Media and Disaster Aid Essay - 2988 Words

INTRODUCTION There is little doubt that the media has a profound impact on our awareness of humanitarian emergencies and disaster relief around the world. The reality of these disasters, and our responses to them, are heavily influenced by the framework that the media uses – through exposure on television, radio and in print – to capture our attention. The media has a number of important responsibilities as it reports on the events surrounding a natural disaster. I have broken down the media’s focus into four stages: early warning, immediate response, post-disaster review, and implementation. While these phases do not necessarily occur consecutively without overlap, they form a good basis for explaining the different roles of the media†¦show more content†¦The final stage is the â€Å"implementation† phase. The media’s responsibility here is to bring forward the recommendations from the post-disaster review, and put pressure on the government to change their policies. 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One problem with effective warning systems is that they are transmitted through multiple channels before being broadcast to the vulnerable population. In the case of a fire alert for example, the warning could pass through the Bureau of Meteorology, fire department headquarters and the local fire authority, before the media receives the information and makes theShow MoreRelatedThe Media, Disasters, and Aid Essay2947 Words   |  12 PagesINTRODUCTION There is little doubt that the media has a profound impact on our awareness of humanitarian emergencies and disaster relief around the world. The reality of these disasters, and our responses to them, are heavily influenced by the framework that the media uses – through exposure on television, radio and in print – to capture our attention. The media has a number of important responsibilities during a natural disaster. 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New Technology Ventures Assignment 1 - 1302 Words

New Technology Ventures – Assignment 1 Angela Ririe Piclo, the eBay for renewable energy â€Å"Distributed renewables and smart grid technologies are the future. We’re challenging the energy industry and reinventing how things are done. We’ve built Piclo - an online Peer-to-Peer Energy Marketplace that lets people buy and sell energy directly.† (Openutility.com, 2016) The Idea Piclo, the UK’s first online marketplace for renewable energy has been developed by Open Utility (a London based innovative energy start-up) in collaboration with Good Energy a 100% renewable electricity supplier. At present 7% of the UK’s electricity is produced from renewable sources and this percentage is expected to grow to 30% by 2020 as a result of EU targets.†¦show more content†¦Piclo’s granular analytics can help companies shift demand away from peak times and simplify sustainability reporting †¢ For energy generators: At present the only way companies that generate their own power can monetise excess capacity is to sell it back to the grid on a Feed-in Tariff (FiT) basis. Piclo will provide these companies with a dynamic online market where they are able to control exactly who they sell power to and at what price. The platform should enable smaller generators to get better prices for power than they would currently be able to achieve through FiT. Piclo’s analytics tools will provide generators with information on the current energy market and demand levels at different price points. Producers will also be able to market the story behind their project and have the ability to offer different prices to different buyers – for example offering lower pricing to local businesses. †¢ To keep the system in balance the company have developed â€Å"energy matching technology† that matches demand and supply every 30 minutes with Good Energy providing additional 100% renewable power or buying surplus power if required. Good Energy also provides Piclo with assistance with billing and meeting regulatory requirements. Figure 1: How Piclo works Source:

Declaration of Independence Summary free essay sample

The declaration of Independence was put in place on July 4th, 1776. The declaration came more than a year after the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War. It made the thirteen American colonies at war with Great Britain independent states and no longer under the British monarchial rule. Thomas Jefferson was chosen by John Adams to write the original draft of the declaration in which congress would finalize it. The declaration explained why the American colonies voted on July 2nd to declare independence; it would justify the independence of the United States due to its grievances against King Georg III and its right to revolt. The declaration of Independence asserted the rights of the American colonies to gain independence as ties with a once ruling country are not always in the best interest of the nation. It is the natural law of the people to govern themselves. It also gives the American people the right of revolution. We will write a custom essay sample on Declaration of Independence Summary or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page This gives all people the natural right to revolt if a government has violated their terms of rule. The declaration of Independence also gives natural rights to American citizens. It states that all men are created equal with the right of â€Å"life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. † To govern these rights a government will be created and if a government becomes destructive and stops doing their jobs then it is the right of the people to alter of abolish them. A new government must be put in place to rule the country. The last section of the declaration refers to the charges of King George III. They all refer to him violating the colonist’s rights and therefore should no rule them. The King raised taxes, oppressed the rights of the people and obstructed the administration of justice. The declaration states that when they have gone through all possibilities and all options tried, with the tyranny of the king he must be removed and it is their given right.

