full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Malte Spitz: Your phone company is watching

Unscramble the Blue Letters

Like I said at the beginning, iniagme that all those people on the streets of Berlin in autumn of 1989 had a mobile phone in their pcoket. And the ssati would have known who took part at this protest, and if the Stasi would have known who are the leaders behind it, this may never have happened. The fall of the Berlin Wall would maybe not [have been] there. And in the aftermath, also not the fall of the Iron Curtain. Because today, state aeginces and companies want to store as much information as they can get about us, online and offline. They want to have the plsitsiioby to track our lives, and they want to store them for all time.

Open Cloze

Like I said at the beginning, _______ that all those people on the streets of Berlin in autumn of 1989 had a mobile phone in their ______. And the _____ would have known who took part at this protest, and if the Stasi would have known who are the leaders behind it, this may never have happened. The fall of the Berlin Wall would maybe not [have been] there. And in the aftermath, also not the fall of the Iron Curtain. Because today, state ________ and companies want to store as much information as they can get about us, online and offline. They want to have the ___________ to track our lives, and they want to store them for all time.

Solution

  1. imagine
  2. possibility
  3. agencies
  4. pocket
  5. stasi

Original Text

Like I said at the beginning, imagine that all those people on the streets of Berlin in autumn of 1989 had a mobile phone in their pocket. And the Stasi would have known who took part at this protest, and if the Stasi would have known who are the leaders behind it, this may never have happened. The fall of the Berlin Wall would maybe not [have been] there. And in the aftermath, also not the fall of the Iron Curtain. Because today, state agencies and companies want to store as much information as they can get about us, online and offline. They want to have the possibility to track our lives, and they want to store them for all time.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations

ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
mobile phone 8
phone company 4
data retention 3
people stood 2
internet service 2
state agencies 2
digital age 2

Important Words

  1. aftermath
  2. agencies
  3. autumn
  4. beginning
  5. berlin
  6. companies
  7. curtain
  8. fall
  9. happened
  10. imagine
  11. information
  12. iron
  13. leaders
  14. lives
  15. mobile
  16. offline
  17. online
  18. part
  19. people
  20. phone
  21. pocket
  22. possibility
  23. protest
  24. stasi
  25. state
  26. store
  27. streets
  28. time
  29. today
  30. track
  31. wall