I successfully developed my own technology to stop the plane from running off the runway and break the US monopoly.

Not long ago, Mr. Chen saw a novel thing on the Discovery Channel: Americans put a blocking bed at the end of some airport runways, which actually prevented planes from rushing off the runways. On the TV screen, the materials paved at the end of the runway successfully prevented a Boeing passenger plane from rushing out of the runway, which protected the plane and ensured the safety of passengers.

The technology presented in the picture is called Engineering Material Arresting System (EMAS), which has long been monopolized by foreign companies. On July 12th, 2012, EMAS, developed by China Civil Aviation Science and Technology Research Institute and with completely independent intellectual property rights, officially passed the qualification examination of Civil Aviation Administration of China and was approved for engineering application. This is an important progress made by China Civil Aviation in the research and development of major systems related to flight safety, and it is also the second EMAS in the world to be approved by government civil aviation authorities. The achievement of this achievement will greatly reduce the cost of installing the system in airports, thus promoting the effective improvement of safety and security capabilities of many plateau airports and airports with special terrain in China.

How to stop the plane from running off the runway?

With the rapid development of the world’s civil aviation industry, the number of take-off and landing flights has increased significantly, and the number of aircraft rushing off the runway has shown an upward trend. How to avoid serious accidents after the aircraft rushing off the runway has become an important issue for civil aviation safety. In order to solve this problem, as early as the 1960s, the British began to research and develop related technologies to stop planes that ran off the runway, but failed to form products for various reasons. By the 1980s, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and an American company began to jointly develop the EMAS system.

In fact, EMAS is a kind of foam concrete with specific mechanical properties, which is laid on the ground of the runway extension line with a thickness of several tens of centimeters to form an arresting bed. Its width is consistent with the runway, and its length is between tens of meters and more than 100 meters. Once the plane rushes out of the runway, it enters it, and the foam concrete is crushed under the rolling of the wheels, so as to absorb the kinetic energy of the plane, and on the premise of ensuring the safety of the plane and the people on board, the plane will gradually slow down and finally stop in the arresting bed.

In 1990s, FAA approved the design method of EMAS system. In 1996, the first trial laying was carried out at Kennedy Airport in new york, and three planes were successfully stopped. Subsequently, the FAA issued a license for it and promoted it in civil airports in need in the United States. Up to now, 55 sets of EMAS systems have been laid in 35 civil airports in the United States, and 8 planes have been successfully stopped. At the same time, the United States promotes the EMAS system on a global scale. In recent years, the system has been installed at Jiuzhai Huanglong Airport in Sichuan and Songshan Airport in Taiwan.

Can solve the problem of running off the runway.

Sichuan Jiuzhai Huanglong Airport was built by cutting mountains, surrounded by mountains on three sides. Due to the influence of complex terrain and high altitude, pilots often feel that the runway is short during the flight mission of Jiuzhai Huanglong Airport, especially in rainy and snowy weather. Once the plane lands and stops taking off, there will be back spraying, brake failure or rushing off the runway, and the consequences will be unimaginable. Therefore, in 2006, when Jiuzhai Huanglong Airport carried out the second phase expansion project, two sets of EMAS systems were installed at the north and south ends of the runway respectively.

In China, a considerable number of airports are built by cutting mountains, commonly known as "desktop airports". Although these airports have established runway-end safety zones according to the standards, there are often steep slopes or cliffs outside the safety zones. Once the plane rushes out of the runway-end safety zone, the tragedy of plane crash and death will inevitably be staged. In addition, some airports in Linjiang, Linhai and residential areas also have such problems.

With the rapid development of civil aviation in China, the number of flights has increased dramatically. In order to maintain the past safety level, we need updated safety measures. According to the statistics of ICAO, the number of runway accidents in the world ranks first in the statistics of civil aircraft accident types. In recent years, the number of incidents of civil aviation rushing off the runway in China also ranks first in the statistics of serious accident symptoms of civil aircraft. It can be seen that the installation of EMAS system in the airport where the safety zone at the runway end is not long enough can solve the problem of the plane rushing off the runway and obviously improve the safe operation level.

Technical problems of

Before the EMAS developed by the China Academy of Civil Aviation Science and Technology was approved by the Civil Aviation Administration of China, there were no similar products in China. If we want to install it in our airports, we need to face three problems: high product price, long transportation distance and difficult system maintenance.

It is reported that in 2010, Taiwan Songshan Airport plans to lay a set of this system, with a budget as high as NT$ 430 million. Compared with 2006, when the system was laid at Jiuzhai Huanglong Airport in Sichuan, the price has increased significantly. Such a high cost, even if the government gives most subsidies, it is difficult for small and medium-sized airports in China that need to install EMAS system most.

China needs its own EMAS system! In 2010, under the direction of Li Jian, deputy director of the Civil Aviation Administration, the Academy of Aeronautics and Astronautics organized a research and development team headed by its main leaders and attended by dozens of scientific research backbones, and relevant units in the United Nations invested tens of millions of yuan. After more than two years, the technical problems of material production and system design methods have been overcome. In order to effectively verify the performance of the product and the safety of the system, the Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics designed and built a special test bench, conducted dozens of tests on the process of wheel rolling materials, and obtained a lot of valuable data, and finally established a set of perfect simulation calculation model and design method for the blocking process. The Academy of Aeronautics and Astronautics also specially purchased a Boeing 737 aircraft from Air China. Since the fourth quarter of 2011, it has carried out six large-scale real aircraft verification tests using the second runway of Tianjin Airport. The test results show that the EMAS system developed by the Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics has an effective blocking effect and can ensure the safety of the aircraft and the crew.

Development prospect of

"For China’s civil aviation, the EMAS project is a brand-new and groundbreaking project, and only the United States has mastered this technology in the world. We don’t have any experience to learn from. Doing this project well is of great significance for China civil aviation to export standards to the international civil aviation community, to enhance the international status of China civil aviation, to enhance the safety margin of complex airports, and to build a strong civil aviation country. " Li Jian, deputy director of CAAC, has repeatedly emphasized the importance of China Civil Aviation in developing its own EMAS system.

The responsible person of Academy of Aeronautics and Astronautics (Beijing) Science and Technology Development Co., Ltd. revealed to the reporter that the successful research and development of domestic EMAS system has greatly reduced the laying cost, and provided reasonable engineering solutions for many plateau airports, airports with complex terrain and other airports that are difficult to extend the runway safety zone for special reasons. It has a very broad market prospect. Tengchong Airport has decided to install EMAS system, and many airports at home and abroad have also shown strong interest in this product. "We have more than 10,000 square meters of production workshop in Tianjin Airport Economic Zone, which can meet the environmental requirements for the production and maintenance of blocking materials, and can ensure the stability of material performance, and can produce one set of materials required for EMAS system every month."

This year, ICAO will put forward the standard of increasing the length of the safety zone at the runway end in the "International Standards and Recommended Measures" to reduce the serious flight safety accidents caused by running off the runway. However, due to geographical or other environmental constraints, many airports are difficult to meet the new requirements for the length of runway safety zone. EMAS has been written into Article 3.5.5 of Airport Design and Operation, Volume I, Annex 14 of ICAO Convention on International Civil Aviation, which has become an internationally accepted equivalent safety measure.

It is understood that although the price of domestic EMAS system has dropped significantly compared with similar products abroad, it is also a huge expense for many airports, especially small and medium-sized airports. In view of the purpose of laying EMAS system to improve the safety of airport operation, CAAC is working on formulating relevant subsidy policies to support the popularization and application of EMAS system.

How to master the related knowledge of electronic invoice? What are the formats and characteristics of electronic invoices?

In today’s digital era, electronic invoices have become a common form of bills in economic activities. It is very important for individuals and enterprises to master the relevant knowledge of electronic invoices.

