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本帖{zh1}由 triumph02 于 2010-1-31 21:11 编辑
Apple unveils the iPad
苹果公布iPad
Steve Jobs and the tablet of hope
史蒂夫-乔布斯和他的平板之寄托(原译：充满希望的史蒂夫-乔布斯和平板电脑)
The innovation machine churns out another game-changing device
苹果公司再“耍”电脑新花样(原译：创新产品搅局，改变游戏规则)
Getty Images
Jan 28th 2010 | SAN FRANCISCO | From The Economist print edition
“HEROES and heroics” is one of the central themes of the current season at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco, which prides itself on showcasing contemporary artists who challenge conventional ways of doing things. On January 27th the centre played host to one of the heroes of the computing industry: Steve Jobs, the boss of Apple, who launched the company’s latest creation, the iPad. Mr Jobs also has a reputation for showcasing the unconventional. He did not disappoint.
旧金山前卫艺术中心本季的中心主题之一是“英雄与壮举”，该中心以展出标新立异的当代艺术家作品而引以为荣。1月27号前卫艺术中心为计算机行业的英雄之一做东：史蒂夫-乔布斯，苹果公司的老板，在此推出苹果的{zx1}设计——the iPad。乔布斯先生同样也因标新立异而享有盛誉。他，没有令人失望。
The iPad, which looks like an oversized Apple iPhone and boasts a colour screen measuring almost ten inches (25cm), promises to change the landscape of the computing world. It is just half an inch thick and weighs 1.5lb (680 grams). “It’s so much more intimate than a laptop, and so much more capable than a smartphone,” Mr Jobs said of the device, which will be available in late March.
The iPad看起来像是一款特大号的苹果iPhone手机，这款“iPhone”手机的彩屏有近10英寸（25厘米）那么夸张。The iPad有望让计算机界焕然一新(原译：为之焕然一新)。它仅有半英寸厚1.5磅重（680克）。The iPad将于三月底面市，乔布斯先生称它“比笔记本电脑更为贴心，比智能手机功能更多。”。
The new iPad has important limitations, which critics were quick to point out. It does not have a camera or a phone and users cannot run multiple applications on it at the same time. But Apple should be able to correct such flaws in due course. Together with a host of other touch-screen “tablet” computers that are expected to reach shops over the next year or so, the iPad looks set to revolutionise the way in which digital media are consumed in homes, schools and offices.
批评家们很快就指出，新iPad有很大缺陷。它没有摄像功能或者电话功能，而且用户无法运行多应用同时操作。但苹果公司应该会有能力及时修正这样的瑕疵。the iPad连同许多其它明年有望面市的触摸屏式“平板”电脑，即将彻底扫清数字媒体进入家庭，学校和办公场所的障碍。
The flood of devices is likely to have a profound impact on parts of the media business that are already being turned upside-down by the internet. The move from print to digital has not been easy for newspaper or magazine publishers. Readers have proved reluctant to pay for content on the web. Companies are unwilling to pay as much for online advertisements as for paper ones—hardly surprising, given the amount of space on offer. The iPad will probably accelerate the shift away from printed matter towards digital content, which could worsen the industry’s pain in the short term. Yet publishers hope that tablets will turn out to be the 21st-century equivalent of the printed page, offering them compelling new ways to present their content and to charge for it. “This is really a chance for publishers to seize on a second life,” says Phil Asmundson of Deloitte, a consultancy.
因为各种先进设备的涌现，传媒业中那些已经被互联网弄得天翻地覆的媒体公司可能会深受影响。对于报社或杂志出版商来说，从印刷转变到数字化并非易事。已证实读者是不愿为网页内容付费的。相比平媒广告，公司不愿对在线广告付出同样的广告费——这毫不令人奇怪，因为广告所占面积太小。(原译：在线广告的收入会和纸制上的一样多？传媒公司对此不抱希望——毫不令人惊奇)。The iPad将加速印刷物品朝数字化内容的转变，这在短期内会使传媒业雪上加霜。出版商希望平板会成为21世纪的出版物，能让他们以匠心独具的新方法来送出内容和对内容收费(原译：这使他们以强制性的新方法来送出内容和对内容收费)。“对于出版商来说，这真的是重获新生的机会，”德勒咨询公司的 Phil Asmundson称。
It does not come as a surprise, then, that Apple has already attracted some blue-chip media brands to the iPad’s platform. During his presentation Mr Jobs revealed that the company had struck deals with leading publishers such as Penguin and Simon & Schuster. They will provide books for the iPad, to be found and paid for in Apple’s new iBooks online store. More agreements ought to be signed before the first iPads are shipped in March. Users will also be able to download applications that give them access to electronic versions of newspapers such as the New York Times, which presented an iPad app at the launch.
