Refelction and discussion Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Refelction and discussion - Essay Example While the major decisions and the exercise of accounting prerogatives are performed by the senior accountant, I learnt a lot about the demands of the profession by performing the regular or routine work such as executing the trial balance of the statement of financial condition or reconciling the sales balances for the month. Aside from helping in the preparation of the financial statements for the firm, I occasionally was asked to do some tasks that had to do with the individual projects which the construction firm was involved in. It happens to be a much more difficult accounting for projects rather than for the company in its entirety because projects have a budget that was drawn pursuant to the terms of the contract, and the interpretation of accounts, allocation of expenses, and reconciliation of records and activities pertaining to the project can be difficult while the project is in progress. For a short while I was assigned to other sections to gain a better grasp of the acco unting procedures involved in those areas. While the stay in each section was brief and the work I was asked to perform was only routine, my brief exposure nevertheless added to my appreciation of the manner in which the job was done and the significance of the function of the section in the overall department. There are a number of skills I developed in the course of the program, the most of important of which is the set of people skills which I needed to deal with my superiors, co-workers and team mates, and with the clients who would consult occasionally concerning the progress of the projects. I also dealt on a regular basis with staff from the other departments, coordinating with counterparts in procurement, engineering, and marketing. From this I discovered that the organisation is more than just a rigid structure that governs people. An organisation is a dynamic set of relationships among its members who interact with one another to successfully achieve the organisationâ€⠄¢s strategic goal. As mentioned, I worked under the supervision of a senior accountant. She has been in the profession for several years and with the construction company for almost the same duration. From her, I had learnt that because of the specialised knowledge which our profession implies, we are held to a higher standard of ethics than most other workers in the organisation. This is because we, as accounting and finance professionals, are relied upon by all major stakeholders who deal with the organisation, such as the management, shareholders or business owners, the government and regulators. I learnt in school that the position of an accountant or financier is imbued with trust, but it was only during the internship that I came to realise what this actually means in practice, and it is such a profound responsibility. There are other things about which I had been taught in school, but had only come to fully appreciate during the internship. I had gained a greater self-confid ence during the program and began to trust my abilities and my decisions in addressing the tasks of my job. I learnt to face clients with a greater sense of self-assuredness by understanding that the service was all about satisfying their needs in the most convenient way possible for them. I also learnt the value of team work, particularly where

Amazon Metrics Essay Example for Free

Amazon Metrics Essay As a thumb in on-line shopping industry, Amazon surely owned massive competitive advantages. Amazon believes the main competitive factors in its market segments included ‘selection, price, availability, convenience, information, discovery, brand recognition, personalized services, accessibility, customer service, reliability, speed of fulfillment, ease of use, and ability to adapt to changing conditions, as well as our customers’ overall experience and trust in transactions with us and facilitated by us on behalf of third-party sellers’. And there is large number of technologies used to support these diverse advantages, which compared with its competitors are different. First, Look inside a current textbook on software architecture, and you’ll find few patterns that we don’t apply at Amazon. We use high-performance transactions systems, complex rendering and object cashing, workflow and queuing systems, business intelligence and data analytics, machine learning and pattern recognition, neural networks and probabilistic decision making, and a wide variety of other technologies. In other words, Amazon always keep its technologies are the lasted ones. That is also help to operating business, such as deal with the orders, tracking shipping information, customer services, more effective and efficient. Second, Amazon pays more attention to their customers with their unique technologies. Round (2004) notes that Amazon focus on customer satisfaction metrics. Each site is closely monitored with standard service avail-ability monitoring (for example, using Keynote or Mercury Interactive) site availability and download speed. We use a set of applications for accepting and validating customer orders, placing and tracking orders with suppliers, managing and assigning inventory to customer orders, and ensuring proper shipment of products to customers. All these purposes are came true by a transaction-processing system. There is also an automated e-mail measurement and optimization system. This measure would give big contribution to promote available inventory. There is a good cycle from the system to promotion. Amazon tries their best to give personalized services. Web pages tailored to individual preferences, such as recommendations and notifications; 1-Click technology; secure payment systems; image uploads; searching on our websites as well as the internet; browsing; and the ability to view selected interior pages and citations, and search the entire contents of many of the Book’ and ‘Search Inside the Book’ features. Third, to further provide a comfortable shopping environment for customers, Amazon makes many attempts. A company like Amazon could (and did) record every move a visitor made, every last click and twitch of the mouse. In time, the work of editorial reviews, such as Marcus, was marginalized since Amazon found that the majority of visitors used the search tools rather than read editorial. At the last, Amazon devotes itself to improve and innovation constant. Providing the latest and effective technology to guide all stakeholders, such as third parties, as well. As Amazon explains in SEC (2005): using primarily our own proprietary technologies, as well as technology licensed from third parties, we have implemented numerous features and functionality that simplify and improve the customer shopping experience, enable third parties to sell on our platform, and facilitate our fulfillment and customer service operations. And the Amazon retail platform enables other retailers to sell products online using the Amazon user interface and infrastructure through their ‘Syndicated Stores’ programme. Above all, these creative and maturity technology enhanced Amazon’s core capability while competed with other rivals.

