【每日阅读训练第四期——速度越障17系列】【17-14】经管

杀G给猴看

Hi, everybody~ It's reading time! Enjoy!
Do not hesitate to contact me if you have any advice. : )

【PART I: SPEED】

Article 1: Don’t Multitask: Your Brain Will Thank You
By Issie Lapowsky April 17, 2013
(Check the title later)

【TIME 1】
The ability to juggle work is a standard job requirement.
Researchers have another name for this supposedly desirable skill, however: chronic multitasking.
If this sounds more like an affliction than a resumé booster, that’s because research has shown again and again that the human mind isn’t meant to multitask. Even worse, research shows that multitasking can have long-term harmful effects on brain function.
In a 2009 study, Stanford researcher Clifford Nass challenged 262 college students to complete experiments that involved switching among tasks, filtering irrelevant information, and using working memory. Nass and his colleagues expected that frequent multitaskers would outperform nonmultitaskers on at least some of these activities.
They found the opposite: Chronic multitaskers were abysmal at all three tasks. The scariest part: Only one of the experiments actually involved multitasking, signaling to Nass that even when they focus on a single activity, frequent multitaskers use their brains less effectively.
Multitasking is a weakness, not a strength. In 2010, a study by neuroscientists at the French medical research agency Inserm showed that when people focus on two tasks simultaneously, each side of the brain tackles a different task.
This suggests a two-task limit on what the human brain can handle. Taking on more tasks increases the likelihood of errors, so Nass suggests what he calls the 20-minute rule. Rather than switching tasks from minute to minute, dedicate a 20-minute chunk of time to a single task, then switch to the next one.
His second tip: “Don’t be a sucker for email.” The average professional spends about 23 percent of the day emailing, studies show. Inspired by that statistic, Gloria Mark of the University of California, Irvine, and her colleague Stephen Voida infiltrated an office, cut 13 employees off from email for five days, strapped heart monitors to their chests, and tracked their computer use. Not surprisingly, the employees were less stressed when cut off from email. They focused on one task for longer periods of time and switched screens less often, thereby minimizing multitasking.
Mark and Voida encourage business owners and their employees to check emails a few scheduled times per day and turn email notifications off the rest of the time. Adds Voida: “Quick questions are often better asked face to face or by phone, where they don’t add to the huge amount of email we’re already dealing with.”
【TIME 1 ENDS – 390 words】
Source: TIME
http://business.time.com/2013/04/17/dont-multitask-your-brain-will-thank-you/#ixzz2QmnJaFdp
This post is in partnership with Inc., which offers useful advice, resources, and insights to entrepreneurs and business owners. The article below was originally published at Inc.com.


Article 2: The Key to Creativity and Productivity
Here's why embracing healthy conflict within your team proves to be a necessary part of getting things done faster and better.
(Check the title later)

【TIME 2】
Brainstorming sessions often begin with the assertion that there's no such thing as a bad idea.
That sounds lovely in theory, but research has shown that it's lousy for productivity. Teams produce many more ideas when team members are encouraged to challenge one another in a debate setting, according to a 2004 study published in The European Journal of Social Psychology. When participants were instructed to debate, they produced far more solutions to a given problem than when they were instructed not to. The debate group also produced more ideas after the brainstorming session was over.
"Debate makes people diverge, so it reduces conformity," says co-author Jack Goncalo, a professor of organizational behavior at Cornell University. "It also fosters competition." Goncalo notes, however, that excessive competition can stifle productivity. "There's a point of diminishing return," he says. "A little bit of competition is good. Too much can get out of control."
That's particularly true when you have several dominant personalities on one team. Organizational psychologist Richard Ronay of VU University Amsterdam addressed this topic in a 2012 study on links between productivity and hierarchy.
Ronay and his team first conducted a manipulation to put some subjects into a high-power mindset and others into a low-power mindset. Some subjects were asked to describe a time when they held power over another individual. Others were told to write about a situation in which someone had power over them. A control group wrote about a trip to the supermarket.
The subjects were then divided into three types of groups: all high-power, all low-power, and a mix of high-power, low-power, and control subjects. The members of each group played a collaborative word game designed to show how well they worked together. It turned out that the mixed-power groups were nearly twice as productive as the high-power groups in any task that required collaboration.
The takeaway: Top performers won't necessarily work well as a team. Similar trends have been observed among NBA players and Wall Street analysts, two communities with fierce status competition and a preponderance of Type A personalities. "When you have too many star players on one team, it promotes status conflicts within the team, which kills the performance," says Ronay. "You can't have a group made up of all leaders. You need some people who are prepared to defer."
【TIME 2 ENDS – 387 words】
Source: http://www.inc.com/magazine/201304/issie-lapowsky/get-more-done-duke-it-out.html


