AN OBJECTION, of a nature different from that which has been stated and answered, in my last address, may perhaps be likewise urged against the principle of legislation for the individual citizens of America. It may be said that it would tend to render the government of the Union too powerful, and to enable it to absorb those residuary authorities, which it might be judged proper to leave with the States for local purposes. Allowing the utmost latitude to the love of power which any reasonable man can require, I confess I am at a loss to discover what temptation the persons intrusted with the administration of the general government could ever feel to divest the States of the authorities of that description. The regulation of the mere domestic police of a State appears to me to hold out slender allurements to ambition. Commerce, finance, negotiation, and war seem to comprehend all the objects which have charms for minds governed by that passion; and all the powers necessary to those objects ought, in the first instance, to be lodged in the national depository. The administration of private justice between the citizens of the same State, the supervision of agriculture and of other concerns of a similar nature, all those things, in short, which are proper to be provided for by local legislation, can never be desirable cares of a general jurisdiction. It is therefore improbable that there should exist a disposition in the federal councils to usurp the powers with which they are connected; because the attempt to exercise those powers would be as troublesome as it would be nugatory; and the possession of them, for that reason, would contribute nothing to the dignity, to the importance, or to the splendor of the national government.

这类不同于我在上一次论述中已提出并回答过的反对意见，人们或许也会针对对美国个体公民行使立法的原则提出异议。有人会说，这样做会使联邦政府过于强大，并使其能够吞并那些本应为地方目的而保留给各州的剩余权力。即便把合理之人所能要求的对权力之爱的最大限度都予以承认，我仍承认，我难以想见掌管国家政府的人会出于何种诱因而愿意剥夺各州此等性质的权力。仅仅是一州内部之治安与行政的规制，在我看来，对雄心并无多大诱惑。商业、财政、外交与战争，似乎囊括了所有能吸引受此激情支配之心灵的对象；而为达成这些对象所必需的一切权力，理当首先存放于国家层面的总汇之处。至于同一州公民之间的私法裁判、对农业以及性质相近的其他事务的监督——简言之，一切适宜由地方立法加以规定之事——绝不可能成为一般层级管辖所乐于承担的关切。因此，联邦当局间存在篡取与之相连之权力的倾向，实属不大可能；因为试图行使这些权力，将同样麻烦且徒劳无益；正因如此，占有这些权力也不会给国家政府的尊严、重要性或辉煌增添分毫。

But let it be admitted, for argument’s sake, that mere wantonness and lust of domination would be sufficient to beget that disposition; still it may be safely affirmed, that the sense of the constituent body of the national representatives, or, in other words, the people of the several States, would control the indulgence of so extravagant an appetite. It will always be far more easy for the State governments to encroach upon the national authorities than for the national government to encroach upon the State authorities. The proof of this proposition turns upon the greater degree of influence which the State governments if they administer their affairs with uprightness and prudence, will generally possess over the people; a circumstance which at the same time teaches us that there is an inherent and intrinsic weakness in all federal constitutions; and that too much pains cannot be taken in their organization, to give them all the force which is compatible with the principles of liberty.

但且为论辩起见，纵使仅凭恣意与支配之欲就足以滋生那种倾向；仍可坦然断言，国家代表之选民团体——换言之，各州人民——的意志，会抑制如此过分的嗜好。州政府侵犯国家权力，永远要比国家政府侵犯州权来得容易得多。此命题之根据，在于：若州政府以正直与审慎治理其务，便通常会对人民拥有更大的影响力；而这一情形也同时教导我们：一切联邦宪制中，皆潜藏着一种与生俱来的内在弱点；因此在其组织设计上，必须不遗余力，使之具备与自由原则相容的最大力度。

The superiority of influence in favor of the particular governments would result partly from the diffusive construction of the national government, but chiefly from the nature of the objects to which the attention of the State administrations would be directed.

各州政府在影响力上的优势，部分源于国家政府结构的分散与广布，更主要则源于州级行政所要关注之事物的性质。

It is a known fact in human nature, that its affections are commonly weak in proportion to the distance or diffusiveness of the object. Upon the same principle that a man is more attached to his family than to his neighborhood, to his neighborhood than to the community at large, the people of each State would be apt to feel a stronger bias towards their local governments than towards the government of the Union; unless the force of that principle should be destroyed by a much better administration of the latter.

众所周知，人性之情感，往往随对象之距离或分散程度的增加而减弱。基于同一原理，一个人对家庭的依恋强于对邻里的依恋，对邻里的依恋又强于对整个共同体的依恋；因此，各州人民极易对其地方政府抱有较之对联邦政府更为强烈的偏向；除非联邦政府的施政远为优越，以至于抵消此一原理之作用。

This strong propensity of the human heart would find powerful auxiliaries in the objects of State regulation.

人心这种强烈的倾向，在州政府所规制的诸多事务中，还会找到有力的助缘。

The variety of more minute interests, which will necessarily fall under the superintendence of the local administrations, and which will form so many rivulets of influence, running through every part of the society, cannot be particularized, without involving a detail too tedious and uninteresting to compensate for the instruction it might afford.