Key Success Factors for Online Advertising Essay Example

Key Success Factors for Online Advertising Essay Social Advertising Catherine Tucker? February 15, 2012 Abstract In social advertising, ads are targeted based on underlying social networks and their content is tailored with information that pertains to the social relationship. This paper explores the e? ectiveness of social advertising using data from ? eld tests of di? erent ads on Facebook. We ? nd evidence that social advertising is e? ective, and that this e? cacy seems to stem mainly from the ability of targeting based on social networks to uncover similarly responsive consumers. However, social advertising is less e? ective if the advertiser explicitly states they are trying to promote social in? uence in the text of their ad. This suggests that advertisers must avoid being overt in their attempts to exploit social networks in their advertising. Catherine Tucker is Associate Professor of Marketing at MIT Sloan School of Management, Cambridge, MA. and Faculty Research Fellow at the NBER. Thank-you to Google for ? nancial support and to an anonymous non-pro? t for their cooperation. Thank-you to Jon Baker, Ann Kronrod, Preston Mcafee, and seminar participants at the George Mason University Roundtable on the Law and Economics of Internet Search, the University of Rochester, UCLA and Wharton for valuable comments. All errors are my own. ? 1 Electronic copy available at: http://ssrn. com/abstract=1975897 1 Introduction Recent advances on the internet have allowed consumers to interact across digital social networks. This is taking place at unprecedented levels: Facebook was the most visited website in the US in 2010, accounting for 20% of all time spent on the internet, a higher proportion than Google or Yahoo! ComScore, 2011). However, it is striking that traditional marketing communications have been at the periphery of this explosion of social data despite the documented power of social in? uence on purchasing behavior. Much of the emphasis on marketing in social media, so far, has been on the achievement of ‘earned reach,’ whereby a brand builds it s subscriber base organically and also hopes that this will in? uence others organically through sharing links with their social networks (Corcoran, 2009). However, recent research by Bakshy et al. 2011) has emphasized that this kind of organic sharing is far rarer than previously supposed, and that there are very few examples of a commercial message being consistently transmitted across social networks. Further, Tucker (2011a) shows that in order to achieve virality, an advertiser may have to sacri? ce the commercial e? ectiveness of their message. This means that advertisers may need to use paid advertising to facilitate the sharing of their commercial message through social networks. Both Facebook and LinkedIn have recently introduced a new form of advertising called ‘social advertising. A social ad is an online ad that ‘incorporates user interactions that the consumer has agreed to display and be shared. The resulting ad displays these interactions along with the use r’s persona (picture and/or name) within the ad content’ (IAB, 2009). This represents a radical technological development for advertisers, because it means that potentially they can co-opt the power of an individual’s social network to target advertising and engage their audience. This paper asks whether social advertising is e? ective, and what active steps advertisers themselves should take in their ads to promote social in? ence. 2 Electronic copy available at: http://ssrn. com/abstract=1975897 We explore the e? ectiveness of social ads using data from a ? eld experiment conducted on Facebook by a non-pro? t. This ? eld experiment compared the performance of social ads with conventionally targeted and untargeted ads. The social ads were targeted to the friends of ‘fans’ of the charity on Facebook. The ads featured that fan’s name and the fact that they had become a fan of this charity. We ? nd that on average these social ads were more e? ective than demographically targeted or untargeted ads. We will write a custom essay sample on Key Success Factors for Online Advertising specifically for you for only $16.38 $13.9/page Order now We will write a custom essay sample on Key Success Factors for Online Advertising specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer We will write a custom essay sample on Key Success Factors for Online Advertising specifically for you FOR ONLY $16.38 $13.9/page Hire Writer Further, this technique is useful for improving both the performance of demographically targeted and untargeted campaigns. Comparing the performance of these ads that contained the name of the fan and were targeted towards the fan’s friends with those that were simply targeted to that fan’s friends suggests that their e? ectiveness stems predominantly from the ability of social targeting to uncover similarly responsive consumers. We present results that suggest that as well as being more e? ective at gathering clicks, social advertising is also more e? ective at promoting actual subscriptions to the newsfeed and is more cost-e? ctive. We then turn to investigate how advertisers should word their social advertising. Through randomized ? eld tests, we investigate the e? ectiveness of advertisers deliberately promoting social in? uence in their advertising copy through including a statement that encourages the viewer to, for example, ‘be like their friend. ’ W e ? nd that consumers reject attempts by advertisers to explicitly harness or refer to a friend’s actions in their ad copy. This result contrasts with previous empirical research that ? nds consistent bene? ts to ? rms from highlighting previous consumer actions to positively in? ence the consumers’ response (Algesheimer et al. , 2010; Tucker and Zhang, 2011). This rejection is reasonably uniform across di? erent wording, though slightly less severe for ads that make a less explicit reference to friendship. We then present additional evidence to rule out two potential explanations for our ? ndings. First, we rule out that the overt mention of social in? uence simply made people aware they were seeing an ad rather than something organic to the site. We do this by comparing an ad that states it is an ad with an ad that does not, and ? nding no di? rence. 3 Second, to investigate whether it was simply bad advertising copy, we examined how the ads perform for a group of Fa cebook users who have shown a visible propensity for social in? uence. We identify such users by whether or not they have a stated attachment to a ‘Fashion Brand’ on their Facebook pro? le. These users, in contrast to our earlier results, react more positively to the advertiser explicitly co-opting social in? uence than to a message that did not. This suggests that it was not simply that the message was badly communicated, but instead re? cts a taste (or more accurately distaste) for explicit references to social in? uence among most, though not all, consumers. This research builds on a literature that has studied the interplay between social networks and word of mouth. Zubcsek and Sarvary (2011) present a theoretical model that examines the e? ects of advertising to a social network, but assume that a ? rm cannot directly use the social network for marketing purposes. Instead, ? rms have to rely on consumers to organically pass their advertising message within the soci al networks. There has been little work on advertising in social networks. Previous studies in marketing about social network sites have questioned how such sites can use advertising to obtain members (Trusov et al. , 2009), and also how makers of applications designed to be used on social network sites can best advertise their products (Aral and Walker, 2011) through viral marketing. Hill et al. (2006) show that phone communications data can be used to predict who is more likely to adopt a service, Bagherjeiran et al. (2010) present a practical application where they use data from instant messaging logs at Yahoo! to improve online advertising targeting, and similarly Provost et al. 2009) show how to use browsing data to match groups of users who are socially similar. Tucker (2011b) explores how privacy controls mediate the e? ectiveness of advertising on Facebook. However, to our knowledge this is the ? rst academic study of the e? ectiveness of social advertising. Managerially, our results have important implications. Social advertising and the use of onl ine social networks is e? ective. However, when advertisers attempt to reinforce this social 4 in? uence in ad copy, consumers appear less likely to respond positively to the ad. This is, to our knowledge, the ? st piece of empirical support for emerging managerial theories that emphasize the need for ? rms to not appear too obviously commercial when exploiting social media (Gossieaux and Moran, 2010). 5 2 Field Experiment The ? eld experiment was run by a small non-pro? t that provides educational scholarships for girls to attend high school in East Africa. Without the intervention of this non-pro? t, and other non-pro? ts like them, girls do not attend secondary school because their families prioritize the education of sons. Though the non-pro? t’s main mission is funding these educational scholarships, the non-pro? has a secondary mission which is to inform young people in the US about the state of education for African girls. It was in aid of this secondary mission that t he non-pro? t set up a Facebook page. This page serves as a repository of interviews with girls where they describe the challenges they have faced. To launch the ? eld experiment, the non-pro? t followed the procedure described in ‘A/B Testing your Facebook Ads: Getting better results through experimentation’ (Facebook, 2010) which involved setting up multiple competing campaigns. These ad campaigns was targeted to three di? erent groups as shown in Table 1. The ? st group was a broad untargeted campaign for all Facebook users aged 18 and older in the US. The second group were people who had already expressed interest in other charities. These people were identi? ed using Facebook’s ‘broad category targeting’ of ‘Charity + Causes. ’ The third group were people who had already expressed an interest in ‘Education + Teaching. ’ Previously, the charity had tried such reasonably broad targeting with little success and was hopeful that social advertising would improve the ads’ performance (Tucker, 2011b). In all cases, the charity explicitly excluded current fans from seeing its ads. For each of these groups of Facebook users, the non-pro? t launched a socially targeted variant. These ads employed the Facebook ad option that meant that they were targeted only to users who were friends of existing fans of the charity. This also meant that when the fan had not opted-out on Facebook, the ad also displayed a ‘social endorsement’ where the name of the friend was shown at the bottom of the ad as shown in Figure 1. 