What technological advances do you see coming over the next five to 10 years? and how is NeXTSTEP structured to take advantage of those?

未来五到十年内你认为会有哪些技术进步？NeXTSTEP 是如何构建以利用这些进步的？

I'll give you a global answer. Then we can descend into some details. I believe that you can use the concept of technology windows opening, and then eventually closing. And what I mean by that is, enough technology, usually from fairly diverse places, comes together, and makes something that's a quantum leap forward possible.

我会给你一个总体的回答。然后我们可以深入一些细节。我相信你可以使用技术窗口开启然后最终关闭的概念。我的意思是，足够的技术，通常来自相当多样化的地方，汇聚在一起，使得某种飞跃成为可能。

And it doesn't come out of nowhere. If you poke around the labs, and you hang around the Media Lab here at MIT and other places, you can, kind of, get a feel for some of those things. And usually, they're not quite possible. But, all of a sudden, you start to sense things coming together, and the planets lining up, to where this is now possible, or barely possible. And a window opens up.

这并不是凭空而来的。如果你在实验室里四处探查，或者在麻省理工学院的媒体实验室和其他地方逗留，你可以大致感受到其中的一些东西。通常来说，这些东西并不是完全可行的。但突然间，你开始感觉到事情在逐渐成形，行星开始对齐，这一切变得可能，或者勉强可能。然后，一个窗口打开了。

And it usually takes around— my experience anyway, my life has been, it takes around five years to create a commercial product that takes advantage of that technical window opening up.

通常需要大约——根据我的经验，我的生活是，创造一个利用那个技术窗口开放的商业产品大约需要五年。

Sometimes you start before the window is quite open. And you can't get through it. And you push it up. And you push it up. Sometimes it just takes a lot of work, took that long with the Apple II, took that long with the Mac. You know, it took a Lisa along the way, $100 million. It takes a while. It's a expensive to push those windows open.

有时候你在窗口还没完全打开的时候就开始了。你无法通过它。你不断地推它。你不断地推它。有时候这确实需要很多努力，Apple II 花了那么长时间，Mac 也花了那么长时间。你知道，Lisa 也花了 1 亿美元。需要一段时间。推开这些窗口是很昂贵的。

And in our case, you know, our first product failed. We came out with this cube. And we sold 10,000 of them. Why? Because we weren't quite there yet. And we made some mistakes along the way. And we had to course correct.

在我们的案例中，你知道，我们的第一个产品失败了。我们推出了这个立方体。我们卖出了 10,000 个。为什么？因为我们还没有完全准备好。在这个过程中我们犯了一些错误。我们不得不进行调整。

You know, Macintosh was a course correction off the Lisa. So with Apple II and III, we did it in reverse. It takes around five years, or some number of years like that, to realize that window opening. And then it seems to take about another five years to really exploit it in the marketplace.

你知道，Macintosh 是对 Lisa 的一个修正。因此，在 Apple II 和 III 上，我们是反向操作。大约需要五年，或者类似的几年，才能意识到那个窗口的开启。然后似乎又需要大约五年才能在市场上真正利用它。

And let me give you some examples. from my life. Apple II lasted 15 years, 15 years. The hardware churned. But basically, it was the same for 15 years. DOS—you know, DOS, just passed 10 years. I don't think anyone would disagree that it's going to easily last another five, right—unfortunately.

让我给你一些例子，来自我的经历。苹果 II 持续了 15 年，15 年。硬件更换了。但基本上，它在 15 年里都是一样的。DOS——你知道，DOS，刚过了 10 年。我想没有人会不同意它很容易再持续五年，对吧——不幸的是。

And Mac, you know, Mac is eight years old, right? No question it's going to last another four or five years, right? These things are hard. They don't last because it's convenient, or even because it's economic. They last because they're really—this is hard stuff to do.

而 Mac，你知道，Mac 已经八岁了，对吧？毫无疑问，它还会再用四五年，对吧？这些东西很坚固。它们之所以耐用，不是因为方便，甚至也不是因为经济实惠。它们之所以耐用，是因为这真的是很难做到的。

And so when we are pushing that window open, I think with our current generation of products, we finally got the window open. After six years, it's open. We've got an extremely elegant implementation. And we've got five years of work to do to exploit it in the marketplace.

