Documents revealed that Orlov, the prime minister in charge of the paper industry, had ordered construction of a large cellulose complex on the lake's shores to produce a particularly durable rayon cord for airplane tires with the assumption that the pure water would facilitate the chemical process resulting in stronger fibers, and the story goes that Orlov had chosen the site by simply pointing to a place on the shoreline while cruising in a motorboat with some old friends. Tile site, however, turned out to be a seismically active region, and the buildings, while supported by steel piles, are still vulnerable to the major earthquakes that have occurred there once or twice a century.
The pure water helped the process, whose final product proved out-of-date, aviation industry switching to metallic cord. The variety of fish, unfortunately, fell victim to the toxic waste, the fragile ecological balance of the region threatened. Those concerned proposed that the lakeshores be closed to new industry and existing enterprises be moved but they encountered tough resistance from officials defending their decision and saving face by insisting on the complex's importance. Of course, what you see on pictures is still a beauty but the lake is no longer a home to more than 1,000 species of plants and animals unknown anywhere else.
The statement that best relates the main idea of this passage is ______.
A. too many people are attracted to the lake that it has now been deprived of its natural beauty
B. an important natural resource is destroyed by human ignorance
C. industry is less important than ecological balance
D. one should be extremely careful when choosing a construction site
The result on Saturday is likely to ______ whether independents and Democrats turn out in
A. tell apart
B. decide on
C. hiuge on
D. map out
What stands behind the message that blips onto and off our television screens before we have time to get to the kitchen and hack? Months of planning; hundreds of interviews with potential users of the product; hours of writing; dozens of actors, directors, and technicians; days of filming; and hundreds of thousands of dollm's in payments to the television networks that will run the ad.
Take for example a recent commercial for a certain brand of cough drops. The manufacturer of the cough drops spent four months trying to think of a way to boost sales. After several surveys of cough drop users, the company decided to market a strawberry-flavored lozenge. Further surveys identified tile typical users of the strawberry-flavored cough drop as persons between the ages of 15 and 30. This infforination was important in planning the content and style. of the commercial (fast-paced and upbeat, with colorful graphics and lively music) and in determining when to air it (during situation comedies, prime-time dramas, and music specials).
The creative team at the advertising agency that handled the cough drop company's account then took over. After hours of discussion and writing, they came up with six scripts, from which the client chose two. One involved a young woman pulling a strawberry out of a box of cough drops. The outline, or storyboard, for the commercial looked deceptively simple: four sketches and a few lines of 'voice-over.' Yet these few words and images (just enough to fill 15 seconds) had been carefully selected to convey crucial information about the product: its effectiveness in suppressing coughs and soothing sore throats, the absence of sugar, and its strawberry flavor.
Turning this carefully calculated script. into an effective commercial involved finding just the right actor: a young woman who would be attractive to the target audience and who could make her positive response to the cough drops look convincing. Forty-two actors were. auditioned; one was chosen.
The actor wasn't the only element of the commercial that had to go through an audition. More than a hundred outfits were inspected before one was chosen for her to wear, and hundreds of strawberries had to be sorted through.
The filming began at 9:30 one morning. "All" the actor had to do was to open a box of cough drops, pull out a strawberry and munch on it. Yet her movements and facial expressions had to be just right, and achieving that perfection took three hours and 72 shootings, or 'takes.'
Even then—shooting completed—the job was far from done. Thousands of feet of film had to be reduced to a compact 45 feet of finished commercial. Using million-dollar, computerized equipment, the producer, writer, and art director selected the best two takes and mixed images and sound to produce a polished final product. The result? A simple, effortless-looking lisle film that shows none of the tremendous effort that went into producing it, but which should justify all of that time, creativity, and expense by boosting cough drop sales.
Which of the following best expresses the main idea of the selection?
Although most television commercials look simple and straightforward, they typically take a great deal of time, effort, and money to produce.
Because the development of television commercials involves so many steps, commercials are among the most difficult and complex types of fihn to produce.
C. The major factors in developing a successful television commercial are good planning of style. and content and careful selection of actors.
D. A reduction in the average length of television commercials has made their development more complex and costly than it used to be.
In the author's opinion,______.
A. the project did more harm than good to both the environment and the industry
B. some people profited at the price of the loss of the natural balance
C. the complex was so important that all efforts must be made to keep it going
D. all industrial investments must be given the most careful examination