Young CEOs in Silicon Valley Rush to Make Mark on World

By Patrick May

Marissa Mayer

Elon Musk

Google’s Sergey Brin puts his money where his meat is, funding the world’s first test-tube hamburger in a bid to change the way the world eats.1. Sergey Brin: 谢尔盖·布林，谷歌创始人之一；puts his money where his meat is: 源自俗语puts his money where his mouth is，意为“某人出钱支持他所相信的事情”，此处稍作改动，意为“出钱支持跟肉相关的一个行业”，即下文提到的试管汉堡；test-tube hamburger: 试管汉堡，由荷兰科学家用母牛干细胞在试管里培养出来的牛肉，造价30多万美元，于2013年8月4日在伦敦举行了试吃活动；in a bid to: 试图，为了。Tesla’s Elon Musk pushes space tourism as a down payment on ensuring our intergalactic salvation.2. Tesla: 特斯拉电动汽车公司；Elon Musk: 埃隆·马斯克，他集工程师，企业家和慈善家各种身份于一身，并且是贝宝、空间探索技术公司以及特斯拉汽车三家公司的创始人；down payment: 定金，预付款；ensure: 保证，确保；intergalactic: 银河间的，星系际的；salvation: 拯救，救赎。And Amazon’s Jeff Bezos3. Jeff Bezos: 杰夫·贝索斯，亚马逊的创始人，他于去年自掏腰包，花费巨资收购了传统媒体巨头《华盛顿邮报》。buys The Washington Post because, well, he hasn’t said.

Driven by bravado, benevolence, boredom or perhaps equal measures of each, deep-pocketed and increasingly young CEOs in Silicon Valley and beyond are taking their money, power and fame and using it to plant flags in all kinds of surprising places.4.也许是受蛮干逞能、仁慈本性或无聊因素的驱使，或许是三者兼而有之，那些财力雄厚、越来越年轻化的硅谷及其他地方的CEO运用他们的钱财、权利和名望在世界各个令人感到惊讶的领域开辟新的事业。bravado: 蛮干心理，逞强的行为；benevolence: 仁慈，善举；deep-pocketed: 财力雄厚的。

Sergey Brin

硅谷年轻的CEO们在取得各自领域的成功之时，也没忘了要兼顾自己嗜好，有的忙着弄试管汉堡，有的忙着玩太空飞船，有的忙着建万年钟表，还有的忙着搞食谱……要说这跨界要玩出名堂也不容易，也许只有这些资本雄厚又舍得花精力的硅谷才俊才能折腾得起吧！

And unlike in the valley’s olden days, when successful tech pioneers quietly assembled philanthropic powerhouses or lobbied to protect open space, there’s now a land rush by tech’s young titans to leave their mark on the world—and maybe save it in the process, one newspaper or in-vitro burger at a time.5. olden: 古昔的；assemble: 聚集，组合；powerhouse: 强大的集团；land rush: 占领土地的热潮，此处喻指年轻的CEO们争相在各个新领域进行投资；titan: 巨子，成就非凡的人；in-vitro: 在试管内的。

“This trend is driven by some weird amalgam of guilt and ego and a desire to help the planet, but it’s like everybody wants to be Bono now,”6. weird: 奇怪的，怪诞的；amalgam: 混合物；Bono: 波诺，原名Paul David Hewson，是爱尔兰歌星，同时他也是音乐家、风险投资家、商人和社会活动家，此处指每个人都想要像Bono那样多方面发展。said author Michael S. Malone, long a keen observer of valley culture. “They want to do good, but they also want to make themselves look good in the process. It’s really just another form of one-upmanship7. one-upmanship:〈口〉高人一等的表现，抢先一步。.”