To master the relevant knowledge of electronic invoices, you can first obtain information through official channels. The official website of the tax department is an important source of information, which will contain detailed contents such as policy interpretation, issuance process, reimbursement regulations and so on. In addition, you can also pay attention to the official WeChat official account of the tax department and get the latest policy trends and operational guidelines in time. At the same time, corporate financial personnel can also participate in training courses organized by tax authorities to systematically learn the relevant knowledge of electronic invoices.

How to master the related knowledge of electronic invoice? What are the formats and characteristics of electronic invoices?

For individuals, when they come into contact with electronic invoices in their daily lives, they can consult the merchants about relevant issues, and know how to issue electronic invoices and how to obtain them. You can also search related knowledge articles and videos through the Internet to learn more about the use of electronic invoices and matters needing attention.

Electronic invoice has its unique format and characteristics. From the format, the common electronic invoice formats are PDF, OFD and so on. PDF format is a common one, it has good compatibility, and most devices and software can be opened for viewing. OFD format is a format of layout document independently developed by China, which has the advantages of high security and strong traceability.

The characteristics of electronic invoices are very remarkable. First, it is convenient to issue. Compared with traditional paper invoices, electronic invoices can be generated quickly through the system without filling in a lot of information manually, which greatly improves the billing efficiency. Second, it is convenient to store. Electronic invoices exist in the form of electronic data, which can be stored in computers, mobile phones and other devices without fear of loss or damage. Third, environmental protection and energy saving. Electronic invoice reduces the use of paper and conforms to the concept of green development. Fourth, the inspection is easy. Consumers and enterprises can quickly and accurately check the authenticity of electronic invoices through the official inspection platform of the tax department.

The following is a comparison table between electronic invoices and traditional paper invoices:

Contrast project Electronic invoice Traditional paper invoice Issuing method System automatic generation Fill in or print manually Storage mode Electronic data storage Paper preservation Environmental protection Save paper, environmental protection and energy saving. Consume a lot of paper Inspection difficulty Quick inspection through the official platform Inspection is relatively cumbersome.

In a word, knowing how to acquire knowledge, format and characteristics of electronic invoices will help us to use electronic invoices more efficiently and conveniently in economic activities and adapt to the development trend of digital economy.

How many routines are there behind a low-cost tour group that forces tourists to spend 20 thousand yuan in one hour?

  ● With the increasing popularity of self-help outdoor tourism, outdoor clubs, donkey friends clubs and go on road trip clubs frequently publish tourism products illegally through WeChat groups or QQ groups, publicize tourism routes, and receive citizens or donkey friends to travel.

  ● According to the relevant provisions of the Tourism Law, it is illegal for non-tourism enterprises and individuals to organize tourism activities by themselves.

  ● To completely eradicate the chaos of compulsory consumption of low-priced groups, we should rely on the law, increase punishment measures, and increase illegal costs and rights protection benefits.

  □ Our reporter Zhao Li

  "Since you have chosen a group with shopping links, you need to spend. What was your attitude towards me in the shop today? They’re all fighting guerrillas in there! Now get off and go to the store, and spend 20,000 yuan an hour … …” These words came from a female tour guide in Guilin.

  This female tour guide brought a group organized by a beauty brand. According to tourists, "Give a product gift of 598 yuan to the travel agency", and you can go to Guilin from Hunan for free. On the last day of the trip, due to the high consumption of jade shops, the consumption of tourists did not meet the "psychological expectation" of the tour guide, so the above scene appeared.

  After this compulsory consumption incident was exposed, the "low-priced group" once again attracted attention.

  With the increasing popularity of self-help outdoor tourism, it is not uncommon for outdoor clubs, donkey friends clubs, go on road trip clubs, health care products sales enterprises and some training institutions to illegally publish tourism products, publicize tourism routes and receive citizens or donkey friends to travel through WeChat groups and QQ groups. According to the relevant provisions of the Tourism Law, it is illegal for non-tourism enterprises and individuals to organize tourism activities by themselves. However, according to the disclosure of relevant departments, many tourism activities attract consumers to join the group with "low-cost group tours" or even "zero group tours".

  Through unannounced visits to such organizations that operate travel agencies without travel qualifications, the "Legal Daily" reporter found that many low-priced groups hide many tricks.

  Ostensibly claiming not to be profitable.

  In fact, hidden invisible consumption.

  Recently, the reporter found a large number of QQ groups of related organizations through online search, and the format of group names is simple and consistent: ×× Outdoor Club. The reporter tried to apply to join the QQ group of these outdoor clubs as an outdoor sports enthusiast, but the pass rate was extremely low. Many applications for joining the group are "sinking into the sea" after they are issued. Some organizations directly rejected the reporter’s application for joining the group. For example, the ×× Shanshui Outdoor Club refused on the grounds that it was not introduced by acquaintances in the group after the reporter repeatedly applied for joining the group.

  After many attempts, the reporter finally entered the individual group chat as an ordinary tourist, but after joining the group, the relevant responsible persons of these organizations will know the information of the new group users, such as "Who introduced them", "Where did they come from" and "What activities have they participated in before".

  At present, the QQ group of "Beijing XX Outdoor Club" has 1436 people, and it promotes itself as an outdoor adventure club with the theme of mountaineering, hiking, camping, grassland riding, desert crossing, forest adventure, seaside swimming, photography, skiing, food, singing and making friends. The outdoor activities of this club are rich and varied, and most of them are short-lived, generally divided into one-day activities and two-day activities. The prices of short-term activities are generally low. Many one-day activities cost less than 100 yuan, and some two-day activities cost around 300 yuan. Take the one-day tour of Kingfisher Valley (located in Yanqing, Beijing) as an example. The activity cost is 65 yuan/person, including car charter, expressway fee, master fee and outdoor insurance. The activity was held on June 15th. By 15:30 on June 14th, more than 50 people had signed up.

  The person in charge of the club explained to the reporter: "The expenses incurred by the activity are all AA system, without any additional benefits."

  Two years ago, Ms. Wang, a citizen of Beijing, was dragged into an outdoor tour group, which published many low-priced tour routes. "People who organize tours say that if they don’t make money, they just organize everyone to go out to play." But Ms. Wang found that they "have not earned less money."

  She once took part in a trip to Zhangjiakou, the cost was not enough for 300 yuan, but after getting on the bus, the hidden cost began. The organizer charged each tourist 50 yuan’s hard work and each tourist had to pay 10 yuan’s tea fee after the meal.

  "Without a formal contract, it is too informal for such a tour group to transfer money through WeChat or pay by punching in." Ms. Wang said.

  Some insiders also revealed to reporters that some outdoor clubs often attract friends to travel under the banner of non-profit, and the relevant personnel of the club make profits through the price difference. Because outdoor clubs don’t need to pay deposits and taxes like travel agencies, the operation of outdoor clubs is almost "zero cost".

  The reporter interviewed Mr. Zhang, a staff member of a scenic spot who is in charge of receiving these clubs. He said: "The profits of related expenses can basically be divided into four or six with the organizers, and the commissions taken by general travel agencies or tour leaders are more."

  The promoter declares that he is not responsible.

  Tourists face greater risks.

  Another "Beijing Lvyou ××" QQ group information shows that it was founded on October 23, 2015. At present, it has 2,862 members and has organized 44 activities. The organizer is "Beijing× Wolf Outdoor". The activity destinations are nearly Shuanglong Gorge, Pofengling and Dongling Mountain in the suburbs of Beijing, and as far away as Wuyuan, Dunhuang and Mohe.

  According to the information of official website in Beijing × Wolf Outdoor, this organization is "dedicated to the tent rental industry in Beijing (Tianjin)", and its business scope mainly includes various outdoor goods rental businesses such as Beijing (Tianjin) camping tent rental, cotton sleeping bag rental, down sleeping bag rental, walkie-talkie rental and mountaineering bag rental.

