Jack Ma, whose Chinese name is Ma Yun, became the richest man in China, when the company he founded was floated on the stock market last year with a value of around £140 billion. Here are some interesting stories about him.
1 "Beer" was the first word that Jack Ma searched for on the Internet. In 1995 Ma made his first trip to the US and used the Internet for the first time. After searching for "beer" and then "China", he saw that no results came up relating to China. He decided to set up a Chinese website - the seeds of Alibaba had been planted.
2 Jack Ma applied to study at Harvard University 10 times and was rejected (拒绝) each time. Ma failed the entrance exam to college in China three times and was also rejected by many jobs, including one at KFC. He was also turned down by Harvard University 10 times after applying.
3 Jack Ma learnt English by guiding tourists free every day for nine years. Limited resources meant it was difficult to learn English when Ma was young. However, he found that he could learn the language by guiding tourists free around his hometown, Hangzhou, which he did during his teenage years every morning for nine years. He found everything they said and did was so different from what he had been taught at school and by his parents, which opened his mind.
4 Jack Ma named his company Alibaba because it's a globally known story. Ma simply wanted his company to have a global and interesting name and realised that Alibaba is a story known across the world and it begins with A, appearing at the top of lists. The company was founded in 1999 and since then has grown from 15 employees to more than 30,000. Ma hopes to keep expanding Alibaba outside of China.
You can choose a private setting when you browse (浏览) the Internet. But be forewarned: It may not afford nearly as much privacy as you expect. That's the finding of a new study.
Major web browsers, such as Google's Chrome and Apple's Safari, are often a private-browsing option. It's sometimes referred to as "being incognito". This option lets you surf the Internet browser and saves a record into its history of each page that you visited. And what sites you visit won't affect the suggestions your browser makes the next time you're filling out an online form.
Many people believe incorrectly that the incognito setting broadly protects them. Most believe it even after reading a web browser's explanation of the incognito mode.
For instance, a new study had 460 people read web browsers' descriptions of private browsing. Each person read one of 13 descriptions. Then the participants answered questions about how private they thought their browsing would be while using this tool. The volunteers didn't understand the incognito mode. This was true no matter which browser's explanation they had read. The researchers reported their findings on April 26 at the 2018 World Wide Web Conference in Lyon, France.
More than half of the volunteers thought that if they logged in a Google account through a private window, Google wouldn't keep a record of their search history. Not true. And about one in every four participants thought private browsing hid their device's IP address. That's wrong, too.
Blase Ur was one of the study's authors. He's an expert in computer security and privacy at the University of Chicago in Illinois. "Companies could clear up this confusion by giving better explanations of the incognito mode," his team said. For example, the browsers should avoid vagueness (模糊).The web browser Opera, for instance, promised users that "your secrets are safe". Firefox encourages users to "browse like no one's watching". In fact, someone might be. (If you'd like to know more about the research information, please click here.)
Two Chinese sisters dreamed of having a trip to Buckingham Palace and the Peppa Pig World theme park in the UK. Lately, their mother helped them express their wish online to meet Queen Elizabeth II, which caught not only millions of social media users' attention but also the attention of the British ambassador (大使) to China.
Five – year - old twins Mi Ai and Mi Ni, who live in Beijing, appeared in a video on social media platform Weibo last week, where they spoke of their love of British cartoon Peppa Pig and their keen interest to visit Buckingham Palace. Mi Ni said she and her sister wanted to visit the gardens at Buckingham Palace, just like Peppa Pig and her friends did in the cartoon.
The British ambassador answered their call with her own video, inviting the twins to her house in Beijing. "Hello Mi Ni and Mi Ai," she said. "I'm the British ambassador. I'd like you to come and visit me in my house in Beijing and we can have tea and cookies in a British style." The twins accepted the ambassador's invitation and joined her for afternoon tea on Monday, when they ate cakes and drew pictures of their favorite characters from Peppa Pig.
The ambassador has made arrangements for the girls and their parents to tour the UK. They are going to tour the studios where Peppa Pig was made, take a trip to Peppa Pig World theme park in Hampshire and visit Buckingham Palace. The queen has not yet said if she will have time to welcome the girls.
The Peppa Pig series, introduced in the mid - 2000s in China, has become extremely popular among Chinese children and adults. As this year is the Year of the Pig according to the Chinese tradition, the country has set to mark the Chinese New Year with a film starring Peppa Pig, where the audience can see a number of Chinese cultural elements.
Black Friday is the day after Thanksgiving Day in the USA, falling on the Friday after the fourth Thursday in November.
Many people choose a day from their annual leave and have a day off on Black Friday. Some people use this to take trips to see family members or friends who live in other areas or to go on vacation. Shopping for Christmas presents is popular on Black Friday. Many stores have special offers and lower their prices of some goods, such as toys.
Public life
Many people take a day off on the day after Thanksgiving Day. Many organizations also close for the Thanksgiving weekend.
Public transportation systems may run on their normal schedule or may have changes. Some stores extend their opening hours on Black Friday.
Background
Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving Day, is one of the busiest shopping days in the USA. One theory is that the wheels of vehicles in heavy traffic on the day after Thanksgiving Day leave many black marks on the road surface, leading to the term "Black Friday".
