OnLive创始人：有了云游戏，谁还要游戏机

    如何为那些真正能做出开创性贡献的人才提供到位的激励是个非常复杂的问题。我想，十年之后，人们会说我们并不是一家昙花一现的公司。但我们同样不仅仅代表着下一代的游戏终端。可以通过我们的系统发行电影。围绕电影的整个用户界面都能发送，而不光是电影本身……

    我们拥有巨大的企业级市场。游戏市场的规模是600亿美元。企业级市场的规模约为1,200亿美元，还有中小企业、消费者、教育界，以及其他很多种市场、卖点，等等。这一技术的应用领域如此广泛，因此在某种程度上，对大多数公司而言，我们创造的这一技术有点包罗万象，所以它们很难理解，它与它们的哪些业务可以发生关联——无论是从积极的方面而言，还是从可能构成的威胁而言……

    索尼对改变这种局面帮助很大。因为如果没有人大力支持这一技术，那些大公司就会袖手旁观，说些诸如此类的风凉话：“行了，不需要我们亲自动手，也许这些家伙自己就会销声匿迹的。”但一旦有人站出来立下战书并声称：“我们支持这个新事物，”那么这一风险暗藏的局面就会立即改观。大家会不再怎么嘟囔“希望这种颠覆创新不会发生”，而是纷纷表示“希望我们不会掉队”。

    说到落在人后，OnLive的应用在苹果应用商店（Apple App Store）的审核批准曾拖了大约6个月。而照您刚才描述的画面，OnLive在如此众多的领域都一路攻城略地、所向披靡过来了，那么碰到当时这种局面，是否很让人郁闷？

    希望进军的每个平台都有特定的挑战，这些都得逐一面对。对这每一个平台来说，都会有一场不同的谈判。事情千头万绪，对方也有不同的要务要处理，而你只能一个不落地去适应他们。有时候，你的合作伙伴度假去了，或是要处理一些让他们焦头烂额的事。你永远没法知道会发生什么。有一次，我们有一款电视机即将出货，但供应商突然停止生产其中的芯片，于是电视机厂商就没法再顺利出货。你怎么能料到这些事情呢？而这仅仅是我们必须穿过的无数激流险滩之一。

    贵司曾和苹果公司谈过你们的应用吗？

    我们曾和苹果开展过广泛探讨，并且已通过他们的审批流程。和所有经过这一审批流程的公司一样，我们也不想透露这方面的细节，只想说确实已经和对方进行过讨论，并且努力满足了他们的要求。苹果有一套要致力维系的高标准，他们有自己的立场。最终我们还是在他们规定的框架内达到了标准。这方面我们可谓不遗余力，精益求精。

    苹果还批准了我们其他一些应用。比如OnLive Viewer，通过它可以观看游戏。还有OnLive Desktop，能用在桌面上……要获得苹果认可是一个非常复杂的过程，这就好比你如果拿着全新的东西走进一个领域，你最好是保持耐心，在能够有所进展的地方设法前进，如果做不到，那就原地逗留，伺机而动。

    您知道到底是什么让苹果迟迟没有批准你们进驻吗？

    坦率地说，我们真不知道。我们所知道的就是，迟迟无法获批。所以这个过程真是费尽心机。苹果没义务为此特别明确问题所在，也没有义务在批准过程上始终保持一致的做法。我们能做的只有尽力而为。

    您认为这种情况真会出现吗？

    希望如此吧。我也不知道。我们一直在尽力而为，但现实世界就是如此。有时候披头士乐队（Beatles）对苹果也未必认可，而有时候苹果又对其他人不予放行。只能说，你希望最后能迈过这道坎。

    译者：清远

    And to keep incentives in place for people that are doing something which is truly groundbreaking is a very complex equation. I think after 10 years, people can say we're not a pop-and-top company. But it is also the case that we're not just the next generation of consoles. You can distribute movies through us. You can distribute the entire user interface around the movie, not just the movie itself….

    We have this huge market in enterprise. The game market is a $60 billion market. The enterprise market is about $120 billion market, and then there's small- and medium-sized business, there's the consumer, education, there's all these other markets, point-of-sale, and so on. The applications of this technology are vast, and so in some ways we've created something which is too broad in scope for most companies to wrap their heads around in the sense of where it relates to their business — both in the positive and how it threatens them….

    Sony helps a lot with that, because if nobody has big backing, then the large companies kind of stand back and say, "All right, we don't need to do anything, and maybe these guys will actually fade away." But once someone's thrown the gauntlet down and said, "We're getting behind this thing," then the risk equation changes. It's less about "let's hope this doesn't happen," and more about "let's hope we don't get left behind."

    Speaking of being left behind, OnLive's app has been pending approval with the Apple App Store for about six months. With the portrait that you just painted of all of the different areas OnLive is functioning, how frustrating has that been?

    Every platform you try to move into has challenges that you've got to deal with. For everyone it's a different negotiation. There's different things, they've got different priorities, and you've got to work for all of them. Sometimes the people you want to work with are on vacation or they have an issue they're dealing with that is really bogging them down. You never know. We had a television ready to ship and the manufacturer stopped making the chip that was inside it, and so the TV maker couldn't ship the product. Okay, well how do you anticipate that? So, you know, that is just one of the shoals that we have to get around.

    Have you spoken with Apple about your app?

    We have spoken with Apple extensively and we've gone through the approval process. Like every other company that goes through the approval process, you generally don't want to go and share any details about that, other than to say that you've had discussions with them and you're trying to work things out. Apple has their standards they're trying to maintain, they have their point of view. Ultimately we have to go and work within that framework. We're doing the best we can.

    They've approved other apps. The OnLive Viewer is there, and you can watch games. We have OnLive Desktop and you can use it with your desktop…. It's very complicated, and the best you can do if you're walking into the world with something that's brand-new, is be patient and make headway where you can make headway, and stick around and wait if you can't.

    Do know what the issue is that's holding up the approval?

    The honest answer is we really don't. We do know that it has not been approved, though. So, it's complicated. There's no real obligation for them to go and specifically identify or be consistent in how they approve things. You do the best you can.

    Do you think that it will happen?

    I hope so. I don't know. We're trying our best and it's the world we live in. Sometimes the Beatles don't approve Apple, sometimes Apple doesn't approve somebody else. You hope that eventually you get over the hump.