《经济学人》双语：苹果Vision Pro头显产品，能否再次改变世界？

原文标题：
Apple
The meaning of “spatial computing”
The Vision Pro is an incredible machine. Now to find out what it is for
苹果
“空间计算 "的含义
Vision Pro是一款不可思议的设备。现在让我们去了解它的用途

Mind-goggling
难以想象

[Paragraph 1]

NO ONE SHOWS off a new gadget quite like Apple. But the device that Tim Cook unveiled on June 5th was billed as something more significant.

其他公司不会像苹果公司那样炫耀新产品。但蒂姆.库克在6月5日推出的这款设备被宣传为超级重磅产品。

The Vision Pro, a pair of sleek glass goggles, represents “an entirely new spatial-computing platform”, said Apple’s boss, comparing its launch to that of the Macintosh and the iPhone.

苹果公司的老板说，Vision Pro是一副光滑的玻璃头显，代表着 "一个全新的空间计算平台"，他把它的重要性与Macintosh和iPhone相提并论。

Apple’s message is clear: after desktop and mobile computing, the next big tech era will be spatial computing—also known as augmented reality—in which computer graphics are overlaid on the world around the user.
苹果公司透露的消息很明确：继台式机和移动计算之后，下一个科技大时代将是空间计算（也称为增强现实），是指将计算机图形覆盖在用户周围的世界上的计算技术。

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The presentation was both jaw-droppingly impressive and oddly underwhelming.
发布会演讲既令人惊叹，又平淡无奇。

The Vision is stuffed with innovations that eclipse every other headset on the market.
Vision头显独辟蹊径，使市场上所有其他头显都黯然失色。

Clunky joysticks are out, hand gestures and eyeball tracking are in.
笨重的操纵杆已经过时，手势和眼球追踪功能开始流行。

Instead of legless avatars, users get photorealistic likenesses, whose eyes also appear on the outside of the glasses to make wearing them less antisocial.
用户可以看到逼真的人物肖像，而不是无腿的照片，用户的眼睛会显示在外面，这样会更正常。

The product is dusted with Apple’s user-friendly design magic.
这款苹果产品体现了以用户为中心的设计理念。

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Yet the company had strangely uninspiring suggestions for what to do with its miraculous device.
然而，对于如何使用这款神奇的设备，苹果公司的建议毫无新意。

Look at your photos—but bigger! Use Microsoft Teams—but on a virtual screen! Make FaceTime video calls—but with your friend’s window in space, not the palm of your hand!
可以看照片--更大的照片! 使用微软视频会议--在虚拟屏幕上! 进行FaceTime视频通话--通过朋友的空间窗口，而不是您的掌上设备！"

Apple’s vision mainly seemed to involve taking 2D apps and projecting them onto virtual screens (while charging $3,499 for the privilege). Is that it?
苹果的理念似乎主要是将2D应用投影到虚拟屏幕上（同时收取3499美元的费用）。是这样吗？

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Patience. Mr Cook is right that spatial computing is a new platform, but it will take time to exploit.
耐心点。库克是对的，空间计算是一个新平台，但它需要时间来开发。

Consider the iPhone’s launch, 16 years ago. Like the Vision, its technology sparkled, but its dull initial uses were inherited from earlier platforms: make calls, write emails, browse the web, listen to music.
想想16年前iPhone的发布。与Vision头显一样，它的技术熠熠生辉，但它的初始用途也是沿袭自早期平台：打电话、写邮件、浏览网页、听音乐等。

It was years before developers found mobile computing’s killer use-cases: group chats, ride-hailing, short video, casual gaming, mobile payments and all the other things that today persuade people to spend $1,000 or more on an iPhone (whose $499 launch price in 2007 was considered shocking).
多年后，开发者才发现移动计算的极佳应用场景：群聊、叫车、短视频、休闲游戏、移动支付、以及如今有很多其他的因素促使人们花费1000美元或更多的钱购买一部iPhone（2007年当时的发售价499美元就令人震惊）。