  The official website page of Beijing × Wolf Outdoor has also set up a column of "Journey Friends Activities". Open this page, which shows 70 pieces of relevant travel information released by this organization from June 6, 2017 to October 24, 2018. The reporter opened several links, most of which are related introductions such as tourist routes, itinerary planning and cost range, and occasionally a "disclaimer" is attached to the introduction. Disclaimer said: The initiator of the activity is only the contact person of the activity, and may not have participated in the training of outdoor leaders and field rescue. Although it is obligatory to help every participant, the initiator and leader of the activity are not responsible for any damage and consequences caused by participating in the activity — — Sign up voluntarily at your own risk.

  Such a disclaimer can also be found in the details of the activities of the "Beijing donkey friends ××" QQ group.

  The reporter found that the Mountain X Outdoor Club has also organized outdoor travel activities many times. According to a tweet from its WeChat WeChat official account on June 13th, the length of a seven-day trip is around 3,000 yuan per person. The travel routes include Jiaju Tibetan Village, Hailuogou Glacier, Daocheng Aden, Siguniang Mountain and other popular tourist attractions. The expenses include transportation (driver’s accommodation), accommodation (7 nights), tickets (Siguniang Mountain Shuangqiaogou, Jiaju Tibetan Village, Aden Scenic Area, Hailuogou), meals (breakfast in Danba), tour leader service and insurance. At the same time, it is stated that this line only buys travel accident insurance for players, excluding illness insurance and financial insurance. During the activity, if the financial loss occurs, it shall be borne by the players themselves; If financial losses are caused by personal reasons and need to be handled by themselves, a "departure agreement" needs to be signed.

  Another go on road trip club, "X Ant go on road trip Club", also indicated similar terms in a go on road trip route push on June 14th. There is only a 500,000 yuan personal accident insurance in the travel expenses, and there is nothing else.

  The leader of "Beijing × Star Club" told reporters that the price given by his club was "more cost-effective than the travel agency" and an extra accident insurance would be given. When the reporter asked whether to sign the relevant responsibility contract, the team leader replied: "Without signing the contract, the activities are voluntary."

  Free travel has become a new trick

  Force shopping to set a trap

  It is worth noting that related disputes occur frequently.

  In April 2017, Tian Congxin, an outdoor travel enthusiast, sued the organizer of the WeChat group tour and lost the case. The lawsuit originated in the summer of 2016. He and his friends joined the WeChat group of Happy Friends’ self-help tour and drifted to Daqinggou, Inner Mongolia. During the drifting, he accidentally caused an acute compression fracture of the lumbar spine. When he claimed compensation from the tourism organizer, he was rejected and sued the court. The court ruled that the organizer did not aim at profit, and because Tian Congxin was injured in the wrong sitting position, he took full responsibility.

  On November 22nd, 2014, Zhang Bingyu followed the coaches of Qingdao Qianli Sports and Leisure Club Co., Ltd. to Jiuxian Mountain for altitude downhill outward bound training. During the descent, the protective rope was untied, and Zhang Bingyu fell from a height of about 30 meters above the ground and died. Yu, an employee of Qianli Sports Company, is the leader of this outward bound training. He knows Cao, whose net name is Mumu, from the outdoor sports group, who was temporarily hired by the company as the outdoor coach of this activity. According to the verdict, both Yu and Cao claimed that they did not have the qualification certificate to engage in downhill activities.

  Organizations and individuals without tourism qualifications like this often offer various low-cost tours when operating travel agency business.

  According to a Beijing resident who didn’t want to be named, his parents participated in a low-cost tour organized by the "outdoor donkey friends group" WeChat group. "Everyone has a one-day tour in 50 yuan and Yixing Zhuhai. My parents gather at 6: 30 in the morning and come back with big bags at 6: 00 in the evening. Bamboo shoots, bamboo chopping boards, activated carbon balls, dish towels, etc., spend hundreds of dollars and buy a bunch of useless things. "

  The reporter interviewed Mr. Zhang, who used to be a tour guide. Mr. Zhang said: "In the tourism industry, low-cost groups basically imply consumption content, which is a default rule in the industry. But if you pay enough money reasonably, there may be only some slight guidance and no compulsory consumption. "

  Ma Aiping, a professor at beijing international studies university Tourism Management College, thinks that the tour fee for four days and five nights is 598 yuan. If this fee includes food, accommodation and transportation, the price is obviously low, so travel itinerary includes three shopping items.

  Liu Simin, director of the Tourism Research Institute of the Cultural and Creative Industry Research Center of Beijing Foreign Studies University, believes that there may be many reasons for being lower than the market price and operating cost, but if there are obvious shopping arrangements in the itinerary, it can basically be judged as unreasonable low-cost travel.

  In 2017, the National Development and Reform Commission, in conjunction with the public security, industry and commerce, price and other departments, continued to carry out a number of actions to comprehensively rectify the order of the national tourism market, and seriously investigated and dealt with illegal acts such as "unreasonably low-cost travel" and "illegally operating travel agency business", and filed 2,595 cases, fined and confiscated illegal income of 33.26 million yuan, and revoked 45 business licenses.

  Since then, although the related problems of some travel agencies have been contained and supervised to a certain extent, some organizations and individuals who operate travel agencies without tourism qualifications have begun to "move". There are also companies tying health care products during the "zero tour fee" tour.

  Take Jiufang Joy as an example. This company is not qualified to organize tourism. In August 2018, a fire broke out in Beilong Hot Spring Leisure Hotel in Harbin, Heilongjiang, causing 20 deaths and 23 injuries. According to media reports, Jiufang Joy mainly sells health care products to middle-aged and elderly people, and customers with large consumption can get travel opportunities rewarded by enterprises.

  According to the disclosure of relevant departments in Beijing, many tourism activities use "zero tour fee" as bait to attract the elderly to join the group, which hides multiple risks. Law enforcement officials of relevant departments in Beijing said that low-cost tours under the guise of "free tours" and "zero tour fees" are becoming more and more hidden, and the elderly often become the "hardest hit areas" for being deceived.

  According to law enforcement officials, at present, "buying health care products for travel" and "buying wealth management for free travel" organized in the form of companies have become new tricks of criminals, and even some companies cheat in the name of recruiting "tourism experiencers", and applicants encounter compulsory shopping traps when traveling.

  "WeChat friends circle, clubs, motorists’ clubs and other spontaneous group trips are often personal agreements, and there is no business license. Many irregular behaviors cannot be defined and are in a blind spot of supervision. This kind of tourism behavior is more prone to problems, ‘ Black tour guide ’ The phenomenon of slaughtering customers is even more difficult to detect, which brings difficulties to tourism law enforcement and evidence collection. " Beijing lawyer Liu Chengxian told reporters.  

Here comes Gemini, Google’s strongest model! Really multi-modal, pouring all resources and supporting Chinese, GPT4 is no longer unique.

Google’s strongest AI model, which has attracted much attention and is considered by the industry to be the most likely to beat GPT-4, has finally appeared!

On December 6th, US Western Time, Google CEO Sundar Pichai and DeepMind Director Demis Hassabis jointly announced the official launch of Gemini 1.0 in official website.

Gemini is jointly created by several Alphabet teams such as Google Research and DeepMind. As a new powerful multi-modal artificial intelligence model, it can induce, understand, operate and combine different types of information. It can not only process text, images, video and audio, but also complete complex tasks in mathematics, physics and other scientific fields, and can understand and generate high-quality codes in various programming languages.

Pichai described Gemini as "our largest and most powerful AI model to date" and said that it has shown the most advanced performance in many leading benchmarks. "The first generation of Gemini 1.0 was optimized for different sizes, namely: Ultra, Pro and Nano. These are the first models to enter the Gemini era and the first realization of our vision when we established Google DeepMind earlier this year. "

At the Google I/O conference in May this year, Pichai spoiled the news that Google was developing Gemini. It is described as the "Next Generation Multi-modal Intelligent Network", which is designed for API integration. It is said that it has trillions of parameters like GPT-4, but its computing power is five times that of GPT-4, and it can perform more complex and diverse tasks.

