It’s an App World 应用程序上瘾
- 详细资料
- 创建于 2010年8月09日
- 最后更新于 2024年5月25日
- 发布于 2012年4月30日
- 作者：Mike Lee
- 点击数：268
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Smartphone applications can help users do it all 智能手机应用程序，什么都办得到
Meet Barbara Place. She’s an appaholic. One look at her smartphone explains her condition.
芭芭拉．普莱丝是个应用程序下载狂，看看她的智能手机，就能了解她的状况。
She has an app to wake her, a few to provide the day’s news, one to check her bank account, another to make a grocery list, two to track her diet and one to get the weather. She has an app for baseball scores and an app for movie data. One app lets her program her DVR from afar. Another helps her unwind with quizzes about famous artworks. And that’s just a portion of her daily intake.
有一个应用程序负责叫她起床，有几个应用程序提供当天新闻，还有一个用来查核银行账户，另一个则用来开日常用品的购物列表，两个应用程序追踪她的饮食，一个提供天气状况。普莱丝还有一个应用程序负责棒球比数、一个提供电影信息。让她可以从远程遥控设定数字录放机是另一个应用程序的工作，还有一个会出些著名艺术品的考题，帮助她纾解身心。以上只不过是普莱丝应用程序日常使用量的一部分而已。
Such stories of dependency are growing as apps – shorthand for the ubiquitous software applications that live on iPhones, iPod Touches and an array of mobile devices running Google’s Android operating system – continue their inexorable march from cellphone novelties to virtual personal assistants.
应用程序从手机内的新鲜玩意变成虚拟个人助理，随着这股趋势变得持续锐不可当，使上述依赖成瘾的故事也愈来愈多。app是软件应用程序的英文缩写，在iPhone、iPod Touch、以及一系列使用谷歌Android操作系统的行动装置内，普遍可见。
Lots of variety 种类丰富、应有尽有
More than 100,000 apps now populate Apple’s App Store, which opened for business two years ago. Since then, more than 2 billion apps have been downloaded at prices ranging from free to $900 (for iRa, which links a phone to a surveillance camera network).
苹果的App Store专卖店两年前开始营业，目前店内的应用程序超过十万种。开业迄今，应用程序下载数量已突破二十亿次，下载价格从免费到美金九百元不等（将手机连接到监视器网络的程序iRa Pro，即为九百美元。）
Tech specialists estimate the annual app market at $2 billion.
科技专家估计，应用程序年度销售金额可达二十亿美元。
“The sea change here is that people are gradually moving away from spending time with TV and computers to their mobile devices,” say Matt Murphy, who manages the iFund– which invests in iPhone-specific app developers – for a Silicon Valley venture capital firm. “And that mobile time is increasingly less about talking and all about apps.”
麦特．墨非表示，「这个巨大转变在于人们逐渐把看电视、打计算机的时间，改花在行动装置上。」墨非在硅谷一家创投公司管理iFund，这个基金专门投资iPhone专用的应用程序开发业者，「而且使用行动装置的时间，愈来愈少是花在通话上，都是在玩应用程序。」
He points to a recent statistic showing that typical cellphone users now spend 30 percent of their 40-minutes-a-day average on data, and iPhone users spend 55 percent of their 60-minutes average on non-talking phone activities.
他指出，近来统计数字显示，一般手机用户平均每天四十分钟的使用时间中，有三成是花在非话务性质的数据上，而iPhone用户平均六十分钟的使用时间中，则有五成五是花在非通话性的活动上。
“There will be no slowing this app economy,” Murphy says. “Apps enrich our lives in ways specific to who we are.”
墨非表示，「这股应用程序经济浪潮不会迟缓下来，应用程序以个人独特的表现方式丰富了我们的生活。」
单词发音
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appaholic 应用程序下载狂 someone who is addicted to buying apps for their iPhone, iPod, or their iPad
-aholic [əˋholɪk] suf. 字尾, 表示沉湎于……的人，有……癖好的人
afar [əˋfɑr] adv. 在远方；从远方；遥远地
quizzes [ˋkwɪzɪz] n. 问答比赛（游戏）( quiz的名词复数)
intake [ˋɪn͵tek] n.〔食物﹑饮品等的〕纳入量
surveillance [sɚˋveləns] n. 监视
shorthand [ˋʃɔrt͵hænd] n. 简略的表达方式
live on something 靠……生活 to depend on something for sustenance
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Time management 时间管理
That’s scary news for Dan Wright, who’s already wrestling with his phone’s on/off switch.