Either way, the stampede8. stampede: 人群的蜂拥而至。is on. Whether it’s Bezos with the “10,000 Year Clock” he’s helping build inside a West Texas limestone mountain and his Blue Origin spaceflight startup, or Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s $100 million campaign to jump-start public education, the new moguls of online commerce and social media are fanning out with outsize dreams and a ton of cash.9. 无论是贝索斯帮忙在西得克萨斯州一座石灰岩的山内建造的万年钟和新建的蓝色起源宇宙飞船公司，还是脸谱网创始人兼CEO马克·扎克伯格出资一亿美元来推动公共教育的运动，这些电子商务和社交媒体的新富豪都在拿着大把的钞票去展开宏伟的梦想。10,000 Year Clock: 万年钟，是贝索斯出资建造的一座预计能运行一万年的巨大钟表；Blue Origin spaceflight startup: 蓝色起源宇宙飞船，是贝索斯资助的无人驾驶宇宙飞船公司；jump-start: 启动，推动；mogul: 富豪；fan out:展开；outsize: 特大的，特大号的。Brin, in particular,is one busy paradigmshifter, pushing wind power and driverless cars, even as he sports Google Glass eyewear while hawking humane hamburgers.10. paradigm-shifter: 模式改变者；sport: v. 玩弄，炫耀；Google Glass eyewear: 谷歌眼镜，是由谷歌公司研发的一款具有上网等多种功能的眼镜；hawk: 兜售。

Some of these executive endeavors are simply hobbies or personal statements writ large.11. endeavor: 努力；writ large: 扩大了的，更明显的。Oracle’s Larry Ellison buys tennis tournaments, Asian art and exotic cars.12. Oracle: 甲骨文公司，世界上最大的软件数据库公司；Larry Ellison: 拉里·埃里森，甲骨文公司的老板；tournament: 联赛，锦标赛；exotic: 奇异的。Yahoo chief Marissa Mayer created a spreadsheet of ingredients for cupcake recipes.13spreadsheet: 电子数据表；cupcake: 杯形蛋糕。And Zuckerberg, acting on his passion for hunting and killing his own food, shot a bison and had the head mounted on a wall at Facebook headquarters.14. bison: 野牛；mount: 放置，镶嵌。

While some of these activities may conjure up memories of the late billionaire Howard Hughes and his plywood-clad Spruce Goose, futurist Paul Saffo cautions that “quirky” may be the wrong adjective.15. 尽管这些活动可能会让人想起已故的亿万富翁霍华德·休斯和他那胶合板的木质飞机，未来主义者保罗·萨佛警告说，他们的行为可不仅仅是“离奇”这个词所能形容的。conjure up: 使浮现于脑海；Howard Hughes: 霍华德·休斯，美国航空工程师、企业家和电影导演；plywood-clad: 胶合板包着的；Spruce Goose: 斯普如斯之鹅，是霍华德·休斯的木质飞机的名称；futurist: 未来主义者；quirky: 古怪的，离奇的。“Silicon Valley,” he said, “is full of ideas that seemed silly until they took off like a rocket and changed the world. And while Musk and Bezos with their space efforts may have personal goals that raise eyebrows, this is important stuff—opening up space for commercial ventures may eventually get us out of the gravity well of Earth.16. raise eyebrows: 竖起眉毛（表示惊奇、怀疑等）；venture: 商业冒险，冒险事业。”

Regis McKenna, a Silicon Valley veteran and Apple’s first marketing guru, describes a long local legacy of techies converting their professional success into global goodwill, but adds that “they didn’t brag about it and a lot of the philanthropic work was done under the radar.”17. 瑞吉斯·麦金纳是硅谷的资深人士，也是苹果公司的首位营销专家，他描述说：硅谷长期以来都有一种当地的传统，那就是技术人员会将他们职业上取得的成功转化为全球性的善行；但他又补充说：“他们不会对此夸耀吹嘘，而且会低调地去进行很多慈善事业。”Regis McKenna: 瑞吉斯·麦金纳，硅谷著名的营销大师；guru: 领袖，专家；techie: 技术人员；convert: 转变；brag about:夸耀，吹嘘；under the radar: 低调神秘，不引人注意。

Marissa Mayer

“At one point,” McKenna says, “Silicon Valley was known as the private foundation capital of the world, but today these sorts of things have become much more visible.”