Computer mediated communication

Computer mediated communication 1. Introduction: Social network sites (SNSs) have become some of the most popular online destinations in recent years (comScore, 2007a, 2007b). Academic researchers have started studying the use of SNSs, with questions ranging from their role in identity construction and expression (boyd Heer, 2006) to the building and maintenance of social capital (e.g., Ellison, Steinfeld, Lampe, 2007) and concerns about privacy (e.g., Gross Acquisti, 2005; Hodge, 2006). While these areas of inquiry are all important and worthy of exploration, a significant antecedent question has been largely raised: Are there systematic interconnection between the level at which users show online with their friends and offline with their counterparts, and are people equally likely to act in a similar or different way comparing their online and offline life? This article sets out to address this question. 2. Literature Review 2.1Online Offline: A Distinction Online offline distinction have been generalized from computing and telecommunication into the field of human interpersonal relationships. The distinction between what is considered online and what is considered offline has become a subject of study in the field of computer mediated communication. The distinction between online offline is conventionally seen as the distinction between computer mediated communication and face to face communication respectively. Online is virtuality and offline is reality. Slater D. (2002:533) states that the distinction is so far too simple. To support his argument that the distinction in relationships are more complex than a simple online offline dichotomy, he observes that some people draw no distinctions between an online relationship such as including in cybersex, and offline relationship such as being pen pals. Slater also asserts that there are legal and regulatory pressures to reduce the distinction between online and offline with a â€Å"general tendency to assimilate online to offline and erase the distinction†, stressing that this does not mean online relationships are being reduced to pre-existing offline relationships. He also conjectures that an online/offline distinction may be seen by people as â€Å"rather quaint and not quite comprehensible† within 10 years. Individuals online activity also depends on his/her online identity or internet persona. This online identity or internet persona is a social identity that an internet user establishes in online communities or websites. Although some people prefer to use their real names online, most internet users prefer to be anonymous, identifying themselves by means of pseudonyms, which reveal varying amounts of personally identifiable information. 2.2Friendship In addition to differences in social cues in online and offline environments, friendship is defined differently on social networking sites than it is in offline relationships. MySpace defines Friendship as any kind of mutual relationship among its members. Adding a friend to a list of contacts is not necessarily an indication of feelings for that person. Rather, it is seen as an expansion of ones social network. In an ethnographic study of teenage users, boyd (2006a) distinguishes friendship from Friendship: the former refers to a close relationship between two people and the latter refers to an online tie that connects people on social network sites. boyd (2006a) distinguishes between several types of online Friends including close offline friends and acquaintances, family members, work and school mates, admired people and strangers. boyds (2006a) and Dwyers (2007) work suggests that most users do not take online friendships seriously and consider most of them to be superficial. boyd explains that some of the relative superficiality can be attributed to social pressures associated with â€Å"Friending† (adding friends to list of contacts) online. Some users, as according to boyd, (2006a:25): â€Å"prefer to accept Friendships with someone they barely know rather than going through the socially awkward process of rejecting them while others hope that Friending a celebrity will make them look cool.† Bigge (2006) suggests that users accumulate friends to increase their social capital. The element of status associated with accumulating friends may explain the large number of friends that most users have linked to their profiles. According to Rosens (2006) study, MySpace users link an average of 200 friends to their profile, many of whom they have never met face-to-face. This clarifies to some extent on the way most users perception attitude towards online and offline friends. 2.3Purpose of being Online Despite the alleged superficiality of relationships, users participate in social networking sites to develop new relationships, maintain older friendships, and expand their social networks (Dwyer, 2007; Gallant, et al., 2007; boyd, 2006a; boyd, 2007). Participants in Dwyers 2007 study indicated that they use networking sites because they provide an inexpensive, easy and convenient way of managing social relationships. Gallant, et al. (2007:21) conclude from their content analysis of focus groups of MySpace and Facebook users that participants access network sites for â€Å"staying in touch with friends, making social plans, communicating with others and finding out about them, and dating.† In other studies, users report the usefulness of social networking sites as a means of establishing contact with old friends and people they do not see regularly (Dwyer, 2007). Online social interactions are informed by different rules and contexts than offline relationships. Dwyer (2007) explains that computer-mediated communication on social network sites can reduce and delay the transmission and perception of social context cues. Social context cues elicit cognitive interpretations of a given situation which shapes peoples communication. Dwyer explains: â€Å"When social context cues are strongly perceived, behavior becomes more otherfocused and carefully managed. Conversely, with communication of these cues is weak and cues are not perceived, feelings of anonymity result in more self-centered and unregulated behavior†. boyd (2007:8) suggests that online forums (as an example MySpace) provide spaces for teens to â€Å"do identity work† online. boyd argues that networking sites such as MySpace facilitate aspects of life central to teen identity formation, including exploration of social and cultural identities, social relations, and performances of the self. boyd (2006c) suggests that the dynamics of identity production online include a considerable emphasis on the construction of â€Å"cool.