【每日阅读训练第二期——速度越障3系列】【3-14】

shelvey

速度

All the world’s a game

速度一【314】
IN NOVEMBER 2010 “Call of Duty: Black Ops” was released. Fans in many countries queued round the block to get their hands on a coveted early copy. A lucky few had won tickets to invitation-only release parties which were broadcast live to viewers across the internet. The event had been advertised on billboards, buses and television for weeks. Chrysler even produced a commemorative version of its Jeep. In the event the reviews were mixed, but no matter: the publishers, Activision, notched up worldwide sales of $650m in the first five days. That made it the most successful launch of an entertainment product ever, and people kept buying. A month later the total stood at over $1 billion.
“Black Ops” is not a film or a book: It is a video game. For comparison, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2”, the current record-holder for the fastest-selling film at the box office, clocked up just $169m of ticket sales on its first weekend. “Black Ops” stole the crown from its predecessor in 2009, “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2”. The latest installment, “Modern Warfare 3”, released on November 8th, set a record of its own with $750m in its first five days.
Over the past two decades the video-games business has gone from a cottage industry selling to a few niche customers to a fully grown branch of the entertainment industry. According to PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), a consulting firm, the global video-game market was worth around $56 billion last year. That is more than twice the size of the recorded-music industry, nearly a quarter more than the magazine business and about three-fifths the size of the film industry, counting DVD sales as well as box-office receipts (see chart below). PwC predicts that video games will be the fastest-growing form of media over the next few years, with sales rising to $82 billion by 2015.
速度二【307】
Over the past two decades the video-games business has gone from a cottage industry selling to a few niche customers to a fully grown branch of the entertainment industry. According to PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), a consulting firm, the global video-game market was worth around $56 billion last year. That is more than twice the size of the recorded-music industry, nearly a quarter more than the magazine business and about three-fifths the size of the film industry, counting DVD sales as well as box-office receipts (see chart below). PwC predicts that video games will be the fastest-growing form of media over the next few years, with sales rising to $82 billion by 2015.
So who plays? The stereotypical image of the gamer—teenaged, male and probably rather nerdy— has hardly changed in 20 years. But it is no longer accurate, if it ever was. Today the average age of players in America, the biggest market, is 37, and 42% of them are female, according to the Entertainment Software Association (ESA), an American trade group. Some 72% of households in America play games of some sort, says the ESA. Even among the over-50s the share is one in three.
One explanation for this coming of age is demography. The first video-gaming generation, which grew up with games arcades and home consoles, is now entering middle age. It seemed likely that some of those who whiled away their youth playing “Space Invaders” and “Galaxias” would stick to their hobby into adulthood. But games companies, readier than other media to chase the “next big thing”, have also started looking for new audiences. In recent years they have drawn in groups such as women, the elderly and middle-aged commuters who would never describe themselves as gamers but are more than happy to play “Farmville” on Facebook or “Angry Birds” on their smartphones.
速度三【314】
The biggest market is America, whose consumers this year are expected to spend $14.1 billion on games, mostly on the console variety written for Microsoft’s Xbox 360, Sony’s PlayStation 3 or Nintendo’s Wii. Consoles also dominate in Britain, the fifth-largest gaming market. In other parts of Europe, and particularly Germany, PC games are more popular, says Peter Moore, chief operating officer of Electronic Arts, a big games publisher. “German parents tend to see console games as childish, but they think PCs have some education value,” he notes.
China is already the second-biggest market and one of the fastest-growing, with sales rising by 20% last year. The high price of consoles and rampant piracy has encouraged the development of online games, mostly played on PCs, which are easier to protect from pirates.
