乔布斯传 第138期:我们当海盗吧!(6)(在线收听

 Jobs and Belleville, along with Apple veteran Rod Holt (the guy Jobs enlisted to design the first power supply for the Apple II), flew to Japan to figure out what to do.

乔布斯和贝尔维尔,以及苹果的资深员工罗德·霍尔特(帮乔布斯设计AppleII第一款电源的人)一起飞到了日本,寻求解决问题的办法。
They took the bullet train from Tokyo to visit the Alps facility.
他们从东京乘坐高速列车前往阿尔卑斯电子公司的工厂。
The engineers there didn't even have a working prototype, just a crude model.
那里的工程师甚至连一件可以使用的样机都没有,只有一个未完工的模型。
Jobs thought it was great, but Belleville was appalled.
乔布斯觉得不错,但贝尔维尔对这种状况感到震惊。
There was no way, he thought, that Alps could have it ready for the Mac within a year.
他认为,阿尔卑斯电子公司绝不可能在一年之内将它准备就绪,然后应用到Mac上。
As they proceeded to visit other Japanese companies, Jobs was on his worst behavior.
他们又接着参观了另外几家日本公司,乔布斯的举止十分粗鲁。
He wore jeans and sneakers to meetings with Japanese managers in dark suits.
他穿着牛仔裤和运动鞋去跟那些穿深色西装的日本经理会面。
When they formally handed him little gifts, as was the custom,
他们会按照惯例,郑重地递给乔布斯一些小礼物,
he often left them behind, and he never reciprocated with gifts of his own.
但这些礼物经常被乔布斯丢在一边,他也从没有回赠礼物给对方。
He would sneer when rows of engineers lined up to greet him, bow, and politely offer their products for inspection.
成排的工程师们列队欢迎他,对他鞠躬,然后恭敬地送上自己的产品供他检查,他只会冷笑一声。
Jobs hated both the devices and the obsequiousness.
乔布斯既讨厌他们的产品,又讨厌他们的谄媚。
"What are you showing me this for?" he snapped at one stop.
“你绘我看这个干什么?”他在一家工厂的时候厉声问道,
"This is a piece of crap! Anybody could build a better drive than this."
“这就是一块垃圾!随便找个人做出来的驱动器都比这个好。”
Although most of his hosts were appalled, some seemed amused.
虽然接待方的大多数人都会对他的举止感到震惊,但有一些人似乎被他逗乐了。
They had heard tales of his obnoxious style and brash behavior, and now they were getting to see it in full display.
他们事先听说过关于他令人讨厌的作风和鲁莽行为的故事,现在亲眼见到了。
The final stop was the Sony factory, located in a drab suburb of Tokyo.
参观的最后一站是坐落在东京一处死气沉沉的郊区的索尼工厂。
To Jobs, it looked messy and inelegant. A lot of the work was done by hand.
在乔布斯看来,这家工厂很杂乱,要价也很髙,很多工作都是手工完成的。
He hated it. Back at the hotel, Belleville argued for going with the Sony disk drive. It was ready to use.
他痛恨这些。回到酒店后,贝尔维尔主张使用索尼的磁盘驱动器,因为它们已经可以直接用到Mac上了。
Jobs disagreed. He decided that they would work with Alps to produce their own drive,
乔布斯不同意,他决定跟阿尔卑斯电子公司合作,生产他们自己的驱动器,
and he ordered Belleville to cease all work with Sony.
同时命令贝尔维尔停止与索尼的一切合作。
Belleville decided it was best to partially ignore Jobs,
贝尔维尔认为最好在一定程度上忽略掉布斯。
and he asked a Sony executive to get its disk drive ready for use in the Macintosh.
他要求索尼的一名管理人员,让他们的磁盘驱动器准备好应用于麦金塔电脑上。
If and when it became clear that Alps could not deliver on time, Apple would switch to Sony.
万一阿尔卑斯电子公司无法按时供货,苹果公司就会转用索尼的产品。
So Sony sent over the engineer who had developed the drive,
于是索尼把开发这款驱动器的工程师派到了苹果公司,
Hidetoshi Komoto, a Purdue graduate who fortunately possessed a good sense of humor about his clandestine task.
他就是嘉本秀年,毕业于普渡大学,幸运的是,他对于这项秘密任务充满了幽默感。
  原文地址:http://www.tingroom.com/lesson/qbsz/354865.html