Monday, September 30, 2019

Contemporary strategy analysis Essay

2001-2011 was filled with many black swan events (i. e. events that are extremely rare, have a major impact and are unpredicted even if they are rationalised retrospectively) e. g. Sep 11 attack, Lehman Brother collapse, Greece/Iceland bailouts, Arab Spring revolutions, major earthquakes and tsunamis) Rise of BRIC countries creating a multipolar world 2. Sluggish Economic Growth + Increased Competition Economic growth in advanced economies sluggish throughout the medium term governments and household sectors are over-leveraged insufficient productive investment from companies sitting on cash excess capacity in most sectors -> resulting in strong price competition Internationalisation of companies from emerging-market countries e. g. contract manufacturers (OEM) in China and India competing with their customers in final markets. 3. Technology Disruption Digital technology disrupting incumbents (e. g. Netflix replacing Blockbuster) and redrawing industry barriers (e. g. Apple, Nokia, Nintendo, Blackberry now competing in same mobile device market) 4. Social Pressure and Crisis of Capitalism Loss of social legitimacy of companies as a result of a fall-out from the 2008/9 financial crisis – disdain for companies (hypocrisy + greed of bankers, traders, etc) and their leaders (e. g. Occupy Wall Street movement) Rise of alternative forms of business enterprise as better, more sustainable models over limited liability companies – e. g. state-owned firms (China, Brazil) and cooperatives (i. e. businesses mutually owned by consumers or employees). Challenge faced by companies of whether to unilaterally create/stick to its own values (which may become out of step) or reflect the current values and attitudes of society it operates within. Item 2: New Directions in Strategic Thinking 1. Re-orientate Corporate Objectives of Companies Reconcile the need for profit maximisation with a broader societal role (i. e. companies having greater social and environmental responsibilities) Move away from focusing on stock market valuation alone – Management should not focus on profits but what strategic factors that drive profits or create value e. g. customer satisfaction, innovation Best antidote to corporate empire building and CEO hubris is a stronger emphasis on basic principles of strategy analysis. 2. Seeking More Complex Sources of Competitive Advantage Competitive advantages in today’s dynamic world is difficult to sustain due to high rate of technology diffusion + increased competition from emerging market companies who are more cost-effective Developing multiple layers of competitive advantage is now required (e. g. as shown from companies that maintained profitability and market share for years (e. g. Toyota, Wal-Mart), combined with the ability to combine multiple capabilities. 3. Managing Options The portfolio of options of a company e. g. growth options, abandonment options, and flexibility options are increasingly important as sources of value. Therefore option thinking should be adopted into a firm’s strategy: e. g. industry attractiveness should not depend on profit potential, but option potential (e. g. an industry that produces a no of different products, comprises multiple segments, has many strategic groups, utilises a wide variety of alternative technologies) e. g. a resource is attractive if it can be deployed in different businesses and support alternative strategies (e. g. nanotechnology). Dynamic capabilities are important because they generate new options. 4. Understanding Strategic Fit Importance of fitting the strategy of the firm with the firm’s business environment and its resources and capabilities. 2 major concepts regarding linkages within companies: complementarity and complexity Complementarity: the importance of linkages among a firm’s management practices and finding the optimal configuration (e. g. a six-sigma quality program needs to be accompanied by changes in incentives, recruitment policies, product strategy, etc) Complexity: the idea that companies are complex systems whose behaviour results from interaction of a large number of independent agents. This results in unpredictability, self-organisation by a company and a company positioning between inertia, chaos, and evolutionary adaptation Common to both concepts is the contextuality of linkages: Do the benefits from any particular activity depend on which other activities take place? 2 dimensions of this contextuality: contextuality of activities (are management activities and their benefits dependent or independent of each other? ); contextuality of interactions (do activities interact in similar ways across firms) Item 3: Redesigning organisations The challenge of today’s business environment is reconciling multiple dilemmas (e. g. product at low cost, but also innovate), requiring multi-dexterity. Companies are now multi-dimensional structures with organisational capabilities for each business area e. g. quality management processes, social and environmental responsibility, knowledge management, innovation and exploration, etc. 1. Solution to Complexity – Making Organisations Informal, Self-Organising and Permeable Informal Organisation: Rely upon informal rather than formal structures and systems e.g. team-based structures which rely on coordination rather than control. Companies are moving towards project based organisations – temporary cross-functional teams charged with clear objectives (as opposed to permanent functions and continuous operations). Such teams are more able to achieve innovation, adaptability and rapid learning than more traditional structures and avoids issues of over-concentration of power and rigid, inflexible structures (e. g. W. L. Gore, supplier of Gore-Tex boots). This is an example of a consensus-based hierarchy, which emphasises horizontal communication, over an authority-based hierarchy, which emphasises vertical communication. Self-Organisation: Humans (and therefore, companies) have a capacity for self-organisation. Three factors are conductive for self-organisation: identity, information and relationships. Identity is a shared cognition of what the organisation is (what is core, distinctive, and enduring about the character of the company) and an emotional attachment towards what it represents. A strong consensus of identity provides a powerful basis for coordinated action that permits flexibility and responsibility to be reconciled with continuity and stability. Information and communication networks within companies support spontaneous patterns of complex coordination with little or no hierarchal direction Relationships, or informal social networks, allow information to be created and transformed and allows the organisation’s identity to expand and include more stakeholders. The more access people have to one another, the more possibilities there are. 2. Breaking Down Corporate Boundaries There are limits to the range of capabilities that companies can develop internally. Therefore, companies must collaborate in order to access the capabilities of other companies e. g. strategic alliances. Today’s web-based technologies permit much wider networks of collaboration (e. g. use of ICT technologies by P&G and IBM to draw upon ideas and expertise across the globe or the rise of open-source communities that build highly complex products such as Linux). Item 4: Changing Role of Managers The changing conditions and types of organisations require new approaches to management and leadership. Previous era of restructuring and shareholder focus associated with change masters (highly visible, individualistic and often hard-driving management styles e. g. Michael Eisner of Disney, Rupert Murdoch) â€Å"Buck-stop here† peak decision-making role of CEOs may no longer be feasible or desirable for the current era. Instead, it is the role of guiding organisational evolution that is more important nowadays (being a social architect by creating an environment where every employee has the chance to collaborate, innovate and excel). CEOs should be less concerned about decision-making and more concerned about cultivating identity and purpose. Senior managers also require different knowledge and skills nowadays – e. g. self-awareness, self -management, social awareness (empathy) and social skills – i. e. emotional intelligence. They should move away from being administrators and controllers and become entrepreneurs, coaches and team leaders instead. In particular, Rapid evolution requires a combination of both incremental improvement and stimulating radical change (e.g. Sam Palmisano at IBM) Establishing simple rules: the idea that companies can be managed by a few simple rules (boundary rules and â€Å"how-to† rules) with limited managerial direction otherwise (e. g. Cisco) Managing adaptive tension: Create a level of tension that optimises the pace of organisational change and innovation. This is done through imposing demanding performance targets, but ensuring targets are appropriate and ac hievable.

Sunday, September 29, 2019

How useful are typologies of welfare states?