Article 3: China local authority debt 'out of control'
By Simon Rabinovitch, FT.com
April 17, 2013 -- Updated 1115 GMT (1915 HKT)
(Check the title later)

STORY HIGHLIGHTS
•        A senior Chinese auditor has warned that local government debt is "out of control"
•        Zhang Ke said could spark a bigger financial crisis than the US housing market crash
•        His accounting firm, ShineWing, had all but stopped signing off on bond sales by local governments
•        It is rare for a figure as established as Mr Zhang to issue such a stark warning
(Check the content later)

【TIME 3】
(Financial Times) -- A senior Chinese auditor has warned that local government debt is "out of control" and could spark a bigger financial crisis than the US housing market crash.
Zhang Ke said his accounting firm, ShineWing, had all but stopped signing off on bond sales by local governments as a result of his concerns.
"We audited some local government bond issues and found them very dangerous, so we pulled out," said Mr Zhang, who is also vice-chairman of China's accounting association. "Most don't have strong debt servicing abilities. Things could become very serious."
The International Monetary Fund, rating agencies and investment banks have all raised concerns about Chinese government debt. But it is rare for a figure as established in the Chinese financial industry as Mr Zhang to issue such a stark warning.
"It is already out of control," Mr Zhang said. "A crisis is possible. But since the debt is being rolled over and is long-term, the timing of its explosion is uncertain."
Local government debts soared after 2008, when Beijing loosened borrowing constraints to soften the impact of the global financial crisis. Provinces, cities, counties and villages across China are now estimated to owe between Rmb10tn and Rmb20tn ($1.6tn and $3.2tn), equivalent to 20-40 per cent of the size of the economy.
Last week, Fitch cut China's sovereign credit rating, in the first such move by an international agency since 1999. On Tuesday, Moody's cut its outlook for China's rating from positive to stable.
Local governments are prohibited from directly raising debt, so they have used special purpose vehicles to circumvent these rules, issuing bonds under the vehicles' names to fund infrastructure projects.
Investment companies owned by local governments sold Rmb283bn of bonds in the first quarter of 2013, more than double the total for the same period last year. Such an increase would normally be expected to boost the economy, but China's growth unexpectedly slowed to 7.7 per cent in the first quarter of 2013.
【TIME 3 ENDS – 329 words】

【TIME 4】
Mr Zhang said many local governments had invested in projects from public squares to road repairs that were generating lacklustre returns, and so were relying on financing rollovers to pay back their creditors. "The only thing you can do is issue new debt to repay the old," he said. "But there will be some day down the line when this can't go on."
Mr Zhang added that he grew alarmed when smaller towns and counties discovered that investment vehicle bonds were an easy way to raise financing. "This evolution was quite frightening," he said. "China has more than 2,800 counties. If every county issued debt, it could lead to a crisis. It could be even bigger than the US housing crisis."
Beijing has taken steps to control bond issuance by the local governments' investment companies. In December, the finance ministry barred them from injecting public assets such as hospitals and schools into the special purpose vehicles they use to sell bonds.
Bonds issued by government-owned investment companies almost always receive top-tier credit ratings from domestic agencies because they are seen as being guaranteed by the provinces and cities that back them. But Mr Zhang puts little faith in official guarantees, saying ShineWing only audited bonds if it was very clear that borrowers were able to make repayments: "When the time comes, it won't be the government that assumes responsibility. It will be the accounting firms and the banks that do."
ShineWing's caution is an example of how an elite group of Chinese accounting firms are trying to establish reputations as responsible, well-managed entities capable of challenging the global Big Four in the industry. ShineWing has been the most aggressive Chinese firm in expanding abroad and is now planning a move into Europe.
【TIME 4 ENDS – 292 words】
Source: CNN
http://edition.cnn.com/2013/04/16/business/china-local-debt/index.html?hpt=ibu_c2


