The information commissioner gave Facebook a rap over the knuckles earlier this month,putting the company on notice of likely fines-the equivalent of a few minutes'revenue-for breaches of privacy.On Wednesday the European commission gave Google a vigorous

It would be all too easy to say that Facebook’s market meltdown is coming to an end.After all,Mark Zuckerberg’s social
network burned as much as$50 billion of shareholders’wealth in just a couple months.To put that in context,since its debut(初次登台)on NASDAQ in May,Facebook has lost value nearly equal to Yahoo,AOL,Zynga,Yelp,Pandora,Open Table,
Group on,LinkedIn,and Angie's List combined,plus that of the bulk of the publicly traded newspaper industry:
As shocking as this utter failure may be to the nearly 1 billion faithful Facebook users around the world,it’s no surprise to
anyone who read the initial public offering(IPO)prospectus(首次公开募股说明书).Worse still,all the crises that emerged
when the company debuted-overpriced shares,poor corporate governance,huge challenges to the core business,and a
damaged brand-remain today.Facebook looks like a prime example of what Wall Street calls a falling knife-that is,one that
can cost investors their fingers if they try to catch it.
Start with the valuation.To justify a stock price close to the lower end of the projected range in the IPO,say$28 a share,Facebook’s future growth would have needed to match that of Google seven years earlier.That would have required
increasing revenue by some 80 percent annually and maintaining high profit margins all the while.
That’s not happening.In the first half of 2012,Facebook reported revenue of$2.24 billion,up 38 percent from the same
period in 2011.At the same time,the company’s costs surged to$2.6 billion in the six-month period.
This so-so performance reflects the Achilles’heel of Facebook’s business model,which the company clearly stated in a
list of risk factors associated with its IPO:it hasn’t yet figured out how to advertise effectively on mobile devices,The number
of Facebook users accessing the site on their phones surged by 67 percent to 543 million in the last quarter,or more than
half its customer base.
Numbers are only part of the problem.The mounting pile of failure creates a negative feedback loop that threatens Facebook’s future in other ways.Indeed,the more Facebook’s disappointment in the market is catalogued,the worse Facebook’s
image becomes.Not only does that threaten to rub off on users,it’s bad for recruitment and retention of talented hackers,who are the lifeblood of Zuckerberg’s creation.
Yet the brilliant CEO can ignore the sadness and complaints of his shareholders thanks to the super-voting stock he
holds.This arrangement also was fully disclosed at the time of the offering.It’s a pity so few investors apparently bothered to
do their homework.

It can be inferred from the context that the“Achilles’heel”(Line 1,Para.5)refers to____《》（）

A.deadly weakness
B.problem unsolveD
C.indisputable fact
D.potential risk

It would be all too easy to say that Facebook’s market meltdown is coming to an end.After all,Mark Zuckerberg’s social
network burned as much as$50 billion of shareholders’wealth in just a couple months.To put that in context,since its debut(初次登台)on NASDAQ in May,Facebook has lost value nearly equal to Yahoo,AOL,Zynga,Yelp,Pandora,Open Table,
Group on,LinkedIn,and Angie's List combined,plus that of the bulk of the publicly traded newspaper industry:
As shocking as this utter failure may be to the nearly 1 billion faithful Facebook users around the world,it’s no surprise to
anyone who read the initial public offering(IPO)prospectus(首次公开募股说明书).Worse still,all the crises that emerged
when the company debuted-overpriced shares,poor corporate governance,huge challenges to the core business,and a
damaged brand-remain today.Facebook looks like a prime example of what Wall Street calls a falling knife-that is,one that
can cost investors their fingers if they try to catch it.
Start with the valuation.To justify a stock price close to the lower end of the projected range in the IPO,say$28 a share,Facebook’s future growth would have needed to match that of Google seven years earlier.That would have required
increasing revenue by some 80 percent annually and maintaining high profit margins all the while.
That’s not happening.In the first half of 2012,Facebook reported revenue of$2.24 billion,up 38 percent from the same
period in 2011.At the same time,the company’s costs surged to$2.6 billion in the six-month period.
This so-so performance reflects the Achilles’heel of Facebook’s business model,which the company clearly stated in a
list of risk factors associated with its IPO:it hasn’t yet figured out how to advertise effectively on mobile devices,The number
of Facebook users accessing the site on their phones surged by 67 percent to 543 million in the last quarter,or more than
half its customer base.
Numbers are only part of the problem.The mounting pile of failure creates a negative feedback loop that threatens Facebook’s future in other ways.Indeed,the more Facebook’s disappointment in the market is catalogued,the worse Facebook’s
image becomes.Not only does that threaten to rub off on users,it’s bad for recruitment and retention of talented hackers,who are the lifeblood of Zuckerberg’s creation.
Yet the brilliant CEO can ignore the sadness and complaints of his shareholders thanks to the super-voting stock he
holds.This arrangement also was fully disclosed at the time of the offering.It’s a pity so few investors apparently bothered to
do their homework.