所以当我们推开那个窗口时，我认为凭借我们当前一代的产品，我们终于把窗口打开了。经过六年，它终于打开了。我们有一个极其优雅的实现。我们还有五年的工作要在市场上利用它。

You know, we'll peak in five years. Five years, we'll all sit around, and say, OK, it's time to get started on the next thing. It's time to get going on the next thing—maybe four years from now. But we've got a lot of work ahead of us just to move this thing out, and educate the market, and continue to refine it based on market feedback.

你知道，我们将在五年内达到巅峰。五年后，我们都会坐在一起，说，好吧，是时候开始下一个事情了。是时候开始下一个事情了——也许是四年后。但我们还有很多工作要做，才能推动这个项目，教育市场，并根据市场反馈继续完善它。

So everything I know about technology windows that are open, or just about open, is in NeXTSTEP, or we're working on it in the labs. And these things generally don't come along independently. They, kind of— clumps of them come together, has been my experience.

所以我所知道的关于技术的所有信息，关于开放或即将开放的窗口，都在 NeXTSTEP 中，或者我们正在实验室中进行研究。这些东西通常不会独立出现。根据我的经验，它们往往是成群结队地出现的。

So the things that aren't in there right now that I can talk about, there's some video stuff that's really interesting, that's going to be integrated in. There some security stuff that's really fascinating that's integrating in. But most of the core technologies in there—products are getting smaller and portable. Products are getting much, much faster. But these things are well known.

所以现在没有提到的一些事情，我可以谈谈，有一些非常有趣的视频内容将会被整合进来。有一些非常吸引人的安全技术也在整合中。但大多数核心技术已经在里面——产品变得更小、更便携。产品变得快得多。但这些事情都是众所周知的。

You know, the products that we can put on—that we can give to you in the next year or two are going to be running at speeds that I find hard to believe. And I've been doing this for a while. So I think the windows open.

你知道，我们可以在接下来一两年内提供给你的产品将以我难以置信的速度运行。我已经做这个有一段时间了。所以我认为机会来了。

And I think object-oriented technology is the biggest technical breakthrough I have seen since the early '80s, with the graphical user interfaces. And I think it's bigger, actually. It will prove to be bigger over time. Yes?

我认为面向对象技术是自 80 年代初图形用户界面以来我所见过的最大的技术突破。而且我认为它实际上更大。随着时间的推移，它将被证明更大。是吗？

WARREN BUFFETT: We generally look at businesses — we feel change is likely to work against us. We do not have great ability — we do not think we have great ability to predict where change is going to lead.

WARREN BUFFETT：我们通常看业务——我们觉得变化很可能对我们不利。我们并不具备——我们不认为自己具备预测变化将把事情带向何处的强大能力。

We think we have some ability to find businesses where we don’t think change is going to be very important.

Now, at a Gillette, the product is going to be better 10 years from now than now, or 20 years from now than 10 years from now. You saw those earlier ads going back to the Blue Blade and all that. The Blue Blade seemed great at the time. But they keep — the shaving technology gets better and better.

拿 Gillette 来说，10 年后产品会比现在更好，20 年后会比 10 年后更好。你们看过早期广告，从 Blue Blade 起一路演进。Blue Blade 在当时看起来很棒。但他们一直——剃须技术在不断进步。

But you know that Gillette — although they had that little experience with Wilkinson in the early ’60s — but you know that Gillette is basically going to be spending many multiples the money on developing better shaving systems than exist now, compared to anyone else.

但你知道 Gillette——尽管他们在 60 年代初和 Wilkinson 有过一段小插曲——你仍然知道，相比任何对手，Gillette 基本上会在研发更好的剃须系统上投入成倍于别人的资金。

You know, they’ve got the distribution system. They’ve got the believability. If they bring out a product, and they say, “This is something that men ought to look at,” men look at it.

你知道，他们有分销系统。他们有可信度。如果他们推出一款产品并说“这是男性应该关注的东西”，男性就会关注。

And they found out here a few years ago that the same thing happened when they said to women to look at it in the shaving field. They wouldn’t have that same credibility someplace else. But in the shaving field, they have it.

