Advertising to Children Notes Essay

* Children cannot comprehend advertising messages due to their young age. * Children don’t understand persuasive intent until they are eight or nine years old and that it is unethical to advertise to them before then. According to Karpatkin and Holmes from the Consumers Union, â€Å"Young children, in particular, have difficulty in distinguishing between advertising and reality in ads, and ads can distort their view of the world. † Additionally children are unable to evaluate advertising claims. Beder, 1998) * Older children pay less attention to advertisements and are more able to differentiate between the ads and TV programs but they are also easy prey for advertisers. Around puberty, in their early teens, children are forming their own identities and they are â€Å"highly vulnerable to pressure to conform to group standards and mores. † At this age they feel insecure and want to feel that they belong to their peer group. Advertising manipulates them through their insecurities, seeking to define normality for them; influencing the way they â€Å"view and obtain appropriate models for the adult world;† and undermining â€Å"fundamental human values in the development of the identity of children. † Advertisements actively encourage them to seek happiness and esteem through consumption. (Beder, 1998) * Younger children often do not understand the persuasive intent of advertisements, and even older children probably have difficulty understanding the intent of newer marketing techniques that blur the line between commercial and program content. Calvert, 2008) * One key area in research on the effect of advertising on children has been analysis of age-based changes in children’s ability to understand commercial messages, particularly their intent. Before they reach the age of eight, children believe that the purpose of commercials is to help them in their purchasing decisions; they are unaware that commercials are designed to persuade them to buy specific products. The shifts that take place in children’s understanding of commercial intent are better explained using theories of cognitive development. Calvert, 2008) * During the stage of preoperational thought, roughly from age two to age seven, young children are perceptually bound and focus on properties such as how a product looks. Young children also use animistic thinking, believing that imaginary events and characters can be real. For instance, during the Christmas season, television is flooded with commercials that foster an interest in the toys that Santa will bring in his sleigh pulled by flying reindeer. Young children â€Å"buy in† to these fantasies and the consumer culture they represent. Preoperational modes of thought put young children at a distinct disadvantage in understanding commercial intent and, thus, in being able to make informed decisions about requests and purchases of products. (Calvert, 2008) * With the advent of concrete operational thought, between age seven and age eleven, children begin to understand their world more realistically. They understand, for example, that perceptual manipulations do not change the underlying properties of objects. More important, they begin to go beyond the information given in a commercial and grasp that the intent of advertisers is to sell products. By the stage of formal operational thought, about age twelve and upward, adolescents can reason abstractly and understand the motives of advertisers even to the point of growing cynical about advertising. (Calvert, 2008) * Increased use of the Internet to target children offers increasing opportunities for advertisers to convey their messages. * A new arena for advertising is the Internet. It is estimated that about four million children are using the Internet worldwide and this figure is bound to increase dramatically over the next few years. Beder, 1998) * As the enormous increase in the number of available television channels has led to smaller audiences for each channel, digital interactive technologies have simultaneously opened new routes to narrow cast to children, thereby creating a growing media space just for children and children’s products. (Calvert, 2008) * Newer marketing approaches have led to online advertising and to so-called stealth marketing techniques, such as embedding products in the program content in films, online, and in video games. Calvert, 2008) * Television has long been the staple of advertising to children and youth. Children view approximately 40,000 advertisements each year. The products marketed to children— sugarcoated cereals, fast food restaurants, candy, and toys—have remained relatively constant over time. But marketers are now directing these same kinds of products to children online. (Calvert, 2008) * Rapid growth in the number of television stations and online venues has also led advertisers to market directly to children and youth. Because children and youth are heavy media users and early adopters of newer technologies, media marketing and advertising campaigns using both television and newer media are efficient pathways into children’s homes and lives. Although television is still the preferred medium for reaching children and youth, marketers are exploring how to reach this age group online using cell phones, iPods, game platforms, and other digital devices. Banner ads, for example, which resemble traditional billboard ads but market a product across the top of an Internet page, appear on most webpages. And â€Å"advergames† integrate products such as cereal and candy into online video games to sell products to youth. (Calvert, 2008) * Although television is still the dominant venue for advertising, marketers are exploring new ways to market to children and adolescents through online media and wireless devices, often using stealth techniques whereby consumers are immersed in branded environments, frequently without knowing that they are being exposed to sophisticated marketing campaigns. Marketers carefully analyze children and adolescents’ interest patterns, focusing on games for â€Å"tweens,† as well as communication software for teens. Tracking these patterns provides extensive information that marketers now analyze in aggregate form, but that can, in the future, be used for one-on-one relational marketing strategies directed at specific individuals. (Calvert, 2008) * Online interactive agents are a virtual form of stealth advertising. Marketers program robots, or bots, to reply? to surfers who initiate a conversation. Such bots are programmed to respond to users in a one-on-one relational way that builds brand loyalty, as for instance, with virtual bartenders who â€Å"talk† to those who visit their sites. These alcohol-related websites feature humor, games, and hip language to appeal to minors. (Calvert, 2008) * Many companies have realized that children, particularly tweens and teens, enjoy using technology for education, communication, and entertainment purposes. The Internet allows tweens and teens to become involved with, explore, and learn about products when and where they want to (Schumann and Thorson, 2007). * Some marketers suggest that the best way to engage children through the Internet is by the use of ‘viral’ or buzz marketing strategies that encourage children to email their avourite commercials and other product information to each other (Schumann and Thorson, 2007). As the Internet has continued to grow in prominence and commercial strength, concerns about this medium have grown accordingly, particularly as they relate to children and teens (Schumann and Thorson, 2007). * Typically, these concerns focus around issues of time spent on the Internet and its effect on intellectual and social development, the vulnerability of children to advertisers’ tactics and children’s access to inappropriate content (Schumann and Thorson, 2007). One of the concerns often voiced about children and Internet advertising is how much time children are exposed to advertising messages while online and also how much attention they pay to these messages (Schumann and Thorson, 2007). * Because exposure to Internet advertising is not regulated like advertising on broadcast television, there is concern about the amount of exposure that a child may have to advertising messages. On television, a single advertisement for a single brand may last 30-60 seconds before switching to another advertisement. On the internet, however, a child can spend hours on a single web site playing games, chatting to friends, catching up on product news, all while being continually exposed to a range of persuasive messages for that brand (Schumann and Thorson, 2007). * While television and other media have long been used to sell to children, the Internet presents some important differences. For example, television advertisers are asked to maintain a clear separation between content and advertising; Internet advertisers are not. And television advertisers are prohibited from using their corporate logos both as content and pitchmen at the same time; Internet advertisers face no such restrictions. As a result, Tony the Tiger has free rein among the games, quizzes and activities on Kellogg’s site, while on television he is restricted to station breaks (Carleton, 2000). * Today, children spend an estimated $130 million annually, and influence another $500 million in household purchases. And the Internet is a great place to reach those young consumers (Carleton, 2000). * Unlike traditional media, the Internet allows children and adolescents to access different kinds of content, and a specific characteristic is that this can be done in privacy, without the knowledge of parents (Marshall, 2010). * The most influential sources of information for children today making decisions and keeping contact with peers are media, meaning that children receive far more information from media than from parents and schools. This phenomenon has been called ‘the parallel school of media’, which means that children and adolescents will daily use up several hours on various media (Marshall, 2010). * Children can very quickly adopt and use new media technology and companies and advertising agencies are extremely innovative and creative when it is a question of targeting children with commercial messages (Marshall, 2010). * Children are targeted because of the amount of money they spend on themselves, the influence they have on their parents and because of the money they will spend when they grow up (three different markets). Young children are increasingly the target of advertising and marketing because of the amount of money they spend themselves, the influence they have on their parents spending (the nag factor) and because of the money they will spend when they grow up. (Beder, 1998) * Children represent three different markets. In addition to the direct money that children spend and the money they influence, children also represent a third major market and perhaps the most significant and that is the future market. Advertisers recognise that brand loyalties and consumer habits formed when children are young and vulnerable will be carried through to adulthood. (Beder, 1998) * In Australia, children under 18 have an average $31. 60 to spend each week and they influence more than 70 per cent of their parents’ clothes and fast food purchases. (Beder, 1998) * Both the discretionary income of children and their power to influence parent purchases have increased over time. (Calvert, 2008) * The affluence of today’s children and adolescents has made youth a market eminently worthy of pursuit by businesses. Calvert, 2008) * Evolution of a child consumer. (Beder, 1998) – From age 1: Accompanying Parents and Observing. Children are taken with their parents to supermarkets and other stores where all sorts of goodies are displayed. By the time a child can sit erect, he or she is placed in his or her culturally defined observation post high atop a shopping cart. From this vantage point the child stays safety in proximity to parents but can see for the first time the wonderland of marketing. – From age 2: Accompanying Parents and Requesting. Children begin to ask for things that they see and make connections between television advertising and store contents. They pay more attention to those ads and the list of things they want increases. At the same time, the youngster is learning how to get parents to respond to his or her wishes and wants. This may take the form of a grunt, whine, scream, or gesture–indeed some tears may be necessary–but eventually almost all children are able on a regular basis to persuade Mom or Dad to buy something for them. – From age 3: Accompanying Parents and Selecting with Permission. Children are able to come down from the shopping trolley and make their own choices. They are able to recognise brands and locate goods in the store. At this point the child has completed many connections, from advertisements to wants, to stores, to displays, to packages, to retrieval of want-satisfying products. For many parents this is a pleasing experience. Ditto for the marketers, for it signals the beginning of the child’s understanding of the want-satisfaction process in a market-driven society. – From age 4: Accompanying Parents and Making Independent Purchases. The final step in their development as a consumer is learning to pay for their purchases at the checkout counter. – From age 5: Going to the Store Alone and Making Independent Purchases. – By the age of eight children make most of their own buying decisions. * Integrating a variety of different theoretical perspectives, Patti Valkenburg and Joanne Cantor advanced a developmental model? of how children become consumers * In the first stage (birth to two years), toddlers and infants have desires and preferences, but they are not yet true consumers because they are not yet truly goal-directed in their product choices. During the second stage (two to five years), preschoolers nag and negotiate, asking for and even demanding certain products. At this point in their development, young children do not understand the persuasive intent of commercials; they focus on the attractive qualities of products and cannot keep their minds off the products for long. These developmental characteristics make them extremely vulnerable to commercial advertisements. By the end of this stage, children replace whining and throwing tantrums to get a desired product with more effective negotiation. In early elementary school (five to eight years), children reach the stage of adventure and first purchases. They begin to make clearer distinctions between what is real and what is imaginary, their attention spans are longer, and they make their first purchases outside the company of their parents. * In the final stage (eight to twelve years), elementary school children are attuned to their peer groups’ opinions. Their critical skills to assess products emerge, and their understanding of others’ emotions improves considerably. In the later years of this stage, interest shifts from toys to more adult-like products, such as music and sports equipment. Although children’s consumer behaviors continue to develop during the adolescent years, the foundation is laid in these early years with a progression from simple wants and desires to a search to fulfill those desires to making in- dependent choices and purchases to evaluating the product and its competition * (All Beder, 1998). The ability of elementary children to recognize both traditional online advertising such as banner and button ads and embedded advertising that is part of advergames seems to be limited. With only about a third of the children able to accurately identify advertising, a large percentage is left unable to identify advertising content. * Children’s culture is increasingly dominated and defined by market interests, as advertisers, children’s industries, and other producers of consumer goods clamour to capture the hearts, minds and pocketbooks of this profitable demographic. * The creation of online communities and spaces for children and youth has thus become a growing and lucrative endevour for many media, toy and food companies. This article provides a critical analysis of one such online community called NeoPets, whose premise is that users create or adopt a virtual pet to nuture. * Acquisition of currency (called ‘NeoPoints’), gained by playing various games, exchanging or selling items, filling out marketing surveys, and entering contests and games of chance, allows for the purchase o pet food and other virtual consumer products. * Neopets is part of a landscape of global, youthful, digital entertainment products that have emerged with the Internet and technological convergence. In its few years of operation, 16 million users have created Neopets. According to promotional material, Neopets is one of the fastest growing Internet youth communities. * The neopets site generates revenue through a strategy it calls ‘immersive marketing’, a scheme similar to product placement in films. Food manufacturers and entertainment giants have thus flocked to neopets, eager to reach this youthful market through insinuation of their brand in games and activities on the site. * Neopets generates a substantial part of its revenue by providing market research and consumer studies of its users. The neopets website exemplifies the new ‘children’s digital media culture’- a culture which fosters deepening levels of intimacy between marketer and children by dissolving traditional barriers between ‘content and commerce’. * In neopia, products and brand names are integrated within the many games and features that are part of the rich content on the site. Advertisers and entertainment companies such as Walt Disney, McDonalds and Mattel have flocked to Neopets, eager to reach the tween and teen market. * The majority of neopets users are under 18 years of age, with 39% below the age of 12 and 40% between 13-17 years old. Neopets conforms to modern conventions found in Saturday-morning cartoon series, comics, children’s advertising and product design: the use of a brightly coloured palate, with a predominance of primary and secondary colours, and highly-stylized ‘bubbly’ graphics. * Immersive advertising directly integrates a sponsor’s product or service into the activities available with in the site. Advertisers hope that immersive advertising campaigns will encourage children to play with the products, thus enabling them to later identify their brand. As children and youth continue to expand their access and presence on the Internet, they adopt participatory roles in the creation of online content and contribute in meaningful ways to online environments, including games and communities. * As children are sucked into the commercial marker in an increasingly competitive cradle-to-grave branding strategy, neopets strategy of immersive advertising amidst a fantastical community concerned with the ethos of acquisition and entrepreneurialism as entertainment provides a salient example of ‘childhood as a cultural space constituted by consumerism’. Neopets global marketing strategy of cross-media licensing and integrated marketing is a blatant example of branding children’s media environments. Slapping consumer culture onto children’s culture means we are denying children a degree of autonomy and agency in creating their own spaces.