To this end, Google also merged its two strongest artificial intelligence laboratories: Google Brain and DeepMind, led by Demis Hassabis, the former CEO of DeepMind, and invested hundreds of millions of dollars in research and development of Gemini.

Even sergey brin, the co-founder of Google, who has resigned for four years, has returned to the office of Mountain View in Silicon Valley to participate in the Gemini decision-making and join the LLM scuffle.

But just last week, The Information quoted people familiar with the matter as saying that Pichai recently silently canceled a series of Gemini public appearances that should have been held in California, new york and Washington, D.C., because it was found to be "unreliable in handling some non-English queries", which cast a gray color on the product launch process.

Perhaps to consolidate market confidence, early this morning, Gemini 1.0 suddenly made its grand debut, appearing in the public’s field of vision and quickly occupying the front pages of major scientific and technological media.

So, what is the strongest artificial intelligence model that Google is betting on the whole army?

Hassabis, head of DeepMind, called Gemini their most flexible model, which can run efficiently on all kinds of devices from data centers to mobile devices.

In order to achieve this extensibility, Gemini 1.0 has designed three versions with different functions and sizes:

Gemini Nano —The most efficient model on the end-side equipment. Designed for smart phones, it can perform efficient AI processing tasks without connecting to an external server. Now it has been integrated into Pixel 8 Pro, which can support the function of "summarizing text" in recording applications and the function of "intelligent reply" in Gboard. Starting with WhatsApp, it will be extended to more applications next year.

Gemini Pro —The best model for various tasks running in Google data center. Support the latest version of the AI chat robot Bard from today. It can respond quickly and understand complex queries, which is the biggest upgrade since Bard was introduced. At present, it provides English services to more than 170 countries and regions, and plans to support new languages and regions in the coming months, and apply them to more Google products such as search, advertising, Chrome and Duet AI.

Gemini Ultra -The largest and most powerful model, dedicated to highly complex tasks, will be provided to developers and enterprise customers early next year after completing the current testing phase. At that time, an updated version of Bard Advanced based on Gemini Ultra will be launched.

In terms of model architecture, Gemini still uses Transformer architecture, adopts an efficient attention mechanism, and supports the context length of 32k.

Google confidently said that after rigorous testing and performance evaluation of the Gemini model, from natural image, audio and video understanding to mathematical reasoning,Among the 32 academic benchmarks widely used in the research and development of large-scale language models, the performance of Gemini Ultra has exceeded the most advanced level represented by ChatGPT at present.. Before the release of Gemini, Google conducted a series of tests to evaluate it with standard industry indicators.

In the MMLU test, the score rate of Gemini Ultra is 90.0%, which is higher than that of GPT-4 (86.4%), making it the first model to surpass the performance of human experts. The MMLU test covers 57 subjects, including mathematics, physics, history, law, medicine and ethics, and aims to evaluate the model’s understanding and problem-solving ability in the global knowledge field.

In Reasoning, Math and Code, except HellaSwag, which lags behind GPT-4 by 87.8%, others include challenging math problems such as multi-step reasoning, algebra/geometry/pre-calculus and so on.

In terms of multimodal capability, Gemini Ultra achieved a SOTA score of 59.4% in the new MMMU benchmark test, which exceeded the 56.8% of the multimodal version GPT-4V of OpenAI. This benchmark test spans many different fields and requires precise reasoning for many tasks.

In the image benchmark test, even without the assistance of Object Character Recognition (OCR) system, the performance of Gemini Ultra is better than all previous models only by analyzing pixel information. In audio testing, the scores of automatic speech recognition and automatic speech translation of Gemini are higher than those of Whisper system connected to GPT-4.

Hassabis said that this highlights the superiority of Gemini’s native multimodal. Up to now, the usual way to create multi-modal models is to train individual components of different modes independently, and then splice them together to try to simulate some functions.

Although such models can sometimes effectively perform specific tasks such as describing pictures, they often perform poorly in more conceptual and complex reasoning.

Gemini was originally designed in a native multi-modal way, and was pre-trained in different modes from the beginning using TPUs v4 and v5e chips designed by Google.. Then it is fine-tuned with more additional multimodal data to improve its performance.

This method enables Gemini to understand and reason all kinds of input content more naturally in the initial stage, and its ability in almost all fields has reached an unprecedented advanced level.

First of all, Gemini has complex multi-modal reasoning ability, which can help to understand complex written and visual information and discover indistinguishable knowledge content in massive data.

For example, it is instructed to filter irrelevant papers through the natural language prompt, or extract key data through reading. With a lunch break, Gemini can help you extract 250 document points from 200,000 papers, and further transform the data into any required chart form. This will greatly help to achieve innovative breakthroughs in science, finance and other fields at a digital speed.

The trained Gemini can obviously recognize and understand text, image and audio data at the same time, better understand subtle information and answer questions related to complex topics. This makes it especially good at explaining reasoning in subjects such as mathematics and physics. In the example, the staff showed that Gemini can check handwriting physical mistakes and explain the correct way.

In order to show the multimodal capabilities of Gemini more intuitively, Brother Chai released a video in X, saying that "the best way to understand the amazing potential capabilities of Gemini is to look at their practical applications".

In the video, Gemini taught the staff the pronunciation of "duck" in Mandarin according to the instructions, and also explained the Chinese tone.

The staff also gave Gemini a demonstration of interaction only in Chinese. By asking about the indoor light in a picture, Gemini is asked to give the orientation of the apartment in use. Gemini answers in Chinese and guesses that the room faces south. Circle a plant in the photo and ask what kind of lighting it needs. gemini then explains the plant species and lighting requirements. The whole process is as smooth as the mother tongue, which shows that Gemini is outstanding in multilingual environment, which is no less than GPT-4.

In addition, Gemini can understand, interpret and generate high-quality codes of the most popular programming languages in the world, such as Python, Java, C++ and Go. The ability to achieve cross-language work and handle complex information makes it one of the world’s leading basic coding models, helping programmers to use the powerful AI model as a collaborative tool to design applications.

For developers, starting from December 13th, Gemini Pro can be obtained through the Gemini API in Google AI Studio or Google Cloud Vertex AI. Android developers can also use Gemini Nano, the most efficient model for end-to-end tasks, through AICore.

Looking back on the development of Google’s big model all the way, compared with the continuous and rapid update of OpenAI’s "Wang Fried", Microsoft always seems to be one step behind when it integrates various AI functions of GPT into core products and pushes them to customers. When Bard, a chat robot, was released in February this year, it got off to a bad start, and the market value evaporated by 100 billion dollars overnight with a factual error. Benchmarking Microsoft Copilot’s Duet AI work suite, the market response was moderate, and the financial performance of cloud services also lost to Microsoft.

Especially after the internal friction caused by the reorganization of Brain and DeepMind teams and the loss of senior talents to OpenAI, Google’s AI battle is even more exhausted.

However, this is, after all, an AI pioneer who contributed to Transformer’s pioneering masterpiece Attention is all you need and the landmark artificial intelligence program AlphaGo, and inspired the subsequent development of many large models including ChatGPT. No matter from the technical genes, training data, capital and infrastructure, it should have one of the best strengths.

The release of Gemini is regarded by Google as the most critical technological innovation in the past decade. Can it make Google rally, beat OpenAI and regain the throne of the big model stadium?

Will the AI competition pattern be reshaped after Genmini Ultra comes out next year?

And, has everyone tried the new Google Bard? How do you feel?