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Other platforms have taken just as long to reach their potential.
其他平台也花了同样长的时间来挖掘潜能。

Television producers began by filming people appearing on stage. Internet pioneers started off by sharing files, before spinning the web and much more.
电视制作人从拍摄舞台上的人开始。互联网先驱们从分享文件开始，然后才开始发展出网络等等。

Apple’s own smartwatch was a damp squib until consumers decided that it was a health and fitness device. It now sells 50m watches a year.
苹果的智能手表最初并没有引起多大反响，直到消费者将其视为健康和健身设备。现在它每年卖出5000万块手表。

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No one yet knows what spatial computing’s killer use-case might be—or if it even has one, though that seems likely.
没有人知道空间计算的极佳应用场景会是什么--或者说它是否有这样的应用场景，尽管这看起来很有可能。

It could be commercial (surgeons, engineers and architects have dabbled in the tech) or educational (Apple previewed a “planetarium” in its demo) or in entertainment (Disney made a cameo with ideas for immersive cinema and sports coverage).
它可能是商业性的（外科医生、工程师和建筑师已经涉足这项技术）或教育性的（苹果在发布会上展示了 "天文馆"）或娱乐性的（迪士尼提出了沉浸式电影和体育报道的想法，并在发布会上客串了一下）。

Vision Pros could even become high-end porn goggles, if Apple relaxes its ban on such things.
如果苹果公司放宽限制，Vision Pros甚至可能成为高端色情头显。

Artificial intelligence will allow programmers to make eerily realistic content in all these categories, and many more.
人工智能将允许程序员在应用场景中制作更多更逼真的内容。

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The way to speed up this process is to get the hardware into the hands of developers—and that is the real purpose of the Vision.
加快这一进程的方法是将硬件送到开发者手中--这才是Vision的真正目的。

Apple will not sell many of the expensive first-generation units, and doesn’t care.
苹果的第一代Vision设备销量将不会很多，但它也不在乎。

Its aim is to get the product to the people who will work out what spatial computing can do. It is uniquely well placed.
它的目的是将产品交到那些能够发掘空计算潜力的人手中。苹果有得天独厚的优势。

Meta, its chief rival in the headset game, lacks Apple’s links with developers, who like making software for Apple’s best-in-class hardware (and its richest-in-class consumers).
Meta公司是苹果在头显领域的主要竞争对手，但它缺乏苹果与开发者那样的联系，开发者喜欢为苹果一流的硬件（及其最富有的消费者）开发软件。

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The flawed but extraordinary Vision shows that the technological struggle to make spatial computing a reality is being won.
有缺陷但非凡的Vision头显表明，技术上让空间计算成为现实指日可待。

The next race is to discover what it is for. Apple has just fired the starting gun.
下一场竞赛是为了发现空间计算的用途。苹果刚刚打响了起跑枪。

（恭喜读完，本篇英语词汇量661左右）
原文出自：2023年6月10日《The Economist》Leaders版块

精读笔记来源于：自由英语之路

本文翻译整理: Irene本文编辑校对: Irene
仅供个人英语学习交流使用。

【补充资料】（来自于网络）
空间计算Spatial Computing是指利用技术在物理空间中创建沉浸式和交互式体验的过程。它是一个术语，用于描述虚拟现实、增强现实和混合现实技术的融合，使用户能够在现实世界环境中与数字内容进行交互。空间计算利用一系列传感器、摄像头和其他设备来跟踪和响应用户的动作和手势，创建物理与数字世界的无缝融合。它在游戏、教育、建筑和医疗等领域都有应用。

【重点句子】（3个）
The presentation was both jaw-droppingly impressive and oddly underwhelming.
发布会演讲既令人惊叹，又平淡无奇。

Artificial intelligence will allow programmers to make eerily realistic content in all these categories, and many more.
人工智能将允许程序员在应用场景中制作更多更逼真的内容。

The flawed but extraordinary Vision shows that the technological struggle to make spatial computing a reality is being won.
有缺陷但非凡的Vision头显表明，技术上让空间计算成为现实指日可待。