† Most of todays teens prefer to demonstrate ‘cool or to be called as so. Comments on sites such as MySpace serve as validation from peers and, boyd (2006c: para. 18)argues, as â€Å"a form of cultural currency.† Validation as well as negative feedback online can influence users self-esteem. Valkenburg, et al. (2006) found in a study of 881 Dutch teenage users of a social network site similar to MySpace that the publicly visible feedback they received on their profiles affected their social self-esteem and well-being. Positive feedback, which nearly 80 percent of the participants received, enhanced their self-esteem, whereas negative feedback, which seven percent of the individuals surveyed received, lowered their self-esteem (Valkenburg, et al. 2006). This shows that the behavior of users possessing themselves online relate to their lives to some degree. On networking sites, users social networks may overlap. For instance, users may be linked to close friends, acquaintances, co-workers and family members through the same profile. The identity the user establishes online may be appropriate for friends but not for relatives or co-workers (boyd, 2006a, Snyder, et al., 2006; Bigge, 2006). Due to this, some users change their profile name or display name other than the real one to be limited within their friends circle. 2.4Disclosure of users Information Users employ text and images in their profiles and blogs to describe who they are, what they like, and what they do. Through their posts, users send greetings, exchange messages, make plans, flirt, and maintain contact. These features of social networking sites allow users to reveal information about themselves and their lives. Stutzman (2006) suggests that while disclosing this information is optional, many users include it in their profiles. Stutzman (2006:1) attributes the high level of disclosure of personal information online to the â€Å"inherent sociality† of social network communities. Though many users share personal information, its validity is unproven. Some users intentionally mask their offline identities by using pseudonyms or remaining anonymous for fear of consequences related to disclosing sensitive or socially undesirable personal characteristics. Although these strategies may mitigate users privacy concerns, unintended audiences might still be able to find them through friends profiles (boyd, 2007). Unintended audiences such as employers, educational institutions, law enforcement officials, and marketing companies can access and use private information that users make public online. Employers can monitor current and potential employees through social networking sites (Bigge, 2006; Snyder, et al., 2006). Some colleges and schools keep track of their students posts on networking sites and issue offline punishments for socially undesirable or illegal activities disclosed online (Barnes, 2006). Prosecutors and police officers could potentially use online data to investigate interactions between suspects and victims (Schesser, 20 06). Bigge (2006) and Barnes (2006: para 3) criticize the fact that social network sites: â€Å"coordinate the interpersonal exchanges between American teens and global brands.† For Snyder, et al. (2006), who analyze the ‘terms of use document of MySpace, these unintended audiences violate the ‘social contract of networking sites because they use the sites for information seeking rather than for networking with others. Parents and lawmakers are concerned about the behavior of teens and children online. Through legislation such as the Childrens Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998 (COPPA) and the 2006 Deleting Online Predators Act (DOPA), lawmakers try to protect young teenagers from social network sites by requiring public libraries and schools to install Internet filters (boyd and Jenkins, 2006). Librarians and academics expressed worries in response to these acts, citing concern for the development of a new digital divide in which users who rely on public access would be deprived of socializing online (Miller, 2006; boyd and Jenkins, 2006). Many parents express concerns about their childrens use of social networking sites. In a survey of 267 pairs of adolescent MySpace users and their parents, Rosen (2006) found that 63 percent of parents think that sexual predators use MySpace; 81 percent of them were concerned about teens meeting online friends in offline locations; and, 88 percent of them were worried about the posting of sexual photos. Despite their expressed concerns, many parents are not involved in their childrens use of social networking sites (Rosen, 2006; Rogers, et al., 2007). In Rosens (2006) study, one third of the parents did not know what kind of personal information their children were disclosing online; 43 percent of them did not know how much time their children spent on social networking websites; and, 62 percent of them had never talked to their children about such sites. Moreover, parents imposed little restrictions on their childrens use of these websites. Fifty percent of the teenagers surveyed in Rosens study were allowed to have computer in their bedroom and less than half of the parents set limits to their childrens computer use and the use of online sites. This is consistent with Rogers et al.s (2007) study in which only 15 percent of the adolescent participants reported having limits on their use of these Web sites. 