Passage One
Questions 46 to 50 are based on the following passage.
Interactive television advertising, which allows viewers to use their remote controls to click on advertisements, has been pushed for years. Nearly a decade ago it was predicted that viewers of “Friends”, a popular situation comedy, would soon be able to purchase a sweater like Jennifer Aniston’s with a few taps on their remote control.“It’s been the year of interactive television advertising for the last ten or twelve years,”says Colin Dixon of a digital-media consultancy.
So the news that Cablevision, and American cable company, was rolling out interactive advertisements to all its customers on October 6th was greeted with some skepticism. During commercials, an overlay will appear at the bottom of the screen, prompting viewers to press a button to request a free sample or order a catalogue. Cablevision hopes to allow customers to buy things with their remote controls early next year.
Television advertising could do with a boost. Spending fell by 10% in the first half of the year. The popularization of digital video recorders has caused advertisers to worry that their commercials will be skipped. Some are turning to the Internet, which is cheaper and offers concrete measurements like click-through rates—especially important at a time when marketing budgets are tight. With the launch of interactive advertising,“many of the dollars that went to the Internet will come back to the TV,”says David Kline of Cablevision. Or so the industry hopes.
In theory, interactive advertising can engage viewers in a way that 30-second spots do not. Unilever recently ran an interactive campaign for its Axe deodorant(除臭剂)，which kept viewers engaged for more than three minutes on average.
The amount spent on interactive advertising on television is still small. Magna, an advertising agency, reckons it will be worth about $138 million this year. That falls far short of the billions of dollars people once expected it to generate. But DirecTV, Comcast and Time Warner Cable have all invested in it. A new effort led by Canoe Ventures, a coalition of leading cable providers, aims to make interactive advertising available across America later this year. BrightLine iTV, Which designs and sells interactive ads, says interest has surged: it expects its revenues almost to triple this year. BSkyB, Britain’s biggest satellite-television service, already provides 9 million customers with interactive ads.
Yet there are doubts whether people watching television, a“lean back”medium, crave interaction. Click-through rates have been high so far(around 3-4%, compared with less than 0.3% online), but that may be a result of the novelty. Interactive ads and viewers might not go well together.
46.What does Colin Dixon mean by saying“It’s been the year of interactive television advertising for the last ten or twelve years”(Lines 4-5, Para.1)?
A)Interactive television advertising will become popular in 10-12 years.
B)Interactive television advertising has been under debate for the last decade or so.
C)Interactive television advertising is successful when incorporated into situation comedies.
D)Interactive television advertising has not achieved the anticipated results.
47.What is the public’s response to Cablevision’s planned interactive TV advertising program?
A)Pretty positive.
B)Totally indifferent.
C)Somewhat doubtful.
D)Rather critical.
48.What is the impact of the wide use of digital video recorders on TV advertising?
A)It has made TV advertising easily accessible to viewers.
B)It helps advertisers to measure the click-through rates.
C)It has placed TV advertising at a great disadvantage.
D)It enables viewers to check the sales items with ease.
49.What do we learn about Unilever’s interactive campaign?
A)It proves the advantage of TV advertising.
B)It has done well in engaging the viewers.
C)It helps attract investments in the company.
D)it has boosted the TV advertising industry.
50.How does the author view the hitherto high click-through rates?
A)They may be due to the novel way of advertising.
B)They signify the popularity of interactive advertising.
C)They point to the growing curiosity ofTV viewers.
D)They indicate the future direction of media reform.
Passage Two
Questions 51 to 55 are based on the following passage.
What can be done about mass unemployment? All the wise heads agree: there’re no quick or easy answers. There’s work to be done, but workers aren’t ready to do it—they’re in the wrong places, or they have the wrong skills, Our problems are“structural,”and will take many years to solve.
But don’t bother asking for evidence that justifies this bleak view. There isn’t any. On the contrary, all the facts suggest that high unemployment in America is the result of inadequate demand. saying that there’re no easy answers sounds wise. But it’s actually foolish: our unemployment crisis could be cured very quickly if we had the intellectual clarity and political will to act. In other words, structural unemployment is a fake problem, which mainly serves as an excuse for not pursing real solutions.
The fact is job openings have plunged in every major sector, while the number of workers forced into part-time employment in almost all industries has soared. Unemployment has surged in every major occupational category. Only three states. With a combined population not much larger than that of Brooklyn, have unemployment rates below 5%. So the evidence contradicts the claim that we’re mainly suffering from structural unemployment. Why, then, has this claim become so popular?
Part of the answer is that this is what always happens during periods of high unemployment—in part because experts and analysts believe that declaring the problem deeply rooted, with no easy answers, makes them sound serious.
I’ve been looking at what self-proclaimed experts were saying about unemployment during the Great Depression; it was almost identical to what Very Serious People are saying now. Unemployment cannot be brought down rapidly, declared one 1935 analysis, because the workforce is“unadaptable and untrained. It cannot respond to the opportunities which industry may offer.”A few years later, a large defense buildup finally provided a fiscal stimulus adequate to the economy’s needs—and suddenly industry was eager to employ those“unadaptable and untrained”workers.
But now, as then, powerful forces are ideologically opposed to the whole idea of government action on a sufficient scale to jump-start the economy. And that, fundamentally, is why claims that we face huge structural problems have been multiplying: they offer a reason to do nothing about the mass unemployment that is crippling out economy and our society.
So what you need to know is that there’s no evidence whatsoever to back these claims. We aren’t suffering from a shortage of needed skills, We’re suffering from a lack of policy resolve. As I said, structural unemployment isn’t a real problem, it’s an excuse—a reason not to act on America’s problems at a time when action is desperately needed.
51.What does the author think is the root cause of mass unemployment in America?
A)Corporate mismanagement.
B)Insufficient demand.
C)Technological advances.
D)Workers’ slow adaptation.
52.What does the author think of the experts’ claim concerning unemployment?
A)Self-evident.
B)Thought-provoking.
C)Irrational.
D)Groundless.
53.What does the author say helped bring down unemployment during the Great Depression?
A)The booming defense industry.
B)The wise heads’ benefit package.
C)Nationwide training of workers.
D)Thorough restructuring of industries.
54.What has caused claims of huge structural problems to multiply?
A)Powerful opposition to government’s stimulus efforts.
B)Very Serious People’s attempt to cripple the economy.
C)Evidence gathered from many sectors of the industries.
D)Economists’ failure to detect the problems in time.
55.What is the author’s purpose in writing the passage?
A)To testify to the experts’ analysis of America’s problems.
B)To offer a feasible solution to the structural unemployment.
C)To show the urgent need for the government to take action.
D)To alert American workers to the urgency for adaptation.
