1 . Germany’s top court (法院) has ruled that parts of the country’s 2019 climate action law must be changed because they don’t do a good job of protecting young people. Nine young people aged 15 to 24 took the government to court over the law. They said that the government’s failure to plan carefully was putting their future lives in danger.

The judges (法官) of Germany’s highest court said climate change will influence young people far more than adults. That’s because climate change will become more serious over time. As young people become adults, they’ll be left to deal with any problems that today’s adults don’t deal with.

In 2019, Germany passed a new law, promising that the country would be producing no more CO2 than the forest can take in by 2050. The law made a plan of action until 2030. But the law didn’t have any plans for climate actions that would be taken between 2031 and 2050.

The court has asked the German government to fix the law by the end of 2022. The climate law will now need to have a plan for the actions that will be taken after 2030.

The German government has said that it will quickly begin working to make the needed changes. One important part of high court decisions like this is that they act as guides or examples for future decisions. This means that in the future, Germany’s lawmakers will be more likely to think about the climate future of young people as they create their laws.

7 . Since Zhao Hongshan’s dermal filler injection (皮肤填充注射) four years ago—he has spent around 80,000 yuan on his face. “Getting plastic surgeries is just as normal as body building. Both make men more handsome and confident,” says the 33-year-old, who owns a gym in Beijing.

Zhao is among a growing number of Chinese men using plastic surgeries to change their physical appearance to increase their self-confidence. In 2021, the market for beauty medicine in China was worth more than 495 billion yuan, with males accounting for around 15 percent of customers, according to a report by plastic surgery social networking app Gengmei.

There is a rising trend of young men turning to plastic surgeries; most male customers are in their teens or 20s. “Some men just want to please themselves, while others hope to improve their possibility in job hunting or dating,” says Wang Jun, vice-president of marketing for Gengmei. “Men are under the same social pressures as women and their confidence and competitiveness would be more or less weakened by facial and body weaknesses.”

However, experts point out the risks of plastic surgeries. Fan Jufeng, director of the Plastic Surgery Department at Beijing Chaoyang Hospital, does not encourage people, no matter men or women, to “blindly” go under the knife.

According to the National Health Commission, a total of 2,772 cases related to illegal (非法的) plastic surgeries were handled by China's health departments during a year long attack that started in May 2017.

Fan also warned the public of the negative influences of live streaming celebrities (流量明星) who promote the misunderstanding that being pretty goes above all else. “Whether to have plastic surgeries is a personal choice, but people should not be addicted (上瘾) to it,” Fan says. “Think twice on it. After all, a rich and beautiful inside world is far more important than a pretty face.”

The world of live action role-playing

For many people, the days of playing make-believe (假扮) ended in childhood. But for some, the game of make-believe lives on in Live Action Role-Playing, or LARP. This is a game where people act out characters in a(n)     1     plot. A gamemaster creates the plot and then puts together an event where people     2     the story. Those who find a particular plot interesting sign up for the event. Then the gamemaster, or the players themselves, make up their characters for the story. At the event, each person comes in costume and behaves as their character.

Although pretty much anything goes in LARP, nearly every event involves players completing a(n)     3     together. A gamemaster writes a goal into the plot and usually prepares challenges for the players. For example, a character may hold up the mission, making it hard to     4     the goal. LARP events can be as long as the gamemasters want them to be. They can last anywhere from a few hours to several days.

The genius of LARP is that each event can be any kind of story. The most     5     ones come from fantasy, historical, horror or science fiction genres (体裁). With such a variety of story types, LARP attracts all kinds of people. Some players enjoy LARP as a(n)     6     to practice creating or costume-making. Other players enjoy the challenge of going into different worlds and using their brains to solve puzzles. There are also those who simply want to have fun and make friends.

One     7     LARP players have is coming out of their LARP experiences and returning to the real world. This is especially common after a long event. Most players experience a “bleed,” which describes parts of their LARP experience     8     into their everyday life. Since all the senses — seeing, hearing, touching, smelling and tasting — are at work,     9     becomes difficult. However, researchers agree that the overall effects of LARP are     10    . People of different backgrounds come together to grow their skills, play and express creativity.

10 . Imagine looking through 3.7 million outfits online in search of just the right fit. Sounds like an impossible task, doesn’t it? Not anymore — artificial intelligence (AI) stylists make such a task possible.

An AI stylist is a computer algorithm (算法) that can put together outfits. It works by scouring the internet in a very similar way to the Google search engine. The program searches for clothing images on fashion blogs, online stores and social media, collecting thousands of outfits created by human stylists. The program can also “read” text and pick out important details about each article of clothing. Both the images and text are stored in a data set from which the AI stylist makes fashion suggestions for people based on their personal preferences.

An AI stylist can collect tens of thousands of outfits to display to millions of shoppers online. This data set of outfits is constantly updated and controlled by a team of people. The team helps the computer improve the algorithms which in turn helps the AI stylist put together better outfits for a customer.

An AI stylist displays outfits and fittings based on a customer’s desires, but it can also suggest things that may be a little out of the customer’s comfort zone. People are often willing to try something new if they are following styling advice.

An AI stylist can run into trouble when people of different cultures use it. What is trendy in Asia can be very different from what is fashionable in Europe. AI stylists keep up with the latest trends in different countries and then change the program for different regions. Companies can create a set of guidelines for the AI stylist to use, which can be adjusted by country to reflect preferences for different styles.

An Al stylist must also keep up with “fashion rules”. For example, big-sleeved tops do not go with skinny fit blazers. It is difficult for the AI stylist to recognize “rules” like these. So a different AI model that can recognize the cut, style and color of garments adds that information to the database.

AI stylists have been tested against real stylists and fashion influencers and have received positive feedback. Maybe someday we won’t put together an outfit without using our AI consultant first.