种种更为细微的利益，必然落入地方行政的督察之下，并化作无数影响力的细流，流经社会的每一处；若要一一细述，势必陷入冗长而乏味的铺陈，所获教益不足以抵偿其枯燥。

There is one transcendant advantage belonging to the province of the State governments, which alone suffices to place the matter in a clear and satisfactory light,–I mean the ordinary administration of criminal and civil justice. This, of all others, is the most powerful, most universal, and most attractive source of popular obedience and attachment. It is that which, being the immediate and visible guardian of life and property, having its benefits and its terrors in constant activity before the public eye, regulating all those personal interests and familiar concerns to which the sensibility of individuals is more immediately awake, contributes, more than any other circumstance, to impressing upon the minds of the people, affection, esteem, and reverence towards the government. This great cement of society, which will diffuse itself almost wholly through the channels of the particular governments, independent of all other causes of influence, would insure them so decided an empire over their respective citizens as to render them at all times a complete counterpoise, and, not un-frequently, dangerous rivals to the power of the Union.

州政府职权范围内，有一项卓绝的优势，足以单独将问题阐释得明白而令人满意——我指的是刑事与民事司法的日常实施。在所有来源之中，此事最为强大、最为普遍、亦最具吸引力，足以激发民众的服从与依附。它作为生命与财产的直接且可见的守护者，其利益与威惧不时显现于公众眼前，规制着一切与个人切身相关、与日常相熟之事；因而较诸任何其他因素，更能在人民心中烙下对政府的亲爱、敬重与崇敬。这个社会之大粘合剂，几乎将完全经由各州政府的渠道而弥散开来；即便撇开其他一切影响因素不论，也足以使各州政府对其各自公民拥有如此明确的支配力，以至于在任何时候都能构成对联邦权力的完全抗衡，并且不止一次地成为其危险的对手。

The operations of the national government, on the other hand, falling less immediately under the observation of the mass of the citizens, the benefits derived from it will chiefly be perceived and attended to by speculative men. Relating to more general interests, they will be less apt to come home to the feelings of the people; and, in proportion, less likely to inspire an habitual sense of obligation, and an active sentiment of attachment.

反之，国家政府的运作较少直接处于广大公民的目光之下；由此获得的利益，多半只会为思辨之士所感知并加以留意。此类运作关涉较为宏泛的一般性利益，因此不太容易切近人们的情感；相应地，也就不大可能激发一种习惯性的义务感与一种积极的依附情绪。

The reasoning on this head has been abundantly exemplified by the experience of all federal constitutions with which we are acquainted, and of all others which have borne the least analogy to them.

关于此点的推理，凡我们所熟悉的一切联邦宪制，以及一切与其稍有类比之政体的经验，已提供了充分的例证。

Though the ancient feudal systems were not, strictly speaking, confederacies, yet they partook of the nature of that species of association. There was a common head, chieftain, or sovereign, whose authority extended over the whole nation; and a number of subordinate vassals, or feudatories, who had large portions of land allotted to them, and numerous trains of INFERIOR vassals or retainers, who occupied and cultivated that land upon the tenure of fealty or obedience, to the persons of whom they held it. Each principal vassal was a kind of sovereign, within his particular demesnes. The consequences of this situation were a continual opposition to authority of the sovereign, and frequent wars between the great barons or chief feudatories themselves. The power of the head of the nation was commonly too weak, either to preserve the public peace, or to protect the people against the oppressions of their immediate lords. This period of European affairs is emphatically styled by historians, the times of feudal anarchy.

虽则古代封建制度严格说来并非邦联，但它们带有此类联合的性质。全国之上有一共同之首，即酋长或君主，其权威扩及全境；其下有若干从属的封臣或采邑领主，他们分得广袤土地，并各自拥有众多更下级的封臣或扈从，这些人以向所依附者宣誓忠诚或服从为土地占有之条件，占据并耕种土地。每一位主要封臣在其特定领地之内，皆是一种意义上的君主。此等格局的后果，是不断与君主权威相对抗，以及大贵族或主要封建领主之间频繁的战争。国家元首的权力通常太弱，无足以维持公共安宁，亦不足以保护人民免受其直属领主的压迫。史家强调地将欧洲事务的这一时期称为封建无政府时代。

When the sovereign happened to be a man of vigorous and warlike temper and of superior abilities, he would acquire a personal weight and influence, which answered, for the time, the purpose of a more regular authority. But in general, the power of the barons triumphed over that of the prince; and in many instances his dominion was entirely thrown off, and the great fiefs were erected into independent principalities or States. In those instances in which the monarch finally prevailed over his vassals, his success was chiefly owing to the tyranny of those vassals over their dependents. The barons, or nobles, equally the enemies of the sovereign and the oppressors of the common people, were dreaded and detested by both; till mutual danger and mutual interest effected a union between them fatal to the power of the aristocracy. Had the nobles, by a conduct of clemency and justice, preserved the fidelity and devotion of their retainers and followers, the contests between them and the prince must almost always have ended in their favor, and in the abridgment or subversion of the royal authority.

