Last Thursday morning I was on the bus to work inthe central business district of Beijing, browsingsocial media and loathing myself for obsessing over posts about fashion, when I saw a pictureof black and purple smoke rising over thousands of completely burnt-out cars. News travelsfast in China these days. The photo was reposted by a friend of mine, who is from Tianjin. Itlooked like a war zone.

上周四早晨，我坐在公交車上，要到北京中央商務區(CBD)去上班。我一邊瀏覽著社交媒體，一邊為自己沉迷于時尚類帖子而自我唾棄，這時我看到了一張照片：在數千輛完全被燒毀的汽車上空，冒著黑色和紫色的濃煙。如今，資訊在中國傳播得很快。這張照片是天津的一個朋友轉發的。那場景看起來像戰場。

The last time I saw something this terrifying was seven years ago. Back then I was working as ajournalist for the Chinese state media, and on the afternoon of May 12 a friend called to tell methere had been a major earthquake near his home town in Sichuan province. He hung up in arush, saying he needed to check if his parents were safe.

上一次我見到同等級別的可怕場景還是在7年前。當時我是中國官方媒體的一名記者。那年5月12日下午，一位朋友打電話給我，說他在四川省的老家附近發生了大地震。他匆忙掛斷電話，說要打回去看看自己的父母是否平安。

In 2008 it was unusual for breaking news to arrive via your phone. Facebook and Twitter werealready blocked to most Chinese internet users. Weibo, which has been called the Chineseversion of Twitter, did not yet exist. Neither did WeChat — now China’s most widely used socialmedia platform and the one on which I heard about last week’s tragedy in Tianjin. It would notbe launched for more than two years.

2008年時，通過手機收到突發資訊還不常見。大多數中國網民已經無法使用Facebook和Twitter。被稱為中國版Twitter的微博(Weibo)還未誕生，也沒有微信(WeChat)——兩年多后微信才問世，如今已是中國使用最廣的社交媒體平臺。也正是通過微信，我得知了上周發生在天津的慘劇。

A week after my friend’s distraught call, I went to Sichuan with a group of fellow reporters toreport on the aftermath of the earthquake. The closer I got to the reality of the disaster, themore distant I was from information about it: we were on the move constantly with no radioand no newspapers; my mobile phone was disconnected quite often due to bad reception.

接到朋友焦慮不安的電話一周后，我和一群記者同行趕赴四川，報道震后災情。我越接近災難現場，就離這場災難的信息越遠：我們一路奔波，聽不到廣播，也沒有報紙;由于信號不好，我的手機經常連不上網絡。

I had the chance to talk to survivors, shed tears with them, and we faced the fear ofaftershocks, flood and contamination together. We were all scared. But at least we knew whatwas happening — unlike many farther away, who relied on what second-hand information theycould obtain.

我抓住機會與幸存者交談，跟他們一起流淚，我們共同面對余震、洪水及污染所帶來的恐懼。我們都很害怕，但至少我們知道這里發生了什么——不像外面的人，只能依賴他們能夠得到的一些二手信息。

No one had to rely on such reports last week. Still on the bus in Beijing, I sent an instantmessage to my friend. “A disaster, she replied, “like the end of the world. Fortunately myparents were living far enough away, so they are OK.

上周的爆炸發生后，人們不必再依賴此類報道。還在北京公交車上時，我給朋友發了一條信息。“一場災難，她回復說，“像世界末日。幸虧我父母住得足夠遠，所以他們沒事。

You did not have to know someone in the stricken city to know what was going on. Mysmartphone buzzed with all sorts of information: pictures of the blast site, apparently taken bya drone; video footage of the shock wave; logs written by reporters on the scene.

