You are given many opportunities in life to choose to be a victim or creator. When you choose to be a victim, the world is a cold and difficult place. “They” did things to you which caused all of your pain and suffering. “They” are wrong and bad, and life is terrible as long as “they” are around. Or you may blame yourself for all your problems, thus internalizing(内化)your victimization. The truth is, your life is likely to stay that way as long as you feel a need to blame yourself or others.

    Those who choose to be creators look at life quite differently. They know there are individuals who might like to control their lives, but they don't let this get in the way. They know they have their weaknesses, yet they don't blame themselves when they fail. Whatever happens, they have choice in the matter. They believe their dance with each sacred(神圣的)moment of life is a gift and that storms are a natural part of life which can bring the rain needed for emotional and spiritual growth.

Victims and creators live in the same physical world and deal with many of the same physical realities, yet their experience of life is worlds apart. Victims relish (沉溺)in anger, guilt, and other emotions that cause others—and even themselves—to feel like victims, too. Creators consciously choose love, inspiration, and other qualities which inspire not only themselves, but all around them. Both victims and creators always have choice to determine the direction of their lives.

    In reality, all of us play the victim or the creator at various points in our lives. One person, on losing a job or a special relationship, may feel as if it is the end of the world and sink into terrible suffering for months, years, or even a lifetime. Another with the same experience may choose to first experience the grief, then accept the loss and soon move on to be a powerful creative force in his life.

    In every moment and every circumstance, you can choose to have fuller, richer life by setting a clear intention to transform the victim within, and by inviting into your life the powerful creator that you are.

    It's holiday season and time for shopping. There are a bunch of items on your shopping lists ranging from small gifts, toys and festive decorations to Christmas and New Year cards. What's your first react ion to products labeled “Made in China”? If you still tend to relate “Made in China”to poor quality. You need to update your ideas. China's ability to produce high-quality product s has been recognized by a growing number of foreigners. It's a misunderstanding to associate low quality with“Made in China”.

    Cameron Purdy, a Web user, says that China manufactures poor-quality products does not mean it cannot manufacture high-quality product s. He explains that the poor-quality products one purchases in the US for example, are made in the quality that the American companies ask for. “The price that you pay for the product has no relationship to the cost of its manufacturing,” suggested Purdy. For example, for an item priced at $20 in the US, the cost of manufacturing it paid by the American company is usually less than $1. To guarantee the room for profit, the Chinese co-manufacturer spends less than $1to produce the item.

    Amanda Wu, who lives in Shanghai, noted that many top brands have manufacturing factories located in China, and the most convincing example of China's manufacturing quality is Apple products. On the back of the iPhone, one can find the product is Made in China—“Designed by Apple in California. Assembled (装备) in China. ”Chinese and foreign Web users commented that some Chinese pro ducts with good reputations around the world are Haier, Lenovo, GREE, Huawei and China Railway High-speed.

    On the other hand, foreign misunderstandings can sometimes affect Chinese people's minds. For instance, when Chinese people travel abroad, some would still avoid buying products Made in China. It's time for the world to stop relating Made in China with low-quality products. Just remember, you get what you pay for.

    If you have a long holiday to spend, where can you go?

    Nikoi Island, Indonesia

    Less than 85 km-but somehow a whole world away-from Singapore's shining skyline lies Nikoi Island. Surrounded by white sandy shorelines and vivid coral reefs, Nikoi's centre is hidden in rainforest, resulting in amazing biodiversity seen in its native plants, animals and bird life. Marrying traditional Indonesian craftsmanship with contemporary design, Nikoi boasts just 15 stilted（建于支柱上的）beach houses, all with breathtaking sea views, guaranteeing privacy and total escape from the daily routine.

    Amanpulo, Philippines

    The only property on Pamalican Island, the luxurious Amanpulo resort offers extremely impressive accommodation, with only access to over five kilometres of clean coral sand beach. Designed to resemble local Bahay Kubo homes, Amanpulo's beachside, treetop and hillside villas all feature comfortable decks（木质平台）with hammocks（吊床）from which to enjoy the spectacular views of the greenish-blue sea below. Fill your schedule with Amanpulo's signature adventures (including diving, windsurfing and sailing), recharge in the award-winning spa or feast on locally caught seafood-the choice is yours.

    Song Saa, Cambodia

    Song Saa's incredible ocean views, and breathtaking sunsets are a very typical example of pure paradise. Its 24 villas—each with their own sea-view private plunge pool-are designed to reflect the natural beauty of Cambodia's coastline; built from recycled wood with straw roofs and driftwood furnishings, these presences are stylish proof of Song Saa's admirable commitment to sustainability and conservation. You can choose to do as much or as little as you want here. With rainforest tours, island safaris and reef snorkeling（徒手潜水）, it just offers some of the activities that show this spectacular destination.

