【推荐3】Today, getting information is as easy as opening a browser on your computer/phone, typing in a question and waiting a nanosecond for a long list of links to load. These websites will promise to answer your question. But actually, they may not be all that trustworthy. Figuring out which site is believable and which is false takes work. It isn’t impossible, though. Actually, it is what every good journalist does daily. And students and other non-journalists also can do it.

To check a new claim, good reporters contact experts on the topic. In journalism, such experts are known as “sources”. This may be a scientist who discovered something new in the lab. Or it could be the witness to a crime.

However, not everything is easy. For instance, if there’s a forest fire, how do you know where it started, when and how? You can ask government officials, but they may not know. You can talk to people near the fire shortly after it started. But unless someone spotted the fire as it happened, people may never know for sure. They may simply offer speculation. Saying something “might have” or even “probably” started that fire isn’t a fact. So you’d have to qualify any statement about the fire’s origins.

I describe such words as “weasel words”. These words and phrases include “might” “could have” “was likely to have been”, etc. Whenever something isn’t known for sure, journalists will highlight their uncertainty by using weasel words. They never over-blow claims to the readers.

A good reporter should be paid for the work he does. Some blogs and even news sites are authored by unpaid writers. Many of these writers are untrained in reporting, and their reports may not provide the depth. Thus, if the news you’re reading is free to the world online, consider what that may mean. Overall, you should be skeptical. That’s acting like a journalist.

【推荐1】A cell phone is one of the few things that we hold close to our faces all the time, and yet it could possibly explode – this is what made the recent Samsung’s Galaxy Note 7 smart phone accidents so shocking.

According to technology news website, The Verge, flawed (有瑕疵的) phone batteries might be to blame.

Even if you are not a science student, you probably know that it is common sense that the negative end and the positive end of the battery should never touch. If they do, the battery will short-circuit (短路), causing a powerful electrical reaction that can destroy the battery and cause a fire.

This is why all lithium-ion (锂离子) batteries – the kind that can be found in many of our devices (电子设备) like tablets and cameras – have a separator layer inside to stop the two ends from touching one another.

But somehow, the separators in some of the Samsung phones broke, causing explosions.

Overcharging is another problem that can make batteries heat up quickly. Fortunately, most batteries are designed to be able to automatically stop charging once they are fully charged. But again, this somehow failed to happen in some of the Samsung phones.

According to Lynden Archer, a materials scientist at Cornell University, US, we have already achieved 90 percent of the battery life possible from a lithium-ion battery. Customers’ demands that their devices get thinner and their battery have a longer life have given producers little choice but to try to put more power into thinner batteries. However, the more energy you put into a box, the more dangerous it’s going to be.

【推荐2】As 17-year-old Torri’ell Norwood drove through Florida, last February, the laughter and chatter from the four teenage girls inside her car quickly gave way to screams. As they approached an intersection, another car T-boned them, sending their car sailing into the yard of a nearby home, coming to a stop only when it crashed into a tree.

As smoke rose from the car, a bystander shouted, “It’s about to explode! Get out!” Shaken, but otherwise OK, Norwood crawled out through the window as the driver’s side door couldn’t be opened. Along with two of her friends, who’d also managed to free themselves, she ran for her life. But halfway down the street, she realized that her best friend, Simmons, wasn’t with them. Norwood ran back and found Simmons unconscious in the back seat. She threw open the back door and pulled her friend out. She dragged Simmons a few feet to safety and laid her on the ground. After checking her pulse and found there was no sign of life, she started CPR.

Had the accident happened a few weeks earlier, she might not have known what to do. But just the day before, Norwood, who wanted to pursue a career in medicine, had earned her CPR certificate by learning on her own. Kneeling on the ground and looking down at her dying friend, Norwood knew she had precious little time to practice what she’d learned.

She started pumping Simmons’s chest with her interlocked fingers and breathing into her friend’s mouth in hopes of filling her lungs with the kiss of life. After quite a while, Simmons began coughing and taking quick deep breaths for air. The CPR had worked! Soon, the ambulance arrived and rushed Simmons to the hospital. And then she heard how her best friend had saved her life. “I wasn’t shocked,” Simmons told others. “She will always help any way she can.”

【推荐3】A young British sailor was missing at sea yesterday in similar circumstances (情况) to the way his father died five years ago.

The dinghy (救生橡皮船), used to take Richard Smith, 21, to his yacht (快艇), was discovered empty, floating in seas off the Caribbean island. An air and sea search was carried out but he has still not been discovered.

Richard’s mother, Bicknell, said from her home in Hampshire, “It’s so much coincidence. Richard always carried a photograph of his father attached to a poem, which included the date of his disappearance.”

Now, it’s very strange because all they have found is Richard’s dinghy. We need to know this time what has happened one way or another. If you know at least you can go through the grieving process.

In November 1996, Mr Smith’s father, Charlie, was sailing in the Tasmen sea between the Australian mainland and the island of Tasmen with his new wife. They lost radio contact with the shore and they, together with their yacht were never seen again, and their disappearance remains a mystery.

Richard is described a talented and experienced sailor who has crewed for the champion ocean racer. He had sailed to the Caribbean in November to crew ocean racing yachts for entertainment. He ended the evening drinking in the Abracbabra bar but left after local police closed it for being too noisy.

About 2 am the following day Richard headed back for his dinghy. He started its outboard motor before giving an elderly woman a lift to her yacht after her dinghy had gone missing. It was the last time he was seen.

