[originaltext] Today, I want to talk to you about information technology. So

Today, I want to talk to you about information technology. Some of you know that before I came to IBM, my background was a lot like yours. I was a customer of IBM. I was a customer of the computer industry. I arrived at BMI with a firmly held conviction that this technology was one of those transformational technologies that comes along every hundred years or so and changes everything in our society.
    Today, in almost every industry, in almost every part of the world, there are many examples of enterprises using technology to challenge their competitors. I think we’re seeing information technology reach the point that all transformational technology reach when they are no longer controlled by just a small group of skilled professionals, and they cross over to mass acceptance and ubiquity.
    Networking technology is still in its infancy, yet it has already reached the point where we can call it a new mass medium.
    Less than 5 years after the birth of the World Wide Web, some 90 million people are online around the world, and that number will be hundreds of millions before too long.
    Here in China, the number of Internet users has nearly doubled since just last October. And I’ve seen statistics that say your Internet population will exceed 100 million people by the year 2005.
Questions 16 and 18 are based on the passage you have just heard.
16. What kind of role does the speaker play in IBM?
17. How is the situation of network technology?
18. How many net citizens will be in China in the future?