《毕金献阅读理解》电子书节选之一_大学英语阅读

《毕金献阅读理解》电子书节选之一

　　Consumers are getting the message. Sales of many of these devices should take off this year and next: U.S. shipments of MP3 digital music players for listening to songs downloaded from the Net are expected to jump by more than 50% this year, to 7 million units, according to researchers International Data Corp. Sales of personal video recorders, such as TiVo, which let you record TV shows for later viewing, should nearly triple this year in the U.S., to 2.2 million units.

　　Even high-definition television the durable Next Big Thing may soon take off. By the end of 2003, nearly 6 million U.S. homes should have HDTV sets, and by yearend, some 7.7 million American homes are expected to have networks to tie their digital gear together, with strong growth spurred by a new standard for wireless links called WiFi.

　　Call it the next big wave of technology. After the PC era and the Internet Age, many consumers have grown comfortable with tech: Two-thirds of U.S. homes own PCs today, while 60% have Internet access, according to researchers Gartner Data?quest. To reach the rest of the market, technology companies need to build simpler devices that offer more entertainment. And these new machines need to work together as readily as stereo components do today, and should be nearly as easy to set up and use as a telephone or a television. That is leading to the consumerization of technology over the next five to ten years. The future is about MP3 players, digital video, and the like.