemma isn’t all that different from what its competitor, Reuters, has been going through for some time. However, the pressure on Reuters has been intensified because its data business doesn’t spin off quite as much cash as Bloomberg does. Reuters tried to create a web-based media operation too, spending millions to hire writers and editors and investing tens of millions in a new content system—and then a new CEO pulled the plug, saying the returns didn’t justify the investment.