几年前他们也发现，在剃须领域，如果他们号召女性去看一看，同样有效。换作其他领域，他们未必拥有同样的公信力。但在剃须领域，他们拥有。

Those are assets that can’t be built. And they’re very hard to destroy.

这些是无法复制的资产，而且极难被摧毁。

So change — we think we know, in a general way, what the soft drink industry or the shaving industry or the candy business is going to look like 10 or 20 years from now.

所以谈到变化——我们认为，整体而言我们知道 10 或 20 年后的软饮行业、剃须行业、糖果行业会是什么样子。

We think Microsoft is a sensational company run by the best of managers. But we don’t have any idea what that world is going to look like in 10 or 20 years.

我们认为 Microsoft 是一家了不起的公司，由最出色的管理者掌舵。但我们不知道 10 或 20 年后的那个世界会是什么样。

Now, if you’re going to bet on somebody that is going to see out and do what we can’t do ourselves, I’d rather bet on Bill Gates than anybody else.

当然，如果你要押注某个能看清远方、去做我们自己做不到之事的人，我宁愿押注 Bill Gates，而非其他人。

But that — I don’t want to bet on anybody else. I mean, in the end, we want to understand, ourselves, where we think a business is going. And if somebody tells us the business is going to change a lot, in Wall Street, they love to tell you that, you know, that’s great opportunity.

但问题在于——我不想押注任何其他人。归根结底，我们希望亲自理解一家企业将走向何处。如果有人告诉我们这门生意将发生巨变，华尔街最爱说“那是巨大机会”。

They don’t think it’s a great opportunity when Wall Street itself is going to change a lot, incidentally. (Laughter)

顺便说一句，当华尔街自身要发生巨变时，他们却并不认为那是巨大机会。（笑声）

But they — you know, it’s a great opportunity. We don’t think it’s an opportunity at all. I mean, we — it scares the hell out of us. Because we don’t know how things are going to change.

We are looking, you know — when people are chewing chewing gum, we have a pretty good idea how they chewed it 20 years ago and how they’ll chew it 20 years from now. And we don’t really see a lot of technology going into the art of the chew, you know? (Laughter) So, that —

我们关注的是——当人们在嚼口香糖时，我们大致知道他们 20 年前如何咀嚼，也能预见 20 年后会如何咀嚼。而且我们看不出“咀嚼的艺术”里会涌入多少技术，你懂的？（笑声）所以——

And as long as we don’t have to make those other decisions, why in the world should we? I mean, you know, if I — all kinds of things, we don’t know. And so, why going around trying to bet on things we don’t know, when we can bet on the simple things?

只要我们不必做那些别的决策，我们为什么非要去做？我的意思是，你知道，有很多事情我们并不知道。既然可以押注简单明了的事物，为什么要四处押注我们不了解的东西呢？

Zone 1? (Applause)

第 1 区？（掌声）

I can see the shareholders like us sticking with the simple ones. They understand us, yeah.

我看得出来，股东们喜欢我们坚持做简单的事。他们理解我们，没错。

WARREN BUFFETT: Bob Noyce, one of the two founders of — two primary founders — of Intel, grew up in Grinnell, Iowa. I think he’s the son of a minister in Grinnell, and went through Grinnell College and was chairman of the board of trustees of Grinnell when I went on the board of Grinnell back in the late ’60s.

沃伦·巴菲特： 鲍勃·诺伊斯是英特尔的两位主要创始人之一，他在艾奥瓦州的格林内尔长大。我记得他是格林内尔一位牧师的儿子，就读于格林内尔学院，并在我于60年代末加入格林内尔董事会时，担任学院董事会主席。

And when he left Fairchild to form Intel with Gordon Moore, Grinnell bought 10 percent of the private placement that funded — was the initial funding for Intel.

当他离开仙童公司（Fairchild）与戈登·摩尔（Gordon Moore）共同创立英特尔时，格林内尔购买了英特尔初始私募资金的10%。

And Bob was a terrific guy. He was very easy to talk to, just as Bill Gates is. I mean, these fellows explained the businesses to me, and they’re great teachers but I’m a lousy student. And they — I mean, they really do. They’re very good at explaining their businesses.