6 Table 1: Di? erent Groups Targeted Condition Untargeted Baseline: Only Shown Baseline text All people in US over age of 18 who are not fans of the non-pro? t already. All people in US over age of 18 who state a? nity with charities on their Facebook pro? le who are not fans of the non-pro? t already. All people in US over age of 18 who state a? nity with education on their Facebook pro? le who are not fans of the non-pro? t already. Social Variant: Shown all 5 texts from Table 2 All people in US over age of 18 who are friends of the non-pro? t’s supporters who are not fans of the non-pro? t already. All people in US over age of 18 who state a? nity with charities on their Facebook pro? le who are friends of the non-pro? t’s supporters who are not fans of the nonpro? already. All people in US over age of 18 who state a? nity with education on their Facebook pro? le who are friends of the non-pro? t’s supporters who are not fans of the nonpro? t already. Charity Education The non-pro? t varied whether the campaign was demographically targeted and whether the campaign was socially targeted, and also explored di? erent ad-text con ditions. Table 2 describes the di? erent ad-copy for each condition. Each di? erent type of ad-copy was accompanied by the same picture of an appealing secondary-school student who had bene? ted from their program. The socially targeted ads displayed all ? ve variants of the advertising message depicted in Table 2. For each of the non-socially-targeted campaigns, we ran the baseline variant of the ad text which, as shown in Table 2, simply says ‘Help girls in East Africa change their lives through education. ’ The non-pro? t could not run the other four conditions that refer to others’ actions, because federal regulations require ads to be truthful and they did not want to mislead potential supporters. The di? erent ad conditions were broadly designed to cover the kinds of normative and informational social in? ence described by Deutsch and Gerard (1955); Burnkrant and Cousineau (1975). 1 We want to be clear that we do not argue that these advertising measures 1 Other forms of social in? uence studied in the literature involve network externalities where there is a performance bene? t to multiple people adopting (Tucker, 2008). However, that does not seem to be relevant 7 Ta ble 2: Di? erent Ad-Text Conditions Condition Baseline Be like your friend Ad-Text Help girls in East Africa change their lives through education. Be like your friend. Help girls in East Africa change their lives through education. Don’t be left out. Help girls in East Africa change their lives through education. Your friend knows this is a good cause. Help girls in East Africa change their lives through education. Learn from your friend. Help girls in East Africa change their lives through education. Don’t be left out. Your friend knows Learn from your friend. capture all types of social in? uence or are necessarily successful at distinguishing between the di? erent types of social in? uence that are possible. The literature on social in? ence has emphasized that the underlying mechanism is nuanced and complex. Obviously, di? erent types of social in? uence relate and interact in ways that cannot be teased apart simply with di? erent wording. However, the variation in messages does allow us to study whether explicit advertising messages that attempt to use di? erent types of wording to evoke social in? uence are e? ective in general. Figure 1: Sample Ad Figure 1 displays an anonymized sample ad for a social ad in the ‘be like your friend’ condition. The blacked-out top of the ad contained the non-pro? t’s name. The grayedhere. out bottom of the ad contained a supporter’s name, who had ‘liked’ the charity and was a Facebook friend of the person who was being advertised to. It is only with developments in technology and the development of automated algorithms that such individualized display of the friend’s name when pertinent is possible. Table 3 describes the demographics of the roughly 1,500 fans at the beginning of the campaign. Though the initial fans were reasonably spread out across di? erent age cohorts, they were more female than the average population, which makes sense given the nature of the charity. At the end of the experiment, the fans were slightly more likely to be male than before. The way that Facebook reports data means that we have access to the demographics only of the fans of the charity, not of those who were advertised to. Table 3: Demographics of the non-pro? t’s fans before and after the ? eld experiment Age 18-24 25-34 35-44 45-54 55+ Total Before Male 5 5 6 3 3 22 Experiment After Experiment Female Male Female 13 8 14 14 6 14 17 6 16 13 3 13 10 4 10 67 27 67 The ‘Total’ row does not add up to 100% because fans who are below 18 years of age are omitted. 9 3 Data The data that Facebook shares with advertisers is both anonymous and aggregate. This means that we cannot trace the e? ects of social advertising on the friends of any one individual. It also means that we cannot examine heterogeneity in the degrees of in? uence across individuals, as is studied, for example, by Godes and Mayzlin (2009) in their study of o? ine ? rm-sponsored communications. However, given that the central research question of the study is whether, on average, di? erent types of social advertising are more e? ective, the aggregate nature of the data is su? cient. Table 4 reports daily summary statistics for the campaigns in our data. Over a 5-week period, there were 630 observations. There were 18 campaigns in total that consisted of a) The three baseline conditions that were demographically targeted to everyone, charity-lovers and education-supporters and used the baseline text, and b) The ? fteen social ad conditions that had all the ? ve di? erent types of text, and socially targeted separately to everyone, charity-lovers and education-supporters. Table A2 in the appendix provides a summary of these campaigns. Table 4: Summary Statistics Mean Std Dev Min Max Average Impressions 13815. 13898. 6 1 98037 Average Clicks 5. 06 5. 17 0 37 Connections 2. 70 3. 52 0 24 Unique Clicks 5. 04 5. 14 0 36 Daily Click Rate 0. 11 0. 10 0 1. 27 Impression Click Rate 0. 045 0. 047 0 0. 50 Cost Per Click (USD) 0. 98 0. 40 0. 31 3. 90 Cost Per 1000 views (USD) 0. 52 1. 37 0 24. 5 Ad-Reach 6165. 7 6185. 0 1 60981 Frequency 2. 32 0. 82 1 9. 70 18 ad variants at the daily level for 5 weeks (630 observations) There are two click-through rates reported in Table 4. The ? rst click-through rate is the proportion of people who clicked on an ad that day. The denominator here is the 10 Ad-Reach measure that captures the number of people exposed to an ad each day. The second click-through rate is per ad impression. We focus on the former in our econometric analysis, because impressions can be a function of person refreshing their page or using the back button on the browser or other actions which do not necessarily lead to increased exposure to the ad. We show robustness subsequently to using this click-through rate per impression measure. Due to the relatively small number of clicks, these click through rates are expressed as percentage points or sometimes as fractions of a percentage point. In our regression analysis we also use this scaling in order to make our coe? cients more easily readable. 2 The data also contains an alternative means of measuring advertising success. The connection rate measures the number of people who liked a Facebook page within 24 hours of seeing a sponsored ad, where the denominator is the ad’s reach that day. We compare this measure to clicks in subsequent analysis to check that the click-through rate is capturing something meaningful. We also use the cost data about how much the advertiser paid for each of these ads in a robustness check. The data reassuringly suggests that there were only ? ve occasions where someone clicked twice on the ads. Therefore, 99. 8% of the click-through rate we measure captures a single individual clicking on the ad. 2 11 Figure 2: Social advertising is e? ective 4 4. 1 Results Does Social Advertising Work? First, we present some simple evidence about whether social advertising is more e? ective than regular display advertising. Figure 2 displays the basic comparison of aggregate (that is, across the whole ? ve-week period) click-through rates between non-socially-targeted ads and ads that were socially targeted. Since these are aggregate click-through rates they di? er from the daily click-through rates reported in Table 4. These are expressed as fractions of a percentage point. It is clear that social advertising earned far larger click-through rates. The di? erence between the two bars is quite striking. To check the robustness and statistical signi? cance of this relationship, we turn to econometrics. The econometric analysis is relatively straightforward because of the randomization induced by the ? eld tests. We model the click-through rate of campaign j on day t targeted to demographic group k as: 2 ClickRatejt = ? SocialT argeting Endorsementj + ? k + ? t + j (1) SocialT argeting Endorsementj is an indicator for whether or not this campaign variance was socially targeted and displayed the endorsement. Since Facebook does not allow the testing of these di? erent features separately, this is a combined (rather than separable) indicator. ?k is a ? xed e? ect that captures whether this wa s the untargeted variant of the ad. This controls for underlying systematic di? erences in how likely people within that target and untargeted segment were to respond to this charity. We include a vector of date dummies ? t . Because the ads are randomized, ? t and ? k should primarily improve e? ciency. We estimate the speci? cation using ordinary least squares. Though we recognize that theoretically a click-through rate is bounded at one hundred since it is measured in percentage points, click-through rates in our data are never close to this upper bound or lower bound. 