【推荐2】Alex Vardkostas spent his child flipping (快速翻转) burgers at his parent’s restaurant in Southern California. It was, he recalls, a repetitive and uninteresting task.

Vardkostas said, “Making so many burgers every day, I realized that there must be a better product I can create to make food. ”He helped develop the restaurant’s main attraction: a robot machine that makes “the world’s freshest cheeseburgers”.

The machine has already drawn big crowds. People want to see exactly how a robot makes a burger and whether it tastes good. The robot is 14-foot long and takes five minutes to make a delicious burger.

After seeing the robot in action, one customer, Evan, was almost speechless. “I knew that they could drive cars,” he said, “but i didn’t know that robots could make a delicious burger.”

The robot’s 350 Sensors (传感器) and 20 microcomputers help make sure that every burger is perfect. The materials are organic and locally sourced (寻找……的来源) whenever possible, but the burgers are still affordable (负担得起的). Because a machine makes the burgers, the restaurant doesn’t have to pay kitchen staff (职员). Employees focus on offering e customer good service.

Besides, the restaurant offers its employees higher pay than the ordinary standard in the food industry. Staff members are able to read books for five percent of their workday so that they can continue to learn. Money is allotted (分配) for books, and more educational opportunities are being planned.

For Evan, the most important thing is still the burger. “The restaurant’s robot is the perfect chef,” he said, “because a person can make mistakes but a robot can’t.”

【推荐1】Most of time black and white appears as opposites. White means light and purity(纯洁),while black is darkness and evil. But it is not always true. Sometimes the words are used differently.

White hats and black hats represent the traditional meaning of the words. The hats are used to tell the “good guys” and the “bad guys” in American western movies. Now the tradition of white hats and black hats is no longer a part of movie making,but you still hear the expression when people talk about good guys and bad guys. “A black sheep” is a person who does things that are not accepted,who breaks tradition. “A black sheep” is rejected(被排斥)because he brings shame to his group. A family may have a member who is thought of as “a black sheep”,a person who is not welcome at family gatherings.

Black is also used in some expressions that describe good things. Being “in the black” for example,is a good thing for anyone. It is a business expression that means a company is making money. When someone says his business is “in the red”,he means it is losing money.

White usually means something good. A “white collar” job,for example,is the kind of job many people want. It is a job where you work at a desk,using your brain instead of your muscles. Sometimes white is used in an expression that is not good. “Whitewash” is such an expression. At first “whitewash” meant to paint over something with a white paint to make it look better. But now “whitewash” has a different meaning: to hide or cover up mistakes or failures.

【推荐2】The Terracotta Army Museum is one of the must-visit attractions for all travelers to China. The attraction is located in Xi’an, in west China's Shanxi Province.

What’s special?

The terracotta Army is the buried army of Qin Shi Huang, an ancient Chinese emperor. These ancient sculptures were built and buried over two thousand years ago near the city of Xi'an. They were discovered in 1974 by farmers digging a well looking for underground water. Over a thousand terracotta warriors and horses have been uncovered since then. Each warrior is made of clay (泥土). They are around two meters tall. The sculptures are so detailed that it is possible to guess the age, rank and personality of each one. None of the soldiers are the same.

The best time to visit

The Terracotta Army is an indoor attraction, which is not likely to be affected by weather, so it can be visited all year round.

As the Terracotta Army Museum is one of the must-visit attractions in China, it is crowded most of the time. We advise our customers to avoid the following periods when the museum is particularly crowded:

National Day holiday(October 1-7), when it is fully packed.

Labour Day holiday(May 1-3)

Weather in winter is dry, cold and the least comfortable, and it's also the worst season for air quality, but it's also low season.

Travel style: private, group or independent?

A private tour means a lot of flexibility and you will be well taken care of by a private guide and driver. The museum is crowded most of the time, but our guides know how to escape the crowds, and help our customers to enjoy more in the museum. See our 3-Day Terracotta Warriors Private Tour.

Going with a group you won't get lost, but i lacks flexibility and personal service.

Travelling on your own you may meet a lot of trouble, such as wasting time on finding a taxi or public bus to the attraction, lining up for tickets, reading maps, making sense of Chinese signs, etc.

【推荐3】I stood outside my front door catching my breath. After a lazy Christmas holiday, I had to recover from climbing stairs with carry-on bags and a suitcase. I looked up and blinked. Red tape crossed the door. I didn’t understand Hungarian, but the one English word said enough: “POLICE”.

Google Translate told me I would be arrested if I entered, so I didn’t. Finally, I called my rental agent. He went to the police station for more details.

My agent returned with authorization to enter. Not only were my files undisturbed, but so were the TV and printer. The burglars had taken a few items from the top drawer as well as a small amount of foreign currency in the bottom drawer. Somehow they hadn’t found the jewelry box in the third drawer.

I was in shock. My agent’s words were fuzzy, something about fixing the locks tomorrow and making a list for the police.

Then one day, I remembered that I’d left another jewelry box in the flat. My heart sank as I thought of another locket that had been in that box, a gold engraved one with a picture of my late honey Grandma inside. When I realized the box was missing, the whole experience seemed to crash down on me. I cried.

At the end of January, I received a registered letter from the police. The burglar hadn’t been found, and the case was closed. I slept with my purse by my bed. I hid my laptop when I showered. And then another challenge rose. I was unexpectedly laid off.

Then one July night, I reached into my third drawer, pulled out my jean shorts, and heard a small thud. I looked down and blinked: It was the tiny jewelry box I thought had been stolen six months earlier.

Inside was the locket with honey Grandma smiling at me, being there for me, telling me not to give up. I started to cry.