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Guide: western medicine treatment of herpes zoster

Click on "Huanghuai nurse" above to follow.

guide language

The treatment scheme of herpes zoster can be roughly divided into traditional Chinese medicine therapy and western medicine therapy. Today, we will learn the western medicine therapy recommended by the guide.

Therapeutic goal of herpes zoster

Relieve acute pain; Shorten the duration of skin lesions; Prevent the spread of skin lesions; Prevent or reduce complications.

First, antiviral drugs

Commonly used drugs in clinical treatment of herpes zoster can effectively shorten the course of disease, accelerate the healing of rash, reduce the formation of new rash and reduce the spread of virus to internal organs. It should be used within 72 hours after the eruption, so as to quickly reach and maintain the effective concentration and obtain the best therapeutic effect. At present, the approved systemic antiviral drugs include acyclovir, valaciclovir, famciclovir, bromovudine and foscarnet sodium.

acyclovir

Function characteristics:

Acyclovir triphosphate is produced by phosphorylation of viral thymidine kinase in infected cells, which can inhibit viral DNA polymerase and stop the extension of viral DNA chain.

  Usage:

(1) Oral administration: 400-800 mg/time, 5 times/day, for 7 days;

(2) Intravenous drip: 5 ~ 10 mg/kg for patients with immune impairment or serious nervous system diseases, once every 8 hours, with a course of 7 days. 

Precautions:

Patients should drink plenty of water during the administration of acyclovir to prevent acyclovir from precipitating in renal tubules and damaging renal function.

Valaciclovir

Function characteristics:

The prodrug of acyclovir is quickly absorbed by oral administration and quickly converted into acyclovir in gastrointestinal tract and liver, and its bioavailability is 3~5 times that of acyclovir.

  Usage:

Oral administration: 300 ~ 1000 mg/time, 3 times/day, for 7 days.

Fanciclovir

Function characteristics:

The prodrug of penciclovir is rapidly converted into penciclovir after oral administration, and maintains a long half-life in cells. The mechanism of action is the same as that of acyclovir, the bioavailability is higher than that of acyclovir, and the frequency and dosage of administration are lower than that of acyclovir.

  Usage:

Oral administration: 250 ~ 500mg/time, 3 times/day, for 7 days.

brivudine tablets

Function characteristics:

The antiviral effect is highly selective, and the process of inhibiting virus replication is only carried out in virus-infected cells. 

Usage:

Oral administration: 125mg//day, l times/day, for 7 days.

Sodium foscarnet

Function characteristics:

Blocking the phosphate binding site of viral DNA polymerase in a non-competitive way, thus showing antiviral activity.

  Usage:

Intravenous drip: 40 mg/kg each time, once every 8 hours.

Note meaning 

Patients with renal insufficiency should reduce the dosage accordingly;

If renal function continues to decline, acyclovir should be stopped immediately and famciclovir or other antiviral drugs should be used to continue treatment;

For patients suspected of renal insufficiency, creatinine level should be detected before initial administration (creatinine level is not required for bromovudine).

Second, analgesics

Mild to moderate pain:Acetaminophen and tramadol can be selected; 

Moderate and severe pain:

1. Opioid drugs, such as morphine or oxycodone;

2. Drugs for the treatment of neuropathic pain, such as calcium channel regulator gabapentin and pregabalin, in addition to amitriptyline and 5% lidocaine patch. Severe acute pain during herpes zoster is a risk factor for post-herpetic neuralgia (PHN). Combined with calcium channel regulator can not only effectively relieve pain, but also reduce the occurrence of PHN. Studies have shown that early use of pregabalin can significantly reduce the pain score of herpes zoster, especially within 7 days of herpes occurrence, which can significantly reduce the incidence of PHN. The pain of elderly patients with herpes zoster is more common and severe, which seriously affects all aspects of life, such as anxiety, disorder and inability to work or live normally. Studies have shown that pregabalin combined with oxycodone can not only further reduce the incidence of PHN, but also improve the daily activities and sleep of patients and improve their quality of life.

Third, glucocorticoid

At present, there is still controversy about whether to use glucocorticoid to treat herpes zoster.

It is generally believed that systematic application of glucocorticoid in the early stage of acute onset of herpes zoster and gradual decrease can inhibit the inflammatory process, shorten the duration of acute pain and the healing time of skin lesions, but it is ineffective for the pain with PHN. 

Recommended dose:The initial dosage of prednisone is 30~40 mg//day, which is taken orally and gradually reduced, and the course of treatment is 1~2 weeks.

 Fourth, neurotrophic drugs

It is also helpful to relieve neuroinflammation and neuralgia. Commonly used drugs include mecobalamin, vitamin B1 and vitamin B12, etc., which are taken orally or injected intramuscularly.

Five, topical drugs

Mainly dry and anti-inflammatory. 

Blister fluid is not broken:Calamine lotion, acyclovir cream or penciclovir cream can be used externally. 

After herpes is broken:

3% boric acid solution wet compress;

1: 5000 furacilin solution wet compress;

0.5% neomycin ointment for external use;

2% mupirocin ointment. 

Ophthalmic herpes:3% Acyclovir Eye Ointment and Iodine Eye Drops for External Use.

References: [1] Herpes Zoster Expert Consensus Working Group. Herpes Zoster Expert Consensus in China [J]. Chinese Journal of Dermatology .2018,51 (6): 403-406.

Laiyuan/Yunque

Global news: US stocks fell for three consecutive days, the Dow fell below the 50-day moving average, and US bond yields soared, which continued to put pressure on the market.

  On Thursday, local time, with the soaring yield of 10-year US bonds and the "assistance" of the yield of 10-year British bonds, the risk appetite of market investors continued to be suppressed. The three major indexes of US stocks recorded a three-day losing streak. After the S&P 500 index, the Dow also fell below the 50-year moving average, which is usually regarded as a signal of a short-term downward trend.

  It should be noted that the American Association of Individual Investors released the latest market sentiment survey report on Thursday, and the bullish enthusiasm of American retail investors in the next six months has plummeted, directly from 44.7% to 35.9%, breaking the state of being better than the historical average in the past 10 weeks. It is enough to show that current investors are not optimistic about the future trend of the market.

  The relatively vague monetary policy direction of the Federal Reserve has played a great role. According to the latest calendar of the Federal Reserve in official website, Powell will deliver a speech at the annual meeting of Jackson Hole Central Bank on August 25th, local time. If you have memories, you should remember last year’s "nine minutes of darkness". Powell’s speech directly caused the S&P 500 index to plummet by 3%, and then it went from 4,200 to below 3,500 in the next two months.

  The market may be worried that Powell’s speech this year may still cause market turmoil before inflation is completely tamed, and monetary policy may continue to be tightened during the year. At present, according to the observation tool of CME Federal Reserve, the probability of raising interest rates again at the end of the year has risen to over 30%, while the hope of lowering interest rates is slim, which was originally the biggest catalyst in the market.

  In other important news, on Thursday (August 17th), local time, the latest report released by market research company Counterpoint Research showed that global smartphone shipments will drop by 6% to 1.15 billion units this year. If it is finally true, it will be the lowest level in ten years.

  North America is still the main drag on the global recovery, and the disappointing performance in the first half of the year may bring the year-on-year decline of shipments in this region to double digits. However, the high-end market still maintains some flexibility. The report pointed out that Apple will therefore be in a favorable position, and the company will usher in an important product upgrade in the second half of this year, which may make it perform strongly before the end of this year.

  In addition, on Thursday night, Beijing time, Musk, the world’s richest man, announced his arrival in Japan on the social media platform, but did not disclose the itinerary. A sudden visit to Japan has caused a lot of discussion in the market. The important daily activities of his social media platform X come from Japan, with a population of only one-third of that of the United States, but the daily activities are comparable to those of the United States.

  Musk’s team is still frantically seizing the satellite Internet business in low-earth orbit. Japanese Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada has previously confirmed that the Japanese Self-Defense Force has started testing this equipment since March this year.

