21世纪大学英语读写教程第一册08

Unit 8

Text A

Listening

First Listening
Before listening to the tape, have a quick look at the following words.

description
描述

communicate
交流

potential
潜力

creative
创造性的

Second Lister
Listen to the tape again. Then, choose the best answer to each of the following questions.

1. What is the main topic of the listening passage?
A) The history of the computer.
B) The future of the information highway.
C) Practical uses of the Internet.
D) How the Internet was invented.
2. How did Bill Gates learn about the first personal computer?
A) He invented it.
B) He read about it in a magazine.
C) One of his professors at Harvard University told him about it.
D) One of his friends told him about it.
3. Who does Gates feel should make decisions about the information highway?
A) Elected officials.
B) International political organizations.
C) Computer programmers.
D) Everyday people as well as experts.
4. What does Gates say his purpose in writing this book is?
A) To make more money.
B) To publicize the Internet.
C) To encourage people to discuss the new technologies.
D) To warn people about the dangers of new technologies.

Pre-reading Questions

1. What do you know about Bill Gates and his company Microsoft? What is Gates most famous for?
2. What do you consider to be the most important technological achievements of the last 20 years? Why is each important?
3. What kind of technological innovations might we see in the next 20 years?
4. Skim the text to get the answers to the following questions:
a) What sort of "revolution" does Gates believe is currently occurring?
b) What stage of the revolution are we in now?
c) How long does Gates expect it to go on?

Foreword

Bill Gates

The past twenty years have been an incredible adventure for me. It started on a day when, as a college sophomore, l stood in Harvard Square with my friend Paul Allen and pored over the description of a kit computer in Popular Electronics magazine. As we read excitedly about the first truly personal computer, Paul and I didn't know exactly how it would be used, but we were sure it would change us and the world of computing. We were right. The personal computer revolution happened and it has affected millions of lives. It has led us to places we had barely imagined.
We are all beginning another great journey. We aren't sure where this one will lead us either, but again I am certain this revolution will touch even more lives and take us all farther. The major changes coming will be in the way people communicate with each other. The benefits and problems arising from this upcoming communications revolution will be much greater than those brought about by the PC revolution.
There is never a reliable map for unexplored territory, but we can learn important lessons from the creation and evolution of the $120-billion personal-computer industry. The PC — its evolving hardware, business applications, on-line systems. Internet connections, electronic mail, multimedia titles, authoring tools, and games — is the foundation for the next revolution.
During the PC industry's infancy, the mass media paid little attention to what was going on in the brand-new business. Those of us who were attracted by computers and the possibilities they promised were unnoticed outside our own circles.
But this next journey, to the so-called information highway, is the topic of endless newspaper and magazine articles, television and radio broadcasts, conferences, and widespread speculation. There has been an unbelievable amount of interest in this subject during the last few years, both inside and outside the computer industry. The interest is not confined only to developed countries, and it goes well beyond the large numbers of personal-computer users.
Thousands of informed and uninformed people are now speculating publicly about the information highway. The amount of misunderstanding about the technology and its possible dangers surprises me. Some people think the highway is simply today's Internet or the delivery of 500 simultaneous channels of television. Others hope or fear it will create computers as smart as human beings. Those developments will come, but they are not the highway.
The revolution in communications is just beginning. It will take place over several decades, and will be driven by new "applications" — new tools, often meeting currently unforeseen needs. During the next few years, major decisions will have to be made. It is crucial that a broad set of people — not just technologists or those who happen to be in the computer industry — participate in the debate about how this technology should be shaped. If that can be done, the highway will serve the purposes users want. Then it will gain broad acceptance and become a reality.
I'm writing this book The Road Ahead as part of my contribution to the debate and, although it's a tall order, I hope it can serve as a travel guide for the forthcoming journey. I do this with some misgivings. We've all smiled at predictions from the past that look silly today. History is full of now ironic examples — the Oxford professor who in 1878 dismissed the electric light as a gimmick; the commissioner of U.S. patents who in 1899 asked that his office be abolished because "everything that can be invented has been invented." This is meant to be a serious book, although ten years from now it may not appear that way. What I've said that turned out to be right will be considered obvious and what was wrong will be humorous.
Anyone expecting an autobiography or a treatise on what it's like to have been as lucky as I have been will be disappointed. Perhaps when I've retired I will get around to writing that book. This book looks primarily to the future.
Anyone hoping for a technological treatise will be disappointed, too. Everyone will be touched by the information highway, and everyone ought to be able to understand its implications. That's why my goal from the very beginning was to write a book that as many people as possible could understand.
The process of thinking about and writing the present book took longer than I expected. Indeed, estimating the time it would take proved to be as difficult as projecting the development schedule of a major software project. The only part that was easy was the cover photo which we finished well ahead of schedule. I enjoy writing speeches and had thought writing a book would be like writing them. I imagined writing a chapter would be the equivalent of writing a speech. The error in my thinking was similar to the one software developers often run into — a program ten times as long is about one hundred times more complicated to write. I should have known better.
And here it is. I hope it stimulates understanding, debate, and creative ideas about how we can take advantage of all that's sure to be happening in the decade ahead.
(866 words)