Three makes a trend. The Washington Post Co. Friday announced that it would look to sell its headquarters building in downtown W

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问题     Three makes a trend. The Washington Post Co. Friday announced that it would look to sell its headquarters building in downtown Washington, D. C. In January, the Detroit Free Press and The Detroit News announced they would put up for sale their headquarters. The same month, Frank Gannett said it will sell the building that houses the Rochester, N.Y., Democrat & Chronicle. The building was the place where Gannett started and built his vast newspaper empire.
    It’s no secret that newspapers are in crisis. Advertising revenues have fallen by half in the past decade and are back to where they were in 1983; circulation revenues are back to where they were in 1996. The digital numbers are rising, but not fast enough. Print media is hampered by high fixed costs incurred in the pre-digital era—pensions and union contracts, equipment like printing presses, large numbers of employees, and big office buildings.
    Virtually every newspaper company has engaged in drastic measures—laying off experienced employees, eliminating sections, cutting back printing from daily to a few days per week. Those efforts are all meant to lower day-to-day operating costs. But we’ve also seen newspaper companies seek onetime injections of cash by selling off non-core assets. Increasingly, the headquarters building—typically located right in the middle of town—is falling into the non-core asset category.
    Traditionalists may find these sales and the continued shrinking of newspapers’ real-estate footprints to be depressing. But it’s actually a positive development. Call it creative destruction, or adaptive reuse. In cities around the country, investors are finding better uses for properties. In lower Manhattan, Class B office buildings that used to house financial firms have been converted into expensive separate apartments. "It’s a great thing, because it drives more tax revenue to the cities. And it gives the suburbs a run for the money," said Jonathan Miller, president of appraisal company MillerSamuel.
    In D. C, the Washington Post will likely fetch an excellent price for its headquarters because Washington is a boomtown. Throughout D. C, investors are plowing cash into housing, office, and retail developments. The building that housed the organization that exposed the Watergate scandal may become the next Watergate complex.
    Of course, progress inevitably displaces the prior tenants. It’s likely the new homes that will be occupied by newspapermen and newspaperwomen in Washington, Rochester, and Detroit will be less grand, less central, and less historic than their current homes. And the sale of these properties alone won’t solve the newspapers’ financial problems. But it will buy them a very valuable commodity: time.
By saying "Three makes a trend" (Para. 1), the author implies that ________.

选项 A、the three companies have sold their buildings together
B、newspaper-publishers have widely fallen into crisis
C、newspaper giants start to enter housing market
D、it’s popular for printing companies to change headquarters

答案B

解析 根据题干定位到第一段Three makes a trend该句总起全文,引出要讨论的话题;该段随后分别列举了三个报业大集团出售其办公大楼的事例;紧接着第二段第一句点出卖楼原因乃是报业不景气(newspapers are in crisis),因而可知,该句是想通过具体事例说明报业危机的趋势,故选B项。第一段第二三四句列举了三家集团都计划出售总部大楼的情况,但并未说一起出售,A项错误。第二段第一句说“报业危机四伏并非秘闻”,指出卖楼是因为行业萧条,并非新业务拓展,C项无中生有。D项是对trend的曲解。从第二段可知,报业陷入危机,这些集团是迫于压力变卖资产,而非特意要更换总部,popular无原文依据。
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