3 Table 5 reports our initial results. Column (1) presents results for the simple speci? cation implied by equation (1) but without the date and demographic controls. The point estimates suggest that social targeting and a friend’s endorsement increased the average daily clickthrough rate by around half. Column (2) repeats the analysis with the controls for date. It suggests that after controlling for date, the result holds. This is reassuring and suggests that any unevenness in how ads were served across days does not drive our results. It also suggests that our result is not an artifact of a failure of randomization. Column (3) adds an extra coe? cient that indicates whether that campaign was untargeted rather than being targeted to one of the customer groups identi? d as being likely ‘targets’ by the non-pro? t We also tried alternative speci? cations where we use the unbounded clicks measure (rather than a rate) as the dependent variable and show that our results are robust to such a speci? cation in Table A1, in the appendix. 3 13 Educational and Charity supporters. It suggests that indeed, as expected, an untargeted camp aign was weakly ine? ective, though the estimate is not signi? cant at conventional levels. We speculate that the apparent weakness of demographic targeting may be because target markets of charity and educational supporters is reasonably broad, and consequently may have ontained many individuals who would not support an international charity. An obvious question is what explains the success of social advertising. One explanation is that the endorsement of a friend is informative. Another explanation is that social targeting uncovers people who will be more likely to be interested in their charity as they are similar, in unobserved ways, to their friends who are already fans of the charity. Manski (1993) pointed out that this particular issue of distinguishing homophily (unobserved characteristics that make friends behave in a similar way) from the explicit in? ence of friends on each other is empirically problematic. Ideally, to address this we would simply randomize whether users saw the endorsement or not. However, Facebook’s advertiser interface does not allow that. What we can do is take advantage of the fact that sometimes ads are shown to people without the endorsement if that fan has selected a privacy setting which restricts the use of their image and name. The interface which users use to do this is displayed in Figure A1; all users do is simply select the ‘No One’ rather than the ‘Only my friends’ option. Of course, this will not represent perfect randomization. It is likely that the fans who select stricter privacy settings di? er in unobserved ways from those who do not, and that therefore their social networks may di? er as well. However, despite this potential for bias, this does represent a useful opportunity to try to disentangle the power of social targeting to enable homophily and the power of personal endorsements. Column (4) displays the results of a speci? cation for equation (1) where the dependent variable is the conversion rate for these socially targeted but not socially endorsed ads. Here for ads that were being shown to friends, the click-through rate was only calculated for occasions when the endorsement was not shown. A comparison of Column 14 (3) and Column (4) in Table 5 makes it clear the ads that were displayed to friends of fans but lacked a clear endorsement were less e? ective than those that had a clear endorsement. However, they were still measurably more e? ective than non-socially-targeted ads. It appears that, roughly, the endorsement accounted for less than half of the persuasive e? ect and the ability to use social networks to target the ad accounted for slightly more than half of such ads’ e? acy. Columns (5) and (6) of Table 5 estimate the speci? cation separately by whether the campaign was targeted or untargeted. Though the point estimate for the targeted campaigns is higher, it is notable that social advertising improved the performance of both targeted and untargeted campaigns. Given the widely reported lack of e? cacy of untargeted campaigns (Reiley and Lewis, 2009), the increase in e? ectiveness allowed by social advertising appears large for untargeted campaigns. 15 Table 5: Social Targeting and Endorsement is E? ective (4) No Endorsement Click Rate SocialTargeting Endorsement All (1) Click Rate 0. 0386 (0. 0123) (2) Click Rate 0. 0385 (0. 0108) 0. 0287 (0. 0143) -0. 000275 (0. 0122) 0. 0794 (0. 0116) 0. 0132 (0. 0166) (3) Click Rate 0. 0386 (0. 0125) Untargeted (5) Click Rate 0. 0297 (0. 00755) Targeted (6) Click Rate 0. 0376 (0. 00927) SocialTargeting Untargeted Constant 16 Date Controls No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Observations 630 630 630 630 210 420 Log-Likelihood 542. 1 610. 3 610. 3 427. 8 187. 7 452. 3 R-Squared 0. 0221 0. 212 0. 212 0. 119 0. 317 0. 228 OLS Estimates. Dependent variable is the percentage point of people who click on the ad. Dependent variable in Columns (4) for social ads is the percentage point daily click-through rate of ads that did not display the endorsement. Robust standard errors. * p 0. 10, ** p 0. 05, *** p 0. 01 4. 2 Robustness Table 6 checks the robustness of the ? nding that social targeting and endorsement are effective, to di? erent de? nitions of the dependent variable. Column (1) reports the results of using a dependent measure which is the percentage click-through per impression. Again, we ? nd that social advertising is more e? ective, though the e? ectiveness is less pronounced and less precisely estimated than before. This suggests that the appeal of social advertising is not necessarily enhanced by multiple exposure. It could also, of course, merely re? ect noise introduced into the process by someone refreshing their browser multiple times. The results so far suggest that consumer privacy concerns or the intrusiveness of such ads do not seem to outweigh the appeal of social advertising for consumers. 4 There is always the possibility of course that people clicked on the ads because they were annoyed or wanted to understand more the extent of privacy intrusion rather than because the ads were actually e? ective. To explore this, we estimate a speci? cation where the dependent measure was the proportion of clicks that became subscribers of the newsfeed. The results are reported in Column (2). We see that again social advertising appears to be more e? ective at encouraging Facebook users to take the intended action as well as simply clicking. This is evidence that people are not clicking on social ads due to annoyance at their intrusiveness but instead are clicking on them and taking the action the ads intend to encourage them to take. Untargeted ads are less likely to lead to conversions than those targeted at appropriate demographics. This makes sense these people are being targeted precisely because they are the kind of people who have signed up for such news feeds in the past. A ? nal question is whether ads that are socially targeted and display endorsements are more expensive for advertisers, thereby wiping out their relative e? ectiveness in terms of return on advertising investment. We explore this in Column (3) of Table 6. There are This may be because Facebook users ? nd it reassuring that these ads, though narrowly targeted, are not overly visually intrusive (Goldfarb and Tucker, 2011). 4 17 everal missing observations where there were no clicks that day and consequently there was no price recorded. In Column (3), we report the results of a speci? cation where our explanatory variables is the relative price per click. The results suggest that advertisers pay less for these clicks that are socially targeted. This suggests that Facebook is not charging a premium for this kind of advertising. Though Faceboo k shrouds in secrecy the precise pricing and auction mechanism underlying their advertising pricing, this result would be consistent with a mechanism whereby advertisers pay less for clicks if they have higher clickthrough rates. In other words, prices paid bene? t from an improved ‘quality-score’ (Athey and Nekipelov, 2011). The results also suggest that advertisers pay less for demographically untargeted clicks which is in line with previous studies such as Beales (2010). Table 6: Social Advertising is E? ective: Checking robustness to di? erent dependent variables SocialTargeting Endorsement (1) Click Rate (Multiple) 0. 0108 (0. 00501) 0. 00526 (0. 00582) Yes 630 1086. 5 0. 150 (2) Clicks to Connections Rate 0. 433 (0. 0997) -0. 321 (0. 0768) Yes 554 -467. 5 0. 163 (3) Cost Per Click (USD) -0. 95 (0. 0480) -0. 177 (0. 0520) Yes 559 -129. 0 0. 426 Untargeted Date Controls Observations Log-Likelihood R-Squared OLS Estimates. Dependent variable is the click-through rate (expressed as a fraction of a percentage point) for impressions in Column (1). Dependent variable in Column (2) is the clicks to conversions rate. Dependent variable in Column (3) is cost per click. Robust standard errors. * p 0. 10, ** p 0. 05, *** p 0. 01 4. 3 What Kind of Social Advertising Messages Work? We then go on to explore what kind of advertising message works in social ads. We distinguish between ads that rely simply on the Facebook algorithm to promote social in? uence by featuring the automated endorsement at the bottom of their ad, and ads that explicitly refer to this endorsement in their ad copy. 18 Table 7: Social Advertising is Less E? ective if an Advertiser is Too Explicit (3) No Endorsement Click Rate SocialTargeting Endorsement All (1) Click Rate 0. 0577 (0. 0139) (2) Click Rate 0. 0571 (0. 0113) 0. 0333 (0. 0168) -0. 0287 (0. 00886) -0. 000463 (0. 0122) -0. 0136 (0. 0115) -0. 0189? (0. 01000) -0. 0378 (0. 0115) -0. 0429 (0. 0144) -0. 101 (0. 0124) Yes 630 615. 4 0. 225 Yes 630 618. 1 0. 232 Yes 630 429. 5 0. 124 Yes 210 189. 6 0. 329 Yes 420 461. 0 0. 260 -0. 000281 (0. 0177) 0. 0161 (0. 0169) -0. 0303? (0. 0167) -0. 0284 (0. 0124) Untargeted (4) Click Rate 0. 0498 (0. 0245) Targeted (5) Click Rate 0. 0527 (0. 0130) SocialTargeting SocialTargeting Endorsement ? Explicit Untargeted SocialTargeting Endorsement ? Don’t be left out Social Targeting Endorsement ? Be like your friend SocialTargeting Endorsement ? Learn from your friend 19 SocialTargeting Endorsement ? Your friend knows SocialTargeting ? Explicit Date Controls Observations Log-Likelihood R-Squared OLS Estimates. Dependent variable is the percentage points of people who click on the ad. Dependent variable in Columns (3) adjusted for social ads so that is the percentage point daily click-through rate of ads that did not display the endorsement. Robust standard errors. * p 0. 10, ** p 0. 05, *** p 0. 01 We use the additional binary indicator variable Explicitj to indicate when the advertiser uses a message that evokes social in? uence explicitly in their ad copy, in addition to the social endorsement automated by the Facebook algorithm.