于是，苹果公司把一些优质的xx媒体公司吸引到the iPad平台上，就看起来就不那么令人惊奇了。展示期间，乔布斯先生公布苹果公司已跟Penguin,Simon & Schuster.等出版业领军人物签订了合作协议。它们将给iPad提供书籍用来创办苹果公司的iBooks网店，同时也作为给该网店的报偿。大部分协议应该会在三月首批iPad面市之前签定。推出iPad后，xxxx等电子版报纸会出现在iPad的app上，用户届时可通过下载应用程序看到它们。
Apple’s media partners no doubt have mixed feelings about dealing with Mr Jobs. Apple is now widely demonised in the music industry for dominating the digital downloading business with its iTunes store. The firm has been able to control the price of music, boosting sales of iPods but not bringing the record companies a great deal of money. That said, Apple did provide a way for the music business to make a profit online, which had hitherto eluded it. Apple’s sleek iPhone has also given plenty of content producers a platform on which they can charge for their wares.
苹果公司的媒体合作伙伴们觉得与乔布斯先生合作无疑就像打翻了五味瓶一样。由于iTunes网店统治数字音乐的缘故，苹果公司现在在音乐界可是臭名远扬。苹果公司能够控制音乐价格了，这抬升了iPods的销售额但却对唱片公司赚钱没什么帮助。虽然苹果为音乐商户提供了在网络上赢利的方式，但是尽唱片行业至今都在避免这种模式(原译：那就是说，苹果公司提供了一种音乐交易的方式，从而在网络上获得了利润。苹果至今对此避而不答。苹果那外表光滑的iPhone 也替很多内容制造者提供了收费赚钱的平台(原译：苹果那外表光滑的iPhone也让很多内容制造者赚了钱)。
The firm’s record suggests that it will be able to make one of the computing industry’s most fervent wishes come true. Technology companies have repeatedly tried to make a success of tablets or similar devices. But the zone between laptops and mobile phones has been something of a Bermuda Triangle for device-makers, points out Roger Kay of Endpoint Technologies, a consultancy. “Products launched in there have usually disappeared from the radar screen,” he says.
苹果公司的纪录表明自己能够使计算机业最强烈的愿望之一变为现实。科技公司们多次努力尝试，希望能在平板或同类产品上获得成功(原译：它多次地努力尝试，终于成功造出了平板等类似设备)。但是介于笔记本电脑和移动电话之间的领域对电脑元件厂商来说从来都是百慕大三角般的神秘和充满危险。终点科技公司顾问罗杰-凯指出。“以前推出介于笔记本电脑和移动电话之间的产品，现在即使用雷达都找不到了，”他称。
Among them are previous generations of tablet-style computers. In the 1990s various companies experimented with the machines, including Apple. When its Newton personal digital assistant failed to take off, Mr Jobs killed the project. Tablets were once again briefly in the limelight when Microsoft’s Bill Gates predicted they would soon become people’s primary computing device—powered, of course, by his company’s software. That did not come to pass because consumers were put off by tablets’ high prices, clunky user interfaces and limited capabilities. Instead the devices, which cost almost as much as proper PCs, have remained a niche product used primarily in industries such as health care and construction.
先前消失的产品中也有平板型的电脑。上世纪90年代，包括苹果公司在内有许多公司研发平板电脑。由于牛顿掌上电脑未能取得成功，乔布斯先生裁掉了该项目。当微软老板比尔-盖茨预言它们将很快成为人们主要的计算机设备时（当然，是用微软公司软件的装置），平板电脑也只是在公众的视线里一闪而过。预言没能实现的原因是由于平板电脑高昂的价格，粗糙的用户界面和有限的功能阻碍了消费者购买。平板电脑反而是作为主要用于医疗保健和建筑业等行业的小众产品而保留下来。
Why are tablets causing so much excitement these days? One reason is that innovations in display, battery and microprocessing technologies have greatly reduced their cost. Apple’s iPad is priced at between $499 for the basic version and $829 for one with lots of memory and a 3G wireless connection, bringing it within the reach of ordinary consumers. Another reason for optimism is that interfaces have improved greatly. The iPad boasts a big virtual keyboard, which pops up when needed. It also features multi-touch, meaning that two fingers can be used to change the size of a photo. Furthermore, tablets will benefit from the fact that people have become accustomed to buying and consuming content in digital form (see chart).