Given the complexity and depth of questions faced by undergraduate students of Social Policy, let alone academic researchers, the classification of different welfare states into typologies is only natural. As an aid to academic study, the formulation of typologies represents a logical progression in the field of welfare state research. When Titmuss gave his lecture on ‘Social Administration in a changing society' in 1951, he noted that at the start of the study of Social Policy (or administration) in 1913, most issues discussed were entirely contemporary, designed to prepare those who wanted to work in the charitable of voluntary field. After World War Two, Titmuss and other academics such as Marshall, started laying greater theoretical foundations – examining the welfare state that was growing around them and its motivations. The intensive study of ‘typologies' of welfare states, widely recognised as being prompted by Esping-Anderson's ‘The three worlds of Welfare capitalism' (1990), is a natural progression – an attempt, in search of a fundamental theory or law, to bring together earlier theoretical work on the welfare state and its foundations. The use of typologies is useful because it provides a tool that can be used to simplify complex comparative work, thus making it easier to work on a universal theory of welfare state formation and development. Similarly, typologies can also provide ‘an approximate picture of the range of options available to policy-makers for policy reform' (Bonoli, 1995, 352). However, despite these apparent attributes, the concept of using typologies as a methodological tool has not been entirely uncontested. Those such as Baldwin have disputed that typologies have any explanatory power whatsoever, claiming that they most certainly cannot be useful in the formulation of theories about current and future development of welfare states (Arts & Gelissen, 2002). Most criticism along these lines deals with the apparent impossibility that, given the massively varied complexity of welfare states across the world, no typological theory is capable of summarising these differences except in a deeply misleading way. Esping-Anderson (1990, 2) fully accepts that a ‘trade-off' must be made, which this means that it will be impossible to make ‘detailed treatments' of differences between regimes, but asserts that this is the ‘price to be paid for making grand comparisons'. This seems commonsensical to me. We simplify the levels of detail about economic activity by creating an assumption of ‘homo-economicus' and even though we know this model not to be completely accurate, no-one would deny that the results the model produces are not instructive. Similarly, in creating a model of welfare-state typologies, we look to gain insights into the nature of welfare states, which we can then use in further theoretical work. The ideal types used in typologies are, as Klant (1984, cited in Arts and Gelissen, 2002) notes, a ‘representation of a reality, which cannot (yet) be described using laws'. As long as we recognise that the typologies themselves are not ever claimed to be, even by their proponents, complete explanatory theories, then they can usefully be used to gain insights into the past, present and future of welfare states. Therefore, I will move to look quickly at the different varieties of typological survey that have been conducted, before then spending some time comparing the different sorts of ‘welfare state regimes' that emerge. Different typological classifications of welfare states vary in both the amount, and kind, of variables used for analysis. The most basic attempt to categorise welfare states has been to compare the levels of public expenditure between countries. For example, it is posited that the Scandinavian countries, all spending in excess of 30% of GDP on social expenditure in the period 1989-92, constitute a type of welfare state regime significantly different to the kinds experienced in the United Kingdom or in Italy, countries which both experience much lower levels of social spending. However, such crude classification seems to go against any conception of varied mixed economies of welfare – while two countries may appear identical in terms of their % GDP social spend, they may be completely different on the level of overall welfare provided by the other welfare ‘pillars' – the voluntary and family sector. Similarly, other, more recent models have also tried to classify welfare states using a one-dimensional approach. Ferrera (1993) uses the ‘coverage model', which, rather than looking at the quantity of welfare provided, instead looks at the method of provision – specifically whether welfare states provide services on a universal basis, or on an occupational basis. However, as Bonoli (1995) points out, the problem arises in distinguishing between the generosity of benefits offered by welfare states of the same ‘method' typology – for example, the Netherlands and Switzerland are both included in the Ferrera's same set of welfare states regimes, despite massive differences between the extent of welfare provision between those two states. Esping-Anderson's (1990) approach was two-dimensional in the sense that it considered two factors – the degree of decommodification and social stratification. These variables are explicitly outcome, rather than means, based – decommodification, for example, is defined as ‘the degree to which individuals or families can uphold a socially acceptable standard of living independently of market provision'. Thus, independence is deemed identical, whether achieved through state or voluntary provision. This practical approach implies a value-judgement that it does not matter if states actually provide the welfare or not, that it is just outcomes that matter, which may be controversial to some socialists. However, this must be considered justified as a modelling assumption. Despite praise for the two-dimensional nature of Esping-Anderson's approach, some questions have been raised about whether the correct two variables were chosen. Bonoli (1995), raises concern that what he perceives as being the two fundamental distinctions between different kinds of welfare states – ‘how' and ‘how much' – are merged in both of Esping-Anderson's variables, and that as a result, they are both ‘taken into account only so far as they affect the decommodifying [or stratifying] impact of social policy'. He therefore suggests two different variables – level of social spending and the method (measured in terms of the % of benefits that are contribution-based) of welfare delivery. Similarly, most other criticisms of Esping-Anderson have not disputed the methodological use of typologies, but instead have sought to question the variables used to measure the relative congruence of different welfare states in order to form sets of welfare regimes. While requirements for brevity make it impossible for me to outline all here, a useful summary can be found in the tables of Arts & Gelissen's 2002 article. While the indicators/factors used in typology classification vary widely, the extent of similarity in the output of empirical testing is striking. All models find three or four different typologies, which, rather than being completely distinctive, are similar in terms of characteristics and the country assignments. To start, let us examine Esping-Andersen's typology, which distinguishes between three clusters of welfare regimes, each of which represents a different ‘world of welfare capitalism'. The three ‘ideal-typical' regime types are the liberal, the conservative (or corporatist), and the social-democratic regimes. The main characteristic of the liberal welfare regime is the important role assigned to the market and the strong emphasis placed upon individual responsibility. In general, only if the market fails will the state interfere. Benefits are means-tested and targeted for low-income dependents, who accordingly make the intensive use the welfare state. Financed by taxation, this leads to significant income redistribution. In contrast, the state is generally passive with regards to gender issues – the market determines the position of women, who are neither encouraged nor discouraged by the government to work for pay. In the conservative/corporatist welfare regime less stress is placed on the role of the market. The regime's main goal is to preserve existing status/class differentials, a task which is often left to other non-state actors such as the church, classes and the family. They play a crucial role in society, and the state supports them in this role. Social benefits are more elaborate than in liberal welfare regimes and are usually organized along occupational lines, with negligible amounts of redistribution. With regard to the position of women, the breadwinner model (husband as breadwinner, wife as caregiver) is implied and perpetuated through the design of the welfare system, which thereby systematically discourages women from participating in the labor market. Finally, the social-democratic welfare regime distinguishes itself from the other two models in that much more emphasis is laid on the interventionist role of the state. The idea of equal rights for all citizens is guaranteed by the social democratic state, which delivers extensive, universal welfare services not usually subject to means testing. The welfare regime is designed around active-labour policies – both men and women are expected to participate fully in the labor market, and therefore the government makes arrangements to overcome any gender-obstacles to doing this, for example, by providing extensive free childcare. Leibfried (1992) and Ferrera (1996) initially criticized Esping-Anderson's group of typologies for the omission of what they called a ‘Latin-Rim' model of the welfare state, characterized by strong family-centric properties and an immature and selective social security system that offered poor benefits and lacked a guaranteed minimum benefit system. Esping-Anderson (1999) accepted that more emphasis should be put on the family-effects of welfare regimes, and made a distinction between familalistic regimes on the one extreme (e. g. , Italy), and defamilialising regimes on the other extreme (e. g. , Sweden). A familialistic regime was defined to be where â€Å"public policy assumes that households must carry the principal responsibility for their members' welfare†, as opposed to a de-familialising regime â€Å"which seeks to unburden the household and diminish individuals' welfare dependence on kinship† (1999, 51). Given the late inclusion of a ‘Latin-Rim' model in Esping-Anderson's work, we have four examples of welfare-state regimes that we can compare with other models. Bonoli's (1997) classification, based on the expenditure and method factors as described earlier, produced four ideal-types – Continental, British, Nordic and Southern – to which he assigns countries through the empirical work. These clearly correspond respectively with Esping-Anderson's Conservative, Liberal, Social-Democratic and Latin-Rim typologies. The British regime is characterized by a low level of social expenditure which is mainly financed through general taxation rather than contributions – this fits in with Esping-Anderson's description of the Liberal regime as being limited in scope and mildly redistributive in nature. Similarly, Bonoli's Nordic regime, with low levels of contributions but high levels of overall spending, brings to mind Esping-Anderson's social democratic regime, characterised by universal benefits for all on the basis of citizenship and not contribution. There are minimal differences in state-placement between the two writers' typological systems. The Netherlands and Belgium are perhaps the only significant variation, placed in the ‘continental' typology by Bonoli but in the ‘Social Democratic' by Esping-Anderson. Such disagreements about the placement of the Benelux states are repeated in various other schemes of classification – such as in work by Korpi and Palme (1998, cited in Arts & Glissen, 2002) and by Visser and Hemerijck (1997, cited in Arts & Glissen, 2002). Such variability of outcome on ‘border cases' between typologies returns us to the original debate about the methodological justification and accuracy of such explanatory systems, and thus it seems to be a sensible place to conclude this essay. It would not be right, though Esping-Anderson (1999) has tried, to try and plead the ‘unique' nature of these ‘rogue' states – the initial simplification and assumptions made by any typological system are done so on in full knowledge that detailed individual characteristics, the ‘uniqueness' of each regime will be obscured. Rather than attempting to remove previously imposed assumptions, we must accept the limits of typological classification. Ideal-type classifications are exactly that – ideal, and there will undoubtedly be some states that are ‘hybrid'. The continued existence of such apparent ‘anomalies' gives purpose to further theoretical work – to examine the interactions and movements between the different ‘ideal types' of states, and to identify whether there is any trend that will make the occurrence of such a hybrid regimes more common and explainable in the future.

Saturday, September 28, 2019

Comparison of three learning theories Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Comparison of three learning theories - Essay Example All these theories will be compared and contrasted as well so as to understand the similarities and differences. Social Cognitive Theory Social cognitive theory explains the acquisition of behavioral patterns by human beings. It is based on the idea that human beings learn by observing the behavior of other people around them. According to the social cognitive theory there are three factors that have an impact on behavior namely environment, person, and behavior. A person acquires knowledge when environment combines with personal characteristics and experience. A learner also evaluates new experiences through the past and prior experience help the learner understand the present experience. In short, it is through the interplay of environment, behavior and personality that an individual acquires knowledge. The social cognitive theory takes into account the personal factors of the learner therefore it is also used in personality development. All the three factors can be manipulated to bring a desired change in the behavior of a person. Social cognitive theory also emphasize on the emotional element of learning. A learner is more likely to learn from a source with which the learner feels emotionally attached (Bandura, 1994). Learning therefore is also dependent on perceived similarities between the model and the learner. The theory focuses on the environmental, personal, and behavioral factors in order to explain how human beings learn. Vygotsky’s Social Development Theory Vygotsky is a Russian psychologist who gave his theory of social development. He emphasizes the role of social interaction in the overall learning process of a person. He explained human development through social interaction and claimed that social learning through interaction is followed by development. The first stage of learning according to Vygotsky is social learning. The social development theory also include ‘the more knowledgeable other’ (MKO). This is a thing or a p erson that serves as a teacher for the learner as this MKO has skills superior to the learner. The theory also talks about ‘the zone of proximal development’ (ZPD) which is the difference between what the learner can do without help and what the learner can do with MKO. It is in this ZPD that a learner can acquire new knowledge. The main difference between social development theory and social cognition theory is that former argues that social interaction lead to cognitive development and the latter argues that learning takes place with the combination of environmental, personal and cognitive factors. Application of social development theory can be in schools where teachers should focus on open dialogue and should engage in discourse (Hausfather, 1996). It will be helpful because it is through social interaction that cognitive development can be achieved. Game Based Learning Game based learning theory focuses on learning through different activities and games. Learners g ain knowledge by taking part in activities designed to challenge themselves thereby keeping their interest and involvement high. It is a relatively new theory that uses games and interesting techniques to help students learn difficult concept. The idea behind game based learning is to attract the attention of the learners and develop interest in order to facilitate learning.

Friday, September 27, 2019

Teaching Assistants Sopporting the Curriculum Essay

Teaching Assistants Sopporting the Curriculum - Essay Example This interaction will also instil in me the ability to assess where each pupil stands in terms of their individual learning and help me identify any gray areas where further effort is required to help the pupil progress further. I am aware that when working in any school as a teacher's assistant there will be a number of children who will be identified as having special educational needs. Some of these special needs pupils may have the same diagnosis and at times some of them may have not one but a combination of conditions. I will make sure that I adapt class activities to suit these special needs pupils. As Susan Bentham has successfully pointed out "In any discussion of diagnosis it is important to remember that a child is first and foremost an individual with his/her own personality". (Bentham pg 72) I plan to use this very philosophy to help each special need child and cater to them in the way that will suit them the best. This may involve adjusting various class activities to suit the personality and level of understanding of the special pupil or group of special pupils.

Thursday, September 26, 2019

The War of 1812 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

The War of 1812 - Essay Example A lot of incidents related to the war also happened in the sea. Background Events Leading to the War: The war was instigated in 1783 after the termination of American Revolution. That was a time when US was irritated with Britain’s lack of consent to ratify commercial agreements in favor of America and Britain’s failure to retreat from the territory of America alongside the Great Lakes. The French Revolutionary Wars that happened between 1792 and 1802 and the Napoleonic Wars that started after that and continued till 1815 flared up American resentment. France and Britain were the primary contestants in these wars. With the passage of time, France dominated most of Europe. On the other hand, Britain ruled over the seas. France and Britain had commercial fights with each other in which Britain tried to blockade Europe while France did all to make sure that British goods were not sold in the French possessions. The maritime policies of Britain and France indulged into seve ral conflicts with the US in the 1790s. The difficulties became intense and grew manifolds after 1803. The British Orders in Council of 1807 tried to channel all neutral trade to continental Europe through Great Britain, and France's Berlin and Milan decrees of 1806 and 1807 declared Britain in a state of blockade and condemned neutral shipping that obeyed British regulations. (gatewayno.com, n.d.). Causes of the War: US felt that her rights upon seas were being subdued by France and Britain. Because of British dominance upon the seas, the British maritime policies were more disliked. British felt that it was their right to the British sailors with them from the merchant ships of America. In their haste, they took many Americans with them as well. This was the fundamental cause of tension between the two countries. There were numerous causes of the war. There was war going on between Great Britain and France in the early 1800s. In that war, England fell short of skilled sailors. In order to make up for the deficiency of sailors, Great Britain started stopping American ships and forcefully took sailors from them. In addition to that, Great Britain forbade US from entering into any trade with France. According to the Treaty of Paris (1783), Great Britain was supposed to remove her soldiers from the American territory, though she continued occupying US territory. A vast majority of the British soldiers remained along the Great Lakes and offered full support to Indians like Tecumseh, the Shawnee leader so that they may fully revolt against the American settlers. Proceedings of the War: US first tried to alter the European powers’ policies economically. The British ship Leopard attacked Chesapeake, which was an American frigate in 1807. At that time, Congress placed a ban upon American ships from trade by passing the Embargo Act. As a result of that, New England shipping was devastated but the French and British policies were left unaltered. Americans were i n the economic depression and were distressed. They resolved to commence the war in order to restore national honor. In 1810, the Congress was elected. In November, 1811, the War Hawks joined the Congress and asked to commence war against Great Britain. As a result of the aforementioned attempts by Great Britain all of which went against the interests of US, President James Madison convinced the Congress to declare war upon Great Britain in 1812. Battles of the War: In 1812,

