俄羅斯科技天才用技術挑戰國家威權

LONDON — When a SWAT team appeared at Pavel Durov’s door in St. Petersburg, he started thinking about his future in Russia.

倫敦——當一支特警隊出現在帕維爾·杜羅夫(Pavel Durov)位於聖彼得堡的住所前時，他開始考慮自己在俄羅斯的前途。

He was home alone, and he peered at them through a monitor.

當時杜羅夫獨自一人在家，通過監視器看着他們。

“They had guns and they looked very serious,” said Mr. Durov, once Russia’s biggest celebrity entrepreneur. “They seemed to want to break the door.”

“他們端着槍，看起來非常嚴肅，”杜羅夫說。“像是準備破門而入。”他曾是俄羅斯最受歡迎的知名企業家。

Not long ago, Mr. Durov, 30, was seen as Russia’s Mark Zuckerberg. He founded a social network, VKontakte, which is more popular in Russia than Facebook, and made a splash by publicly offering Edward Snowden a job.

不久之前，30歲的杜羅夫還被視作俄羅斯的馬克·扎克伯格(Mark Zuckerberg)。他創建了社交網站VKontakte，在俄羅斯比Facebook更受歡迎。他還因爲公開爲愛德華·斯諾登(Edward Snowden)提供工作機會而引起轟動。

Then the Kremlin tightened its grip over the Internet and President Vladimir V. Putin’s allies took control of VKontakte. Mr. Durov eventually sold his remaining stake for millions and fled Russia in April, after resisting government pressure to release the data of Ukrainian protest leaders.

後來，克里姆林宮加大了對網絡的管控力度，總統弗拉基米爾·V·普京(Vladimir V. Putin)的盟友掌控了VKontakte。杜羅夫最終以數以百萬美元計的價格出售了自己剩餘的股份，並於今年4月離開俄羅斯。在此之前，他頂住了來自政府的壓力，拒絕透露烏克蘭抗議活動領袖的相關信息。

Mr. Durov, known for his subversive wit and an all-black wardrobe that evokes Neo from the “Matrix” movies, is now a little-seen nomad, moving from country to country every few weeks with a small band of computer programmers. One day he is in Paris, another in Singapore.

杜羅夫以智力超羣、喜歡穿一襲黑衣而聞名。這種打扮讓人想起《黑客帝國》(Matrix)裏的尼奧(Neo)。他現在已經成了神出鬼沒的流浪者，每隔幾周就會帶領一小組計算機編程人員從一個國家轉移到另一個國家。某一天，他會待在巴黎，另一天又會現身新加坡。

“Me myself, I’m not a big fan of the idea of countries,” Mr. Durov said, wearing a custom-made cross between a hoodie and a sport coat.

身穿兼具帽衫與休閒西服特色的定製服裝的杜羅夫說，“我本人不大讚同國家的概念。”

When he arrived with little warning in London for his first interview outside cyberspace since leaving Russia, he was en route to San Francisco, where he appeared at a technology conference on Tuesday. He is surfacing to showcase his new messaging app, Telegram, for people craving privacy and security.

他突然造訪倫敦，在離開俄羅斯後首次現身接受面對面採訪。當時他正在前往舊金山的途中，準備在接下來的週二出席在那裏舉行的科技大會。他之所以露面，是爲了展示爲注重隱私與安全的用戶設計的新即時通訊應用Telegram。

His odyssey reflects the changing nature of the Internet in Russia.

杜羅夫的傳奇經歷反映了俄羅斯互聯網性質的變遷。

The Internet was once seen as a way to diversify Russia’s economy beyond oil. When VKontakte started in 2006, Mr. Durov says, he envisioned his country as a tax-free and libertarian utopia for technologists.

互聯網曾被視作推動俄羅斯經濟擺脫對石油的依賴而向多樣化發展的一種途徑。杜羅夫在2006年推出VKontakte時表示，他理想中的俄羅斯是一個讓科技從業者如魚得水的自由意志主義免稅烏托邦。

“The best thing about Russia at that time was the Internet sphere was completely not regulated,” he said. “In some ways, it was more liberal than the United States.”