对丹．赖特来说，那是个可怕的消息，因为他已经和手机开关不断在角力了。
“That’s hard for me to tell my kids to turn off their devices and pay attention at dinner when my own phone is pinging and buzzing at me constantly,” says Wright, 49, a publishing consultant from Tennessee. “I struggle. I’m married with three kids and yet it’s easy to get so carried away shopping around for the next new app. I am trying hard to turn it off.”
四十九岁的赖特是来自田纳西州的出版顾问，他表示，「当我自己的手机不断传来吵杂的短讯声时，我实在很难开口要小孩关掉行动装置，专心吃晚餐。我很挣扎，我已婚、有三个小孩，但还是很容易就沉迷于搜寻下一个上市的新应用程序，我很努力想关机。」
Part of the problem is that Wright’s mobile phone now largely takes the place of his computer. Whether he’s blogging, tweeting, Skypeing or just playing, it all happens through apps.
部分问题是出在，如今赖特的手机取代了计算机大部分的功能，不管是写部落格、在推特发文、使用Skype、甚或只是玩游戏，通通都是透过应用程序。
“My mobile device doesn’t boot up, it just comes on. I love that,” he says. “I was skeptical about the iPad, but I’m changing my thinking. It could help me move almost completely off my computer.”
「我的手机不必启动，直接就可以用，我超喜欢这一点。」赖特指出，「我之前对iPad抱持怀疑态度，但是我的想法正在改变，iPad可让我几乎完全远离我的计算机。」
A part of everyday life 融入日常生活之中
Paul Saffo, a Silicon Valley futurist, envisions a near future in which today’s home computer feels like yesterday’s brick-sized cellphone, an immobile hunk of hardware that doesn’t mesh with our always-on-the-go lives.
保罗．赛佛是硅谷未来学家，他想象不久的未来世界中，今日的家庭计算机感觉起来就像过去砖块般大小的大哥大手机，这种无法带着走的笨重硬件，与我们总是奔波忙碌的生活搭不起来。
Central to that vision is the app-loaded mobile device, which he calls “our own personal diplomats for negotiating the physical world.” The lightning-quick embrace of apps, he says, is rooted in two simple lures: ease and price.
这个愿景最重要之处就是装有应用程序的行动装置，赛佛称之为「处理真实世界问题的个人专用外交官」。他表示，应用程序瞬间爆红，是基于两项单纯的吸引力：取得容易与价格低廉。
“A one-click purchase appeals to our need for instant gratification, and the low cost means that you can buy at will,” Saffo says.
赛佛指出，「按个键就能买到，让我们的需求立即得到满足，而且低廉的价格意味着，我们可以爱怎么买就怎么买。」
In fact, with many apps priced the same as a song – 99 cents – people increasingly “treat buying an app much as they would music: It’s disposable and there’s no great regret if you don’t pick a winner,” says Tom Hume, managing director of an app developer based in England.
事实上，许多应用程序的价格和一首歌一样，才美金九角九分而已。英国一家应用程序开发公司的总经理汤姆．修摩表示，大家「对于选购应用程序的态度，愈来愈像在下载歌曲，用完可丢，如果没挑对，也不会觉得太可惜。」
单词发音
More Information
ping [pɪŋ] v. 使…叮当响; 寄發短訊(查看對方是否在線上) to make such a noise; to send an email or text message
buzz [bʌz] v.（蜂等）嗡嗡叫；（机器等）唧唧响 to make a low droning or vibrating sound like that of a bee
carry away 使激动而失去自制力; 吸引住 captivate; lose control
tweet [twit] v. 在推特上发送讯息 to post a brief comment on Twitter
boot [but] v.【计算机】开机
come on 开始
futurist [ˋfjutʃɚ͵ɪst] n. 未来学家; 未来主义者 someone who studies current trends and other information in order to advise others, especially companies, about making intelligent plans for the future
hunk [hʌŋk] n.【口】大块，大片；厚块
mesh [mɛʃ] v. 使紧密配合；使互相协调
on the go 活跃, 忙碌 constantly busy or active
embrace [ɪmˋbres] n. 指被欣然接受
appeal [əˋpil] v. 有吸引力，迎合爱好 [W][（+to）]
gratification [͵grætəfəˋkeʃən] n. 满足；满意
at will 随意地, 任意地 as one chooses or pleases
pick a winner 挑选得极好
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It’s ‘all about you’ 使用者最大
The essence of the app’s appeal is power, says Peter Sealey, an adviser to various Silicon Valley tech companies.
