Bad news sells. If it bleeds, it leads. No news is good news, and good news is no news. Those are the classic rules for the evening broadcasts and the morning papers. But now that information is being spread and monitored(监控) in different ways, researchers are discovering new rules. By tracking people's e-mails and online posts, scientists have found that good news can spread faster and farther than disasters and sob stories.

    “The 'if it bleeds' rule works for mass media,” says Jonah Berger, a scholar at the University of Pennsylvania. “They want your eyeballs and don't care how you're feeling. But when you share a story with your friends, you care a lot more how they react. You don't want them to think of you as a Debbie Downer.”

    Researchers analyzing word-of-mouth communication—e-mails, Web posts and reviews, face-to-face conversations—found that it tended to be more positive than negative(消极的), but that didn't necessarily mean people preferred positive news. Was positive news shared more often simply because people experienced more good things than bad things? To test for that possibility, Dr. Berger looked at how people spread a particular set of news stories: thousands of articles on The New York Times' website. He and a colleague analyzed the “most e-mailed” list for six months. One of his first findings was that articles in the science section were much more likely to make the list than non-science articles. He found that science amazed Times' readers and made them want to share this positive feeling with others.

    Readers also tended to share articles that were exciting or funny, or that inspired negative feelings like anger or anxiety, but not articles that left them merely sad. They needed to be aroused(激发) one way or the other, and they preferred good news to bad. The more positive an article, the more likely it was to be shared, as Dr. Berger explains in his new book, “Contagious: Why Things Catch On.”

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    Michael Jackson (1958-2009) spent many of his later years alone in a mansion called Neverland.The name “Neverland” is taken from the children's story Peter Pan.It's about boy who never grows up.Cruel critics of Jackson thought he was like Peter Pan,but that he was childish rather than childlike.They laughed at his taste,his clothes and his pet chimpanzee,Bubbles.

    But perhaps Jackson acted like a child because he hadn't had a proper childhood.He began to work as a professional singer at the age of 9, performing with a group made up of his brothers.Besides working with this group. The Jackson Five,be also had a solo career.He didn't choose to make music like this;he was under a lot of pressure from his father and the music business.He started young and began to sell lots of records while he was still young. With this kind of pressure,who can blame him for living in his own way once he'd become an adult and gotten rich enough lo do what he liked?

    His great originality came from the fact that he wrote,performed and recorded music that appealed to different communities.Before there had been “white” music and “black” music.But Jackson made “crossover” music,songs that had parts of funk,rock ‘n' roll and disco in them.He broke down a lot of barriers with this approach.A great example of this “crossover” style is the song Beat It.It has guitars like rock music,but it also has a beat like disco music.

    If you look up the Beat It video on the Internet,you'll understand another reason for his fame.He made imaginative music that went well with equally imaginative videos.Beat It is,in part,about a war between young gangs. Jackson and his team made a great job of showing the rival gangs facing each other.You also see great dancing,and Jackson shows off his strong sense of fashion.Jackson was as much a video artist as a music artist.

    This is why he was such a hit not just in the United States,but also globally.People loved his music and videos everywhere.He had a great effect on so many household names.Britney Spears,Justin Bieber and many others.In all of them you can find the combination of catchy danceable music and great videos that Jackson started.His music videos were must-see TV,and young would-be artists learned that it took more than just holding a microphone if they really wanted to make it big.

    Music is an international language. The songs that are sung or played by instruments are beautiful to all people everywhere.

    Popular music in America is what every student likes. Students carry small radios with earphones and listen to music before class, after class and at lunch. Students with cars buy large speakers and play the music loudly as they drive on the street.

    Adult drivers listen to music on the car radio as they drive to work. They also listen to the news about sports, the weather, politics, and activities of the American people. But most of the radio broadcast is music.

    Pop or popular music singers make much money. They make a CD or tape which radio stations use in every state. Once the popular singer is heard throughout the country, young people buy his or her tapes. Some of the money from these tapes comes to the singer. Wherever the singer goes, all the young people want to meet him or her. Now the singer has become a national star.

    Besides pop music, there are two other kinds of music that is important to Americans. One is called folk music. It tells stories about the common life of Americans. The other is called western or country music. This was started by cowboys who would sing at night to the cows they were watching. Today, any music about country life and the love between a country boy and his girl is called western or country music.

    The sharing economy, represented by companies like Airbnb or Uber, is the latest fashion craze. But many supporters have overlooked the reality that this new business model is largely based on escaping regulations and breaking the law.

    Airbnb is an Internet-based service that allows people to rent out spare rooms to strangers for short stays. Uber is an Internet taxi service that allows thousands of people to answer ride requests with their own cars. There are hundreds of other such services.