What effect will Facebook’s failure in the market have 《》（）

A.Its users’benefits will be threatened.
B.Talented hackers will take down the website.
C.The CEO will hold the super-voting stock.
D.The company’s innovation strength will be damageD.

It would be all too easy to say that Facebook’s market meltdown is coming to an end.After all,Mark Zuckerberg’s social
network burned as much as$50 billion of shareholders’wealth in just a couple months.To put that in context,since its debut(初次登台)on NASDAQ in May,Facebook has lost value nearly equal to Yahoo,AOL,Zynga,Yelp,Pandora,Open Table,
Group on,LinkedIn,and Angie's List combined,plus that of the bulk of the publicly traded newspaper industry:
As shocking as this utter failure may be to the nearly 1 billion faithful Facebook users around the world,it’s no surprise to
anyone who read the initial public offering(IPO)prospectus(首次公开募股说明书).Worse still,all the crises that emerged
when the company debuted-overpriced shares,poor corporate governance,huge challenges to the core business,and a
damaged brand-remain today.Facebook looks like a prime example of what Wall Street calls a falling knife-that is,one that
can cost investors their fingers if they try to catch it.
Start with the valuation.To justify a stock price close to the lower end of the projected range in the IPO,say$28 a share,Facebook’s future growth would have needed to match that of Google seven years earlier.That would have required
increasing revenue by some 80 percent annually and maintaining high profit margins all the while.
That’s not happening.In the first half of 2012,Facebook reported revenue of$2.24 billion,up 38 percent from the same
period in 2011.At the same time,the company’s costs surged to$2.6 billion in the six-month period.
This so-so performance reflects the Achilles’heel of Facebook’s business model,which the company clearly stated in a
list of risk factors associated with its IPO:it hasn’t yet figured out how to advertise effectively on mobile devices,The number
of Facebook users accessing the site on their phones surged by 67 percent to 543 million in the last quarter,or more than
half its customer base.
Numbers are only part of the problem.The mounting pile of failure creates a negative feedback loop that threatens Facebook’s future in other ways.Indeed,the more Facebook’s disappointment in the market is catalogued,the worse Facebook’s
image becomes.Not only does that threaten to rub off on users,it’s bad for recruitment and retention of talented hackers,who are the lifeblood of Zuckerberg’s creation.
Yet the brilliant CEO can ignore the sadness and complaints of his shareholders thanks to the super-voting stock he
holds.This arrangement also was fully disclosed at the time of the offering.It’s a pity so few investors apparently bothered to
do their homework.

To make its stock price reasonable,Facebook has to____《》（）

A.narrow the IPO price range
B.cooperate with Google
C.keep enormously profitable
D.invest additional$2.6 billion

