The dream of the personal computer
PC之梦（陈继龙 编译）
Jul 27th 2006
From The Economist print edition
NOT many 25-year-olds can reasonably claim to have changed the world. The IBM personal computer, which was launched in 1981 and celebrates its 25th birthday in August, is a raree_______①.Other personal computers had been launched before; but it was the IBM PC that ended up defining the standard around which a vast new industry thencoalesced[1].IBM, the titan of the computing world at the time, quickly lost control of its own creation, allowing others to reap the benefits.（1）But leave aside what the PC has done for the fortunes of particular companies, and instead step back and consider what the PC has done for mankind.
没有多少25岁的人或者公司可以理智地断言自己改变了这个世界。IBM个人电脑（PC）是个特例，它1981年投放市场，今年8月将迎来25周年庆。早前也有其它的PC投放市场，但最终确立PC标准的则是IBM，随后这一标准便成为一个庞大的新产业结合点。作为当时计算机领域的巨头，IBM很快就对自己的成果失去了控制，使得其它公司从中受益。但是，我们姑且不论PC给个别公司所带来的财富，先退一步想想PC为人类所做的贡献。
The PC's most obvious achievement has been to help make computers cheaper, more widely available and more useful than ever before. Before it appeared, different computers from differentm________②were mostly incompatible with each other. （2）The PC's architecture was not perfect, but its adoption as an industry standard made possible economies of scale in both hardware and software. This in turn reduced prices and enabled the PC to democratise computing.
[replyview]PC最显著的成就在于使得计算机比以前更便宜、更普及、更有用了。在PC面世之前，不同生产商制造的不同计算机大都互不兼容。PC的结构设计并不完美，但作为一种产业标准，它的采用让软硬件方面的规模经济成为可能，从而也降低了价格，使得PC可以实现计算机大众化。
It is also worth celebrating the innovation that has beenunleashed[2]by the PC. Its flexible, general-purpose architecture has made it the platform on which new technologies, from voice-over-internet calling to peer-to-peer file-sharing, have been incubated. Most important of all, the PC has, in the past decade, turned primarily into a communications device, thanks to the rise of the internet. （3）Cheap, fast global communication, online commerce, the ability to find the answer to almost any question on the web using a search engine and the many other wonders of the internet are all underpinned[3] by the widespread availability of inexpensive, powerful PCs.
[replyview]同样值得庆祝的还有，PC为创新打开了局面。它灵活多用的结构设计使其成为互联网对话和点对点文件共享等新技术的开发平台。最为重要的是，由于互联网的发展，PC在过去十年里已经开始变成一种通讯设备。廉价而快捷的全球通讯、在线商务、可以使用搜索引擎在网上找到几乎所有问题答案以及其它许多互联网奇迹，都是以价格不高、功能强大的PC的普及应用作为支撑的。
But although the PC has itsm______③,it also has its faults. （4）Its flexibility has proved to be both a strength and a weakness: it encourages innovation, but at the cost of complexity, reliability and security.And for people in the developing world, PCs are too bulky, expensive and energy-hungry. When it comes to extending the benefits of digital technology—chiefly, cheap and easy access to information—to everyone on the planet, the PC may not be the best tool for the job.
[replyview]不过，PC有其优点，也有其缺点。事实已经证明，它的灵活适用性可谓有利有弊——促进了创新，却失去了复杂性、可靠性和安全性。而且，对于发展中国家的人来说，PC体积过大，价格不菲，且耗电量多。如果就数字技术带给这个星球上所有人的好处——主要是获取信息既便宜又容易——而言，PC也许并非最好的工具。
Look on the streets of almost any city in the world, however, and you will see people clutching tiny, pocket computers, better known as mobile phones. Already, even basic handsets have simple web-browsers, calculators and other computing functions. Mobile phones are cheaper, simpler and more reliable than PCs, and market forces—in particular, the combination of pre-paid billing plans and microcredit schemes—are already putting them into the hands of even the world's poorest people. （5）Initiatives to spread PCs in the developing world, in contrast, rely on top-down funding from governments or aid agencies, rather than bottom-up adoption by consumers.
[replyview]然而，站在世界上几乎任何一个城市的大街上，你都将看到人们手持极小的袖珍计算机，也就是手机。就连一些基本配置的手机都已经拥有简单的网络浏览器、计算器和其它数据处理功能。手机比PC便宜，操作简单，也更为可靠。而且，市场力量——尤其是预付费设计和小额存款方案——已经把手机带到了世界上最贫穷的人的手中。与手机不同的是，PC能在发展中国家得到普及，则主要依靠政府或援助机构自上而下的专项资助，而非消费者自下而上的（自主）选用。
Merchants in Zambia use mobile phones for banking; farmers in Senegal use them tom_______④prices; health workers in South Africa use them to update records while visiting patients. All kinds of firms, from giants such as Google to start-ups such as CellBazaar, are working to bring the full benefits of the web to mobile phones. （6）There is no question that the PC has democratised computing and unleashed innovation; but it is the mobile phone that now seems most likely to carry the dream of the “personal computer” to its conclusion.
[replyview]赞比亚商人用手机存款，塞内加尔农民用手机监控价格，南非卫生工作者访视患者时用手机更新记录。各种各样的公司，包括像Google这样的巨头和CellBazaar之类的小公司，无不在努力将所有网络优势整合到手机上。毫无疑问，PC使计算机变得大众化，并为创新打开了局面，而现如今成就PC梦想的却似乎最有可能是手机。
[QUIZ]
1. 根据上下文和英文释义，完成单词：
①e________（n. something or someone that is not included in a general statement or does not follow a rule or pattern）
②m________（n. a company that makes large quantities of goods）
③m________（n. an advantage or good feature of something）
④m________（v. to carefully watch and check a situation in order to see how it changes over a period of time）
2. 英译汉（将划线部分英文翻译成中文）：
[NOTES](LONGMAN)
1. coalesce v. （into/with）（事物或观点）结合，接合
2. unleash v.发泄，放纵；给狗解开皮带
3. underpin v.巩固；支撑，支持
[KEY TO QUIZ]
[replyview]1. ①exception 例外 ②manufacturers（maker， producer）制造商 ③merits 优点 ④monitor 监控
2.（见译文，仅供参考，欢迎指正）
