Giải đề Achieve IELTS – Test 2 – Listening Part 4

You will hear part of a lecture on the current and future use of mobile phones.

Lecturer: OK, now today we’re looking at changes in communication, and specifically changes that have just happened or are likely to happen in the next few years. Key to this is the mobile phone, which is increasingly being seen as an all-purpose system rather than just a phone.  If you only use your phone for texting and making calls now, you will be amazed at how you will be using it in the future. The technology has  been developed for a range of other uses. For example, phones could be used so that if you are meeting someone and they get lost you could send them a map of your location to help them. This will save all those complicated explanations over the phone and our poor friends or colleagues trying to drive and find out where they are at the same time. And, if you get bored waiting, or if you are travelling for example, you will soon be able to see TV news on your phone as it is actually being broadcast. This means that you won’t have to miss any of your favourites if you are away for a few days. Most people have got used to texting now, and young people send pictures to each other but, what is exciting, is the possibility of putting music with them before you send them. And it’s not all frivolous. Phones are going to become even more critical in business and education. Some recent developments have a highly practical usage so, for example, as lecturers we will be able to send everybody a text to let them know if lectures have been cancelled. And the new phones could have a further use in education, as well as business, as they will enable us to go to any destination – such as when we are doing a field trip for instance – and from there to send data directly to a computer so that we can access it when we get home. This means we will no longer be limited by what the phone can store.

And it’s interesting to look at the different ways that men and women use phones now, as that does affect how the technology will develop. Some research has been done on how people use phones and some of the results are surprising. One of the increasing usages of mobile phones is to get all sorts of data such as phone numbers, the weather, train times, etcetera and, while there’s been an attempt to  set up connections with things that women might be interested in accessing, it is overwhelmingly men who do this. But what about the traditional use of a phone – to speak to people! I suppose we would predict that it is mainly women who use phones as a method of contact for friends and family but, in fact, the tenders exploit this facility equally. I’ve spoken about the increased business usages that phones will offer and I suppose we would associate this usage with men. The survey picked up though that women are often working from home or catching up with work in the evenings so they use phones in this way as much as men do. Most of us are aware we can store photos on our phones it’s an ideal method of capturing a moment, wherever you are. Women tend to be  the group that keep photos on their phones, but it seems that men use their phones to actually take pictures much more than women do. And, of course, all this knowledge affects the marketing that the companies will do … (fade) …