Questões de Concursos Inglês

Snacking at the Colosseum? Prepare to Pay a Fine

Dapper as always in their bleached white shirts and matching caps, members of Rome"s municipal police force were out on the Spanish Steps one warm autumn day, trolling for offenders.

"Stefano, look! There"s another eater," one officer said to another before sauntering over to a baffled couple who had begun munching on an inoffensive-looking meai while sitting on the steps. The culprits, a couple of foreign tourists, had settled down on the landmark, one of Rome"s most famous. In their hands were the offending items: sandwiches.

The officers pounced, and after much waving of hands, the couple wrapped up the sandwiches and slouched away, looking sheepish.

They were in violation unwittingly, in ali probability - of a municipal ordinance that went into force this month. The measure outlaws eating and drinking in areas of "particular historie, artistic, architectonic and cultural value" in Rome"s center, to better protect the city"s monuments, which include landmarks like the Colosseum, the Pantheon and the Spanish Steps. Fines range ali the way up to $650 for culinary recidivists.

Italian cities, Rome included, have long enacted ordinances and regulations to protect monuments from ill- mannered tourists (and residents). But after a recent stroll through the city center, where he saw several people making themselves at home, literally, Rome"s mayor, Gianni Alemanno, decided the rules needed toughening.

"There were people camped out, and we weren"t able to move them," said Antonio Gazzellone, the municipal council member responsible for tourism, noting that alcohol may have been involved. The new ordinance, which also outlaws camping or "setting up makeshift beds," will "give monuments back their proper decorum," he said. "Rome needs to be protected, its beauty respected."

(http://www.nytimes.com)

                                               Selecting the Olympic Sports

   Is blue growth the beginning or end of a healthier ocean?

March 17th 2015

Across the globe, countries are increasingly looking seaward in search of new economic opportunities, including oil, gas, and mineral extraction from the sea floor, renewable energy development, and biotechnology.
The push to expand this so-called “blue economy" comes at a time when the ecological health of the oceans is seriously degraded. Last year, the Economist"s World Ocean Summit concluded with a resounding consensus that more needs to be done to protect and restore the world"s seas, especially the high seas. Will blue growth help or harm efforts to achieve a healthier ocean ecosystem?
The U.N. has proposed ambitious sustainable development goals relating to ocean health. They include reducing pollution from agriculture run-off, decreasing untreated sewage and solid waste, rebuilding depleted fish stocks, and protecting and restoring natural habitats.
A healthy ocean ecosystem is a public good—both locally and globally. Mangroves, corals, and salt marshes protect  coastal towns from storms. Oceans store carbon and produce oxygen that benefits us all. And areas of high biodiversity support global fisheries and are essential for resilient and productive oceans.
These natural benefits can remain intact if nations encourage—and even require—participants in the blue economy to reinvest the economic capital created from that economy in the natural capital of marine and coastal ecosystems; namely by restoring degraded habitats, protecting healthy ones, and financing blue economy “greening" efforts.
Channeling the new wealth of a growing blue economy into projects that will build a healthier ocean will require new financial tools. For instance, a global ocean trust fund, eco taxes, or user fees could be managed at the global level (say the U.N., World Bank, or the Global Environmental Facility) or even at a regional level, perhaps through existing regional seas organisations.
But for now the blue economy needs to aim higher than merely to do no harm. Converting blue economic capital into blue natural capital can raise all boats and produce a healthier, more sustainable blue economy.

                       (http://www.economistinsights.com/opinion/blue-growth-beginning-or-endhealthier-ocean)

                                                          Back to School

How to dig out from the information avalanche
Majority of workers feel overwhelmed by deluge of data, survey finds
By Eve Tahmincioglu updated 8:18 p.m. ET March 16, 2008

Don"t expect Shaun Osher, the CEO of Core Group Marketing in New York, to answer your e-mail right away. He has stopped responding to e-mails every minute and only checks his e-mail account twice a day. He also started turning off his BlackBerry during meetings. This tactic has made him so much more productive that earlier this year he held a meeting with his staff of 50 and "strongly suggested" that they stop relying so heavily on e-mail and actually start calling clients on the phone. And, he requested his employees put cell phones and PDAs on silent mode during meetings, as well as curtail the common practice of cc-ing everybody when sending out an e-mail. "There was so much redundancy, so much unnecessary work," he explains. "One person could handle an issue that should take two minutes, but when an email goes out and five people get cc-ed, then everybody responds to it and there"s a snowball effect." It"s not that Osher has anything against technology. In fact, he loves it. The problem is, last year he realized he was inundated with so many e-mails and so much information in general that he began to experience data overload. "In the beginning, e-mail and all this data was a great phenomenon, revolutionizing what we do. But the pendulum has swung way too much to the other side," he maintains. "We"re less productive." Osher isn"t the only one out there under a data avalanche. Thanks to technological innovations, you can be talking to a customer on your cell phone, answering a LinkedIn invitation on your laptop, and responding to email on your PDA all at the same time. Besides, during tough economic times, who will want to miss any information when your job could be on the line if you indulge in the luxury of being offline? Turns out, seven out of 10 office workers in the United States feel overwhelmed by information in the workplace, and more than two in five say they are headed for a data "breaking point," according to a recently released Workplace Productivity Survey. Mike Walsh, CEO of LexisNexis U.S. Legal Markets, says there are a host of reasons we"re all on the information brink: "exponential growth of the size of the information "haystack," the immensity and immediacy of digital communications, and the fact that professionals are not being provided with sufficient tools and training to help them keep pace with the growing information burden." Ellen Kossek, a professor from Michigan State, believes we are less productive in this age of 24-7 technology, and our multitasking mentality has spawned a "not-mentallypresent" society. "We"re becoming an attention-deficit disorder society switching back and forth like crazy," Kossek says. "We"re connected all the time. We"re working on planes, in coffee shops, working on the weekends. Work is very seductive, but yet we"re actually less effective." The key to getting your head above the data flood, according to workplace experts, is managing and reducing the information you"re bombarded with.

© 2008 MSNBC Interactive - (slightly adapted) http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23636252/

When I talk with librarians about thinking of themselves as designers, sometimes they demur. "Designer? I cant even draw a stick figure!" But you dont need to. Whether you know it or not, youre already a designer.

Every time librarians create a bookmark, decide to house a collection in a new spot, or figure out how a new service
might work, theyre making design decisions. This is what I like to call design by neglect or unintentional design. Whether library employees wear name tags is a design decision. The length of loan periods and whether or not you charge fines is a design decision. Anytime you choose how people will interact with your library, youre making a design decision. All of these decisions add up to create an experience, good or bad, for your patrons.

When we are mindful of our roles as library experience designers, we can make more informed design choices. This awareness can provide better experiences for our patrons and demonstrate that we care about them.

Really. People will notice, [CONJUNCTION] not necessarily consciously, if we [VERB] the time to think about them when were developing our services. The secret here is not to think of library patrons, users, or customers: we need to think of people. We need to consider their lives and what theyre trying to accomplish. This act, which can only be done by cultivating the skill of empathy, is the most important ? and perhaps the most difficult ? part of user experience design.

(Adapted from http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6713142.html?nid=2673&source=title&rid=1105906703)