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Zinc ions are very toxic to fish and many things that live in water.
Zebra
Zebras are mammals of the family "Equidae". Zebras are African horses. They are in the same genus as the common horse, "Equus caballus", and donkeys. Zebras are known for having many black and white stripes. There are three main species of zebra, Grevy's Zebra, the Plains Zebra, and the Mountain Zebra.
All zebras have very short fur because they live in hot areas. Their fur has black and white stripes. The main part of the body has mostly vertical stripes, and the legs have horizontal stripes. They also have a dark line directly down their spine. Each of the different zebra species has different type of stripes. Each zebra has a unique pattern.
Despite many attempts, we do not really know what the advantage is of having those characteristic stripes. There are different species and sub-species of zebra, and they all have stripes so, think scientists, it must be important.
Zebras are social animals that spend time in herds, they graze together and sometimes even groom each other. They can have babies (foals) when they are about five years old and can have one every year. Zebras mainly eat grass, but they also eat fruit, leaves and some vegetables. They always live near water and are an endangered species.
Zebras live in Africa, south of the Sahara desert.
Zoo
A zoological garden, zoological park, or zoo is a place where many different species types of animals are kept so people can see and watch them.
Modern zoos try not only to be for people's entertainment, but for education, research, and the conservation and protection of animals. Many zoos are centers where rare animals are preserved when they are in danger of dying out. These modern zoos also want to give the animals a natural life, so that they are healthy and behave normal. This is done for the animals, but also that people can see the animals as if they were in nature, and not in a zoo.
Zoos cost money. They educate the public on the biological diversity that makes up the world. They help people and wildlife successfully coexist. They pursue continuing research and education for people. They preserve crucial natural resources. They work to ensure zoos can provide the most natural environment possible for wildlife in its care. Without enough money they cannot do these things.
Many zoos are not like the modern type of zoo. There the animals are held in bad conditions. They are kept in small cages, and they are bored and get sick.
There are different types of zoo all over the world. They are:
A safari park is a type of zoo where visitors can drive their own vehicles or ride in vehicles given by the park to see the animals. Sometimes, visitors can feed the animals through the car windows. The first safari park was Whipsnade Park in Bedfordshire, England. It was opened by the Zoological Society of London in 1931.
A public aquarium is a type of zoo which has lots of aquatic animals and plants for people to see. Most public aquariums have very large tanks. They may also have smaller tanks. The first public aquariums were made in the mid-19th century.
A petting zoo is a type of zoo that has domestic animals and some wild animals that are very calm so that the visitors can touch and feed them. Most petting zoos usually have very calm herbivorous domesticated animals, such as: sheep, goats, pigs, rabbits or ponies, to feed and touch them safely. Few petting zoos have wild animals (such as pythons or baby big cats) touch. These are rare and usually found outside Western countries.
An animal theme park is a combination of a theme park and a zoo. It mainly built for entertainment, amusement, and commercial reasons. Many animal theme parks combine theme park elements, like entertainment and amusement rides, with zoo elements such as live animals kept inside cages so that visitors can see them.
Copyright
With copyright, a work can only be copied if the owner gives permission. If someone copies a work without permission, the owner can say they infringed their copyright. When this happens, the owner may sue for the amount that should have been paid. Most cases are handled by civil law. In more serious cases, a person who copies a work that is protected under copyright could be arrested, fined or even go to prison. Commonly, the copy-right law will protect the authors and their heirs from 50 to 100 years since the first day of the authors' deaths.
In many countries, the governments tried to modify copyright law to meet international standards. However, there are still some differences, according to the law culture each country. In some countries, someone violating copyright law will be sued only to the civil law courts but other countries they can also be charged by criminal courts.
Copyright was originally made in the 18th century for books. Before printing presses were made, books could only be copied by hand, which would take time. But when printing presses were made, books could be copied faster and easier. Because of this, some books were copied by people who did not own the book themselves. So lawmakers gave only owners the right to copy. National laws were somewhat standardized by international treaties.
Because technology got better over time, copyright began to cover other types of media such as pictures, sound, and film. Commonly, copyright violation warning would be shown at the beginning of the media to warn audiences against violating copyright law.
In most countries, authors automatically own the copyright to any work they make or create, as long as they do not give the copyright to someone else.
In most countries, there is no need to register the copyright, and some countries do not even have procedures to register copyrights. But, where registration is available, many authors register anyway, especially for works that are sold for money. That is because registration helps to prove that the copyright of a work belongs to a certain author.