3.Analysis: Online intimate friendship relationship is a rare phenomenon and so could be summed up in some cases only in terms of lying and deception, they would not be so common. For many of those who have known someone intimately through the internet, the relationships have proven to be positive, if not life-changing experiences. Lies and misrepresentations have been brought to explain some of these tendencies but they only begin to constitute a fuller theoretical mechanism. Research in this area often address what seems to be a working paradox in online dating sites: the connection between a pragmatic, consumerist tool for meeting others wrapped up in romantic and magical discourses. Individual, social and mediatized conceptions about love, and connecting gave us new sights into an activity whose popularity calls for reference to a broad social context. When individual engage in online communication/conversation, the spectacle in turn enhance a regime of communication that could be described as spectral, its quality being a confessional transparency. As noticed, users will tend to describe their inner feelings in detail, opening their soul in a manner that is in part imputable to the physical absence of their interlocutors. Imagination will play a crucial role, and conceptions of love, past experiences, stereotypes and phantasms will be used along with the acted information gained from the communication to construct an image of the potential partner and the story of their meeting. Online daters will tend to shorten this period, in their desire to avoid deception after having imagined someone incorrectly or having faced its own deformed or incomplete projection. Problem is that the interpretation of a persons mediated representation does not always accord with the actual in-real-life presentation of that person. On other occasions, the cause of the mismatch is not misrepresentation, but simply lies. According to Albright, ‘perhaps the lowered accountability levels of online interactions and the inability to pinpoint an online personal to a solid offline identity might foster such facades and lower peoples inhibitions about lying. It is more difficult, though, to assert that playing on online places which of course happens a lot in discussion groups, social networks and online dating sites can lead to long lasting relationships ( particularly if they go face to face). Indeed what could be considered as playing in an overtly playful space seems to be related more to lying and concealing in other spaces, such as online dating sites, where false information about physical appearance and occupational status abound. As an example, woman is prepared to meet a six feet tall lawyer could be surprised to be faced with a rather a short programmer or even a child. Flirting and playing go together, but the lack of physical proximity between dyadic partners opens the door to misrepresentation. But as a matter of fact, playing with ones body, personality and social status can also lead to sexual dysfunctions, cheating and criminal deviance such as harassment, rape or pedophilia. Playing is ok as long as every participant actually knows that he/she is in playing frame, which is not always the case online. There exist online places such as second life where playing with gender, physical characteristics and personality is the norm. Flirting and intimate relationships abound there as well but the rules are clear: this is game and you can play as such. Whitty et,al (2001:624) say: â€Å"Even if people are not engaging in cybersex or exchanging photos, we cannot disregard the importance of body or physical attraction. This is because- even in absence of photographs- bodies are reconstructed through users imaginations. Moreover, imaginations can give fantasized vision of the self and the others†. Whitty et al, (2001) use notions such as play potential space, transitional objects and splitting to construct a probing psychoanalytical lecture about online romance. Psychoanalytic approach that Whitty Carr (2001:623) say: ‘Play is all about illusion †¦, such illusion can only be sustained provided play can be kept within a frame work of its own- a frame which seeks to separate it from ordinary life. The objective of online dating sites is to change online connection rapidly in the hope of developing intimate relationships (Casual sex or Cybersex). In discussion groups or SNSs, the point is to allow perspective couples to meet online, then may be offline, in the hope of finding people who will understand each others feelings, share their own and eventually (in some situations) become more intimate. The very sense of a body attached to personal information could be considered to be more important in dating sites than in discussion groups, since the goals- which may still be the same for some users- are not dealt with in the same way. As a matter of fact, leaving an online profile with no photographs is giving oneself no chance of being contacted. In an online community, people get to know each other based on shared interests, not with perceived physical attractiveness of the participants. In theory, this works, but in fact, online flirting happens everywhere, even where it is not assumed to. How users who experience online romance define romance and love at large prior to and during their online explorations has not been thoroughly discussed by internet researchers as such. Before reading profiles on an online dating sites or being interested in the person behind certain online discussion posting on a community sites, a user hold wealth of personal conception about what he/she is/isnt, likes/dislikes, loves/hates and so on. This conception may change in the course of ones online intimate experience that could provide critical insight into the individual social integration of online connection. However, according to Anderson (2005), people who experience online romance do it in various online places but one thing they share is that they can conceive of finding love by using the internets online connection. In terms of finding love online, for many of us, it is not an easy thing. Working long hours, some of them alone, others at remote places, feeling caught in an improper relationship, being tired of a series of dreams with no tomorrows, lacking the confidence to face interesting prospects or just wanting to try something that supposedly works well, millions of people have been drawn to the internet over last few years, looking for individuals with whom to communicate and to bond. That is probably why many online researchers have observed that online intimacy is constituted and maintained mainly by trust, commitment and high level of self disclosure. It is