(共20张PPT)
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
Schumpeter: Lords of the metaverse
Forget space. The next billionaire battle is to take people beyond reality
熊彼特: 元宇宙之王
忘记物理空间吧。下一场亿万富翁之战是带领人们超越现实
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
【1】You have to hand it to Mark Zuckerberg. When the founder of Facebook announced in October that he was changing the name of the social-media network’s parent company to Meta Platforms in order to help create an
alternative digital reality known as the metaverse, he was mercilessly mocked.
你不得不佩服马克·扎克伯格（Mark Zuckerberg）。今年10月份，这位脸书的创始人宣布，他将把这家社交媒体网络母公司的名称改为原平台（Meta Platforms），以帮助创造另一种被称为元宇宙的数字现实。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
To some, he was generating a smokescreen to distract attention from a political furore. To others, he was merely the latest middle-aged tech billionaire to chase a childhood fantasy, much as Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and Tesla’s Elon Musk were doing with space rockets.
当时，他遭受了无情的嘲讽。在一些人看来，他是在利用障眼法来转移人们对脸书政治风波的注意力。另一些人则认为，他只不过是最新一位追逐童年幻想的中年科技亿万富翁，就像亚马逊的杰夫·贝佐斯（Jeff Bezos）和特斯拉的埃隆·马斯克（Elon Musk）追逐太空火箭梦一样。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
【2】And yet his timing was impeccable. Since October searches on Google for “metaverse” have soared. Wall Street is fanning the hype. According to Bernstein, a broker, the term cropped up 449 times in third-quarter earnings calls, up from 100 in the second quarter.
然而，他的时机把握得无懈可击。自10月以来，谷歌上“元宇宙”的搜索量激增。华尔街也正在大肆炒作。经纪公司伯恩斯坦(Bernstein)的数据显示，该术语在第三季度财报电话会议中出现了449次，高于第二季度的100次。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
It says markets with potential annual revenue of at least $2trn could be disrupted by the metaverse. Jefferies, a bank, says that though the phenomenon may be more than a decade
away, it has the potential to disrupt “almost everything in human life”.
该公司表示，潜在年收入至少为2万亿美元的市场可能会被元宇宙扰乱。杰富瑞银行表示，尽管这种现象可能还要十多年才会出现，但它有可能影响“人类生活的方方面面”。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
【3】Other tech giants like Microsoft have set out plans to head for the metaverse. But it is big firms still under the control of their founders that may become the most ardent
evangelists. Mr Zucker berg, with a net worth close to $125bn and almost total control of a company valued at $908bn, is the most prominent.
微软等其他科技巨头已经制定了进军元宇宙的计划。但是，仍然由创始人控制的大公司可能会成为“元宇宙”最热心的传道者。最突出的是扎克伯格，他的净资产接近1250亿美元，并且对一家估值为9080亿美元的公司几乎拥有完全控制权。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
Others include Jensen Huang of Nvidia, a maker of graphics processors worth $722bn, and Pony Ma of Tencent, the Chinese tech giant worth $550bn, whose gaming investment portfolio includes a 40% stake in Epic Games, owner of “Fortnite”, one of the world’s most popular games.
其他人包括价值7220亿美元的图形处理器制造商英伟达的联合创始人黄仁勋，以及价值5500亿美元的中国科技巨头腾讯的首席执行官马化腾。马化腾的游戏投资组合中包括英佩公司40%的股份，英佩公司是全球最受欢迎的游戏之一“堡垒之夜”的所有者。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
Epic’s founder, Tim Sweeney, is himself a force to be reckoned with. He recently told Bloomberg that the metaverse was a multitrillion-dollar opportunity, and that companies like his were in a race to get to a billion users in order to set the metaverse’s standards for the future.
英佩公司的创始人蒂姆·斯维尼（Tim Sweeney）本身就是一股不可忽视的力量。最近，他告诉彭博社，元宇宙是一个价值数万亿美元的机会，像他这样的公司正在争取达到10亿用户，以便为元空间的未来制定标准。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
【4】It is shaping up to become a billionaire battle similar to the Bezos-Musk space race. Instead of rocket science, it will be fought with reality-bending headsets, blockchains, cryptocurrencies and mind-frazzling amounts of computing power.