Text 2 Should we be thinking of Facebook as a news site?Is that how Facebook thinks of itself?No,not primarily,Facebook now says.In a document posted on Wednesday,the company explained,for the first time,the"values"that govem its news feed,the scrolling list of posts that Facebook presents to its l.65 billion users every time they log on.Though it is couched in the anodyne language of a corporate news release,the document's message should come as a shock to everyone in the media business.According to these values,Facebook has a single overriding purpose,and it isn't news.Facebook is mainly for telling you what's up with your friends and family.Adam Mosseri,the Facebook manager in charge of the news feed,said in a recent interview that informing and entertaining users was also part of the company's mission.But he made clear that news and entertainment were secondary pursuits."We think more,spend more time and work on more projects that try to help people express themselves with their friends or learn about their friends or have conversations with their friends,"he said.As if to underscore the point,the company is making a tweak to its news feed ranking system to increase the prominence ofcoiitent from your friends and family over posts by news companies and other organizations.It is also waming news companies that their traffic might decline as a result of the change.These moves highlight a truth that tends to get lost in commentary about the social network's influence over the news:At Facebook,infonrung users about the world will always take a back seat to cute pictures of babies..Because Facebook does not think ofitself primarily as a news company,it seems to want us to stop expecting it to act like one.Whether we should,though,is a more complicated matter.The company has long been hounded by journalists and activists over its power to shape the news through its algorithms,or the code that determines which stories you see,in the news feed.The question of how to think about Facebook's role in the news-and whether we should demand the same standards of accuracy,objectivity,transparency and fairness that we expect from traditional outlets-may be the primary puzzle ofour new media age.According to Facebook,the values outlined in the document have been the informal governing philosophy of its news feed since it was started a decade ago,and Mr.Zuckerberg and Chris Cox,Facebook's chiefproduct officer,were deeply involved in drafiing the new document.30.The best title for this text could be.

A.Facebook-a News Giant That Would Rather Show Us Baby Pictures
B.Facebook Is Reluctant to Be a News Website
C.Facebook,a New Bom Baby in the Age oflntemet
D.Facebook's Mr.Zuckerberg and Chris Cox

Text 2 Should we be thinking of Facebook as a news site?Is that how Facebook thinks of itself?No,not primarily,Facebook now says.In a document posted on Wednesday,the company explained,for the first time,the"values"that govem its news feed,the scrolling list of posts that Facebook presents to its l.65 billion users every time they log on.Though it is couched in the anodyne language of a corporate news release,the document's message should come as a shock to everyone in the media business.According to these values,Facebook has a single overriding purpose,and it isn't news.Facebook is mainly for telling you what's up with your friends and family.Adam Mosseri,the Facebook manager in charge of the news feed,said in a recent interview that informing and entertaining users was also part of the company's mission.But he made clear that news and entertainment were secondary pursuits."We think more,spend more time and work on more projects that try to help people express themselves with their friends or learn about their friends or have conversations with their friends,"he said.As if to underscore the point,the company is making a tweak to its news feed ranking system to increase the prominence ofcoiitent from your friends and family over posts by news companies and other organizations.It is also waming news companies that their traffic might decline as a result of the change.These moves highlight a truth that tends to get lost in commentary about the social network's influence over the news:At Facebook,infonrung users about the world will always take a back seat to cute pictures of babies..Because Facebook does not think ofitself primarily as a news company,it seems to want us to stop expecting it to act like one.Whether we should,though,is a more complicated matter.The company has long been hounded by journalists and activists over its power to shape the news through its algorithms,or the code that determines which stories you see,in the news feed.The question of how to think about Facebook's role in the news-and whether we should demand the same standards of accuracy,objectivity,transparency and fairness that we expect from traditional outlets-may be the primary puzzle ofour new media age.According to Facebook,the values outlined in the document have been the informal governing philosophy of its news feed since it was started a decade ago,and Mr.Zuckerberg and Chris Cox,Facebook's chiefproduct officer,were deeply involved in drafiing the new document.29.Mr.Zuckerberg and Chris Cox believe that.

A.serious news is the most valuable to be posted to their users.
B.the standards ofnews they post are accurate and objective.
C.they have the conventional governing policy ofits news.
D.the intefaction with friends is the most important news.