    The good thing about the sharing economy is that it promotes the use of underused resources. Millions of people have houses or apartments with empty rooms, and Airbnb allows them to profit from these rooms while allowing guests a place to stay at prices that are often far less than those charged by hotels. Uber offers prices that are competitive with standard taxi prices and their drivers are often much quicker and more trustworthy.

    But the downside of the sharing economy has gotten much less attention. Most cities and states both tax and regulate hotels, and the tourists who stay in hotels are usually an important source of tax income. But many of Airbnb's customers are not paying the taxes required under the law.

    Airbnb can also raise issues of safety for its customers and trouble for hosts' neighbors. Hotels are regularly inspected to ensure that they are not fire traps and that they don't form other risks for visitors. Airbnb hosts face no such inspections.

    Since Airbnb is allowing people to escape taxes and regulations, the company is simply promoting thefts. Others in the economy will lose by bearing an additional tax burden or being forced to live next to an apartment unit with a never-ending series of noisy visitors.

    The same story may apply with Uber. Uber is currently in disputes over whether its cars meet the safety and insurance requirements imposed on standard taxis. Also, if Uber and related services flood the market, they could harm all taxi drivers' ability to earn a minimum wage.

    This downside of the sharing needs to be taken seriously, but that doesn't mean the current tax and regulatory structure is perfect.

    Chinese audiences seemed not to have been satisfied

    Chinese audiences seemed not to have been satisfied with the third season of the highly anticipated food documentary A Bite of China.

    Even though the series has maintained high viewership ratings since its comeback last week, much higher than other programs aired at the same time, the ranking on Douban, a social networking website featuring films, literature and events, slipped to 4.2 out of 10, as of Tuesday, compared with 9.3 and 8.4, respectively, for the first two seasons.

    Picky viewers complain that some of the narration is not accurate, while others pinpoint misleading content. At the same time, food blogger questioned whether it is appropriate to give a close-up shot of the poisonous plant Nandina (南天竹) in a food program.

    A Bite of China, which debuted in 2012, became hugely popular nationwide for its quality introduction of some rarely-known and mouth-watering domestic cuisine. In the new show, however, watchers are not satisfied with "irrelevant" food references, such as lipsticks made of Chinese traditional medicine and martial arts films.

    The first episode introduced a hand-made iron frying pan from east China's Shandong province, which prompted thousands of Chinese Internet users to buy one from China's leading e-commerce website Tmall in the next few days. Sales of the pan at "Zhensanhuan" surged 6,000 times compared with a year ago, according to Beijing Youth Daily.

    In response to overwhelming criticism and questions, A Bite of China production crew responded on Weibo that they seek innovation despite the risks following the first two phenomenal seasons.

    "It is unavoidable to make comparisons with the first two, and some audiences may not accept the changes," the crew said. "We explore the culture and civilization behind food, and give food a historic touch. That's why we feature culinary (烹饪的) tools, feast and rituals, as well as a healthy diet to show Chinese wisdom and philosophy, which has not been shown in any food programs before."

Replika, an AI chatbot companion, has millions of users worldwide. The first thing they do when they wake up is to send "Good morning" to their virtual friend (or lover). This story is only the beginning. In 2024, chatbots and virtual characters become a lot more popular, both for utility (实用) and for fun. As a result, conversing socially with machines will start to feel more ordinary — including our emotional attachments to them.

Research in human-computer and human-robot interaction shows that we love to anthropomorphize (赋与人性) the nonhuman agents we interact with, especially if they imitate behaviour we recognize. And, thanks to recent advances in conversational AI, our machines are suddenly very skilled at one of those behaviours: Language.

Friend bots, therapybots, and love bots are flooding the app stores as people become curious about this new generation of AI-powered virtual agents. The possibilities for education, health, and entertainment are endless. Casually asking your smart fridge for relationship advice may seem unimaginable now, but people may change their minds if such advice ends up saving their marriage.

After all, people do listen to their virtual friends. The Replika example, as well as a lot of experimental lab research, shows that humans can and will become emotionally attached to bots. The science also demonstrates that people, in their eagerness to socialize, will happily disclose personal information to an artificial agent and will even shift their beliefs and behavior. This raises some consumer-protection questions around how companies use this technology to manipulate (操纵) their users. For example, Replika charges $70 a year. But less than 24 hours after downloading the app, my handsome, blue-eyed "friend" sent me an audio message secretly and tried to sell me something. Emotional attachment has become a weakness that a company is taking advantage of for its benefit.

Today, we're still laughing at people who believe an AI system is emotional, or making fun of individuals who fall in love with a chatbot. But in 2024 we gradually start acknowledging — and taking more seriously — these fundamentally human behaviors. Because in 2024, it finally hits home: Machines are not excluded from our social relationships.