离开乔布斯的苹果真心无力续航?

Confession: I was one of the more than 200 sources Yukari Iwatani Kane interviewed for Haunted Empire, the new book about Apples transition from Steve Jobs to Tim Cook that arrived Tuesday to largely negative reviews.首先要交代一下，由于《困境中的帝国：后乔布斯时代的苹果》(Haunted Empire: Apple After Steve Jobs)一书的缘故，尤加利伊瓦塔尼凯恩早已拒绝接受了200多次专访，我意味着是其中之一。这本新书描写了在后乔布斯时代，由蒂姆库克接掌的苹果公司(Apple)到底再次发生了哪些变化。这本书上周二一面市立刻遭遇了大量的负面评价。Ive known since last summer -- and agreed to keep silent about -- the arc of her story. Kane told me in July that she went into the two-year project thinking that if any company could survive the loss of its visionary leader, Apple (AAPL) could. But she came out of it concluding that the companys best days were behind it. Far behind. Not even Jobs, she said, could restore Apple to its former greatness. Tim Cook, his handpicked successor, didnt have a chance.早于在去年夏天，我就告诉了她的故事梗概，但我仍然信守保持沉默的允诺。

凯恩在7月份告诉他说道，她在启动这个为期两年的文学创作计划时指出，如果只有一家公司需要在丧失有远见的领导者之后之后存活下去，那就是苹果公司。但写完这本书后，她得出结论一个结论：这家公司最巅峰的岁月早已过去了。一去不复返。她说道，就算乔布斯死而复生，他也无法率领苹果公司再现昔日荣耀，更加遑论他特地挑选出的接班人蒂姆库克。

I was intrigued. I knew Kanes byline from the three years she spent covering Apple from the Wall Street Journals San Francisco bureau, where she scored some impressive scoops. Chief among them: The front-page news (reported with Joann Lublin) that Steve Jobs had a secret liver transplant in the spring of 2009. This was a reporter who knew how to follow a chain of sources from the periphery of a story to its center. If she had the goods about Apple in the post-Jobs era, I was eager to see them.我很奇怪。我对凯恩的理解源于她在《华尔街日报》(Wall Street Journal)旧金山分社工作期间对苹果公司持续3年的追踪报道，其中少有一些令人印象深刻印象的独家新闻，其中最知名；大科那篇头版新闻（与乔安卢布林合作），曝光史蒂夫乔布斯曾在2009年春天做到过一次秘密的肝脏移植手术。

这是一位告诉如何跟踪线索链，从一个故事的外围往返核心的记者。如果她掌控了一些关于后乔布斯时代的苹果公司的干货，我很想要一睹为快。

Ive read the book. And Im sorry to say that it doesnt deliver.我早已读过了这本书。十分难过，我实在它过于好。There is some good reporting in the first third -- the part that covers the last three years of Jobs life. But as the Guardians Charles Arthur points out, the last two thirds are infected with an almost toxic bias, a kind of writerly tick that turns everything Kane sees and hears into further evidence that Apple is doomed.《困境中的帝国》的前三分之一主要描写乔布斯最后三年的生活，写出得还不俗。但正如《卫报》(the Guardian)的查尔斯亚瑟所认为的那样，这本书的后三分之二弥漫着一种完全具有毒性的种族主义。

凯恩用一种精致的文学创作手法，把她看见和听见的一切都转化成为突显苹果公司逃不过告终宿命的证据。Ultimately, Kanes attitude undermines her credibility as a reporter. The book is peppered with conclusions that feel like they were reached before the facts were in.最后，凯恩的这种态度毁坏了她作为一位记者的信誉。

书中夹杂的结论让人实在她还没列出、分析事实，就先入为主地下了定论。A decline was inevitable, she writes in her Epilogue, painting Apples rise and fall in mythical terms:“衰败不可避免，”她在后记中写到，并使用神话体刻画了一番苹果公司的兴衰史：The story follows an archetypal pattern—a pattern familiar in both history and myth. A struggling empire, on the brink of dissolution, recalls one of its founders from exile and casts him as a savior. The ruler, ruthless and cunning as Odysseus, gathers the faithful and emboldens them to take startling risks that allow the empire to reach even greater heights than before. Amid the celebrations, the emperor grows sick. Knowing that he is the living embodiment of his kingdoms fortunes, he tries to hide his illness until he is finally forced to accept that he is not immortal. Left to carry on in his name, the emperors lieutenants fall prey to complacency and confusion, lapsing into disarray and paralysis. Bound to the way things have always been done, these new leaders become less flexible and ignore the warning signs. Their emperor is gone, but ever present. Though they are still at war with enemy armies, these lieutenants cannot find their own way forward. They are tired. They are uncertain. The well of ingenuity has run dry.这个故事遵循着一个在历史和神话中少见的模式。一个陷入困境、深陷解体的帝国解任了一位独自流亡海外的创始人，把他封为救世主。这位有如奥德修斯般无情和阴险的统治者将忠心的部下们开会在一起，鼓舞他们大胆冒险，放手一搏。

这个帝国迅速就步入了前所未有的巅峰岁月。随后，被一片祝贺声围困的皇帝生病了。

皇帝自知他自己是帝国命运的生动象征物，于是就尝试着掩盖自己的病情，直到他再一不得不拒绝接受一个事实：他不是长生不老的神仙。皇帝归天后，以他之名沿袭帝国事业的副官们堕入了可笑和迷茫之中，整个帝国旋即乱作一团，倒下。这些束缚于昔日运营方式的新任领导人显得不那么灵活性，忽视了至此经常出现的警告信号。

皇帝早已总有一天地离开了他们，但他的魂魄仍然无处不在。尽管这些副官依然在与敌军登陆作战，但他们无法靠自己修筑一条前进的道路。

他们累官了，对一切都不那么确认。巧夺天工的创新之源早已干枯。She may be right. But the fact is we dont actually know. And because Yukari Kane didnt manage after two years of reporting to get to the center of the story, neither does she.她说道的有可能到底。

但事实是，我们显然不告诉苹果公司未来的命运。由于凯恩花费两年时间也没能到达故事的核心，她只不过也不告诉。Serious students of Apple Inc. may want to read this book for the fresh details she adds to the growing literature on the subject. But there are three other recent books theyll want to read first:阐述这个主题的著作有如汗牛充栋，而且数量还在大大快速增长。

那些正在严肃研究苹果公司的人们也许期望在这本书中寻找凯恩发掘出的新鲜细节。但我建议他们还是再行读读近期出版发行的另外三本著作：Walter Isaacsons Steve Jobs, for its unparalleled access to the books reclusive subject.沃尔特艾萨克森的《乔布斯传》(Steve Jobs)。

引荐理由：对于这位深居简出的主人公，作者的认识次数和理解程度是其他人望尘莫及的。Adam Lashinskys Inside Apple, for what he learned about the companys internal structure.亚当拉辛斯基的《苹果解密》(Inside Apple)。引荐理由：作者对这家公司内部结构展开了深入分析。

Leander Kahneys Jony Ive, for what it reveals about Apples processes for creating new products.利恩德卡尼的《乔纳森艾维》(Jony Ive)。引荐理由：这本书透露了苹果公司建构新产品的流程。

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