Article 4: How might your choice of browser affect your job prospects?
Apr 10th 2013, 23:50 by E.H.
(Check the title later)

【TIME 5】
THE internet browser you are using to read this blog post could help a potential employer decide whether or not you would do well at a job. How might your choice of browser affect your job prospects?
When choosing among job applicants, employers may be swayed by a range of factors, knowingly and unknowingly. In one experiment, attractive women who included photos of themselves with their curricula vitae, for example, were less likely to be offered an interview than those who did not. Recruiters may also frown upon messy handwriting, body piercings and tattoos, even though these have no bearing on people's ability to do particular jobs. Psychometric tests claim to offer an alternative to these methods of selection by measuring a candidate's personality objectively. And yet such tests are as likely to mislead as to inform.
Evolv, a company that monitors recruitment and workplace data, has suggested that there are better ways to identify the right candidate for job. It analysed 3m data points from over 30,000 employees, comparing traits of applicants with those of existing employees, to determine which traits are most indicative of reliability, trustworthiness and suitability for particular jobs. Among other things, its analysis found that those applicants who have bothered to install new web browsers on their computers (such as Mozilla's Firefox or Google's Chrome) perform better and stay in their posts for 15% longer, on average, than those who use the default pre-installed browser that came with their machine (ie, Internet Explorer on a Windows PC and Safari on an Apple Mac). This may simply be a coincidence, but Evolv's analysts reckon that applicants' willingness to go to the trouble of installing a new browser shows decisiveness, a valuable trait in a potential employee.
【TIME 5 ENDS – 290 words】

(The rest)
Another of Evolv's findings was that applicants who belonged to one or two online social networks tended to stay in their jobs for longer than those who belonged to four or more social networks. And working with Xerox, a printer-maker, Evolv determined that the one of the best predictors of whether an employee will stick with a job is (less surprisingly) if he lives nearby and can get to work easily. Collectively, such findings suggest that algorithms and analysis of "big data" can provide a powerful tool to help employers sift through job applications. They might also make things fairer, by taking the personal prejudices of recruiters out of the equation. The challenge is to ensure that algorithms do not inadvertently introduce new biases. In the meantime, you might want to consider installing a new web browser.
(137 words)
Source: Economist
http://www.economist.com/blogs/economist-explains/2013/04/economist-explains-how-browser-affects-job-prospects

【PART II: OBSTACLE】

Article 5: Mining digital gold
Even if it crashes, Bitcoin may make a dent in the financial world
Apr 13th 2013 |From the print edition
(Check the title later)