当君主恰好具备勇悍好战之性情并兼有卓越才能时，他会获得一份个人分量与影响，暂时可起到较为正规权威的作用。但一般而言，伯爵等贵族之力常常胜过君主之力；在许多情形里，君主的统治被完全摆脱，广大封地被树立为独立的侯国或邦国。在那些君主最终战胜其封臣的案例中，其成功主要得益于封臣对其部属的暴虐。那些贵族既是君主之敌，又是平民之压迫者，因此同时为双方所畏惧并憎恶；终于，在共同危险与共同利益的驱使下，二者结成联盟，从而致使贵族权势覆亡。若贵族以仁恕与正义行事，得以维系其侍从与追随者的忠诚与奉献，则他们与君主之间的争斗几乎总会以贵族取胜而告终，并导致王权的缩减或颠覆。

This is not an assertion founded merely in speculation or conjecture. Among other illustrations of its truth which might be cited, Scotland will furnish a cogent example. The spirit of clanship which was, at an early day, introduced into that kingdom, uniting the nobles and their dependants by ties equivalent to those of kindred, rendered the aristocracy a constant overmatch for the power of the monarch, till the incorporation with England subdued its fierce and ungovernable spirit, and reduced it within those rules of subordination which a more rational and more energetic system of civil polity had previously established in the latter kingdom.

此并非仅凭臆测或揣度而下的断言。诸多可资佐证的例子之中，苏格兰便提供了一个有力的样本。该王国早期引入的氏族精神，将贵族与其部属以近乎血亲的纽带联结起来，使得贵族阶层长期压倒君主之力；直至与英格兰的合并，方才制服其凶悍而难驯之气，并将之纳入后者王国先前所确立的更为理性且更具活力的市民政体之服从规则内。

The separate governments in a confederacy may aptly be compared with the feudal baronies; with this advantage in their favor, that from the reasons already explained, they will generally possess the confidence and good-will of the people, and with so important a support, will be able effectually to oppose all encroachments of the national government. It will be well if they are not able to counteract its legitimate and necessary authority. The points of similitude consist in the rivalship of power, applicable to both, and in the CONCENTRATION of large portions of the strength of the community into particular DEPOSITS, in one case at the disposal of individuals, in the other case at the disposal of political bodies.

邦联中的各个分立政府，颇可与封建采邑相类比；就其有利之处而言，基于前述缘由，它们通常能获得人民的信任与善意；凭借如此重要的支撑，它们足以有效抗拒国家政府的一切蚕食。若它们尚不足以抵消国家政府正当且必要的权威，那已属幸事。二者相似之处，在于彼此皆存在权力之争，以及把社会相当大一部分力量集中于特定“蓄积”之中——前者由个人所支配，后者则由政治团体所支配。

A concise review of the events that have attended confederate governments will further illustrate this important doctrine; an inattention to which has been the great source of our political mistakes, and has given our jealousy a direction to the wrong side. This review shall form the subject of some ensuing papers.

对历来伴随邦联政体而生的事件作一番简要回顾，将进一步阐明这一重要原理；忽视此点，正是我们政治错误的根源所在，并使我们的猜忌指向了错误的一边。此一回顾，将成为后续若干篇文章的主题。

There is a tremendous strategic synergy between the “finished goods business and the OEM operating system business. E.g. we have about 90% share of office productivity software with Microsoft Office, and that is a great business (about \$5B, also 85%+ operating margin). But also important is the fact that this software is heavily valued by the actual users (operating systems are a bit more invisible to the user), and they resist shifting brands. If we own the key “franchises built on top or the operating system, we dramatically widen the “moat that protects the operating system business. I.e. if J owned the most successful daily newspaper in Buffalo, I wouldn’t want to leave it to my competitor to  own the Sunday edition.

“盒装产品”业务与 OEM 操作系统业务之间存在巨大的战略协同。例如，Microsoft Office 在办公软件市场占约 90% 份额，这是一门极佳的生意（约 50 亿美元，运营利润率亦超过 85%）。更重要的是，实际用户非常重视这些软件（操作系统对用户而言相对隐形），因此他们不愿轻易换品牌。如果我们拥有构建在操作系统之上的关键“特许经营”，就能大大加宽保护操作系统业务的“护城河”。就好比若我拥有布法罗最成功的日报，可不想把星期日版留给竞争对手。

*****

Your analysis of Microsoft, why I should invest in it, and why I don’t could be more on the money. In effect the company has a royalty on a communication stream that can do nothing but grow. It’s as if you were getting paid for every gallon of water starting in a small stream but with added amounts received as tributaries turned the stream into an Amazon. The toughest question is how hard to push prices and I wrote a note to Bill on that after our December meeting last year. Bell should have anticipated Bill and let someone else put in the phone infrastructure while he collected by the minute and distance (and even importance of 1-hr call he could have figured a way to monitor it) in perpetuity.

你对微软的分析——我为何该投资、又为何没有投资——再贴切不过。实际上，微软对一条只会壮大的信息流收取版税。就像从一条小溪的每加仑水开始收费，而支流汇入后，那条小溪最终变成亚马逊。最棘手的问题是价格能推到多高；去年十二月会议后我还就此给比尔写过一张便条。贝尔当初若能料到比尔的做法，就该让别人铺设电话基础设施，自己按通话时长、距离（甚至一小时电话的重要性——他肯定能想出监测办法）永续收费。

Coke is now getting a royalty on swallows; probably 7.2 billion a day. If this average gulp is one ounce. I feel 100 % sure (perhaps mistakenly) that I know the odds of this continuing—again 100 % as long as cola doesn’t cause cancer. Bill has an even better royalty—one which I would never bet against but I don’t feel I am capable of assessing probabilities about, except to the extent that with a gun to my head and forced to make a guess, I would go with it rather than against. But to calibrate whether my certainty is 80 % or 55 %, say, for a 20-year run would be folly. If I had to make such decisions, I would do my best but I prefer to structure investing as a no-called-strikes game and just wait for the fat one.

