新托福阅读：深受欢迎的“技能交换”

技能交换

Skill exchanges are currently popular among the Chinese youth and so are the Web sites providing netizens with skill-exchange platforms. Netizens may exchange items covering almost all aspects of life on skill-exchange Web sites, such as accompanied driving, cooking, piano playing and painting skills.

About 89 percent of the surveyed post-80s generation is willing to exchange skills and become a "Geek." Among them, 40 percent said they are very willing to participate in it, and about 47 percent of all respondents are from the post-80s generation and more than 33 percent are from the post-70s generation, according to a survey conducted by the China Youth Daily Social Survey Center last week.

Hao Yi, founder and webmaster of the skills exchange website, said that since the website launched in April 2007, the number of registered members has jumped from less than 1,000 to the 30,000 and its daily traffic stands at around 10,000. "Geeks" taking part in skills exchanges are mostly from the post-80s and post-90s generations who are experienced at using Internet resources and enthusiastic about life. English learning is the most popular item among all types of exchanged skills. Some living skills are also attractive to netizens, such as cooking and driving.

As for their favorite skills, more than 51 percent of respondents voted for "financial management skills," followed by "computer skills, such as repairing computers and developing software (nearly 51 percent)," "foreign language skills such as English and Japanese (nearly 41 percent)," "skills in stock market speculation (more than 38 percent)," "cooking, tea ceremonies, and other life skills (38 percent)," "skills in handling professional relationships (31 percent)," "painting, calligraphy, and other artistic skills (nearly 31 percent)," "skills in identifying antiques (nearly 26 percent), and "tennis, table tennis and other sports skills (over 24 percent)."

According to the survey, over 63 percent of respondents believe the reason for young people's enthusiasm for skills exchanges is that they can "learn more through one-to-one training." Nearly 62 percent think it is because "people now have much greater awareness of the importance of active learning," and nearly 62 percent attributed it to the low costs of skills exchanges.

In addition, nearly 68 percent believe that skills exchanges can enhance one's social connections, and nearly 57 percent think that skill exchanges may become an important way of acquiring knowledge and skills in the future.