Economic Implications on Social Media Essay

The developments in the information technology sector have led to facilitation in information sharing across the globe in what has been referred to as social media. The internet has brought many changes in the way individuals across the world interact. Through the use of social media, individuals are able to exchange photographs, videos, post their thoughts on blogs and take part in discussions that takes lace online. Social media allows the people, organizations, companies and governments to be able to reach large numbers of people with a lot of ease. This paper shall give an overview of how the social media has impacted on the economic domain of development in the society by analyzing both the positive and the negative impacts. Social Media: Social media refers to the various internet based and mobile services which allows the user to take part in online exchanges, contributing user-created content and being able to join the online community. It also refers to the tools and technologies that enable an online interaction, networking, sharing and collaboration. There are various services internet services that are usually associated with social media which includes blogs, wikis, social bookmarking, social network sites, status updates services, virtual word content and media sharing site (Dewing, 2010). Blogs is a short form of ‘web log’ which can be described as an online journal in which pages are put on view in an overturned chronological order. The blogs can be hosted for free on various websites including WordPress and Blogger among others. Wikis on the other hand refers to collective websites in which anyone participating can modify the pages or create their new pages using a Web browser. A good example of a wiki is the Wikipedia which is a free online encyclopedia that utilizes the wiki technology. Social bookmarking sites are those sites which allow the users to share and organize links to websites for instance the Delicious, Digg, and Reddit. Social network sites are the web-based services which enables the individuals to build a public or semi-public profile in a delimited system. The individuals are also able to articulate a list of other users whom they share connection thus being able to navigate through and view their list of connections and those of others in the system. Such sites include Facebook, MySpace, and Windows Live Spaces amongst others (Dewing, 2010). Status-update services are also referred to as micro-blogging services are more like social network sites but they allow individuals to share short updates and also be able to view updates from others. A good example is the twitter services. Virtual world content on the other hand offers a game-like virtual environment for the users to interact. A good example of this would be the imaginary world that is created in Second Life whereby users can create avatars to interact with each other. Avatars are the virtual representations of the users. Media–sharing sites are those which enable the users to post videos or photographs for instance the You Tube and Flickr. It must be noted that some of these categories do overlap for instance twitter can be regarded as both a social network site as well as a stats update service (Dewing, 2010). Social media is capable of affecting the manner in which individuals interact online. Social media is known to open up new ways for cooperation and dialogue in today’s world. Most of the content posted in social media may remain there permanently at least by default. The content may also be accessible, replicable, and searchable. Social media can therefore be used anywhere, and at any moment provided that there is internet connectivity in the area. Such factors are responsible for shaping of the dynamics of the social media. The fact that the players in the social media are usually invisible raises various questions regarding the framework, correctness and unambiguousness regarding the communication. The identity and motives of those who post contents in the social media are not always clear (Dewing, 2010). Evolution of Social Media: The internet became popular in the last two decades and web sites which allowed individuals to create and upload content started appearing with the first network site said to have appeared in 1997 for the first time. The first social network site to be launched was called ‘SixDegrees. com’ and it was followed soon by many others at the turn of the millennium. In 2002, there was an upsurge in the number of social network sites with some surging to popularity only to fade in a little while such as the Friendstar. However, others were able to develop niche communities for instance MySpace appealed to adolescent music enthusiasts (Dewing, 2010). Towards the end of the first decade of the second millennium, social media was widely accepted, for instance; by the year 2009, Facebook made the announcement that its users were well over 350 million worldwide (Dewing, 2010). There are a number of factors that have led to a surge in the social media participation which include technological factors, social factors and economic factors. Technological factors include things such as readily available broadband, improvement in software tools, and the development of more powerful computer and mobile services. Social factors on the other hand include the rapid uptake of social media by the young generation while the economic factors include the growth in commercial interests in the social media sites and affordability of computers and related software (Dewing, 2010). Impacts of Social Media: Since the widespread usage of social media is a recent phenomenon, social and economic implications can only be barely understood. Some quarters hold the belief that social media is causing isolation amongst the people whereas others believe that social media has broaden democratic participation. According to a research conducted by statistics Canada; We should expect neither a dysfunctional society of loners nor a blissful society of happy net-workers. Rather, we are facing a society that is differently cohesive from the one we have known. There do not appear to be any significant differences in the number of social ties or in the amount of social interaction between Internet users and non-users. Instead, the Internet is providing ways of fostering participation with community members and enhancing relationships, including through social media (Dewing, 2010, para 10). Social media has also had economic impacts in regard to the manner in which what is contained in the social media is created and consumed. This can be summed up to the growth in the information and communication sector of the economy. In most economies, growth in this sector of the economy has been tremendous even surpassing the overall economic growth. Many business firms and organizations have also incorporated social media in their marketing strategies (Dewing, 2010). Socio-economic Impacts: The socioeconomic theory appears to be spearheading the deflationary cycle more than the financial or the political economics. Previously, the Keynesian and libertarian theories were believed to be the key players in the deflationary cycle. According to the socio-economic theories, it is claimed that in order for us to get out of the deflationary cycle, there is need to view it as both a sociological and fiscal problem. The solution is therefore to be found in the ground-breaking technology which promises huge profits to be used in investment so as to commence the next boom cycle, and snap the society out of the predicament created by the economic downturn. Social media could play a role in mitigating the damages that arise from the deflationary cycle. It could also be instrumental in the construction of the next opportunities for technological innovations (Fischer, 2009). Understanding the objective economic potential is very crucial and dependant on the revolution of the social media. Social media is known to utilize technology in enhancing the people’s ability to interact with others. Social media is to be found in interaction, connection, trust and relations that are driven by technology. In regard to business, this implies establishment of trust and channels of communication which supports and enables collaboration and building of engaged teams through the removal of barriers and frustrations that were created by conventional structures. Social media particularly in regard to collaboration has the potential to unlock the hidden knowledge in organizations when required. It also lowers the cost of software via open source cooperation, easing the finding of appropriate information, and making organizations to be more responsive. These are however cultural changes that occurs gradually. Nevertheless, the promise for change is there even though it might take much longer time. However, the technological investment that is required to bring about these changes is quite cheaply available (Fischer, 2009). With social media, change is bound to happen. Social media has the prospects of creating more effective organizations via the collaboration, â€Å"providing a greater variety of information services at low cost through mashups and open source, and a lower cost to product and service messaging, when the product and service has great appeal†(Fischer, 2009, para 7). Similarly, social media has detrimental impacts on the established industries. The conventional advertising media has become decreasingly effective due to the increasing numbers of the individuals who are networked and therefore attentive to one another. It is imperative to observe that; Friend of a friend referrals, rating sites or consumer oriented websites will become the norm and rely on their objectivity to maintain trust with their followers, therefore are not as subject to trying to manipulate their audience based on the promise of big advertising revenue (Fischer, 2009, para 8). There is no doubt that manipulation is part of the social media practice though the ability for any individual to broadcast and gain audience to the large network in the social media indicates that it is not an easy task and it is destined to be the exception and not the norm in the long run (Fischer, 2009). The distribution of retail products may also come to the forefront due to the social media influence. Due to the fact that e-commerce has been enhanced in the recent past owing to a revolution in the social media, some social observations have been made in regard to marketing trends for instance, there has been a relation drawn between the trends on how particular products are moved in the market. Such observations may be observed as ‘individuals who bought product X also bought product Y’. Large business organizations may also offer lower prices and utilize the social media to achieve the personal touch, a domain previously associated with small business organizations. This has been geared towards the ‘commodization’ of products that are produced on a large scale and the futuristic markets with the chances of realizing massive profits. The markets of the future are said to be niche markets that would require subject matter expertise and customization (Fischer, 2009). The gains of the social media in economic venture may be offset by the unsettling role associated with it in the conventional industries. In the past, any technological changes would result in obvious and simple routes to massive increases in the production and demand. However, with the social media, increase in productivity and demand over a short time is not palpable due to the fact that it requires cultural changes together with the technological transformations. Eventually, as the cultural changes are realized over time, massive increases in the production may be realized; however, in the short term social media can not be used to provide an obvious path for investment capable of leading to gains in effectiveness and productivity (Fischer, 2009). There is this argument that tightly knit society has the capability to survive economic stress better compared to a loosely knit society. Social media ensures that the world is woven in complex interactions and also offers individuals with something to do when they are not involved in an economic activity. This is motivated by what can be referred to as ‘reputation economics’ which is designed to motivate individuals to engage in activities such as creating open source software, report on events, and many more information services that would have required individuals to pay for before the advent of the internet. This allows for rich content and growth of valuable products to be carried out devoid of investment and yet with returns for instance a â€Å"business entity that hosts their websites on Linux servers or uses open office to create and manage documents† (Fischer, 2009, para 9). To add on the long term effectiveness of the social media which include the creation of complex systems like an operating system at relatively low cost; it could also enable the development of new innovations presenting a clear path that shall increase production and demand. The deflationary cycle that is predicted by the socio-economic theories could only be shortened if only we are able to find out the kind of innovation required and be able to bring it more quickly (Fischer, 2009). Social media is said to provide revenue to both the users and platforms. It has to be noted that social media better known as social computing is a driver for competitiveness. The effects of social computing may be seen on the industry itself for instance, the development in the social media or the information and communication technology sector. It can also be observed in other industries that uses the social computing. There is evidence that â€Å"more targeted marketing and user research which are reliant on user profiles and content interest are opening new channels to markets† (Pascu, 2008, para 11). There are emergent employment possibilities vial social networks and new opportunities to utilize user innovations in developing the products or as an intermediate between organizations and consumers (Pascu, 2008). The impact of social media can not be wished away as insignificant. This is because, faced with the modern reality where social media provides a platform for the consumers, competitors and the market place to discuss products, services and employees. All this is carried out online â€Å"whether it’s a protest group on Facebook (â€Å"United Airlines Sucks! â€Å"), a persistent hashtag on Twitter (#attfail) or just a meme that travels from blogger to Blogger† (Taylor, 2009, para 5). At this juncture, it does not matter as to whether it is of importance to probe into the social networks. What is of importance is whether one is paying attention to the social media where the message has gone to. This means that the customer to the company products is the one to define the brand in the market. This is quite challenging as it means that those organizations with acceptable products are bound to be reap benefits even with minimum branding and marketing strategies whereas those companies that are considered bad by the customers are destined to suffer from a bad reputation even when they spent more money to advertise themselves and try to position themselves as market leaders (Taylor, 2009). It is therefore important for organizations to take time and monitor what is going on in the social media. There are various services at the disposal of whoever would like to monitor the social media which include the individual services such as ‘Search. twitter. com’ and more complicated ones such as ‘Filtrbox’ and ‘Radian 6’. For successful business undertaking, there is need for organizations to embrace the social media which provides an avenue to engage with the customers. Interaction on the social media with the customers is crucial and thus joining these sites for creating new bully pulpits for the organization’s marketing and sales messages without proper interaction with the customers is not commendable (Taylor, 2009). The organizations can not be isolated from the social media as they create a powerful impression with the capability of having a lasting impact that may prove to be hard to change. Accompany with a bad reputation might score poorly even with spirited advertisement due to evaluations that are obtained from the social media. It is therefore important to address the problems that are affecting the organizations one by one rather than spending huge sums of money in advertising the products (Chong, 2010). Conclusion: Social media has been a new discovery in the information and communication sector and that its impacts on the economic development are worthy noting. The economic impacts of social media are two fold and may bring positive results or negative results to a business organization. With social media, the consumers of the company products are able to talk about the products, services and competitors and definitely such discussions are to impact on the business entity either for better or for worse. Social media can therefore have far reaching repercussions on the business organizations in terms of profitability. Reference: Chong, S. , (2010). Nothing Can save Negative Buzz on Twitter. Retrieved on 26th July 2010 from; http://www. penn-olson. com/2010/07/02/nothing-can-save-negative-buzz-on-twitter/. Dewing, M. , (2010). Social Media: 1. An Introduction. Retrieved on 26th July 2010 from; http://www2. parl. gc. ca/Content/LOP/ResearchPublications/2010-03-e. htm. Fischer, K. , (2009). Exploring the economic impact of social media. Retrieved on 26th July 2010 from; http://www. web20blog. org/2009/03/24/exploring-the-economic-impact-of-social-media/. Pascu, C. , (2008). ERoSC-The Socio-economic Impact of Emerging Social Computing Applications. Retrieved on 26th July 2010 from; http://docs. google. com/viewer? a=v&q=cache:dHneLXVRkYgJ:www. foresight-network. eu/index. php%3Foption%3Dcom_docman%26task%3Ddoc_view%26gid%3D352+Economic+Implications+on+Social+Media&hl=en&gl=ke&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEEShixNJSG5ddAxmDsp3_H0NmsZ-LetSdSeKnGykkb0y_4ruRrW-EstMaeGHfs16v1u66MJlBbpW-WIgVRxtCabedvJWeojTeW4mfj7Z70xD-y31hAWGz7VhQwakzAylysKUUV0NN&sig=AHIEtbRbStc-eBG_GjfGNgsEL-OmZ0oP8g Taylor, D. , (2009). What’s the impact of social media on business growth? Retrieved on 26th July 2010 from; http://www. intuitive. com/blog/impact_of_social_media_twitter_facebook_business_growth. html

