有声英语故事连载：《名人传记》之乔布斯 第57期

故事连载

 

And much to Bill and Microsoft’s credit they used that fantastic opportunity to create more opportunities for themselves.

比尔和微软抓住了机会，创造成了更多机会

Most people don’t remember but until 1984 with the Mac, Microsoft was not in the application business, which dominated by Lotus.

人们忘了微软在1984年之前根本不做应用软件，那时是Lotus的天下

 

And Microsoft took a big gamble, to write for the Mac.

微软确实很有胆量，冒险为Mac编写应用程序

And they came out with applications that were terrible.

刚开始他们的应用程序非常糟

But they kept at it and make them better. And eventually, they dominated the Macintosh application market,

但他们不断改进，最终占领了Mac的应用市场

and then used the spring board of Windows to get into the PC market with the same applications.

然后借助Windows这块跳板，打开了PC市场的大门

And now they dominated the application business in the PC space too. So they have 2 characteristics.

现在他们已经占领了PC市场，我觉得他们有两大优势：

 

I think they are very strong opportunists. And I don't mean that in a bad way.

首先，擅长捕捉机会

And two, they are like the Japanese. They just keep on coming.

其次，像日本人一样锲而不舍

And now, they were able to do that because of the revenue stream from the IBM deal.

他们起家全靠跟IBM合作

But nonetheless they made the most of it and I gave them a lot of credit for that. The only problem with Microsoft is they just have no taste.

但是他们很擅长利用机会，这一点我很佩服

They have absolutely no taste, and what that means is... I don’t mean that in a small way, I meant that in a big way in the sense that they don't think of original ideas,

微软唯一的问题是没品位，完全没有品位可言，只会一味模仿

and they don’t bring much culture into their products.

产品缺少文化和内涵，

And you say why is that important

为什么这很重要?

well, proportionally spaced fonts come from typesetting and beautiful books.

比例字体的灵感来自字体设计和精美书籍

 

That’s where one gets the idea. If it weren’t for the Mac, they would have never had that in their products.

如果没有Mac，微软永远不会想到这些

And, so I guess, I’m saddened not by Microsoft’s success. I have no problem with their success.

让我难过的并非微软的成功，我一点不嫉妒他们

They’ve earned their success, for the most part.

他们的成功基本上是靠勤奋工作换来的

I have the problem with the fact that they just make really third-rate products.

我难过的是他们做的是三流产品