你不必認識受災城市的人就可以獲悉那里發生了什么。我的智能手機不停地收到各種信息：爆炸現場的照片(顯然是由無人機拍攝);爆炸沖擊波的視頻;現場記者所寫的日志。

A photographer with the nickname X-ceanido uploaded images to WeChat after spendingThursday in the ruins. Within 24 hours these cruelly graphic pictures, accompanied by a diary-style report, had been viewed 100,000 times and attracted more than 2,000 comments. Theywere deleted, probably by internet censors, only to pop up again every time they were takendown.

一位網名為X-ceanido的攝影師上周四在廢墟中忙碌了一天，隨后他將所拍照片上傳到微信。24小時內，這些慘烈的圖片伴隨著一篇日記風格的報道已經被閱讀了10萬次，吸引了2000多條評論。這些照片被刪除了(很可能是互聯網審查者所為)，但每次它們被撤下后都會很快再次出現。

At home that evening I tuned my television to a Tianjin station and steeled myself for morehorrifying footage. What I saw shocked me for a different reason: the channel wasbroadcasting a Korean television drama. There was nothing about the explosions. Eventuallythe schlocky romance was turned off and some newsreaders came on, reading carefully writtenstatements from a teleprompter. The city authorities held press conferences, each one as briefas possible — although some of them ended awkwardly, with critical questions leftunanswered, prompting more criticism online.

那天晚上回家后，我打開電視，調到天津一電視臺，并做好了心理準備，以為自己會看到更多恐怖鏡頭。我確實看到了令自己震驚的一幕，但不是因為恐怖的畫面，而是因為該臺居然在播放韓國電視劇。沒有關于爆炸的報道。最終，蹩腳的電視劇被停掉，資訊播報員出來了，小心翼翼地宣讀著臺詞提示器上的書面聲明。天津市政府舉行了多場資訊發布會，每一場都盡可能地簡短——有些發布會尷尬收場，而關鍵問題沒有得到回答，在網絡上引發了更多批評之聲。

While information is now easier to come by, hard facts are not. The fragmented sources onsocial media are bewildering; some offer solid reporting, but others can be subjective andinaccurate. It is difficult to tell which are which. Advanced technology has provided an escapefrom the censorship. But we are at risk of replacing silence with indecipherable noise. It issometimes difficult to believe anything unless you see it with your own eyes or hear it fromsomeone you trust.

雖然如今人們可以更容易地獲取信息，但得知真相并不容易。社交媒體上分散的信息來源讓人眼花繚亂;有些提供扎實可靠的報道，還有些可能是出于主觀想法的，或者是不準確的。很難分辨這些信息的真假。先進的技術提供了逃避審查的方法。但我們面臨一種危險：沉默被打破時，取而代之的是各種難以分辨的嘈雜聲。有時候很難相信任何信息，除非親眼見到或者從信任的人那里聽到。

And silence has a way of coming back. Three days after the explosions, some popular postsseemed to have been deleted. A Weibo message recording the explosion, which had beenposted by a nearby resident on the evening it happened, had somehow disappeared into thinair. The authorities have arrested some people who posted online, accusing them of“scamming. Hundreds of social media accounts have been shut down on the grounds thatthey had been used for “spreading rumour.

而且，沉默會以自己的方式回歸。爆炸發生三天后，一些人氣很旺的帖子似乎已被刪除。一條爆炸現場附近居民當晚所發的、記錄爆炸過程的微博已經消失得無影無蹤。當局逮捕了一些在網上發帖的網民，指控他們“欺詐。數百個社交媒體賬戶被封殺，理由是它們被用于“散布謠言。

On Monday night, nearly five days after the blasts, official television was reporting that least 114people had died and 70 were missing. Whether any local officials were expected to be heldresponsible, it did not say. As to why dangerous chemicals were being stored only hundreds ofmetres from residential buildings where tens of thousands of people live, there was nodefinitive official answer.

