2016年经济学人 Slack一代 职场通讯工具如何取代其他沟通形式(下)（在线收听）

A self-professed introvert, which is fitting for a company that sells itself on textual communication, he values efficiency and candour. After Yahoo bought Flickr, he worked there for a few years. “Everything was horrible, ugly, slow, difficult to use and confusing,” he says, frankly.

他自称性格内向——这恰恰适合靠文本通讯谋生的公司——并且珍视效率和坦诚。雅虎收购Flickr之后，他在那里工作了几年。“一切都很可怕、丑陋、缓慢、难用、混乱。”他毫不掩饰地说道。

In retrospect, Flickr was sold too soon. The sale marked the beginning of the technology industry's resurgence after its crash in the early 2000s. Now Mr Butterfield has a second chance. Investors do not want to see him sell Slack too early. Earlier this year there were reports that Microsoft considered bidding around $8 billion for the company. Mr Butterfield says that Slack has never received a formal offer from anyone and is planning to go public. Last year it started submitting itself to voluntary audits, in what appears to be preparation for a public debut. But it seems even more likely that a large tech giant will see the strategic value of Slack and try to snap it up first for an even splashier sum.

回想起来，当年卖Flickr卖得太早了。那一次并购标志着科技产业在经历21世纪初崩溃后的复苏。如今巴特菲尔德有了第二次机会。投资者不愿意看到他过早卖掉Slack。今年早些时候有报道称，微软考虑出价80亿美元收购该公司。巴特菲尔德则表示从未收到任何人的正式报价，而公司正计划上市。去年，公司做了一次外部审计，似乎是为公开上市准备。但貌似可能性更大的是某家科技巨头会意识到Slack的战略价值，以更高的出价抢先将其收归麾下。

Mr Butterfield says that Slack could achieve $10 billion in revenue if it signs up 100m knowledge workers, of which there are around 850m worldwide. That is far easier said than done. For one thing, Slack still needs to woo larger companies outside the technology world. Currently it holds particular appeal among workers at firms in the internet, media and advertising industries, and among teams of software developers within larger firms. Conquering traditional businesses may prove harder. Slack's yearly minimum of $80 per employee is steep for companies with tens of thousands of workers.

巴特菲尔德表示，假如全球约8.5亿的知识型劳动者中有一亿成为Slack的付费用户，那么公司的年收入将达到100亿美元。这说起来容易，实际难度却大得多。一方面，Slack还须博取非科技业大公司的青睐。目前，Slack特别受互联网、媒体、广告公司员工的欢迎，大公司内部软件开发团队的员工也很爱用。但征服传统公司可能会更难。Slack每人80美元的最低年费对拥有数以万计员工的企业来说是一项不菲的开支。

For another, Slack has rising competition to fend off. Already, rival products are taking aim at the market for workplace collaboration, including one, Atlassian, from an Australian software company, which is called HipChat, and bundled with its other services. There is also Symphony, a rival startup backed by several banks that specialises in highly regulated industries such as financial services, which require more compliance controls. Tech giants such as Microsoft, Oracle and Facebook have collaborative work apps, but these are only modestly successful.

另一方面，Slack还要抵御不断加剧的竞争。已有不少竞争产品瞄准办公协作的市场，其中包括澳大利亚软件公司Atlassian推出的HipChat，该产品还捆绑提供公司的其他服务。另一对手是拥有多家银行支持的创业企业Symphony，其产品专门针对金融服务等受高度监管的行业而设，这些行业要求更多的合规控制。微软、甲骨文和Facebook等科技巨头也有协同工作应用，但都成绩有限。

Slack's greatest challenge may be people's own habits. To some, its endless stream of chatter may be worse even than e-mail, because the barriers to commenting rapidly are lower. The introverted Mr Butterfield should welcome the chance to appeal to people who do not want constant interaction, even when it comes in textual form.

Slack面临的最大挑战可能是人们自身的习惯。一些人认为，这种没完没了地唠叨也许比电子邮件还要糟糕，因为不假思索地大发议论的屏障降低了。内向的巴特菲尔德也该考虑怎样吸引那些不喜欢持续互动的人，即便是以文本形式互动。