Four Basic Funtions of Management in Business Management free essay sample

Every organization, regardless of size, has developed and implemented its own management concepts in order for it to run smoothly and accomplish the vision, goal, and objective, the company has set forth. The basic functions of management can be broken down into four different areas, allowing the organization to handle the strategic, tactical, and operational decisions (Sanjau, 2007). The four functions of management are essential to building strong teams and stronger organization. Common to all managers, the four functions are planning, organizing, leading, and controlling (Pakhare, 2007). A good manager is able to accomplish all four functions both effectively and efficiently (Bateman Snell, 2009). At Triumph, planning is the foundation in which all management decisions regarding the company will be based upon. The management teams will utilize the planning function to assess the status of the company today, as well as in the upcoming future. Once the management team has an agreed upon plan, and the company’s mission has been established, the team must determine how the desired results will be achieved. We will write a custom essay sample on Four Basic Funtions of Management in Business Management or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page The next objective is to establish a goal and the strategies to achieve the goals set forth. After setting the goal the next step the management team will accomplish is to create a time line to complete the objective. The organizing function for the team at Triumph is to formulate the activities, which will include the accounting department, sales department and supply chain involved in helping reach the goal that has been set forth. Once all the different departments are set, it is up to the management team to departmentalize the process and create smaller groups to achieve the goals and objectives. Once the departments create their own teams a clear organizational structure is drawn and all employees are made aware of whom they are accountable too to help reach the goal of the company. Once the departmental teams are in place, the management team can help direct, communicate, motivate and assist the staff in meeting the company’s goals and objectives. At Triumph the management team will have open discussion with departmental teams to create and build positive working environment. In this process the employees feel as though they are part of the decision making and will ultimately help the company reach the desired goals and objectives. The final stage of the four functions of management is to control or establish the performance standard of the company’s objective (Bateman Snell, 2009). In this stage management keeps a close watch to make sure that all teams are on track to complete the goals and objectives that have been set forth and within the timeline. If at this point, it appears that one of the team’s seems to be off track then management will step in and help guide or make any necessary changes. The managers at Triumph know that ignoring any of the four functions can result in the failure of the company. Without using the planning stage first to make sure that all objectives are met and then organizing the plan and leading or motivating the team will result in not obtaining the objective or goal of the company. Managers at Triumph know that the final stage of creating an effective and productive team, one must control the budget, departments and cost efficiency of the work implemented to achieve the objectives. According to Barnes (2008), â€Å"if one can master the four management functions of planning, organizing, leading, and coordinating of resources, their opportunities are endless†

The Skeleton Crew essays

The Skeleton Crew essays 1.A huge storm hits the town where David is staying w/ his wife and son. 3. David and his neighbor start cleaning up outside. 4. They decide to go to the grocery store w/ Billy, his son, to get some lunch food. 5. Once they get there, a man comes in and warns everyone about the fog. 6. David gets a bad feeling and decides not to leave the store. 7. People start clearing out of the store. 8. Mrs. Carmody starts preaching to the grocery store about a terrible Armageddon. 9.The mist comes up and surrounds the grocery store and everything else. 10. The people sort of set up camp in the grocery store. 11.David goes into the backroom and hears gurgling noises from outside. 12. One of the stores checkout boys opens the storage doors a little. 13. A huge tentacle grabs him by the leg. 15. The men try to tell the other people, but they dont believe it. 16.Mrs. Carmody has now gathered some people together who all believe in the Armageddon. 17. David, Ollie, and several others decide to make investigations around the supermarket area. 18. During the day they go to the pharmacy, and huge spiders with acid webs chase after them. 19. They discover the only way to get away from the Mist Creatures are by not letting them smell you. 20. They decide to make a break for it. 21. Mrs. Carmody makes a big fuss and tries to stop them, so Ollie shoots her dead. 22. They get into Davids Scout and start driving south. 23. The mist is everywhere, so they stop at a gas station. 24. Youre left hanging at the end. No real ending to the story. 25. David tells the reader that all he has left is hope. c.) Situation- an interesting situation is when David goes to the back storage room due to a strong smell. When he gets back ...

Business Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 25

Business - Essay Example The employees working in the campus has the facility that they can have free food any time they want, they can give their clothes for dry cleaning and can use the gym in order to maintain their health (Emerson, 2012). The employees have the facility that they can work on their own idea in the 20% of the time that is allocated for them to become innovative and do whatever they want so that they can expand as well. Google allows the employees to take leave for a year or two without being paid, but this way they can try to launch their own idea (Emerson, 2012). The company gives all the employees special attention and apart of basic benefits, some other benefits are also given to the employees that are on-site medical facility, Japanese washrooms, swimming pools, conference bike, free haircut, ball pits etc (Emerson, 2012) . Emerson, R. (2012, January 31). Googles Best Benefits: The Top 7 Perks Google Offers Employees. Retrieved June 30, 2012, from http://www.huffingtonpost.com:

Evaluate methods of managing and developing human resources Essay

Evaluate methods of managing and developing human resources - Essay Example herent of its human resources who are usually motivated and encouraged to commit to the workforce and in this way they feel the organization is valuing them therefore; they play an important role in the organization. For an organization to succeed, it is important that it motivates its employees and have a high-level job involvement. An organization is able to experience increased productivity if it motivates its employees and makes them enjoy their work. Workers who have the ability and desired skills for performing a certain job have the great chance of increasing the company’s productivity. Therefore, companies that recognize the efforts of its workers are able to encourage its employees to meet and even exceed the expected productivity. One of the strategies that companies use to improve its productivity is developing its employees using several development programs such as education and training. During employee development, the manager can set various development goals for employees because the goals and training will enable the worker to reach his career aspirations. Moreover, companies that have invested in their employees through recruitment and training, they usually lose when the employees leaves and joins other companies. Therefore, it is important for companies to try and retain their workers and make them loyal in order to help it in achieving goals by reducing the costs incurred when recruiting new employees. Loyalty can be enhanced by offering recognition of the superior performance, and this will enhance satisfaction inside the workers’ mind. Induction is also used as a training method because it enables a newly recruited employee to catch up and become reproductive quickly. Induction is importa nt because it prevents the organisation from costly mistakes that may be caused by the recruit. In addition, most managers use employee motivation and involvement to enhance their motivation at the workplace1. A motivated worker will show up at the