If an author gets paid to make a work for someone else, the person who pays for making the work (for example, the author's employer) will often get to own the copyright instead of the author themselves. For example, if a person working for a company, Microsoft creates a new computer software program at work, the Microsoft company would own the copyright. It is very common that the company will instead register the copyright to avoid their employees from claiming their works.
Copyright laws usually protect owners of copyright beyond their lifetime. In some countries, such as Canada and New Zealand, works are protected for 50 years after the last living author dies. In other countries, like the United States and the European Union, the protection lasts for 70 years after death. When the period of copyright protection has ended, the written document, musical composition, book, picture, or other creative work is in the public domain. This means that no one owns the copyright and everyone is free to copy, use and change them without having to ask for permission or pay the owner.
There is an exception to the rules of copyright, called fair use. This means that people can copy a very small amount of a work to use in reviews or in research reports.
An example of fair use is when newspaper writers quote several sentences from a copyright-protected document to tell the story. Another example of "fair use" is when a university professor quotes several sentences from a copyright-protected book in a review of the book, or in a research report.
Different countries have different copyright laws. Most of the differences are about:
Because of these differences, a certain piece of work may be under copyright in one country, and in the public domain in another.
Some people argue that copyright laws make it easier for people to make new works and think of new ideas. After all, if authors get to make money for the time, effort and money they put in, then they will want to make more works later, and make more money.
But others believe that copyright laws make it harder to be creative. Without copyright, other people could reuse existing work, and copyright law often stops that.
If an author wants to sell a work, it's often easiest to give the copyright to a publisher. The publisher will do all the selling, and in return for that service, will keep part of the money. But the publisher has many different things to sell, and they may not want to sell the work the author made. Authors often find it very hard to find a publisher willing to sell their work.
But without a publisher, it can be even harder for an author to sell his or her work. In many markets, a few big publishers own the copyrights to almost everything available, and stores will not want to sell works published by small authors themselves. Many people say copyright law helps big publishers stay in control, and keeps smaller authors out of the market. (tragedy of the anticommons).
As a solution to these problems, groups of authors have come up with the idea of open content. With open content, authors give everyone permission to copy, change and give away or sell their works, as long as they follow certain rules. These rules are explained in an open content license. Some possible open content rules are:
The term for Open Content is sometimes called Copyleft.
Republic of China
The Republic of China (), also known as Taiwan, is a island country in East Asia. The People's Republic of China (PRC) is located to the northwest; Japan is to the northeast; the Philippines is to the south. The Chinese Nationalists lost the Chinese Civil War to the Communists in 1949 and moved the government of the Republic of China from Nanjing to Taipei. It still claims the ownership of all of China including Mainland China.
The territory the Republic of China (ROC) controls is known by most people as the island of Taiwan. Most places on Taiwan Island are called "Taiwan Province" by the government of the Republic of China for official business, except the two largest cities of Taipei and Kaohsiung. West of Taiwan Island, there are three small groups of islands that also belong to ROC. They are:
The ROC used to govern Mainland China too. Now Mainland China is governed by the Communist People's Republic of China; see History and Political problems of China. However, ROC still declares Mainland China as its territory officially. The Republic of China also used to govern Mongolia.
There are administrative divisions in different levels and types.
157 Districts (區 qū ㄑㄩ), 17 Country-controlled cities (縣轄市 xiànxiáshì ㄒㄧㄢˋㄒㄧㄚˊㄕˋ), 41 Urban Townships (鎮 zhèn ㄓㄣˋ), and 153 Rural Townships (鄉 xiāng ㄒㄧㄤ) stand the 3rd level. Districts stand under either Special municipalities or Provincial cities; Country-controlled cities, Urban Townships, and Rural Townships stand under Counties.
Villages (里 lǐ ㄌㄧˇ or 村 cūn ㄘㄨㄣ) stand the 4th level, and Neighborhoods (鄰 lín ㄌㄧㄣˊ) stand the 5th level.
The Nationalists, led by Dr. Sun Yat-sen, got rid of the Qing Dynasty ruled by the Manchus, then they established the ROC and ended Imperial Dynastic Rule in late-1911. The ROC at that time had Mainland China and all of what is now called Mongolia.
After the Japanese were defeated by the Allies during World War II, Taiwan was controlled by the ROC.