While local luminaries of the tech world have occasionally taken sharp career detours after finding success in their primary field, the trajectory of entrepreneur-CEO-altruist seems increasingly woven right into the valley’s DNA.18. luminary: 杰出人物；detour: 绕道，弯路；trajectory: 轨道，轨迹；altruist: 利他主义者。Tech engineer-turned-philanthropist-turned-Hollywood producer Jeff Skoll may be the textbook example, first finding success at eBay and then giving away a billion dollars to deal with water and nuclear issues by the time he was 46.19. Jeff Skoll: 杰夫·斯科尔，加拿大工程师、网络企业家和电影制作人；textbook example: 范例。But he’s got more and more company on the dance floor.

“Once entrepreneurs get a big win under their belt, they’ll often tackle things they weren’t comfortable with before that,”20. under one’s belt:〈口〉被自己获得（或掌握、记住、经历过）；tackle: 着手处理。said Dale Partridge,the 28-year-old founder and CEO of online clothes-and-accessory “socialgood retailer” Sevenly. His 2-year-old firm, which donates $7 from each sale to a different charity every week, has “grown to 50 employees and revenues21. revenue: 总收入。.buy:〈口〉相信，接受，同意；purity-of-motive: 动机纯洁。of eight figures.”

Not everyone buys the purity-of-motive argument.22Karen Brosi, a financial planner and tax expert, heard the Brin-burger story and thought:“That’s just too weird. Or I see Larry Ellison buying an island in Hawaii,and it seems like some of these guys have more dollars than sense.”

Then there’s Musk and Bezos, with their fascination with outer space.

“There are so many places in the world where these guys could make a significant difference with their dollars, and you’re going to take me on vacation to the moon?” Brosi said. “It makes me want to grab them by their ties and say, ‘What are you thinking?’ ”

Big Side Projects

Corporate chieftains and their ambitious if sometimes quixotic side projects:23. chieftain: 首领；quixotic: 不切实际的。

Jeff Bezos

Sergey Brin, Google co-founder: A huge offshore wind-power development to pump up the East Coast power grid;24. offshore: 近海的；pump up: 打气；grid:（输电线路、天然气管道等的）系统网络。a driverless car; Google Glass; test-tube hamburger.

Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Facebook: Founded Startup: Education foundation with $100 million in an attempt to transform public schools; shot and killed a bison as a way to show he’s “thankful for the food I have to eat,” and had the head mounted on a wall at work.

Elon Musk, founder and CEO of Tesla: Working on “The Hyperloop,” a new high-speed transportation system that he says will take riders from Los Angeles to San Francisco in a half-hour; launched SpaceX25. SpaceX: 艾伦·马斯克建立的美国太空运输公司，在2010年12月成为第一个能够发射回收宇宙飞船的私人公司。to develop rockets that would open up space travel and eventually enable people to live on other planets.

Larry Ellison, co-founder and chief executive of Oracle: Made a brief cameo appearance26. cameo appearance: 客串演出，友情客串。in the 2010 movie Iron Man 2; bought a 50 percent share in a top U.S.tennis tournament; collects exotic cars; won the America’s Cup in Spain in 2010;bought most of Lanai, Hawaii’s sixth-largest island.

Marissa Mayer, former Google executive and president and CEO of Yahoo: A passionate baker, she once created a spreadsheet of ingredients for cupcake recipes,saying, “My hobbies actually make me better at work”; has invested in tech startups like design retailer Minted and car-sharing marketplace Getaround.

Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon: To encourage more “longterm thinking” on the planet, he’s helping build a clock inside a West

Texas mountain that will keep time for the next 10,000 years; bought The Washington Post for $250 million of his own money; to open space travel to

paying customers, he launched Blue Origin, a human spaceflight startup borne

of his fascination with space travel, including “space hotels, amusement parks and colonies for 2 million or 3 million people orbiting the Earth.”