Wednesday, September 25, 2019

THE IMPORTANCE OF NUTRITION FOR A HEALTHY LIFE STYLE Essay

THE IMPORTANCE OF NUTRITION FOR A HEALTHY LIFE STYLE - Essay Example Some cut back on the proteins, while others reduce the intake of carbohydrates in certain proportions. But according to the latest study published in The New England Journal of Medicine, the comparison of different diets shows that they are not only very difficult, their tastes buds are already immune to a pattern in which they cannot stay away from cheese burger, additives, pizza, candy or soda for very long, but also not successful in most cases (Parker, 2008). Thus failure of weight loss due to such diets leads people to believe that its it their fault they are overweight and hence has further negative effects on their lifestyle, for example loss of self confidence. The answer to such negative effects is not diets but instead a healthy lifestyle which may not make one very skinny but a person can enjoy a good healthy life. In opinion an additional advantage of having nutritional food over unhealthy food is that not only the consumption becomes less (since we won't eat packets and packets of Doritos), but also less expensive (organic food) and makes our lifestyle fit, our bodies stronger and lowers our health cost since we would be required to spend much time in the doctor's office or the hospital.

Tuesday, September 24, 2019

Personal Property for Person Suffering from Alzheimers Disease Assignment

Personal Property for Person Suffering from Alzheimers Disease - Assignment Example The appellee used the parking garage for purposes of parking his automobile since the public was invited to use it. The parking garage in which the appellee parked his car was owned by the appellant, and before parking his automobile, the appellee received a receipt to allow for the same. The nature of the relationship between the appellee and the appellant, therefore, qualifies for express bailment. The express bailment, in this case, is written as is proven by the receipt, a written confirmation. The bailment at will would depend on the amount of time that the bailor, Mr Allen, would need to use the parking garage, and would be terminated once he submitted the receipt to the attendant at the single exit of the parking garage. The bailee would act as a warehouse because there would be a compensation for the period of time used to store the automobile.The bailment, in this case, was for the mutual benefit of both the bailor who is the appellee in this case and the bailee who is the a ppellant (Twomey and Jennings). While the bailor would have his automobile parked in a safe environment, the bailee would receive a payment that is in relation to the amount of the time that the parking garage was used. When bailment is for the mutual benefit of both bailor and bailee, the bailee is liable to the bailor for ordinary negligence, and the bailee bears the duty of ordinary care to his property (Twomey and Jennings).Though the appellee and the appellant have a bailor-bailee kind of relationship, there is no liability to be borne by the bailee. Any liability that would have been shouldered by the appellant was disqualified by the receipt purchased by the appellee. The ticket bore clear instructions that it only served the purpose of gauging the time an automobile has been in the parking garage and not for identification of the vehicle. Though there was an attendant present at the exit of the parking garage, the attendant had no means of identifying whether persons left wi th the right cars. The ticket also made it clear that the appellant would not be held responsible for losses incurred by theft,  collision or otherwise; and that automobiles were parked at owner’s risk.

Monday, September 23, 2019

International Business Coursework Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

International Business - Coursework Example For example, in Western cultures, ordinary employee can speak with the director of the company equally while in Eastern cultures it is almost impossible that the opinion of the ordinary employee would be considered seriously. In other words, cultures with high score of power distance believe that every person has its place and they should act in accordance with their role in society. Uncertainty avoidance is a dimension that identifies peoples attitude to their inability to predict future. Some cultures let things happen in their natural flow; others tend to control the future. Pragmatic cultures with high uncertainty avoidance scores tend to pay more attention to planning than those cultures where the score is low. This score helps to predict peoples attitude to planning and define the best way to build long- and short-term relationships with them. Also, pragmatic cultures rely on planning, experts and analysts who try to define future obstacles and prepare people and organizations for changes. Overall, power distance and uncertainty avoidance are really important for successful cross-cultural business. If people ignore these cultural dimensions, they can fail to build good relationships with representatives of the opposite culture. On the contrary, they succeed if they pay enough attention to features of every culture they deal with. 2. Conflict and violence, terrorism and kidnapping, property seizure, police changes and local content are 5 main types of political risk. Out of these 5 types, conflict and violence and policy changes affect international business directly. In case of external and internal political conflicts, any society experiences crisis related to unstable political and economic situation. All international companies suffer from this instability and it results in a sequence of unwanted consequences for any organization. Business becomes dangerous in terms of safety; in many cases the best solution to the issue is to ship the

Sunday, September 22, 2019

Annotated Bibliographies of Glacier Extinction Related Articles Essay Example for Free

Annotated Bibliographies of Glacier Extinction Related Articles Essay Al gore delivers this book the impinging global warming by combining the truths through presentation of scientific evidences from experts and helping the audience visualize the facts laid by science through pictures and other forms of visual presentations. Al Gore has been venturing with environmental issues, emphasizing the importance of preserving the environment. The article argues about the different ways of viewing the issue, either politically, scientifically and morally, which actually does not hinder people from different disciplines read it. The reading material wishes to convince readers to make some action regarding the inconvenient truth, which is the title of the book. Human race can be affected by these natural disruptions. Compared to other books, personal touch was added to the book by attaching personal opinions and anecdotes, relating his personal experiences being an advocate to the environment for a more effective and affective learning experience to the readers. 2. Jowit, Juliette. â€Å"Speed of Melting Glaciers’ destruction revealed†. The Observer January 2007:7. Academic Search Premier. Lexis Nexis. City University of New York Library, 9 October 2007 http://web. lexis-nexis. com/. Underlined with the statements of the article are factual evidences that strengthen the stand of the author. The article dwells much of its attention to the factual evidences of the effects of global warming but does not mention that much on its possible effects in humanity. The article, being short, provides a lot of important points that can be informative enough to satisfy the thirst for knowledge for those who seek information regarding the issue. Numerical figures put an intense effect on the reader that engages him to thinking that people should already make their actions to save the environment from a slow to fast approaching disruption of natural processes. The melting of ice that increases the sea level as a common notion was added with the fact that reflection of sun’s harmful rays is one of the important functionalities of glaciers. Presented here are a number of reference organizations that dedicated themselves on the study of glacial behavior that helps in making this article reliable. This article could actually deliver in an understandable sense the importance of the glaciers and how the humans consume them, knowingly or unknowingly, and how the nature is trying to get back what losses humans have caused. 3. Khalil, M. A. K. â€Å"Non—CO2 Greenhouse Gases in the Atmosphere†. Annual Review of Energy the Environment 24. 1 (1999):645-662. Khalil, who focused the article only about greenhouse gases, emphasizes in the article that CO2 is not the sole greenhouse gas that is the reason for global warming. It has been pointed out that many industrial, agricultural and those that produce gases such as CH3, NO2 and CFCs can individually contribute to global warming insignificantly; but when all these combined and through time, the effect is magnified and becomes even more significant than CO2. The author suggests of the possible answers to avoid the additional hazard of these gases, that is the formulation of other gases (perfluorocarbons and sulfur hexafluoride, which are inert in the atmosphere) of the same application as the three mentioned. The extinction of glaciers was not touched by this article, but same problem is tackled which are of about the same impact to the environment. Also, the danger it might cause to forms of life was not mentioned. 4. Raper, Sarah C. B, and Braithwaite, Rojer J. â€Å"Low Sea Level Rise Projection from Mountain Glaciers Icecaps under Global Warming†. Nature 439 (2006): 311-313. The rise of sea level due to global warming was introduced in the article, which was then connected to greenhouse gas emissions, that would result in 0. 387-m rise on the 22nd century. Several factors are mentioned including thermal expansion, which contributes 0. 288-m rise, 0. 106-m rise as caused by melting of glaciers and ice caps, 0. 024-m rise as influenced by Greenland, and a fall of 0. 074 due to Antartica. A modeling technique was done to further improve the discussion which talks about the effects of melting, which has some corrections to avoid error. The melting of mountain glaciers and ice caps were differentiated and compared to other existing computations. Effects on the biosphere is not mentioned in the article. 5. United States. Environmental Protection Agency. â€Å"Coastal Zones and Sea Level Rise†. 9 October 2007 http://www. epa. gov/climatechange/effects/coastal/index. html. This paper is filled with scientific evidences referring to the coastal zones and the rise of the sea level related to the climate variability and changes. The article introduces the possible areas that can be affected by sea level rise, then tackled each area in relation to it and with each other in some sense. Subsiding coastal lands being the reason for sea level rise, where the extinction of glaciers is mentioned. Actually this is the only portion of the paper that mentions about glaciers, and the rest do not, but then everything connects with the rise of the sea level, but then it is not directly emphasized that the reason for all is the glacier’s extinction. The author’s knowledge makes interconnection among the plausible effects of sea level elevation, which is mainly due to the melting of glaciers. This article compared to the 2nd one is more scientifically supported, and is actually lengthier and more statistically played upon. The readers will be able to extract many things from this article.