Japan is a law unto itself. It was the second-biggest market until China overtook it earlier this year, but the Japanese idea of fun is different from other people. Western games that sell well elsewhere tend to struggle there, says Mr. Moore, and the same is true of Japanese games in the West. Nobody really knows why. In high-tech South Korea, the fourth-largest market, PCs and online games are also popular, not least because of lingering resentment of Japanese products.
The PlayStation generation
If you had to pinpoint the moment when gaming started to move from niche to mainstream, December 3rd 1994 would be a good date to pick. That was when Sony, a Japanese consumer-electronics giant, launched its PlayStation console. Until then games-console companies, led by Sega and Nintendo, had concentrated largely on children and teenagers. Their best-known products featured the adventures of pixelated Italian plumbers and cute cartoon hedgehogs. But the PlayStation’s neat design, slick marketing and line-up of big-budget games appealed to young men in their 20s and 30s, says Piers Harding-Rolls of Screen Digest, a firm of media analysts.
速度四【267】
Another big event was the launch of Nintendo’s Wii console in 2006. This was specifically aimed at women, families and those who had never played video games before. Its user-friendly, simple design, intuitive motion-sensitive controller and light-hearted games based on fitness, sports and the sorts of puzzles found on the back pages of newspapers helped it sell 89m units, half as many again as PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360.
Now the ever-increasing computing power of mobile phones has put the means of playing games into the pockets of people who would never think of spending hundreds of dollars on a dedicated console or a PC. The simple games that came pre-loaded onto the mobile handsets of a decade ago have evolved into a subset of the industry in its own right, appealing to a more casual crowd who play them on trains, in airport departure lounges or while waiting for the washing to finish. Today’s smartphones pack far more computing power than the original PlayStation, and games are a big part of their appeal: the two most popular kinds of software on Apple’s App Store are games and entertainment.
The internet has played a crucial part in the rise of video games, enabling developers to get their products into their customers’ hands without the need for traditional shops or publishers. That has allowed small, independent developers to compete with the big firms who might spend tens of millions of dollars on developing a single title and as much again on marketing it. As a result the industry is becoming increasingly fragmented as its markets become more differentiated.
速度五【368】
The internet has also become a games platform in its own right, making the hobby truly sociable by electronically linking gamers the world over. Millions of people spend many hours each week playing and working (sometimes the distinction is not clear) in virtual places such as “World of War craft” and “EVE Online”. Hundreds of millions more play free, simple, sociable games on Facebook, such as “Lexulous”, which is a bit like Scrabble, and “Farmville”, a game with an agricultural setting. Increasingly the games themselves are free, but the virtual goods available in these online worlds—a stable for one’s electronic horses, say, or a particularly pretty shirt for one’s digital alter ego to wear—cost real money.
The video-games industry has long been dogged by accusations that violent games breed violent behavior and that its products can cause addiction. The evidence was never strong in the first place, but the shady reputation has proved hard to shake off. In fact many games do not feature any violence. With the new emphasis on more casual games, some of the most popular titles involve inoffensive pastimes such as constructing electronic cities, completing abstract logic puzzles or managing a virtual football team.
Like all media businesses, the games industry is changing fast. What makes it different from the rest is that it has welcomed change and innovation and thrived on it. It is now growing in all sorts of unexpected ways. For example, the best players can earn money (sometimes a lot of it) from “e-sports”—that is, video games played professionally, in front of a crowd. And after years of talk about an imminent “virtual reality” revolution, it is the games industry that has perfected cheap, convincing simulations of the real world. Technology pioneered by games is now being put to use in fields from military training programs to molecular biology and virtual showrooms for cars. The industry has even spawned a management technique, “gamification”, which applies the psychological principles of game design to motivating workers and engaging customers.
Yet video games are still widely regarded as trivial. This special report will argue that as the newest and fastest-growing form of mass media they deserve to be taken seriously.