Oranges and Fair Trade Essay

In both poems â€Å"Oranges† and â€Å"Fair Trade† by Gary Soto, the author explores the recurring theme of compassion and pride. Both poems have several ways to show the theme. The poem â€Å"Oranges† is about young love and knowing how it once felt. At the beginning of the poem, I get the sense that the boy is a little apprehensive in meeting his girl as he states, â€Å"Cold and weighted down / with two oranges in my jacket. † Certainly two oranges aren’t going to weigh anyone down, therefore the image described must be the nervousness along with the anticipation of seeing meeting her. As I walked toward / her house, the one whose / porch light burned yellow / night and day, in any weather,† tells me about his burning passion for her. â€Å"She came out pulling / at her gloves, face bright / with rouge,† tells me that she is also excited to see him and that she is either blushing or has applied some makeup in the manner a young inexperienced woman would. As she comes out of her house, some of that nervousness exits him because he smiles and even has the courage to touch her shoulder. The line about the â€Å"used car lot† and â€Å"newly planted trees† is imagery about his reality and what kind of life he lives. As they enter into the drugstore and look at the candies, the boy is probably feeling for the first time a sense of maturity as he asks her what she wanted; because he’s able to buy her something. â€Å"The lady’s eyes met mine, / and held them, knowing / very well what it was all / about. † The imagery here provides some tension for the reader: â€Å"Will the boy ask the girl to change her selection? Will the saleslady demand cash or no sale? Although his courage is impressive, the risk was also a safe and intelligent bet: If the saleslady had refused to honor his orange for payment, he would still have the two oranges to share with the girl on their way home. The oranges give the narrator â€Å"weight† and importance, and then they became a medium of exchange used to buy the candy. â€Å"I took my girl’s hand / in mine for two blocks,† The boy’s reference to the girl as â€Å"my girl,† shows that he now feels in control. The boy proves himself and impresses the girl, which was the goal in the first place, and he is rewarded for his bravery by being allowed to hold her hand on the walk home. As the narrator describes â€Å"I peeled my orange / that was so bright against / the gray of December / that, from some distance, / someone might have thought / I was making a fire in my hands,† symbolizes the new energy of confidence he has in himself, as well as his increased affection for his girl. As a result, the imagery in this poem reflects the boy’s struggle in life from adolescence to adulthood. The poem â€Å"Fair Trade† is about money, pride, and sympathy. The title gave off an aura of sarcasm as he states, â€Å"she said, â€Å"Dollar thirty,† / I thought, No meat or butter. It wasn’t really a fair trade, because a dollar thirty for two slices of bread is quite expensive at his time. Neither did the waitress offered meat nor butter. â€Å"The man / hesitated, then fumbled for / coins from his pocket,† tells me that the man is poor, because he wouldn’t have been taken aback if he have lots of cash. Only the narrator sympathize the Mexican man as he states, â€Å"I stabbed the carrots, / hurting for this man. † I conclude that the bread may not have satisfied the man because he didn’t leave anything on his plate. At the end of the poem, the narrator tells us that the experience had left him a mark, that he wouldn’t forget the memory of that day. The images of the poem reflect the Mexican man’s pride and the narrator’s compassion towards him. Both poems teach us the same lesson; â€Å"Compassion comes from seeing others struggle. † The poems’ similarities are that they both have people who show sympathetic pity and concern to others. In the poem â€Å"Oranges,† the narrator describes compassion by his own experience, how pride affected him. On the other hand, the poem â€Å"Fair Trade,† describes the narrator’s interpretation of pride.

Second Home Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Second Home - Essay Example Specifically, the author’s diction, her sentence structure, the choice of words, imagery, and figurative language are important aspects of the use of tone. One of the key techniques employed by the writer is the use of imagery in expressing the mood of the essay. The author is extravagant in painting images and visual aspects of the places that she describes in the minds of the readers. This use of image shapes the general idea of the subject in the mind of the reader by portraying it as either negative or negative. For instance, the writer clearly shows that she is lonely in saying that â€Å"in general, I get a huge amount of pleasure out of filling my home with the things that other people used to have in theirs. What more can I say?† The writer further portrays herself as a nonsocial being using aspects of imagery. It is, in fact, the reason why she constantly remembers her childhood and seeks comfort in personifying objects. â€Å"I had a nice phone conversation with the woman who runs the store and ordered two dolls from her store, both young ladies, thinking it would be awesome if my family was made up of two grown siblin gs living together.† The writer further explores figurative language in shaping the feelings of the reader. For example, the writer states that â€Å"I had a revival of interest in my dollhouse when I was around 11.† This statement goes to show that she was reminiscing about her childhood and missing it. The same technique is used in her later life as she remembers her dollhouse to remember her childhood. The writer uses the scale of 1:12 to show the importance of making a good dollhouse. She says that â€Å"one inch representing one foot in a real room†. Moreover, the writer personifies the dolls towards the end of the essay by calling them Lily and Hyacinth. The author uses her word diction to portray the mood of the essay by changing between formal and ordinary levels.

Fashion is no longer led by design, but rather marketing Essay

Fashion is no longer led by design, but rather marketing - Essay Example Consumers thrilled by the advertising themes tend to buy without focusing on the product offerings by the brand (Agins, 1999, p.14). Marketing is more important than designs, but however the importance of design cannot in anyways be neglected. Importance of Marketing in the Fashion Apparel Industry The marketing activities of any industry depend on a set of four functions viz. product, price, place and promotion. The designing of the apparel by the apparel or the clothing industry encompass the product factor in the marketing activities. However, the other marketing activities related to the promotion, place and price must be so used as to help highlight the product usages and unique features. In that marketing activities first endeavor to focus on enlarging the scope of seasonal offerings to the customers. Different segments like women, men, and sports possess separate attributes for producing seasonal products. The number of seasonal offerings increases in the case of women apparel s than for men apparels. For the sports segment a separate line ‘resort wear’ is introduced which needs special promotion efforts to be largely marketed. Promotion and distribution activities of the designer wears constitute selling such garments through the construction of retail outlets or organizing large fashion shows for the promotion of the new lines introduced (Jay, n.d. p.198). Marketing activities in the field of fashion merchandise occupies a place of strategic importance in its ability to relate the firm’s production activities to the outside world. The garment industry through the use of proper planning, promotion and distribution activities can endeavor to get a larger market share of its designed products. In the planning stage the garment manufacturing firms through the incorporation of extensive market research activities endeavor to understand the needs of the consumers and target groups and design products accordingly. Moreover, the designers th rough the spontaneous study of international design standards endeavor to create a product to be accepted in the international market. Fabric designers should lay increased focus on enhancing the product quality through the creation of new textures through blending of fiber yarns and other finishing activities. Having the product built the fabric manufacturers then concentrate on the marketing activities. The marketing activities must focus on making more number of customers aware of the product specialties of the particular brand based on the features of the textures and blends incorporated to produce the desired quality. Marketing activities encompass a wide range of events like advertising, promotion, creating huge publicity and rendering presentations. Presentations can be created to inform the large audiences about the designs incorporated to enhance the quality standards of the products and reflect such development based on market trends. (Frings, Stephens, 2002.pp. 138-147). Marketing Activities affecting the market for Designs The increased focus lent on marketing activities helps the firm to incur more revenue through gaining a larger market share. However, the firms through the use of strategies like price penetration where the prices of the products are considerably lowered to gain wider market

Planning and managing a major recruiting project Essay

Planning and managing a major recruiting project - Essay Example ique) approach is the right solution for such situations because it structures everything, breaks hiring process into smaller tasks and estimates time needed to do each of them. The article exemplifies the use of CPM/PERT on the real case that took place in the US Midwestern city. The search for Pension Financial Manager was vital because that person was responsible for $1.4 billion in pension funds and had to coordinate 8 consultants and assist the City Retirement System (Armacost & Jauernig, 1991). In order to make the right choice, it was decided to break the process of searching and hiring into smaller meaningful steps. It allowed the commission to estimate time and resources required to find new person and meet the deadline. As a result, the process consisted of 13 smaller activities; each of them was analyzed in detail to consider different factors of influence that can complicate the process. Generally, this approach to HR activities allowed making better projections and analysis (Armacost & Jauernig, 1991). Overall, the article comes to the conclusion that CPM/PERT approach is a good way to manage complex HR processes that are different from daily routine. Since every different case is treated as a project, it is vital to know how much it can take to make it happen. Having all plans and projections done, HR managers are more motivated to follow them and succeed at work. The article clearly explains why project management approach it good for HR processes and how managers can implement it in their work flow. At the same time, this article was written more than 20 years ago so it does not present the full picture in its modern state. Today HR managers can use a wide range of special software for planning and managing both ordinary and major HR processes. Despite this drawback, the article is quite informative as it is based on real example and explains the essence of implementing changes in HR processes. Also, it contains enough details about each stage