这将成为一场亿万富翁之战，类似于贝佐斯—马斯克的太空竞赛。与火箭科学不同的是，这将是一场用扭曲现实的头盔、区块链、加密货币和令人头疼的计算能力进行的战斗。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
【5】Precisely what these plutocrats mean by the metaverse is as yet unclear. Will it be an all-consuming futuristic world of virtual reality, avatars, oceanside mansions and other online razzmatazz that will make the real world a dull place by comparison
这些富豪们所说的元宇宙到底意味着什么，目前还不清楚。它是否会成为一个由虚拟现实、虚拟角色、海滨豪宅和其他网上炫目的东西组成的无所不包的未来世界，与之相比，现实世界会变得沉闷？
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
Or will it simply be a richer, more immersive version of what already exists today: a way to socialise, work, shop and play online even as life in the everyday world carries on as normal It is even less clear whether tomorrow’s internet users will be seduced by the dreams of entitled tech billionaires.
或者它只是今天已经存在东西的一个更加丰富、更加沉浸式的版本:一种即使在现实世界日常生活正常进行的情况下，也可以在网上进行社交、工作、购物和游戏的方式？未来的互联网用户是否会被有权势的科技亿万富翁的梦想所诱惑，就更不清楚了。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
【6】A look at the ambitions of Meta, Nvidia, Epic and Tencent give a sense of the scope of the undertaking. Each has their niches. Mr Zuckerberg has earmarked $10bn this year mostly to develop the virtual- and augmented-reality headsets and glasses that he hopes will provide a dominant access point to the metaverse, much as Apple’s iPhone does with the mobile internet.
看看原平台、英伟达、英佩和腾讯的雄心壮志，就能感受到这一事业的规模有多大。每个公司都有自己的市场定位。扎克伯格今年已拨出100亿美元，主要用于开发虚拟现实和增强现实的头盔和眼镜，他希望这些头盔和眼镜能够为元宇宙提供一个主要的接入点，就像苹果公司的手机对移动互联网的作用一样。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
Nvidia is focused on what it calls the omniverse, a technology based on its chips that brings engineers, designers and other creative types together virtually to make things—mostly, for now, in industrial settings. Epic has been creating virtual worlds for years, including “Fortnite”.
英伟达专注于其所称的“全宇宙”技术，这是一种基于其芯片的技术，它将工程师、设计师和其他创意类型的人以虚拟方式聚集在一起制造东西——目前主要是在工业环境中应用。英佩公司多年来一直在创造虚拟世界，包括“堡垒之夜”。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
In the metaverse, its killer app may be Unreal Engine, a platform that gives its own and other developers the ability to make lifelike 3D experiences, including games, films, architectural models and industrial designs. Tencent has China to crack. But his firm’s popular WeChat super-app, including WeChat Pay, is already a 2d version of what the metaverse could become in 3D.
在虚拟世界中，它的杀手级应用可能是虚幻引擎，这个平台让它自己和其他开发者能够制作逼真的3D体验，包括游戏、电影、建筑模型和工业设计。腾讯要攻克中国市场。但马化腾的公司广受欢迎的微信超级应用，包括微信支付，已经是元宇宙可能成为3D的2D版本。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
【7】Behind their futuristic ambitions lie some common experiences. First, the mobile internet is reaching the end of an era. In America and Europe, politicians are threatening tighter rules against monopolies and privacy abuses, especially with respect to Facebook and Google.
在他们对未来的雄心的背后，隐藏着一些共同的经历。首先，移动互联网正在走向一个时代的终结。在美国和欧洲，政客们威胁要对垄断和侵犯隐私的行为制定更严格的规定，尤其是对脸书和谷歌。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
【8】Next, they operate in constrained worlds. Apple is a particular bugbear for Mr Zuckerberg and Mr Sweeney. The iPhone-maker is using the privacy settings in its IOS operating system to control the extent to which Facebook can sell digital adverts.