Saturday, September 21, 2019

Effects of Psychodrama Practice on University Students Subjective Well-Being and Hopelessness Essay Example for Free

Effects of Psychodrama Practice on University Students Subjective Well-Being and Hopelessness Essay Psychodrama can be defined as the helpful role-playing method technique usually conducted by groups. Many questions have been raised about the effects which can be caused by psychodrama on students (Blatner, Adam, 2014). This article have discussed and compiled those effects caused by psychodrama practice on university students’ subjective well-being and hopelessness, morenean approaches: Recognizing Psychodrama’s many facets, the integration of psychodrama with Bowen’s theory in couple therapy and enriching psychodrama through the use of cognitive behavioral therapy techniques Bibliography. Article summary on the effects of psychodrama practice on university students’ subjective well-being and hopelessness                  The effects of psychodrama can be either positive or negative (benefits or limitation).Psychodrama has several applications in real life today. These applications include business, training, religion, and application in business and also teaching together with psychotherapeutic application and concentrations (Blatner, Adam, 2014). Many people have made it a major part in their colleges as psychodrama trainers who puts efforts broadly with such persons (Farmer et al, 2007). The psychodrama tic tactic can be readily unified with several other approaches which relates to psychotherapy. According to Blatner, Adam, (2014), the integration of psychodrama with psychoanalysis, gestalt therapy, behavior therapies, creative arts therapies, play therapy, body therapies, family therapy, group therapy, imagination therapies and other miscellaneous psychotherapies. For example within (ASGPP) American Society for the Study of Group Psychotherapy and Psychodrama there is a sub class of psychodrama that precisely concentrate on application of psychoanalytic. Psychodrama symbolizes a full expansion and improvement of role-playing together with their applications and implementation. Although role-playing is mostly discussed, outdoor of psychodrama it has not often been considered as an intermediation but except decisiveness training, others are known by the clinician. A psychodrama tic role-playing meeting is perfect for formulating for example a university student to have an encounter with a family or friend member, employer, or maybe the colleague worker. Psychodrama have another application of addressing a wide range of matters and problems comprising those in the currently, future, and past or those that comprise the interior encounter (Farmer et al, 2007). According to Farmer et al, (2007), it can be addressed as â€Å"surplus reality,† that is those issues connected to what one might have, would have, and should have done. This can be applied to efficiently address visions and fantasies and can be applied to address worries related to â€Å"God†, â€Å"the church† or â€Å"the government† in a straight sort of manner. This can improve the well-being of a student and assist him or her in grieving through a goodbye meeting with a departed important and esteemed one. Furthermore Psychodrama can be applied to enhance specific therapy on an individual or additional therapy setup. This can assist the move a student past a deadlock or define if they are equipped for expulsion from treatment through tackling an expected challenging situation (Treadwell, 2005). Privacy is an issue in any experimental preparation groups just as it is in psychotherapy groups. Each participants is required to come to an agreement to privacy as one condition for being a fragment of this training (Blatner, Adam, 2014). The participants are also stimulated to take into account ongoing work and school interactions with other participants as they select what they unveil as a personal material. Furthermore, it will be addressed out that a moral condition for group work is to make the contestants aware that though a group trainer is forbidden by law from unveiling any material from group, also other group members do not have that same responsibility. Many ways can lead to physical injury to the participant in the process of enactment. For example, the presentation of fierce scenes, creating effects in example standing on chairs, or peoples who are bodily compromised to start with commotions which they cannot do. It is the teacher’s and therapist’s accountability to be alert of possible hazards and to shield the participants. Societal force can end up in individuals feeling constrained to participate in activities of which they may not otherwise accord. Moreover, it is stressed that this subject must be made clear with each participant with whom the therapist might use the method (Farmer et al, 2007). Psychodrama is the most approach developed by Moreno in his lifespan. Instead of being believed of as an only technique, his work would be greatly aided if utilized and recognized as actually separate mechanisms (Karatas, Zeynep, 2005). Although the efficiency of these individual mechanisms might be added up by using them in performance, there are many situations in which they can be applied in their own right. Moreno came to a conclusion that body movement, active interrelations and actions on the stage, their common familiarity or distance as stated in altitudinal terms, physical, could inform more about the troubles in interpersonal affairs than speaking (Farmer et al, 2007). The action occurring on the stage, movements and spoken words, and objects, make it probable for the character to either to complete anything he or she has been unable to, or have not known how to do it, or tried not do in actuality (Treadwell, 2005). This can be referred as act completion since it is on the psychodrama stage that the person understands the emotions and thoughts that obstruct him, plus the new sequence of behavior that will assist him to express himself independently (Treadwell, 2005). Psychodrama not only sightsees ones unexpressed feelings and thoughts, but also the conditions that have never really occurred but could have the meets with those who are actually not there. Everything can happen in psychodrama and this hidden dimension of experience can be referred as surplus reality or an extra dimension of reality. The â€Å"character’s† story or subject is at the center of the psychodrama tic presentation whereby the character is the client, patient and the subject of the conduct. The character is chosen out of the group and during the psychodrama tic process the group’s participants are the â€Å"listeners† and the source is for the enactment (Blatner, Adam, 2014). About the greatest part, the source plays the part according to the character’s comments and instructions .The organizer may direct the source but not intensively. According to Moreno, the source can be acted to the character’s creative mind in two approaches known as double and soliloquy (Treadwell, 2005). There are many methods which co-therapist use to deal with those in relationships mainly couples by use of psychodrama methods and Bowen’s theories. The authors put together the Bowens theory of differentiated individual as single who is capable to function from a position of me as different from we in couples or relationships and use psychodrama to show this functioning (Blatner, Adam, 2014). The appliance of psychodrama among couples is based on the four Bowens theories (Farmer et al, 2007). the first theory is the theory of triangle, In couples who are too cross of very far there comes a time where some misunderstanding occurs, some couples are able to solve them in a peaceful manner while others they do not manage to do so, this cause an emotional tension which leads to violence in the family. This is where the Bowens theory of triangle gets in, the theory introduces a third party in the family, which helps to solve the problem. The three party’s forms a triangle as the name suggest due to the pull of the third party. The third party can be Christian leaders, police or family friends. According to Blatner, Adam, (2014), in families, differentiated profile according to Bowen’s theory occurs when a child is born with some characteristics similar to those of one parent or grandparent or the child is born during the period of the death of one of the members of the family. The child concentrates more on the family due to the pressure from those sharing the same characteristics with him or her. This makes child to grow in a sense of WE more than I. In this case, Bowen wanted to teach couples on how to be different from others, if is to attend therapy sessions on member can attend and bring a change in the family if both are not willing to attend together (Karatas, Zeynep, 2005). The authors bring together the psychodrama and also cognitive behavioral techniques in-group settings. Those groups should have a minimum of five and maximum of ten members. The sessions should take 2 to 3 hours and total period should be 15 weeks. Those with aggressive disorders should take individual therapy (Treadwell, 2005). In the application of cognitive therapy, therapist should start with dysfunctional contemplation or thought records where the group’s members record things that affect them emotionally. The records are kept in each person’s file. During the filling of dysfunctional forms, the members should be given the samples first to guide them on how to fill them. Those forms help the therapist to know each person problem (Treadwell, 2005). Other cognitive technique is automatic thoughts, which are habitual. The therapist helps the patient to recognize them and assist the patient how to deal with them. The cognitive behavioral technique is very effective and the patient responds to it very well (Blatner, Adam, 2014). Conclusion                  From the impacts of psychodrama and its explanation we can deduce that it not only explores ones unexpressed feelings and thoughts, but also the situations that have at no time really occurred but could have the meets with those who are actually not there. Everything can happen in psychodrama and this hidden dimension of experience can be referred as surplus reality or an extra dimension of reality. Psychodrama is useful since it can be applied in business, training, religion, and application in business and also teaching together with psychotherapeutic application and concentrations. Other than benefits it can affect the participant due to its societal force which can end up in individuals feeling constrained to participate in activities of which they may not otherwise accord. Outline Psychodrama can be defined as the helpful role-playing method technique usually conducted by groups. Effects of psychodrama can be either positive or negative (benefits or limitation). Benefits include the applications in real life situations such as in business, training, religion, application in business and also teaching. Negative effects are the potential harms in terms of emotions, social culture or physical change. According to Moreno, Psychodrama is the most approach developed in his lifespan Psychodrama not only sightsees ones unexpressed feelings and thoughts, but also the conditions that have never really occurred but could have, the meets with those who are actually not there. Everything can happen in psychodrama and this hidden dimension of experience, can be referred as surplus reality or an extra dimension of reality. Bowens theories emphasizes mostly on differentiation where one refers himself as an individual. The force of the third party in a relationship helps a lot. The integration of Bowers theories and psychodrama brought a solution to those in relationships. Dysfunctional thought forms help mostly students and patients with a problem of mood regulation. During the first sessions of application cognitive technique, the students do not cooperate but later they enjoy the sessions. References Blatner, Adam (2014). Morenean Approaches: Recognizing Psychodramas Many Facets. Turk Egitim DernegiFarmer, Chris; Geller, Marcia (2007). The Integration of Psychodrama with Bowens Theories in Couples Therapy. Heldref Publications Winter Karatas, Zeynep. (2005). Effects of Psychodrama Practice on University Students Subjective Well-Being and Hopelessness Treadwell, Thomas W; Kumar, V K; Wright, Joseph H (2005). Enriching Psychodrama Through the Use of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Techniques. HELDREF PUBLICATIONS Summer Source document