截至周一晚，在爆炸發生近五天后，官方電視臺報道，至少有114人死亡，70人失蹤。報道中未提及是否有任何當地官員將對此次事故負責。至于為什么危險化學品被存儲在距離有數萬人口的居民點只有幾百米的地方，還沒有明確權威的官方答復。

Last Thursday morning I was on the bus to work inthe central business district of Beijing, browsingsocial media and loathing myself for obsessing over posts about fashion, when I saw a pictureof black and purple smoke rising over thousands of completely burnt-out cars. News travelsfast in China these days. The photo was reposted by a friend of mine, who is from Tianjin. Itlooked like a war zone.

上周四早晨，我坐在公交車上，要到北京中央商務區(CBD)去上班。我一邊瀏覽著社交媒體，一邊為自己沉迷于時尚類帖子而自我唾棄，這時我看到了一張照片：在數千輛完全被燒毀的汽車上空，冒著黑色和紫色的濃煙。如今，資訊在中國傳播得很快。這張照片是天津的一個朋友轉發的。那場景看起來像戰場。

The last time I saw something this terrifying was seven years ago. Back then I was working as ajournalist for the Chinese state media, and on the afternoon of May 12 a friend called to tell methere had been a major earthquake near his home town in Sichuan province. He hung up in arush, saying he needed to check if his parents were safe.

上一次我見到同等級別的可怕場景還是在7年前。當時我是中國官方媒體的一名記者。那年5月12日下午，一位朋友打電話給我，說他在四川省的老家附近發生了大地震。他匆忙掛斷電話，說要打回去看看自己的父母是否平安。

In 2008 it was unusual for breaking news to arrive via your phone. Facebook and Twitter werealready blocked to most Chinese internet users. Weibo, which has been called the Chineseversion of Twitter, did not yet exist. Neither did WeChat — now China’s most widely used socialmedia platform and the one on which I heard about last week’s tragedy in Tianjin. It would notbe launched for more than two years.

2008年時，通過手機收到突發資訊還不常見。大多數中國網民已經無法使用Facebook和Twitter。被稱為中國版Twitter的微博(Weibo)還未誕生，也沒有微信(WeChat)——兩年多后微信才問世，如今已是中國使用最廣的社交媒體平臺。也正是通過微信，我得知了上周發生在天津的慘劇。

A week after my friend’s distraught call, I went to Sichuan with a group of fellow reporters toreport on the aftermath of the earthquake. The closer I got to the reality of the disaster, themore distant I was from information about it: we were on the move constantly with no radioand no newspapers; my mobile phone was disconnected quite often due to bad reception.

接到朋友焦慮不安的電話一周后，我和一群記者同行趕赴四川，報道震后災情。我越接近災難現場，就離這場災難的信息越遠：我們一路奔波，聽不到廣播，也沒有報紙;由于信號不好，我的手機經常連不上網絡。

I had the chance to talk to survivors, shed tears with them, and we faced the fear ofaftershocks, flood and contamination together. We were all scared. But at least we knew whatwas happening — unlike many farther away, who relied on what second-hand information theycould obtain.

我抓住機會與幸存者交談，跟他們一起流淚，我們共同面對余震、洪水及污染所帶來的恐懼。我們都很害怕，但至少我們知道這里發生了什么——不像外面的人，只能依賴他們能夠得到的一些二手信息。

No one had to rely on such reports last week. Still on the bus in Beijing, I sent an instantmessage to my friend. “A disaster, she replied, “like the end of the world. Fortunately myparents were living far enough away, so they are OK.

上周的爆炸發生后，人們不必再依賴此類報道。還在北京公交車上時，我給朋友發了一條信息。“一場災難，她回復說，“像世界末日。幸虧我父母住得足夠遠，所以他們沒事。

You did not have to know someone in the stricken city to know what was going on. Mysmartphone buzzed with all sorts of information: pictures of the blast site, apparently taken bya drone; video footage of the shock wave; logs written by reporters on the scene.