Text 2 Should we be thinking of Facebook as a news site?Is that how Facebook thinks of itself?No,not primarily,Facebook now says.In a document posted on Wednesday,the company explained,for the first time,the"values"that govem its news feed,the scrolling list of posts that Facebook presents to its l.65 billion users every time they log on.Though it is couched in the anodyne language of a corporate news release,the document's message should come as a shock to everyone in the media business.According to these values,Facebook has a single overriding purpose,and it isn't news.Facebook is mainly for telling you what's up with your friends and family.Adam Mosseri,the Facebook manager in charge of the news feed,said in a recent interview that informing and entertaining users was also part of the company's mission.But he made clear that news and entertainment were secondary pursuits."We think more,spend more time and work on more projects that try to help people express themselves with their friends or learn about their friends or have conversations with their friends,"he said.As if to underscore the point,the company is making a tweak to its news feed ranking system to increase the prominence ofcoiitent from your friends and family over posts by news companies and other organizations.It is also waming news companies that their traffic might decline as a result of the change.These moves highlight a truth that tends to get lost in commentary about the social network's influence over the news:At Facebook,infonrung users about the world will always take a back seat to cute pictures of babies..Because Facebook does not think ofitself primarily as a news company,it seems to want us to stop expecting it to act like one.Whether we should,though,is a more complicated matter.The company has long been hounded by journalists and activists over its power to shape the news through its algorithms,or the code that determines which stories you see,in the news feed.The question of how to think about Facebook's role in the news-and whether we should demand the same standards of accuracy,objectivity,transparency and fairness that we expect from traditional outlets-may be the primary puzzle ofour new media age.According to Facebook,the values outlined in the document have been the informal governing philosophy of its news feed since it was started a decade ago,and Mr.Zuckerberg and Chris Cox,Facebook's chiefproduct officer,were deeply involved in drafiing the new document.27.By"making a tweak",Facebook means to.

A.adjust the ranking system of the different news.
B.give priority to news about friends and family.
C.solve the traffic problem online.
D.wam media companies to change their organizations.

Following a widespread dispute over wages, both parties involved__________ came to an agreement to end the three-month walkout, as the company offered higher wages and job guarantees.

A. equally
B. finally
C. annually
D. increasingly

共用题干
1.Tired of social networking?Logging off Facebook?You're probably not the only one.Fearing for their privacy or perhaps just bored with using the site,100,000 Britons are said to have deactivated（注销）their accounts last month. And Facebook fatigue seems to be catching. Six million logged off for good in the U.S.too,figures show.Worldwide,the rate of growth has slowed for a second month in a row一and as it aims to reach its goal of one billion active users,Facebook is having to rely on developing countries to boost its numbers.The figures suggest that there could be a"natural limit" for Facebook's saturation（饱和）.There is even speculation on blogs that, as is feared for its failing rival MySpace,the website could one day "pass into oblivion"（被人遗忘）.
2.Earlier this year,executives announced that the number of Facebook accounts held in the UK had reached 30 million,accounting for about half the population.The milestone was an increase of four million from last July and represented the highest saturation of any country in Europe.
3.But times change一and last month more than 100,000 in the UK stopped using the website, figures show.In the U.S.,user numbers dropped from 155.2 million to 149.4 million throughout May.In Canada there was also a fall,of about 1.5 million users,while in Russia and Norway num-bers also fell by more than 100,000 users.
4.It's not all bad news for the site.Worldwide,Facebook is still expanding and has around 600 million users,thanks to strong growth in countries such as Mexico and Brazil.
5.According to Eric Eldon,of the website Inside Facebook,which obtained the figures through analysis of the company's advertising tools,there is a point at which the site can no longer grow, once it has established itself in a country."By the time Facebook reaches around 50 percent of the total population in a given country,growth generally slows to a halt,"he explained.

Paragraph 1_________
A:Facebook users in Britain increased a lot earlier this year.
B:Facebook seems to be faced with a gloomy future.
C:Facebook is a very popular social place for many people.
D:Users of Facebook dropped dramatically in many countries.
E:In spite of the setback in some countries,Facebook is still expanding worldwide.
F: There is a reason for the decreasing users of Facebook.

