2 . What’s in a Game?

Picture you and your friends sitting around one Saturday, bored. You’ve read every book, watched every movie and played every game. There is absolutely nothing left to do.     1    ? Here are some guidelines to help you invent a new game that’s both playable and fun.

The Ohjective

The first thing you’ll need to design a great game is an objective or goal for players to work toward.     2    . For example, Hockey games and Risk, a kind of card game, have one thing in common — when one player or team reaches the final objective, they win.

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Next, you’ll need rules to let your players know what they can and can’t do. It might seem like a game with no rules would be more fun. You can do anything you want! Unfortunately, this often results in confused players arguing about how the game should be played. Rules set limits and define what the game is — and what it isn’t. Players need to know what they can and can’t do, and what will happen when they do different things.

Meaningful Choices

While you are creating your rules, think about the choices players will make and what effects those choices will have.     4    . If the same thing happens no matter what choice the player makes, they’ll wonder why they have to choose.

Don’t Forget to Playtest!

Any game you see in stores has gone through many rounds of testing and revision. Rules that seem clear to you might be confusing for others. Situations might come up that you didn’t expect.     5    .

4 . Anyone who has seen a waterfall up close will agree that their majesty(壮观)is almost indescribable. These are the four falls on the planet, each of which is wonderful in its own way.

Niagara Falls

At 3,950 feet wide, Niagara Falls is far from the largest waterfall around, but it is the falls with the largest volume of water traveling through it and is undoubtedly the best known waterfall on the planet. It receives somewhere between 14 and 20 million visitors annually. It has three separate parts: American Falls, Bridal Veil Falls and Horseshoe, or Canadian Falls.

Chutes Kongou

Also known as Kongou Falls, Chutes Kongou measures 10,500 feet wide, making it the world’s third largest existing waterfall. It’s part of the Ivindo River in Gabon, and is roughly 185 feet tall. Among the most powerful waterfalls in the world, roughly 31,800 cubic feet of water f low down it each second. It is located within the Ivindo National Park, which was set up to protect the biodiversity of the Ivindo River.

Salto Para

Salto Para, or Para Falls, is an 18,400-foot wide waterfall on the Rio Caura in the Bolivar region of Venezuela. These half-moon-shaped falls are formed where two parts of the river come together and drop down almost 200 feet, each side of which is a green jungle island.

Chutes de Khone

Chutes de Khone—also known as Khone Falls—is the largest waterfall in the world. At 35,376 feet wide, it’s almost twice the width of its next largest competitor. The falls are part of the Mekong River in Laos, and occur where the river divides into seven large channels and many more smaller ones. It’s made up of several different rapids and falls, pouring down from a height of 69 feet.

5 . Nicholas Chorier is not a usual photographer. He is a kite aerial (航空的) photographer. He uses a kite to hoist (吊起) his camera into the skies and clicks photographs. As a teenager, Nicholas had two passions — photography and kite flying. During a trip to India to make a photo report on kite making, he learnt about this unique style of photography. Fascinated, he literally tied his two hobbies together for a living. Nicholas learnt to make strong kites modeled on the Japanese kites, Rokkaku that could stand high winds. A newbie in his chosen field, he then set out to train himself,

Today he is one of the most well-known kite aerial photographers in the world. The technique is to tie a basket containing the photography equipment to the string of the kite and then fly it, thus launching the camera into air. From the ground, Nicholas controls the angles of the camera with a remote. An air-to-ground video link enables him to see the view from the kite’s point. Once satisfied with the frame, he clicks a picture, However, the job does have its pitfalls, too. Once, his kite disappeared in the Yamuna River, with his expensive camera following it.

He is especially fond of India, having made a couple of trips and taken many spectacular photos. “India is a too vast and beautiful country to be captured through the cameras in one life,” he says. He recently released a book, Kite’s Eye View: India between Earth and Sky. Though it includes photographs of “No Photo” sites like the Taj Mahal, it shows them from a totally different perspective.

8 . Research suggests that confidence is important to health and psychological well-being. But developing and maintaining confidence isn’t easy and it’s an easy thing to lose when you feel like you’ve failed or made a mistake.     1    .

Stop Comparing Yourself to Others

Do you compare how you look to people around you? Or do you compare your salary to what your friend earns? Making comparisons is natural. But it isn’t likely to help boost your self-confidence.     2    . When you notice that you are drawing comparisons, remind yourself that doing so isn’t helpful. Everyone is running their own race and life isn’t a competition.

Surround Yourself With Positive People

The people you spend time with can influence your thoughts and attitudes about yourself, perhaps more than you realize.     3    . If you feel bad about yourself after hanging out with a particular person, it may be time to say goodbye. Instead, surround yourself with people who love you and want the best for you.

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Self-talk that is optimistic can help you overcome self-doubt and take on new challenges. The next time you begin to think that you have no business speaking up in a meeting or that you are too out-of-shape to work out, remind yourself that your thoughts aren’t always accurate. Then find a way to turn those thoughts around into more positive self-talk.

Set Realistic Goals

The more you achieve your goals, the greater your confidence in yourself and your abilities. To set realistic goals, write down what you want to achieve.     5    . If the answer is slim to none, the goal may be a bit too high. Dial (调整) it back so it is more realistic and more achievable.

10 . My first job at KCRW was Ruth Seymour’s assistant. Soon after, I became Assistant General Manager and worked closely with her for 16 years. Therefore, I have had the opportunity to observe her and the enormous impact she had on KCRW and the other radio stations.

Ruth did nothing conventionally and nothing she created was a reaction to anything. She created KCRW not to gain the most listeners or to win any awards but to be an intellectual force for arts, culture and smart ideas. She wanted to start the conversation, not just contribute to it.

Ruth had the highest artistic standards, which is why KCRW aired radio dramas like the 10-hour Babbitt and 30-hour Ulysses. She created Jewish Short Stories From Eastern Europe and Beyond in two audio collections that featured famous actors reading the work of Jewish authors like Sholem Aleichem, Philip Roth and Isaac Bashevis Singer. KCRW sold more of those collections than anything else in our history.

Ruth went to a newsstand every day and read articles from New York Times, word for word, on the air at noon because ordinary people couldn’t easily get that paper then. She discovered people who matched her intellect at dinners or parties and gave them on-air shows on journalism, literature, film, art, theater, travel, dance or music.

She said it best, “I wanted to do the program as an act of love and respect.”

When she came to KCRW in 1977, she found herself building the station in a junior high classroom right off the playground. Now KCRW could be heard across Los Angeles. Most powerfully, the radio format (总体安排) she created continues to be used by radio stations — news of the day, debates of ideas, art, artists, food, literature and film.

Outspoken and fearless women leaders were rare in the 1960s and 1970s — in fact, women couldn’t get credit cards apart from their husbands until 1974 — which is why her achievements are so singular.