Reading Passage 3

Questions are based on the following reading Passage.
A. After a long break, online bookseller Amazon is back trying to encourage us to read in a new way. Its Web site now features this description of its Kindle reading device: “Availability; In Stock. Ships from and sold by Amazon. com. Gift-wrap available. ” This good news for consumers comes after the first batch of the devices sold out in just six hours late last year.
B. This seems like a fitting time to ask: If the Internet is the most powerful communications advance: ever—and it is—then how do this medium and its new devices affect how and what we read?
C. Aristotle lived during the era when the written word displaced the oral tradition, becoming the first to explain that how we communicate alters what we communicate. That’ s for sure. It’ s still early in the process of a digital rhetoric replacing the more traditionally written word. It’ s already an open question whether constant email and multitasking leaves us overloaded humans with the capability to handle longer- form writing.
D. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos dedicated his most recent shareholder letter to explaining his cultural ambitions for the Kindle. Laptops, BlackBerrys and mobile phones have “shifted us more toward information snacking, and I would argue toward shorter attention spans. ” He hopes that “Kindle and its successors may gradually and incrementally move us over years into a world with longer spans of attention, providing a counterbalance to the recent proliferation of info-snacking tools. ”
E. To an info-snacker of many years, the prospect of a gourmet meal sounds pretty good. Perhaps a new digital device like the Kindle can help us regain the attention spans earlier devices helped us lose. If so, this could become a great era for books, or more accurately for the future of words that for centuries could be delivered only in book form.
F. Digitized words can be spread at low cost in newly interactive ways. As the marketing for the Kindle puts it, over 100, 000 books can be delivered wirelessly in less than a minute, “whether you’ re in the back of a taxi, at the airport, or in bed. ”
G. In Print Is Dead: Books in Our Digital Age—published in hardcover last November, and now available for the Kindle—author Jeff Gomez challenges authors and publishers to think creatively about the new medium: “It’ s not about the page versus the screen in a technological grudge match. It’ s about the screen doing a dozen things the page can’ t do. ” Digitized words should count for more. “What’ s going to be transformed isn’ t just the reading of one book, but the ability to read a passage from practically any book that exists, at any time that you want to, as well as the ability to click on hyperlinks, experience multimedia, and add notes and share  passages with others. ”
H. The book introduced a disciplined way of thinking about topics, organized around contents pages, indexing, citation and bibliography. These are at the root of Web structure as well. One theme for the next annual conference on the book is that the digital experience could simply be an evolution: “The information architecture of the book, embodying as it does thousands of years’ experience with recorded knowledge, provides a solid grounding for every adventure we might take in the new world of digital media. ”
I. The not-so-positive case is that, at least so far, we’ re not giving up on books for the same words on screens—we’ re giving up on words. Pick your data point: A recent National Endowment for the Arts report, “To Read or Not to Read, ” found that 15-to-24-year-olds spend an average of seven minutes reading on weekdays; people between 35 and 44 spend 12 minutes; and people 65 and older spend close to an hour.
J. Much is at stake, As Mr. Gomez concluded, “what’ s really important is the culture of ideas and innovation” books represent. But “to expect future generations to be satisfied with printed books is like expecting the BlackBerry users of today to start communicating by writing letters, stuffing envelopes and licking stamps. ”
K. Innovations to address our evolving expectations include combining traditional books with newer media. Scholastic plans a new series for kids called “39 Clues, ” which will feature books, online games and collecting cards; the aim is to get kids “excited about books in a whole new way. ” Leapfrog’ s Leapster device for toddlers looks like a junior videogame device, but actually teaches key skills through titles like “Letters on the Loose” and “Numbers on the Run. ”

L. Marshal McLuhan more than 40 years ago warned, “The electric technology is within the gates, and we are numb, deal blind and mute about its encounter with the Gutenberg technology on and through which the American way of life was formed. ” Maybe McLuhan was too pessimistic. With innovations like the Kindle, digital media can help return to us our attention spans and extend what makes books great: words and their meaning. 

Questions

For each question below, choose the answer that best completes the sentence. Then mark the corresponding letter on the Answer Sheet with a single line through the center.