My daughter recently asked me what a Travel Agency does. There is one located on our street and it has just been pletely rebuilt. I told her that they helped people book their trips and vacations. “Why haven’t we ever been in there?” she wanted to know. “Because we do everything ourselves online these days” I explained. “But why do it yourself if other people want to do it for you?” she wondered out loud.
The answer is that the travel agency makes a little bit of money on each ticket you book through them. If you book your ticket yourself, online, you save that money. Saving money sounds great except that when you think about it you typically spend three evenings paring prices to end up saving $30 on a $300 trip. All those $30 discounts add up of course so I guess we should be happy with that.
Still, how bad is it really to pay someone $30 and trust them to buy you something decent? Wouldn’t you say your free evenings are worth more than $10 a piece?
Consider books for a moment. Buying your book at Amazon saves you maybe 30% to 40% on each book. Add to that the convenience of shopping from home and getting the package delivered to your home address. So far so good.
Unfortunately that does mean you spend way too much time browsing Amazon. while you could do something fun instead. Like maybe reading an actual book?
Then the package arrives and you aren’t home and end up having to pick it up at the local post- office. All in all I wonder how much time I end up investing in the whole process.
Time sounds free, but to most of us, it is more valuable than money.
The Internet Economy promised to get rid of the middle-men and we loved it. Somehow, I’m starting to get the feeling that we ourselves ended up doing the work of that middle-men we were so eager to get rid of.
In any project you can always pick two of these: fast, cheap or good. We seem to have focused a lot on ‘cheap’ and ‘good’ but the extra time we need to invest to keep it ‘fast’ es out of our own pockets.
You can always make more money but you can never make more time.
【小题1】What is the purpose of the first paragraph?A．It mainly shows the curiosity of the author’s daughter.B．It indicates that the Internet has influenced our daily life.C．It tells us the importance of a travel agency.D．It shows why people need a travel agency.【小题2】What’s the author’s attitude towards the Internet Economy?A．The author thinks online shopping saves time and is a convenient way to buy products.B．The author worries about sending personal information over the internet.C．The author doesn’t think online shopping is satisfactory in every way. D．The author likes the convenience but is concerned about the e-merce environment.【小题3】What’s the best title for the passage?A．The convenience of the Internet Economy.B．How to save money in the Internet Economy.C．The hidden cost of the Internet Economy.D．How to save time in the Internet Economy.B
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(答案→)B
解析：文章讲述的是网购虽然可以节省我们的开支，但是却花了我们大量的时间，省钱是有代价的。
【小题1】主旨大意题，根据第一段Because we do everything ourselves online these days可知，现在人们的生活受到了英特网的影响。
【小题2】推理判断题，根据文章中作者讲到网购的好处和存在的问题可以得知，作者不是全面肯定网购
【小题3】推理判断题，根据文章内容可知，作者认为网购虽然省了一些钱，但是花费了很多的时间，这就是网购的隐藏代价。