difficult to theoretical framework that fully describes what is going on and when (two or) more people are flirting on the web or not. If individuals are to successfully develop a romantic relationship from an online dating site, they need to present a balance between an attractive and a real self on their profiles. Observing that online daters tend to meet each other fece to face more quickly than do participation in other kinds of online based relationships, Whitty(2001) suggests, in doing so, they can and want to avoid the frequent lies and embellishments associated with personal profiles. Also she holds that it shuts up the potential presence of a ‘true self (referring to what someone would like to be, but is not yet able to be), which, in theory, emerges slowly, coupled with high self-disclosure, trust and commitment. On another side, as she observed in her research, at the same time a seeking out authentic and genuine profiles, individuals were also looking for the more attractive and appealing profiles. Engaging on an online conversation, knowing friends friends on any SNSs, or putting a profile on an online dating agency is easy and banal in itself. But it can lead to profound changes in ones life. Over recent years, many researchers have addressed romantic relationships initiated on the internet. 4. Overview on Hypothesis: The hypothesis set out in this paper includes the change in the perception due to shift of online relations to offline relation and vice-versa, advantages and disadvantages of doing it with regards to the use of SNSs through the internet. To establish and get into the hypothesis set out in here, individual interviews have been employed in order to fully get into the subject. Except the individual short interviews, content analysis of the papers related to the use of SNSs as well as the survey questionnaires were also designed and disseminated to 55 international students of the two universities in Cyprus; University of Nicosia The European University Cyprus. As we are facing the world of fast-changing pace, it is hard to generalize the finding from the study of such a small group of people. However, the results obtained so far will give genuine insights to further research in the same area. Bringing offline relations to online seems very easy provided that the users real life friends or relatives are facilitated through the use of the internet or else they have not been regarded as the victims caused by the so called digital divide. On the other hand, bringing online relations to offline may result to both advantages and disadvantages. The term ‘trust has more to play the role in it. Because some people show their trust to the people met online that the information provided by them online are factual and true, whereas some do not find any trust in those information. It requires a sort of experience or say, the psychological knowledge to understand the motive of the strangers met online to decide whether or not he/she should meet hi m/her offline. In this regard, a genuine person who always flows true and factual information through the internet and holds decent desire of friending through online process may be the victim of some who do not trust online friends any more. The current fears of internet fraud, identity theft and the fakesters have constantly loosened in the extent of trust among the moderate internet users. Spam, junk mail and many other unknown mails coming everyday into the inbox are also the cause in declining the trust in the internet. Bringing offline relations to online seems the everyday routine of most of the internet users. The use of internet and its know-how is growing rapidly throughout the world. Today, many rely on the internet and cannot even think of their lives without being into it. Internet users even tend to see their offline friends online with the motive of being able to contact at any time, and also know how they are up to though they are physically very far. With regards to strangers online meeting them in real life situations seem unpredictable for everyone. For some, it is like a game as well as an interesting part of their life. Doing so, many get engaged for long time relationships, some as business partners and so on. 5.Methods: To accomplish the objective of the paper, three methodologies have been incorporated: Interviews Survey Content Analysis 5.1Interviews: Interviews conducted is the semi-structured consisting of 12 individuals who have their profiles on social networking sites; many of them being on facebook and Hi5. Interview questions (see Apendix) ranges from their demographics information, perceptions and understanding of online communications, involvement in SNSs, chatting preferences, time spent on the internet as well as the views on friends online/offline. Only the information obtain from individual semi-structured interviews were insufficient to come answer the proposal question raised in the paper. Hence other methods of research have also been carried out. Interview took place in different physical locations in Cyprus and around 6 individuals were interviewed online through facebook. 5.2Survey: A set of questionnaire was designed and disseminated to 55 international students of the two universities (University of Nicosia European University Cyprus) in Cyprus. The set of questionnaire consists of questionnaire that consists of 33 questions splitting them in three sections (see Appendix). The first section (section A) consists of 6 questions and collects the participants demographic information such as A/S/L, marital status, occupation, country of origin parental education. Inclusion of parental education in the demographic information is aimed to find whether participants parental education level is linked with their online offline perceptions or behaviors. 21 questions on the next section (Section B) address on the participants involvement with the internet, its use. More use or the less use of the internet and the time spent on any social network sites by any individual can be the basis to reveal the participants behaviors and perceptions regarding online/offline friends and connections. Last section of the questionnaire (Section C) is an attempt to explore the users online and offline behaviors, expectations, language used and the priority among online or offline friends. This section includes 6 questions all of which address how users intend to establish connections to their online friends (strangers and not strangers) and offline friends in their real life situations. 