其次，他们在受限制的世界中运作。对扎克伯格和斯威尼来说，苹果公司尤其令人担忧。这家手机制造商正在使用其IOS操作系统中的隐私设置来控制脸书销售数字广告的范围。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
Epic is engaged in an antitrust battle with Apple over the fees its App Store imposes on game developers, which has so far been fairly unsuccessful. That is why both men vow so vehemently to promote interoperability—ie, no closed systems—as well as common standards. They, too, want to be architects of the operating systems of the future.
英佩公司正在与苹果公司就其应用商店向游戏开发商征收费用的问题展开反垄断斗争，但迄今为止，这一斗争并不成功。这就是为什么扎克伯格和斯威尼都如此强烈地宣称要推动互操作性——即没有封闭的系统——以及通用标准。他们也想成为未来操作系统的架构师。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
【9】They won’t have the field to themselves. Apple, though so far quiet about the metaverse, is no doubt preparing an offensive. Telecoms firms want a sniff, having invested heavily in ultra-fast, low-latency 5G spectrum. Rapidly growing platforms like Roblox, offering a build-your-own games model that attracts 200m users a month, have already captured young hearts.
他们不会独占这一领域。尽管苹果迄今对元宇宙保持沉默，但毫无疑问，它正在准备发起攻势。电信公司已经在超快速、低延迟的5G频谱上投入了大量资金，因此想要有所收获。像罗布乐思这样快速发展的平台，提供了一个每月吸引2亿用户的自建游戏模式，已经俘获了年轻人的心。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
There are naysayers, too, notably proponents of more distributed technologies that are known as Web3, who argue that blockchains and cryptocurrencies are the next big thing—
though as Ben Thompson, a tech pundit, points out, these may find much better use cases in the metaverse than in the real world.
也有反对者，特别是被称为Web3的更多分布式技术的支持者，他们认为区块链和加密货币是下一个大事件——尽管正如技术专家本·汤普森（Ben Thompson）指出的那样，这些东西可能能在元宇宙中找到比现实世界中更好的使用场景。
The bitter taste of sanctions 被制裁的苦涩
【10】There is a lot to play for. As Mr Thompson says: “Elon Musk wants to go to the Moon. Mark Zuckerberg wants to create entirely new moons in digital space.” But just as space is a race, so is the metaverse. Messrs Zuckerberg, Huang, Sweeney, Ma et al may promise a future for the internet that is more open, immersive and engaging than the mobile one that exists today. But each wants to get there first, so that they can set the rules to their
有很多东西值得做。正如汤普森所说: “埃隆·马斯克（ElonMusk）想要登上月球。马克 扎克伯格（Mark Zuckerberg）希望在数字领域创造一个全新的月球。”但正如太空是一场竞赛一样，元宇宙也是一场竞赛。扎克伯格、黄仁勋、斯威尼、马化腾等人可能会承诺互联网的未来会比现在的移动互联网更加开放、更具沉浸感和吸引力。但是每个人都想抢先一步到达那里，这样他们就可以制定对自己有利的规则。熊彼特: 元宇宙之王
【挖空练习】
Schumpeter: Lords of the metaverse
熊彼特: 元宇宙之王
Forget space. The next ___________ battle is to take people beyond reality
【1】You have to hand it to Mark Zuckerberg. When the founder of Facebook announced in October that he was changing the name of the social-media network’s parent company to Meta Platforms in order to help create an ___________ _______ reality known as the metaverse, he was ___________ mocked. To some, he was __________ a ___________ to ________ attention from a political ______. To others, he was merely the latest middle-aged tech ___________ to _____ a childhood _______, much as Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and Tesla’s Elon Musk were doing with space _______.