Friday, September 20, 2019

Protecting Children from Harm in the Internet Age

Protecting Children from Harm in the Internet Age Yiliang, Yin Issues regarding children’s Internet safety remained an overarching concern for the society. But as a matter of fact, internet is already an irreplaceable part of daily life, especially for children (learning, gaming, and social networking). The Canadian government has introduced agreements to protect children. Nervertheless, some crimes are national basis. In addition, a lot of countries define ‘children’ differently, makes protecting children a harder work [Minujin et al. 2006]. Internet filtering technology has been conducted in most western countries as well as some developing countries. It is used to prevent Internet users from accessing materials that considered inappropriate or unsafe [Hamade, 2008]. Although parents and local institution are encouraged to use these software to protect their children and the community, but there is no guarantee that these software are 100% effective at regulating undesirable contents, they always likely to under- or over-block content. Therefore, besides using network level filtering, it is critical for parents, education- and government-related personnel to educate children about self-protection, risks and responsibility they may encounter while using the Internet. 1. INTRODUCTION Internet has become one of the most important media among the others. Common uses of internet among people including children are: Leaning Social-networking Entertaining The development of technology makes Internet usage more convenient. Children are now able to access internet from their cellphone, tablet and laptop instead of desktop computers. But this made supervision much more difficult than before [LoÃÅ' pez, Arnao and Puente, 2012]. While the internet is overall a great educational place for children, there are also exist areas that are not appropriate for children. Without appropriate supervision, children are likely to get contacted by contents involving: violence, porn, hate speech, etc. Although there exist unsafe contents on the internet, but internet itself is a powerful tool. The internet gives parents and educators better opportunity to teach children according to their age and interest, giving children better way of learning while having fun. Parents, education- and government-related personnel should work together in order to build a safer environment for children. It is everyone’s responsibility to build and maintain a healthy environment for children wherever they are, giving children a safe and nurturing childhood. 2. Children Internet Use Both the amount of children and their ability to use internet are increasing. Some parents claim they don’t know better than their child about the internet. According to a survey conducted by the pan-European survey published by the European Commission, children start to use the Internet at 7, and the age of internet user is decreasing, internet uses include: social-networking (89%), entertaining (84%) and schoolwork (80%) [Digital Agenda, 2010]. Therefore, building safe guideline and setting rules for children’s internet usage should start once they get contact with computer. An important role of enabling children’s safety online is to help them understand the concepts of safety and risks, so that they will be able to make better decisions in the future based on what they have known. Internet safety education is critical in protecting children from internet threats. Some people blocked children’s internet usage completely, claiming it as an evil thing, which will misguide the children. They should also keep in mind that internet use is one of the basic skills in daily life. In addition, children learn from their mistakes. Therefore, it is the goal to teach children the ’internet manner’ and ‘look before you leap’. 3. Potential Risks According to research, children between ages of 8-15 are mostly likely to be afflicted by online threats. Some are risky to their safety and privacy; some may also resulted from children intentionally or unintentionally violates the law, such as torts which may lead to dangerous situations. Figure 1 shows the overview of common internet risks from Valcke et al. (2011): Fig. 1. Overview of internet Risks File-sharing is a useful technology that allows teachers to show useful information to the student and peers to share files with each other. But many file-sharing programs, like email, give children a way of accessing harmful contents. Example of such contents including: pornography, violence, hate, racism. According to research from Valkenburg and Soeters (2001), figure 2 shows data from children’s positive experience of using internet, and figure 3 shows negative experience. Fig. 2. Positive Impacts about children’s Internet Use Fig. 3. Negative Impacts about children’s Internet Use While children are searching movie clips, some sexually explicit files or sites advocate usage of alcohol, tobacco or illegal drugs may appear. In this case, some online filter or parent-control software can be used. The most common contact risks to think of is a child turn up missing or being hurt after meeting someone online. This always resulted by young children especially girls allured by criminals online. There are many ways internet users can lose their privacy, and leading themselves to danger. If children carelessly exposed family address, phone number, or name to a stranger, serious danger may occur to family members as well. Besides, nowadays there are a lot of companies collecting potential customers’ information as registering for contests or filling address for prize, children should also be aware of giving out information this way, causing mental and property damage. It is not only our privacy we need to consider. Parents should also be aware their children putting other people’s information (e.g. friend, other family members, etc.) online. Making jokes as claiming a missing child by putting a friend’s information online can cause a lot of trouble to the family and police. People get angry sometimes, same for children. A lot of people take internet as a way to vent the anger. Children will have higher chance to be exposed to hate speech and violent sentence when get involved. The best defense for children is to avoid getting into online arguments until they are mature enough to filter out bad information, control the anger and speak out their minds. The lack of uniform definition as what is appropriate for children or what is the definition of children are different in most countries based on their culture. Most developed countries take 18 years old as the boundary to differentiate adults from children. But people get marry early in some country so they arrive their adulthood much earlier. In this case, the lack of uniform online legislation may allow children to access inappropriate material from other countries. 4. Present Concerns and Solutions Along with the growth of children’s internet use, a large number of Web 2.0 applications like Facebook came out, which makes it now more critical to protect children from unsafe online environment. There are three aspects need to be worked with: government regulation, technologies, parents supervision. 4.1 Government Policies regarding Children’s Online Safety According to Liu (2006), Ontario police established the earliest investigation group about child pornography. The investigators realized shortly, child pornography exists not only in certain places, it became an issue of the world. Online investigation needs a lot of time, money and human resources, especially skilled investigators. So the local police station founded an Internet Safety Committee, formed by police representatives, governors from election, members from the local Education Committee, etc., and their goal is to provide the safest online environment as they can for children. To accomplish the goal, the committee established the following detailed rules: educate students about the importance of internet safety; teach the parents how to protect their children from internet risks. The committee worked with one school and added specific course about Internet Safety for students with different age. An insurance company donated a disk with video about Internet Risks to the committee made the education process ran smoother than before. According to the research before experiment, 62% of elementary students were using internet in the spare time, and 23.7% of the student have visited online chatting rooms. For students in grade 9 and grade 10, 88.6% of them have spent spare time online, 66.19% students have chatted online within the last 6 months. The most disturbing result is that there were 90.5% of students thought it is alright to meet people that they met online, and 22% had already met their net friend. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) of United States had revised Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) on July 1, 2013. COPPA give US-parents greater control over their children’s privacy. It detailed what a website operator must follow, when and how to seek permission and verification from a parent to guardian, and what responsibility an operator has to protect children’s privacy and safety online, including restrictions on doing business with children under 13. 4.2 Internet Filtering Technology A lot of countries have chosen to establish national internet regulation with varying degrees of success, but sometimes will have unintended consequences. Number of countries who use filtering technologies to block the access of certain content has increased dramatically. Normally, the following threes filtering technologies are used to block the access of websites via network infrastructure: IP blocking, DNS filtering, and URL blocking using a proxy. Filters can also be implemented by using software on local computers, in other words, client-side filters. This type of filter can be managed by anyone with administrator-level privileges on the computer. It can be argued that net-work based filtering causes filtering errors: over-blocking and under-blocking. For example, when searching health-related information, some useful information may be filtered out by having same searching keywords with porn-related material. And most of the filtering software will prefer over-blocking instead of allowing any leaking information that their customers don’t want. As a result, over-blocking encourages users to bypass the filtering technology entirely. When new information is updated online, under-blocking may occur. The filtering software may fail to recognise the new information because it has not yet updated on the client side when blacklisting are used instead of whitelisting. With the rapid development of science and technology, people expect higher efficiency for their software. It has been reported that most inline filters (parent-control software) as well as online content filtering are slow when processing. According to AkbasÃÅ' § (2008), content filtering can be accelerated by examining only web content. In this case, offline filtering and proxy works synergistic, so filtering process and data transfer works independently to accelerate the filtering process. Therefore, decision can be made by examining only part of the web content. While children’s internet use at school or home is usually supervised and filtered, many children are now able to access internet through other devices and in different locations with no supervision and internet filter. This means, children are likely to access inappropriate material on the internet. It is therefore, important to educate children how to behave online, and discuss issues that may encounter when accessing Internet. 4.3 Parents and Educators’ Action When the government trying to enact laws to protect children as complete as possible, parents and other community members in the society also have the responsibility to guide children, provide a safe and entertained online environment for them. Except using filtering technologies, parents and educators should teach children how to safeguard themselves, since the most effective way of preventing problems arising from internet use is to empower children. Guardians and educators can teach them about legal boundaries, moral and ethical norms regarding their culture. Empowering children can prevent them from being victims as well. It is undeniable that children adapt new technologies better than adults. This made a good relation with children much important, since young people usually will have a trusted relationship with peers or adults, so the influencers should be aware of the risks themselves and give reliable advices. In addition, parents, guardians, educators and trusted influencers should play an active role in teaching children about the risks they may face from sexually explicit materials online and how to avoid internet predators and scammers. Children should also be educated about being careful of sharing personal information on the internet. As children growing up day by day, parents’ guardian role becomes challenging. While parents are being responsible for their children’s safety, they have to respect children’s rights to privacy themselves. Parents might give up at this them, but it is urgent to encourage parents to talk and discuss with children about their online activity. (what the parents can do are: communicate with children as much as they can; make sure the children understand the importance of not exposing private information to strangers; make sure they don’t meet net friend; if found anything that children did were not appropriate online, stop them, and educate them; put the computer at where you can see easily; use parents control software;) 5. Conclusions Internet control is not impossible. Along working with children in their families and schools, there are a lot of actions that government can do to build public awareness to help children be benefit from the internet in a safe environment. For example, involve all members in the society to build public awareness about internet safety; encourage law enforcement and the educational department to develop best practices in proving safe online environment and dealing with crimes. The internet renovates so rapidly that the government regulation and technologies might not keep up. More effective and durable measures are those close to children: family, school, and community, guiding children to make good decisions, so that they will grow to become the next generation of responsible and trusted influencers. REFERENCES http://refworks.scholarsportal.info.proxy.bib.uottawa.ca/refworks2/default.aspx?r=file::get_filefile_name=yyin051-RefList.htmlcontent_type=text/htmlfile_token=WWFvJ8ccM8n3WWpZKOfcZRsWMbn0Mo5vMb5yMoefNE90J8e0GApnVtW[ZhkcUCd[GtA1T8c4E. AkbasÃÅ' §. 2008. Next Generation Filtering: Offline Filtering Enhanced Proxy Architecture for Web Content Filtering. In Computer and Information Sciences, 2008. ISCIS 08. 23rd International Symposium on. 1-4. DOI:http://dx.doi.org.proxy.bib.uottawa.ca/10.1109/ISCIS.2008.4717892 S. N. Hamade. 2008. Internet filtering and censorship. Information Technology: New Generations, 2008. ITNG 2008. Fifth International Conference on ( 2008) , 1081-1086. DOI:http://dx/doi.org/10.1109/ITNG.2008.50 Zhongwen Liu. 2006. On internet safety for canadian children. Journal of Liaoning Police Academy 39, 5 (September. 2006)DOI:http://dx/doi.org/1008-5378(2006)05-0049-02 E. M. LoÃÅ' pez, R. N. M. Arnao, and S. M. Puente. 2012. Children and adolescent risk environment characterization to use information technologies and communications (ICT): Case merida, venezuela. Latin America Transactions, IEEE (Revista IEEE America Latina) 10, 3 ( 2012), 1791-1797. DOI:http://dx/doi.org/10.1109/TLA.2012.6222586 Alberto Minujin, Enrique Delamonica, Alejandra Davidziuk, and D. E. Gonzalez. 2006. The definition of child poverty: A discussion of concepts and measurements. Environment and Urbanization 18, 481 ( 2006)DOI:http://dx/doi.org/10.1177/0956247806069627 M. Valcke, B. De Wever, H. Van Keer, and T. Schellens. 2011. Long-term study of safe internet use of young children. Computers Education 57, 1 (August. 2011), 1292-1305. DOI:http://dx/doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2011.01.010. P. Valkenburg and K. Soeters. 2001. Childrens positive and negative experiences with the internet an exploratory survey. Communication Research 28, 5 (October. 2001), 652-675. DOI:http://dx/doi.org/10.1177/009365001028005004 Page 1 of 7

Thursday, September 19, 2019

Various Factors Explaining Why Boys are Boys and Men are Men :: Mens Health Male Roles Society Essays

Various Factors Explaining Why Boys are Boys and Men are Men This paper is going to describe various key factors explaining why boys are boys, men are men, and how boys adapt in this male dominant society to become men. Growing up in Pensacola Florida in a single parent home wasn’t something I wished are hoped for, but something I had to adapt to. My mother, even though she couldn’t be the male role model I needed, help me understand what roles I’m expected to take as a young man. â€Å"Let the boys be boys,† was a phrase used by hip hop legends â€Å"onyx† portraying a message that boys are going to be boys no matter what. So I ask my self what makes a boy, a boy? Rambo like characteristics? Muscles? Short hair? Wearing T-shirts and jeans or playing with sporting equipment? Well last I remember; the main characteristics that boys shared were penises. The role gender association play in the lives of our children can sometimes affect them negatively. The messages that gender roles send, is that in order to be part of society, you must fit into the norm trying to accomplish what society expects of you; But all the while, trying to incorporate individuality and establishing ones sense of self. Two conflicting ideas that can confuse a child and also alter the way they live their lives. There are two colors that are designated to babies that serve one purpose and one purpose only. Most infant boys were the color blue and girls wear pink. Seeing that it is difficult to determine the sex of an infant without general exposure to the genitals, most parents choose to clothe they’re young child in the respective colors so people will know whether it is a boy or a girl. After all, what male infant wears pink? When the children grow older, do they still continue the practice the color identification game? This is where it changes, When boys reach the age where they start dressing themselves and start buying their own clothes, they will continue to wear the blues and the greens and even yellows and reds, but not pink or violet, cause those are â€Å"girly† colors. Girls on the other hand, when they reach the same age still continue to wear the pink and violets and can even wear the blues, yellows, blacks, and greens. So why can girls make the â€Å"cross-over† without being teased or mocked but boys cant without being called a gay or a fagot.