你不必認識受災城市的人就可以獲悉那里發生了什么。我的智能手機不停地收到各種信息：爆炸現場的照片(顯然是由無人機拍攝);爆炸沖擊波的視頻;現場記者所寫的日志。

A photographer with the nickname X-ceanido uploaded images to WeChat after spendingThursday in the ruins. Within 24 hours these cruelly graphic pictures, accompanied by a diary-style report, had been viewed 100,000 times and attracted more than 2,000 comments. Theywere deleted, probably by internet censors, only to pop up again every time they were takendown.

一位網名為X-ceanido的攝影師上周四在廢墟中忙碌了一天，隨后他將所拍照片上傳到微信。24小時內，這些慘烈的圖片伴隨著一篇日記風格的報道已經被閱讀了10萬次，吸引了2000多條評論。這些照片被刪除了(很可能是互聯網審查者所為)，但每次它們被撤下后都會很快再次出現。

At home that evening I tuned my television to a Tianjin station and steeled myself for morehorrifying footage. What I saw shocked me for a different reason: the channel wasbroadcasting a Korean television drama. There was nothing about the explosions. Eventuallythe schlocky romance was turned off and some newsreaders came on, reading carefully writtenstatements from a teleprompter. The city authorities held press conferences, each one as briefas possible — although some of them ended awkwardly, with critical questions leftunanswered, prompting more criticism online.

那天晚上回家后，我打開電視，調到天津一電視臺，并做好了心理準備，以為自己會看到更多恐怖鏡頭。我確實看到了令自己震驚的一幕，但不是因為恐怖的畫面，而是因為該臺居然在播放韓國電視劇。沒有關于爆炸的報道。最終，蹩腳的電視劇被停掉，資訊播報員出來了，小心翼翼地宣讀著臺詞提示器上的書面聲明。天津市政府舉行了多場資訊發布會，每一場都盡可能地簡短——有些發布會尷尬收場，而關鍵問題沒有得到回答，在網絡上引發了更多批評之聲。

While information is now easier to come by, hard facts are not. The fragmented sources onsocial media are bewildering; some offer solid reporting, but others can be subjective andinaccurate. It is difficult to tell which are which. Advanced technology has provided an escapefrom the censorship. But we are at risk of replacing silence with indecipherable noise. It issometimes difficult to believe anything unless you see it with your own eyes or hear it fromsomeone you trust.

雖然如今人們可以更容易地獲取信息，但得知真相并不容易。社交媒體上分散的信息來源讓人眼花繚亂;有些提供扎實可靠的報道，還有些可能是出于主觀想法的，或者是不準確的。很難分辨這些信息的真假。先進的技術提供了逃避審查的方法。但我們面臨一種危險：沉默被打破時，取而代之的是各種難以分辨的嘈雜聲。有時候很難相信任何信息，除非親眼見到或者從信任的人那里聽到。

And silence has a way of coming back. Three days after the explosions, some popular postsseemed to have been deleted. A Weibo message recording the explosion, which had beenposted by a nearby resident on the evening it happened, had somehow disappeared into thinair. The authorities have arrested some people who posted online, accusing them of“scamming. Hundreds of social media accounts have been shut down on the grounds thatthey had been used for “spreading rumour.

而且，沉默會以自己的方式回歸。爆炸發生三天后，一些人氣很旺的帖子似乎已被刪除。一條爆炸現場附近居民當晚所發的、記錄爆炸過程的微博已經消失得無影無蹤。當局逮捕了一些在網上發帖的網民，指控他們“欺詐。數百個社交媒體賬戶被封殺，理由是它們被用于“散布謠言。

On Monday night, nearly five days after the blasts, official television was reporting that least 114people had died and 70 were missing. Whether any local officials were expected to be heldresponsible, it did not say. As to why dangerous chemicals were being stored only hundreds ofmetres from residential buildings where tens of thousands of people live, there was nodefinitive official answer.

截至周一晚，在爆炸發生近五天后，官方電視臺報道，至少有114人死亡，70人失蹤。報道中未提及是否有任何當地官員將對此次事故負責。至于為什么危險化學品被存儲在距離有數萬人口的居民點只有幾百米的地方，還沒有明確權威的官方答復。