【2】And yet his timing was __________. Since October searches on Google for “metaverse” have soared. Wall Street is _______ the ____. According to Bernstein, a ______, the term cropped up 449 times in third-quarter earnings calls, up from 100 in the second quarter. It says markets with _________ annual _______ of at least $2trn could be _________ by the metaverse. Jefferies, a bank, says that though the __________ may be more than a decade away, it has the _________ to _______ “almost everything in human life”.
【3】Other tech giants like Microsoft have set out plans to head for the metaverse. But it is big firms still under the control of their founders that may become the most ardent evangelists. Mr Zucker berg, with a net worth close to $125bn and almost total control of a company valued at $908bn, is the most prominent. Others include Jensen Huang of Nvidia, a maker of ________ processors worth $722bn, and Pony Ma of Tencent, the Chinese tech giant worth $550bn, whose gaming __________ _________ includes a 40% _____ in Epic Games, owner of “Fortnite”, one of the world’s most popular games. Epic’s founder, Tim Sweeney, is himself a force to be ________ with. He recently told Bloomberg that the metaverse was a multitrillion-dollar opportunity, and that companies like his were in a race to get to a billion users in order to set the metaverse’s standards for the future.
【4】It is _______ up to become a ___________ battle similar to the Bezos-Musk space race. Instead of ______ science, it will be fought with reality-_______ headsets, blockchains, cryptocurrencies and mind-frazzling amounts of computing power.
【5】Precisely what these plutocrats mean by the metaverse is as yet unclear. Will it be an all-_________ __________ world of _______ reality, _______, oceanside mansions and other online razzmatazz that will make the real world a ____ place by comparison Or will it simply be a richer, more immersive version of what already ______ today: a way to _________, work, shop and play online even as life in the everyday world carries on as normal It is even less clear whether tomorrow’s internet users will be seduced by the dreams of ________ tech billionaires.
【6】A look at the ambitions of Meta, Nvidia, Epic and Tencent give a sense of the _____ of the ___________. Each has their niches. Mr Zuckerberg has earmarked $10bn this year mostly to develop the _______- and _________-reality headsets and glasses that he hopes will provide a ________ access point to the metaverse, much as Apple’s iPhone does with the mobile internet. Nvidia is focused on what it calls the omniverse, a technology based on its chips that brings engineers, designers and other creative types together virtually to make things—mostly, for now, in industrial ________. Epic has been creating _______ worlds for years, including “Fortnite”. In the metaverse, its killer app may be Unreal Engine, a ________ that gives its own and other developers the ability to make ________ 3D experiences, including games, films, _____________ models and industrial designs. Tencent has China to _____. But his firm’s popular WeChat super-app, including WeChat Pay, is already a 2d version of what the metaverse could become in 3D.
【7】Behind their __________ ambitions lie some common experiences. First, the mobile internet is reaching the end of an era. In America and Europe, politicians are ___________ tighter rules against monopolies and _______ ______, especially with respect to Facebook and Google. In China, the tech industry is reeling from the government _________. Not for nothing are some first-__________ tech entrepreneurs in America and China calling it _____. Those who remain standing need a __________ new story to tell.
【8】Next, they operate in ___________ worlds. Apple is a __________ bugbear for Mr Zuckerberg and Mr Sweeney. The iPhone-maker is using the _______ ________ in its IOS _________ system to control the ______ to which Facebook can sell _______ adverts. Epic is _______ in an _________ battle with Apple over the ____ its App Store imposes on game developers, which has so far been fairly ____________. That is why both men vow so __________ to promote interoperability—ie, no closed _______—as well as common standards. They, too, want to be architects of the _________ _______ of the future.
【9】They won’t have the field to themselves. Apple, though so far quiet about the metaverse, is no doubt _________ an _________. Telecoms firms want a _____, having invested heavily in _____-fast, low-_______ 5G ________. Rapidly growing platforms like Roblox, offering a build-your-own games model that attracts 200m users a month, have already captured young hearts. There are naysayers, too, notably proponents of more ___________ technologies that are known as Web3, who argue that blockchains and cryptocurrencies are the next big thing—though as Ben Thompson, a tech ______, points out, these may find much better use cases in the metaverse than in the real world.