“那時的俄羅斯最棒的一點在於，互聯網領域完全不受約束，”他說。“在某些方面，俄羅斯比美國還要自由。”

Now the Internet is viewed with suspicion by Mr. Putin, who has called it a “C.I.A. project” and has taken steps to insulate Russia from the rest of the digital world. One leading Russian activist recently said the government was on a “campaign to shut down the Internet.”

到了今天，普京對互聯網持懷疑態度，稱這是“中情局(CIA)的項目”，並在採取措施將俄羅斯與數字世界的其他部分隔離開來。俄羅斯一位著名活動人士最近表示，政府正在“開展行動壓制網絡”。

“Since I’m obviously a believer in free markets,” Mr. Durov said, “it’s hard for me to understand the current direction of the country.”

“我堅信自由市場，”杜羅夫說，“所以我很難理解這個國家目前的發展方向。”

Russia’s economy is also increasingly isolated, with its currency plummeting amid Western sanctions. The government is now predicting a recession for next year. Mr. Putin’s big challenge is falling oil prices, which Mr. Durov calls “the only chance” for economic and political reform.

俄羅斯經濟日益遭到孤立，在西方國家的制裁之下，貨幣大幅貶值。俄羅斯政府目前預測本國經濟明年將陷入衰退。油價不斷下跌是普京面臨的巨大挑戰，而杜羅夫稱這是進行經濟及政治改革的“唯一機會”。

“When the petrol prices are high, there is no incentive for those reforms,” he said. “It can stay like this forever; nobody really cares.”

“汽油價格很高時，沒有改革的動機，”他說。“過去的狀態會一直延續下去，沒人真的在乎。”

As the tensions in Russia play out, Mr. Durov says he is focused on Telegram, which he started last year.

隨着俄羅斯國內出現緊張氣氛，杜羅夫表示，他目前關注的是去年啓動的Telegram。

There will be no outside investors, he says, no ads and no marketing, and it is available free, though he is likely to eventually charge for additional services. He says he has about 50 million users, almost entirely outside Russia.

他表示，他們不會有外部投資者，沒有廣告，也沒有市場營銷。這款應用眼下可以免費獲得，但他可能最終會爲附加服務收取費用。他表示，Telegram現在大約有5000萬用戶，幾乎全部來自俄羅斯之外的地方。

Mr. Durov learned programming from his brother, Nikolai, a mathematician and Mr. Durov’s right-hand man at VKontakte and Telegram. By 11, the younger Mr. Durov was coding his own versions of games like Tetris. The two developed a strategy game set in ancient China, which they called Lao Unit.

杜羅夫向哥哥尼古拉(Nikolai)學會了編程。尼古拉是一名數學家，也是杜羅夫在VKontakte和Telegram的得力助手。11歲的時候，杜羅夫就會編寫自己版本的遊戲，比如俄羅斯方塊。兄弟二人研發了一款背景設定在古代中國的策略遊戲，名爲“老子軍團”(Lao Unit)。

At St. Petersburg State University, Mr. Durov studied linguistics. In lieu of military service, he trained in propaganda, studying Sun Tzu, Genghis Khan and Napoleon, and he learned to make posters aimed at influencing foreign soldiers.

在聖彼得堡國立大學(St. Petersburg State University)就讀期間，杜羅夫學習語言學。他沒有服兵役，而是選擇接受宣傳方面的訓練，研究孫子、成吉思汗和拿破崙。他還學習瞭如何製作旨在動搖外國部隊軍心的海報。

The posters said things like “You are surrounded, surrender, there’s no hope,” or they would suggest to foreign soldiers that “some other guy is entertaining himself with your wife,” he recalled.

這些海報上印着“你們已被包圍，除了投降，別無出路，”或者告訴敵軍“其他男人在和你們的妻子廝混”，他回憶道。

His main interest was developing a social network. A friend who studied in America showed him Facebook, then in its infancy, and he learned from it.