IN 1999 an 18-year-old called Shawn Fanning changed the music industry for ever. He developed a service, Napster, that allowed individuals to swap music files with one another, instead of buying pricey compact discs from record labels. Lawsuits followed and in July 2001 Napster was shut down. But the idea lives on, in the form of BitTorrent and other peer-to-peer filesharers; the Napster brand is still used by a legal music-downloading service.
The story of Napster helps to explain the excitement about Bitcoin, a digital currency, that is based on similar technology. In January a unit of Bitcoin cost around $15 (Bitcoins can be broken down to eight decimal places for small transactions). By the time The Economistwent to press on April 11th, it had settled at $179, taking the value of all Bitcoins in circulation to $2 billion. Bitcoin has become one of the world’s hottest investments, a bubble inflated by social media, loose capital in search of the newest new thing and perhaps even by bank depositors unnerved by recent events in Cyprus.
Just like Napster, Bitcoin may crash but leave a lasting legacy. Indeed, the currency experienced a sharp correction on April 10th—at one point losing close to half of its value before recovering sharply (see chart). Yet the price is the least interesting thing about Bitcoin, says Tony Gallippi, founder of BitPay, a firm that processes Bitcoin payments for merchants. More important is the currency’s ability to make e-commerce much easier than it is today.
Bitcoin is not the only digital currency, nor the only successful one. Gamers on Second Life, a virtual world, pay with Linden Dollars; customers of Tencent, a Chinese internet giant, deal in QQ Coins; and Facebook sells “Credits”. What makes Bitcoin different is that, unlike other online (and offline) currencies, it is neither created nor administered by a single authority such as a central bank.
Instead, “monetary policy” is determined by clever algorithms. New Bitcoins have to be “mined”, meaning users can acquire them by having their computers compete to solve complex mathematical problems (the winners get the virtual cash). The coins themselves are simply strings of numbers. They are thus a completely decentralised currency: a sort of digital gold.
Bitcoin’s inventor, Satoshi Nakamoto, is a mysterious hacker (or a group of hackers) who created it in 2009 and disappeared from the internet some time in 2010. The currency’s early adopters have tended to be tech-loving libertarians and gold bugs, determined to break free of government control. The most infamous place where Bitcoin is used is Silk Road, a marketplace hidden in an anonymised part of the web called Tor. Users order goods—typically illegal drugs—and pay with Bitcoins.
Some legal businesses have started to accept Bitcoins. Among them are Reddit, a social-media site, and WordPress, which provides web hosting and software for bloggers. The appeal for merchants is strong. Firms such as BitPay offer spot-price conversion into dollars. Fees are typically far less than those charged by credit-card companies or banks, particularly for orders from abroad. And Bitcoin transactions cannot be reversed, so frauds cannot leave retailers out of pocket.
Yet for Bitcoins to go mainstream much has to happen, says Fred Ehrsam, the co-developer of Coinbase, a Californian Bitcoin exchange and “wallet service”, where users can store their digital fortune. Getting hold of Bitcoins for the first time is difficult. Using them is fiddly. They can be stolen by hackers or just lost, like dollar bills in a washing machine. Several Bitcoin exchanges have suffered thefts and crashes over the past two years.

Ripple effects
As a result, the Bitcoin business has consolidated. The leading exchange is Mt.Gox. Based in Tokyo and run by two Frenchmen, it processes around 80% of Bitcoin-dollar trades. If such a business failed, the currency would be cut off at the knees. In fact, the price hiccup on April 10th was sparked by a software breakdown at Mt.Gox, which panicked many Bitcoin users. The currency’s legal status is unclear, too. On March 18th the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, an American government agency, proposed to regulate Bitcoin exchanges; this suggests that the agency is unlikely to shut them down.
Technical problems will also have to be overcome, says Mike Hearn, a Bitcoin expert. As more users join the network, the amount of data that has to circulate among them (to verify ownership of each Bitcoin) gets bigger, which slows the system down. Technical fixes could help but they are hard to deploy: all users must upgrade their Bitcoin wallet and mining software. Mr Hearn worries that the currency could grow too fast for its own good.
But the real threat is competition. Bitcoin-boosters like to point out that, unlike fiat money, new Bitcoins cannot be created at whim. That is true, but a new digital currency can be. Alternatives are already in development. Litecoin, a Bitcoin clone, is one. So far it is only used by a tiny hard-core of geeks, but it too has shot up in price of late. Rumour has it that Litecoin will be tradable on Mt.Gox soon.
A less nerdy alternative is Ripple. It will be much easier to use than Bitcoin, says Chris Larsen, a serial entrepreneur from Silicon Valley and co-founder of OpenCoin, the start-up behind Ripple. Transactions are approved (or not) in a few seconds, compared with the ten minutes a typical Bitcoin trade takes to be confirmed. There is no mystery about the origins of Ripple nor (yet) any association with criminal or other dubious activities.
OpenCoin is expected to start handing out Ripples to the public in May. It has created 100 billion, a number it promises never to increase. To give the new currency momentum, OpenCoin plans eventually to give away 75% of the supply. Existing Bitcoin users can already claim free Ripples and eventually anyone opening an OpenCoin account will also receive some.
The 25% retained by OpenCoin will give it a huge incentive to make sure that the Ripple is strong: the higher its value, the bigger the reward for OpenCoin’s investors when the firm cashes out. On April 10th several blue-chip venture-capital firms, including the ultra-hip Andreessen Horowitz, announced that they had invested in OpenCoin.
If Ripple gains traction, even bigger financial players may enter the fray. A firm such as Visa could create its own cheap instant international-payments system, notes BitPay’s Mr Gallippi. And what if a country were to issue algorithmic money?
At that point Bitcoin would probably be bust. But if that happened, its creators would have achieved something like Mr Fanning. Napster and other file-sharing services have forced the music industry to embrace online services such as iTunes or Spotify. Bitcoin’s price may collapse; its users may suddenly switch to another currency. But the chances are that some form of digital money will make a lasting impression on the financial landscape.
【OBSTACLE ENDS – 1146 words】
Source: Economist
http://www.economist.com/news/finance-and-economics/21576149-even-if-it-crashes-bitcoin-may-make-dent-financial-world-mining-digital

