176. Jennifer: Video rental outlets in Centerville together handled 10,000 fewer video rentals in 1994 than in 1993. The decline in rentals was probably due almost entirely to the February 1994 opening of Videorama, the first and only video rental outlet in the area that, in addition to renting videos, also sold them cheaply.
Brad: There must be another explanation: as you yourself said, the decline was on the order of 10,000 rentals. Yet Videorama sold only 4,000 videos in 1994.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the force of the objection that Brad presents to Jennifer's explanation?
(A) In 1994 Videorama rented out more videos than it sold.
(B) In 1994 two new outlets that rent but that do not sell videos opened in Centerville.
(C) Most of the video rental outlets in Centerville rent videos at a discount on certain nights of the week.
(D) People often buy videos of movies that they have previously seen in a theater.
(E) People who own videos frequently loan them to their friends
Why is the answer e and not A?
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Hi RiyaR,
In these types of "conversation prompts", you have to be very careful to focus on the specific points that the two people agree on and disagree on. The question asks us to Weaken Brad's objection, so we have to be clear on Brad's POINT (so that we can weaken/attack it).
Jennifer and Brad seem to agree that 10,000 fewer video rentals occurred in 1994 than in 1993. They also agree that Videorama (the new store) did some business (including SELLING videos). Brad's point is that the 4,000 videos that Videorama SOLD could NOT have accounted for 10,000 fewer rentals overall. THAT is the point that we need to counter. If we can find a way to show that 4,000 videos COULD have led to 10,000 fewer rentals, then his argument would be weakened.
Since you narrowed the options down to A and E, I'll focus on those.
Answer A: Videorama rented more videos than it sold. This is a tempting answer, but here's the problem: we don't know how MANY more. This wording implies that Videorama could have rented out 4,001 videos; combined with the 4,000 sold videos, we don't necessarily have a situation that descrease the total number of rentals by 10,000.
Answer E: People who own videos frequently loan them to their friends. According to this, if each of the 4,000 videos was FREQUENTLY loaned out to friends (who would have otherwise rented the videos), then we could very easily decrease the number of rentals by 10,000 (or more).
GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich
In these types of "conversation prompts", you have to be very careful to focus on the specific points that the two people agree on and disagree on. The question asks us to Weaken Brad's objection, so we have to be clear on Brad's POINT (so that we can weaken/attack it).
Jennifer and Brad seem to agree that 10,000 fewer video rentals occurred in 1994 than in 1993. They also agree that Videorama (the new store) did some business (including SELLING videos). Brad's point is that the 4,000 videos that Videorama SOLD could NOT have accounted for 10,000 fewer rentals overall. THAT is the point that we need to counter. If we can find a way to show that 4,000 videos COULD have led to 10,000 fewer rentals, then his argument would be weakened.
Since you narrowed the options down to A and E, I'll focus on those.
Answer A: Videorama rented more videos than it sold. This is a tempting answer, but here's the problem: we don't know how MANY more. This wording implies that Videorama could have rented out 4,001 videos; combined with the 4,000 sold videos, we don't necessarily have a situation that descrease the total number of rentals by 10,000.
Answer E: People who own videos frequently loan them to their friends. According to this, if each of the 4,000 videos was FREQUENTLY loaned out to friends (who would have otherwise rented the videos), then we could very easily decrease the number of rentals by 10,000 (or more).
GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich
