“種菜”小心栽進(jìn)廣告陷阱

Here's an idyllic scene: a hamlet where the sun always shines, crops always grow and your friends drop by to sweep your yard to the sound of guitar music. Animals do what they are told, there is no disease, and lendin' folks a helpin' hand makes you richer and wiser.
這是一個(gè)田園詩(shī)般的景象：小村莊里，陽(yáng)光永遠(yuǎn)普照，莊稼不斷生長(zhǎng)，朋友造訪，伴著吉他樂(lè)曲打掃你家院子。動(dòng)物們馴順聽(tīng)話，沒(méi)有疾病侵?jǐn)_，助人為樂(lè)讓你越來(lái)越富有，越來(lái)越聰明。

"It reminds me of my childhood," says one player, Lia Curran, 37, a pharmacist from London. "Right now I'm growing wheat and poinsettia, I've got a small orchard, and I'm rearing some chickens and some cows. I like having the animals. It's soothing."
“它讓我想起了童年時(shí)代，”37歲的玩家莉婭·柯倫說(shuō)。她是倫敦的一名藥劑師。“我正在種植小麥和一品紅，我有一個(gè)小果園，還養(yǎng)著一些雞和奶牛。我喜歡飼養(yǎng)動(dòng)物。它能撫慰人心。”

Curran's fledgling herd, however, is nothing more than a collection of computer-generated cartoons. FarmVille is an online computer game built into the social networking site Facebook and is described by its players as "addictive". Launched last June by Zynga Game Network, FarmVille now has more players than Twitter's entire user base--or more than the population of the UK. The players are largely women over the age of 35.
但是，柯倫剛剛飼養(yǎng)起來(lái)的動(dòng)物只不過(guò)是一群電腦生成的卡通形象而已。FarmVille是一款內(nèi)置于社交網(wǎng)站“臉譜”的網(wǎng)上電腦游戲，被玩家們形容為“讓人上癮”。

FarmVille cunningly unites the worlds of social networking and gaming. Players are given a patch of ground with six fields, "cash", a few seeds and a plough and have to build up wealth, skills and neighbours to create bigger, better, richer farms.
FarmVille巧妙地將社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)和游戲世界結(jié)合在一起。玩家獲得一片有六塊田的土地、“現(xiàn)金”、幾粒種子和一把犁杖，必須積累財(cái)富、技能，并網(wǎng)絡(luò)鄰居，來(lái)建設(shè)更大、更好、更富有的農(nóng)場(chǎng)。

Inviting your online friends to play means you earn more and get free gifts; you rise rapidly through the first levels but, once hooked, have to work harder and harder with no final level or goal in sight.
如果邀請(qǐng)網(wǎng)友加入游戲，就可以賺到更多的錢(qián)并獲取免費(fèi)禮品；在初級(jí)階段你會(huì)進(jìn)步得很快，然而一旦著了迷，就必須加倍努力，要達(dá)到最高層級(jí)或終極目標(biāo)卻遙遙無(wú)期。

"It's very moreish," says Curran. She hasn't yet paid real-world money to advance in the game, but her friends do. One buys extra virtual currency at the exchange rate of $240 (£145) in FarmVille for $40 (£24) in the real world.
“真是讓人欲罷不能，”柯倫說(shuō)。她還沒(méi)有為了游戲晉級(jí)花過(guò)錢(qián)，但她的朋友卻花過(guò)。用現(xiàn)實(shí)世界的40美元（折合24英鎊）可以購(gòu)買(mǎi)FarmVille中240美元（折合145英鎊）的虛擬貨幣。

"I'd expanded on FarmVille as much as I could, but I just wanted a pond and some hedges," says the woman, who is too embarrassed to be named. "I didn't tell my husband I'd paid real money because he'd think I'm mad. But then he did keep me waiting in the car outside our house while he harvested his raspberries."
“我極力在FarmVille上擴(kuò)大我的農(nóng)場(chǎng)，但我就是想要一個(gè)池塘和一些樹(shù)籬，”這位羞于透露姓名的婦女說(shuō)。“我沒(méi)有告訴我丈夫我支付了真錢(qián)，因?yàn)樗麜?huì)以為我瘋了。但當(dāng)時(shí)他讓我在屋外的車(chē)?yán)锏戎?，而自己卻在收獲樹(shù)莓。”