Moonshots
【10】There is a lot to play for. As Mr Thompson says: “Elon Musk wants to go to the Moon. Mark Zuckerberg wants to create entirely new moons in _______ space.” But just as space is a race, so is the metaverse. Messrs Zuckerberg, Huang, Sweeney, Ma et al may promise a future for the internet that is more open, immersive and engaging than the mobile one that ______ today. But each wants to get there first, so that they can set the rules to their advantage.
【答案】
Schumpeter: Lords of the metaverse
熊彼特: 元宇宙之王
Forget space. The next billionaire battle is to take people beyond reality
【1】You have to hand it to Mark Zuckerberg. When the founder of Facebook announced in October that he was changing the name of the social-media network’s parent company to Meta Platforms in order to help create an alternative digital reality known as the metaverse, he was mercilessly mocked. To some, he was generating a smokescreen to distract attention from a political furore. To others, he was merely the latest middle-aged tech billionaire to chase a childhood fantasy, much as Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and Tesla’s Elon Musk were doing with space rockets.
【2】And yet his timing was impeccable. Since October searches on Google for “metaverse” have soared. Wall Street is fanning the hype. According to Bernstein, a broker, the term cropped up 449 times in third-quarter earnings calls, up from 100 in the second quarter. It says markets with potential annual revenue of at least $2trn could be disrupted by the metaverse. Jefferies, a bank, says that though the phenomenon may be more than a decade away, it has the potential to disrupt “almost everything in human life”.
【3】Other tech giants like Microsoft have set out plans to head for the metaverse. But it is big firms still under the control of their founders that may become the most ardent evangelists. Mr Zucker berg, with a net worth close to $125bn and almost total control of a company valued at $908bn, is the most prominent. Others include Jensen Huang of Nvidia, a maker of graphics processors worth $722bn, and Pony Ma of Tencent, the Chinese tech giant worth $550bn, whose gaming investment portfolio includes a 40% stake in Epic Games, owner of “Fortnite”, one of the world’s most popular games. Epic’s founder, Tim Sweeney, is himself a force to be reckoned with. He recently told Bloomberg that the metaverse was a multitrillion-dollar opportunity, and that companies like his were in a race to get to a billion users in order to set the metaverse’s standards for the future.
【4】It is shaping up to become a billionaire battle similar to the Bezos-Musk space race. Instead of rocket science, it will be fought with reality-bending headsets, blockchains, cryptocurrencies and mind-frazzling amounts of computing power.
【5】Precisely what these plutocrats mean by the metaverse is as yet unclear. Will it be an all-consuming futuristic world of virtual reality, avatars, oceanside mansions and other online razzmatazz that will make the real world a dull place by comparison Or will it simply be a richer, more immersive version of what already exists today: a way to socialise, work, shop and play online even as life in the everyday world carries on as normal It is even less clear whether tomorrow’s internet users will be seduced by the dreams of entitled tech billionaires.
【6】A look at the ambitions of Meta, Nvidia, Epic and Tencent give a sense of the scope of the undertaking. Each has their niches. Mr Zuckerberg has earmarked $10bn this year mostly to develop the virtual- and augmented-reality headsets and glasses that he hopes will provide a dominant access point to the metaverse, much as Apple’s iPhone does with the mobile internet. Nvidia is focused on what it calls the omniverse, a technology based on its chips that brings engineers, designers and other creative types together virtually to make things—mostly, for now, in industrial settings. Epic has been creating virtual worlds for years, including “Fortnite”. In the metaverse, its killer app may be Unreal Engine, a platform that gives its own and other developers the ability to make lifelike 3D experiences, including games, films, architectural models and industrial designs. Tencent has China to crack. But his firm’s popular WeChat super-app, including WeChat Pay, is already a 2d version of what the metaverse could become in 3D.
