英語口語對話(高級) lesson 1 Archiving the Web

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Vanessa and Alexander are interviewing Brewster Kahle, founder of the Internet Archive who speaks about his efforts to collect all the published works of mankind.

Dialogue:

Vanessa: Hi and welcome to World Report. Alexander is in San Francisco and he’s joined by Brewster Kahle, founder of the Internet Archive. Thank you both.

Alexander: Hi Vanessa.

Brewster: Good afternoon.

Vanessa: Brewster, could I start by asking you… on your web site you mention that your mission is ‘global access to all human knowledge’? Sounds mind-boggling. Could you elaborate?

Brewster: Well, suppose you took all the published works of mankind, then all the music, video and TV material, software, web pages ever produced, preserved them for the long term and made them available to people…

Alexander: Incredible. So you’re not just archiving web pages.

Brewster: Far from it. Along with web pages, we’re storing music, movies and books. And it’s so rewarding to see our efforts bearing fruit.

Vanessa: Sounds awesome.

Alexander: Brewster, I guess you’ve accumulated a huge amount of material by now.

Brewster: Well, we started back in 1996 by taking snapshots of all available web sites every two months and storing them on hard drives. It’s now about 500 terabytes of information. The archive is growing at about 50 terabytes each month.

Alexander: Incredible. It must take a huge number of servers to keep all that in storage.

Brewster: Well, it does. And we’re saving double copies. History’s taught us archives should always be saved in multiple copies in various locations. I suppose we have the destruction of the Library of Alexandria to thank for that.

Vanessa: I’m sorry?

Brewster: In 300 BC, they set out to collect every book from every possible source, and surprisingly they almost got there. But it all went up in smoke. One of the catastrophes of civilization, and there’s a lot to be learned from that.

Vanessa: Brewster Kahle, Alexander, thank you both very much.

Now answer the following question…

What is Brewster trying to collect?

All the published works of mankind, all the music, video and TV material, software, web pages ever produced.

Now listen again to the dialogue in parts. After each part there will be 3 to 4 questions on some details...

Part 1

Vanessa: Hi and welcome to World Report. Alexander is in San Francisco and he’s joined by Brewster Kahle, founder ofthe Internet Archive. Thank you both.

Alexander: Hi Vanessa.

Brewster: Good afternoon.

Vanessa: Brewster, could I start by asking you… on your web site you mention that your mission is ‘global access to all human knowledge’? Sounds mind-boggling. Could you elaborate?

Brewster: Well, suppose you took all the published works of mankind, then all the music, video and TV material, software, web pages ever produced, preserved them for the long term and made them available to people…

Alexander: Incredible. So you’re not just archiving web pages.

Brewster: Far from it. Along with web pages, we’re storing music, movies and books. And it’s so rewarding to see our efforts bearing fruit.

Vanessa: Sounds awesome.

Now answer the following questions …

1. What does Vanessa mean when she says “Sounds mind-boggling”?

When Vanessa says “Sounds mind-boggling”, she means she finds the term ‘global access to all human knowledge’ difficult to understand.

2. What does Alexander mean when he says “Incredible. So you’re not just archiving web pages”?

When Alexander says “Incredible. So you’re not just archiving web pages,” he means he finds the idea surprising.

3. What does Vanessa mean when she says “Sounds awesome”?

When Vanessa says “Sounds awesome”, she means she is impressed by the project.

Now listen again to the second part of the dialogue.

Part 2

Alexander: Brewster, I guess you’ve accumulated a huge amount of material by now.

Brewster: Well, we started back in 1996 by taking snapshots of all available web sites every two months and storing them on hard drives. It’s now about 500 terabytes of information. The archive is growing at about 50 terabytes each month.

Alexander: Incredible. It must take a huge number of servers to keep all that in storage.

Brewster: Well, it does. And we’re saving double copies. History’s taught us archives should always be saved in multiple copies in various locations. I suppose we have the destruction of the Library of Alexandria to thank for that.

Vanessa: I’m sorry?

Brewster: In 300 BC, they set out to collect every book from every possible source, and surprisingly they almost got there. But it all went up in smoke. One of the catastrophes of civilization, and there’s a lot to be learned from that.

Vanessa: I’m sorry?

Brewster: In 300 BC, they set out to collect every book from every possible source, and surprisingly they almost got there. But it all went up in smoke. One of the catastrophes of civilization, and there’s a lot to be learned from that.

Vanessa: Brewster Kahle, Alexander, thank you both very much.

Now answer the following questions…

1. What does Alexander mean when he says “I guess you’ve accumulated a huge amount of material by now”?

When Alexander says “I guess”, he means he assumes that it’s the case.

2. What does Alexander mean when he says “It must take a huge number of servers to keep all that in storage”?

When Alexander says “It must take”, he means he assumes that it’s the case.

3. What does Brewster mean when he says “ I suppose we have the destruction of the Library of Alexandria to thank for that.”

When Brewster says “I suppose we have the destruction of the Library of Alexandria to thank for that.” he means that the destruction of the ancient library has taught mankind something very important.