Wednesday, September 18, 2019

Selling Products versus Images :: Marketing Advertising Commercials Ads

Products or Images? What are they really selling? If an alien were shown an advertisement and asked to describe what product that particular company were selling, in most cases the alien would not know. The reason that the product itself would be unclear is that it is not actually being shown because the product is not what is most appealing to the consumer. The ideal or image that is most likely projected is the attention grabber. The fantasy that is being put forth by the company is what the consumer is really investing in. People like to buy things that represent what they admire or respect. Products and brands have symbolic meanings and project certain images (Mehta, page 82) in the case of the ENYCE brand of clothing the ad portrays an image of living in an inner city and leading an urban lifestyle. It shows young attractive individuals who appear to be cool, relaxed and enjoying themselves. The men look tough and strong, while the women look stylish and comfortable. The reason that the clothes that are being sold are not simply shown on their own, is because people buy the image they wish to express to others. Individuals prefer products that match their self-concept since these purchases provide a means of self-expression. (Mehta, page 82) If a person wishes to project an image of being cool, tough, confident and relaxed in the city than they could relate to this ENYCE ad and wish to buy the products, regardless to what the product looks like. The person is not, however, investing into the quality of the clothes or the affordability, but the association of being cool or happy. This reason is why companies have turned to using a fantasy or image to sell their products. Value-expressive attributes or image of the product rather than functional attributes and informational claims are often used in advertising. (Mehta, page 81) Products often promote things that are valued by everyone such as happiness, romance, sex and other things that most people desire. Images often vary as product images do, but many of them play on what that target population wants as a whole. Everyone wants to be happy and self confident in everything they do, and this can be seen in ads of every kind.

Tuesday, September 17, 2019

Concepts in Brave New World

10/11/12 Journal Entry #5: HTRLLAP Concepts The concept of â€Å"vampires† is present in Brave New World because the men and women don’t respect each other in the area of romance. Men like Henry Foster just use girls like Lenina for sex. But having sex with multiple people is socially accepted in the World State. In Brave New World, symbolic vampirism is used because the men and women use each other to get what they want which is sex. They do not care about what the other person wants.An example is Lenina trying to seduce John, when he makes it clear he does not just want to have sex with her. John is the opposite of the men from the World State because when he was thinking about how pretty she was he told himself that it was a â€Å"destestable thought† (145). Acts of Communion, was shown in Lord of the Flies when the boys were having a feast after Jack had killed the pig. This was a failed meal because towards the end Simon gives his piece of meat to Piggy who asked for some, but Jack denied saying he didn’t hunt.Piggy replies with, â€Å"no more did Ralph, nor Simon† (74) and Simon, being the inherently good person, gives Piggy his piece of meat. The meal is a failure because Jack becomes furious over Simon’s actions. At the end, Ralph becomes â€Å"envious and resentful† (75) which shows that he is upset with how the boys are acting and later in the book, hunting becomes a negative thing because the boys end up killing Simon, mistaking him for the beast. The Bible is used in Lord of the Flies to describe Simon and Roger. Simon was the Christ figure throughout the book.He helped Ralph build the shelters when the other boys were off playing, he gave Piggy his food when Piggy asks about having a piece of meat and he is killed like a martyr. He is murdered by the boys and he is the first boy to die at the hands of the others. Simon was carried away by the ocean and the description of how he was carried away portr ayed him as an angel. The snake of the Garden of Eden was represented by Roger. Roger was always quiet and in the background. He threw rocks at the young boys, purely for fun and he was the boy who pushed the rock that killed Piggy and shattered the conch shell.The concept of â€Å"It’s All About Sex†¦Except Sex† is shown in Brave New World because Huxley uses sex as a way to show the character’s desires to have power over another person. Because all of the Alpha’s are equal, they want to feel somewhat above the other person. Sex throughout the story is also used by the women as a sense of freedom. They can be with any man and people do not make any judgment of them. Sex is also used as a release and freedom for the people. They take the soma and then the characters don’t have a care in the world and do whatever they please because of the effects of the soma. Concepts in Brave New World 10/11/12 Journal Entry #5: HTRLLAP Concepts The concept of â€Å"vampires† is present in Brave New World because the men and women don’t respect each other in the area of romance. Men like Henry Foster just use girls like Lenina for sex. But having sex with multiple people is socially accepted in the World State. In Brave New World, symbolic vampirism is used because the men and women use each other to get what they want which is sex. They do not care about what the other person wants.An example is Lenina trying to seduce John, when he makes it clear he does not just want to have sex with her. John is the opposite of the men from the World State because when he was thinking about how pretty she was he told himself that it was a â€Å"destestable thought† (145). Acts of Communion, was shown in Lord of the Flies when the boys were having a feast after Jack had killed the pig. This was a failed meal because towards the end Simon gives his piece of meat to Piggy who asked for some, but Jack denied saying he didn’t hunt.Piggy replies with, â€Å"no more did Ralph, nor Simon† (74) and Simon, being the inherently good person, gives Piggy his piece of meat. The meal is a failure because Jack becomes furious over Simon’s actions. At the end, Ralph becomes â€Å"envious and resentful† (75) which shows that he is upset with how the boys are acting and later in the book, hunting becomes a negative thing because the boys end up killing Simon, mistaking him for the beast. The Bible is used in Lord of the Flies to describe Simon and Roger. Simon was the Christ figure throughout the book.He helped Ralph build the shelters when the other boys were off playing, he gave Piggy his food when Piggy asks about having a piece of meat and he is killed like a martyr. He is murdered by the boys and he is the first boy to die at the hands of the others. Simon was carried away by the ocean and the description of how he was carried away portr ayed him as an angel. The snake of the Garden of Eden was represented by Roger. Roger was always quiet and in the background. He threw rocks at the young boys, purely for fun and he was the boy who pushed the rock that killed Piggy and shattered the conch shell.The concept of â€Å"It’s All About Sex†¦Except Sex† is shown in Brave New World because Huxley uses sex as a way to show the character’s desires to have power over another person. Because all of the Alpha’s are equal, they want to feel somewhat above the other person. Sex throughout the story is also used by the women as a sense of freedom. They can be with any man and people do not make any judgment of them. Sex is also used as a release and freedom for the people. They take the soma and then the characters don’t have a care in the world and do whatever they please because of the effects of the soma.

Monday, September 16, 2019

Traditional Cultures Report

All traditional cultures are susceptible to change due to a variety of factors that encourage the acceptance of new tools and ideas (O'Neil 1). Some of these factors include changes in the environment, contact or interaction between societies, and other forces at work within a community. Nevertheless, Haviland, Prins, McBride and Walrath (363) argue that culture change is mostly unplanned or unforeseen; hence, all changes are not adaptive or positive. Culture change may lead to invention where new ideologies and technologies are introduced to the society or culture loss where traditional cultural patterns are replaced by new cultures such as in marriage. Therefore, this report will focus on how the traditional cultural patterns of marriage have been replaced by new ideas through globalization modernization and changed the institution of marriage today. Marriage is a dynamic part of life, which is characterized by a wedding in most cultures. However, the reason why people get married vary from one individual to another, though most people get married in order to have a legally binding relationship, which is intimate and lasting. Parties getting married must have the ability to understand the duties and responsibilities involved, as well as the nature of the marriage contract. Also, they must consent to marry willingly and cannot be forced to do so by any one. Most cultures have a minimum age for marriage; for instance, in Canada, the minimum age is sixteen with parental consent, or eighteen or nineteen without any parental consent. Blood relationships (consanguinity) and close relationships (affinity) in marriage are also prohibited in most cultures. However, through globalization and modernization, the institution of marriage has changed through acculturation, diffusion, innovation, and cultural loss (Haviland et al 363). Some marriage ideas have been borrowed from other societies, and replaced the traditional ones while others have been created and accepted widely by other communities. In addition, dominant and powerful societies have expanded their cultural practices across borders; thus, forcing other societies to forsake their traditional cultural practices in marriage and adopt the new ones. According to Haviland et al (410), globalization plays a significant role in shaping the future of the world. It refers to a process that transforms local traditions and cultures into global ones; hence, resulting in investment, trade and cultural exchange across the borders. Globalization signifies the removal of mostly economic barriers in order to assist in inter-cultural relations. Thus, it is the best way to end discrimination since it encourages inter-cultural and inter-racial marriage. However, globalization has changed how the marriage ceremony used to be conducted in Africa. Most African countries practiced traditional marriages where the bride and the groom got married under the customary law. It was a requirement for the family of the groom to pay dowry to the bride’s family before marriage. Through globalization, most African societies have borrowed the idea of weddings, which is a common practice in the west (Browning 102). As a result, the traditional cultural practice of marriage has weakened and the payment of dowry is no longer a requirement. Similarly, modernization refers to a process through which the society goes through industrialization, urbanization and other social changes based on the social organization and development of technology. According to Browning (102), modernization is also referred to as globalization if the changes involved occur in all parts of the world. However, although most people believe that modernization helps the society to change and develop, it is also a threat to the quality and stability of marriage. One of the major effects of modernization in marriage is the evident in parenthood. Traditionally, women were expected to stay at home and take care of their children and husbands by cooking, washing, and doing other household chores. The husband was supposed to be the sole bread winner and worked outside the home, but this traditional practice has greatly changed due to modernization, which has encouraged gender equality. Women no longer stay at home; rather, they have careers and are the sole bread winners of the family while men stay at home and take care of household chores, as well as raise their children. According to the traditional culture, every woman and man was expected to get married, and live together as husband and wife. Today, this cultural practice is no longer observed because some couples choose not to get married, but still live together as a married couple in a common-law relationship, which is referred to as cohabitation (Jervis 1). Moreover, traditionally unmarried partners were not required to support each other financially, but currently, some cultures recognize cohabiting couples as spouses. Thus, they have legal responsibility to support each other and have the benefits that legally married couples enjoy. In the traditional culture, marriages were expected to last a life time; hence, divorce cases were very rare. However, modernization has played a big role in empowering women and encouraging gender equality, which Jervis (1), believes is one of the main causes of divorce in the modern world. Both the traditional culture and the modern culture work for the society because they suit the conditions in the society. According to Giddens (45), change from traditional culture to modern culture is one of the greatest achievements in the society today. This is because traditional culture is said to be one of the many factors that hinder development. As discussed earlier, modernization has changed the traditional culture of marriage through gender equality such that women now have careers. However, although many tend to run away from their parental duties, studies have proved that gender equality is one of the major factors that drive development. Nevertheless, since culture is constantly changing, I believe it is the duty of the society to ensure that development and culture complement each other in order to protect the institution of marriage. In conclusion, the traditional culture is said to be held together by relationships in the society such as family, marriage and tribe. Societies where traditional culture is still strong understand that relationships among people are highly essential in order for their cultural practices to survive. However, globalization and modernization has resulted in the creation of modern culture where relationships among people such as marriage and family are no longer valued. Giddens (92), states that unlike the traditional culture, modern culture is held together by things and power, and not by relationships and people.

