黑莓手機時代是如何終結的
The BlackBerry phone, whose tactile keyboard once made it the ultimate business gadget no self-respecting chief executive could be without, has been consigned to history by its maker.
黑莓(BlackBerry)手機制造者讓黑莓手機成爲了歷史。它的觸感鍵盤一度讓所有自視甚高的首席執行官把黑莓作爲必不可少的終極商業設備。
Devotees - from the fictional Martin Lukes to the ultimate power user President Obama - have assumed the prayer position and risked thumb strains to bang out emails on its coveted keyboard over the years, but on Wednesday, its Canadian maker finally hung up on its hardware division, after failing to rekindle the wild success of its early days.
從虛構的小說人物馬丁•盧克斯(Martin Lukes)到終極權力用戶奧巴馬總統等的擁躉曾經對黑莓頂禮膜拜，多年來冒着拇指痙攣的風險在夢寐以求的鍵盤上趕寫着郵件，但在本週三，這家加拿大製造商在未能再創早年的火爆之後，最終關停了硬件部門。
Although phones with a BlackBerry badge will continue to be sold in markets like Indonesia, and possibly China and India, they will not be made or designed by the company that bears its name.
儘管帶有黑莓標識的手機將繼續在印尼（可能還有中國和印度）市場銷售，但不會由黑莓公司製造或設計。
In effect, the BlackBerry era is over.
實際上，黑莓時代已經結束。
The days when legions of CrackBerry addicts wandered through offices with their phone jutting out of a holster on their hip while complaining about ‘BlackBerry Thumb’ from the frenetic typing of emails, are long gone.
曾幾何時，許多癮莓們後腰上挎着手機套彆着黑莓手機在辦公室裏走來走去，同時抱怨瘋狂趕寫郵件造成的黑莓拇指。這個時代早已一去不復返了。
The phone, which at the turn of the century was as much of a corporate status symbol as a shiny new Rolex or a Mont Blanc pen, lost its grip on the office as more iPhones and iPads started appearing on desks five years ago, and only the diehards have persevered.
黑莓手機在本世紀初曾和嶄新的勞力士(Rolex)手錶或萬寶龍(Montblanc)鋼筆一樣是企業地位的象徵，但隨着5年前更多的iPhone和iPad出現在了辦公桌上，如今它在辦公室裏已經失勢了，只有鐵桿用戶還在堅持用黑莓。
It has been death by a thousand cuts for the phone business under chief executive John Chen, who has slowly unwound the company’s attempts to stay relevant in the handset market.
在首席執行官程守宗(John Chen)的領導下，黑莓手機業務被凌遲處死——程逐漸地讓黑莓公司離開手機硬件市場。
Waterloo, Ontario is now a hotbed of start-ups and a thriving technology industry, but that was far from the case in 1984, when Research In Motion was founded by two engineering students, Mike Lazaridis and Douglas Fregin.
安大略省滑鐵盧市如今是初創企業的溫牀，有着蓬勃發展的科技產業，但1984年的時候絕非如此，當時兩位工程專業學生邁克•拉扎裏迪斯(Mike Lazaridis)和道格拉斯•弗雷金(Douglas Fregin)創立了RIM公司(Research in Motion)。
The tiny company started as a wireless data transmission business.
這家小公司一開始從事無線數據傳輸業務。
By the 1990s it was making point-of-sale terminals and in 1996, launched the Inter@ctive Pager, which took it into competition with Motorola, then the giant of the mobile phone sector.
到上世紀90年代，它轉而製造銷售終端機，並在1996年推出了Inter@ctive Pager，從而與當時的移動電話巨頭摩托羅拉(Motorola)展開了競爭。
The move into pagers, an unloved technology of yesteryear, paved the way for a sidestep into the growing handset market and RIM’s success anticipated the data-hungry habits of the modern smartphone user.
進軍曾遭受冷落的傳呼機領域爲公司橫跨一步邁進蒸蒸日上的手持設備市場鋪平了道路，在現代智能手機用戶形成渴求數據的習慣之前，RIM就已取得了成功。
In 1998, RIM had developed a handheld device ideal for emailing, which embedded a tiny Qwerty keyboard.
1998年，RIM開發了一款非常適合寫電子郵件的手持設備，嵌入了小巧的Qwerty鍵盤。
It was set to be called the PocketLink or MegaMail, but the technology sector’s love of fruit-based branding claimed another hit when Lexicon Branding struck on the idea that the tiny keys felt like drupelets, the pockmarks on the skin of berry fruit.
該公司本來準備將它稱爲PocketLink或者MegaMail，但科技行業喜歡用水果給品牌命名，當時品牌推廣公司Lexicon Branding想到這些按鍵就像莓類水果表面密佈的細小顆粒。
Strawberry was deemed too slow sounding for a technology brand and the name BlackBerry was born.