Gay marriage (equal rights for everyone) Research Paper

Gay marriage (equal rights for everyone) - Research Paper Example The third point to be considered is the negative attitude toward legalization of gay marriage, because very often these relationships are considered only with regards to sexual and intimate relations among gay couples. The fourth point to be taken into account is positive attitudes to gay marriage, because gays as a rule are devoted partners and contribute much not only to their families, but also to the community and the society. The fifth point, which should be taken into account, is that homosexuality is not a kind of deviance and these people have the same rights as all of the rest of the members of the society. Analysis and Evaluation Jullian Rayfield in her online review "New York State Senate Passes Marriage Equality Bill" (24 June, 2011) is focused on gay marriage legalization in New York. The author generalizes her main concerns and introduces the supportive arguments for the introduction of gay marriage. A centennial struggle happened in the society, where gays wanted to pr otect their rights and have an opportunity to live together with their sexual partners. Nowadays this struggle has borne some fruits and led to the legalization of gay marriage in the New York State Senate. The author of the article provides her main argument referring to the answers of Republicans and other representatives of political parties, providing supporting and counterarguments to the discussion of gay rights marriage. Social participation of gays and their restriction from heterosexual individual rights is the most controversial claim. Nowadays we have a perfect opportunity to raise our voices in order to protect gay community. Moreover, the author of the article provides positive answers of the members of the Senate, who are much concerned an opportunity of all people to behave equally and have a chance to provide gay couples with a right to get married. The processes of globalization underline the necessity of limits blurring and there is no need to save worn out stereot ypes and social norms. Republicans underline that inability to pass this law would mean to hide the democratic principles of their policy. To have a right for marriage means to have an ability to live with a beloved person. So, if gays have their beloved persons, why do not they have a chance to spend their lifetime together? The development of the community and the society depends on all members of the society. Gay couples have the same rights as all other members of the society. Unfortunately, very often these people are prevented from children upbringing or even being married. Still, we have a hope that there is an essential shift towards the gay rights for marriage acknowledgement throughout the country. If to consider the second point of the paper, which is based on Laura Kipnis appeal for the society to provide all human beings with an opportunity to get married, it is the only way to hold beloved hearts together and to establish a kind of a societal bound between them. Gays s hould be treated equally and there is no need to focus our attention on their sexual or intimate preferences. Kipnis underlines that contemporaries should focus their attention on the

Understanding Challenges In The Third Sector Essay - 4

Understanding Challenges In The Third Sector - Essay Example I realized that human resource is a challenge to the third sector. Specifically, distinction between the role of the volunteer and the regular employees often bring many challenges (Tilly, 2011 p 23). among them include planning the activities of the agency with the volunteers. The agency depends on the human resource in running its activities an aspect that makes reliance on the volunteers quite challenging. As the name suggest, a volunteer may seize to be a staff of the agency. I think soliciting funds is a challenge to the agency because it has a direct impact on running the activity of the organizations. Before the children get into the hands of their adopters, for instance, they live under the care of the agency. This means that the agency has to solicit funds that can sustain the program. Moreover, the agency does know when the adopters would knock at the agency’s door. I think this explains the reasons for allocating funds for nearly every person under the umbrella of the organization. Although third sector has been in place for a number of years, lack of understanding between funders and state based purchasers makes the running of the agency quite hard. I believe that this misconception is worrying because it shifts the attention of either group, an aspect that might dent the functions of the organization. Arguably, lack of awareness among the main players contributes to this situation (Tilly, 2011 p12). Further, the recognition of the brands used by the third sector is an important step that would help in changing the situation. I think formalization of the activities of the firm would not only influence the future state of the firm, but also change the present trends in handling issues within the agency. I think distinction between the beneficiaries and the other persons is gnawing at the agency. In turn, the reverberation of this challenge affects normal activities

Aristotle's Theory concerning Moral Responsibility Essay

Aristotle's Theory concerning Moral Responsibility - Essay Example Aristotle believes that every human being has a responsibility for his or her actions, something that makes others reasonably praise, blame or even punish him or her; he shows this by pointing out various conditions, which lessen or even cancel this responsibility. He converses force of occurrences, threats, along with coercion, bad character, ignorance and intoxication. Taken together, his version shows the basic concepts involved in being a person who ends up getting reasonably praised or blamed. The primary limitation concerning voluntary action is the force of circumstances. Aristotle gives an example about a ship caught in a storm; in this case, the sailors have to throw goods overboard to avoid the sinking of the ship. Here, the action is not entirely voluntary; therefore the sailors are not to blame for their actions. On the other hand, the storm is not to blame for the undesirable outcome, which is the loss of the goods, since it is a natural event that no one is responsible. Another example is the case whereby my friend accidentally pushes me as a result of getting pushed by a bully; here, she is not to blame considering that it was not here intention to push me, rather, she got pushed, and as a result, ended up pushing me. These cases are extreme instances of the force of necessity whereby we always live and always get forced into our actions by natural facts, though we only notice this when the force happens to be sudden or unexpected (Williams 25). In reality, the interference of other people is what causes us the most grief, which in turn causes problems when it comes to responsibility attributions. This interference tends to take many forms; however, its paradigmatic forms happen to be coercion and manipulation. Concerning coercion, the judgment by Aristotle get balanced since it is dependent on what act my coercer is demanding from me, as well as the threats he is making. On the other hand, there are some actions, which tend to be extremely heino us that we must be blamed for carrying them out, whatever a person gets threatened with, together with whatever blame also tends to be attached to the coercer; hence Aristotle dismisses the thought that a man may be compelled to killing his mother (Williams 45). Apparently, a central issue at stake when it comes to attributions of responsibility happens to be the expectations that people have each other. Although there are some kinds of coercion that we do not normally expect people to oppose, there are also some forms of action that people should never embark on, regardless of such features. In these cases praise, together with blame tends to work on clarifying and to reinforce these expectations through the provision of a form of moral education. What determines appropriate or immoral character happens to be the manner in which a person reacts when he discovers the truth or failing to regret their deeds, then they can be blamed, albeit the original choice being justifiable. Accord ing to Aristotle, our praise and blame is in most cases, not about an individual act; rather, it is about the character of the one who acted. Importantly, not every form of ignorance gets excused since moral knowledge happens to be extremely distinctive from factual knowledge (Echenique 49). However, if a person tends to be morally ignorant, he or she ends up being unable to choose well; here, Aristotle grants that the majority of people of settled villainous character, whether they are morally ignorant or otherwise, are

Global International Markets Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Global International Markets - Research Paper Example According to Wensley, global strategic market is â€Å"initiating, negotiating, and managing acceptable exchange relationships with key interests groups or constituencies, in the pursuit of sustainable competitive advantage within specific markets, on the basis of long run consumer, channel and other stakeholder franchise† (Wensley, 1982). The Wal-Mart Wal-Mart is one of the largest retail stores chain in the world and was established in 1962. On the basis of the strategic perspective, the Wal-Mart is structured into three main segments namely, Wal-Mart United States, Sam’s Club and Wal-Mart International. According to the statistical report of the company, in 2011, the Wal-Mart’s revenues constitute up to about three-fifth of the United States market. The web portal, Wal-Mart.com also contributes heavily to the total turnover of the company, constituting nearly 8% of the total revue through online retail operations (Wal-Mart 2011). Today, the company operates th eir business in over 15 countries, accounting for 25% of their net sales. Their selling policy includes promotion techniques of discounting outlets, restaurants, superstores, retail stores and multiple formats of outlets, to gain the maximum satisfaction of their customers especially in countries like China and Japan. The retail and online operations of the Sam’s club contributes about 10.5% in terms of annual revenues to the company. Moreover, the company holds the top position for employing over 2.1 million people, which remains bigger than all other major retailers (Carrefour, Tesco and Metro AG) put together (Wal-Mart 2009).Besides, the company functions nearly 3000 superstores, 720 discount outlets, and more than 600 Sam’s Club outlets in the United States. Globalization of Markets Globalization of Markets refers to the integration of national markets into one large global marketplace. Today international trade has become much easier as the hurdles of crossing the borders for trade is eradicated. All companies like to offer a standard product worldwide. However, there are considerable variances existing among each market such as, consumer tastes and preferences, cultural variations, and legal regulations. Such variations in the international market make a company to adopt strategies that may match with the conditions of a country’s market. Wall-Mart may still require diversifying their products across each country according the local tastes and preferences. Globalization of production The term globalization of production is associated with sourcing of goods and services from various locations across the globe while taking advantage of the variations in cost and quality of factors of production across the regions. Here, Wal-Mart operates over 4200 outlets in the global markets and which constitutes a quarter of its annual revenues. Its efficiently running primary retailer markets like Mexico and Canada enhance a fast market expansion a cross South America, Africa and Asia (Wal-Mart 2009). Driving Forces There are various drivers of globalization in the global marketplace. When a company becomes subject to these forces, they practically become candidates for globalization. The major driving forces of globalization are; technological advances, global economic growth, converging market needs and wants, pressure to improve quality, opportunities for