可口可乐现在对“吞咽”收取版税——大约每天72亿次。如果平均每口一盎司，我百分之百确定（也许是错觉）这种局面会持续下去——只要可乐不会致癌，概率依旧是百分之百。比尔的版税更胜一筹——我永远不会押注它会失败，但若要我评估其中概率，我自觉做不到；如果被架着枪逼着猜，我宁愿押正面而非反面。但要精确校准我究竟有80%还是55%的把握，并据此下注20年，那就是愚蠢。若真得做这种决定，我会尽力而为，但我更愿把投资当作“没有被三振”的比赛，耐心等那颗大好的球。

MR. WINGFIELD: Can you tell me what percentage of them were free versus paid?

温菲尔德先生：你能告诉我他们中有多少百分比是免费的，多少是付费的吗？

MR. JOBS: I don’t know off the top of my head, but the majority, clearly, which is great. Our purpose in the App Store is to add value to the iPhone. Free apps do that just as well as paid apps sometimes. We love free apps.

乔布斯先生：我不太清楚，但显然大多数是，这很好。我们在 App Store 的目的是为 iPhone 增加价值。免费应用有时和付费应用一样好。我们喜欢免费应用。

MR. WINGFIELD: You, as you said the last time we talked, don’t expect to make...

温菲尔德先生：正如你上次谈到的，你们并不期望...

MR. JOBS: By the way, some free apps have back-end service components that they charge for. A perfect example is like Epocrates. The Epocrates app is a free app. They’ll give you a free database when you go to their website and register, but then they have all of these other products that they will sell you the services for.

乔布斯先生： 顺便提一下，一些免费的应用有后端服务组件是收费的。比如 Epocrates 应用就是一个很好的例子。Epocrates 应用是免费的。你去他们的网站注册后，他们会给你一个免费的数据库，但他们还有很多其他产品会向你销售服务。

MR. WINGFIELD: Upsell.

温菲尔德先生： 追加销售。

MS. COTTON: [inaudible 9:25] talking about it, because his wife’s a doctor.

MS. COTTON: [听不清 9:25] 在谈论这件事，因为他的妻子是一名医生。

MR. JOBS: On Epocrates, you should go visit them.

乔布斯先生： 在 Epocrates 上，你应该去拜访他们。

MR. WINGFIELD: Yeah, I’ve talked to the...

温菲尔德先生： 是的，我和...谈过。

MR. JOBS: You should talk to Kurt. They exceeded their whole year forecast for iPhone downloads in the first two weeks. He could probably give you some pretty interesting...

乔布斯先生： 你应该和 Kurt 谈谈。他们在头两周内就超过了整年的 iPhone 下载预期。他可以给你一些相当有趣的数据...

[crosstalk] [相声]

MR. WINGFIELD: Do you know how it compares to their other platforms that they’re on? They’re a pretty mature product.

温菲尔德先生：你知道这和他们其他平台的比较如何吗？他们是个相当成熟的产品。

MR. JOBS: You should ask Kurt. He’s told me some things. I don’t know how much I’m free to say. They’re very happy.

乔布斯先生： 你应该问库尔特。他告诉我一些事情。我不知道我可以说多少。他们非常开心。

MR. WINGFIELD: The service fees, the advertising that appears, you guy don’t participate in that.

温菲尔德先生：服务费和出现的广告，你们没有参与其中。

MR. JOBS: No, we don’t.

乔布斯先生：不，我们没有。

MR. WINGFIELD: OK. The 70-30 split, are the economics of this working out the way that you had said when we last spoke, which is that you might make some money, but you don’t expect it to be a big source of profits?

温菲尔德先生：好的。那么 70-30 的分成，经济模式的运作情况是否如你上次所说的那样，就是你们可能会赚一些钱，但不期望这是一个大的利润来源？

MR. JOBS: Yeah. It’s just like iTunes.

乔布斯先生： 是的。这就像 iTunes。

MR. WINGFIELD: Even with the huge popularity of this, you don’t...

温菲尔德先生：即使这个非常受欢迎，你也不...

MR. JOBS: No. It costs money to run it. Those free apps cost money to store and to deliver wirelessly. The paid apps cost money, too. They have to pay for some of the free apps. We don’t expect this to be a big profit generator. We expect it to add value to the iPhone. We’ll sell more iPhones because of it.

乔布斯先生：不。这需要成本来运营。那些免费的应用在存储和无线传输上都要花钱。付费的应用也需要花钱，他们必须为一些免费的应用付费。我们不期望这会成为一个大的利润生成器。我们期望它为 iPhone 增值。我们会因此卖出更多的 iPhone。

We spend enormous energy thinking about how to empower builders, inside and outside of our company. We characterize builders as people who like to invent. They like to dissect a customer experience, assess what’s wrong with it, and reinvent it. Builders tend not to be satisfied until the customer experience is perfect. This doesn’t hinder them from delivering improvements along the way, but it drives them to keep tinkering and iterating continually. While unafraid to invent from scratch, they have no hesitation about using high-quality, scalable, cost-effective components from others. What matters to builders is having the right tools to keep rapidly improving customer experiences.