Understanding Today's Generation Research Paper

Understanding Today's Generation - Research Paper Example Although there are a range of factors that contribute to this divergence which has been noted, it cannot and should not be ignored that one of the fundamental aspects motivating this divergence and change is with respect to several of the most dominant generations that defined the 20th century. Accordingly, it is necessary to examine and understand the Baby Boom Generation (1946 to 1964) and Generation X (1965 to 1983). As a means of realizing the unique dynamics that existed within these generations and the continued impact upon the way in which development is realized, it will further be necessary to draw a level of prediction with regards to the generation of the Millenials (1984 to 2002). Firstly, with regards to the Baby Boom Generation, one of the most prevalent differentials that exist is with relation to the role that minorities and women play within society as well as the extent to which technology pervades, and the way in which individuals communicate and identify with one another. Interestingly, the interview that was performed helped to highlight this very differential with regards to the way in which technology was seen as one of the most important differentials separating the Baby Boom Generation from that of Generation X, and the Millenials (Martacchio 395). However, what cannot be said is that from the interview that was conducted the individual respondent was of the view that either Generation X or the Millenial generation were â€Å"worse† than her own. This is an interesting concept to integrate with due to the fact that pervasive societal knowledge and impressions from the media oftentimes integrate a belief that current society is declining and far worse with respect to overall morality and ethics than the ones which it been evidence previously. However, as stated, neither the research which was performed to inform this particular essay nor the interview led credence to this particular point of view. Said the interviewee with regards to the negative role of technology within current generations and society, â€Å"People do not have real face time with each other to communicate verbal or non-verbally† (Holmes 2). In this way, the reader can see that the most important piece of information which was related was with respect to the way in which technology and technological advancement have weakened human communication within current generations. Interestingly, Generation X stands in stark contrast to many of the more rigid and conservative mores and norms that the Baby Boom generation exhibited. Ultimately, before delving too deeply into Generation X and/or seeking to understand prime motivators and reasons for behavioral actions, it must be understood that this was the first generation that grew up in an era that was not defined by the Second World War. Rather, this was a generation of political action, protests, civil rights, and the Vietnam War. In this way, the reader can and should realize the Generati on X takes many of the positive features from the Baby Boom Generation as well as many of the positive features from the Millenials. This is due to the fact that, according to the research which has been read to direct this analysis, Generation X traditionally has a work ethic that is on par if not above that of the Baby Boomer generation. Yet a further interesting dynamic exists within this particular generation due to the fact that it was the first generation that was able to integrate directly with the growing technological revolution which took place (Shoch 26). Whereas the Baby Boom Generation was necessitated to create the technological revolution and seek to integrate life within it, Generation X was able to grow up in a world that

The Space Race: Is Funding for NASA Still Relevant?

The Space Race: Is Funding for NASA Still Relevant? Abstract Since its inception in 1958, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), has spent a total $1.3 trillion dollars adjusted for inflation. This paper examines the debate between two opposing views on funding for NASA. The debate is broken down into two groups, pro-funding and anti-funding. The arguments between both sides, while very similar, are opposite in their views. The pro-funding side is in the opinion that, positive economic impact, international relations, and planning for the future call for increased funding. Those anti-funding argue that funding NASA impedes the economy, there is little to no return on investment, and that the United States should be focused on the present, rather than the future. This paper examines both sides of the argument, weighs each of the opinions, and examines how the relationship of this issue is pertains to the field of Public Administration. The author states his view and gives his recommendations on the issue. Keywords: NASA, public funding, public administration, national debt Ten years after the start of the Cold War, the U.S.SR launched the first artificial Earth Satellite into space. In response to tensions with the former Soviet Union, the United States National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, or NACA, launched its first satellite into space, kick starting what is known as The Space Race. A few months later, NACA was dissolved and superseded into NASA, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Since its founding in July of 1958, NASA has averaged roughly 0.9% (Rawden, 2017) of the annual United States Federal budget. However, since the 1990s, that average has seen a significant decrease. In February of 2016, 58 years since NASA was founded, Congress surpassed NASAs requested budget of $18.5 billion and approved $19.3 billion (AG, 2016) to fund NASA. With the House and Senate both approving a Federal Budget of $3.9 trillion (Congressional Budget Office, 2017), NASAs current budget only equates to 0.49% of the overall budget. However, with C ongress surpassing the NASAs requested budget, this marks the first time in five years they have seen a substantial budget increase. With budget forecasts by the Congressional Budget Office (2016) putting the nation at a debt of $20.1 trillion by 2018, this leaves public administrators to question whether this budget increase and NASA itself is worth the money. As Public Administrators, we can see that the debate over the funding of NASA is broken down into two opposing viewpoints. Those in favor are compelled by several factors, such as, public admiration for NASA, strengthening international relations, and planning for the future. While those opposed argue that funding NASA impedes the economy, there is little to no return on investment, and that the United States should focus on the present, rather than the future. No matter what side you are on, we can see that the debate over the funding of NASA is important to the field of Public Administration. This paper examines both sides of the debate over the funding NASA and how public administrators can use this debate as a case study for future problems. Viewpoint #1: Those in Favor A 2015 PEW Research survey shows that 68% of Americans had a favorable view of NASA (Motel, 2015), with those of higher education having more favorability. The survey also cites a different PEW survey conducted in 2011 that found 58% of the public said it was essential that the U.S. continue to be a world leader in space exploration. These studies confirm that the public has great admiration toward NASA, but there is a need to justify the high price tag of space exploration. This justification can be argued with several factors: Inventions and Technology, International Relations, and Future Planning. Inventions and Technology After a Korean airliner accidentally strayed into Soviet airspace in 1983, and was subsequently shot down, then President Ronald Regan declassified the use of Global Positioning System (Brustein, 2014). This 20-year-old technology was developed during joint experiments between the Navy and NASA using NASAs advancements in satellites and technology. GPS is today one of the most widely used inventions that NASA helped create. However, there are also a wide range of inventions and technology that funding of NASAs research and development helped to create. In NASAs magazine Spinoff (NASA, 2008), they credit themselves with several medical inventions, including artificial limbs improvements, thanks to innovations in robotics and shock-absorbing materials. When NASA needed a stronger material for their landing parachutes, Goodyear developed a new fibrous material that is five times stronger than steel. Goodyear then used this technology in their tires to create the longer-lasting tires we have today. NASA also created Solar Energy technology, which sparked the clean-energy movement. While it is hard to quantify NASAs return on investment, the countless advances they have made on inventions and technology have helped shape our world and boost our economy. International Relations While NASA is the highest spending space agency in the world, there are many other countries that work with the United States to continue space exploration. While the U.S. was the only country to land on the moon, future explorations require international cooperation. In 2006 NASA and China reached an agreement promising that both countries would strengthen exchanges, enhance mutual trust, develop a lasting friendship, and promote cooperation in relevant fields (Foley, 2014). This policy is necessary to continue the economic prosperity and relationship between the two countries. NASA also collaborates with 15 other countries to maintain and expand the International Space Station. This partnership strengthens relationships and encourages trade agreements. In turn, the trade agreements help boost our economy and strengthen NASAs case for a high return on investment. Future Planning Proponents of continuing to fund NASA usually break down Future Planning into two parts: Population Growth and Earth Security. The population is undoubtedly growing exponentially. The UN estimates the world population will reach 9.7 billion people by 2050 (UN, 2015). This growth raises the question of earth sustainability. The world will eventually run out of resources and room to house and feed its people. Many people believe that the solution is in space exploration. With NASA currently planning expeditions to Mars, a planet with possible habitation aspects, there is a strong belief that humans can become an interplanetary species. This belief is only possible if we continue funding NASA, and being the leader in space exploration. Earth Security is another part of NASAs responsibilities. NASA not only monitors the weather, but asteroid and nautical sea patterns. Defunding our space program could potentially be disastrous if NASA could no longer take preventative steps to combat cli mate change. View Point #2: Those Against While there is no doubt there is a great love for NASA, defunding the space program would be beneficial for our economy. PEW Research conducted a study in 2014 finding that although a majority of people were in favor of space exploration, only 22% of people said that the U.S. spends too little on space exploration (Wormald, 2014). This leaves opponents questioning as to why the U.S. spends billions of dollars each year to fund NASA. Those arguing for defunding the space program have three main reasons: NASA impedes the economy, there is little to no return on investment, and that the United States should focus on the present, rather than the future. Impeding the Economy With a forecasted debt of $20.1 trillion by 2018, many politicians are trying to find ways to reduce our spending. While only 0.5% of the national budget, $19.1 billion dollars is no small amount of money. Adjusted for inflation, NASA has accounted for $1.1 trillion in expenditures since its founding in 1958 (Rawden, 2017). Since the introduction of the new fleet of space shuttles in 1971, each launch carries a price tag of around $1.5 billion per flight. Companies such as SpaceX have been awarded contracts totaling $1.6 billion for 6 flights to the ISS. It is no wonder NASA has started to turn towards private companies to send supplies and expeditions into space, when private companies can accomplish the goals at a smaller price. In 2014, NASA announced that U.S. companies SpaceX and Boeing were awarded $6.4 billion for future space flights. All this money could have been allocated toward paying back debts and protecting the financial future of the United States. Return on Investment In the opposing view, I stated that it would be hard to quantify NASAs Return on Investment. This lack of calculation gives cause to those opposed to funding the space program. While NASA is credited with countless inventions, but the price tag for inventing them is hard to justify. A 2011 PEW Research study shows that only 38% of people think the space program contributes to a lot to scientific advancements, and that 52% of people believe that human astronauts are non-essential to the program (Kennedy, 2015). These statistics can be viewed as a misallocation of NASA funding. If there has not been a significant invention since NASA published its 2008 list of technologies that benefit our lives and its last crowning achievement, sending Pathfinder to mars, costing $265 million, NASA has not truly justified its recent return on investment. Prioritizing the Present As NASA continues to look to the future, opponents say we should focus on the present. With a large National Debt, the United States needs to prioritizing its current finances so it can continue to have a future. While the earth is made up of a finite amount of resources, it is unlikely that they will run out before we can fix our economy. The sun is not estimated to begin to die for another 5 billion years (Scudder, 2015), and only 3% of the earth supports more than half of humanity (Nuwer, 2015). In other words, the world is not ending anytime in the foreseeable future, and we are not going to run out of room on earth. Instead of worrying about the future, the U.S. needs to prioritize on the present. NASA needs to look at all their assets, and begin to look at what it can liquidize. The space shuttle program alone is valued at nearly $200 billion (Hsu, 2011).ÂÂ   If the U.S. defunded NASA and worked toward privatizing the program and selling its assets, the U.S. could be benef icial toward reducing the U.S. debt. The Military and Department of Defense need to absorb most of NASA while privatizing and selling the rest. Afterwards, the U.S. needs to begin to cut the enormous Defense Budget, to make up most, if not all, of the deficit.ÂÂ   If the United States focuses on prioritizing the present, by takes steps to reduce its expenditures, such as reducing or eliminating NASAs budget, we can begin to see a brighter, less constrictive future. Assessing the Arguments Both sides of the debate have similar yet conflicting arguments. The pro-funding NASA side argues that NASA boosts the economy by, facilitating inventions and new technology, strengthening international relations, and planning for the future. While those against argue that funding NASA impedes the economy, there is little to no return on investment, and that the United States should focus on the present, rather than the future. Whether NASA helps to boost or impedes the economy is the biggest aspect of the debate. While the space agency can never truly be recognized for their accomplishments, it is my belief that NASA has helped the economy in the past and is no longer the innovative and economically stimulating agency it once was. Public interest in NASA is starting to dwindle as much as their budget, and it is only time before private companies, such as SpaceX start to take over. There is also no doubt that NASA has strengthened our international relationships with other space-orie nted nations. These relationships facilitate our trade agreements with one another, boosting our economy. If the U.S. were to defund NASA, it would make it hard to find a new avenue in which to continue those relationships. In the final argument, Future versus Present orientation, is the most heated side of the debate. At only 0.49% of the U.S. Budget, defunding NASA would hardly make a dent in the debt. However, the U.S. needs to start somewhere, as every little bit helps. If the U.S. were to privatize and sell NASAs assets, it would be able to make a noticeable difference on tackling the debt. Conclusion and Recommendation As Public Administrators, we should be concerned at every aspect of our national budget. I believe we should either go all in and increase funding of NASA, or privatize and sell the assets.ÂÂ   Both sides of the debate have compelling sides. If we were to increase the budget, we would continue international cooperation and trade agreements, possibly continue to see new inventions and technologies, and facilitate Americans love of space travel. However, forced to choose a side, I believe we should take the opposite route. The national debt is wildly out of control and if we do not take steps to fix our mistakes, the world could see a disastrous economic depression. By selling off some of NASAs assets to private companies and foreign countries, the U.S. would, in turn, can cash a sizable paycheck, and begin to pay off its debts. By privatizing NASA, the U.S. can also begin to turn the $19 billion funding toward the debt. If we do not begin to take action against our debt, the curr ent and future generations may see a disastrous financial future. The United States cannot continue down the current financial path it is taking, and defunding of NASA is a crucial step on the road to recovery. If the U.S. takes the route toward defunding NASA, that road can be used as a vital case study for Public Administrators. We will be faced at a time to do what is popular versus what is economically feasible. In times of economic hardship, the right path is not always the easiest. References AG: News Reviews in Astronomy Geophysics. (2016). U.S. boosts budget for NASA. Astronomy Geophysics, Vol. 57 Issue 1, p1.7 https://doiorg.spot.lib.auburn.edu/10.1093/astrogeo/atw014 Brustein, Joshua. (2014, December 4) GPS as We Know It Happened Because of Ronald Reagan. Bloomberg. Retrieved from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-12- 04/gps-as-we-know-it-happened-because-of-ronald-reagan Congressional Budget Office. (2017, February 8). The Federal Budget in 2016: An Infographic. Retrieved from https://www.cbo.gov/publication/52408 Congressional Budget Office. (2016, January 25). The Budget and Economic Outlook: 2016 to 2026. Retrieved from https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/114th-congress-2015-2016/reports/51129-2016outlook.pdf Foley, Jordan. (2014, April 16) Strategy for International Cooperation in Planning the Chinese Space Station. MIT Political Science Department Research. Retrieved from https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Delivery.cfm/SSRN_ID2425862_code1609318.pdf?abstracti d=2425862mirid=1 Hsu, Jeremy. (2011, April 11). Total Cost of NASAs Space Shuttle Program: Nearly $200 Billion. Astrobiology Magazine. Retrieved from http://www.space.com/11358-nasa- space-shuttle-program-cost-30-years.html?_ga=1.261610826.693458589.1485213070 Kennedy, Brian. (2015, July 14). 5 facts about Americans views on space exploration. Fact Tank. Retrieved from http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/07/14/5-facts-about- americans-views-on-space-exploration/ Motel, Seth. (2015, February 3) NASA Popularity Still Sky-High. Fact Tank. Retrieved from http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/02/03/nasa-popularity-still-sky-high/ NASA (2008) NASA Technologies Benefit Our Lives. Spinoff. Retrieved from https://spinoff.nasa.gov/Spinoff2008/tech_benefits.html Nuwer, Rachel (2015, September 1). Is the world running out of space? Retrieved from http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20150901-is-the-world-running-out-of-space Rawden, Zachary. (2017, February 10). NASA Budgetary Breakdown. Retrieved from https://1drv.ms/x/s!AqSRkru4qW2DlGLiBv3dpnZnmNwA Scudder, Jillian. (2015, February 13). The sun wont die for 5 billion years, so why do humans have only 1 billion years left on Earth?. The Conversation. Retrieved from https://phys.org/news/2015-02-sun-wont-die-billion-years.html UN. (2015, July 29). World population projected to reach 9.7 billion by 2050. Retrieved from http://www.un.org/en/development/desa/news/population/2015-report.html Wormald, Benjamin. (2014, April 23). Americans keen on space exploration, less so on paying for it. Fact Tank. Retrieved from http://www.pewresearch.org/fact- tank/2014/04/23/americans-keen-on-space-exploration-less-so-on-paying-for-it/

