乔布斯传 第90期:伟大的艺术家窃取灵感

 "Great Artists Steal"

伟大的艺术家窃取灵感
The Apple raid on Xerox 1 PARC is sometimes described as one of the biggest heists in the chronicles of industry.
苹果公司对施乐PARC的这次技术盗窃，有时被形容为工业史上最严重的抢劫行为之一。
Jobs occasionally endorsed 2 this view, with pride.
乔布斯偶尔也会骄傲地承认这一说法。
As he once said, "Picasso had a saying:'good artists copy, great artists steal',and we have always been shameless about stealing great ideas."
他有一次说，“毕加索不是说过么：'好的艺术家只是照抄，而伟大的艺术家窃取灵感。“在窃取伟大的灵感这方面，我们一直都是厚颜无耻的。”
Another assessment 3, also sometimes endorsed by Jobs, is that what transpired 4 was less a heist by Apple than a fumble 5 by Xerox.
乔布斯认同的另一个说法是，与其说是苹果公司实施了抢劫，不如说是施乐公司自己酿下了苦果。
"They were copier-heads who had no clue about what a computer could do," he said of Xerox's management.
“他们就是一帮白痴，根本没有意识到电脑的巨大潜力。”他如此形容施乐的管理层，
"They just grabbed defeat from the greatest victory in the computer industry.
“在这场计算机产业最伟大的胜利中，他们被打败了。
Xerox could have owned the entire computer industry."
施乐本可以称霸整个计算机产业的。”
Both assessments 6 contain a lot of truth, but there is more to it than that.
以上两种说法都有道理，但并不能说明全部问题。
There falls a shadow, as T.S. Eliot noted 7, between the conception and the creation.
概念与造物之间，如同T.S·艾略特所说的“落下影子”。
In the annals of innovation, new ideas are only part of the equation.Execution is just as important.
在创新的过程中，新颖的想法只是一部分，具体执行也同样重要。
Jobs and his engineers significantly improved the graphical interface 8 ideas they saw at Xerox PARC, and then were able to implement 9 them in ways that Xerox never could accomplish.
乔布斯和他的工程师们对在施乐PARC看到的图形界面技术进行了巨大的改进，然后又以施乐永远无法实现的方式对这些技术作了进一步完善。
For example, the Xerox mouse had three buttons, was complicated, cost $300 apiece, and didn't roll around smoothly 10;
比如说，施乐的鼠标有三个按键，结构复杂，每只造价300美元，移动不够平滑。
a few days after his second Xerox PARC visit, Jobs went to a local industrial design firm, IDEO, and told one of its founders 11, Dean Hovey, that he wanted a simple single- button model that cost $15,
乔布斯在第二次造访施乐PARC之后没几天，就找到了一家当地的工业设计公司，告诉该公司的创始人之一迪安·霍维，自己想要一种简单的、只有一个按键的、造价只要15美元的鼠标，
"and I want to be able to use it on Formica and my blue jeans." Hovey complied.
“而且它要能在塑料面板和我的牛仔裤上正常使用。”霍维答应了。
The improvements were in not just the details but the entire concept.
得到提升的并不仅仅是细节，还有整个概念。
The mouse at Xerox PARC could not be used to drag a window around the screen.
施乐PARC的鼠标并不能用来在屏幕上拖拽窗口。
Apple's engineers devised an interface so you could not only drag windows and files around, you could even drop them into folders 12.
而苹果工程师们设计出的界面上，用户不仅可以任意拖拽窗口和文件，还可以将它们拖到文件夹中。
The Xerox system required you to select a command in order to do anything, ranging from resizing a window to changing the extension that located a file.
施乐的系统中，不管是调整窗口的大小还是更改文件的扩展名，用户都必须选择一条指令后才能执行操作。
The Apple system transformed the desktop 13 metaphor 14 into virtual reality by allowing you to directly touch, manipulate, drag, and relocate things.
苹果的系统将桌面的概念转化为了虚拟现实，允许用户直接触摸、操作、拖拽和移动文件。
And Apple's engineers worked in tandem 15 with its designers,with Jobs spurring them on daily
苹果的工程师和设计师每天都受到乔布斯的鞭策。
to improve the desktop concept by adding delightful 16 icons 17 and menus that pulled down from a bar atop each window and the capability 18 to open files and folders with a double click.
他们协同工作，完善了桌面概念：添加了漂亮的图标和位于窗口顶端的下拉菜单，以及双击鼠标打开文件和文件夹的功能。