鲍勃是一个了不起的人。他非常平易近人，就像比尔·盖茨一样。我是说，这些人向我解释他们的业务，他们是很棒的老师，但我是个糟糕的学生。他们确实是非常擅长解释他们的业务。

Bob was a very down to earth Iowa boy who could tell you the risks and tell you the upside, and enormously likeable, a hundred percent honest, every way.

鲍勃是一个非常脚踏实地的艾奥瓦州男孩，他会告诉你风险和潜力。他非常讨人喜欢，完全诚实，方方面面都是如此。

So we did buy 10 percent of the original issue. The genius that ran the investment committee and managed to sell those a few years later, I won’t give you his name. (Laughter)

因此，我们确实购买了最初发行的10%。至于那个领导投资委员会并在几年后卖掉这些股份的天才，我就不说他的名字了。（笑声）

And there’s no prize for anybody that calculates the value of those shares now.

顺便说一下，现在谁要是计算这些股份的价值，是没有奖品的。

Incidentally, one of the things Bob was very keen on originally, in fact he was probably the keenest on it, was he had some watch that Intel was making. And it was a fabulous watch, according to Bob.

顺便说一下，鲍勃最初非常热衷的一件事，实际上他可能最为热衷的，是英特尔当时制作的一款手表。据鲍勃说，这是一款了不起的手表。

It just had one problem. We sent a guy out from Grinnell who was going out to the West Coast to where Intel was. And Bob gave him one of these watches. And when he got back to Grinnell he wrote up a report about this little investment we had, and he said, “These watches are marvelous.” He said, “Without touching anything, they managed to adapt to the time zones as they change as we went along.” In other words, they were running very fast, as it turned out. (Laughter)

不过它有一个问题。我们从格林内尔派了一个人到西海岸英特尔的所在地。鲍勃给了他一块这样的手表。当他回到格林内尔时，他写了一份关于我们这笔小投资的报告。他说：“这些手表太棒了。”他说：“不用动任何东西，它们就能自动适应我们经过的时区变化。”换句话说，事实证明，它们走得非常快。（笑声）

And they worked with that watch for about five or six years, and they fell on their face.

他们花了五到六年时间研究那款手表，结果以失败告终。

And as you know, you know, they had a total transformation in the mid-’80s when the product on which they relied also ran out of gas. So, it’s not —

大家知道，在80年代中期，他们依赖的产品也失去了动力，于是他们进行了彻底的转型。所以，这并不是——

And Andy Grove has written a terrific book, incidentally, Only the Paranoid Survive, which describes strategic inflection points. I recommend that every one of you read that book, because it is a terrific book.

顺便说一下，安迪·格罗夫写了一本非常棒的书——《只有偏执狂才能生存》，书中描述了战略拐点。我建议你们每个人都去读这本书，因为它确实很好。

But they had an Andy Grove there who made that transformation, along with some other people. But that doesn’t happen every time. Companies get left behind.

但他们有安迪·格罗夫和其他一些人一起完成了转型。不过，这种事情并不是每次都会发生。公司会被落下。

We don’t want to be in businesses where companies — where we feel companies can be left behind. And that means that, you know — and Intel could have, and almost did, go off the tracks. IBM owned a big piece of Intel, as you know, and they sold it in the mid-’80s.

我们不希望进入那些我们认为可能会被落后的行业。这意味着，英特尔曾经——几乎确实——脱轨了。你们知道，IBM曾经拥有英特尔的大量股份，但他们在80年代中期卖掉了。

So, you know, here are a bunch of people that should know a lot about that business but they couldn’t see the future either.

所以，你看，这些人应该对那个行业非常了解，但他们也看不到未来。

I think it’s very tough to make money that way, but I think some people can make a lot of money understanding those kinds of businesses. I mean, there are people with the insights.

我认为靠那种方式赚钱非常困难，但我也认为有些人可以通过理解那类业务赚很多钱。我的意思是，有些人确实有这种洞察力。

Walter Scott, one of our directors, has done terrifically with a business that started, you know, just a gleam in the eye maybe ten or 12 years ago here in Omaha, and it turned into a huge business.