It would be all too easy to say that Facebook’s market meltdown is coming to an end.After all,Mark Zuckerberg’s social
network burned as much as$50 billion of shareholders’wealth in just a couple months.To put that in context,since its debut(初次登台)on NASDAQ in May,Facebook has lost value nearly equal to Yahoo,AOL,Zynga,Yelp,Pandora,Open Table,
Group on,LinkedIn,and Angie's List combined,plus that of the bulk of the publicly traded newspaper industry:
As shocking as this utter failure may be to the nearly 1 billion faithful Facebook users around the world,it’s no surprise to
anyone who read the initial public offering(IPO)prospectus(首次公开募股说明书).Worse still,all the crises that emerged
when the company debuted-overpriced shares,poor corporate governance,huge challenges to the core business,and a
damaged brand-remain today.Facebook looks like a prime example of what Wall Street calls a falling knife-that is,one that
can cost investors their fingers if they try to catch it.
Start with the valuation.To justify a stock price close to the lower end of the projected range in the IPO,say$28 a share,Facebook’s future growth would have needed to match that of Google seven years earlier.That would have required
increasing revenue by some 80 percent annually and maintaining high profit margins all the while.
That’s not happening.In the first half of 2012,Facebook reported revenue of$2.24 billion,up 38 percent from the same
period in 2011.At the same time,the company’s costs surged to$2.6 billion in the six-month period.
This so-so performance reflects the Achilles’heel of Facebook’s business model,which the company clearly stated in a
list of risk factors associated with its IPO:it hasn’t yet figured out how to advertise effectively on mobile devices,The number
of Facebook users accessing the site on their phones surged by 67 percent to 543 million in the last quarter,or more than
half its customer base.
Numbers are only part of the problem.The mounting pile of failure creates a negative feedback loop that threatens Facebook’s future in other ways.Indeed,the more Facebook’s disappointment in the market is catalogued,the worse Facebook’s
image becomes.Not only does that threaten to rub off on users,it’s bad for recruitment and retention of talented hackers,who are the lifeblood of Zuckerberg’s creation.
Yet the brilliant CEO can ignore the sadness and complaints of his shareholders thanks to the super-voting stock he
holds.This arrangement also was fully disclosed at the time of the offering.It’s a pity so few investors apparently bothered to
do their homework.


What can be inferred about Facebook from the first paragraph 《》（）

A.Its market meltdown has been easily halted.
B.It has increased trade with the newspaper industry.
C.It has encountered utter failure since its stock debut.
D.Its shareholders have invested$50 billion in a social network.

It would be all too easy to say that Facebook’s market meltdown is coming to an end.After all,Mark Zuckerberg’s social
network burned as much as$50 billion of shareholders’wealth in just a couple months.To put that in context,since its debut(初次登台)on NASDAQ in May,Facebook has lost value nearly equal to Yahoo,AOL,Zynga,Yelp,Pandora,Open Table,
Group on,LinkedIn,and Angie's List combined,plus that of the bulk of the publicly traded newspaper industry:
As shocking as this utter failure may be to the nearly 1 billion faithful Facebook users around the world,it’s no surprise to
anyone who read the initial public offering(IPO)prospectus(首次公开募股说明书).Worse still,all the crises that emerged
when the company debuted-overpriced shares,poor corporate governance,huge challenges to the core business,and a
damaged brand-remain today.Facebook looks like a prime example of what Wall Street calls a falling knife-that is,one that
can cost investors their fingers if they try to catch it.
Start with the valuation.To justify a stock price close to the lower end of the projected range in the IPO,say$28 a share,Facebook’s future growth would have needed to match that of Google seven years earlier.That would have required
increasing revenue by some 80 percent annually and maintaining high profit margins all the while.
That’s not happening.In the first half of 2012,Facebook reported revenue of$2.24 billion,up 38 percent from the same
period in 2011.At the same time,the company’s costs surged to$2.6 billion in the six-month period.
This so-so performance reflects the Achilles’heel of Facebook’s business model,which the company clearly stated in a
list of risk factors associated with its IPO:it hasn’t yet figured out how to advertise effectively on mobile devices,The number
of Facebook users accessing the site on their phones surged by 67 percent to 543 million in the last quarter,or more than
half its customer base.
Numbers are only part of the problem.The mounting pile of failure creates a negative feedback loop that threatens Facebook’s future in other ways.Indeed,the more Facebook’s disappointment in the market is catalogued,the worse Facebook’s
image becomes.Not only does that threaten to rub off on users,it’s bad for recruitment and retention of talented hackers,who are the lifeblood of Zuckerberg’s creation.
Yet the brilliant CEO can ignore the sadness and complaints of his shareholders thanks to the super-voting stock he
holds.This arrangement also was fully disclosed at the time of the offering.It’s a pity so few investors apparently bothered to
do their homework.