越障

Difference Engine: Volt farce【1332字】

FOR General Motors, a good deal of the company’s recovery from its brush with bankruptcy is riding on the Chevrolet Volt (Opel or Vauxhall Ampera in Europe), its plug-in hybrid electric vehicle launched a year ago. Not that GM expects the sleek four-seater to be a cash cow. Indeed, the car company loses money on every one it makes. But the $41,000 (before tax breaks) Chevy Volt is a “halo” car designed to show the world what GM is capable of, and to lure customers into dealers’ showrooms—to marvel at the vehicle’s ingenious technology and its fuel economy of 60 miles per gallon (3.9litres/100km)—and then to drive off in one or other of GM’s bread-and-butter models.
So, it is no surprise that GM should bend over backwards to mollify customers concerned by recent news of the Volt’s lithium-ion battery catching fire following crash tests. GM is offering to loan cars to Volt owners worried about their vehicle’s safety while an official investigation is underway and modifications made if deemed necessary. The company has even offered to buy vehicles back from owners who have lost confidence in the technology.
There have not been many takers. As of December 5th, fewer than three dozen owners—out of 6,400 Volts sold to date in North America—had requested loan cars. And only a couple of dozen had asked for their Volts to be bought back. At a suitable price, your correspondent would have welcomed the chance to buy one of those secondhand buy-backs for himself, had they not already been snapped up by employees. Dan Ackerson, GM’s chief executive, is believed to have bought one for his wife.
The trouble all started in May, when the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) carried out a routine 20 mph (32km/h) crash test on a Volt—to simulate a sideways impact with a tree or telegraph pole followed by a rollover. Three weeks after the test, the car’s 16 kilowatt-hour battery pack caught fire in NHTSA’s car park, destroying the vehicle and several others nearby.
Shortly thereafter, both NHTSA and the carmaker repeated the side-impact and rollover test on at least two other cars, all to no effect. However, in subsequent tests—carried out in November by experts from the energy and defense departments as well as GM—the investigators deliberately damaged the battery packs and ruptured their coolant lines. One battery pack behaved normally. Another emitted smoke and sparks hours after it was flipped on its back. And a third exhibited a temporary increase in temperature, but then burst into flames a week later.
GM claims the initial fire in June would never have happened if the NHTSA's engineers had drained the Volt’s battery immediately after the impact. It is odd that they did not. When crash testing a conventional petrol-powered car, the standard procedure is to drain the fuel tank to prevent any chance of fire. It would seem reasonable to do the equivalent with an electric vehicle.
But, then, GM did not adopt a “depowering” protocol for the Volt until after the June fire. Even when it did, it failed to share the procedure with the safety agency until embarking on the November tests. In the wake of the latest findings, GM is now working with the Society of Automotive Engineers, NHTSA and other vehicle manufacturers, as well as fire-fighters, tow-truck operators and salvage crew, to implement an industry-wide standard for handling battery-powered vehicles involved in accidents.
Toyota ran into similar troubles when its Prius hybrid car was introduced over a decade ago. Though the Prius’ battery pack is considerably smaller than the Volt's, fire-fighters and other first-responders had to learn how to disarm the vehicle following an accident—by removing fuses from under the bonnet and pulling a catch beneath the rear storage area to isolate the high-voltage system. Until they had done so, they were warned, they were on no account to take a metal cutter to an overturned Prius to extricate trapped occupants. Lurking beneath the floor was a big orange cable carrying a heavy current that would have fried anyone slicing though it.
The lithium-ion cells used in the Volt’s battery pack have many virtues. They are much lighter and operate at a higher voltage than other rechargeable cells—and can therefore store more energy for a given weight. In addition, they have no “memory effect” (the tendency to accept less and less charge each time they are recharged) and can also hold their charge far longer than, say, the nickel-metal hydride cells used in the Prius. For good reason, all plug-in electric vehicles, including the Nissan Leaf and the forthcoming Ford Focus Electric plus Toyota’s long-awaited plug-in Prius, have embraced lithium-ion chemistry.