我们的董事之一沃尔特·斯科特，在一家业务上取得了巨大的成功。这家业务大约在十到十二年前从奥马哈萌芽，后来发展成了一个巨大的企业。

And you know, Walter explained that to me on the way down to football games, but bad student again, so — (Laughs)

沃尔特曾在我们去看橄榄球比赛的路上向我解释过这个业务，但我还是一个差学生，所以——（笑声）

Walter — if Walter could have connected, and you know, I’d cheer from the stands. But that doesn’t bother me at all. I mean, what would bother me is if I think I understand a business and I don’t. That would bother me.

如果沃尔特能理解，我会在看台上为他欢呼。但这对我来说根本没有困扰。真正会困扰我的是，如果我认为我理解一个业务，但实际上并没有，那才会困扰我。

Let’s take a look at what kind of businesses turn us on.  And while we’re at it, let’s also discuss what we wish to avoid.

让我们看看什么样的企业会让我们眼前一亮。同时，也谈谈我们希望回避的公司类型。

Charlie and I look for companies that have a) a business we understand; b) favorable long-term economics; c) able and trustworthy management; and d) a sensible price tag.  We like to buy the whole business or, if management is our partner, at least 80%.  When control-type purchases of quality aren’t available, though, we are also happy to simply buy small portions of great businesses by way of stockmarket purchases.  It’s better to have a part interest in the Hope Diamond than to own all of a rhinestone.

我和 Charlie 寻找具备以下特征的公司：a）我们看得懂的业务；b）长期经济特性良好；c）有能力且值得信赖的管理层；d）合理的价格标签。我们偏好买下整个公司，或者在管理层愿作我们伙伴时，至少持有 80%。当无法获得此类优质控股型收购时，我们也乐于通过二级市场购买伟大企业的一小部分股权。拥有一部分 Hope Diamond 要胜过把整块人造水晶握在手里。

A truly great business must have an enduring “moat” that protects excellent returns on invested capital.  The dynamics of capitalism guarantee that competitors will repeatedly assault any business “castle” that is earning high returns.  Therefore a formidable barrier such as a company’s being the lowcost producer (GEICO, Costco) or possessing a powerful world-wide brand (Coca-Cola, Gillette, American Express) is essential for sustained success.  Business history is filled with “Roman Candles,” companies whose moats proved illusory and were soon crossed.

真正伟大的企业必须拥有可持续的“护城河”，以守护其出色的投入资本回报。资本主义的动力机制决定了：凡是能获得高回报的商业“城堡”，竞争者都会一再攻城。因此，像成为行业低成本生产者（GEICO、Costco）或拥有强大的全球品牌（Coca-Cola、Gillette、American Express）这样的坚固壁垒，是长期成功的关键。商业史充斥着“Roman Candles”式的公司——它们的护城河被证明是虚幻的，很快就被跨越。

Our criterion of “enduring” causes us to rule out companies in industries prone to rapid and continuous change.  Though capitalism’s “creative destruction” is highly beneficial for society, it precludes investment certainty.  A moat that must be continuously rebuilt will eventually be no moat at all.

我们强调“可持续”，这使我们排除那些处于快速且持续变革行业的公司。尽管资本主义的“创造性破坏”对社会大有裨益，但它排除了投资的确定性。若护城河必须不断重建，最终就等同于没有护城河。

Speaker 2:

So that was technology disrupted brands. Now, nobody thought of that when the internet came around like, oh boy, I have to worry about Budweiser. And I think AI will be like that. So I think the value trade of, oh, I'm just going to swing from growth to value is going to be overly simplistic this time. I think it's really going to have to be You're really going to want this active overlay, I believe, and of course I'm talking my book, but that it is going to be the ability to have both a reasonable valuation, durable growth and the ability to adapt to changing times. That's a tiny fringe of companies.