杀G给猴看

WORD LIST
今天的文章偏长了些，但是单词不多啦~~大部分也不难，加油加油~

1.      juggle  英['dʒʌg(ə)l] 美['dʒʌɡl]  vi. 玩杂耍；欺骗；歪曲  vt. 歪曲；欺骗  n. 玩戏法；欺骗

2.      chronic  英['krɒnɪk] 美['krɑnɪk]  adj. 慢性的；长期的；习惯性的

3.      affliction  英[ə'flɪkʃ(ə)n] 美  n. 苦难；苦恼；折磨

4.      abysmal  英[ə'bɪzm(ə)l] 美[ə'bɪzməl]  adj. 深不可测的；糟透的；极度的

5.      infiltrate  英['ɪnfɪltreɪt] 美[ɪn'fɪltret]  vt. 使潜入；使渗入，使浸润  vi. 渗入  n. 渗透物

6.      diverge  英[daɪ'vɜːdʒ; dɪ-] 美[daɪ'vɝdʒ]  vi. 分歧；偏离；分叉；离题  vt. 使偏离；使分叉

7.      stifle  英['staɪf(ə)l] 美['staɪfl]  vt. 扼杀；使窒息；藏匿  vi. 窒息；被扼杀

8.      preponderance  英[prɪ'pɒnd(ə)r(ə)ns] 美[prɪ'pɑndərəns]  n. 优势；多数；占优势

9.      stark  英[stɑːk] 美[stɑrk]  adj. 完全的；荒凉的；刻板的；光秃秃的；朴实的  adv. 完全；明显地；突出地；质朴地

10.   circumvent  英[sɜːkəm'vent] 美[,sɝkəm'vɛnt]  vt. 包围；陷害；绕行

11.   lackluster ['læk,lʌstə]  adj. 无光泽的；无生气的  n. 无光泽；无生气

12.   anonymize[ə'nɒnɪmaɪz]  隐去姓名资料，使匿名

13.   fiddly  英['fɪdlɪ] 美['fɪdli]  adj. 需要手巧的，要求高精度的

14.   hiccup  英['hɪkʌp] 美['hɪkəp]  n. 打嗝  vi. 打嗝  vt. 呃逆着（或间断地）说出

15.   ripple  英['rɪp(ə)l] 美['rɪpl]  n. 波纹；涟漪；[物] 涟波  vi. 起潺潺声  vt. 在…上形成波痕

16.   deploy  英[dɪ'plɒɪ] 美[dɪ'plɔɪ]  vt. 配置；展开；使疏开  vi. 部署；展开  n. 部署

17.   fiat  英['fiːæt; 'faɪæt] 美['faɪæt]  n. 命令；许可；政法  vt. 批准；颁布

18.   whim  英[wɪm] 美[wɪm]  n. 奇想；一时的兴致；怪念头；幻想

19.   dubious  英['djuːbɪəs] 美['dubɪəs]  adj. 可疑的；暧昧的；无把握的；半信半疑的

20.   momentum  英[mə'mentəm] 美[mo'mɛntəm]  n. 势头；[物] 动量；动力；冲力

铁板神猴

e sofa......