Organizational Culture Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Organizational Culture - Essay Example There are various perspectives that are used in interpreting the organisational culture. Each organisation has its stated approach in interpreting organisational culture. This explains the reason why there is a discrepancy in the performance of many organisations operating in the same field. For instance, some organisations fuse organisational culture with other aspects that enhance its performance. On the other hand, some organisations solely rely on the organisational culture to enhance their performance. As it is explicitly seen, some organisations will have an upper hand as compared to other organisations (Levinson, 2010:15). The first perspective in organisational culture is the scope of maintaining the organisational culture at all times. In this perspective, an organisation sticks to its intended organisational culture at all times. Though there may be changing times, the organisation will focus on its organisational culture through all times. This is mostly done in organisati ons that have strong organisational cultures that were implemented by the founding fathers. Some of these organisations were formed long time ago with strong organisational cultures that were influential in the success of the organisation. To ensure the organisation keeps improving, the organisation makes the decision that it will stick to the organisational culture as initially stated. To begin with, some organisations stick to their initial organisational culture to enhance uniformity. Uniformity explains the way people in the organisation interact, work and behave. This is a continuous process that does not change through different times. For instance, some organisations have a belief that their behaviour inside and outside the organisation will have direct effects on the... The researcher of this essay states that success in any organisation starts with understanding of an organisation’s culture. Workers and people that understand the culture of an organisation are well prepared to make effective changes when they are needed. For instance, the organisational culture explains the acceptable behaviour as required by the organisation. As such, workers will be observant as they do not want to let down the organisation. Collective assumption of such will enhance the performance of the organisation as all the workers are in unison. Secondly, organisational culture shows enhanced communication in an organisation. Thirdly, understanding organisational culture shows uniformity and organised working. The workers will be in constant communication in achieving the organisation’s goals and vision. As such they will be working in unison for the success of the organisation. Fourthly, understanding organisational culture ensures workers are focused on imp lementing positive attributes in the organisation. This includes success, service delivery, quality production and uplifting the name if the organisation that were discussed in the essay. Lastly, Understanding organisational culture ensures there is development of people’s experience. In conclusion, organisational culture is a vital aspect that should be given utter consideration. This will be vital in making the developments as required. However, when the organisational culture is not observed, the organisation is not likely to make positive change.