5.3Content Analysis: Many studies have been carried out on the issues of social network sites and their use. Distinguishing the users and non-users of social networks sites has also been studied. Stutzmans.(2006) â€Å"An evaluation of identity-sharing behavior in social network communities† has addressed a bit of online and offline behaviours of the internet users being focused on social network sites. Danah m boyd has been continually contributing to the social network sites and their use through her study. More and more sequential research made by boyd regarding the use of internet especially focusing teenagers have given more insights for accomplishing this paper. These two researchers are the basis to ground the theoretical aspects ranging from the meaning of SNSs to their use, internet persona as well as identity construction online. Hence, this paper also uses the content analysis approach of the study carried out by these two researchers in the field of social network sites and their use, but in a brief. 6.Results Discussion on Findings: Demographics: The study sample of international students taken from the two universities in Cyprus is skewed towards more male around 71.7%, female users being only 28.3% of total 55 students, 55.7% were Nepalese whereas the rest (36.3%) were Indian background. Regarding the parental education of the participants, fathers of 30% participants were postgraduates and none of the participants father were illiterate. 15 % of the participants reported that their mothers are illiterate. The age of the sample size of this study ranges from 18-30 years. With reference to the marital status, 54.5% were single and 45.5% were married. None of the participants were reported to be in a relationship or divorced. Results obtained from 12 individual semi-structure interviews are more consistent with the results obtained from the survey and hence the following results and discussion does not fully mention the interviews due to the space problem in this paper. However, the interviews have been the basis to carry out the study and bring it to the final readable form. Internets Use Regarding the average use of internet per week (see table 2), no female participants use internet for more than 15 hours a week. Majority of male (30.9%) were reported to use internet up to 15 hours a week whereas only 16.3% female do so, the study shows. The first task of the users while connecting to the internet, 27% said they check mails (46% female and 20% male), 18% open messenger (26 % female 15% male), 18% browse for news (25 % male) and around 37% open social network sites (26% female 40% male). The term ‘Social network Sites was not known to any of the participants in the sample. When it first appeared in the questionnaire, participants raised the question to the real indication of SNS. Participants were then asked whether they have known or heard of SNSs. 100 % participants said that it is a complete unknown term for them. When they are clarified with the term SNSs, 100% reported that they have their profiles in at least one or more SNSs. Of many SNSs around the wo rld available to everyone in the internet, sample said that they know only 7 SNSs of 16 SNSs mentioned in the questionnaire. Facebook, Hi5 and Bebo are the three social network sites that all participants have heard of and also have their profiles. The table 1 below is the illustration of knowing of SNSs reported by the sample of the study. Social networking sites respondents profile SNSs Respondents Total Male Female Orkut 52% 38% 53% Windows Live Space 36% 26.6% 29% LinkedIn 14.5% 15% 13.3% Bebo 100% 100% 100% MySpace 34% 37.5% 26.6% Facebook 100% 100% 100% Hi5 100% 100% 100% Table 1 As the sample recorded that the participants have their profile at least in one or more SNSs. It is now vital to get the data on how real are the information placed on their profiles taking into serious considerations on names, gender, age, location etc. 80% said

The Industrial Revolutions: The effects on Europe and the World :: European Europe History

The Industrial Revolutions: The effects on Europe and the World The Industrial Revolution affected life in Europe during the 19th century very greatly. Cities in Great Britain were growing rapidly, this was known as urbanization. Many cities such as Glasgow and Berlin more than doubled in size. The Industrial Revolution was having a positive affect on Great Britain. From the outpour of people into cities looking for work, things were so rapidly paced that there was no order in these cities. Unsanitary and unsafe buildings were being built all over to home all of the workers. There was less than adequate education and police protection for the ever-growing population. Many people had to live in shelters due to the lack of housing; many families lived in a single room. Many people died of cholera from the poor living and working conditions. The main goal that factory owners wanted was to keep their production a constant, working for the better part of a day. Since the owners wanted to save as much money as possible, the factories were rarely cleaned or well lit. Coalmines posed the biggest danger from the constant inhalation of coal dust and the collapse of the mines. Workers had a life expectancy 10 years less than of another worker. Even though the Industrial revolution brought problems to life quickly, through the long run a number of positive effects arose. It provided jobs for workers and it aided in technological progress and invention. It raised the standard of living from increased production of good and it in the improvement in people's lives. Better housing and cheaper mass-produced clothing helped people become healthier. From the strong demand of engineer's and professional workers, education became very profuse. For the lower class workers of the Industrial Revolution, their life slowly but surely improved during the 19th century, through earning higher wages, shorter hours, and improved working conditions.