1'53''
1'48''
1'32''
1'38''
1'32''
30''

5'52''

vividlai

1-1'56
multitasking is not a good habbit, it may do some harm, when shift from on task to another, you need a 20minutes break for your brain
dealing with 2 tasks simultaneously will reduce your efficiency
some companies put a ban on email using for their employees, which reduces their stresses and makes them focus on one task

2-2'01
a new study shows that moderate competition will promote people's creativity and productivity, but too much competitions will make things go out of control
researchers had done an experiment showed that there is link between productivity and hierarchy, a mixed power group can perform better than other kinds of group, since those who are stars and experts in one fields may not collaborate successfully, a group needs to have mixed power people to do better, a group needs someone to deter

3-1'50
a famous auditor said that the debt of local government is going out of control, his company has stopped signing off bonds sales by local government
many companies do not have the debt serving abilities, it is unknown when the explosion will start exactly
local governments circumvents the rules to issue bonds

4-1'38
if every towns issue bonds , China will undergo great financial crisis like American housing crisis
Beijing has taken some measures to control the bonds issue

5-1'33
employer choose their employees in many differnt ways, even though something they consider may not affect one's ability
a study shows that who install new browsers on their computer can perform better than those who use default browsers

obstacle
6'24
in the past Shawn Fanning opened a firm to let people share the musics without buying discs, called Napster, which is forced to closed down in 2001, but its idea lives on
Bitcoin is based on this idea, it used to buy online services, and there are digital currency all over the world such as QQ coins in China
but they can be mined by hackers, and nowadays more online ecommerce accept Bitcoins
and Bitcoin also faces competition, such as Lincoin and Ripples

今天文章很有趣~

超级无敌小鹤鹤

第一次离猴布斯这么近！

杀G给猴看

这次手慢了………………居然让出来这么多楼TT
顺便瞻仰楼上猴布斯以及鹤布斯……………………（怎么听起来好像动物园的样子……= =）

晓野的野

2:40
2:32
2:44
1:59
2:14
8:07
还是觉得生单词好多，==，少壮不努力，老大背单词。
1 多重工作效率低→实验证明→建议少check emails
2 teamwork中bad idea 也是好的→促进竞争有助于提高效率→实验证明→NBA中不能全是leader
3 讲政府债务 out of control的事情，以及对中国经济的影响。
4 投资项目中的问题→北京的措施→债务中的隐患。
5 How might your choice of browser affect your job prospects? 原来考察的方面。后来考察的两个方面。
6 音乐产业历史的改变→上个故事用来解释Bitcoin→B的影响→B的不同→B的产生→B的business→B的弊端。
  ripple effects→B中存在的问题（法律、技术、竞争）→例子→未来展望。

zcdzheng

01:55
Multitask is not as good as people though before.It makes the brain less effective. People should switch task not frequently and check the email a few scheduled times per days.
02:05
It will produce more idea to make the team have a little competition
01:50
01:35
The local government debt is too much,which is very dangerous. These debt began at 2008 when the government loosened borrowing constraints. And now the government wants to solve the problem by selling bonds.
01:18
According to the analysis, the employees who install the new browers perform better than those who use the default browers.

09:10
MI:Bitcoin may disappear but the legacy will continue.
Structure:
1,Bitcoin develops very well and the price increases from 15 to 179. It make the e-commerce much easier. The difference between Bitcoin and others is that there is no the centerd association to manage.It can be mined by make computer sovle the complex math problem.And some legal agency begin to accept it. However, bitcoin is likely to be stolen.
2,it face some problems. There are many competitors such as Ripple. And some tech problems should be solved.
记笔记还是很有用啊！！！

kimwang53

占占坐坐

ywxkdxh

2'28
2'17
2'00
1'51
1'43
8'18
B is a digital currency. It has experienced bubble and crush.
>what makes it different from others is that it is completely decentralised.
>many problems are needed to solve for the development of B. And the real threat is the competition from the Ripple.
>B may be bust, but some form of digital money will have a lasting influence on the financial landscape.