2010考研英語——歷年真題來源報刊閱讀100篇(22)

　Online booksellers face higher   
　　costs for shipping abroad  
　　THE Postal Service is taking the “ship” out of shipping, and thousands of small online booksellers are bracing for trouble.  
　　The post office said last month that as of mid-May, it would no longer transport goods internationally via cargo ships for individual customers. These so-called surface deliveries have been the crucial method by which booksellers have sold books to foreign markets because the cost is about one-third that of air mail.  
　　Analysts said Amazon.com would not be affected by the change; international book shipments represent a small fraction of its business, and because, like other high-volume businesses, it can qualify for discounts on foreign shipments.  
　　But many thousands of smaller used-and rare-book merchants say they will suffer, since they rely on foreign demand.  
　　“If postage costs as much, if not more, than the book, it’ll be hard to sell books,” said Rob Stuart, owner of FrenchboroBooks.com, a seller of rare and antique books in Frenchboro, Maine.“And maybe 25 percent or more of my books sell internationally.”  
　　In announcing the changes last month, the post office said demand for international air-mail delivery was increasing at the expense of sea-borne services, which account for just 2.7 percent of foreign deliveries.“As a result, efficient international surface delivery networks have diminished and costs have dramatically increased,” the Postal Service said.
　　Mr. Stuart called the changes “a brutal reality” that put him in a difficult position, since his entire town may feel the effects. His company has shipped enough rare and antique books to sustain mail deliveries for the 75 residents of Frenchboro, an island about eight miles off Maine’s northeast coast. Now Mr. Stuart, who is also a town selectman, said the island’s mail deliveries could be threatened, and he may also be forced to lay off a part-time worker.  
　　Yvonne Yoerger, a spokeswoman for the Postal Service, said customers aren’t yet aware of other options. She said “customized agreements” for surface mail are being developed for higher-volume shippers that will be enhanced over the next several months to address the needs of small businesses. “The Postal Service has a longstanding commitment to small businesses and is working to accommodate customers�� needs as the international mail changes take effect,” Ms. Yoerger said.  
　　Philip Bevis, chief executive of Arundel Books, which sells online and in its Seattle store, said he did not believe such customized agreements would extend to small booksellers like him.  
　　“I think the Postal Service dangled that to defuse any pushback,” Mr. Bevis said. “If they were really serious about this, they would’ve pushed back the cancellation of surface mail until they could incorporate these other standards.” Because small booksellers typically list their inventories with multiple Web sites, like Amazon, AbeBooks.com and Alibris.com, the new shipping costs will be felt, to varying degrees, up the industry’s food chain until those customized agreements are final.

　　考研單詞：
　　brace[breis]
　　v.①使防備，使受鍛煉;②支撐;③使(手，足，肩等)繃緊;n.托架，支架
　　transport[ˈtrænspɔ:t]
　　v.運輸，運送，搬運;n.①運輸，運送;②運輸系統，運載工具
　　[真題例句] It was during the same time that the communications revolution (25：speeded) up, beginning with transport (n.②), the railway, and leading (26：on) through the telegraph, the telephone, radio, and motion pictures (27：into) the 20th century world of the motor car and the air plane.[2002年完形]
　　[例句精譯] 與此同時，通訊革命加速發展，從鐵路運輸開始，發展到電報、電話、無線電和電影，直到20世紀的汽車和飛機。
　　via[ˈvaiə]
　　prep.經，通過
　　[真題例句] He sent it on via the group�餾 on�瞝ine service, Death NET.[1997年閱讀1]
　　[例句精譯] 他通過協會的在線服務“死亡之網”將其轉發了出去。
　　crucial[ˈkru:ʃiəl]
　　a.至關重要的，決定性的
　　[真題例句] The panel has not yet reached agreement on a crucial question, however, whether to recommend legislation that would make it a crime for private funding to be used for human cloning.[1999年閱讀4]
　　[例句精譯] 然而，該小組尚未在一個關鍵問題上達成一致，即是否建議立法機關將私人資金用于克隆人的行為視為犯罪。
　　qualify[ˈkwɔliˌfai]
　　v.①(使)具有資格，證明合格;②限制，限定;③修飾
　　[真題例句] We must pour out a large stream of essential words, unhampered by stops, or qualifying (③) adjectives, or finite verbs.[2000年閱讀3]
　　[例句精譯] 我們必須大量使用基本詞匯，擺脫句號、修飾性形容詞及限定動詞的限制。
　　rely[riˈlai]
　　v.①(on)依賴，依靠;②信賴，信任
　　[真題例句] “I would not rely (①) on agents for finding everything that is added to a database that might interest me,” says the author of a job�瞫earching guide.[2004年閱讀1]
　　[例句精譯] 一位職業搜索指南的作者說：“我不會依賴代理在數據庫增加的每一項內容里去逐一尋找可能令我感興趣的東西。”
　　diminish[diˈminiʃ]
　　v.縮小，減少，遞減
　　[真題例句] Again, differences between people and the opportunity for natural selection to take advantage of it have diminished.[2000年閱讀2]
　　[例句精譯] 人與人之間的差異和利用差異進行自然選擇的機會再一次減少。
　　sustain[səˈstein]
　　v.①支撐，撐住;②維持，持續，經受，忍耐

