外國人最想和你聊的時事話題：在家上班族

　What is SOHO　什么是在家上班族
     The modern concept of small office/home office, or SOHO, refers to the category of business, which can be from 1 to 10 workers. SOHO can also stand for small or home office or single office/home office. A larger business enterprise, one notch up the size scale, is often categorized as a small business. When a company reaches 100 or more employees, it is often referred to as a Small and Medium-sized Enterprise (SME).
     A home office emerged in the mid-1990s, the advent of the personal computer, and breakthroughs in voice and data communication, created opportunities for office workers to decentralize. Decentralization also benefits employers, in lower overhead, and in many cases, greater productivity.
     At the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st, the term "Small or Home Office" and its variants -along with the acronym"SOHO"- have been used to a great extent by companies who market products targeting the great numbers of small businesses that have a tiny or medium sized office.
     Several ranges of products, such as the Armoire desk and a few other desk forms, are often designed specifically for the "SOHO" market. Several kinds of books are written and marketed specifically for this type of office, ranging from general advice texts to specific guidebooks on setting up such things as a small PBX for the office telephones.
     Many consultants and the members of several professions such as lawyers, real estate agents or surveyors in small and medium sized towns operate from such home offices.
     The 36 hour or 48 hour cycles[citation needed] of much of software development has led many practitioners in this domain to do their work in home offices given the difficulty of the traditional business world to adapt its "normal" hours to some of the more extreme needs of software engineering.
     Technology has also created a demand for larger businesses to employ individuals who work from home. (See also home sourcing.) Sometimes these people remain as an independent businessperson, and sometimes they actually become employees of a larger company.
     In popular literature, the home office has not been the topic of as many works as the "normal" modern office. Brian Basset, the author of the newspaper comic strip Adam, has sometimes described its more humorous aspects.
     The small office home office has gone through a great transformation recently since technology has enabled anyone working from a home office to compete globally. Technology has made this possible through webinar systems and telephone connections by VOIP and the like. The Virtual Office concept has been expanded to enable anyone to do globally what they could do locally before. With a global reach through the use of technology, the [SOHO] small office/home office now has a better chance of emerging as a greater challenge in the world marketplace.
     SOHO專指能夠按照自己的興趣和愛好自由選擇工作的、不受時間和地點制約的、不受發(fā)展空間限制的白領(white collar) 一族。更重要的是反映在能否按照自己的興趣和愛好去自由地選擇工作，反映在所選擇的工作是否有著極大的發(fā)展空間。特別適合SOHO的是一些基于信息的制造(manufacturer)、加工(processing)、傳播類(communication)的工作。SOHO代表先進的生產(chǎn)力(advanced productivity)，代表活躍的新經(jīng)濟(new economy)。SOHO作為一種時尚、輕松、自由的生活方式和生活態(tài)度，可以專注一職，也可以是兼職工作(part-time job)，都可被稱為SOHO一族。于是，我們把SOHO叫成Super Office (and) Human Office。即超級的辦公室、人性化的辦公室。