Brian Dudley, chief executive at Broadway Lodge, an addiction treatment centre, warns that this sort of obsessive play can lead to an addiction as severe as gambling.
百老匯洛奇上癮治療中心總裁賴恩·達(dá)德利警告說(shuō)，這種令人著魔的游戲會(huì)導(dǎo)致上癮，其嚴(yán)重程度與賭博無(wú)異。

"Games like this draw people into a fantasy world that's separate from real life where there are no issues, and where things are simple and controllable," he says.
他說(shuō)：“這種游戲把人吸引到一個(gè)與現(xiàn)實(shí)生活分離的幻想世界，那里不存在爭(zhēng)端，一切都簡(jiǎn)單和可以操控。”

Indeed, FarmVille addicts have already faced their first big scandal. On the site, players can take advantage of special offers on ads that promise more virtual cash and points for taking free trials or entering competitions.
的確，F(xiàn)armVille成癮者已經(jīng)遭遇首樁重大丑聞。該網(wǎng)站在廣告中提供了讓玩家得益的特別贈(zèng)品，它給出的承諾是，玩家只要免費(fèi)試用或參與競(jìng)賽，就可以獲得更多的虛擬現(xiàn)金和點(diǎn)數(shù)。

Last month, however, TechCrunch, a US website, revealed the scams behind these freebies: the product come-ons often click through to trial services or quizzes that ask for credit card details or mobile phone numbers. Small print warns that their accounts will be debited for months to come.
但是上個(gè)月，美國(guó)一家網(wǎng)站TechCrunch揭露了這些免費(fèi)品背后的騙局：點(diǎn)擊充滿誘惑力的產(chǎn)品廣告，常常鏈接到需要詢問(wèn)信用卡詳情或手機(jī)號(hào)碼的試用服務(wù)或小測(cè)試。小號(hào)字附加條款則警告，賬款會(huì)在幾個(gè)月后記入其帳戶的借方。

"I clicked on an ad that offered a free IQ test in exchange for points in the game, took the test and punched in my mobile number so they could text me the result," says one victim, Momar Jahihti. "When I checked my statement, they were surreptitiously billing me $30 [£18] per month."
“我點(diǎn)擊了一則提供免費(fèi)智商測(cè)試的廣告，來(lái)?yè)Q取游戲點(diǎn)數(shù)。我完成了測(cè)試，輸入了我的手機(jī)號(hào)碼，以便他們可以將結(jié)果用短信發(fā)給我，”一名受害者莫馬爾·杰希提說(shuō)。“當(dāng)我查看我的結(jié)算單時(shí)，發(fā)現(xiàn)他們居然偷偷摸摸地給我開(kāi)了每月30美元（18英鎊）的賬單。”

Two weeks ago, a group of US players launched a class action against Zynga and Facebook. "Most, if not all, of the online advertisements presented through Zynga are scams," the lawsuit alleges. "The advertisements are highly misleading and often result in users subscribing to goods or services that they do not want or need."
兩周前，一群美國(guó)玩家發(fā)起對(duì)Zynga和“臉譜”網(wǎng)的集體訴訟。“通過(guò)Zynga發(fā)布的大多數(shù)——甚至是全部的——網(wǎng)上廣告都是騙局，”該訴訟稱。“這些廣告誤導(dǎo)性很強(qiáng)，往往會(huì)使用戶訂購(gòu)他們并不想要或不需要的商品和服務(wù)。”

According to Nick O'Neill from the social media site All Facebook, Zynga is making $500,000 (£304,000) a day from its Facebook games, in turn spending some $50m (£30m) a year on Facebook ads.
據(jù)社交媒體網(wǎng)站All Facebook的尼克·奧尼爾稱，Zynga從其“臉譜”網(wǎng)游戲中一天可賺50萬(wàn)美元（30.4萬(wàn)英鎊），繼而每年投入約5000萬(wàn)美元（3000萬(wàn)英鎊）用作“臉譜”網(wǎng)上的廣告費(fèi)。

If all that weren't enough, FarmVille doesn't even function like a proper farm: in FarmVille, wheat grows in two days--in real life, it takes months. But play continues nevertheless.
如果所有這些還不夠說(shuō)明問(wèn)題，那么還可以說(shuō)，F(xiàn)armVille的運(yùn)作程式并不像一個(gè)真正的農(nóng)場(chǎng)：在FarmVille，小麥生長(zhǎng)期為兩天——而在現(xiàn)實(shí)生活中，則需要數(shù)月。盡管如此，游戲還在繼續(xù)。