他主要的興趣是開發社交網絡。在美國學習的一個朋友向他介紹了當時還處於起步階段的Facebook，他從中借鑑了一些東西。

“Some things like the layout of the early VKontakte was very influenced by Facebook,” Mr. Durov said. “Otherwise it could take ages for me to build, and I was not a professional designer.”

“有些東西，比如Vkontakte早期的頁面佈局，受Facebook的影響就很大，”杜羅夫說。“否則，我可能會花很長的時間才能完成，畢竟我不是專業的設計師。”

He also recruited fellow linguistics students to build a database catering to the post-Soviet university system, a step he said gave VKontakte “a tremendous competitive advantage.”

他還找來語言學專業的同學，針對蘇聯解體後的大學體系建立了一個數據庫。此舉給Vkontakte帶來了“巨大的競爭優勢”，他說。

In 2007, he decided to allow users to upload audio and video files, without regard to copyright. Such policies have drawn criticism from the United States Trade Representative and lawsuits from major record labels.

2007年，他決定不考慮版權問題，允許用戶上傳音頻和視頻文件。這個做法已經遭到了美國貿易代表的指責和主要唱片公司的起訴。

“Some people told me when I was implementing it that I would go to jail the next day,” he said. “I was very careless.”

“我這麼做的時候，有人警告，我第二天就會蹲進大牢，”他說。“我當時根本不在乎。”

Demonstrations in 2011 over parliamentary elections resulted in a government showdown. During the SWAT standoff at his home that followed, he called his brother.

2011年針對議會選舉的示威活動，導致了政府向他攤牌。之後，當他的家被特警圍住時，他給哥哥打了一個電話。

“I realized I don’t have a safe means of communications with him,” he said, adding, “That’s how Telegram started.”

“我意識到，我和他之間的所有通訊手段都不安全，”他說，“這就是Telegram的緣起。”

Telegram is competing in a crowded field of messaging apps that promise varying degrees of security. Telegram has its fans and detractors, but it was rated respectably in a recent evaluation by the Electronic Frontier Foundation. The Telegram company, based in Berlin, has a deliberately complex structure of scattered global shell companies intended to keep it a step ahead of subpoenas from any one government.

Telegram所在的領域競爭很激烈，有大量即時通訊應用承諾爲用戶提供程度各異的安全保障。Telegram有粉絲也有反對者，但在電子前沿基金會(Electronic Frontier Foundation)最近的一項評估中，它的排名比較靠前。Telegram公司總部設在柏林，刻意設計了一個複雜的結構，由全球各地的空殼公司組成，力圖做到比任何國家的政府發出的傳票都領先一步。

“This is very unusual for Russian entrepreneurs, to succeed outside of Russia,” said Sergei Guriev, a prominent economist who fled Russia last year. “He may not be a usual person in many ways, but he is definitely a very talented entrepreneur.”

“俄羅斯創業者在本國以外的地方獲得成功，是很不尋常的一件事，”去年逃離俄羅斯的著名經濟學家謝爾蓋·古裏耶夫(Sergei Guriev)說。“從很多方面而言，他可能都不是一個平常人，但他絕對是一個才華橫溢的創業者。”

When Mr. Durov sold his stake in VKontakte last December, there was speculation it was worth a few hundred million dollars. Mr. Durov would not give a specific figure, citing a nondisclosure agreement.

去年12月，杜羅夫出售了他在Vkontakte的股份。有人猜測這部分股份價值數億美元。杜羅夫說他簽訂了保密協議，不能透露具體的數字。

“In my days in Russia, I visited some very rich guys,” he said. “I visited big ships, private airplanes, houses — and I know for sure I don’t want this for myself.”

“在俄羅斯的時候，我見過一些非常有錢的人，”他說。“我參觀了他們的大型遊艇、私人飛機和豪宅——我清楚地知道，我不希望自己變成這樣。”

“I’m very happy right now without any property anywhere,” he added. “I consider myself a legal citizen of the world.”

“現在我在任何地方都沒有任何資產，對此我感到很開心，”他說。“我把自己想成是這個世界的合法公民。”