What does the author imply in the last paragraph 《》（）

A.Sleeplessness does harm to people’s health.
B.Few people really know the importance of sleep.
C.It is important to study our sleep patterns.
D.Average people probably sleep less than the rich.

The information commissioner gave Facebook a rap over the knuckles earlier this month,putting the company on notice of likely fines-the equivalent of a few minutes'revenue-for breaches of privacy.On Wednesday the European commission gave Google a vigorous correction,fining it￠4.3 billion for abusing its market dominance with the AndrOJd operating system which powers the overwhelming majority of the world's mobile phones.Google is appealing.The billions of euros at stake aside,it is easy to see why.Google gives most of Android away,not only to the consumers who use it,but to the companies that build their phones around it.As the company points out,there are more than 24,000 competing Android phones available today,from 1,300 companies.How can that possibly constitute a harmful monopoly?Besides,Google has real competition in the smartphone world from Apple.At the same time,these are exactly the factors that make the commission's decision so interesLing and significant.For Google's business to work,it must become as easy as possible for advertisers to reach users.That is the purpose of all the software that Google gives away,from the Android operating system,through to YouTube,Google search on phones and the Chrome browser.This might look like a cross-subsidy,but on the other hand it is the heart of the company's business.The software that Google gives away is not designed to make a profit on its own.This free version does not include the bits that make a phone useful for anything but making telephone calls,and this was the weak spot in Google's defence.None of the enticements-the mail,the search,the maps and the browser-are included.These can only be used with a proprietary chunk of software that Google controls;and manufacturers who want to use the Play store and 11 crucial Google apps must agree not to build so much as a single phone that does not include them.It is all or nothing.This licensing trick is the way in which Google has undoubtedly limited competition.The commission's decision to punish it probably comes too late to undo the damage it has done.All digital businesses tend towards a monopoly,and this is in part because in some important ways they benefit consumers more the larger they grow.Yet as customers we pay for this in other ways and as citizens even more so,not least because the companies fattened by monopoly profits grow too large to fail and too powerful to challenge.There is a public interest in preventing any company from acquiring almost unlimited power.Regulation defends democracy.
The author's attitude toward the commcssion's decision is

A.cautious.
B.ambiguous.
C.sarcastic.
D.supportive.

The information commissioner gave Facebook a rap over the knuckles earlier this month,putting the company on notice of likely fines-the equivalent of a few minutes'revenue-for breaches of privacy.On Wednesday the European commission gave Google a vigorous correction,fining it￠4.3 billion for abusing its market dominance with the AndrOJd operating system which powers the overwhelming majority of the world's mobile phones.Google is appealing.The billions of euros at stake aside,it is easy to see why.Google gives most of Android away,not only to the consumers who use it,but to the companies that build their phones around it.As the company points out,there are more than 24,000 competing Android phones available today,from 1,300 companies.How can that possibly constitute a harmful monopoly?Besides,Google has real competition in the smartphone world from Apple.At the same time,these are exactly the factors that make the commission's decision so interesLing and significant.For Google's business to work,it must become as easy as possible for advertisers to reach users.That is the purpose of all the software that Google gives away,from the Android operating system,through to YouTube,Google search on phones and the Chrome browser.This might look like a cross-subsidy,but on the other hand it is the heart of the company's business.The software that Google gives away is not designed to make a profit on its own.This free version does not include the bits that make a phone useful for anything but making telephone calls,and this was the weak spot in Google's defence.None of the enticements-the mail,the search,the maps and the browser-are included.These can only be used with a proprietary chunk of software that Google controls;and manufacturers who want to use the Play store and 11 crucial Google apps must agree not to build so much as a single phone that does not include them.It is all or nothing.This licensing trick is the way in which Google has undoubtedly limited competition.The commission's decision to punish it probably comes too late to undo the damage it has done.All digital businesses tend towards a monopoly,and this is in part because in some important ways they benefit consumers more the larger they grow.Yet as customers we pay for this in other ways and as citizens even more so,not least because the companies fattened by monopoly profits grow too large to fail and too powerful to challenge.There is a public interest in preventing any company from acquiring almost unlimited power.Regulation defends democracy.
The phrase"a rap over the knuckles"（I.ine l.Para.1）is closest in meaning to

A.a not-very-severe punishment.
B.a nol-very-correci explanaiion.
C.a heavy fine.
D.a false charge.