In 1949, the Chinese Communists fought a war against the Nationalists and won. They established the People's Republic of China. The Nationalists left mainland China and arrived in Taiwan.
After the ROC created a base on Taiwan, it hoped one day to capture the Mainland. But Chinese Communists grew stronger, so the Nationalists never did go back. The Communists say they replaced the ROC as the only government of China and also calls Taiwan their own.
There are those people in Taiwan who want to never be a part of the People's Republic of China. They believe in complete Taiwan independence and want to rename the ROC (Taiwan) to "Republic of Taiwan" so Taiwan can no longer have any ancestral connection to China or Chinese culture. Some other people wish to unite with the People's Republic of China; they want Chinese reunification. Some still want to attack the PRC and reunify China under the Republic of China. Most others want the "status quo", which means keeping everything the way it is now.
Most Taiwanese people speak the Standard Chinese language known as Mandarin, and others speak local dialects such as Min Nan (Taiwanese) or Hakka. The Cantonese language, spoken in parts of southern China (for example, the province of Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macau), is not spoken in Taiwan. A small percentage of Aboriginal Taiwanese speak aboriginal languages, but the rest of the Chinese people have treated them badly, and many of these people, and their languages, struggle to survive. Some older Taiwanese people who went to school while the country was under Japanese rule can speak Japanese.
After the Nationalist government fled the Mainland in 1949, they brought Mandarin and promoted it in Taiwan. Then everyone in the ROC had to learn Mandarin. But, unlike the people in Mainland China, the Taiwanese never changed to simplified Chinese characters and so they have always used traditional Chinese characters. In the past, students were not allowed to speak their mother tongue in school and were expected to speak only Mandarin. Taiwanese, Hakka, and native languages were considered bad until the early 1990s, when education in these languages began to be taught in some school systems. They were promoted, but by this time, many young people could speak only Mandarin.
Simple English
Simple English might mean:
Prison
A prison or jail is a building where people are forced to live if their freedom has been taken away. The main use for prisons is as a punishment for breaking the law. Those who break the law and are convicted (found guilty) in court can receive a prison sentence, which is an order to spend an amount of time in prison. Prisons are usually run by the government.
There are other reasons why someone might be held in prison. Sometimes, people can be held in prison before their trial (known as pre-trial detention or remand). In times of war, captured soldiers may become prisoners of war and civilians (non-soldiers) may be placed in an internment camp. In some countries, prisons are also used for political prisoners (people who disagree with the country's leader or government).
Other words for a prison include a gaol (pronounced like "jail"), penitentiary or correctional facility. In the US, the words "prison" and "jail" mean separate things. A US "jail" is run by a local government and holds people who have not yet had their trial or who have been convicted for a minor crime. A US "prison" or "penitentiary" is run by the state or federal government and holds people who are serving a long sentence for a serious crime. Outside of North America, "prison" and "jail" mean the same thing. There are lots of slang words for prisons.
Prisons are usually surrounded by walls and gates. There are usually many locked gates inside the prison to control the inmates.
The inmates sleep in small locked rooms called cells. Cells have a bunk bed, a toilet, and a sink. Inmates are allowed to leave their cell every day for exercise. Some inmates work in the prison during the day, either in a factory or doing cooking or cleaning. Law enforcement officers called prison guards watch the inmates. The manager of a prison is called the warden (US, Canada), superintendent (some parts of the US, India) or governor (UK, Australia).
Prisons usually also include other buildings and facilities, such as a chapel, a library, an exercise yard, a gymnasium, an infirmary (small hospital), visiting rooms (for visits from family and lawyers), kitchens, and accommodation for prison staff.
The level of security a prison has depends on the type of prison. A "maximum security prison" has even more protection than a regular prison. Some prisons in the United States have a section called "death row", where people who have been sentenced to death are kept in prison until their execution. On the other hand, an "open prison" is a prison where inmates can often travel out of the prison. These are used for prisoners who have been convicted of minor crimes, or who will soon be released.
The United Nations made the "Standard Minimum Rule" for human treatment for prisoners in 1955. Also the Article 10 of International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights also affirm the treatment with humanity for them in prison. In some prisons, people imprisoned for child sexual abuse are separated from other prisoners for their own safety.
There are four main ideas about what prisons should be used for:
A person who has been charged with a crime, but has not yet been convicted for it in a court, may be sent to prison if:
In some parts of the US, a person who is arrested may be held at a county jail until they decide whether to charge or release the person. In other places, a person who is arrested will be held at a police station, not a prison.