對一個科技品牌來說，草莓(Strawberry)念起來不太順口，於是黑莓(BlackBerry)之名誕生了。
The ability to email on the move caught fire and transformed RIM into a major player in the electronics market.
外出也能發郵件這項功能讓黑莓火了起來，並使得RIM成爲電子產品市場上的一個主要參與者。
Thumb-wheels for scrolling were added, the screens got bigger and soon a phone was added to the device, initially one that could only be used with an external headset.
黑莓設備又增加了拇指輪滾動功能，屏幕越來越大，很快又加了電話功能——最初只能利用外部耳機。
By the time the BlackBerry 6210 was issued in 2002, the device had become a must-have tool not only for business people but also consumers that loved the keyboard.
到2002年推出黑莓6210的時候，它已經不僅僅是商務人士的必備工具，而且還是喜愛全鍵盤的消費者的必備工具。
A legion of Crackberry addicts emerged.
成羣的癮莓出現了。
Nokia and Microsoft both tried to match BlackBerry’s dominance in the enterprise market, but the Canadian company was also able to trade off its speed, reliability and security as it ran its own software and servers.
諾基亞(Nokia)和微軟(Microsoft)都曾試圖爭奪黑莓在企業市場的主導地位，但這家加拿大公司在運行自己的軟件和服務器時還能利用其速度、可靠性和安全性這些優勢。
By the time that the BlackBerry Pearl, Curve and Bold models started selling by the millions, the company found itself as an unlikely star in the teenage market, with young users flocking to use its secure messaging product in a pre-WhatsApp and Snapchat era.
到黑莓的Pearl、Curve和Bold等機型開始以百萬計的數量熱賣時，該公司發現自己已成爲十幾歲年輕人市場上一顆不可思議的明星，在WhatsApp和Snapchat時代來臨之前，年輕用戶紛紛使用黑莓的安全短信產品。
Many bought those models and never bothered tapping in a phone number.
很多人購買了這些機型，但從不撥打電話號碼。
Mr Lazaridis and his co-chief executive Jim Balsillie believed the hype and would enter the stage at trade shows to the blaring tunes of the Black Eyed Peas, something unthinkable when it was solely focused on its core market of business users.
拉扎裏迪斯及其聯席首席執行官吉姆•貝爾斯利(Jim Balsillie)相信宣傳，他們會在黑眼豆豆樂隊(Black Eyed Peas)喧鬧的音樂聲中走進商業展會的舞臺——在黑莓專注於核心的企業用戶市場的時候，這種事是不可想象的。
A botched launch into the tablet market followed, as sales started to stutter and the longstanding management team moved aside in 2012.
後來黑莓在進軍平板市場時告敗，銷售額開始萎縮，長期管理團隊在2012年經歷變動。
Too much had been riding on the 2012 launch of BlackBerry 10, a new software platform and phone series, that was meant to go head-to-head with the latest iPhones and Android handsets.
黑莓把太多的賭注押在2012年黑莓10的推出，這是一個新的軟件平臺和手機系列，本意是要與最新款的iPhone和安卓手機一決雌雄的。
Hubris was evident as senior executives boasted that it had 80m subscribers and nothing to worry about.
驕傲自滿的情緒顯露無遺，黑莓高管們誇耀稱，自己擁有8000萬用戶，什麼都不用擔心。
The software flopped, the phones flopped and BlackBerry — which dropped the RIM name during this period — never recovered, as its subscriber base rapidly eroded.
結果軟件失敗了，手機也失敗了，黑莓（在此期間放棄了RIM的名字）再也沒有恢復過來，其用戶基礎迅速萎縮。
Mr Chen has thrown a huge amount of effort into reviving its fortunes in the corporate market with the giant square Passport phone — designed for architects and spreadsheet lovers — at least capturing the attention.
程守宗採取大量措施以求重振黑莓在企業市場的雄風，至少也要吸引目光。他推出了方屏大尺寸手機Passport，這款手機專爲建築師和製表愛好者設計。
He also released Android-based handsets to broaden its appeal and added a nostalgic tinge to the product line with the Classic model that recreated the Bold design.
他還發布了搭載安卓系統(Android)的手機以求增強其產品吸引力，並給產品增加了一絲懷舊色彩，Classic機型再現了Bold機型的設計。
It proved too little, too late and BlackBerry now joins the likes of Palm and Psion in the legacy brand lounge for tech hardware.
事實證明，這些努力作用太小了，也太遲了，黑莓現在已加入Palm和Psion之列，成爲科技硬件領域的歷史老品牌。
Yet like Nokia, the name BlackBerry will continue to resonate.
然而，與諾基亞一樣，黑莓這個名字仍將繼續迴響。