我们投入大量精力思考如何赋能公司内外的建设者。我们将建设者定义为喜欢创新的人。他们喜欢剖析客户体验，评估其中的问题，并重新设计。建设者往往在客户体验达到完美之前不会满足。这并不会妨碍他们在过程中持续提供改进，但会驱使他们不断地调整和迭代。虽然他们不惧怕从零开始创新，但也毫不犹豫地使用来自他人的高质量、可扩展且经济高效的组件。对建设者而言，重要的是拥有合适的工具，以持续快速地改善客户体验。

The best way we know how to do this is by building primitive services. Think of them as discrete, foundational building blocks that builders can weave together in whatever combination they desire. Here’s how we described primitives in our 2003 AWS Vision document:

我们所知的最佳方法是构建原始服务。可以将它们视为独立的、基础的构建模块，开发人员可以根据自己的需求任意组合。这是我们在 2003 年 AWS 愿景文档中对原始服务的描述：

“Primitives are the raw parts or the most foundational-level building blocks for software developers. They’re indivisible (if they can be functionally split into two they must) and they do one thing really well. They’re meant to be used together rather than as solutions in and of themselves. And, we’ll build them for maximum developer flexibility. We won’t put a bunch of constraints on primitives to guard against developers hurting themselves. Rather, we’ll optimize for developer freedom and innovation.”

Of course, this concept of primitives can be applied to more than software development, but they’re especially relevant in technology. And, over the last 20 years, primitives have been at the heart of how we’ve innovated quickly.

One of the many advantages to thinking in primitives is speed. Let me give you two counter examples that illustrate this point. First, we built a successful owned-inventory retail business in the early years at Amazon where we bought all our products from publishers, manufacturers, and distributors, stored them in our warehouses, and shipped them ourselves. Over time, we realized we could add broader selection and lower prices by allowing third-party sellers to list their offerings next to our own on our highly trafficked search and product detail pages. We’d built several core retail services (e.g. payments, search, ordering, browse, item management) that made trying different marketplace concepts simpler than if we didn’t have those components. A good set of primitives? Not really.

以基础元素的方式思考的众多优势之一是速度。我举两个反例来说明这一点。首先，在亚马逊的早期阶段，我们建立了一个成功的自营库存零售业务，我们从出版商、制造商和分销商那里购买所有产品，将其存储在自己的仓库中，并自行发货。随着时间推移，我们意识到，通过允许第三方卖家在我们流量巨大的搜索和产品详情页面上与我们自己的商品并列展示，我们可以提供更广泛的选择和更低的价格。我们已经构建了几个核心零售服务（例如支付、搜索、订购、浏览、商品管理），这些服务使我们尝试不同的市场模式变得比没有这些组件时更简单。但这算是一套好的基础元素吗？并不是。

It turns out that these core components were too jumbled together and not partitioned right. We learned this the hard way when we partnered with companies like Target in our Merchant.com business in the early 2000s. The concept was that target.com would use Amazon’s ecommerce components as the backbone of its website, and then customize however they wished. To enable this arrangement, we had to deliver those components as separable capabilities through application programming interfaces (“APIs”). This decoupling was far more difficult than anticipated because we’d built so many dependencies between these services as Amazon grew so quickly the first few years.

事实证明，这些核心组件过于混杂，没有正确地进行分割。我们是在 2000 年代初与 Target 等公司合作开展 Merchant.com 业务时，才艰难地意识到这一点。当时的设想是，target.com 将使用亚马逊的电子商务组件作为其网站的基础架构，然后根据自身需求进行定制。为了实现这一安排，我们必须通过应用程序接口（API）将这些组件作为可分离的功能提供出去。然而，这种解耦的难度远超预期，因为在亚马逊最初几年快速增长过程中，我们在这些服务之间建立了太多的依赖关系。

This coupling was further highlighted by a heavyweight mechanism we used to operate called “NPI.” Any new initiative requiring work from multiple internal teams had to be reviewed by this NPI cabal where each team would communicate how many people-weeks their work would take. This bottleneck constrained what we accomplished, frustrated the heck out of us, and inspired us to eradicate it by refactoring these ecommerce components into true primitive services with well-documented, stable APIs that enabled our builders to use each other’s services without any coordination tax.

这种耦合关系在我们过去使用的一种名为“NPI”的繁重机制中尤为突出。任何需要多个内部团队协作的新项目，都必须经过这个 NPI 小组的审查，每个团队都要说明他们的工作需要多少人周。这种瓶颈限制了我们的成就，让我们极为沮丧，并促使我们通过将这些电子商务组件重构为真正的基础服务，配备文档完善、稳定的 API，使开发人员能够在无需额外协调成本的情况下使用彼此的服务，从而彻底消除这种瓶颈。

In the middle of the Target and NPI challenges, we were contemplating building a new set of infrastructure technology services that would allow both Amazon to move more quickly and external developers to build anything they imagined. This set of services became known as AWS, and the above experiences convinced us that we should build a set of primitive services that could be composed together how anybody saw fit. At that time, most technology offerings were very feature-rich, and tried to solve multiple jobs simultaneously. As a result, they often didn’t do any one job that well.