Sunday, September 15, 2019

What is Euthanasia?

Euthanasia is one of the most highly discussed topic in society today. It is not morally correct it has to do with killing someone and ruins the intrinsic value of a human being. That is my argument towards euthanasia. Euthanasia goes against nature. Those that oppose say that it is mercy killing, but it is still killing. I am with the majority who are against this so-called mercy killing. Before presenting my arguments, it would be best to define the term â€Å"euthanasia†. Euthanasia can be defined in many ways. Here are categories that fall in with the term euthanasia. â€Å"The term involuntary euthanasia is where the decision is not made by the person who is to die; the patient's life is ended without the knowledge and consent. It is basically a form of murder. Passive euthanasia is to speed up the process of death to a person and stopping some type of support to let that take its course.' (academic, coup) Like: stopping a form of medical procedure, stopping nutrients of food and water and allowing the person to dehydrate or starve to death, with that not delivering CPR. â€Å"The term active euthanasia involves causing the death of a person through a direct action, in response from that person.† (ACADEMIC.COUP) A well-known example of that is the case of Dr. Kevorkian. He gave a lethal dose of medicine to kill a terminally ill patient. Dr. Jack Kevorkian was a retired pathologist who assisted in the deaths of over 130 people. The famous court case of Dr. Jack Kevorkian brought awareness to the controversial issue of euthanasia to the public. â€Å"In Michigan, Dr. Jack Kevorkian was convicted of the second-degree murder because he administered a controlled substance to end the life of Thomas Youk and had prepared a video showing his action and let the video be broadcast on national television (NY Times). A different yet similar situation and legal case would come about Saskatchewan, Canada when a wheat farmer named Robert Latimer would take the question of euthanasia into his own hands. â€Å"Robert Latimer murdered his young daughter, Tracy, on October 24th, 2008. Behind the reasoning of Latimer's act which was immoral is that he couldn't help to see his daughter suffering from a severe form of cerebral palsy and her disability. He killed her by placing Tracy in the back of his car and ran a hose from the exhaust to the cab, while he watched her die. Latimer was then convicted on November 4,1993 of first-degree murder. The year after he was convicted of second-degree murder.† (Inclusion Daily). So the question is: what's the difference between his actions of killing his Tracy who suffers from serious pain, and a doctor who received given permission to kill an individual who is also suffering from pain? Eventually Dr. Jack Kevorkian, and Robert Latimer, were both charged with murder because they chose to practice euthanasia. If murder is prohibited by law because people take murder into their own hands to kill others, then why shouldn't euthanasia be too since doctors kill their patients even if there is consent. A doctor must receive authorization to assist in the death of a patient who is overly sick. Because of this many have questioned why doesn't Robert Latimer have the right to take his own daughters life, since a doctor would have had to ask him anyways to have the right to kill Tracy? Latimer apparently saved his daughter from suffering, which is the same reason many people.

Saturday, September 14, 2019

Living In a Concentration Camp As a Jew

Living In a Concentration Camp As a Jew By: Sheena Xu Auschwitz was the largest concentration camp to created by the German Nazis in April 1940. It was located by a town called O?wi?cim, Poland. It was one of the most dangerous Nazi camps and was called the â€Å"final solution†. 1, 095, 000 Jewish men, women, and children were deported to Auschwitz and 960 000 died intotal at the camp. Auschwitz was divided into 3 sections. One was a prison camp, one was used as a killing and extermination center, and lastly there was a forced labour camp. Only about 11% of children who were still alive in 1933 had survived the Holocaust. The prisoners had 3 small meals a day. Breakfast was half a litre of imitation coffee or a herbal â€Å"tea† which was always unsweetened. Lunch was a litre of watery soup and you would be considered lucky to have a few pieces of turnip or potato peel, and many newcomers had a difficult time eating it. The evening dinners were around 300 grams of black bread with either sausage, margarine, marmalade, or cheese on top. It had to last until the morning so prisoners would hide it somewhere while they slept, but the starving prisoners would usually eat it all right away. Prisoners had many duties both inside and outside of camp like working in factories, farms, and coal mines. Work was every day except Sunday and they woke up at 4:30 in the summertime and at 5:30 in the wintertime and the nighttime silence was at 9:00. They worked for German companies and were used as slave-labour. The Sonderkommando were Jews selected for their strength and fitness to work in the crematoria. Their job was to dispose of dead corpses coming from the gas chambers. The Kanada Kommando was another job where prisoners were assigned to sort through the valuables of Jewish people so they could be sent back to Germany. Canada was a country that symbolizes wealth to the prisoners, so that's why they named it Kanada because of all the clothing and jewelry. Anyone who worked for the Kanada Kommando had much better living spaces in barracks than the other prisoners, but if they were caught stealing anything, they would be killed.Doing anything wrong or not to the standards could be risking your life. Most prisoners were sent to the gas chambers immediately after arriving. Different punishments they would use was the â€Å"post† or flogging. The â€Å"post† was where you're hung in the air for a long time, so your arms become paralyzed and you are sent to the gas chambers because of being unfit for work. Flogging is when a prisoner is bent over a stool with their arms stretched forward and they would be whipped for about 25 times. A hanging would take place during roll call and it was meant to intimidate other prisoners. A shooting was where prisoners had to strip naked and they were shot in the back of the head. Smoking, relieving yourself at the wrong time, or attempting suicide meant punishment or death. On January 27, 1945, the Soviet Union soldiers had liberated the remaining prisoners from Auschwitz. Intotal, 135, 000 Jewish prisoners were liberated but most died soon after. Many relief workers and physicians tried to save the prisoners but many were too weak to digest food and they couldn't be saved. Since they had gone without food for so long, the food was too rich for the prisoners, so they had to eat little by little. Even though so many had died, there were still those who fought to survive, and they are the people that could still live to tell their story.