所以，这是技术对品牌的颠覆。当互联网刚刚兴起时，没有人会担心像百威这样的品牌会受到威胁。但我认为，AI也会带来类似的颠覆。因此，那种“从成长股切换到价值股”的思维在这一次将会显得过于简单粗暴。我认为，这一轮你真正需要的，是主动管理的能力——当然我是在“自卖自夸”，但确实如此——你要找到那些估值合理、增长持久、同时又有能力适应时代变化的公司。这类公司，其实只是一个很小的边缘群体。

Michael Batnick:

So I floated this theory on TV today and of course nobody likes it, which is probably why it's true. I think the stock market is the least cyclical it's ever been. The economy will always be cyclical. It's probably less cyclical than it was in the 70s because it's less reliant on bank funding and factory output. But I think the stock market has effectively become, at the high end, collections of companies whose businesses are predominantly subscription-based. And because they're not transactional companies, it's less likely that a weakening economy will have the same effect as it would have on the stock market even 10 years ago. So think about the largest market cap companies. Netflix, is anyone canceling Netflix in an economic downturn? Probably not. I would argue Starbucks has turned itself into a subscription service with the app. It's 30 million app users and your order is waiting for you. It's one button. I would argue that looks more like a subscription than a transaction. This is where all the market cap is. It's in Amazon, which is prime subscriptions, Spotify, which is music. And I guess my point is we're definitely susceptible to an economic downturn in the stock market without a doubt. But we used to look at companies like Alcoa and Caterpillar as bellwethers. I couldn't tell you when they report, what they had to say, or if anybody even reported on it.

我今天在电视上提出了一个理论，当然没人喜欢，这也许正说明它是对的。我认为现在的股市是有史以来最不具周期性的。经济永远是周期性的，虽然可能比70年代更不周期性了，因为现在对银行融资和工厂产出的依赖更少。但股市的高端部分，已经变成了由一系列订阅型公司构成的集合。因为这些公司不是“交易型”的，它们对经济放缓的反应不会像10年前那样剧烈。想想现在市值最大的公司，比如Netflix，经济下行时有人会真的取消Netflix吗？大概不会。我认为星巴克通过App也已经把自己变成了一个“订阅服务”公司了，有3000万用户，点单只需要一键。它看起来更像是一种订阅模式，而不是一次性交易。这些公司就是市值的所在：亚马逊靠Prime会员，Spotify靠音乐订阅。我想说的是，我们的确仍然会受到经济衰退的冲击，但我们过去会关注像Alcoa、Caterpillar这样的公司来判断市场节奏。现在我都不知道它们什么时候发布财报，也没人关心了。

Speaker 1:

Now Alcoa doesn't go first. They could report every week.

现在连“铝业先行指标”都不灵了。Alcoa就算每周发布财报，也没人注意。

Michael Batnick:

I don't think anyone would notice. So that observation is only important insofar as you remember that when we invest in the stock market, We're not investing in economic conditions. We're investing in corporate cash flows. We have companies that have made themselves more recession resilient by means of converting their business model from I need you to buy something today to you've already committed to buying this thing and you're probably too busy to cancel it unless things get really bad. And that's a different stock market than we've had through prior economic downturns. How crap part of a theory is that to explain modern valuation?

我觉得没人会注意。所以这个观察的重要意义在于：投资股市并不是在押注经济形势，而是在押注企业的现金流。很多公司通过把业务模式从“你今天得来买”变成“你已经承诺每月付钱买”，从而让自己在经济衰退中变得更有弹性。大多数人太忙，不会取消这些订阅，除非情况真的很糟。这跟以往经济下行时的股市结构已经完全不同了。这个理论来解释当前的高估值，有多扯？

Speaker 1:

So in terms of...

那如果从……

Michael Batnick:

John hates it.

John肯定讨厌这个说法。

Speaker 1:

No, no, I'm fascinated by it. I'm just trying to think in terms of the Warren Buffett theory of...

不不，我其实挺着迷的。我只是在想这跟巴菲特的那套理论，比如……

Michael Batnick:

Do you believe in inertia? Do you believe in inertia? Like the power of inertia? This is what the whole stock market is now based on. People not cancelling things.

你相信“惯性”吗？你相信惯性的力量吗？现在整个股市的估值基础就建立在“人们不会取消订阅”这件事上。