【7】Behind their futuristic ambitions lie some common experiences. First, the mobile internet is reaching the end of an era. In America and Europe, politicians are threatening tighter rules against monopolies and privacy abuses, especially with respect to Facebook and Google. In China, the tech industry is reeling from the government onslaught. Not for nothing are some first-generation tech entrepreneurs in America and China calling it quits. Those who remain standing need a compelling new story to tell.
【8】Next, they operate in constrained worlds. Apple is a particular bugbear for Mr Zuckerberg and Mr Sweeney. The iPhone-maker is using the privacy settings in its IOS operating system to control the extent to which Facebook can sell digital adverts. Epic is engaged in an antitrust battle with Apple over the fees its App Store imposes on game developers, which has so far been fairly unsuccessful. That is why both men vow so vehemently to promote interoperability—ie, no closed systems—as well as common standards. They, too, want to be architects of the operating systems of the future.
【9】They won’t have the field to themselves. Apple, though so far quiet about the metaverse, is no doubt preparing an offensive. Telecoms firms want a sniff, having invested heavily in ultra-fast, low-latency 5G spectrum. Rapidly growing platforms like Roblox, offering a build-your-own games model that attracts 200m users a month, have already captured young hearts. There are naysayers, too, notably proponents of more distributed technologies that are known as Web3, who argue that blockchains and cryptocurrencies are the next big thing—though as Ben Thompson, a tech pundit, points out, these may find much better use cases in the metaverse than in the real world.
Moonshots
【10】There is a lot to play for. As Mr Thompson says: “Elon Musk wants to go to the Moon. Mark Zuckerberg wants to create entirely new moons in digital space.” But just as space is a race, so is the metaverse. Messrs Zuckerberg, Huang, Sweeney, Ma et al may promise a future for the internet that is more open, immersive and engaging than the mobile one that exists today. But each wants to get there first, so that they can set the rules to their advantage.
①短语：1.原文：You have to hand it to Mark Zuckerberg.
词典：have（got）to hand it to someone 你（或某人）真行<非正式>
例句：I've got to hand it to you—you've got the magic touch.
你真行——简直是神通广大。
2.原文：Wall Street is fanning the hype.
词典：fan the hype 大肆炒作
例句：Scalpers fanned the hype of the ticket prices for the concert
黄牛们大肆炒作演唱会的票价。
3.原文：Many people object to assisted dying on religious grounds.According to Bernstein, a broker, the term cropped up 449 times in third-quarter earnings calls, up from 100 in the second quarter.
词典：crop up 突然出现
例句：Similar problems crop up at traditional companies.
在传统的公司里，类似问题也会突然发生。
4.原文：According to Bernstein, a broker, the term cropped up 449 times in third-quarter earnings calls, up from 100 in the second quarter.
词典：earnings calls财报会议
例句：Larcker and Zakolyukina pored through the transcripts of thousands of corporate earnings calls when CEOs and chief financial officers take questions from analysts.
拉克尔和察柯柳金娜钻研了上千份首席执行官们和财务总监们在财报会议时回答分析师们提问的录本。
5.原文：Other tech giants like Microsoft have set out plans to head for the metaverse.
词典：set out plans to制定计划
例句：The transport secretary has set out plans to ease traffic jams at ninety-two pinch points.
交通部长已经制订出计划，要在92个易堵塞路段实施缓解交通阻塞问题。
6.原文：But it is big firms still under the control of their founders that may become the most ardent evangelists.
词典：under the control of 在…控制下
例句：Under the control of the program, computers even can do some great things.
在程序的控制下，电脑甚至能够做出一些惊人的事情。
7.原文：To others, he was merely the latest middle-aged tech billionaire to chase a childhood fantasy, much as Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and Tesla’s Elon Musk were doing with space rockets.
词典：much as 就像
例句：The day ended much as it began.
这一天结束时还像开始时一样。
8.原文：Or will it simply be a richer, more immersive version of what already exists today: a way to socialise, work, shop and play online even as life in the everyday world carries on as normal
词典：even as 即使=even though/if
例句：Even as a humanitarian mission it has been only a qualified success.
