As I’m rushing through my final week, let me share about the E-commerce course I took this semester—our instructor commissioned two optional topics for its final thesis. Thinking about them is some fun exercise: Analyze the difference between e-commerce and traditional commerce in terms of product flow mechanisms—discuss your understanding of e-commerce risk management specific measures. How to solve problems when (i) platforms abuse the use of big data technology, for example, to conduct price discrimination; and (ii) platforms abuse their market power to limit seller’s multi-homing behavior and force exclusive commitment. How will the innovation of the third-party logistics models solve the problem of “the last kilometer fulfillment”? How does the development of e-commerce circulation promote the solution of the problem of insufficient and unbalanced development in China? Please elaborate via examples. Enjoy🤯.

Here’s a gift to all for 2025’s beginning. It’s going to be a fun year. Will be to arrive where we started, and know the place for the first time. What we call the beginning is often the end. And to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where to start from. — T.S. Eliot, Little Gidding.

Snippet from the press conference of National Health Commission of China, Dec. 25, 2024 (full transcript in Chinese available here). The reporter inquired the credibility of data related to mental psychology circulating on the Internet. (Xie Bin, Party Secretary of Shanghai Mental Health Centre) [There has been] rumours that the prevalence of depression among teenagers has reached 15%-20%. According to the results of epidemiological surveys by authoritative institutions, in fact, the prevalence of depression among adolescents in China is only about 2%. ...

My home university has a course that teaches intermediate-level Excel operations, made mandatory to all undergrads. On paper it looks great: you learn how to import and summarize data, create dynamic charts, and solve simple models for things like inventory or investment management. The course has a strong reputation, and many alumni speak highly of it. source: xkcd comics But here’s my take: for computer science major waste 64 hours of precious course load to teach skill that is key to non-promotable work which is going to be replaced by AI very soon. ...

A serie of works about incentives for early arrival: Ge, Yaoxin, et al. “Incentives for Early Arrival in Cooperative Games.” Proceedings of the 23rd International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems. 2024. Zhang, Junyu, et al. “Incentives for Early Arrival in Cost Sharing.” Proceedings of the 24rd International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems. 2025. The gem is because the problem is taken online. I’m surprised that algorithmic game theorists took the problem first before economists. It’s an interesting and exciting line of work and I look forward to its follow-ups.

The most performed ballet is Nutcracker. Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy gets 41M views on YouTube (here). Of course, Swan Lake is more famous. But Swan Lake requires excessive technique and giant production of a medium-large ballet company, whereas for Nutcracker, almost any area of US or Europe will have one, two, or four different productions of The Nutcracker at Christmastime—and Shanghai as well. ...

It’s that time of year again—graduate-entrance exams have just wrapped up, and for many people around me it’s a moment of reflection (or panic) as they contemplate what comes next. Amidst the usual stress and sleepless nights, another topic has quietly stirred debates among the community of exam-takers: the rise of so-called IQ-booster pills. Yes I’m talking about Methylphenidate—aka Ritalin. Real Quick Fact Check: ADHD, Ritalin, and Neurotransmitters For those unfamiliar, Ritalin is a prescription-only medication primarily used to treat ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder). It works by modulating dopamine and norepinephrine levels in specific parts of the brain, calming overactivity to help those with ADHD focus better. ...

if it doesn’t open click here An official upgraded version will be released soon. Or you can view a preliminary version here.

Right before Christmans, Ariana Grande released a live performance video of “Santa Tell Me” as part of the Eternal Sunshine live sessions. The song was originally released Nov. 24, 2014. So this is essentially the 10th year anniversary version. watch the performance here on YouTube

Nature’s take on poster design: snapshot of the article. toggle light mode on top left corder so that the text would be readable. read the full article here. https://aritang.github.io/files/ariana_tang_cv.pdf The scientific poster remains a crucial currency for communication and connection….Researchers now have access to an array of high-end graphics software — and the ‘how to make a poster’ conversation has been going on for years (see Nature 483, 113–115; 2012)…. Yet, researchers often slap posters together at the last minute instead of thinking about the best ways to deliver their message and engage their audience. ...