The other theory is that the term "Black Friday" comes from an old way of recording business accounts. Many businesses, particularly small businesses, started making profits before Christmas. They hoped to start showing a profit marked in black ink on the day after Thanksgiving Day.
More recently, Black Friday has been exported to nations outside of North America such as the United Kingdom by major online retailers like Amazon or Apple. In 2011, IBM reported online Black Friday sales were up by 24.3%, according to a study that includes 500 retailers.
A. People's activities
B. History of Black Friday
C. Losses were recorded in red ink and profits in black ink.
D. A busy shopping day is a holiday in some states.
E. There can also be jams on roads to popular shopping destinations.
F. There are two popular theories as to why it is called “Black Friday”.
G. Black Friday is not a federal holiday but a public one in some states.
While traveling, there are chances that you stay at a hotel or a family member's house. But have you ever thought about staying in a stranger's 1?
This might sound 2, but it's actually a trend that is becoming popular around the world, including China.
Lodging rental companies like Airbnb are helping people look for cheap ways to 3. This website allows people to rent out their 4 rooms or apartments as an alternative to 5 in over 190 countries.
Created by young American men Brian Chesky, Joe Gebbia and Nathan Blecharczyk, Airbnb is a good example of a 6 economy. Through the Internet, people share 7 such as cars, apartments and 8 their expertise (专门知识).
9 post information about the location, prices, descriptions and pictures. Guests can go to the 10 and find their favorite places to stay. Users 11 their opinions on their stay so that people know whether a place is good or not.
A man in New York named Jonathan Powley even rents out his 12 for $22 (140 yuan) per night through Airbnb. This isn't a (n) 13 car. Powley takes out the car seats and changes the 14 to look more welcoming.
He keeps it clean and puts flowers in it every day. He provides snacks and tells travelers where they can go and shower.
But Airbnb does have some 15. Sometimes it is not as 16 as it looks like online. 17, hosts sometimes get mad when they get home and it's a complete 18.
In China, Airbnb operates in five 19 including Beijing and Shanghai. The country has seen a major 20 in Airbnb users in the past year.
Many kinds of dinosaurs' bones (find) recently by Chinese scientists in Nanyang, Henan Province. the scientists inspected the bones, they were surprised (spot) these dinosaurs could not only run the others but also climb the trees.
Dinosaurs died suddenly around 60 million years ago. Some scientists think came after an (expect) incident when a huge rock from space hit the earth put too much dust into the air. Others think the earth got too hot for the dinosaurs to live on any (much). Nobody knows sure why and how dinosaurs disappeared from the earth in such a short time.
I fetched my mail as usual. Suddenly a colorful flyer (传单) jumped into my sight. In the middle was a drawing of an old-fashioned phone, like the one my great-aunt Sara owned 40 years ago and at the bottom was a phone number. Running over it, I couldn't help laughing.
"Is that mail funny?" my ten - year - old daughter, Jenny, asked.
"Not really," I admitted. "It's about the wake-up service. Outdated already."
"What's that?" she frowned (皱眉). I explained how, before smart-phones, people sometimes paid someone to wake them with a call.
"Who sent this flyer?" she pressed.
I shook my head. "Probably someone older and he could need some money," I said.
Her eyes lit up. "Can we order a wake-up service?" she asked.
"No kidding. With smart phones at hand, who will need it? And it's not cheap at all. $ 2.5 per day." I picked up the flyer and headed for the recycling bin.
"Wait!" she shouted.
"I feel sorry for the wake - up man, if he needs some money," she said in tears. "Can't we order?"
I looked at the flyer with its drawing of an old - fashioned phone. I remembered, again, my great - aunt Sara and her old phone. As a kid, I used to visit her over Labor Day when Jerry Lewis would host his charity (慈善) event for the disabled kids. Aunt Sara would grasp my hand tightly and then reach for the telephone, dialing the number on the screen. Holding the receiver between us, we'd announce to the operator, "We'd like to help those kids."
But now here was my own child, showing the same heart I had once been encouraged to have, and how could I ignore (不理睬) her? I googled the flyer's telephone number. The number belonged to a man called Raymond.
注意：
1）所续写短文的词数应为150左右；
2）至少使用5个短文中标有下划线的关键词语；
3）续写部分分为两段，每段的开头语已为你写好；
4）续写完成后，请用下划线标出你所使用的关键词语。
Paragraph 1:
Jenny dialed the number.
Paragraph 2:
"Ring, ring, ring" went the phone at 6 o'clock sharp.
增加：在缺词处加一个漏字符号 (∧) ，并在其下面写出该加的词。
删除：把多余的词用斜线 (\) 划掉。
修改：在错的词下画横线，并在该词下面写出修改后的词。
注意：1．每处错误及其修改均仅限一词；
2．只允许修改10处，多者 (从第11处起) 不计分。
Last Wednesday our class organized a environmental activity whose theme were "Join Together to Build a Civilized City" in a community. The students divided into three groups. We Group One went from door to door recycling the using things. The second group had cleared up the posters and advertisements on the walls as good as the rubbish on the ground. The last group handed out the magazine of the environmental protection and we also invited the residents to take part. The local praised us with our practice and gave us much appreciation，it made us all feel happy.