  It is worth mentioning that on the occasion of Musk’s visit to Japan, when Tesla’s redesigned Model 3 was exposed to mass production, did this trip take a fancy to the potential of the Japanese electric vehicle market? The share of electric vehicles in the Japanese market has just exceeded 2%, and the best-selling Mini-EV is Nissan SAKURA, which sold 33,000 vehicles in the whole fiscal year of 2022. Tesla and () are regarded as luxury brands.

  [overnight U.S. stocks]

  Among the large-scale Chinese stocks, Alibaba rose 1.78%, Baidu fell 0.54%, Netease fell 0.09%, Tencent Music rose 5.78%, and Pinduoduo rose 0.81%.

  Among the large US technology stocks, Apple fell 1.46%, Amazon fell 0.81%, Google A rose 0.95% and Netflix fell 3.00%.

  [global index]

  In the European stock market, the FTSE 100 index in Britain fell slightly by 0.63% to 7310 points. The French CAC40 index fell slightly by 0.94% to 7192 points. Germany DAX index fell slightly by 0.71% to 15,677 points.

  [global goods]

  The main contract of WTI crude oil closed at $80.16 per barrel, up 0.98%; The main contract of Brent crude oil closed at $83.90 per barrel, up 0.54%; The main contract of crude oil in the previous period closed at 639.00 yuan per barrel overnight, down 0.08%.

  Overnight, the Shanghai gold main contract closed down 0.30% to 455.42 yuan per gram; The main contract of Shanghai Bank closed down 0.02% to 5627.00 yuan per kilogram.

  [overnight news]

  Powell will deliver a speech at Jackson Hole’s annual meeting next week.

  The Federal Reserve also quietly updated official website’s calendar after the close, showing that Powell will deliver the annual meeting speech of Jackson Hole at 10: 05 local time on August 25th. Investors should still remember clearly that on August 26th last year, with Powell’s famous "9-minute speech", not only did the S&P 500 index drop by 3% that day, but in the next two months, it even fell from 4,200 to 3,500.

  US retail investors’ bullish enthusiasm plummeted

  The American Association of Individual Investors also released the latest market sentiment survey report on Thursday. The bullish enthusiasm of American retail investors in the next six months has "dived down", directly dropping from 44.7% to 35.9%, breaking the state of being better than the historical average in the past 10 weeks.

  Fed officials are increasingly wary of the stock market’s rise.

  According to the latest minutes of the Fed meeting, Fed staff pointed out at the FOMC policy meeting in July that stock prices generally rose, corporate bond spreads narrowed, asset valuation pressure was "significant", and the risk assessment in May was "moderate"; Also named residential and commercial real estate prices, calling them "relatively high in terms of fundamentals".

  Research report: global mobile phone shipments may fall to a 10-year low, and Apple is expected to go against the trend.

  The latest report released by Counterpoint Research, a market research company, shows that global smartphone shipments are expected to hit the worst year in a decade in 2023. Despite the overall decline in smartphone shipments, the high-end market still maintains a certain degree of flexibility. The report pointed out that Apple will therefore be in a favorable position, and the company will usher in an important product upgrade in the second half of this year, which may make it perform strongly before the end of this year.

  After energy and food, the signs of sticky inflation in the United States reappear, and the price of used cars rose for the first time in four months.

  According to statistics, the wholesale data of used cars in the first half of August in the United States rose for the first time in four months, and the market is worried. This is another sign that inflation may be stuck for a long time after the rebound of energy and food prices.

  The global bond market selling added fuel to the fire, and the demand for Japanese bond auctions was the worst since 1987.

  The auction results of 20-year Japanese bonds on Thursday may show that investors are increasingly betting that the Bank of Japan will soon relax the easing policy YCC to control the yield curve. As the global sovereign bond yield has reached a 15-year high, the rising Japanese bond yield threatens global bonds.

  [company news]

  Tesla’s modified Model 3 was exposed to lower bicycle costs or add a "price war" card.

  Tesla’s revised Model 3 may start mass production in Shanghai as early as next month. This electric car faucet is in the final stage of the production of the demonstration car, and the vehicle will be transported to the Tesla exhibition hall later this month. Large-scale production will follow closely, starting in September at the earliest. These people familiar with the matter added that Tesla will also increase production during the National Day holiday.

  One of the people familiar with the matter said that the revised Model 3 has been changed in terms of design and interior parts, making it more fashionable. He added that in the case of full production, its cost will be lower than the current version of Model 3, or as low as 200,000 yuan.

  Musk suddenly announced his arrival in Japan. What is he going to do?

  On Thursday night, Beijing time, Musk, the world’s richest man, announced on his social media platform X that he had arrived in Japan. In view of his extreme love of showing himself on the Internet, this totally unexpected trip triggered a hot discussion among netizens: What is he doing in Japan?

  The important daily activities of Musk’s social media platform X come from Japan, with a population of only one-third of that of the United States, but the daily activities are comparable to those of the United States. Musk’s team is still frantically seizing the satellite Internet business in low-earth orbit. Japanese Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada has previously confirmed that the Japanese Self-Defense Force has started testing this equipment since March this year.

  Mardner: The latest version of COVID-19 vaccine can produce a strong response to EG.5 mutant.

  Mardner disclosed on Thursday that preliminary clinical trial data confirmed that the company’s COVID-19 vaccine updated in autumn and winter this year showed a strong immune response against the latest dominant mutant strain EG.5 Mardner’s vaccine was developed for XBB.1.5 mutant, which belongs to Omicron mutant family with EG.5. The latest version of the vaccine is expected to be supplied for autumn vaccination in the next few weeks, and is subject to the approval of relevant departments.

  [AI dynamic]

  Google’s Gemini, the "most powerful model of mankind", will be released in autumn.

  The media broke the news that Google’s "brand-new killer" Gemini combines the capabilities of GPT-4, Midjourney and Stable Diffusion, and can also provide analysis charts, create graphics with text descriptions, and use text or voice command control software.

  AI enters the consulting circle McKinsey launches the first AI chat application Lilli.

  McKinsey, the world’s largest consulting firm, launched Lilli, the first AI chat application, for consulting project assistance. Lilli has been tested in the company for two months, and it is reported that the effect is good, which can shorten the task that originally took several weeks to several hours.

  [financial calendar]

Frighten the "fruit powder"! Apple rarely apologizes! What happened?

Every edited | Du Yu




Image source: Apple conference video screenshot

The name of this 1-minute-long advertisement is Crush! )。Roughly speaking, the things "crushed" by Apple are trumpet, paint bucket, guitar, piano, phonograph, statue, drum set, camera, arcade, monitor, plastic doll and so on.

Although the creativity of this advertisement is not difficult to understand: Apple has "pressed" a large number of functions into this thin and powerful tablet, and can do professional artistic creations such as painting, arranging music, taking photos and retouching pictures.

But the problem is that, as a consumer electronic product targeted at professional users, this advertisement has crushed all the creators’ "eating guys". This strange negative emotion has finally changed from the angry condemnation of a small group of professionals to a storm of public opinion.

Some netizens ridiculed that,It’s really good for Apple to attract professional creators by smashing symbols of human creativity and cultural achievements..


Some netizens criticized thatThis is a heartbreaking, uncomfortable and selfish advertisement..

Hugh Grant, a famous actor, even commented that the advertisement seemed to promote "the destruction of human experience".

Cover image source: Every photo by reporter Kong Zesi

Fifteen cross-border e-commerce emerging platforms you should know.

Fifteen cross-border e-commerce emerging platforms you should know.