在应对 Target 和 NPI 挑战的过程中，我们曾考虑构建一套新的基础设施技术服务，以便亚马逊能够更快地行动，同时也让外部开发者能够构建他们所设想的任何东西。这套服务后来被称为 AWS，上述经验使我们确信，我们应该构建一系列基础服务，让任何人都可以根据自己的需求自由组合。当时，大多数技术产品都功能繁多，试图同时解决多个问题，因此往往无法很好地完成任何单一任务。

Our AWS primitive services were designed from the start to be different. They offered important, highly flexible, but focused functionality. For instance, our first major primitive was Amazon Simple Storage Service (“S3”) in March 2006 that aimed to provide highly secure object storage, at very high durability and availability, at Internet scale, and very low cost. In other words, be stellar at object storage. When we launched S3, developers were excited, and a bit mystified. It was a very useful primitive service, but they wondered, why just object storage? When we launched Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (“EC2”) in August 2006 and Amazon SimpleDB in 2007, people realized we were building a set of primitive infrastructure services that would allow them to build anything they could imagine, much faster, more cost-effectively, and without having to manage or lay out capital upfront for the datacenter or hardware. As AWS unveiled these building blocks over time (we now have over 240 at builders’ disposal—meaningfully more than any other provider), whole companies sprang up quickly on top of AWS (e.g. Airbnb, Dropbox, Instagram, Pinterest, Stripe, etc.), industries reinvented themselves on AWS (e.g. streaming with Netflix, Disney+, Hulu, Max, Fox, Paramount), and even critical government agencies switched to AWS (e.g. CIA, along with several other U.S. Intelligence agencies). But, one of the lesser-recognized beneficiaries was Amazon’s own consumer businesses, which innovated at dramatic speed across retail, advertising, devices (e.g. Alexa and Fire TV), Prime Video and Music, Amazon Go, Drones, and many other endeavors by leveraging the speed with which AWS let them build. Primitives, done well, rapidly accelerate builders’ ability to innovate.

我们的 AWS 基础服务从一开始就被设计成与众不同。它们提供了重要、高度灵活但专注的功能。例如，我们的第一个主要基础服务是 2006 年 3 月推出的亚马逊简单存储服务（“S3”），旨在以互联网规模、极低的成本提供高度安全的对象存储，具有极高的耐用性和可用性。换句话说，就是在对象存储方面做到卓越。当我们推出 S3 时，开发人员感到兴奋，也有些困惑。这是一个非常有用的基础服务，但他们疑惑，为什么只提供对象存储？当我们在 2006 年 8 月推出亚马逊弹性计算云（“EC2”）以及 2007 年推出亚马逊 SimpleDB 时，人们意识到我们正在构建一系列基础设施服务，使他们能够更快、更经济地构建任何他们能想象的东西，而无需提前管理或投入资金建设数据中心或硬件。 随着 AWS 逐步推出这些构建模块（目前我们已为开发者提供超过 240 个模块，远超其他任何供应商），许多公司迅速在 AWS 之上建立起来（例如 Airbnb、Dropbox、Instagram、Pinterest、Stripe 等），一些行业在 AWS 上实现了自我重塑（例如 Netflix、Disney+、Hulu、Max、Fox、Paramount 等流媒体服务），甚至一些关键的政府机构也转向了 AWS（例如 CIA 以及其他几个美国情报机构）。但较少被注意到的受益者之一是亚马逊自身的消费者业务，它们通过利用 AWS 提供的快速构建能力，在零售、广告、设备（例如 Alexa 和 Fire TV）、Prime 视频和音乐、Amazon Go、无人机以及许多其他领域实现了高速创新。基础模块若设计得当，将极大地加速开发者的创新能力。

So, how do you build the right set of primitives?

那么，你该如何构建合适的primitives集合呢？

Pursuing primitives is not a guarantee of success. There are many you could build, and even more ways to combine them. But, a good compass is to pick real customer problems you’re trying to solve.

追求基础元素并不能保证成功。你可以构建许多基础元素，也有更多方式将它们组合起来。但一个好的指南针是选择你试图解决的真实客户问题。

Our logistics primitives are an instructive example. In Amazon’s early years, we built core capabilities around warehousing items, and then picking, packing, and shipping them quickly and reliably to customers. As we added third-party sellers to our marketplace, they frequently requested being able to use these same logistics capabilities. Because we’d built this initial set of logistics primitives, we were able to introduce Fulfillment by Amazon (“FBA”) in 2006, allowing sellers to use Amazon’s Fulfillment Network to store items, and then have us pick, pack, and ship them to customers, with the bonus of these products being available for fast, Prime delivery. This service has saved sellers substantial time and money (typically about 70% less expensive than doing themselves), and remains one of our most popular services. As more merchants began to operate their own direct-to-consumer (“DTC”) websites, many yearned to still use our fulfillment capabilities, while also accessing our payments and identity primitives to drive higher order conversion on their own websites (as Prime members have already shared this payment and identity information with Amazon). A couple years ago, we launched Buy with Prime to address this customer need. Prime members can check out quickly on DTC websites like they do on Amazon, and receive fast Prime shipping speeds on Buy with Prime items—increasing order conversion for merchants by ~25% vs. their default experience.