为什么这些天来平板能造成如此轰动？一个原因是科技革新使显示，电池和微处理技术大大减少了成本。苹果电脑基本型号的iPad定价为499美元，而容量更大和带有3G无线功能的版本定价为829美元。这样的价格让一般消费者都能买得起iPad。另一个乐观的原因是界面有了很大改善。令The iPad洋洋得意的大号虚拟键盘，即用即弹出。The iPad还有多指感触这一大特色，使用者只要用两根手指头就能够把一张图片调大调小了。而且，平板之所以能从中获益，是因为人们如今已经习惯购买和消费数字化形式的内容产品了(见图)。
All this explains why other firms are eyeing the tablet market too. Dozens of prototypes were on show at a consumer-electronics trade fair in Las Vegas earlier this month, including ones from Motorola, Lenovo and Dell. Jen-Hsun Huang, the chief executive of NVIDIA, a maker of graphics chips, reckons this is the first time he has seen telecoms firms, computer-makers and consumer-electronics companies all equally keen to produce the same product. “The tablet is the first truly convergent electronic device,” he says.
所有这些就解释了为什么其它公司也目不转睛盯着平板市场。本月初，成打的样品在拉斯xxx消费电子交易博览会上展示，当中包括摩托罗拉，联想和戴尔等知名厂商的产品。显卡制造商英伟达公司的首席执行官黄仁勋认为，这是他{dy}次看到电信公司，计算机制造厂商和消费电子公司不约而同地热衷于同一种产品。“平板电脑是{dy}个真正汇聚群英的电子产品(原译：平板是{dy}个真正的收敛型电子产品)，”他称。
Netbooks and e-books
上网笔记本与电子书
The iPad and other tablets could shake up the computing scene. There has been some speculation that they could dent sales of low-end PCs, including Apple’s MacBook. But a more likely scenario is that they eat into sales of netbooks, the cheap mini-laptops that are used mainly for web surfing and watching videos. Netbooks have been on a roll recently, with global sales rising by 72% to $11.4 billion last year, according to DisplaySearch, a market research company. That makes them a tempting target.
The iPad同其它平板产品将撼动计算机业。，有部分预测认为，包括苹果公司的MacBook在内，虽然平板电脑能从低端个人台式电脑市场分到一杯羹，但是大部分的盈利还要看它们能否蚕食上网笔记本的销售额。上网笔记本是一种便宜的迷你笔记本电脑，主要用于上网观看视频。上网本最近火热大卖，据市场调研公司-显像资讯管理顾问公司调查显示，去年上网本全球销售额升幅72%，达到了114亿美元。这使得众平板产品无不觊觎于上网笔记本。
Apple’s new device also poses a threat to dedicated e-readers such as Amazon’s Kindle, though these will probably remain popular with the most voracious bookworms. Apple’s long-expected entry into the tablet market has already forced e-reader firms to consider making their devices more versatile and exciting. “You will see more readers using colour and video over the next five years,” predicts Richard Archuleta of Plastic Logic, which produces the Que proReader. And more makers of e-readers may mimic Amazon’s recent decision to let third-party developers create software for its line of Kindles.
尽管在如饥似渴般的书虫眼里，像亚马逊Kindle这样的电子书阅读器依然风韵犹存，但是苹果公司的新产品已对它们虎视眈眈。苹果公司对进入平板市场朝思暮想，这已迫使电子阅读器公司打算把它们的产品变得功能更多和更令人感兴趣。“接下来的五年中，你将看到越来越多的读者使用彩色和能够播放视频的电子阅读器，” 生产Que proReader的塑胶逻辑公司的Richard Archuleta预计道。而且越来越多的电子阅读器生产商会仿效亚马逊公司最近对Kindles的做法，让第三方为电子阅读器设计软件。
Book publishers are quietly hoping that Apple’s entry into e-books will help to reduce the clout of Amazon: the Kindle has 60% of the e-reader market, according to Forrester, a research firm. They are also excited by the opportunities that tablets offer to combine various media. Bradley Inman, the boss of Vook, a firm that mixes texts with video and links to people’s social networks, believes the iPad will trigger an outpouring of creativity. “Its impact will be the equivalent of adding sound to movies or colour to TV,” he says.