Police Use of Force Essay

Police use of force is a tool that is taught to every Officer to help diffuses a situation, it is not meant to do harm, but to ensure the safety of the Officer and the people that are involved in the situation. In some rare cases there are Officers that abuse their power and with the use of excessive use of force on individuals is an issue, Officers not thinking of what the effects it has on the victim, the alleged perpetrator or the community that it occurs in. The ethical or unethical use of force is determined by the community, society, and often a judge and jury. Today’s society there are often electrical devices that capture uses of force which are often used against Law Enforcement, these devices often capture a use of force that had gone bad like in the Rodney King case for example . The Misuse of authority like in the case against Chief Charlie Beck in the Los Angeles Police Department the outcome and concerns with a case like this. The cause and effects of Police use of force in our society and the ethical and unethical outcomes it has. Police Use of Force Use of force is the â€Å"amount of effort required by police to compel compliance by an unwilling subject.† (National Institute of Justice) Police are given this special tool to help enforce their safety and the safety of others when in a dangerous situation, they are taught this through education and training that is kept up yearly to ensure they are the best they can be at all times. The ways that an officer can use force is verbally, physical-restraint, less-lethal force, and when necessary lethal force. â€Å"Police officers should use only the amount of force necessary to control an incident, effective arrest, or protect themselves or others from harm or death.† (National Institute of Justice) Unfortunately, at times there are some police officers have felt that they are above this rule and have used excessive force in unnecessary situations. This is a problem both ethically and lawfully. One of the most famous cases where use of force was abused is the Rodney Kin g beating, this case was national news. This case was a use of force that had accrued in California with the LAPD. Their Police Chief Charlie Beck is being accused of letting officers who have used excessive force go unpunished. It is important for all law enforcement officers to only use force when absolutely necessary and all verbal commands have been expired. In today’s society there is always someone watching and often with some type of recording device recording all actions of Law Enforcement to catch them in an unfavorable situation. Violating use of force protocol is unethical because it does harm to people who do not deserve it, it’s not just the physical damage it can do but the mental as well. It would also be viewed as unethical because it is not for the greater good or overall happiness of everyone. It also appears to makes the police officer look untrustworthy and uncontrollable. This was what happen in the case for Rodney King, who had beaten by three police officers while their supervisor watched. Unfortunately Mr. King was beaten with metal batons, stomped on, and kicked as he lay on the ground defenseless. King was being arrested after sending police on a high speed car chase, that could have injured many innocent bystanders, but that does not justify the actions that were taken upon him. While the officers were trying to arrest him, Mr. King had put up a fight, resisting arrest, so the Officers, shot him twice with a stun gun, unfortunately still he resisted. When he finally rose to his feet, t his is when the beatings began. Unfortunately for the Officers but fortunately for Mr. King, all of this was caught on tape. Even though it was apparent what the Officers had done to be unethical when the case went to trial all of the officers were found innocent. This verdict caused such outrage with many people who followed the case that soon after the verdict was announced riots erupted all over Los Angeles. This is a perfect example of society losing faith in our Criminal Justice System they see the proof of what the Officers had done wrong yet they hw were not held accountable for their actions. When things like this are released it makes our justice system look sloppy, unprofessional, and most importantly unethical. It is understandable that the officers were probably upset that King had sent them on a dangerous car chase and resisted arrest; however, once he was subdued they should have put the cuffs on him, and placed him in the police car, and take him away. Instead, it looks like these officers took out their frustrations on Rodney King brought justice they felt he deserved into the street without a judge or his peers or a right to a fair trial. This would be seen as unethical because it was not for the overall happiness of everyone, it did not do any good, and the officers did not follow by the rules. They took themselves and placed themselves above what society feels to be acceptable and they broke that trust. Another ethical case involving use of force is also in Los Angeles, California. This is a recent problem involving the Chief of Police Charlie Beck. Beck is being accused of not punishing police officers who have used excessive force. â€Å"Since Beck took over as chief in late 2009, the commission has ruled on about 90 incidents involving officers who fired weapons or used other deadly force. In almost all of them, Beck concluded the officers used force appropriately and urged the commission to clear them of wrongdoing. The board followed his guidance most of the time.† (Rubin) However, four shootings that involved three people being killed and another three wounded by gunfire the commission did not agree with the Chief. This did not persuade Beck to invoke punishment to the officers involved in the shootings. He agreed that one of the officers had been wrong in his choice to fire, but still did not punish him. The commission fears that the lack of punishment toward officers who use excessive force could be sending out the wrong message to members of the LAPD. I would agree with the commission that Beck is sending out the wrong message. If an officer is already lacking good moral judgment when faced with a dangerous situation they may over-react to it if they know there are no consequences for their actions. â€Å"Every day, law enforcement officers face danger while carrying out their responsibilities this is something they decided to do take an oath and are to abide by what they have been taught and represent. When dealing with a dangerous—or unpredictable—situation, police officers usually have very little time to assess it and determine the proper response.† (United) We can make sure that when faced with these situations police officers make the right decision through proper training. Such training could include knowing the Use of Force Model. As taught this model is a guide to what use of force actions are appropriate for each situation and should be carried out in such a manner. For example, if someone is assaultive (trying to cause bodily harm) the officer should use defense tactics to subdue the individual first trying all verbal communication before resulting in a physical altercation. Another training guide that is used is the Police Training Model, which w as created in 1999 by PERF and the Reno Police Department. This model â€Å"addresses the traditional duties of policing in the context of specific neighborhood problems and includes several segments on the use of force.† (United) It is very important for police officers to make ethical decisions while in the field. It is important because it is their duty to protect and serve. It is also important because we as citizens look up to law enforcement and if they are caught doing something unethical it can ruin the respect and trust we have in law enforcement. When faced with dangerous or a tough situation police officers need to be trained to quickly make the best and most ethical decision possible. Police officers like those who beat Rodney King should be punished and made an example of. It is not ethical to hurt someone just because you have the power to. â€Å"The criminal justice system is designed to enforce moral rules that have been written into the criminal law. Aristotle believed that justice consist of giving each person his or her due† [ (Jay.S, 2013) ]. Maybe the Police Officers in both cases felt they had to take on the ethical teachings of Aristotle. When looking at today’s society and if you go back as far as there is written proof the court systems and law enforcement rules and regulations have grown and developed into more evolved court system and law enforcement for society to follow. At one time it was not unethical to flogged or whip a person, this was to deter them from committing future crimes, this is where Officers like the ones in these cases may have gotten by with physical abuse and unnecessary of force. Fortunately for us as citizens we have constitutional rights and there are laws in place to protect us from unnecessary use of force and the citizens of The United States of America are allowed their freedom, a speedy trial among a group of their peers fair, representation and the right not to be harmed by those who hold authority by law in which they represent. We have ethical responsibility s citizens to follow the rules and regulation of our count try and they s Law Enforcement Officers have n ethical obligation to lead by example. References 1. Harari, O. (1993). Lessons from the Rodney King tape. Management Review, 82(8), 20. 2. Jay.S, A. (2013). Professional Ethics In Criminal Justice Being Ethical when no one is looking. 3rd edition. In A. Jay.S, Professional Ethics In Criminal Justice Being Ethical when no one is looking. 3rd edition (pp. 1-153). Upper Saddle River : Prentice Hall /Pearson. 3. Jefferis, E., Butcher, F., & Hanley, D. (2011). Measuring perceptions of police use of force. Police Practice & Research, 12(1), 81-96. doi:10.1080/15614263.2010.497656 National Institute of Justice. â€Å"Police Use of Force.† National Institute of Justice. Office of Justice Programs, 20 Jan. 2012. Web. 19 July. 2013. . 4. Matheson, V. A., & Baade, R. A. (2004). Race and Riots: A Note on the Economic Impact of the Rodney King Riots. Urban Studies (Routledge), 41(13), 2691-2696. doi:10.1080/0042098042000294628 5. Rubin, J. (2012, 04 16). Beck facing rare criticism Improper use of force is tolerated too often, police panel says. Retrieved from Los Angeles Times : http://articles.latimes.com/2012/apr/16/local/la-me-beck-discipline-20120416 6. Rubin, Joel. â€Å"LAPD to Hold Meetings on Use-of-force Policies.† Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles Times, 10 Sept. 2012. Web. 21 July 2013. . 7. Stuart, F. (2011). Constructing Police Abuse after Rodney King: How Skid Row Residents and the Los Angeles Police Department Contest Video Evidence. Law & Social Inquiry, 36(2), 327-353. doi:10.1111/j.1747-4469.2011.01234.x 8. United States Department of

Accounting Made Essay

Managerial Accounting refers to the accumulation and preparation of financial reports for internal users only (e. g. management). Managerial Accounting includes all manipulations of financial information for use by managers in performing their specified organizational functions and additionally in ensuring the proper used and handling of an entity’s resources. â€Å"It is the internal business building role of accounting and finance professionals who work inside organizations. These professionals are involved in designing and evaluating business processes, budgeting and forecasting, implementing and monitoring internal controls and analyzing, synthesizing, and aggregation information – to help drive economic value† (IMA). Financial Accounting vs. Managerial Accounting Financial Accounting is primarily concerned with the recording of business transactions and the eventual preparation of financial statements. See more: The Issues Concerning Identity Theft Essay Its purpose is to record the transactions carried out by an organization, principally companies with their environment, in order to summarize at regular intervals their financial position and assets, as well as the net profit or loss on operations. Financial accounting focuses on general purpose reports known as financial statements intended for internal and external users and is subject to reporting according to GAAP (e. g. accrual method of accounting). This financial information is generally for the public, as required by law, and consists of a summary of the company’s past transactions. These all-purpose reports with historical date are prepared for use of different parties and the presentation of the financial statements are done formally, and are still useful even if submitted late. The nature of accounting information is monetary and reports the about the company as a whole. On the other hand, Managerial Accounting is responsible to a lesser degree of financial statement presentations to external users because their reports, which are usually confidential, are primarily for internal purposes or users. Also, it is not subject to reporting according to GAAP (e. g. ash basis). The reports have a strong future orientation, due to the fact that these are used to forecast the company’s health. These, not being required by law, may also be presented informally and timeliness of report is often more important than precision or accuracy and are for specific users only. The nature of its accounting information is both monetary and non-monetary and reports only parts or segments of the company. Other sources refer to Management Accounting as similar to Cost Accounting. However, Cost Accounting is only a subset of both financial and management accounting. This is because management involves many decisions based upon cost information. Accurate product costs must be determined according to the Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) and according to decision relevance for internal purposes. Accounting Basics Accounting standards are needed so that an establishment’s financial statements with fairly and consistently describe its financial performance. Without these vital standards, comparisons and evaluations between companies will be quite difficult since financial statements will be based on individual company accounting rules. The activities that are part of managerial accounting include: (a) explaining manufacturing and non-manufacturing costs and how they are reported in the financial statements; (b) computing the cost of rendering a service or manufacturing a product; (c) determining the behavior of costs and expenses as activity levels change and analyzing cost-volume-profit relationships within a company; (d) assisting management in profit planning and formalizing the plans in the form of budgets; (e) providing a basis for controlling costs and expenses by comparing actual results with planned objectives and standard costs; and (f) accumulating and using relevant data for management decision making. Ethical Standards Managerial accountants recognize that they have an ethical obligation to their companies and the public. The IMA has developed a code of ethical standards entitled Standards of Ethical Conduct for Management Accountants. This code divides the managerial accountant’s responsibilities into four aspects: competence, confidentiality, integrity, and objectivity. Competence includes performing duties in accordance with laws, regulations and the like and preparing complete and clear reports and recommendations. Confidentiality refers to refraining from disclosing confidential information and from using or appearing to use confidential information for unethical or illegal advantage. Integrity involves refusing gifts or favors, recognizing and communicating professional limitations, active or passive subversion of the company’s attainment of objectives, communicating both favorable and unfavorable information, and refraining from activities that would discredit the profession. Lastly, objectivity refers to communicating information fairly and objectively and disclosing fully all relevant information that could influence a decision. Management functions involve performing three broad functions, namely planning, directing and motivating, and controlling. Planning requires the management to look ahead and establish their objectives or goals as a company, keeping in mind that these objectives add value to the business under its control. Directing and motivating involves coordinating diverse activities and human resources to produce a smooth-running operation. Controlling, on the other hand, is the process of keeping the form’s activities on track. In controlling operations, management determines whether planned goals are being met and what changes are necessary when there are deviations from targeted objectives, All these management functions become the foundation for the cause of applying management accounting. To be able to properly account for the success or failure of the business, accounting processes are used and standards are imposed. Ultimately, the purpose or goal is to objectively assess the performance of a corporation to be able to help forecast its future health.

