Collective Buying Power|Groupon：大家揪团来捡便宜

by Marcus Maurice

Groupon is what the dot-com boom was supposed to be about.

In the past, if singles or small families wanted to get lower prices on items, they had to buy them in bulk. Times have changed, and now a new service has _(1)_ bulk buying with the lightning-fast technology of the Internet. Groupon, a combination of the words group and coupon, is a deal-of-the-day website that _(2)_ discounted gift certificates and has become one of the biggest success stories the Internet has ever seen.

Like most people in Internet businesses, Groupon founder and CEO Andrew Mason had to fail first to succeed. His first Internet start-up, The Point, was well-intentioned but _(3)_ being used for pranks. However, Mason found that customers liked banding together to buy things, so he started a blog that _(4)_ turned into Groupon. The premise of Groupon is that a deal on a product becomes _(5)_ if a certain number of people buy it. For example, yoga lessons will be half their regular price if 100 customers _(6)_. Once the magic number is hit, Groupon gets _(7)_ half the money the customers pay for the coupons. If the targeted number is not reached, no one gets the deal that day.

Each day, Mason would _(8)_ emails to everyone on his list, and things grew rapidly from there. Small businesses understood that even if they didn't make much money, it was still a great way to _(9)_ their products or services. Now, Groupon is in more than 500 markets and 44 countries. One of Groupon's biggest problems is that because it's so internationally successful, imitators have _(10)_ everywhere. For Mason, competition is the least of his worries as he is focused on expanding and becoming the fastest company ever to bring in US$1 billion.

(A) ended up    (B) available   (C) popped up   (D) send out    (E) combined

(F) approximately   (G) sign up (H) features    (I) eventually  (J) publicize

Groupon：大家揪团来捡便宜

Groupon 就是新兴网络生意的最佳写照。

　　以前，如果单身者或是小家庭想要以低价购买物品，就必须大量买进才行。但时代已经不同了，现在有一种新兴的服务，结合大量购买与迅速的网络科技。Groupon结合 group（团体）和 coupon（折价券）这 2 个字，是 1 个有每日好康的交易网站，主打折价礼券，近期在网络世界异军突起，成为最成功的案例之一。

　　如同大多数经营网络生意的业者一样，Groupon 的创办人兼执行长安德鲁‧梅森也是先历经失败才有今天的成功。他最初创办的 The Point 网站本抱持善意为出发点，但最后却被人当成恶作剧的工具。然而，梅森发现顾客喜欢一群人一起买东西，所以他成立了 1 个部落格，最后演变成 Groupon。Groupon的运作前提是 1 样商品有一定数量的顾客购买，这项交易才会成立。举例来说，如果某瑜珈课程有 100 名顾客报名购买的话就会打对折。一旦达成预设的人数，Groupon 就可以获得顾客购买折价券大约一半的金额。但如果没有达到目标人数，当天就没有人获得那项交易。

　　起初梅森每天都会寄电子邮件给他名单上的每个人，之后生意迅速扩张。小型企业了解即使他们无法因此赚进大把钞票，但这还是不失为宣传商品或服务的好方法。现在 Groupon 跨足 500 多个生意市场、事业版图跨越 44 个国家。Groupon 最大的问题之一是，由于它在全球市场上的成功，模仿者因此纷纷冒出头。对梅森来说，目前他专注于扩张事业，并成为有史以来最快赚进 10 亿美元的公司，所以同业竞争不是他眼前最担心的问题。

答案：  1. (E)  2. (H)  3. (A)  4. (I)  5 . (B)
6. (G)  7. (F)  8. (D)  9. (J)  10. (C)

有『网络界奥斯卡』之称的威比奖（Webby Awards）今年 6 月举行第 15 届颁奖典礼， Groupon团购网被评选为今年最异军突起的网络现象（Webby Breakout of the Year）。

IBM 的超级计算机 Watson（华森），因为在美国益智问答节目 Jeopardy! 中击败群雄而被选为年度风云人物（Webby Person of the Year）。特别终身成就奖（Lifetime Achievement Award）则颁给了移动电话的发明者 Martin Cooper。而横扫各手机平台的小游戏 Angry Birds（愤怒鸟）则拿下年度手机游戏奖项（Best Mobile Game）。

威比奖以考验赢家的创意著称，每位得奖人必须经历艰难挑战：领奖时致词不准超过 5 个字。（数据源：Yahoo!奇摩新闻、苹果日报）