　　[真題例句] Some scholars conclude that a government with finite resources should simply stop paying for medical care that sustains (②) life beyond a certain age—say 83 or so.[2003年閱讀4] 
　　[例句精譯] 有些學者總結說，如果政府資金有限，它應該停止支付延緩某一個年齡以上人群壽命的醫療費用——比如83歲左右。
　　背景常識介紹：
　　全球比較大的電子零售商，亞馬遜，在其網站上銷售著數百萬件的商品，然而其每個季度的業績讓投資者傷心失望的地方也像其銷售的商品這么多。4月26日發布的第一季度財務報告再度讓投資者感到了失望，盡管該季度收入增長了24%，達到了19億美元，但是其贏利比一年前下滑了30%，只有7800萬美元。
　　參考譯文：
　　網上書商面臨挑戰
　　郵政業將不再用貨船運送貨物，數以萬計的網上小書商正準備迎接由此帶來的麻煩。
　　上月郵電業宣稱，從五月中旬開始，將不再為個人客戶辦理貨船國際商品運送業務。這些所謂的水面運送方式，一直是書商們將書賣往海外市場的主要方法，因為它的花費只有航空郵件的三分之一。
　　分析家說這種變化不會對亞馬遜電子商務公司(Amazon.com)造成影響。書籍的全球運送只代表了它的一小部分業務，而且像其他擁有大量業務的公司一樣，它有能力承受海外運輸市場業務的減少。
　　但是數以萬計的專賣舊書和珍本書的小書商說他們將要遭殃了，因為他們依靠的就是國外的市場需求。
　　羅勃·斯特，是FrenchboroBooks.com 公司的老板，在緬甸的Frenchboro, Maine 賣珍本和古籍，他說：“如果書的郵費比書本身的價格高，或者即使兩者一樣多，就很難把書賣出去了，而且我有25%或更多的書是賣往全球的。”
　　在上個月宣布這些變化時，郵局說在損失了占海外業務2.7%的貨船業務的情況下，國際航空運輸業務增加了。“因此，有效的全球水運網絡衰落了，而運輸費用也大幅度增加”，郵電業如是說。
　　斯特先生稱這些變化為“殘酷的現實”，將他置于一個非常困難的境地，因為他所在的整個小鎮都可能感受到這些變化帶來的影響。他的公司已經用貨船運送了足夠多的珍本書和古籍，以此來支付給75位Frenchboro居民郵書的費用，Frenchboro是一個離緬因州北部海岸約八英里的一個小島。現在斯特先生是小鎮的行政委員，他說，這個小島的郵政運送業務正面臨威脅，而且他也可能不得不辭掉一個兼職工人。
　　郵電業發言人，Yvonne Yoerger說，顧客們還沒有意識到其他的選擇。她說，對于水運“約定俗成的共識”正在制定中，它們將更有利于那些擁有大筆業務的發貨人，從而滿足小公司的要求。她還說：“郵政業將長期致力于為小公司服務，并且當全球郵政業務發生變化時將努力滿足顧客們的要求。”
　　非利普·布瑞斯是Arundel Books的行政長官，這家電子商務公司在網上和西雅圖的書店里出售圖書。他說他不相信這些“約定俗成的共識”會擴展到像他一樣的小書商那里。
　　布瑞斯先生說：“我認為郵電業只是以此作為幌子來緩和任何反對意見。如果他們真的關心此事，那么直到他們能夠將其他標準包含進來，他們也許就不會接受取消水運郵政業務。”因為小書商們都將他們的圖書清單放在多個網頁上，如Amazon，AbeBooks.com，Alibris.com，那么直到這些“約定俗成的共識”已成定局，新的運送費用才將在不同程度上滿足郵電業的食物鏈要求。