Mass production, the defining characteristic of the Second Wave economy, becomes increasingly obsolete as firms install information intensive, often robotized manufacturing systems capable of endless cheap variation, even customization. The revolutionary result is, in effect, the demassification of mass production.
The shift toward smart flex techs promotes diversity and feeds consumer choice to the point that a Wal-Mart store can offer the buyer nearly 110,000 products in various types, sizes, models and colors to choose among. But Wal-Mart is a mass merchandiser. Increasingly, the mass market itself is breaking up into differentiated niches as customer needs diverge and better information makes it possible for businesses to identify and serve micro markets.
Specialty stores, boutiques, superstores, TV home-shopping systems, computer based buying, direct mail and other systems provide a growing diversity of channels through which producers can distribute their wares to customers in an increasingly demassified marketplace. When we wrote Future Shock in the late 1960s, visionary marketers began talking about "market segmentation". Today they no longer focus on " segments" but on " particles "—family units and even single individuals. Meanwhile, advertising is targeted at smaller and smaller market segments reached through increasingly demassified media.
The dramatic breakup of mass audiences is underscored by the crisis of the once great TV networks, ABC, CBS, and NBC, at a time when Tele-Communications, Inc. of Denver, announces a fiber optic network capable of providing viewers with five hundred interactive channels of television. Such systems mean that sellers will be able to target buyers with even greater precision. The simultaneous demassification of production, distribution and communication revolutionizes the economy and shifts it from homogeneity toward extreme heterogeneity.
Which is true about "mass production" according to the author（）
A. It promotes further development in manufacturing systems
B. It defines the Second Wave economy and will last
C. It involves intensive information, automation, and customization
D. It is becoming dated for the present economy
参考答案：D
解析：
[考点] 事实细节
本题考查考生根据文中具体内容进行理解推测的能力。在文章的开头作者就指出，大规模生产是第二次经济浪潮的特点，但是已经越来越不合时宜。这里的关键词是obsolete(过时)与dated同义。由此可以得知选项D为正确答案。
[干扰项分析] 选项A，文章第一句就已经提出大规模生产作为第二次经济浪潮的决定性特征，已经越来越过时了，因此错误。选项B，同样与文中第一句意思相悖，因此错误。选项C，这里“密集的信息、自动化和量身定制”都是在描述大规模生产的非规模化，因此错误。