This is the VOA Special English Technology Report.
这里是美国之音慢速英语科技报道。
Last week, the Wall Street Journal had a report about the online travel company Orbitz. The newspaper said Orbitz shows Mac users higher-priced travel choices at the top of search results than users of Windows. The company began doing this after research suggested that people who use Mac computers spend up to thirty percent more for hotels than people with PCs.
上周，《华尔街日报》发表了一份关于在线旅游公司Orbitz的报道。该报表示，Orbitz在搜索结果顶部对Mac用户展示的旅游产品的价格高于Windows用户。在研究人员表明使用Mac电脑的用户在酒店消费上高出普通电脑用户30%以上之后，该公司开始这样做。
Cameron Yuill is chief executive of a digital media and technology company called AdGent. He is also a former employee of Orbitz. He says this kind of marketing is just another example of how the Internet is influencing the way companies target consumers.
Cameron Yuill是一家名为AdGent的数字媒体和科技公司的首席执行官，也是Orbitz的前雇员。他表示，这类营销只是互联网如何影响公司挑选目标消费者方式的另一个例子。
CAMERON YUILL: "Mac users tend to be more affluent than PC users, so why not target them with the messages that are going to resonate with them?"
CAMERON YUILL：“Mac用户往往比普通电脑用户更有钱，所以为什么不针对他们提供能够引起他们兴趣的信息呢？
This kind of price discrimination is also known as dynamic pricing. Mr. Yuill says it is a very common marketing tool, especially in the travel industry.
这类价格差别对待也被称为动态定价。Yuill先生表示，这是一种非常普遍的营销工具，特别是在旅游行业中。
CAMERON YUILL: "Next time you're on a flight, ask the person next to you what they paid for their ticket. And I guarantee it is not the same, the same dollars that you paid for yours. If you're traveling at a certain period of time, or you're a business traveler or you bought your ticket last minute, you will always get charged more."
CAMERON YUILL：“下次坐飞机时，问问你旁边的乘客的机票价格。我保证这个价格和你掏的机票价格不同。如果你在某个特定时段出行，或者你是商务旅客，又或者你最后时刻才买的机票，你总是会掏更多钱。”
Companies have always gathered information about their customers. But now they have a lot more ways to do it. Eric Martin is a partner at Boost Partners, a management consulting company. He says the Internet has increased the amount of data that companies can collect.
各种公司一直在收集有关其客户的信息，但现在他们有了更多办法。埃里克·马丁（Eric Martin）是Boost Partners公司的一名合伙人，这是一家管理咨询公司。他表示，互联网增加了各种公司能够收集的数据的总量。
ERIC MARTIN: "Technology is creating an environment where your searches, your online behavior, leads the seller to know much more about you than would, for instance, a retailer when you walked into their store."
马丁：“科技创造了这样一种环境，你的搜索，你的网上行为让卖家对你了解得更多。举例说，它会超出你走进一家商店时零售商对你的了解。”
A salesperson in a store can only assume certain things about you based on your appearance. Online sellers, however, have far more information to work with. Eric Martin says this includes information about which website directed you to them.
商店营业员只能根据你的外表推测关于你的一些事情。而网上卖家拥有更多关于你的信息可以利用。马丁表示，这包括来源网站这类信息。
ERIC MARTIN: "Which has a bearing on how they view you as a customer and what your buying habits might be. The people that you deal with you online can't see you at all physically. But they know that, for instance, when you came to Orbitz you may have been directed there by Kayak, which is itself a comparison site, which then may lead Orbitz to believe that you're searching for deals."
马丁：“这会影响到你作为客户，他们如何看待你，以及你的购买习惯可能是怎样。与你在线交易的卖家没法看到你本人，但他们了解关于你的一些事情。例如，你可能是通过Kayak访问到Orbitz，Kayak本身是一家比价网站，这可能会使Orbitz认为你在寻求交易。”
Information about the referring site is only one of the things that a site like Orbitz will consider. Is the person a return visitor? Which hotels has this person viewed in the past? Websites collect this kind of information by placing small files known as cookies on a person's computer.
有关来源网站的信息只是Orbitz这类网站会考虑的事情之一。这个人是不是回头访客？他过去看过哪些酒店（的页面）？网站通过在用户电脑上放置一个被称为Cookie的小文件收集这类信息。
In the case of Orbitz, Mac and PC users were actually given the same choices. However, they appeared in different orders. For Mac users, the higher-priced hotels showed up higher in the search results. Orbitz says ninety percent of its users book a hotel that appears on the first page, and mostly in the top five listings.
在Orbitz这个案例中，Mac和普通电脑用户实际上被给出了同样的选项，但它们出现的顺序不同。对Mac用户来说，价格更高的酒店在搜索结果中展示得更靠前。Orbitz表示他们90%的用户会预定展示在首页的酒店，而且多数预定的是排名前五的酒店。
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