The information commissioner gave Facebook a rap over the knuckles earlier this month,putting the company on notice of likely fines-the equivalent of a few minutes'revenue-for breaches of privacy.On Wednesday the European commission gave Google a vigorous correction,fining it￠4.3 billion for abusing its market dominance with the AndrOJd operating system which powers the overwhelming majority of the world's mobile phones.Google is appealing.The billions of euros at stake aside,it is easy to see why.Google gives most of Android away,not only to the consumers who use it,but to the companies that build their phones around it.As the company points out,there are more than 24,000 competing Android phones available today,from 1,300 companies.How can that possibly constitute a harmful monopoly?Besides,Google has real competition in the smartphone world from Apple.At the same time,these are exactly the factors that make the commission's decision so interesLing and significant.For Google's business to work,it must become as easy as possible for advertisers to reach users.That is the purpose of all the software that Google gives away,from the Android operating system,through to YouTube,Google search on phones and the Chrome browser.This might look like a cross-subsidy,but on the other hand it is the heart of the company's business.The software that Google gives away is not designed to make a profit on its own.This free version does not include the bits that make a phone useful for anything but making telephone calls,and this was the weak spot in Google's defence.None of the enticements-the mail,the search,the maps and the browser-are included.These can only be used with a proprietary chunk of software that Google controls;and manufacturers who want to use the Play store and 11 crucial Google apps must agree not to build so much as a single phone that does not include them.It is all or nothing.This licensing trick is the way in which Google has undoubtedly limited competition.The commission's decision to punish it probably comes too late to undo the damage it has done.All digital businesses tend towards a monopoly,and this is in part because in some important ways they benefit consumers more the larger they grow.Yet as customers we pay for this in other ways and as citizens even more so,not least because the companies fattened by monopoly profits grow too large to fail and too powerful to challenge.There is a public interest in preventing any company from acquiring almost unlimited power.Regulation defends democracy.
Which of the following is true of Google's licensing trick?

A.It is of great use to some users,but of little use to others.
B.It offers many enticing functions to Android users for free.
C.It imposes a restriction on manufacturers'choice of apps
D.It may help Google escape punishment from the commission.

The CEO of the company has been consistent ________ his policy associated with foreign investments over the last few years.

A.of
B.with
C.at
D.for

共用题干
1.Tired of social networking?Logging off Facebook?You're probably not the only one.Fearing for their privacy or perhaps just bored with using the site,100,000 Britons are said to have deactivated（注销）their accounts last month. And Facebook fatigue seems to be catching. Six million logged off for good in the U.S.too,figures show.Worldwide,the rate of growth has slowed for a second month in a row一and as it aims to reach its goal of one billion active users,Facebook is having to rely on developing countries to boost its numbers.The figures suggest that there could be a"natural limit" for Facebook's saturation（饱和）.There is even speculation on blogs that, as is feared for its failing rival MySpace,the website could one day "pass into oblivion"（被人遗忘）.
2.Earlier this year,executives announced that the number of Facebook accounts held in the UK had reached 30 million,accounting for about half the population.The milestone was an increase of four million from last July and represented the highest saturation of any country in Europe.
3.But times change一and last month more than 100,000 in the UK stopped using the website, figures show.In the U.S.,user numbers dropped from 155.2 million to 149.4 million throughout May.In Canada there was also a fall,of about 1.5 million users,while in Russia and Norway num-bers also fell by more than 100,000 users.
4.It's not all bad news for the site.Worldwide,Facebook is still expanding and has around 600 million users,thanks to strong growth in countries such as Mexico and Brazil.
5.According to Eric Eldon,of the website Inside Facebook,which obtained the figures through analysis of the company's advertising tools,there is a point at which the site can no longer grow, once it has established itself in a country."By the time Facebook reaches around 50 percent of the total population in a given country,growth generally slows to a halt,"he explained.

Facebook had strong growth in countries such as_________.
A:around 50 percent of the total population in a given country
B:highest saturation
C:5.8 million
D:Britain,Canada and the U.S.
E:fear for privacy or perhaps just being bored with using the site
F:Mexico and Brazil