Brief History of Cod Fishing

Brief History of Cod Fishing The cods importance to American history is undeniable. It was cod that attracted Europeans to North America for short-term fishing trips and eventually enticed them to stay. The cod became one of the most sought-after fish in the North Atlantic, and it was its popularity that caused its enormous decline and the precarious situation today. Native Americans Long before Europeans arrived and discovered America, Native Americans fished along its shores, using hooks they made from bones and nets made from natural fibers. Cod bones such as otoliths (an ear bone) are plentiful in Native American middens, indicating they were an important part of the Native American diet. Earliest Europeans The Vikings and Basques were some of the first Europeans to travel to the coast of North America and harvest and cure cod. Cod was dried until it was hard, or cured using salt so that it was preserved for a long period of time. Eventually, explorers such as Columbus and Cabot discovered the New World. Descriptions of the fish indicate that cod were as big as men, and some say that fishermen could scoop the fish out of the sea in baskets. Europeans concentrated their cod fishing efforts in Iceland for awhile, but as conflicts grew, they began fishing along the coast of Newfoundland and what is now New England. Pilgrims and Cod In the early 1600s, John Smith charted out New England. When determining where to flee, the Pilgrims studied Smiths map and were intrigued by the label Cape Cod. They were determined to profit from fishing, although according to Mark Kurlansky, in his book Cod: a Biography of the Fish That Changed the World, they knew nothing about fishing, (p. 68) and while the Pilgrims were starving in 1621, there were British ships filling their holds with fish off the New England coast. Believing they would receive blessings if they took pity on the Pilgrims and assisted them, the local Native Americans showed them how to catch cod and use the parts not eaten as fertilizer. They also introduced the Pilgrims to quahogs, steamers, and lobster, which they eventually ate in desperation. Negotiations with the Native Americans led to our modern-day celebration of Thanksgiving, which would not have occurred if the Pilgrims did not sustain their stomachs and farms with cod. The Pilgrims eventually established fishing stations in Gloucester, Salem, Dorchester, and Marblehead, Massachusetts, and Penobscot Bay, in what is now Maine. Cod was caught using handlines, with larger vessels sailing out to fishing grounds and then sending two men in dories to drop a line in the water. When a cod was caught, it was pulled up by hand. Triangle Trade Fish were cured by drying and salting and marketed in Europe. Then a triangle trade developed that linked  cod to slavery and rum. High-quality cod was sold in Europe, with the colonists purchased European wine, fruit and other products. Then traders then went to the Caribbean, where they sold a low-end cod product called West India cure to feed the burgeoning slave population, and bought sugar, molasses (used to make rum in the colonies), cotton, tobacco, and salt. Eventually, New Englanders also transported slaves to the Caribbean. Cod fishing continued and made the colonies prosperous. Modernization of Fishing In the 1920s-1930s, more sophisticated and effective methods, such as gillnets and draggers were used. Commercial cod catches increased throughout the 1950s. Fish processing techniques also expanded. Freezing techniques and filleting machinery eventually led to the development of fish sticks, marketed as a healthy convenience food. Factory ships started catching fish and freezing it out at sea. Fishing Collapse Technology improved and fishing grounds became more competitive. In the U.S., the Magnuson Act of 1976 prohibited foreign fisheries from entering the exclusive economic zone (EEZ) - 200 miles around the U.S. With the absence of foreign fleets, the optimistic U.S. fleet expanded, causing a greater decline in fisheries. Today, New England cod fishermen face strict regulations on their catch. Cod Today The commercial cod catch has decreased greatly since the 1990s due to strict regulations on cod fishing. This has led to an increase in cod populations. According to NMFS, cod stocks on Georges Bank and the Gulf of Maine are rebuilding to target levels, and the Gulf of Maine stock is no longer considered overfished. Still, the cod you eat in seafood restaurants may no longer be Atlantic cod, and fishsticks are now more commonly made of other fish such as pollock. Sources CC Today. 2008. Deconstructing Thanksgiving: A Native American View. (Online). Cape Cod Today. Accessed November 23, 2009. Kurlansky, Mark. 1997. Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World. Walker and Company, New York. Northeast Fisheries Science Center. Brief History of the Groundfishing Industry of New England (Online). Northeast Fisheries Science Center. Accessed November 23, 2009.

rubber glove Essay Example

rubber glove Essay Example rubber glove Essay rubber glove Essay The basic raw material used in the manufacture of natural rubber latex exam gloves is latex concentrate which is produced from Hevea Brasiliensis natural latex using a steel tapping knife. Tapping is done at early dawn and the latex, collected in cups, is harvested several hours later and preserved with ammonia to stop it from premature coagulation. Because of its high water and non-rubber contents, about 70%, the latex is concentrated and purified by centrifugation to a 60% strength latex concentrate and stabilised using lauric soap for long term storage. The major producers of this atex is Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia. Before the latex can be used for manufacturing gloves it must be mixed with a recipe of processing chemicals which include sulfur, zinc oxide, accelerators, pigments, stabilisers, dewebbing agent and antioxidant. These are mixed with the latex and allowed to mature over a period of 24-36 hours for the mix to cure. During this period the sulfur will become mixed with the rubber particles to yield a latex compound ready for dipping. The hand molds (or formers) suspended on a continuous moving chain are first dipped into a slurry of alcium nitrate solution and calcium carbonate. The nitrate is a latex coagulant while the carbonate is a former release agent. After the nitrate and carbonate has partially dried out, the molds are next dipped into the latex compound. At this stage the nitrate immediately coagulate a layer of latex over the mold. Because a thin layer of carbonate separates the film from the mold, it help both in removing the gloves from the molds as well as in preventing the gloves from sticking together. The freshly molded gloves in gel form are next leached in hot water to remove residual water- oluble protein and chemicals. The leaching process has became mandatory as a result of concern with allergic reactions associated with latex proteins. This step is essential to reduce residual extractable latex protein and the effectiveness is based on the amount of clean hot water used and dwell time. Beading brushes are run over the cuff ends to create a zone called beads which assist the users in donning the gloves. The next stage involves drying and curing the wet gloves inside a long and deep oven heated either electrically, by natural gas or hot air. Curing, or vulcanization, converts the gloves into an elastic state by causing the chemicals added during compounding to react with the rubber molecules in the latex. This is the most critical step as without curing the gloves will not be elastic as well as they will tear easily. Vulcanization is a chemical process, discovered by Charles Goodyear, by which the physical properties of natural or synthetic rubber are improved. It consists principally of heating rubber with sulfur and other substances, such as accelerators and activators. The sulfur does not simply dissolve or disperse in the rubber, but rather combines chemically, mostly in the form of cross-links (bridges) between rubber chain molecules and the sulfur atoms. On the other hand, accelerators and activators act as catalysts to initiate the process as well as boost the reaction at room temperatures. Cross-linking is analogous to net building using strings that are knotted together. The sulphur atoms reside in the nodes that link the rubber molecule chains. Just as a net provides strength and a network to catch fishes, ross-linked rubber in latex provides the base upon which gloves are moulded. vulcanlzea ruDDer nas nlgner tenslle strengtn ana reslstance to swelling ana abrasion, and is elastic over a greater range of temperatures. In other words, natural rubber without undergoing vulcanization will eventually become too brittle in cold weather or become sticky in hot weather. Upon exiting the oven the gloves are dipped once again into hot water to perform a dry film post-leaching wash to extract residual proteins and chemicals that bloomed to the glove surface. It has been established that a combination of wet and dry leaching has been very effective in removing residual proteins and chemicals and has significantly reduced the number of cases of protein allergies and sensitization. The leached gloves are then dipped into a slurry of corn starch and dried. This layer of corn starch assist in glove removal and donning. The final step of glove manufacturing involves stripping of the finished gloves from the molds using pneumatic air Jets. The now bare molds are then given a horough chemical wash and rinsing before entering the next dipping cycle. Typically a mold will be dipped 4-5 times in an hour and once a week they will be given a thorough scrub to remove built-up stains and residues. Periodically the molds are visually examined for defects and replaced. Stripped gloves are hot-air tumbled to even them out as well as remove detachable powder. They are batched in bins, tagged and sampled for inspection. Operators examine the samples for visual defects, measure their weights and dimensions and check them for air leaks. Batches hat pass the inspections are routed for direct packing. Those that fail are bagged for rework and retest. Passed gloves are also tested for physical properties. These are tensile strength and elongation at break before and after ageing to ensure they can withstand prolong storage and handling stress. All packed gloves are water tested for compliance to the maximum allowable leak failures called AQL. Batches that fail will be reworked or downgraded. Only gloves that meet the in-house specifications will be allowed to be shipped to customers warehouses.