蘋果速朽，谷歌永存？
????
|
??? 自從谷歌(Google)提出以32億美元收購托尼?法戴爾的智能家居公司Nest Labs以來的一周里，外界做出了許多褒貶不一的評論。 ????在轉向WiFi無線連接的家用電器之前，法戴爾最出名的身份是蘋果（Apple）iPod部門的主管。因此，上周的新聞自然引發了一場有關蘋果和谷歌這兩家公司各自的核心是什么的討論。 ????媒體援引最多的評論很可能是最沒有經過仔細考慮的。史蒂夫?喬布斯的傳記作者沃爾特?艾薩克森周四上午在消費者新聞與財經電視頻道（CNBC）受邀對上周發生的兩起重大新聞事件發表意見，也就是中國移動版iPhone正式上市以及谷歌收購Nest。他當時隨口說道：“如今世界上最偉大的創新并不是來自于蘋果，而是來自于谷歌。”這種觀點顯然不對蘋果狂熱愛好者的胃口。專注于蘋果公司的新聞網站MacDailyNews發布的新聞標題寫道：“史蒂夫?喬布斯乏味傳記的抄寫員認為谷歌比蘋果更具創新精神，因為谷歌收購了一家溫度調節器公司。” ????上周五，在意外技術播客網站（Accidental Tech Podcast）上，約翰?斯拉庫薩提出了可能是最具大災變意味的看法。他說，谷歌一直在利用它從大家的gmail郵箱、安卓手機、谷歌搜索以及在YouTube視頻網站上的愛好等來源收集到的信息干壞事，危險不在于谷歌可能會利用它從大家家里收集的數據干出更壞的事情來。他說，真正的危險在于，大家在谷歌服務器里的信息最終不可避免地落入真正的壞蛋手中。 ????但是，最深思熟慮的評論來自于市場調研公司Asymco創始人霍利斯?德迪歐（經常都是這樣）。 ????德迪歐是克萊頓?克里斯滕森提出的顛覆理論的一位研究者，一直在尋找一家公司的“為什么”——它的經營模式、價值、指導原則。谷歌是一塊難啃的骨頭，因為它的既定原則“不作惡”——太不明確，因此毫無用處；而它的經營模式——銷售廣告——在很大程度上又跟它揚名立萬的本事，也就是免費提供有價值的互聯網服務，沒有聯系。 ????德迪歐寫道，在許多人眼里，谷歌就是互聯網。 ????“我們不懷疑互聯網的生存，所以我們并不懷疑谷歌的生存——它的支柱，它的索引，以及它無處不在的廣告，這些業務以某種方式讓谷歌持續運營下去，我們認為谷歌就是基礎設施。我們不會詳述電網是否容易受到影響，或者燃料供應或天氣是否容易受到影響，道理是一樣的。” ????相比之下，蘋果總是被華爾街視為“緩期執行的暫時享受”。他寫道，世上并不存在所謂的“谷歌喪鐘計時器”，但蘋果喪鐘計時器確實存在。世上也不存在“谷歌在劫難逃”的比喻。 ????“如果一位谷歌高管辭職或者被解雇，投資者不會感到恐慌。如果一款產品被撤回，投資者不會感到悲哀。沒有哪位記者會靠挖掘谷歌的陰暗面來追求普利策獎。” ????他寫道，谷歌被看作是一個體系，由一個仁慈的三人領導小組（拉里?佩奇，謝爾蓋?布林，埃里克?施密特）擁有，而且作為一項公益事業來經營。蘋果可能也被看作是一個體系——或許作為一個永久的顛覆機器，但這并不是外界普遍認同的看法。 ????“因為（蘋果）不是一個體系，”德迪歐推斷說。“它是脆弱的。它是一個人，或者一個想法，或者一款產品，或者解決某個問題的一個關鍵。它最終不能永生。唯一存在爭論的地方在于，它什么時候會消亡。而預計蘋果會很快、而不是很晚才會消亡的人是不無道理。 ????“但如果蘋果是一個體系的話會如何呢？而如果谷歌是一個人（或三個人）的話又會如何呢？” ????現在，這些都不是可能會在CNBC上提出的問題，也不是在CNBC能夠得到答復的問題。（財富中文網） ????譯者:iDo98 ???? |
????There's beena lot of commentary -- good and bad -- in the week since Google (GOOG) made its $3.2 billion bid for Tony Fadell's Nest Labs. ????Fadell was best known, before he moved into WiFi-connected appliances, for running Apple's (AAPL) iPod division. So last week's news naturally led to a conversation about Apple and Google and what -- at its core -- each company is about. ????The remark that got the most play in the media was probably the least considered. Steve Jobs' biographer Walter Isaacson, pressed on CNBC Thursday morning to comment on the two big news events of the week -- the iPhone's launch on China Mobile and Google's purchase of Nest -- casually remarked that "the greatest innovation in the world today right now" is coming not from Apple but from Google. That did not sit well with Apple aficionados. Headline on MacDailyNews: "Scribe of flavorless Steve Jobs biography thinks Google is 'more innovative' than Apple because Google bought a thermostat company." ????On Friday's Accidental Tech Podcast John Siracusa offered what may be the most apocalyptic view. The risk, he said, is not that Google will do something more evil with data from inside your home than it does now with all the information it's already collected from your gmail, your Android phone, your Google searches, your taste in YouTube videos etc. The real danger, he said, comes when the information about you in Google's servers eventually, inevitably, falls into the hands of actual evil doers. ????But the most thoughtful commentary came, as it often does, from Asymco's Horace Dediu. ????Dediu, a student of Clayton Christensen's disruption theory, is always looking for the "why" of a company -- its business model, its values, its guiding principles. Google is a tough nut to crack because its stated principle -- "don't do evil" -- is too vague to be of any use, and its business model -- selling advertising -- is largely disconnected from what it is known for: Providing valuable Internet services for free. ????For a lot of people, Dediu writes, Google is the Internet. ????"We don't question the survival of the Internet so we don't question the survival of Google — its backbone, its index, and its pervasive ads which, somehow, keep the lights on. We believe Google is infrastructure. We don't dwell on whether electric grids are vulnerable, or supplies of fuel, or the weather!" ????Apple, in contrast, is always seen by Wall Street as "temporarily enjoying a stay of execution." There is no "Google death knell counter," he writes, as there is for Apple. There is no "Google is doomed" trope. ????"If an executive from Google quits or is fired there is no investor panic. If a product is withdrawn there is no mourning. There are no journalists pursuing Pulitzer prizes by describing some seamy underside of Google." ????Google, he writes, is viewed as a system, owned and run as a public good by a benevolent triumvirate (Larry Page, Sergei Brin, Eric Schmidt). Apple might also be viewed as a system -- as a perpetual disruption machine, perhaps -- but that's not the conventional wisdom. ????"Because [Apple is] not a system," Dediu concludes, "it's fragile. It's a person, or an idea, or a product or a singular 'key' to something. It is, ultimately, mortal. The only debate is when it will die and points are earned for calling it sooner rather than later. ????"But what if Apple were a system? And what if Google were a person (or three?)" ????Now those aren't questions likely to get asked -- or answered -- on CNBC. |
最新文章