Internet gambling Essay

This document will inform you about the history of internet gambling, the existing issues, and a number of concerns involved with online gambling. Prior to the launching of the World Wide Web in 1993 which changed the setting of gambling, people had to travel great distances to gamble. The world’s first virtual online casino, Internet Casinos, Inc. (ICI) commenced operation on August 18, 1995 with 18 different casino games. Most of these online gambling companies are located outside of the U. S.to avoid government prosecution. ICI operates out of the Turks and Caicos Islands (Kish, 1999). One of the main reasons internet gambling started was because of costs. The value to start up an internet gambling site is around 1. 5 million dollars, which is half of what it costs to actually construct a casino. ICI estimates that the company averages about a twenty four percent profit margin, versus the typical United States casino, which ranges from eight percent to sixteen percent of each dollar wagered (Kish, 1999). An estimated twenty million people are currently online with a projected 160 million online by the year 2020. The overall market for online gambling is estimated to be approximately $49 billion worldwide (Kish, 1999). The history of internet gambling is only a decade old, however, its history will hold on for several more. There are several existing issues facing internet gambling. The first issues we will discuss are how to regulate internet gambling. The question raised by the emergence of Internet gambling is whether old laws–based mainly on a world of atoms–are still viable, and if not, in which way the Internet should be regulated (Walther, 2000). Some scholars believe that internet gambling needs to be regulated, and of course there are those that say let the owners of the sites regulate themselves. Regulatory procedures can be targeted at either or both of the providers and the consumers of gambling services. In the case of consumers, regulation is usually implemented by age, through prohibition of the participation of minors. Procedures might also be contrived to prohibit problem gamblers or undischarged bankrupts from engaging in gambling (Clarke, 2000). Another existing problem with internet gambling is The Wire Act which was intended to assist the states, territories and possessions of the United States, as well as the District of Columbia, in enforcing their respective laws on gambling and bookmaking and to suppress organized gambling activities. Subsection (a) of the Wire Act, a criminal provision, provides: â€Å"Whoever being engaged in the business of betting or wagering knowingly uses a wire communication facility for the transmission in interstate or foreign commerce of bets or wagers or information assisting in the placing of bets or wagers on any sporting event or contest, or for the transmission of a wire communication which entitles the recipient to receive money or credit as a result of bets or wagers, or for information assisting in the placing of bets or wagers, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both† (Rodefer, 2003). During the House of Representatives debate on the bill, Congressman Emanuel Celler, Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee stated â€Å"[t]his bill only gets after the bookmaker, the gambler who makes it his business to take bets or to lay off bets. . . It does not go after the causal gambler who bets $2 on a race (Rodefer, 2003). What the government is having a problem with is that most internet gambling sites are run ran in foreign countries, and they cannot enforce this act against them. What they are trying to do is change the act to include these third parties. An example of this is the introduction of the Internet Gambling Prohibition Act of 1997 (Walther, 2000). The bill would have prohibited Internet gambling by extending the Wire Act’s prohibitions on traditional forms of gambling by phone or wire to the Internet (Walther, 2000). This amendment would provide penalties for online bets and wagers. This so far seems to be the best solution, however ethical and moral dilemmas still rest in the hands of our lawmakers today. The next issue facing internet gambling is taxes. This seems to be the government’s biggest issue. This is because of the billions of dollars we mentioned for profit by these online sites, government can gain significant amount of money from it. The legalization of Internet gambling may cause states to lose some revenue generated from legalized gambling operations because many gamblers would spend their money online (Lassani, 1998). Moreover, states lose revenue by not being able to tax gamblers who win over the Internet. Gamblers who win over the Internet have an incentive not to pay taxes on their winnings because the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) lacks the resources to track online gamblers (Lassani, 1998). The likelihood of addiction to Internet gambling among both children and adults is an extremely important concern. In relation to addiction, children are more likely to become addicted to something new than adults (Smith, 2004). For example, the video game-like nature of virtual casinos, labeled the â€Å"crack cocaine of gambling,† could make online gambling a temptation difficult to resist. Furthermore, the fact that the Internet gambler need not leave the comfort and privacy of his or her home could mean that an individual might become easily addicted. This is the worst thing about internet gambling, because there will not be anyone to detect if a person is addicted or not. Consequently the only aid they will get is their selves, and that leaves the player defenseless against the dependence of gambling. Having to go to the casino to gamble has better chances of knowing who is addicted and who is not, they have hired hands to detect this problem, unlike the home atmosphere. Kevin O’Neill, Deputy Director of New Jersey’s Council on Compulsive Gambling says â€Å"The real threat comes from the isolation and secrecy of the betting activity itself. † â€Å"I call this threat the cave syndrome due to the gambler’s isolated behavior and hidden activity† (Wharry, 2001). In closing the short lived World Wide Web as created pandemonium with our lawmakers. The dilemma of how everyone interprets the Wire Act is a major concern. The efforts to amend it to make all users liable for using the websites are tiresome, and stopping foreigners from creating internet gambling sites seems never-ending since the United States cannot control them. In just over a decade there are over twenty million users, expected to increase to 160 million in the next 14 years. Its revenue is over 49 billion dollars and increasing. There are more profit margins with online gambling than the traditional casino. The cost to create a gambling web is 1. 