图书出版商默默地希望苹果公司进入电子图书市场会有助于减弱亚马逊的影响力：据福里斯特研究公司调查，Kindle拥有60%的电子图书市场份额。图书出版商们还因为平板电脑有机会使各种媒体结合到一起而兴奋不已。经营内容集视频与社交网络于一体的Vook公司老板Bradley Inman坚信iPad会让创造力如泉涌般多起来。“它的影响力之大，就如同给电影加入了声音或电视加上了色彩，”他认为。
Newspaper and magazine publishers are also thrilled by tablets’ potential. Their big hope is that the devices will allow them to generate revenues both from readers and advertisers. People have proven willing to pay for long-form journalism on e-readers. But these devices do not allow publishers to present their content in creative ways and most cannot carry advertisements. Skiff, a start-up spun out of Hearst, is a rare exception to this rule. Its 11.5-inch reader is large enough to show off all elements of a magazine’s design and accommodates advertising too.
报纸和杂志出版商也因为平板电脑的潜力而兴奋不已。他们{zd0}的希望就是平板电脑能让他们从读者和广告商身上都赚到钱。业已证明人们是愿意为电子阅读器上的长篇新闻付款的。但是目前这些电子阅读器还无法让出版商们以创造性地方式把他们的内容赠送出去，同时大部分电子阅读器不能刊登广告。由赫斯特公司推出的Skiff是屈指可数不墨守此归的产品。它的11.5英寸阅读器大到足以在显示杂志设计的全部内容时，还能显示广告。
非常棒，但是开关在哪儿呢？
EPA
Apple’s arrival in the tablet market means that publishers will have to develop digital content for these devices, as well as for e-readers and smart-phones. Many will prove unable or unwilling to do so themselves. That may boost firms such as Zinio, which has developed a digital-publishing model called Unity. This takes publications’ content, repurposes it for different gadgets and stores it in “the cloud”, the term used to describe giant pools of shared data-processing capacity. Users pay once for the content and can access it on various Zinio-enabled devices, increasing the chances that it will be consumed.
苹果公司进入平板电脑市场意味着出版商们不仅要为电子阅读器和智能手机订制数字内容，还必须要为这些平板电脑订制数字内容。许多出版商自身或许没有能力或者不愿这么做，这可能就促进了像Zinio这样的公司的发展。Zinio已经开发出一种叫Unity的数字出版模型。它能改变出版物的内容，以使出版物能够适合不同的小型设备，以及存储在“云端”上——术语，形容分享数据处理量的巨型共享存储池。用户给一段新闻内容付费一次后就能在不同Zinio化的设备上阅读，这增加了消费新闻内容的机会。
Apple has other ambitions for the iPad. It hopes it will become a popular gaming machine and has designed the device so that many of the games among the 140,000 apps available for other Apple products will run on it straight away. The company has also revamped its iWork suite of word-processing, spreadsheet and presentation software for the iPad in an effort to ensure that the new device will catch on with business folk.
苹果公司对iPad还有其它雄心壮志，它希望iPad会成为一款流行游戏机，而且已经设计出了驱动程序，以便其它苹果公司产品的14万种适用程序当中的游戏能够直接在iPad上运行。苹果公司还修改了iWork套装软件的文字处理，电子表格和演示软件，以示其能够迎合商业人士。
Apple’s shareholders are no doubt hoping that the iPad will live up to its billing as a seminal device in the history of computing. They have already seen the company’s share price soar. Defying the recession, on January 25th Apple announced the best quarterly results in its 34-year history, with revenues rising to $15.7 billion and profits to $3.4 billion—an increase of 32% and 50% respectively over the previous year. They will be keeping their fingers crossed that the iPad turns into another billion-dollar hit. Whether or not that turns out to be the case, Mr Jobs has already proven heroic enough to merit a portrait on the Yerba Buena Center’s walls.
作为计算机史上的创意之作，苹果公司的股东们无疑都希望iPad在赢利上能够名符其实。他们已看到公司的股价高涨了。无视于经济的衰退，1月25号苹果公司公布公司34年历史以来{zj0}的季度成绩：季度收入增加到157亿美元，利润增加到34亿美元——分别比去年增加了32%和50%。他们希望iPad好运，成为另一款日进斗金的流行产品。无论这成真与否，乔布斯先生都已经证明了一项壮举，它足以与挂在前卫艺术中心墙上的任何一幅画像相媲美。 |
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