School Library Essay Example for Free

School Library Essay Library can be define as a collection of books and other literacy materials kept for reading, research, study and consultation. A library is a collection of information, sources, resources and services, organized for used and maintained by a public body, an institution or a private individuals. In the more traditional sense, the library means a collection of book. It supports the teaching, learning and research for the user who is comes to the library. The library has three types of library such as National Library, Academic Library, School Library, Special Library, Digital Library, Mobile Library and others. For each library have their function. The function of library such as to analyze, describe, preserve and make available for use it collection of material intended in subsection. The activities will involve in library such as purchase, give and exchange, donation and others. The activities that are produce in library will give the advantages for the user. Library also provides the several of collection such as encyclopedia, journal, book, magazine, and so on. The library are most important place that can be use to search the information. The library emphasizes instruction, reference services, on site and remote access to information in print and electronic formats, development of information literacy, and management of collections. The library provides resources and support for the Universitys major functions such teaching, research, scholarship, creative activity, and community service. 2. 0 MISSION The Library supports the academic programs through instruction, collections, technology and services which enable students and faculty to access recorded knowledge and information resources. This support empowers our constituencies to develop the information and technological competencies necessary to achieve their educational, research and professional goals; succeed in the workforce; apply lifelong learning skills and participate in a diverse society. 3. 0 VISSION To achieve a world class library status, catalyst to scholarship and excellence to the University’s teaching, learning and research attainable through physical and virtual means. 4. 0OBJECTIVE * 100% support the learning, teaching, researching and knowledge development programs. * Making the library well establish in services aspect, different of collection, latest technology and updated information. * To generate the workers to be skillful, responsible, commitment, motivated, ethics, proactive, brilliant, and well educated. * Building appropriate and comprehensive collection that are properly housed, controlled and effectively used. * Make library as a excellent information centre from services aspect, collection diversity, latest technology and information source and steady. * Create trained work force, having various skill, ethical high, proactive and team spirit through training, education continuously and increase in career. * Provide space for customer convenience, staff, and material and equipment placement. 5. 0FUNCTION * To build up as complete a collection of material emanating from or relating to country as appropriate. * To analyze, describe, preserve and make available for use its collection of the material intended in subsection. * To render bibliographic services and serve as the national bibliographic agency. * To serve as the national centre for the conservation and appreciation of its collection of the material intended in subsection. 6. 0ACTIVITIES * Purchase * Donation * Give and exchange 6. 1Purchase Purchasing refers to a business or organization attempting to acquire goods or services to accomplish the goals of the enterprise. Though there are several organizations that attempt to set standards in the purchasing process, processes can vary greatly between organizations. A grip applied manually or mechanically to move something or prevent it from slipping. The library facilitates the acquisition of bibliographic materials for the official use of and retention of officers and staff of the MRB by purchase of information materials (book, journals and e-journals, articles, audio-visual materials, etc. ) for official purposes only. The library also facilitates interlibrary loan among local libraries for information materials not available in its collection. 6. 1. 1Book and Journal Purchase Send suggestions to the Chief Librarian, or submit â€Å"Requisition forms† which are available in the library. Please take note that book orders may take 3 – 4 months to fulfill (from time of order to processing). 6. 1. 2 Document Delivery (Article purchase) Document delivery and interlibrary borrowing services are available without charge to research officers. However, officers are requested to check the Library catalogue (OPAC) as to whether the information material required is already available (in the MRB Library) before sending in requests. Requests may be sent by email or the normal requisition forms. 6. 2Give and exchange Give and exchange service is provided by the library to various institutions within the country and abroad. At the moment exchange partners in the country have reached about 65 institutions including academic library, school library and government library. 6. 3 Donation Donations of funds are always welcome, and may range from a simple cash gift to various forms of planned or deferred giving such as endowments, annuities, and bequests. Donations of books, journals, and other materials broaden our collections, enable us to meet the demand for multiple copies of heavily used titles, and also help us replace lost or damaged copies. Your donation might include: * Books on any or all subjects * Manuscripts, letters, and diaries. * Music recordings and scores * Videos and films * Photographs * Maps * Subscriptions to electronic resources All donation offers receive serious consideration by the Library. Donations of material are accepted with the understanding that the University becomes the sole owner, and reserves the ultimate right to determine retention, location, level of cataloguing, access, and other considerations related to its use or disposition. 7. 0LEGISLATION Legislation means the act or process of making a law or laws. Legislation is important in the library to make sure the patrons follow the rules in the library. There is the legislation in the library such as: * Conduct prejudicial to the proper use of the library is forbidden. * Silence shall be observed in the public areas of the library. Hand phones and pagers should be switched to silent mode before entering the library. * Eating, drinking and smoking are strictly prohibited in the library. * Southern College identification cards are non-transferable. * Bags, briefcases, helmets, umbrellas etc. are not allowed in the library. It should be kept in the locker room. * Reservation of a seat is not permitted. * All users are required to be properly attired as specified by the college. The library reserves the right to ask users, who are not suitably dressed to leave library. * Final year students who fail to clear and fines or return materials borrowed from the library on completion of their courses will have their certificate suspended. * Staffs who have applied resigned will have their library privileges terminated, since 2 weeks before their last working day. If they fail to return materials borrowed from the library, their salary will be suspended. * The library bears no responsibility for any loss of personal belongings or properties on its premises. * All library materials must be kept clean. Making, defacing or multiplying library materials is an offence. * No littering in the library. * All users are encouraged to check their library record in Library Online regularly. * The library reserves the right to amend their rules from time to time. 8. 0COLLECTION The Library has a multilingual and multi-format collection that is related to the academic and research programs of AMDI. Materials in the collection are classified according to the Library of Congress Classification Scheme. Presently the collection is categorized as follows: 8. 1Open Shelf Collection. A large proportion of the books in the collection is on Medicine and its related fields. These books are classified according to the National Library of Medicine Classification System and books in other disciplines are classified according to LC. Books on the shelves are arranged according to the assigned Call Numbers. As of today, the collection consists of 7,000 copies and can be loan out by eligible patrons. 8. 2 Fiction Collection The Fiction Collection consists of light reading material and story books in BM and English. The books are arranged on special shelves according to the authors shorten name. The loan limit is 2 copies and duration is according to the loan privileges of the patron. 8. 3Reference Collection This collection consists of reference material such as bibliographies, directories, encyclopedias, dictionaries, etc. Materials in this collection are marked with a letter r in the call number. This collection is only for reference use within the library. 8. 4Brochures The collection consists of small books and brochures that are less than 50 pages. These materials are placed at the Loan Counter. Use of the material is limited within the library. 8. 5Serials. This collection consists of Current Journals, Bound Journals, Serials Monograph, Annual Reports and all other serials publications and magazines in electronic format (CDROM and online). The use of such materials is limited within the library except for Serials Monograph which can be loan out. Patrons are allowed to photocopy articles that are in this collection. However, photocopying of materials is subject to the Copyright Act 1987. a) Current Journal Collection Current Journal Collection consists of current subscribed publications that are arranged according to journal title. Current issues are displayed at the shelves and back issues are arranged and placed on top of the shelves. b)Bound Journals Back issues of journals with complete issues are bound and arranged on a separate shelf. The arrangement is in alphabetical order according to the journal title. As of today the Library has 1,520 journal titles (27,000 copies) comprising subscribed journals, serials monograph, annual reports and others. c) Electronic Journal Collection Some journal titles are in CD-ROM or via online. The collection consists of 1,200 full text titles. The materials in this collection can only be access within the Library. Printing or transferring of information to diskette is allowed. A minimum charge will imposed for this purpose. Certain titles can be access online. For further information, please contact the Document and Serials Publication Unit at extension 3469 or 3471. 8. 6 Control Access Collection The Controlled Access Collection is made up of materials that are heavily used. Theses, research reports, training collections, pictorial collections, examination questions, official publications and small size publications are placed in this collection. This collection can only be used within the Library. All materials are searchable through the online catalog by author, title or subject heading. 9. 0TYPES OF LIBRARY There are six types of library * National library * Academic library * Special library * School library * Digital library * Mobile Library 9. 