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PART-A
Passage 1:
Students and teachers at 20 schools in China's poor rural areas will have their own computer labs by the end of 2001. The labs are being jointly funded by the China Youth Development Foundation and Coca-Cola (China) Beverages Ltd., which have planned to establish more computer labs in 1,200 rural schools in the future.
Passage 2:
China is now using India's rich resources and expertise in IT education to meet its great demand for software professionals. An Indian company has recently signed a deal with China to establish a joint venture company in Beijing. It is the first Indian company to invest in the education of software professionals in China.
Passage 3:
Code Red II , the world's most vicious cyber worm, is about to start another attack. Unlike its former peer, "I love you" bug, this time the Code Red series will target Internet servers and the network. Anti-bug experts are calling for greater online security.
PART-B
Digital Divide
Jenny: Hi, John.
John: Hi, Jenny.
Jenny: One of the issues today is the digital divide. What does it mean?
John: It refers to the divide between who is online and who isn't.
Jenny: What's the nature of the breakdown? Who are they saying is online and who isn't?
John: They are looking at three principal portions of the American population with regard to ethnic gap, income gap and also different age groups.
Jenny: What do they discover?
John: They find that today 30% of African Americans, 33% of Hispanic Americans, and 47% of White Americans, are online, but the largest portion of the American population are Asian Americans with a 65% online.
Jenny: Do they offer any explanations about why this might be?
John: Well, one reason of course is income. Low income population's use of the Internet is less. For example, for those who earn $75,000 annually, over 70% have computers linked to the Internet.
Jenny: Well, computers are still a fairly pricey item, although prices are coming down.
John: But they're predicting that within five years double the amount of people will be using them.
Jenny: Going back to this digital divide, do men and women use the Internet equally? Is there a gender divide?
John: No. Not only is there not a gender divide but the prediction is this year more women will be online than men.
Jenny: Really?
John: But the difference here is the sites they visit. Men are interested in financial and technology sites. Women tend to prefer sites dealing with more personal matters. For instance. they want to find out about women's health. So while both men and women are online, there is a difference in what they go online for.
Jenny: Yeah. Interesting. What did the study say about the future growth?
John: Well. they're forecasting that three quarters of the country will be online within five years.
Jenny: That's fast, isn't it?
John: Sure. Let's better get involved.
Jenny: Right.
PART-C
Ananova
Ananova is the Cyber-Goddess. She is the perfect woman -- 28, tall and beautiful, available 24 hours a day. She is a green-haired, wide-eyed, animated woman with a mid-Atlantic accent. She delivers the news in a pleasant, quietly intelligent manner that makes people feel relaxed when they listen to her. Unlike humans, she doesn't possess undesirable characteristics such as arrogance, timidity, and dishonesty, and she'll never call in sick or request a two-day vacation.
On April 19, 2000, Ananova made her initial appearance on the Internet. Her first words were "Hello, world " -- a common phrase used in the new software programs, followed by "Here's the news, and this time it's personal." She went on to deliver her first news story, reading a bulletin about a plane crash in the Philippines. During her two-minute speech she used her limited range of facial expressions -- a widening of the eyes and a superficial-looking smile. Her speechwriters attach tags to various words to help the computer animation program know when she should smile or look serious. Crowded with users, her site was very difficult to access that morning. She attracted tens of thousands of users in the first hour.
As technology improves, people will be able to talk to her rather than type in their requests and get personalized bulletins, shopping help and other services read to them, on the Internet or by mobile phone.
In time, Ananova may gain virtual colleagues, a family or a male companion and she will get gradually more sophisticated.
adj. 放松的， 松懈的，随意的 relax的过去式（