5 million dollars compared to the 300 million to build a casino, this creates profit and increases attendance because of its trouble-free access. One important concern with internet gambling is addiction. Children are easily addicted to new things than adults and it will make it harder to control and detect gambling addiction. Internet gambling is a good creation for those people who can control themselves, but for those who cannot have a greater chance to end up bankrupt. Thus we can see from this example alone, why lawmakers are having such problems to secure the problem, do they let it carry on or let people put themselves in jeopardy of losing everything. Michael Bolcerek the President of The Poker Group said, â€Å"It’s a personal liberty issue with regard to how you spend your money and what you see over the Internet†(Roth, 2006). References: Clarke, R. (2000, December). The feasibility of regulating gambling on the internet . Retrieved May 5, 2006, from Regulations of internet gambling Web site: http://www. anu. edu. au/people/Roger. Clarke/II/FeasIGR. html Kish, S. (1999). An analysis of the government’s role in addressing internet gambling. Betting on the Net, 51(no 2), 449-6. Lessani, A.M. (1998, May). How much do you want to bet that the internet gambling prohibition act of 1997 is not the most effective way to tackle the problems of online gambling. Retrieved May 4, 2006, from The Internet Gambling Prohibition Act: An Analysis Web site: http://www. gseis. ucla. edu/iclp/alessani. html Rodefer, J. (2003). Federal wire wager act. Retrieved May 5, 2006, from Gambling-Law- US. com Web site: http://www. gambling-law-us. com/Federal-Laws/wire-act. htm Roth, B. (2006, April 25). Foes try to squelch online gambling. Knight Ridder Tribune Business News, [1]. Smith, A. (2004). Controversial and emerging issues associates with eybergambling (e-casinos). Online Information Review. 28(6), 435-443. Walther, F. M. (2000). A comparative u. s. -swiss perspective. Retrieved May 5, 2006, from Internet Gambling Related Regulatory Questions and Enforcement Problems Web site: http://stlr. stanford. edu/STLR/Events/gambling/contents_f. html#note5 Wharry, S. (2001). E-Gambling threat worries addiction experts. You Bet Your Life, 165,325.

Free Essays on Raja Soliman

Miguel LÃ ³pez de Legazpi, the Spanish conqueror of the Philippines, founded Manila as a fortified colony in 1571, after defeating the forces of the Muslim ruler Rajah Soliman. In 1601 a seminary for nobles, the first educational institution in the country, was established at Manila by the Jesuits. From the 16th to early 19th centuries, Manila played an important role in trade as a stopover port for the Manila galleons, huge trading ships that profited greatly from trade between China and Mexico. During this time, Chinese merchants settled in Manila and became middlemen for other trade from China. By the 1590s the Chinese had become an economically important community. Many Chinese, aware of the political and social advantages enjoyed by the Roman Catholics in the colony, converted to Catholicism and married Filipino women. Many of their mixed-blood descendants became important in Manila. The city remained under continuous Spanish colonial rule for about 350 years, except for a brie f period during the Seven Years' War when Britain held the city from 1762 to 1764. Discontent with Spanish rule among urban Filipinos and some of the Filipino clergy became especially significant in Manila during the latter half of the 19th century. Nationalist sentiment erupted in 1872 when three Filipino priests, who had been charged with leading a military mutiny at an arsenal near Manila, were executed by the Spaniards. The last rajah of Manila, noted for his daring and bravery. Nephew of Rajah Lakandola. Of all of the early rulers of Manila, he was feared most by the Spaniards. He was killed on June 3, 1571, in the Battle of Bangkusay.... Free Essays on Raja Soliman Free Essays on Raja Soliman Miguel LÃ ³pez de Legazpi, the Spanish conqueror of the Philippines, founded Manila as a fortified colony in 1571, after defeating the forces of the Muslim ruler Rajah Soliman. In 1601 a seminary for nobles, the first educational institution in the country, was established at Manila by the Jesuits. From the 16th to early 19th centuries, Manila played an important role in trade as a stopover port for the Manila galleons, huge trading ships that profited greatly from trade between China and Mexico. During this time, Chinese merchants settled in Manila and became middlemen for other trade from China. By the 1590s the Chinese had become an economically important community. Many Chinese, aware of the political and social advantages enjoyed by the Roman Catholics in the colony, converted to Catholicism and married Filipino women. Many of their mixed-blood descendants became important in Manila. The city remained under continuous Spanish colonial rule for about 350 years, except for a brie f period during the Seven Years' War when Britain held the city from 1762 to 1764. Discontent with Spanish rule among urban Filipinos and some of the Filipino clergy became especially significant in Manila during the latter half of the 19th century. Nationalist sentiment erupted in 1872 when three Filipino priests, who had been charged with leading a military mutiny at an arsenal near Manila, were executed by the Spaniards. The last rajah of Manila, noted for his daring and bravery. Nephew of Rajah Lakandola. Of all of the early rulers of Manila, he was feared most by the Spaniards. He was killed on June 3, 1571, in the Battle of Bangkusay....