1National Library A national library is a library specifically established by the government of a country to serve as the preeminent repository of information for that country. Unlike public libraries, these rarely allow citizens to borrow books. Often, they include numerous rare, valuable, or significant works. National libraries are usually notable for their size, compared to that of other libraries in the same country. Some states which are not independent, but who wish to preserve their particular culture, have established a national library with all the attributes of such institutions, such as legal deposit. Many national libraries cooperate within the National Libraries Section of the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) to discuss their common tasks, define and promote common standards and carry out projects helping them to fulfil their duties. National libraries of Europe participate in The European Library. This is a service of The Conference of European National Librarians (CENL). 9. 2Academic Library An academic library is a library which serves an institution of higher learning, such as a college or university libraries in secondary and primary schools are called school libraries. These libraries serve two complementary purposes: to support the schools curriculum, and to support the research of the university faculty and students. The support of teaching requires material for class readings, and for student papers. In the past, the material for class readings, intended to supplement lectures as prescribed by the instructor, has been called reserves. In the period before electronic resources became available, the reserves were supplied as actual books or as photocopies of appropriate journal articles. Traditionally, one copy of a book was made available for each 10 students — this is practical for large classes only if paperback copies are available, and the books reused from term to term. Academic libraries must decide what focus they take in collecting materials since no single library can supply everything. When there are particular areas of specialization in academic libraries these are often referred to as niche collections. These collections are often the basis of a special collection department and may include original papers, artwork, and artifacts written or created by a single author or about a specific subject. 9. 3Special Library A special library is a term for a library that is neither an academic nor school library, nor a public library. Special libraries may include law libraries, news libraries, government libraries, corporate libraries, museum libraries, and medical libraries. Special libraries are also sometimes known as information centers. Special libraries often have a more specific clientele than libraries in traditional educational or public settings, and deal with only a specialized or particular type of information. They are developed to support the mission of their sponsoring organization and their collections and services are more targeted and specific to the needs of their clientele. 9. 4School Library A school library or school libraries media center is library within a school where students, staff, and often, parents of a public or school have access to a variety of resources. The goal of the school library media center is to ensure that all members of the school community have equitable access to books and reading, to information, and to information technology. A school library media center a use all types of media is automated, and utilizes the Internet as well as books for information gathering. School libraries are distinct from public libraries because they serve as learner-oriented laboratories which support, extend, and individualize the schools curriculum. A school library serves as the center and coordinating agency for all material used in the school. 9. 5Digital Library A digital library is a library in which collections are stored in digital formats as opposed to print, microform, or other media and accessible by computers. The digital content may be stored locally, or accessed remotely via computer networks. A digital library is a type of information retrieval system. 9. 6Mobile Library A bookmobile or mobile library is a large vehicle designed for use as a library. They are designed to hold books on shelves so that when the vehicle is parked the books can be accessed by readers. They usually have sufficient space that people can also sit and read books inside them. Mobile libraries are often used to provide library services to villages and city suburbs without library buildings. They also service those who have difficulty accessing libraries, with retirement homes being common stops. They may also carry other information or computer equipment, such as might be found in a library. Some libraries also use their bookmobiles to deliver materials, such as audio books and large print novels, to homebound patrons who dont have anyone to go to the library for them. 10. 0PROFESSION * Chief Librarian * Library Director * Senior Librarian * Librarian * Cataloger * Indexer 10. 1Chief Librarian The Chief Librarian shall, on appointment, provide the staff member with a written position description which sets out the general responsibilities of the position held by the staff member. The Supervisor shall assign the specific duties of the staff member, bearing in mind the position description. The supervisor shall also determine, at least annually, performance expectations which shall be appended to the position description. The Chief Librarian may revise the staff members position description following consultation with the incumbent and, if requested by the incumbent, with the Association. The revision shall take into account the qualifications and experience of the incumbent. The Chief Librarian may transfer a staff member to a different position in the University Library and, if so, shall provide the staff member with the position description for the new position. Prior to such transfer, the Chief Librarian shall consult with the incumbent and, if requested by the incumbent, with the Association. 10. 2Library Director Plan and manage all aspects of library operations: budget, personnel, services, program planning, development and assessment, facilities and equipment. Implement university vision through long-range planning. Plan and implement new and enhanced user-services, including information literacy and remote access for populations at off-campus instructional locations. Create library policies in collaboration with library faculty members. Coordinate collection development and management of library collections Collaborate with Office of Information Technology on integration of emerging technologies and provision of electronic resources to the university community. Lead in an open and collaborative manner. Integrate the core values of respect, compassion, integrity, justice and service in all aspects of interaction. 10. 3Senior Librarian Under direction, to supervise and perform a full range of professional services in a major functional area within the library, and to do related work as required. Supervises children’s section of the library; selects books and other media for children and young adults; plans and presents programs, story hours, puppet shows and book talks; teaches children the use of library tools; advises parents on use of library facilities; establishes communication with teachers; reads book reviews and compiles bibliographies; gathers statistics and prepares report; reads relevant literature and reviews; supervises pages; attends and participates in professional meetings. Supervises cataloging of books and other library materials; does original cataloging as required; supervises book process; plans, supervises and reviews the work of cataloging clerk, book processor, and mender; works with other professionals in maintenance of collection and completeness of catalog; compiles monthly and yearly statistical reports; occasionally works at the reference desk; attends and participates in professional meetings; reads relevant literature. 10. 4Librarian. A librarian is an information professional trained in library and information science, which is the organization and management of information services or materials for those with information needs. Typically, librarians work in a public or college library, an elementary or secondary school media center, a library within a business or company, or another information-provision agency like a hospital or law firm. Some librarians are independent entrepreneurs working as information specialists, catalogers, indexers and other professional, specialized capacities. Librarians may be categorized as a public, school, correctional, special, independent or academic librarian. 10. 5Cataloger The cataloger is responsible for original cataloging of monographs and other formats in Slavic and other European languages in all subjects. The Library is a member of the Program for Cooperative Cataloging, and descriptive cataloging is performed in accordance with national standards. Subject analysis and classification assignment follow Library of Congress standards and local practice. Authority records follow NACO standards and are contributed to the national authority file. The cataloger also investigates and participates in implementation of solutions for providing bibliographic control for all types of resources including electronic resources. In addition to cataloging traditional materials and in support of the Catalog Department’s endeavor to integrate bibliographical control for digital resources, the cataloger may participate in activities to implement non-MARC descriptive standards and contribute to the development of new metadata services for the Library’s growing collection of digital resources. The cataloger collaborates with other catalogers and Library staff to establish and maintain local policies and procedures for bibliographic and metadata services, projects, and other activities that affect the library’s integrated library system, search engines, and overall access to the collections. He/she keeps abreast of the current trends and best practices for bibliographic and metadata services in the field. The cataloger also serves on library committees, participates in library-wide programs and activities, and is expected to be active professionally. 10. 6Indexer Search engine indexing collects, parses, and stores data to facilitate fast and accurate information retrieval. Index design incorporates interdisciplinary concepts from linguistics, cognitive psychology, mathematics, informatics, physics and computer science. An alternate name for the process in the context of search engines designed to find web pages on the Internet is Web indexing. Popular engines focus on the full-text indexing of online, natural language documents. Media types such as video and audio and graphics are also searchable. Meta search engines reuse the indices of other services and do not store a local index, whereas cache-based search engines permanently store the index along with the corpus. Unlike full-text indices, partial-text services restrict the depth indexed to reduce index size. Larger services typically perform indexing at a predetermined time interval due to the required time and processing costs, while agent based search engines index in real time. 11. 0CONCLUSION.

