実践ビジネス英語ディクテーション (aired 11/15,16)

こんにちは。実践ビジネス英語Talk the Talkコーナーのディクテーションです。番組の11月前半のテーマは、‘Staying Tech-Savvy’（テクノロジーに精通した存在で）でした。 “Talk the talk”はdigital divideをめぐる雑談（？）のような・・・。Heatherさんがおっしゃった "get on the bandwagon"という表現、懐かしい感じがしました。

（S: 杉田敏先生　H: Heather Howardさん）

Staying Tech-Savvy

S: Now, in our current vignette, members of H&B staff talk with Ron Walker, a friend of Paul Pearson’s, about the importance of staying on the right side of the digital divide.
Do you find it hard sometimes, Heather, to keep up with younger people who grew up with things like social network services and microblogging?

H: Yes, I do and I’m only forty-two years old. It’s disconcerting sometimes to hear the twentysomethings in my office talk about new technologies like they are the most natural, ordinary things in the world.
Now I can understand why people like my parents and grandparents were a bit flummoxed when the first personal computers came along. I remember my mother, for example, calling to me in a panic one day, because half the text on her computer screen had vanished. She thought she’d done something wrong and erased it.
So, twelve- or thirteen-year-old me had to explain that; no, she’d just filled up the screen typing, and the text had scrolled up to give her more room.

S: Are you taking any steps to enhance your digital literacy?

H: Not at the moment. I know I should. I’m probably hampered by the fact that I’ve never been technologically-oriented in the first place. I’m not an early adopter who always wants to have or try the latest thing right away.
In fact, I often wait so long to buy gadgets that the latest thing ends up coming out just a few months after I bought my newest cell phone or computer or whatever. The same goes for social media networks and such.
I finally joined in the one network I use after many of my friends practically ordered me to set up an account. “Come on,” they said, “everybody else’s on it. Get with the program.”
When that happens, you almost have to participate in the network or get the gadget, don’t you? These things become such an integral part of modern life that those who don’t get on the bandwagon become isolated, like cell phones.
Ten or fifteen years ago, you could still get by without having one. But today, today not having a cell phone is like not having a phone at all.

S: Is there any particular area you’d like to know more about?

H: Smartphones and smartphone apps, I think. I really do wish I’d recognized the potential of smartphones earlier that I’d gotten one and started experimenting with it sooner. I use the smrtphone I have now a great deal, but I sometimes wonder if I might have gotten involved in a creative side with an earlier start.
Maybe I would’ve designed some apps, opened up career opportunities for myself in that regard. I still think about trying my hand at this. I brainstorm sometimes about what kind of apps I could design. But it certainly would’ve been a lot easier to stand out in the early days when there wasn’t enormous amount competition there is now.
Coming up with something unique and building brand recognition would’ve been a much less daunting task.

S: Though, as Paul Pearson says, keeping up with new technologies can be very hard, there’s always something new coming around the bend, and many of us have hectic schedules.

H: True. But there are also so many resources available to us now. Back in the day we had to trek to the bookstore or physically attend the class in some location. But now we can order books online and search the Internet for written and video tutorials on practically any subject.
I was experimenting with some video editing software the other day, for example, software that I only knew the most basic functions for. I wanted to learn more, so I searched the Internet and found a slew of demonstration videos on a video sharing service.
Young people today would take that for granted. But I was once again floored by how easy it is now to get information. The tutorials took less than a minute to find, literally.

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かもめの単語帳
get ( jump, climb) on the bandwagon: 時流に乗る、優勢な側につく

最後までお読みくださり、ありがとうございました♪