我们的物流基础模块就是一个很有启发性的例子。在亚马逊成立初期，我们围绕商品仓储建立了核心能力，然后快速可靠地完成拣货、包装和配送给客户。当我们向市场引入第三方卖家时，他们经常要求使用这些相同的物流能力。正因为我们已经建立了这一套初始的物流基础模块，我们才能在 2006 年推出“亚马逊物流（FBA）”，允许卖家使用亚马逊的物流网络存储商品，然后由我们负责拣货、包装并配送给客户，同时这些商品还能享受快速的 Prime 配送服务。这项服务为卖家节省了大量的时间和成本（通常比他们自己操作便宜约 70%），并且至今仍是我们最受欢迎的服务之一。随着越来越多的商家开始运营自己的直面消费者（DTC）网站，许多商家仍然希望使用我们的物流能力，同时也希望利用我们的支付和身份基础模块，以提高他们自己网站上的订单转化率（因为 Prime 会员已经与亚马逊共享了这些支付和身份信息）。 几年前，我们推出了 Buy with Prime，以满足客户的这一需求。Prime 会员可以像在亚马逊上一样，在 DTC 网站上快速结账，并在购买 Buy with Prime 商品时享受 Prime 的快速配送服务，这使商家的订单转化率比默认体验提高了约 25%。

As our Stores business has grown substantially, and our supply chain become more complex, we’ve had to develop a slew of capabilities in order to offer customers unmatched selection, at low prices, and with very fast delivery times. We’ve become adept at getting products from other countries to the U.S., clearing customs, and then shipping to storage facilities. Because we don’t have enough space in our shipping fulfillment centers to store all the inventory needed to maintain our desired in-stock levels, we’ve built a set of lower-cost, upstream warehouses solely optimized for storage (without sophisticated end-user, pick, pack, and ship functions). Having these two pools of inventory has prompted us to build algorithms predicting when we’ll run out of inventory in our shipping fulfillment centers and automatically replenishing from these upstream warehouses. And, in the last few years, our scale and available alternatives have forced us to build our own last mile delivery capability (roughly the size of UPS) to affordably serve the number of consumers and sellers wanting to use Amazon.

随着我们的门店业务大幅增长，供应链也变得更加复杂，我们不得不开发大量能力，以便为客户提供无与伦比的选择、低廉的价格和极快的配送速度。我们已熟练掌握了将产品从其他国家运往美国、清关并运送至仓储设施的流程。由于我们的配送履约中心没有足够空间存放所有库存以维持理想的库存水平，我们建立了一系列成本较低的上游仓库，专门用于存储（不具备复杂的终端用户拣货、包装和配送功能）。拥有这两类库存促使我们开发算法，预测配送履约中心何时会缺货，并自动从这些上游仓库补货。此外，过去几年中，我们的规模和可用的替代方案迫使我们建立了自己的最后一公里配送能力（规模大致相当于 UPS），以经济高效地服务于希望使用亚马逊的众多消费者和卖家。

We’ve solved these customer needs by building additional fulfillment primitives that both serve Amazon consumers better and address external sellers’ increasingly complex ecommerce activities. For instance, for sellers needing help importing products, we offer a Global Mile service that leverages our expertise here. To ship inventory from the border (or anywhere domestically) to our storage facilities, we enable sellers to use either our first-party Amazon Freight service or third-party freight partners via our Partnered Carrier Program. To store more inventory at lower cost to ensure higher in-stock rates and shorter delivery times, we’ve opened our upstream Amazon Warehousing and Distribution facilities to sellers (along with automated replenishment to our shipping fulfillment centers when needed). For those wanting to manage their own shipping, we’ve started allowing customers to use our last mile delivery network to deliver packages to their end-customers in a service called Amazon Shipping. And, for sellers who wish to use our fulfillment network as a central place to store inventory and ship items to customers regardless of where they ordered, we have a Multi-Channel Fulfillment service. These are all primitives that we’ve exposed to sellers.

我们通过构建额外的履约基础设施，既更好地服务亚马逊消费者，也满足外部卖家日益复杂的电子商务活动，从而解决了这些客户需求。例如，对于需要帮助进口产品的卖家，我们提供了利用我们专业知识的 Global Mile 服务。为了将库存从边境（或国内任何地方）运送到我们的仓储设施，我们允许卖家通过我们的合作承运商计划，使用亚马逊自营货运服务或第三方货运合作伙伴。为了以更低成本存储更多库存，确保更高的库存率和更短的交货时间，我们向卖家开放了上游的亚马逊仓储和配送设施（并在需要时自动补货到我们的配送中心）。对于希望自行管理运输的客户，我们开始允许他们使用我们的末端配送网络，将包裹送达终端客户，这项服务称为 Amazon Shipping。 此外，对于希望使用我们的配送网络作为集中存储库存并向客户发货（无论客户从何处下单）的卖家，我们提供了多渠道配送服务。这些都是我们向卖家开放的基础服务。

Building in primitives meaningfully expands your degrees of freedom. You can keep your primitives to yourself and build compelling features and capabilities on top of them to allow your customers and business to reap the benefits of rapid innovation. You can offer primitives to external customers as paid services (as we have with AWS and our more recent logistics offerings). Or, you can compose these primitives into external, paid applications as we have with FBA, Buy with Prime, or Supply Chain by Amazon (a recently released logistics service that integrates several of our logistics primitives). But, you’ve got options. You’re only constrained by the primitives you’ve built and your imagination.

有意义地构建基础组件能够极大地拓展你的自由度。你可以将这些基础组件保留在内部，并在其基础上开发出引人注目的功能和能力，让你的客户和业务从快速创新中获益。你也可以将基础组件作为付费服务提供给外部客户（例如我们推出的 AWS 和近期的物流服务）。或者，你可以将这些基础组件组合成面向外部的付费应用程序，就像我们推出的 FBA、“Buy with Prime”或亚马逊供应链（最近发布的一项物流服务，整合了我们多个物流基础组件）。总之，你拥有多种选择，唯一的限制是你所构建的基础组件和你的想象力。

Take the new, same-day fulfillment facilities in our Stores business. They’re located in the largest metro areas around the U.S. (we currently have 58), house our top-moving 100,000 SKUs (but also cover millions of other SKUs that can be injected from nearby fulfillment centers into these same-day facilities), and streamline the time required to go from picking a customer’s order to being ready to ship to as little as 11 minutes. These facilities also constitute our lowest cost to serve in the network. The experience has been so positive for customers that we’re planning to double the number of these facilities.