When it comes to cross-border export platforms, I believe most people will blurt out AliExpress, Amazon, eBay and wish. Of course, they are indeed very important cross-border e-commerce platforms, but they are not just these cross-border e-commerce platforms. In fact, every cross-border e-commerce platform has its own industry advantages and loyal customer base, or has important or special influence in a certain country or region. For cross-border e-commerce, online channel diversification is an important way to expand network channels and scale. In addition, for some specific products and brands, it is also an important e-commerce strategy to select the target market for deep-rooted work. Then it is natural to use the local important targeted e-commerce platform. Below, Xiaobian summarizes the following fifteen emerging platforms for cross-border e-commerce from the network.

First, Souq

Souq.com, an Amazon e-commerce website in the Middle East. It has 6 million users and can reach 10 million independent visits every month. According to the current situation of the website, Souq has begun to consider expanding other businesses. For example, Souq has established its own logistics system QExpress and payment system PayFort. Moreover, Souq also launched its own brand of tablet computers. It is understood that Souq.com, Cobone.com and Sukar.com are the three largest local e-commerce websites in the Middle East.

It is understood that the UAE people are keen on surfing the Internet and playing mobile phones, and their Internet penetration rate and mobile phone holding rate have reached more than 70%. Not only the United Arab Emirates, but also people from rich Gulf countries such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar are keen on shopping online. It is expected that the scale of online shopping in the whole Middle East will increase rapidly in the next two or three years. About 5 out of 10 people in UAE buy goods and services through the Internet. It is expected that the e-commerce market in UAE will reach 10 billion US dollars in 2018.

Second, Lazada (Lai Zanda)

It is known as the largest online shopping mall in Southeast Asia. It is a company founded by Rocket Internet to build "Amazon in Southeast Asia". In April this year, it was invested and controlled by Ali for $1 billion. Sales of electronic products, clothes, appliances, books, cosmetics, etc., the market covers Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam. The company provides free delivery, free return within 14 days, and flexible payment methods. The growth rate of Internet penetration in Singapore, Malaysia and Vietnam has exceeded the world average.

By 2020, the e-commerce market in Southeast Asia will reach $20.4 billion. The sustained and rapid economic growth in Southeast Asia has cultivated a large number of middle classes and huge consumer demand. Southeast Asia is another most dynamic and potential consumer market after the United States, the European Union and China. This makes the big e-commerce companies in various countries salivate and want to get it quickly. Therefore, Southeast Asia is the main battlefield for major e-commerce companies at present.

Third, Newegg (new egg)

Newegg was founded in 2001, with its headquarters in Los Angeles, Southern California. Newegg is the leading online supermarket for computer, consumer electronics and communication products in the United States. Newegg gathers about 4,000 sellers and more than 25 million customers. At first, IT sold consumer electronic products and IT products, but now it has expanded to all categories, with 55,000 varieties. Attracting wealthy and internet-savvy men aged 18 to 35. The best-selling categories are automobile supplies, sporting goods and office supplies. It is particularly noteworthy that most consumers are men, but female consumers are also growing rapidly.

Fourth, Rakuten.com (Lotte)

Founded in 1997, it has become the largest e-commerce website in Japan, with a market value of $13.5 billion and an annual revenue of over $4 billion. Lotte is also one of the largest internet companies in the world. In the US market, Lotte spent $250 million to acquire Buy.com, and in 2013, the company changed its name to "Rakuten.com Shopping". Lotte Shopping has gathered 3,000 sellers, more than 80 million customers and 23 million products. The customer base is between 25 and 54, with 50% men and 50% women. Rakuten.com originally specialized in computer and electronic products, but now it provides sporting goods, health and beauty, home and gardening, jewelry and toys.

"Beating Amazon" is the ambitious ambition of Hiroshi Mikitani, the founder of Lotte in Japan. Because the penetration in Japan’s domestic market has reached saturation, it has become difficult to attract more consumers in Japan, and internationalization is the inevitable choice for Lotte to achieve this goal. In recent years, Lotte’s overseas market moves frequently, with its all-round layout in terms of logistics, payment, channels and investment, and its sphere of influence covers Asia, Europe and America. Therefore, for cross-border e-commerce and brand owners, Lotte is an online hypermarket that cannot be ignored.

Five, Bestbuy (Best Buy)

The failure of Best Buy’s online physical store made it enter the online market in 2011. Gathered more than 100 sellers. There are 1 billion visits every year. Different from other e-commerce platforms, only invited sellers can stay in the platform and products can appear in Best Buy stores for sale. But the products are only limited to consumer electronic products.

Sixth, Tesco

Britain’s largest food and groceries retailer. Its e-commerce website was established in 2012, gathering more than 50 sellers, 43 million club card members and 4 million visits per month. The huge offline customer base is being transferred to online. Competitors include Amazon, eBay and Lotte Play.com. Products include home and gardening, baby products, sports and leisure, clothing and jewelry. Only open to invited sellers.

Britain is the largest e-commerce market in Europe, and four of the Top10 European e-retailers are in the UK. At the same time, Britain is one of the largest cross-border e-commerce exporters in the world. In 2013, online retail in the UK was 91 billion pounds (about 148.78 billion US dollars), up 16% year-on-year. Online retailing in the UK will increase by 17% in 2014, reaching 107 billion pounds (about 174.98 billion US dollars).

Seven, Lotte Play.com

Founded in 1998, it is one of the largest online entertainment retailers in the UK. Gather more than 3000 sellers and 15 million customers. Originally selling games and media products, but now it has developed into multiple categories. It is the only e-commerce platform that allows retailers to customize their own storefronts, making it the third largest online market in Britain after Amazon and eBay.

Eight, La Redoute (Shangri-La Fu)

Founded in 2010, it is the leading online retailer in France and the third largest e-commerce market in Europe. Gather more than 1,000 vendors and 10 million customers. Covering 26 countries. Shangri-La Welfare is mainly aimed at women aged between 26 and 35. Its product categories include men’s and women’s wear, underwear, shoes and accessories, furniture, crafts and so on. But don’t sell second-hand products.

MercadoLivre (Mercado Network)

The largest C2C platform in Brazil is equivalent to Taobao in China. Making good use of this platform is conducive to understanding various market information such as Brazil’s price index, consumption trends and payment habits. Gathered more than 52,000 sellers and 50.2 million registered users. The number of visitors ranks among the TOP50 in the world. It covers 13 countries and regions (Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Mexico, Panama, Peru, Dominica, Paraguay, Venezuela and Portugal). In addition to the electronic trading platform, there is also the largest payment platform similar to Alipay in South America. As a result, countries such as Mexico and Argentina have no localized websites. At first, it was just an auction website, but today, it is mainly an online sales platform. Considering the rapidly increasing Internet penetration rate, MercardoLivre can provide sellers with a huge potential market opportunity in South America.

X. Trade Me

It is the largest online trading market in New Zealand with more than 3.1 million members. 1.4 billion web pages are displayed every month. New and second-hand store categories include baby products, books, clothing, computers and household goods. Originally a second-hand auction market, it was a replica of the early ebay, but now it sells new products just like the new ebay.

XI. Ozon

It is the largest e-commerce platform in Russia and currently accounts for 20% of the Russian e-commerce market. The goal in the next decade is to gain 80% market share of Russian e-commerce. As we all know, the early days of Taobao in China were full of opportunities, and many Taobao brands stood out. Today’s Ozon, just like Taobao in those days, I wonder how many China sellers have settled in the sub-platform? The more important local e-commerce platforms in Russia include Lamoda, Wildberries, KupiVIP (all fashions), Ulmart and Svyaznoy (consumer electronic products).

XII. Otto (Otto Group)

The leading provider of e-commerce solutions and services from Germany ranks second only to Amazon in the global comprehensive B2C ranking, and is also the world’s largest online clothing, apparel and daily necessities retail channel provider. Its online shop sells millions of kinds of goods. The products sold cover men’s and women’s clothing, household appliances, household goods, sports equipment, computers, video games and so on. Range of brands is widely sold, and basically all brands that can be seen in the market can be found in OTTO’s online shop. In addition, OTTO has its own brand, which is very cost-effective.

