乔布斯传 第491期:连点成线(2)

 By 2001 Apple had revived its personal computer offerings. It was now time to think different. 到2001年，苹果已经为自身的计算机产品做了不少创新。现在是“非同凡想”的时候了。

A set of new possibilities topped the what-next list on his whiteboard that year. 那一年，乔布斯白板上的“下一步做什么”清单中又多了一些新的可能性。

At the time, a pall¹ had descended² on the digital realm. 那时候，数字领域被蒙上了一层阴影。

The dot-com bubble had burst, and the NASDAQ had fallen more than 50% from its peak. 互联网泡沫破裂了，纳斯达克指数也比最髙时下降了超过50%。

Only three tech companies had ads during the January 2001 Super Bowl, compared to seventeen the year before. 只有3家科技公司在2001年1月的“超级碗”大赛上登了广告，而上一年这个数字是17家。

But the sense of deflation went deeper. 与此同时，通货紧缩也更加严重。

For the twenty-five years since Jobs and Wozniak had founded Apple, 自乔布斯和沃兹尼亚克创立苹果公司以来的这25年中，

the personal computer had been the centerpiece of the digital revolution. 个人计算机成为了数字革命中的核心产品。

Now experts were predicting that its central role was ending. 但是现在，专家预测它的核心地位即将结束。

It had "matured into something boring," wrote the Wall Street Journal's Walt Mossberg. 《华尔街日报》的沃尔特·莫斯伯格写道：计算机“已经衰变成了无聊的东西”。

Jeff Weitzen, the CEO of Gateway³, proclaimed, "We're clearly migrating away from the PC as the centerpiece." 捷威的CEO杰夫·韦特泽恩宣称：“我们已经明确地要改变个人计算机作为核心产品的局面。”

 

1 pall   

v.覆盖，使平淡无味；n.柩衣，棺罩；棺材；帷幕

参考例句：

• Already the allure of meals in restaurants had begun to pall.饭店里的饭菜已经不像以前那样诱人。
• I find his books begin to pall on me after a while.我发觉他的书读过一阵子就开始对我失去吸引力。

2 descended   

a.为...后裔的，出身于...的

参考例句：

• A mood of melancholy descended on us. 一种悲伤的情绪袭上我们的心头。
• The path descended the hill in a series of zigzags. 小路呈连续的之字形顺着山坡蜿蜒而下。

3 gateway   

n.大门口，出入口，途径，方法

参考例句：

• Hard work is the gateway to success.努力工作是通往成功之路。
• A man collected tolls at the gateway.一个人在大门口收通行费。