乔布斯传之节选38

Cinderella

from Chapter 38

The tablet project got a boost in 2007 when Jobs was considering ideas for a low-cost netbook computer. At an executive team brainstorming session one Monday, Ive asked why it needed a keyboard hinged to the screen; that was expensive and bulky. Put the keyboard on the screen using a multi-touch interface, he suggested. Jobs agreed. So the resources were directed to revving up the tablet project rather than designing a netbook.

The usual excitement that Jobs was able to gin up for a product launch paled in comparison to the frenzy that built for the iPad unveiling on January 27, 2010, in San Francisco. The Economist put him on its cover robed, haloed, and holding what was dubbed “the Jesus Tablet.” The Wall Street Journal struck a similarly exalted note: “The last time there was this much excitement about a tablet, it had some commandments written on it.”

As if to underscore the historic nature of the launch, Jobs invited back many of the old-timers from his early Apple days. More poignantly, James Eason, who had performed his liver transplant the year before, and Jeffrey Norton, who had operated on his pancreas in 2004, were in the audience, sitting with his wife, his son, and Mona Simpson.

Jobs did his usual masterly job of putting a new device into context, as he had done for the iPhone three years earlier. This time he put up a screen that showed an iPhone and a laptop with a question mark in between. “The question is, is there room for something in the middle?” he asked. That “something” would have to be good at web browsing, email, photos, video, music, games, and ebooks. He drove a stake through the heart of the netbook concept. “Netbooks aren’t better at anything!” he said. The invited guests and employees cheered. “But we have something that is. We call it the iPad.”

With his final slide, Jobs emphasized one of the themes of his life, which was embodied by the iPad: a sign showing the corner of Technology Street and Liberal Arts Street. “The reason Apple can create products like the iPad is that we’ve always tried to be at the intersection of technology and liberal arts,” he concluded. The iPad was the digital reincarnation of the Whole Earth Catalog, the place where creativity met tools for living.

枫林海

在2007年，乔布斯在考虑设计一款新型的低成本的笔记本电脑时，意外的促进了平板电脑的发展、在某次周一的执行团队的主干会议上，艾弗问道，为什么我们需要在屏幕边上设计上一个键盘呢？那样坐既昂贵又略显笨重，为何不在屏幕上设计出这样的一个利用多点触控界面的屏幕键盘呢、乔布斯同意了他的这个观点，并且这项提议直接加速了平板电脑的发展、
  通常能使人兴奋的就是乔布斯能够在与其他产品的强烈对比中推出一款新的产品、就这样，在2010年的1月27日，iPad在旧金山面世了、在《经济学家》上面，他穿着礼服、头顶光环，手持基督平板电脑--iPad、华尔街日报同时也受其影响高度的赞扬：关于平板，这将会是最后一件令人兴奋的事，并且今后将会有更多的戒律清规被书写、
  犹如是强调这一产品的历史意义一样，乔布斯也请来了许多那个“苹果年代”的亲身参与者们、这其中包括了一年前刚进行了肝脏移植手术的詹姆斯 伊森，还有在2004年进行了胰腺手术的，与妻子、儿子以及辛普森 莫娜坐在一起的杰弗里 诺顿、
  乔布斯经常做一些细致精巧的工作：往一个概念里注入一个新的策略，就像他三年前对iPhone所做的一样、这一次在他背后的屏幕上显示着在iPhone和便捷电脑中间画有一个问号、这个问题就是在这两者之间是否存在着关联呢？“比如说，这些关联必定是对网页浏览器、电子邮件、图片、视频、音乐、游戏以及电子书上是有益的”、并且他在这个这个平板电脑的核心部件上加大了投入、“平板电脑并不是最好的，”他说，“但是我们只要拥有它便足够了，我们称之为iPad、”那些来宾与员工们都欢呼着、
  随着幻灯片的结束，乔布斯所注重的他生命中的一个重要主题，被一个科技和自由艺术所结合的象征——iPad所呈现出来、“苹果之所以能够像iPad一样创造产值的原因是因为我们一直都尽力的融合科技和自由艺术”他总结道、iPad是整个地球目录的数字化身，也是创意与实用工具相遇的地方、