Friday, September 13, 2019

Anonymous Research Essay Example for Free

Anonymous Research Essay Internet (835) , Anonymous (16) company About StudyMoose Contact Careers Help Center Donate a Paper Legal Terms & Conditions Privacy Policy Complaints Anonymous (used as a mass noun) is a loosely associated hacktivist group. It (is estimated to have) originated in 2003 on the imageboard 4chan, representing the concept of many online and offline community users simultaneously existing as an anarchic, digitized global brain.[2] It is also generally considered to be a blanket term for members of certain Internet subcultures, a way to refer to the actions of people in an environment where their actual identities are not known.[3] It strongly opposes Internet censorship and surveillance, and has hacked various government websites. It has also targeted major security corporations.[4][5][6] It also opposes Scientology, government corruption and homophobia. Its members can be distinguished in public by the wearing of stylised Guy Fawkes masks.[7] In its early form, the concept was adopted by a decentralized online community acting anonymously in a coordinated manner, usually toward a loosely self-agreed goal, and primarily focused on entertainment. Beginning with 2008, the Anonymous collective became increasingly associated with collaborative, international hacktivism. They undertook protests and other actions in retaliation against anti-digital piracy campaigns by motion picture and recording industry trade associations.[8][9] Actions credited to â€Å"Anonymous† were undertaken by unidentified individuals who applied the Anonymous label to themselves as attribution.[10] They have been called the freedom fighters of the Internet,[11] a digital Robin Hood,[12] and â€Å"anarchic cyber-guerrillas.†[13] Although not necessarily tied to a single online entity, many websites are strongly associated with Anonymous. This includes notable imageboardssuch as 4chan, their associated wikis, Encyclopà ¦dia Dramatica, and a number of forums.[14] After a series of controversial, widely publicized protests, distributed denial of service (DDoS) and website defacement attacks by Anonymous in 2008, incidents linked to its cadre members have increased.[15] In consideration of its capabilities, Anonymous has been posited by CNN to be one of the three major successors to WikiLeaks.[16] In 2012, Time named Anonymous as one of the most influential groups in the world.[17] The name Anonymous itself is inspired by the perceived anonymity under which users post images and comments on the Internet. Usage of the term Anonymous in the sense of a shared identity began on imageboards.[14] A tag of Anonymous is assigned to visitors who leave comments without identifying the originator of the posted content. Users of imageboards sometimes jokingly acted as if Anonymous were a real person. The concept of the Anonymous entity advanced in 2004 when an administrator on the 4chan image board activated a â€Å"Forced_Anon† protocol that signed all posts as Anonymous.[14] As the popularity of imageboards increased, the idea of Anonymous as a collective of unnamed individuals became an Internet meme.[18] Anonymous broadly represents the concept of any and all people as an unnamed collective. As a multiple-use name, individuals who share in the â€Å"Anonymous† moniker also adopt a shared online identity, characterized as hedonistic and uninhibited. This is intended as a satirical, conscious adoption of the online disinhibition effect.[19] â€Å"| We [Anonymous] just happen to be a group of people on the internet who need—just kind of an outlet to do as we wish, that we wouldn’t be able to do in regular society. †¦That’s more or less the point of it. Do as you wish. †¦ There’s a common phrase: ‘we are doing it for the lulz.’| †| —Trent Peacock. Search Engine: The face of Anonymous, February 7, 2008.[19]| Definitions tend to emphasize that the concept, and by extension the collective of users, cannot be readily encompassed by a simple definition. Instead Anonymous is often defined by aphorismsdescribing perceived qualities.[2] One self-description, originating from a protest video targeted at the Churc h of Scientology, is: We are Anonymous. We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us.[20] â€Å"| [Anonymous is] the first Internet-basedsuperconsciousness. Anonymous is a group, in the sense that a flock of birds is a group. How do you know they’re a group? Because they’re traveling in the same direction. At any given moment, more birds could join, leave, peel off in another direction entirely.| †| —Chris Landers. Baltimore City Paper, April 2, 2008.[2]| Anonymous consists largely of users from multiple imageboards and Internet forums. In addition, several wikis and Internet Relay Chat networks are maintained to overcome the limitations of traditional imageboards. These modes of communication are the means by which Anonymous protesters participating in Project Chanology communicate and organize upcoming protests.[21][22] A â€Å"loose coalition of Internet denizens,†[23] the group bands together through the Internet, using IRC channels[21] and sites such as 4chan,[21][23] 711chan,[21] Encyclopà ¦dia Dramatica,[24] and YouTube.[3] Socia l networking services, such as Facebook, are used for to mobilize groups for real-world protests.[25] Anonymous has no leader or controlling party and relies on the collective power of its individual participants acting in such a way that the net effect benefits the group.[23] â€Å"Anyone who wants to can be Anonymous and work toward a set of goals†¦Ã¢â‚¬  a member of Anonymous explained to the Baltimore City Paper. â€Å"We have this agenda that we all agree on and we all coordinate and act, but all act independently toward it, without any want for recognition. We just want to get something that we feel is important done†¦Ã¢â‚¬ [2] Anonymous members have previously collaborated with hacker group LulzSec.[citation needed] It is impossible to ‘join’ Anonymous, as there is no leadership, no ranking, and no single means of communication. Anonymous is spread over many mediums and languages, with membership being achieved simply by wishing to join.[26] Commander X and the People’s Liberation Front A person known as Commander X provided interviews and videos about Anonymous.[27] In 2011, he was at the center of an investigation into Anonymous by HBGary CEO Aaron Barr, who claimed to have identified him as a San Francisco gardener. Interviewed following the attack on HBGary Federal, Commander X revealed that while Barr suspected that he was a leader of the group, he was in his own words a â€Å"peon.† However, Commander X did claim to be a skilled hacker and founding member of an allied organization, the Peoples Liberation Front (PLF).[28] According to Commander X, Peoples Liberation Front, a collective of hactivists founded in 1985, acted with AnonOps, another sub-group of Anonymous, to carry out denial-of-service (DDOS) attacks against government websites in Tunisia, Iran, Egypt, and Bahrain. Explaining the relationship between Anonymous and the PLF, he suggested an analogy to NATO, with the PLF being a smaller sub-group that could choose to opt in or out of a specific project. â€Å"AnonOps and the PLF are both capable of creating huge â€Å"Internet armies.† The main difference is AnonOps moves with huge force, but very slowly because of their decision making process. The PLF moves with great speed, like a scalpel.†[29] On September 23, 2011, a homeless man in California named Christopher Doyon was arrested and stated by officials to have used the Commander X screen name.[30] He pleaded not guilty.[31] The Low Orbit Ion Cannon is a network stress testing application that has been used by Anonymous to accomplish its DDOS attacks. Individual users download the LOIC and voluntarily contribute their computer to a bot net. This bot net is then directed against the target by AnonOps.[32] Joining the bot net and volunteering one’s resources for the use of the group is thus one way of being a â€Å"member,† a concept that is otherwise hard to define. In April 2009, after The Pirate Bay co-defendants were found guilty of facilitating extensive copyright infringement â€Å"in a commercial and organized form†, Anonymous launched a coordinated DDoS attack against the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), an organisation responsible for safeguarding recording artists’ rights.[33] When co-founders lost their appeal against convictions for encouraging piracy, Anonymous again targeted the IFPI, labelling them â€Å"parasites.† A statement read: â€Å"We will continue to attack those who embrace censorship. You will not be able to hide your ludicrous ways to control us. On January 19, 2012, Megaupload, a website providing file-sharing services, was shut down by the US Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).[36] In the hours following the shutdown, hackers took down the sites of the DOJ and FBI, as well as the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), and Broadcast Music, Inc. (BMI) using distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks.[37]Barrett Brown, described as a spokesperson for Anonymous, called the attack â€Å"the single largest Internet attack in [Anonymous’] history.†[38] With the protests against the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) protests only a day old, Brown stated that internet users were â€Å"by-and-far ready to defend an open Internet.†[38] Although the actions of Anonymous received support,[citation needed] some commentators argued that the denial of service attack risked damaging the anti-SOPA case. Molly Wood of CNET wrote that â€Å"[i]f the SOPA/PIPA protests were the Web’s moment of inspiring, non-violent, hand-holding civil disobedience, #OpMegaUpload feels like the unsettling wave of car-burning hooligans that sweep in and incite the riot portion of the play.†[39] Dwight Silverman of the Houston Chronicle concurred, stating that â€Å"Anonymous’ actions hurt the movement to kill SOPA/PIPA by highlighting online lawlessness.†[40] The Oxford Internet Institute’s Joss Wright wrote that â€Å"In one sense the actions of Anonymous are themselves, anonymously and unaccountably, censoring websites in response to positions with which they disagree.†[37] Anonymous claimed responsibility for taking down government websites in the UK in April 2012 in protest against government extradition and surveillance policies. A message was left on Twitter saying it was â€Å"for your draconian surveillance proposals.†[41] Anonymous activists merged with Occupy Wall Street protesters. Anonymous members descended on New York’s Zucotti Park and organized it partly. After it became known that some Occupy protesters would get violent, Anonymous used social networking to urge Occupy protesters to avoid disorder. Anonymous used Twitter trends to keep protests peaceful.[42] A similar protest occurred outside the London Stock Exchange in early May 2012 during a May Day Occupy protest.[43] Alleged Internet predator Chris Forcand, 53, was charged with child sexual and firearm offenses.[44] A newspaper report stated that Forcand was already being tracked by â€Å"cyber-vigilantes before police investigations commenced.[45] A television report identified a â€Å"self-described Internet vigilante group called Anonymous† who contacted the police after some members were â€Å"propositioned† by Forcand. The report stated this was the first time a suspected Internet predator was arrested by the police as a result of Internet vigilantism.[46] In October 2011, â€Å"Operation Darknet† was launched as an attempt to cease the activities of child porn sites accessed through hidden services in the deep web.[47] Anonymous published in apastebin link what it claimed were the user names of 1,589 members of Lolita City, a child porn site accessed via the Tor network. Anonymous said that it had found the site via The Hidden Wiki, and that it contained over 100 gigab ytes of child pornography. Anonymous launched a denial-of-service attack to take Lolita City offline. The group is responsible for cyber-attacks on the Pentagon, News Corp and has also threatened to destroy Facebook.[54] In October 2011, Anonymous hackers threatened the Mexican drug cartel known as Los Zetas in an online video after one of their members was kidnapped.[55] In late May 2012 alleged Anonymous members claimed responsibility for taking down a GM crops website.[56] In early September 2012 alleged Anonymous members claimed responsibility for taking down GoDaddy’s Domain Name Servers, affecting small businesses around the globe.[57] In mid-September 2012, Anonymous hackers threatened the Hong Kong government organization, known as National Education Centre. In their online video, Anonymous members claimed responsibility for leaking classified government documents and taking down the National Education Centre website, after the Hong Kong government repeatedly ignored months of wide-scale protests against the establishment of a new core Moral and National Education curriculum for children from 6–18 years of age. The new syllabus came under heavy criticism and international media attention, as it does not award students based on how much factual information is learned, but instead grades and evaluates students based on their level of emotional attachment and approval of the Communist Party of China, almost in blind brain-washing fashion.[58] In response to Operation Pillar of Cloud in November 2012, Anonymous launched a series of attacks on Israeli government websites. Anonymous protested what they called the â€Å"barbaric, brutal and despicable treatment of the Palestinian people.†[59] On November 30, 2012, the group declared an operation to shut down websites of the Syrian government, in response to a internet blackout the previous day believed to be imposed by Syrian authorities in an attempt to silence opposition groups of the Syrian civil war Reaction from law enforcement agencies â€Å"| First, who is this group called Anonymous? Put simply, it is an international cabal of criminal hackers dating back to 2003, who have shut down the websites of the U.S. Department of Justice and the F.B.I. They have hacked into the phone lines of Scotland Yard. They are responsible for attacks against MasterCard, Visa, Sony and the Governments of the U.S., U.K., Turkey, Australia, Egypt, Algeria, Libya, Iran, Chile, Colombia and New Zealand.| †| —Canadian MP Marc Garneau, 2012[67]| In December 2010, the Dutch police arrested a 16-year old for cyberattacks against Visa, MasterCard and PayPal in conjunction with Anonymous’ DDoS attacks against companies opposing Wikileaks.[68] In January 2011, the FBI issued more than 40 search warrants in a probe against the Anonymous attacks on companies that opposed Wikileaks. The FBI did not issue any arrest warrants, but issued a statement that participating in DDoS attacks is a criminal offense with a sentence of up to 10 years in prison.[69][70] In January 2011, the British police arrested five male suspects between the ages of 15 and 26 with suspicion of participating in Anonymous DDoS attacks.[71] Matthew George, a Newcastle, New South Wales resident, concerned with forthcoming Australian internet filtration legislation, was arrested for his participation in Anonymous DDoS activities. George participated in Anonymous IRC discussions, and allowed his computer to be used in a denial of service attack associated with Operation Titstorm. Tracked down by authorities, he was fined $550, though he was not fully aware that his actions were illegal, and believed his participation in Operation Titstorm had been a legal form of civil protest. His experience left him disillusioned with the potential of online anonymity, warning others: â€Å"There is no way to hide on the internet, no matter how hard you cover your tracks you can get caught. You’re not invincible.†[72] On June 10, 2011, the Spanish police captured three purported members of Anonymous in the cities of Gijon, Barcelona and Valencia. The operation deactivated the main server from which the three men coordinated DDoS attacks. This particular group had made attacks on the web servers of the PlayStation Store, BBVA, Bankia, and the websites of the governments of Egypt, Algeria, Libya, Iran, Chile, Colombia and New Zealand. The operation revealed that their structure consisted of â€Å"cells† which at any given time could coordinate attacks through the downloading of software; the decision-making process to attack occurred in chat rooms. The Spanish national police stated that this operation corresponds to the fact that the Spanish government and NATO considers this group of hackers a threat to national security.[73] On June 13, 2011, officials in Turkey arrested 32 individuals that were allegedly involved in DDoS attacks on Turkish government websites. These members of Anonymous were captured in different cities of Turkey including Istanbul and Ankara. According to PC Magazine these individuals were arrested after they attacked these websites as a response to the Turkish government demand to ISPs to implement a system of filters that many have perceived as censorship.[74][75] During July 19–20, 2011, as many as 20 or more arrests were made of suspected Anonymous hackers in the US, UK, and Netherlands following the 2010 Operation Avenge Assange in which the group attacked PayPal, as well as attacking MasterCard and Visa after they froze Wikileaks accounts. According to US officials statements suspects’ homes were raided and suspects were arrested in Alabama, Arizona, California, Colorado, Washington DC, Florida, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Mexico, and Ohio, as well as a 16 year old boy being held by the police in south London on suspicion of breaching the Computer Misuse Act 1990, and four being held in the Netherlands.[76][77][78][79] On February 28, 2012, Interpol issued warrants for the arrests of 25 people with suspected links to Anonymous, according to a statement from the international police agency. The suspects, between the ages of 17 and 40, were all arrested.[80] On September 12, 2012; Anonymous spokesman Barrett Brown was arrested at his home in Dallas on charges of threatening an FBI agent. Agents arrested Brown while he was in the middle of aTinychat session.[81] Anonymous Research. (2016, Dec 31). We have essays on the following topics that may be of interest to you