即使是一项人道主义任务，也只是局部成功。
9.原文：In America and Europe, politicians are threatening tighter rules against monopolies and privacy abuses, especially with respect to Facebook and Google.
词典：with respect to关于；至于
例句：The two groups were similar with respect to income and status.
这两组在收入和地位方面是相似的。
10.原文：It is shaping up to become a billionaire battle similar to the Bezos-Musk space race.
词典：shape up 顺利发展
例句：If the new boy doesn't begin to shape up soon, he'll have to leave school.
要是这新来的男孩不快点在功课方面有进展的话，他就得退学了。
11.原文：There is a lot to play for
词典：play for 效力...
例句：He was very excited to be asked to play for Wales.
入选威尔士队使他非常兴奋。
②长难句
原文：When the founder of Facebook announced in October that he was changing the name of the social-media network’s parent company to Meta Platforms in order to help create an alternative digital reality known as the metaverse, he was mercilessly mocked.
分析：该句由主句+时间状语从句+目的状语从句组成。主句的结构是主（he）谓（was mocked）。When引导了时间转语从句，该状语从句的结构是主（the founder of Facebook）谓（announced）宾从（that he was changing the name of the social-media network’s parent company to Meta Platforms）that引导的宾语从句的结构主（he）谓（was changing）宾（ the name of the social-media network’s parent company） in order to引导了目的状语。
3.译文：今年10月份，这位脸书的创始人宣布，他将把这家社交媒体网络母公司的名称改为 Meta Platforms，以帮助创造另一种被称为元宇宙的数字现实。当时，他遭受了无情的嘲讽。
③写作技巧：1.原文：Telecoms firms want a sniff, having invested heavily in ultra-fast, low-latency 5G spectrum.
译文：电信公司已经在超快速、低延迟的5G频谱上投入了大量资金，因此想要有所收获。
词组：sniff作名词，本意是“线索、迹象、一线希望”，本文我们采用“一线希望”这一含义，但翻译成“电信公司想要一线希望”则不明确，实际是“电信公司想要（成功的）一线希望”即“想要有所收获”。在翻译中注意补充，使句意完整。
2.原文：much as Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and Tesla’s Elon Musk were doing with space rockets.
译文：就像亚马逊的杰夫·贝佐斯（Jeff Bezos）和特斯拉的埃隆·马斯克（Elon Musk）追逐太空火箭梦一样。
词组：much as+从句，是much修饰比较分句，表示“很像...一样”。
④背景知识：
Metaverse：元宇宙，是整合了多种新技术而产生的新型虚实相融的互联网应用和社会形态，通过利用科技手段进行链接与创造的，与现实世界映射与交互的虚拟世界，具备新型社会体系的数字生活空间。元宇宙本质上是对现实世界的虚拟化、数字化过程，需要对内容生产、经济系统、用户体验以及实体世界内容等进行大量改造。
Bezos-Musk space race：贝佐斯—马斯克的太空竞赛。电商巨头亚马逊创始人兼CEO杰夫·贝索斯（Jeff Bezos）宣布用更多的时间在商业太空公司蓝色起源（Blue Origin）上，计划于2024年登上月球。在私人航天领域以SpaceX载人火箭发射成功惊艳世界的“硅谷钢铁侠”马斯克也投身太空产业。
killer app：杀手级应用软体。指极度成功与受欢迎的电脑应用软件。
段落大意：
【1】扎克伯格旨在创造元宇宙，令人佩服。
【2】元宇宙这一概念引起人们重视。
【3】由创始人控制的大公司可能会成为“元宇宙”最大的拥护者。
【4】元宇宙将成为一场亿万富翁之战。
【5】元宇宙到底意味着什么，目前还不清楚。
【6】元宇宙的规模巨大。
【7】现实世界的客观因素导致他们追求创造元宇宙。
【8】扎克伯格和斯威尼拥护元宇宙的原因。
【9】元宇宙这一领域由大家共同创造，共同获益。
【10】元宇宙的实现还有很多事需要做。
