不出门环游世界

Japan's biggest airline is betting that the future of travel isn't traveling at all. For the last month, a married couple has been interacting with a robot — called an Avatar — that's controlled by their daughter hundreds of miles away. Made by ANA Holdings Inc., it looks like a vacuum cleaner with an iPad attached. *** But the screen displays the daughter’s face as they chat, and its wheels let her trundle about the house as though she’s really there.

日本最大的航空公司认为未来的旅游将和现在的截然不同。在过去的一个月里，一对夫妻一直在和一个名叫 Avatar 的机器人互动，Avatar 由这对夫妻几百英里之外的女儿所遥控。这台机器人由全日空控股株式会社制造，它看起来像是一台接上了 iPad 的吸尘器。但这对夫妻和女儿聊天时，“iPad”的屏幕上会显示女儿的脸，她可以借助机器人的轮子在房子里缓慢地来回移动，就好像她真的在那一样。

“Virtual travel” is nothing new, of course. Storytellers, travel writers and artists have been stimulating the senses of armchair tourists for centuries. It's only in recent decades that frequent, safe travel has become available to the non-wealthy. ***

当然，“虚拟旅游”并不是什么新鲜事。数百年来，讲故事的人、旅行作家和艺术家们都在为那些足不出户的“神游”旅行者们制造身临其境的感官体验。直到近几十年，不算富有的普通人才能够经常地享受安全可靠的旅行。

Yet even as the world's middle classes climb out of the armchair and into economy-class seats, there are hints of a post-travel society emerging. Concerns about sustainability are taking a toll on carbon-intensive airlines. And the aging of affluent societies is both inhibiting physical travel and creating demand for alternative ways to experience the world. For the travel industry, virtual reality offers a tantalizing response to these trends.

然而，虽然全世界的中产阶级渐渐从家里走出来，开始乘坐经济舱出行，仍有迹象表明，“后旅游社会”正在形成。人们对环境可持续性的担忧正在让碳排放量很高的航空公司蒙受损失。另外，随着富裕社会步入老龄化，人们对于亲身旅游的需求在降低，而对以其他方式体验世界的需求在上升。虚拟现实（技术）为旅游业的这些趋势提供了诱人的解决方案。

Of course, far-out technologies encourage far-out claims. ANA doesn't plan to start selling Avatars until next year. Profits, too, will probably be elusive: By one estimate, the global market for this kind of technology will be worth only about $300 million by 2023. By contrast, ANA’s traditional travel business brought in more than $19 billion last year.

当然，超前的科技会带来过于超前的判断。全日空控股株式会社在明年之前都不打算售卖 Avatar 机器人。而且，该技术要实现盈利可能还遥遥无期：据估算，至 2023 年，该项科技的全球市场总估值仅有大约 3 亿美元，相比之下，全日空控股株式会社的传统旅游业务仅去年就带来了超过 190 亿美元的收益。

But if the business case for virtual vacations is still weak, the market for technologies that bridge physical distances between families and coworkers seems likely to only expand. ANA's robots may not replace its airplanes any time soon, but they’ll almost certainly be a part of travel's high-tech future.

虽然目前虚拟度假可能还没有足够的商业价值，但对于这种缩短家人、同事之间地理距离的科技，其市场需求似乎只会有增无减。全日空控股株式会社的机器人可能不会很快取代飞机，但几乎可以肯定的是，它们一定会成为高科技旅游业未来的一部分。