以我们门店业务中新建的当日配送设施为例，它们位于美国各大都市区（目前共有 58 个），存放着我们销量最高的 10 万个库存单位（SKU），同时还能从附近的配送中心调入数百万个其他 SKU 到这些当日配送设施中。这些设施将从拣选客户订单到准备发货的时间缩短至最快仅需 11 分钟。此外，这些设施也是我们网络中服务成本最低的部分。由于客户体验非常积极，我们计划将这些设施的数量增加一倍。

But, how else might we use this capability if we think of it as a core building block? We have a very large and growing grocery business in organic grocery (with Whole Foods Market) and non-perishable goods (e.g. consumables, canned goods, health and beauty products, etc.). We’ve been working hard on building a mass, physical store offering (Amazon Fresh) that offers a great perishable experience; however, what if we used our same-day facilities to enable customers to easily add milk, eggs, or other perishable items to any Amazon order and get same day? It might change how people think of splitting up their weekly grocery shopping, and make perishable shopping as convenient as non-perishable shopping already is.

但是，如果我们将这种能力视为一个核心基础模块，我们还能如何利用它呢？我们在有机食品杂货（通过 Whole Foods Market）和非易腐商品（例如日用品、罐头食品、健康和美容产品等）领域拥有规模庞大且不断增长的业务。我们一直在努力打造大规模的实体店（Amazon Fresh），提供出色的生鲜购物体验；然而，如果我们利用当天配送设施，让顾客能够轻松地在任何亚马逊订单中添加牛奶、鸡蛋或其他易腐商品，并实现当天送达，会怎样呢？这可能会改变人们对每周杂货购物分配方式的看法，使购买易腐商品变得像购买非易腐商品一样方便。

Or, take a service that some people have questioned, but that’s making substantial progress and we think of as a very valuable future primitive capability—our delivery drones (called Prime Air). Drones will eventually allow us to deliver packages to customers in less than an hour. It won’t start off being available for all sizes of packages and in all locations, but we believe it’ll be pervasive over time. Think about how the experience of ordering perishable items changes with sub-one-hour delivery?

或者，以一项曾被一些人质疑但正取得重大进展、并被我们视为极具价值的未来基础能力的服务为例——我们的无人机送货服务（称为 Prime Air）。无人机最终将使我们能够在不到一小时内将包裹送达客户手中。虽然最初并非所有尺寸的包裹和所有地点都能享受此服务，但我们相信随着时间推移，它将变得普及。试想一下，不到一小时的送货速度将如何改变订购易腐商品的体验？

The same is true for Amazon Pharmacy. Need throat lozenges, Advil, an antibiotic, or some other medication? Same-day facilities already deliver many of these items within hours, and that will only get shorter as we launch Prime Air more expansively. Highly flexible building blocks can be composed across businesses and in new combinations that change what’s possible for customers.

亚马逊药房也是如此。需要喉糖、布洛芬、抗生素或其他药物吗？当天送达服务已经能在数小时内配送许多此类商品，随着我们更广泛地推出 Prime Air，这一时间还会进一步缩短。高度灵活的基础模块可以跨业务组合，并以新的方式组合，改变客户的可能性。

Being intentional about building primitives requires patience. Releasing the first couple primitive services can sometimes feel random to customers (or the public at large) before we’ve unveiled how these building blocks come together. I’ve mentioned AWS and S3 as an example, but our Health offering is another. In the last 10 years, we’ve tried several Health experiments across various teams—but they were not driven by our primitives approach. This changed in 2022 when we applied our primitives thinking to the enormous global healthcare problem and opportunity. We’ve now created several important building blocks to help transform the customer health experience: Acute Care (via Amazon Clinic), Primary Care (via One Medical), and a Pharmacy service to buy whatever medication a patient may need. Because of our growing success, Amazon customers are now asking us to help them with all kinds of wellness and nutrition opportunities—which can be partially unlocked with some of our existing grocery building blocks, including Whole Foods Market or Amazon Fresh.

有意识地构建基础模块需要耐心。在我们尚未展示这些基础模块如何组合之前，向客户（或广大公众）发布最初几个基础服务，有时可能会显得随意。我之前提到过 AWS 和 S3 作为例子，但我们的健康服务也是如此。在过去 10 年里，我们在不同团队中尝试了几次健康领域的实验，但这些尝试并未遵循我们的基础模块方法。这种情况在 2022 年发生了改变，我们将基础模块思维应用于全球医疗保健领域的巨大问题和机遇。现在，我们已经创建了几个重要的基础模块，以帮助改善客户的健康体验：急性护理（通过 Amazon Clinic）、初级护理（通过 One Medical）以及药房服务，以便患者购买所需的任何药物。由于我们日益增长的成功，亚马逊的客户现在要求我们帮助他们探索各种健康和营养方面的机会，而这些机会可以部分通过我们现有的一些食品杂货基础模块来实现，包括 Whole Foods Market 或 Amazon Fresh。