But lithium is a highly reactive element. If overcharged, physically damaged or allowed to get too hot, lithium-ion cells can experience thermal “runaway” and even explode—as has happened on numerous occasions with the lithium-ion batteries in laptop computers and mobile phones. Also, if allowed to drain completely, they can short-circuit and make recharging dangerous. For these reasons, all lithium-ion rechargeable batteries contain circuitry that shuts them down when their voltage rises above or falls below a certain level.
To help keep the Volt’s 435lb (197kg) battery pack at the right temperature, GM designed a sophisticated thermal-management system. This is separate from the main radiator system, which cools the range-extending motor-generator (a 1.4-litre petrol engine) and feeds the car’s heater. The battery pack, mounted in a T-shaped steel tray with a plastic cover, runs down the center of the vehicle.
GM believes the Volt's battery problem was caused by malfunctioning sensors rather than chemical reactions going haywire within the cells themselves. The company is currently developing fixes to make the battery’s control systems sturdier. One proposal is to laminate the electrical circuitry. Another involves beefing up the cooling lines. A third is to reinforce the tray containing the battery modules.
Outsiders note that the lithium-ion pack in the Nissan Leaf—the only other mass-produced electric car currently on sale in the United States—is encased in a rigid steel box rather than a plastic framework. The Leaf has come through its crash-testing program with flying colors. Interestingly, its battery pack manages without any additional cooling system.
Despite GM’s experience with the ground-breaking EV1 electric vehicle in the 1990s, the company still has much to learn about the public-safety issues associated with powerful batteries. For instance, both GM and NHTSA kept their mouths shut about the Volt’s initial fire for the best part of six months, claiming they needed time to assess the results and to carry out further tests. Others suspect they colluded to protect the Volt’s fragile sales. GM hoped to sell a modest 10,000 Volts in its first year, but will be lucky to achieve even three-quarters of its goal.
In November, when GM finally went public about the Volt’s fire problems, it warned owners, dealers and first-responders of the need to drain the car’s battery pack after a crash. The OnStar communications system onboard every Volt should allow the company to dispatch an engineer to drain a battery anywhere in the country within 48 hours. For its part, NHTSA has now opened a formal safety investigation into the crash-worthiness of the Volt’s battery system. Meanwhile, a congressional committee that oversees NHTSA is to hold hearings early in the new year to find out why it took nearly six months for the matter to be made public, and why the committee was not kept informed.
What is left unsaid in all this is the fact that conventional cars with a tank full of petrol are far greater fire hazards than electric cars will ever be. Some 185,000 vehicles catch fire in America each year, with no fewer than 285 people dying as a consequence. But, then, people have been living with the hazard of petrol for over a century. Irrationally, electric-vehicle fires are perceived as somehow more worrisome simply because they are new.

claireya

mark
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xeyyxzty

1'21''1'18''
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6'06''
GM's electric cars Volt
the sales of the cars are not very good.
GM even say that 他们可以给返厂的车退钱以挽回消费者的信心
the Volts'  battery may fire~
after a collision experiment, the car caught fire.
to make sure that there is a link between the fire and the test, more tests were made~there is a link between
a decade ago, a car made by Toyota also had the same problem
锂电池（？）当温度过高或者电压不稳时可能explode~
but there are many advantages, too.~it doesn't have memory effect, etc
in fact, cars with petrol catch more fires every year. but people have got used to it.
people think electric cars bad because they are new.

zz42050524

1'41
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linhan50

2'30
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linhan50

看得眼花  11'34

cindybreakaway

1'40
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讲的是GM的一款车的电池经过测试会爆炸，而且丰田的车也遭遇到同样的问题，GM后来说要改造电池，跟NXXXX串通好六个月后才公布结果，GM对已售出有问题的车进行了警告（警告啥忘了）。
最后小让步，汽油车比电池车更危险，但是汽油车还不是一直在用么，电池车有好多问题都没解决，不像它表面那样简单。

fox0923

好想去买Wii阿 ~~木钱

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很邻家

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balapupu

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