Male and female inmates are usually kept in separate locations, and often in separate prisons.
There are special prisons for people under the age of 18 who commit crimes. These inmates are called young offenders or juvenile offenders. These places will not always have the word "prison" in their name, instead having names like "Young Offenders' Institution".
Prisons are a controversial topic that people have different views about.
As of 2006, there are currently nine million people in prison in the world. The United States currently has the most people in prison; it has more than 2 million people in prison. In 2002, both Russia and China also had over 1 million people in prison. In 2003, the United Kingdom had 73,000 people in prison; France and Germany had a similar number of people in prison.
There are many books and poems about prisons or prison life, such as "The Count of Monte Cristo" by Alexandre Dumas, père and "The Ballad of Reading Gaol" by Oscar Wilde.
There are also movies that depict prison life, including:
There have also been television programs, such as "" (1979–1986), "Prison Break" (2005–2009), Lockup (2005 - present) and (2006 - present). A current TV show about a women's prison is Orange Is the New Black.
Mexico
Mexico (; official name: United Mexican States , ) is a country in North America. Mexico is south of Texas, California and other American states. Guatemala and Belize are south of Mexico. Mexico is between the Pacific Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico.
People living in Mexico or who are from there are called Mexicans. Most Mexican people speak Spanish. There are also Mexicans who speak Native American languages, like Nahuatl, Mayan, and Zapotec. The capital of Mexico is Mexico City.
Before the Europeans came, many Native American cultures existed in Mexico. The earliest was the Olmec culture in the south. The Olmecs are famous for the large stone heads they made. On the Yucatán peninsula lived the Mayans. The Mayans lived in city states ruled by kings. The Mayans were most powerful between 200 and 900 A.D. Another powerful empire belonged to Teotihuacan. Teotihuacan was a very large city, one of the largest at that time. After Teotihuacan declined the Toltecs became powerful. Things made by the Toltecs have been found from the southern parts of the U.S. all the way to Costa Rica. A famous Toltec god is Quetzalcoatl. The Toltec culture declined too, and it was succeeded by the Aztecs. The Aztecs called their own empire Mexico. A famous Aztec king was Moctezuma II.
In 1519 the Spanish explorer Hernán Cortés came to Mexico. The Aztecs thought he was the returned Quetzalcoatl, so they did not want to fight against him. Cortes allied himself with the enemies of the Aztecs. In 1521 they conquered the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan. The Aztec Empire became part of Spain. It was called New Spain.
In 1810 the Mexican priest Miguel Hidalgo started the Mexican war of independence. In 1821 the Spanish finally retreated and Mexico became independent. The first leader of independent Mexico was Agustin de Iturbide. He set up the First Mexican Empire and became emperor. But the Mexicans were not happy with him, and in 1823 the country became a republic.
A man who was very important in Mexico in the early 19th century was Antonio López de Santa Anna. He was the president of Mexico 11 times. When he became a dictator, Texas declared independence (1836). The Battle of the Alamo was part of this Texas Revolution. Between 1846 and 1848 there was war between Mexico and the United States. In this war Mexico lost its large northern areas, which became the southwestern United States. After this war Santa Anna was sent away to Venezuela.
Between 1858 and 1861 there was war again, between liberals and conservatives. The liberal Benito Juárez won the war and became president afterwards. Juarez stayed president until France invaded Mexico and made Maximilian of Habsburg emperor of the Second Mexican Empire. But Maximilian was very unpopular. After more war he was executed in 1867, and Juarez became president again.
Conservatives thought Juarez had too much power. In 1876 they ousted him, and made Porfirio Díaz, a general who had won a battle against the French, president. Porfirio Díaz made the country wealthier, but the poor people became poorer. Franciso I. Madero started the Mexican Revolution in 1910.
The next 10 years the country was in chaos. There were many presidents who ruled for a short time and all kinds of people fought against each other. Famous people from this period are Emiliano Zapata, Pancho Villa and Francisco I. Madero. When Álvaro Obregón became president in 1920 the fighting calmed down.
In 1929 President Plutarco Elías Calles founded the National Mexican Party, PNM. The party was later renamed Institutional Revolutionary Party, PRI. The party would rule for a very long time. Most PRI presidents were not popular, it was said that they were only president to become richer themselves. An exception was president Lázaro Cárdenas. He was president between 1934 and 1940.
