Just a few days after Valentine’s Day, Tinder and the French NGO A voté made their cooperation official, “to match Generation Z with voting”. The partnership kicked off on Thursday and will run through April 8 – two days before the first round of France’s presidential elections – and has one goal: to get more French youths to cast their votes. The slogan is catchy too: “If you can date down your street … You can vote down your street.”

In practice this means that, from now on, French Tinder users will see election ads pop up as they swipe the app to look out for potential love interests.

A recent survey showed that 59 percent of French 18- to 30-year-olds who are already registered to vote plan to abstain(弃权) in the first round of the elections. Seeing that 50 percent of Tinder’s users belong to this very age group, “this partnership represents a great opportunity to raise awareness as much as possible,” co-president of A voté Flore Blondel-Goupil said.

One of the main reasons for France’s high youth abstention rates, however, is not a lack of interest but rather outdated or incorrect paperwork. A registration is invalid when a voter's polling station does not correspondent with their actual place of residence. This is a particularly common problem for young people, who often leave their parents’ homes to pursue studies elsewhere.

Studies show that having an incorrect voting registration address triples the risk of abstention. In 2017, 7.6 million French people were incorrectly registered, with 25- to 29-year-olds accounting for 51 percent of them. Adding to that, between 3 and 4 million French people were not registered to vote at all.

This is not the first time Tinder has helped countries fight voter abstention: It did so in Brazil in 2018, the United Kingdom in 2019, the United States in 2020 and Germany in 2021.

One third of adults over 65 in America have never used the Internet, and half don’t even have Internet access at home. In San Francisco, “the center of technology”, 40% of older adults do not have basic digital literacy skills.

This situation is becoming appalling as over 10,000 Americans turn 65 every single day. By 2050, 22% of Americans will be 65 or older. Meanwhile, technology is developing very fast. This means that a large number of people will be unable to proficiently use emergent technology.

Many people believe that seniors aren’t required to participate in our technological future because they’ll be retired and relaxed soon. But this is the farthest thing from the truth. Baby boomers are currently experiencing a different boom: With more people getting older than ever before, their life expectancies (寿命) are also increasing dramatically. With medical advancements, the number of American people projected to live into their 90’s has doubled since 1965.

However, they don’t have strong financial or educational support. It is not a problem, it’s a crisis. More than half of employees over 50 have been laid off in what’s being called “forced retirement”. And few organizations are actively helping older employees make the transition from full-time jobs to part-time ones. For those fortunate enough to be employed, 3 out of 5 older workers experience prejudice.

The easiest solution is to teach digital literacy. If they want to survive the forthcoming retirement crisis, they should get enough digital knowledge and skills to operate today’s tools and tomorrow’s platforms. With every crisis comes an opportunity. Tutoring, customer service, editing, research, book-keeping, and other virtual assistance-based work open the doors. But again, digital knowledge is first required to live in our high-tech society and growing economy. So try to get more online and navigate the growing number of sites and apps.

More and more people around the world are getting tattoos (纹身). In the United States a large number of people aged 25 to 40 get tattoos. A third of all Americans between 18 and 25 have a tattoo. In Britain a fifth of all adults are tattooed. Tattooing has become an important industry as well. Today, there are more than 50,000 tattoo artists in the US alone.

Even famous people such as Angelina Jolie and David Beckham have some kind of tattoo on their bodies. According to researchers many people tattoo themselves as a sign of individuality (个性). They want to express themselves and show others who they are. Other forms of body art are also on the rise.

Today, tattoos are widely accepted in society. That hasn’t always been the case. Tattoos used to be connected with criminals (罪犯), lower class people or certain groups like sailors and motorcycle gangs. While tattooing was once only for men, more and more women are now getting tattoos.

Tattooing goes way back in history. In many parts of the world, people used tattoos for different purposes. The ancient Romans tattooed their slaves. Native Americans tattooed themselves as a sign of bravery. N Nazi Germany Jews were marked with a number to tell who they were.

Not only has tattooing itself become a big industry, but removing them is also on the increase. Many people just don’t realize that a tattoo lasts forever and at some time in their lives they may want to get rid of it. The cost of tattooing yourself usually depends on how large the tattoo is or how complex (复杂的) it is. Prices are usually from a hundred to over a thousand dollars.