应用程序所具魅力的本质就在于权力，担任多家硅谷科技公司顾问的彼得．席利如是说。
“The app world is all about you,” Sealey says. “From the way we use our apps to the way they seem to spread …. by word of mouth, this represents a new level of cultural and social empowerment for the individual.”
席利指出，「应用程序的世界就是以用户为中心，不管是我们使用应用程序的方式、或是应用程序散播的方式……靠口碑，都代表了个人在文化赋权及社会赋权上都大大提升了。」
Many apps appear to provide the same sort of freedom people felt when phones first became cordless, then wireless.
电话当初先发展为室内无线电话、然后是无线手机时，人们感受到某种自由，而许多应用程序所带来的自由，似乎也很类似。
“It’s my life,” says Eli Bensky, a part-time financial planner. “I don’t go to my TV for weather anymore. And with my Kindle app, I’ve read more books in the past six months than I have in the past five years.”
兼职理财专员伊莱．班斯基表示．「它就是我生活的全部，我不再靠电视来了解天气状况，而有了kindle电子书的应用程序，我在过去六个月所读的书比过去五年读的还多。」
“It’s to the point where I’m not sure what I’d do without my apps,” he says. “I don’t see how they could get any better.”
「我已经到了『没有应用程序就不知道该怎么办』的阶段了，」班斯基说道，「我想不出应用程序还有什么进步空间。」
Dom Sagolla does.
唐姆．萨戈拉却认为应用程序还会更上一层楼。
As the web developer who helped create Twitter sees it, the true “killer app” is yet to come, and it “will be so compelling that it will make you want to go out and buy the hardware” – in other words, a $1 app driving a $400 purchase.
网页开发师萨戈拉是当年促成推特诞生的推手之一，他认为真正的「杀手级软件」尚未出现，「这种软件的魅力会强到让你想去买（行动装置）硬件。」也就是说，美金一块钱的软件能促成四百元的（行动装置）消费。
So what will that wildly irresistible app look like?
那么，这种魅力无法挡的应用程序会是什么模样？
“It will be an app that draws us all in around one single mobile device,” says Sagolla. “It will be high-quality and art-like, with the ability to be a point of conversation and learning.”
萨戈拉表示，「这种应用程序会把大家的注意力都吸引到单一行动装置上。」「它的质量绝佳、犹如艺术品般，还能成为话题与学习的焦点。」
For Place, the ultimate app already exists – whichever one most recently brightened her day. Like the time she went shopping with her mother, who’s 87.
对普莱丝而言，最好的应用软件已经出现了──如最近一次带给她无比快乐的那一个程序就是。例如她和八十七岁的妈妈去逛街的那一次。
“She was bored,” Place says. “So I pulled up a newspaper’s app, handed it to Mom and she was happy. And so was I.”
「妈妈觉得很无聊，」普莱丝说道，「所以我叫出一个看报纸的应用程序，拿给妈妈，结果她开心，我也开心。」
−by Marco R. Della Cava
单词发音
More Information
point [pɔɪnt] n. 要点；中心思想 a brief version of the essential meaning of something
whichever [hwɪtʃˋɛvɚ] pron. 无论哪个；无论哪些 no matter which
brighten (or brighten up) one’s day 使…无比快乐的 if something brightens up your day, something happens that makes you feel positive and happy all day long
单词发音
Vocabulary Focus
unwind [ʌnˋwaɪnd] v.（使）心情轻松 to relax after a period of work or anxiety
inexorable [ɪnˋɛksərəb!] adj. 【正式】不可阻挡的; 不可更改的 continuing without any possibility of being stopped
novelty [ˋnɑv!tɪ] n. 新颖的事物；新奇的经验 an object or experience that is new or unusual
statistic [stəˋtɪstɪk] n. 统计量；统计数值 information based on a study of the number of times something happens or is present, or other numerical facts
wrestle with 斗争，搏斗[（+with）] to try very hard to deal with a difficult problem or decision
boot up 开机; 启动 when a computer becomes ready for use by getting the necessary information into its memory; to begin operating; to start up one's computer/mobile device
lure [lʊr] n. 吸引力；魅力the quality that something has that makes it attractive
empowerment [ɪmˋpaʊɚmənt] n. 授权；许可 the freedom, ability or power to do something
compelling [kəmˋpɛlɪŋ] adj. 引人入胜的; 难以抗拒的; 令人信服的 forceful and persuasive
wildly [ˋwaɪldlɪ] adv. 疯狂地 in an uncontrolled way