    When it's five o'clock, people leave their office. The length of the workday, for many workers, is defined by time. They leave when the clocks tell them they're done.

    These days, the time is everywhere: not just on clocks or watches, but on cellphones and computers. That may be a bad thing, particularly at work. New research shows that clock based work schedules hinder creativity.

    Clock-timers organize their day by blocks of minutes and hours. For example: a meeting from 9 a. m. to 10 a. m, research from 10 a. m to noon, etc. On the other hand, task-timers have a list of things they want to accomplish. They work down the list, each task starts when the previous task is completed. It is said that all of us employ a mix of both these types of planning.

    What, then, are the effects of thinking about time in these different ways? Does one make us more productive? Better at the tasks at hand? Happier? In experiments conducted by Tamar Avnet and Anne-Laure Sellier, they had participants organize different activities from project planning, holiday shopping, to yoga by time or to-do list to measure how they performed under "clock time" vs. " task time". They found clock timers to be more efficient(有效率的) but less happy because they felt little control over their lives. Task timers are happier and more creative, but less productive. They tend to enjoy the moment when something good is happening, and seize opportunities that come up.

    The researchers argue that task-based organizing tends to be undervalued and under-supported in the business culture. This might be a small change to the way we view work and the office, but the researchers argue that it challenges a widespread characteristic of the economy: work organized by clock time. While most people will still probably need, and be, to some extent, clock-timers, task-based timing should be used when performing a job that requires more creativity. It'll make those tasks easier, and the task-doers will be happier.

    Many of us live with a roommate at some stage. Sometimes, there can be problems. Who hasn't had an argument about whose turn it is to take out the rubbish or who should be the one to clear up after dinner? However, living with another person also comes with many benefits.

    You know that there's always someone else around, which can help you feel safer. There is always someone to talk to, so you never feel lonely. Besides these obvious benefits, there are some you may not notice. For example, we're actually more likely to eat healthier food when living with others.

    To examine the effect of living alone, Australian university researchers did much research and found that people living alone tended to eat less fresh food, which can have a significant negative effect on long-term health. However, those living with others generally benefited from a more varied diet compared to those living alone.

    What could explain these findings? The researchers believe the social and cultural roles played by cooking, food preparation and eating may be important considerations. For example, those living with friends have someone else to go shopping with, and thus are likely to buy higher-quality fresh food regularly.

    Cooking skills may be another factor. If people living alone find they do not have the knowledge required to prepare a particular dish or cook a certain food, they may fall back on ready-made, less healthy food. However, if they live with at least one other person, they may be able to ask for help.

    In addition, people living alone can eat whatever they want at any time of the day or night. However, it's helpful to have someone around who questions your decision to eat frozen pizza at 3 am. In other words, roommates can draw your attention to unhealthy routines.

    So, if you now live alone and find yourself fighting a losing battle against poor eating habits, why not consider sharing a home with someone else? You could encourage one another on to greater health and well-being.

 Imagine this. You need an image of a balloon for a work presentation and turn to an AI text- to- image generator, like Midjourney or DALL-E, to create a suitable image. You enter the prompt(提示词)" red balloon against a blue sky" but the generator returns an image of an egg instead.

What's going on? The generator you' re using may have been" poisoned". What does this mean?

Text- to- image generators work by being trained on large databasets that include millions or billions of images. Some of the generators have been trained by indiscriminately (任意地) scraping online images, many of which may be under copyright. This has led to many copyright infringement(侵害) cases where artists have accused big tech companies of stealing and profiting from their work.

 This is also where the idea of" poison" comes in. Researchers who want to empower individual artists have recently created a tool named" Nightshade" to fight back against unauthorised image scraping. The tool works by slightly changing an image's pixels(像素) in a way that confuses the computer vision system but leaves the image unchanged to a human's eyes. If an organization then scrapes one of these images to train a future AI model, its data pool becomes" poisoned". This can result in mistaken learning, which makes the generator return unintended results. As in our earlier example, a balloon might become an egg.

 The higher the number of" poisoned" images in the training data, the greater the impact. Because of how generative AI works, the damage from" poisoned" images also affects related prompt keywords. For example, if a" poisoned" image of a Picasso work is used in training data, prompt results for masterpieces from other artists can also be affected.

 Possibly, tools like Nightshade can be abused by some users to intentionally upload" poisoned" images in order to confuse AI generators. But the Nightshade's developer hopes the tool will make big tech companies more respectful of copyright. It does challenge a common belief among computer scientists that data found online can be used for any purpose they see fit.

 Human rights activists, for example, have been concerned for some time about the indiscriminate use of machine vision in wider society. This concern is particularly serious concerning facial recognition. There is a clear connect ion between facial recognition cases and data poisoning, as both relate to larger questions around technological governance. It may be better to see data poisoning as an innovative(创新的) solution to the denial of some fundamental human rights.