Socrates And Epicurus And Life After Death Philosophy Essay

Socrates And Epicurus And Life After Death Philosophy Essay The idea of death is discussed by both Socrates and Epicurus, with both philosophers having a mutual belief that it should not be feared. Socrates view is that there is either an afterlife, or that death is an eternal sleep. Whereas Epicurus bases his belief on the fact that we should not fear that which does not inflict suffering. In this paper, I will examine both Epicurus and Socrates view on death and argue why I feel Socrates view on death is more rational than Epicurus. If we begin with Socrates and his idea of life after death, we can see that he implies death brings the soul to a better place. In Socrates final speech to the congress that denounces him to death, he states that either death is a state of nothingness and utter unconsciousness, or, as men say, there is a change and migration of the soul from this world to another (Plato, p. 8). His reasoning for this view is that death will free him from judgment associated with his present life, and allow him to face judgment by the true judges outside of the present world. He states that once he dies, he would be able to converse with Orpheus and Musaeus and Hesiod and Homer? Nay if this be true, let me die again and again (Plato, p. 8). This again re-iterates the fact that Socrates feels that his death sentence should not be seen as a bad or painful event. Furthermore, Socrates other view on death is that if it is anything like a sleep in which there was no disturbances by dreams, anyone would agr ee that it is a pleasant state of being (Plate, p. 8). In the works of Epicurus  Principal Doctrines,  we are introduced to his distinct views on death. His reason for not fearing death is the absence of suffering; if one does not suffer through death, then one shall not have a reason to fear death. Everyone is either alive or dead, death does not cause suffering to the living since we are not yet dead, and death does not cause suffering to the dead simply because they are dead and have no feelings (Epicurus, pp.  26-28)1.  Therefore, fear should only be present if one undergoes suffering, and since one does not experience suffering during death, then death should not be feared.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   When comparing both philosophers, it is evident that Socrates view of death is more credible than Epicurus. In Socrates view of death, there are two possible outcomes, either eternal sleep or an afterlife. Socrates provides possible ends to post death, whereas Epicurus definition is perplex and draws several questions, such as his classification of pleasure and justice.     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  As with most philosophers, Socrates views werent shy of criticism. Most critics of his work question the idea whether an after-life may even exist. It is easy to diminish such an argument since Socrates was never concrete about his view of the after-life, he himself thought of a possibility of a death without an after-life. To this, Socrates argues that if there were no after-life, it would be a state of nothingness, and would be a state of eternal sleep which would be as enjoyable as an afterlife, enjoyed in the same sense as much as a dreamless sleep is enjoyed. Another criticism to Socrates work is by the author Thomas Nagel in his writing Death. In his writing Nagel criticizes Socrates view of a conclusive life stating that death cuts short the ability of people to live a just life as long as possible, and asks the question if one were to achieve a just life, wouldnt they want to achieve it for as long as possible. Socrates replies stating that if it was truly a just life, it would be fulfilling regardless of the amount of time. In contrast, Epicurus rebuttals to his critics are not as concrete as Socrates. Epicurus perception of death creates confusion in regard to his idea of pleasure and justice. He had stated in his context that it is impossible to live a pleasant life without living wisely and honorably and justly, and it is impossible to live wisely and honorably and justly without living pleasantly (Epicurus, p. 26). Hence, Epicurus definition of justice lies in the pleasure of the majority of people. His belief had only risen among his own thoughts and not others since he based the affiliation between justice, pleasure, honour and wisdom on the single supposition that the majority of people would reciprocate these same beliefs, yet not everyone feels the same. Epicurus design of justice can be closely related to the Holocaust, also known as World War II. The persuasive Adolf Hitler took charge of the destruction during this time period by compelling the majority of the country to absorb his political views as he governed that it was the best for all of them. Hitlers forceful method is seen as plausible through Epicurus theory, since the greater part of the country found pleasure in his views in thinking that they were prospering the country. Epicurus justifies the notion of murder by inducing rationality into the picture, the more rational one thinks, then the more logical they will act, hence preventing deadly acts from occurring. Hitler had solely relied on swaying people into believing that his path was the only rational path that can lead their country justice. Epicurus too fell on this proposition in using only raw thoughts to conclude his theory that his definition of justice and pleasure would be consented amongst everyone. Culture, religion and society all influence a persons perception on the simplest fixations. From this notion, it is evident to see that Epicurus proposal of allowing rationality to claim superiority over murderous intention is a result of his unproven beliefs. Epicurus was too naÃÆ' ¯ve in thinking that everyone would side on his definition of justice and pleasure, concluding him with an imprecise theory. Residing on purely rationality does not validate Epicurus theory of justice and pleasure, for anyone can rationalize any means of destruction through their own perception. As mentioned before, there are several concepts that are taken into consideration when a person performs an act, and depending on just one thought is not an erroneous way to justify a theory.considering the complexity of the human mind and Therefore, purely assuming that through rational thinking, murderous thought can be eliminated is not so simple, for human minds are too complex for such a generalization to have ef fect. In comparison to both perspective of Socrates and Epicurus, Socrates had a more justifiable and plausible method to his beliefs, hence making it more persuasive that Epicurus. Socrates had a solid foundation and a reasonable definition to his idea, whereas Epicurus simply presumed on rational thinking to motive his beliefs. Therefore in my opinion I would choose Socrates, for her had a realistic ground by taking into consideration the complexity of the human mind and addressing both possibilities to our end.

Specification for a Concrete Footpath

Specification for a Concrete Footpath PUBLIC SAFETY The area was taped and coned of so no traffic could intrude. The excavation was fenced off with orange fencing so no pedestrians could have access. EXCAVATION: Excavate total area to required depth 150mm and remove all waste from site,Excavations are generally undertaken using the correct machines (8 tone digger)was used for this job. And the work undertaken is to excavate the required area to the correct depth dependent on the specification being used, however there are many specifications for different applications, generally domestic footpaths excavate virgin ground to a depth of 160mm for new applications. But for this job there was crush already down so we excavated 160mm to 170mm to give some tolerance to put the shutters in. Next we used a small whacker plate for 7 passes to compact a solid base for the concrete. To form falls and cross falls to assist water escape. We took a level to the top of the step and the last level to work out the difference between them to get your fall which ours was 53mm. This is within tolerance for our specification. After the shutters are in place we placed down DPM to stop moisture spreading into the concrete. Secondly we cut steel mesh so it fitted in but with an extra 50mm cut off each side to have sufficient cover to stop the concrete from rusting, also with a 50mm spacer for it to float in the middle. Once the concrete was poured in the vibrating poker is used all around the area to prevent any voids being left in the concrete. Next the concrete tampered down to help compaction it allows the 20mm aggregate to sink. So when you come to float its easier to get a smoother finish. Lastly we finished the concrete with arris edges and a broom finish before leaving we covered the concrete with polyene to prevent weather condition harming the concrete.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Plans and surveys   We were responsible for setting out the footpaths accurately to line and level in the dimensions that we were given that the instruction supplied, and arranged. All soil including old concrete paths shall be removed from the site and the area kept neat and tidy to ensure minimum obstruction to traffic ways during the course of the work. No stockpiling of excavations shall be left on verges. DIMENSIONS: 4.39m, 1.54m, 0.15m 2.8m, 0.9m, 0.15m SUB-BASE: We use existing crush that was underneath FOOTPATH: This footpath with be 150mm thick with reinforce steel mesh. 1.54m wide coming from the existing step, to existing kerb level  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   †¦0.9m compiling with specification as its doesnt need wheel chair access. FORMWORK: Formwork may be of either steel or planed timber and shall be fixed so as not to flex or displace during concreting operations. Formwork shall be of dimensions equal in depth to the thickness of the concrete to be poured. JOINTS: Every 1.5m long CONCRETE: 1.4m cubed Ready mixed concrete with a slump of 125mm, Maximum aggregated size shall be 20mm, Sand shall be clean, sharp, washed from a river or quarry sand, free from silt and organic matter. BACKFILL: Existing material Tools Steel trowel Arriss trowel Plastic float Shovel Rake Soft broom Claw hammer Lump hammer Sledge hammer Generator Vibrating poker Bolt cutter Plant 8 tonne digger Concrete lorry Materials Steel shutters Wooden planks Concrete DPM Steel mesh Nails Steel road pins Polythene Conclusions We found out that weather condition is a factor we had quite a lot of rain during the time the concrete was curing. Therefore it took longer for it to set so we were rushed for time so when we came to put a brush finish on it was still too wet so the finish isnt as neat as it could be. So in future we should check the forecast prior to work. We could count for rain by putting a gazebo up prior to working. We also originally add more water to the mix which didnt help with the time consumption. So we shouldnt off added more water that would of set more rapidly. Before After