社交媒体时代的新闻与公关

The digital revolution will ultimately strengthen journalism, but so far public relations has managed the web far better.

数字革命最终会加强新闻业，但目前为止更擅长经营web的是公共关系行业。

In the century in which PR has been an organised trade, the case for its importance in business has been the establishment of reputation. Now, the speed and ubiquity of digital communications both makes reputation more fragile — they can make a chief executive history with a tweet — and allows corporations and their leaders to develop their own channels, direct to consumers, without the intermediation of pesky reporters.

一个世纪以来，公关一直是个有组织的行当，其在商界的重要性在于建立声誉。如今，数字通信的快速和无所不在既令声誉更加脆弱（发条推文就能让一位首席执行官成为历史），也让企业及其领导人开辟直接面向消费者的传播渠道，跳过记者这一恼人的中间环节。

The power balance has shifted. “Brand journalism”, produced by corporations and institutions and beamed direct to audiences through social media, is on the rise.

实力平衡发生了转变。由企业和机构制作，通过社交媒体直接发送给受众的“品牌导向型新闻”正在兴起。

Public relations people, often former journalists, now supply much more copy to cash-strapped, slimmed down newspapers. “Native advertising”, designed to look and read like the publication into which it is inserted (with a discreet notice that it is sponsored), is a growing trend: papers are now taking on teams of writers to craft the copy the advertisers want in their outlet’s style.

公关人员往往从事过记者这行，如今他们向资金拮据、瘦身后的报纸输送的新闻稿比以往多得多。“原生广告”成为一种日益盛行的趋势，这种广告的版面设计和内容跟所要插入的出版物风格一致（只是在不显眼的地方声明其为赞助内容）。报纸现在聘用写作团队，根据各自的风格为广告商精心打造文稿。

Business leaders, especially the more visible ones, are being groomed to join “the conversation” — a 24-hour digital commons where corporate and institutional voices must be heard and seen — without the intercession of a journalist.

商界领袖，尤其是那些露面较多的领导者正接受专业培训，以便参加没有记者干扰的“对话”——一个24小时的数字公地，企业和机构的声音必须被听到、看到。

Some, such as Paul Polman, chief executive of Unilever, are public figures on issues (the environment in his case) beyond his corporation. In political communication as in corporate PR, the use of big data banks allow the identification of issues, concerns, habits and intentions right down to an individual level. Campaigns are increasingly run through social media, in which leaders as diverse as Barack Obama (re-elected in 2012) and India’s Narendra Modi (elected in 2014) built and retained an apparently “personal” connection with their voter base.

有些企业领导，比如联合利华首席执行官保罗•波尔曼(Paul Polman)，已成为某些议题上的公众人物（波尔曼关注的是环境问题），其影响超出自己的公司。搞政治传播与经营企业公关一样，利用大数据库可以识别议题、关切、习惯和意向，一直细化到个体层面。竞选活动对社交媒体的运用越来越多，各国领导人都在与自己的基础选民建立并保持貌似“个人”的联系，包括2012年获得连任的巴拉克•奥巴马(Barack Obama)，以及2014年当选的印度总理纳伦德拉•莫迪(Narendra Modi)。