It is understood that clothing is by far the most important category. Women spend 25.8 billion euros (men 22.5 billion) online, which is the main source of online income. This may be related to family shopping. 53.4% of online shoppers are women. Two-thirds of online retailing in Germany is through third-party platforms ebay and Amazon, with few independent websites. Followed by multi-channel retailers. Clothing (11.6 billion), books (5.3 billion) and electronic products (4 billion) are the three most popular categories. The above-mentioned 39.1 billion euros do not include digital products. Online retail sales of digital products (such as air tickets and event tickets) totaled 10.6 billion euros, an increase of 9.3%. Germany is the country with the most popular online sales in the world. Although the number of online consumers in China is huge, it only accounts for 19% of the total population. And Germany is as high as 61%! , more than 60% in the United States. The importance of e-commerce and digital advertising in this country is beyond doubt.

XIII. Jumia

It is the largest e-commerce retail company in Nigeria, a big African country, and its goal is to build a local "Amazon" to sell electronic products, clothing, refrigerators and other commodities. Nigeria has a population of about 160 million, but there are few e-commerce websites and the number of physical supermarkets and shopping malls is extremely limited, which provides a huge potential market for e-commerce companies. The number of Internet users in Nigeria has reached more than 40 million, and it is growing rapidly. Meanwhile, the demand for online shopping in Nigeria is increasing. In recent years, various e-commerce websites have sprung up in Nigeria, including food, drinks, real estate, tourism and mobile phone transfer services. The competition pattern of e-commerce dominated by Jumia, Konga and Dealdey is taking shape, and the "African version of Ctrip" Hotels.ng is also rapidly seizing the online travel market.

Xiv. Gmarket

Gmarket is the largest comprehensive shopping website in Korea, ranking first in the total sales value of goods in the online retail market in Korea, mainly selling books, MP3 players, cosmetics, computers, home appliances and clothes. On May 7th, 2010, ebay announced that it would set up a joint venture company in Gmarket, a Korean e-commerce company, with ebay contributing 10 million US dollars. The joint venture company will help Gmarket explore the Japanese and Singapore markets.

15. Sears (Sears)

Sears is the third largest merchant retailer in the United States, and the top 500 Internet retailers rank eighth. Gather more than 10,000 sellers and as many as 110 million products. It provides self-management, big sellers and various marketing modes in advertising alliance. Categories include electronic products, household goods, outdoor life, tools, fitness, toys and so on. The most popular categories are lawn and garden.

Xiao Bian feels that it is not that the biggest platform has the best effect, but to choose a platform suitable for your own market segments and products. Sometimes, it is often those local platforms that you have never known that get twice the result with half the effort!

The above content belongs to the author’s personal opinion and does not represent Hugo’s position!

Essay: Talk about "America can’t be trusted" in Iranian eyes.

  Xinhua News Agency, Tehran, September 21st: Talk about "America can’t be trusted" in the eyes of Iranians.

  Xinhua News Agency reporter Gao Wencheng

  Iranian President Leahy made it clear in an interview with the American media a few days ago: "We can’t trust the United States." This sentence is not only his personal opinion, but also the consensus of Iranian society. From a government spokesman to an ordinary librarian, Iranian society now widely believes that — — "the United States cannot be trusted."

  The formation of this social consensus is closely related to the United States’ treachery and arrogance on the comprehensive agreement on the Iranian nuclear issue. In July 2015, after 10 years of arduous negotiations, Iran reached the the Iranian nuclear deal with the United States, Britain, France, Russia, China and Germany. However, in 2018, despite the opposition of the international community, the United States unilaterally withdrew from the Iranian nuclear deal and once again held high the sanctions stick to "exert extreme pressure" on Iran.

This is the scene of the new round of political director-level meeting of the Joint Committee of the Iranian Nuclear Comprehensive Agreement, which was filmed in Vienna, Austria on June 12, 2021. Xinhua News Agency (Photo courtesy of the EU delegation in Vienna)

  The United States’ wanton breach of contract and indiscriminate sanctions have caused great harm to Iran’s development. After the Iranian nuclear deal was reached, the United States lifted sanctions against Iraq, and Iran’s daily average oil export once reached 2.5 million barrels, with a record economic growth rate of 13.6%. However, after the United States unilaterally broke the contract and re-imposed sanctions, Iran’s oil exports once plummeted to only 100,000 barrels per day, and the economy shrank sharply year after year.

  Affected by US sanctions, the Iranian currency Rial has depreciated sharply in just a few years. Before the sanctions were restarted, more than 30,000 rials could be exchanged for 1 US dollar, but now it takes 30 Wan Li rials to exchange for 1 US dollar. The import and production costs of Iranian goods have increased significantly, and the shortage of materials has led to soaring prices and difficult people’s livelihood. Since 2018, the overall price in Iran has increased by about 85%, and food prices have doubled. Many Iranian families can’t make ends meet, and their lives are very tight. During the Chinese New Year, many Iranian children can’t put on new clothes, and many housewives have to think about buying a piece of meat for half a day.

  The pain of people’s livelihood has caused Iranians to pay close attention to the Iranian nuclear talks and look forward to the early lifting of sanctions. However, the indirect negotiations between Iran and the United States on the Iranian nuclear deal’s resumption of performance have been going on for nearly a year and a half, with ups and downs in the middle, and no results have been achieved so far. The current U.S. government said one thing and did another. Although it verbally expressed its willingness to return to the Iranian nuclear deal, it inherited the previous government’s policy of "extreme pressure" on Iraq, and even during the negotiations, it continued to raise the threat tone and increase the sanctions against Iraq.

  The current American government’s words and deeds are different, which has deepened the Iranian society’s cognition that "the United States cannot be trusted." Leahy said that if Americans want to reach an agreement, "why should they impose new sanctions on Iran during the negotiation?" Because the United States reneges on its word and has a bad track record, Iran is now very cautious in negotiations. The Iranian side has repeatedly asked the US to make a guarantee that it will not violate the contract again. Mohammad Marandi, consultant of the Iranian negotiating team, made it clear that Iran believes that corresponding provisions should be set, and if the United States breaches the contract again, it must pay the price.

  Iranian society believes that "the United States cannot be trusted" is a silhouette of the increasing bankruptcy of American national credibility in the international arena. A number of polls show that the global influence of the United States is generally declining. In order to safeguard hegemonic self-interest, the United States has repeatedly broken the contract and "retired from the group" and provoked conflicts and confrontations. Although the United States often pretends to be so-called "democracy" and "human rights", it is hard to hide the evil consequences of its perverse actions on other countries and even the whole international community.

Dozens of dead birds fell from the sky! A rare scene on the streets of Russian cities leads netizens to speculate.

  Russian video screenshot today

  Overseas Network September 22ndAccording to the news of "Russia Today" on the 21st, some pictures and videos have been circulated on Russian social media platforms recently: a street in Barakovo is full of dead birds. This rare scene triggered a series of brain hole conjectures by netizens.

  According to reports, this incident occurred in Barakovo, Saratov State, southwestern Russia, which is famous for its large nuclear power plant. According to videos and pictures uploaded by Russian social media users, local residents witnessed the bodies of dozens of dead birds scattered on a road.

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  Source: Russia today

  Below the video, Russian netizens gave many conjectures about why dead birds fell from the sky. Some people blame it on natural phenomena, such as a strong wind or an accidental collision between two birds. Others think that fireworks and exhaust gas from factories may cause a large number of deaths, and some even say that it is related to 5G equipment, although this technology has not yet entered Russia.

  "At the beginning of the nuclear disaster TV series Chernobyl, all the birds died." A comment with the highest praise linked the incident to the American HBO hit drama. The animal medical department of Saratov State is currently investigating this incident, which some people think may be related to bird flu. (Overseas Network Zhang Qi)