After several decades more and more people became unhappy with the PRI. In 1968 security forces shot at protesters, this caused several hundred deaths and became known as the Tlatelolco massacre. Another uprising was in 1994 when Zapatistas rebelled in the province Chiapas.
Mainly through ballot box fraud the PRI managed to stay into power until 2000, when Vicente Fox of the National Action Party, PAN, was elected president. In total the PRI had governed Mexico for 71 years.
Mexico is a constitutional federal democracy ruled by a president. The president is elected every 6 years. The current president is Andrés Manuel López Obrador. Parliament has a Senate and House of Deputies.
Mexico is in the southern part of North America. It is roughly shaped like a triangle. Mexico is more than 3000 km (1,850 miles) long from northwest to southeast. Mexico is between two large seas: the Pacific Ocean in the West and the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea in the East. Mexico has two large peninsulas. Baja California in the northwest, and Yucatán in the southeast. In central and western Mexico are the Sierra Madre mountains. In the Sierra Madre is the Pico de Orizaba, the highest mountain of Mexico. In central Mexico there are also a few volcanoes like the Popocatépetl and the Iztaccíhuatl. The Pico de Orizaba is also a volcano. In the north of Mexico are deserts. In the south are tropical rainforests. Some rivers in Mexico are the Río Bravo (known in the US as the Rio Grande), the Río Balsas, the Río Pánuco, and the Río Yaqui. Many animals are found in Mexico such as birds, jaguars and monkeys.
Mexico is home to the axolotl. Wildcats in Mexico are the ocelot, the mountain lion, the Jaguarundi, Margay, Mexican Bobcat and the jaguar.
Mexico is the most populous Spanish-speaking country in the world. It is also the second most populous country in Latin America (after Brazil). 60% of Mexicans have Native American and European forefathers; these are called mestizos. Almost 30% of Mexicans are pure Native American and 10% are European. Most Mexicans (90%) speak Spanish. 10% of the Mexicans speak a Native American language, like Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs, Maya or Zapotec. Non-indigenous ethnic groups in Mexico speak another foreign language such as Romani, Arabic or Japanese. Most people in Mexico are Catholic (89%) and 6% are Protestant. Other ethnic groups in Mexico are Arabs, Gypsies, Africans, Jews and Asians.
North America
Atlantic Ocean
The Atlantic Ocean is the world's second largest ocean. It covers a total area of about . It covers about 20 percent of the Earth's surface. It is named after the god Atlas from Greek mythology.
The Atlantic formed when the Americas moved west from Eurasia and Africa. This began sometime in the Cretaceous period, roughly 135 million years ago. It was part of the break-up of the supercontinent Pangaea.
The east coast of South America is shaped somewhat like the west coast of Africa, and this gave a clue that continents moved over long periods of time (continental drift). The Atlantic Ocean is still growing now, because of sea-floor spreading from the mid-Atlantic Ridge, while the Pacific Ocean is said to be shrinking because the sea floor is folding under itself or subducting into the mantle.
The Atlantic Ocean is bounded on the west by North and South America. It connects to the Arctic Ocean through the Denmark Strait, Greenland Sea, Norwegian Sea and Barents Sea. It connects with the Mediterranean Sea through the Strait of Gibraltar.
In the southeast, the Atlantic merges into the Indian Ocean. The 20° East meridian defines its border.
In the southwest, the Drake Passage connects it to the Pacific Ocean. The Panama Canal links the Atlantic and Pacific.
The Atlantic Ocean is second in size to the Pacific. It occupies an area of about . The volume of the Atlantic, along with its adjacent seas (the seas next to it), is 354,700,000 cubic kilometres.
The average depth of the Atlantic, along with its adjacent seas, is . The greatest depth is Milwaukee Deep near Puerto Rico, where the Ocean is deep.
The Atlantic Ocean has important ocean currents. One of these, called the Gulf Stream, flows across the North Atlantic. Water gets heated by the sun in the Caribbean Sea and then moves northwest toward the North Pole. This makes France, the British Isles, Iceland, and Norway in Europe much warmer in winter than Newfoundland and Nova Scotia in Canada. Without the Gulf Stream, the climates of northeast Canada and northwest Europe might be the same, because these places are about the same distance from the North Pole.
There are currents in the South Atlantic too, but the shape of this sea means that it has less effect on South Africa.