Social Media Project

Allstate is the company that my group chose for the social media project. The link to the social media's Wiki is http://ism3004socialmedia.wikispaces.com/Allstate.

The social media project is a group project that allow us to do research on the social media policy and practice of a company. As we all know, the social media has transformed into the daily activities in our lives. It is important for all the companies to use different social medias to interact with their customers. Most of the companies now have Facebook, Twitter and an official website on the web. Companies can now get feedback faster and easier from their fans and customers by using these social media.

I can truly say that my group did a great job working with each others. Each group members were assigned with different part of the project. The project consists of research on the different social media that the company has. Each person then posted their work on the discussion board and have their work reviewed by other team members. At the end, everyone's works are post into the company's Wiki page.

Our project is based on Allstate, which is the second largest insurance company in the United States. Allstate is pretty good with their social media, they have a Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, official website, RSS, Google+ and a blog community. On their official website, all the social media has their own icon on webpage. Customers are have easy access through all the social media by clicking the icons.  

In conclusion, I think social medias are vital tools to today's business environment. If a business want to become successful, they will need to use social medias. 

Screen Capture by Yasmin Yuen, Allstate Official Website

Screen Capture by Yasmin Yuen, Allstate Twitter

Citation:
http://www.allstate.com/
http://www.allstate.com?cid=BAC-SN-Twitter

Week 13- Muddy: Social Media

In the week's lesson, the Metcalfe's Law was extremely hard to interpret. The Metcalfe's Law stated that "the value of a network is proportional to the square of the number of users (number of connections that can be made)." Most people think that the more people it has in the network, the more value it will have. But then it said "if a network that has too many users for the capacity can also have a much lower value since no one can access it." It was hard to understand the concept because it first stated that the value of a network is based on the number of the users, but it will also have a lower value with too many users.

So how do we use Metcalfe's Law to calculate the value of a network?

Some Rights Reserved by justin.wikinator- Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial- Share Alike

After searching for my answer online, I was able to understand the concept of the Metcalfe's Law with the help of the Wikipedia. Many people have misinterpreted the Metcalfe's Law. Instead of using the number of users to increase the value of a network, it is the connected devices that increasing the value of a network. For example, two cell phones can make one connection, five cell phones can make 10 connections, and twelves cell phones can make 66 connections.This law has led to the concept of the network effects, which is the effect of one user of a good and service has on the value of that good and services to other people.

The picture above is the Metcalfe wheel, it illustrates the fully connected world that we live in today. We are now able to connect to different people in the world by using computer, mobile devices and other social media. It is important for us to learn how this effect can impact our lives now and in the future.


Citation:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metcalfe%27s_law

Week 12- Clear: World Wide Web

"The World Wide Web (WWW or W3) is what the internet uses to share data and conduct business". Dr. Means explained to the class about the World Wide Web in this week's lesson. The World Wide Web is what we use in almost every day of our lives now. We need to understand how the World Wide Web, Internet, and Browsers work.

The Internet is a network of networks that connect computer to another computer. The World Wide Web can access information by using the Internet. The Browsers help us get to the webpage that we want to go by interpreting the address that we enter and displaying it after. We can go to a web page by entering the URL, a unique name of the page that consists of three parts. The three parts are the protocol, the domain name and the last part contains path & file name.

Web contents usually contain HTML language, CSS coding, graphics, pictures and videos. People use web pages because of different reasons, some use internet to trade, connect or feel. There are different types of websites that accommodate to different types of people.

© alles-schlumpf-Some Rights Reserved Creative Common

It is important for us to learn about the World Wide Web because we are surrounded by it everyday. In the future, we may need to use the World Wide Web to promote our businesses or even have our business on the web.

I found a old school video about the World Wide Web from YouTube. Enjoy!!

Week 11- Clear: Database Project Microsoft Access

By the end of this project, I felt comfortable with Microsoft Access. When I started doing the project, I thought I would never be able to finish it. With practice and research, Microsoft Access was becoming easier to use. I learned to use the basic skills for Microsoft Access, for example:  creating tables, queries, forms, and report. Creating a table was a bit challenging because we had to import a text document that needs to be import with special commands. Creating the query was a bit tough for me because I was stuck with one of the last 12 months returned data. It turns out that I did not pay attention to the field data types for the "left data" field. A lot of the functions in Microsoft Access required the user to pay attention and focus on the specific details.

 One way that I think Microsoft Access can do to enhance the functionality of this database is by having a training wheels function in the program. What I mean by training wheels is that every time when a beginner user starts to create a table, a query or a from, instructions will pop out of the program to help you with the function. Overall the program is a bit hard to use if you are a beginner user but like everything else, practice, practice, practice.

I think it is a great program to use because it is very organized. It can our business to growth because all the data for the company becomes easier to read and understand. Information and data can be organized in different forms and functions.

Week 10- Muddy: Database Skills Track

Let's start this blog by saying that: "I Do Not Like ACCESS!" Well, that came out too strong and I once felt the same way towards Excel. Now that I have to use Excel for my daily life, I am used to the program and I actually enjoy using it very much. Access confuses me a lot, I can not see the benefit of using Access yet. It is still a very new experience for me to get used to. I also feel like Access is very similar to Excel, so what is the differences between the two? I am trying my best to be open minded when it comes to this program. One website that I found was very helpful was the Microsoft Office website.

Microsoft Access is a database tool that helps you understand your information and provide a easy way to access, enter, and navigate your data. One of the tool that I have problem understanding in Microsoft Access is the "Queries". What is queries? Queries allow the user to ask questions and being able to answer these questions. For example, if you have a data file with all the cell phone numbers you have on your phone. Input the criteria you want, for example female. All the cell phone numbers belong to a female friends will be listed.

Now my second question is when should I use Microsoft Access or Microsoft Excel since they share so many similarities. To decide which is the best program to use, we all need to answer this question first: is the data relational or not? Data that can fit into a single table of worksheet is called nonrelational data or flat. For example, if you are creating a list with data that can fit into a worksheet, then Excel is the right program. If you are creating a more complex list, then Access is a better choice.

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Now that I understand a little bit more about Microsoft Access, I hope that I can do good on my project.

Citation:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/excel-help/using-access-or-excel-to-manage-your-data-HA010210195.aspx?CTT=5&origin=HA010264081
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/access/

Excel Project

The Excel project was a great learning experience for all of us. As we all know, Excel is a very popular application software. Almost all companies use Excel today to manage the company data, numbers, tables and etc. In this Excel project, it is consisted of 1000 subjects with 21 heart rate measurements from time 0:00 to 20:00 for each subject. Using the skills we learned from the lesson videos, we need to format the data according to the instructions that were given to us.

In the Excel project, we learned different types of functions that are needed to become an expert. Well maybe not an expert but having the basic knowledge to perform different tasks. We learned the basic structure of Excel, how to create formulas, the different functions and how to create the pivot tables.

The biggest challenge I had in the Excel project was learning how to use the Pivot Table function. It was a bit challenging for me because it was a new concept. I work with Excel everyday but I never came across using the pivot table. Overall it was not hard to understand as long as you practice using the function. I enjoyed doing this project very much!!!

Week 9: Clear- Moore's Law

Moore's law was a very easy concept to understand this week. The Moore's law stated that the performance of a chip will doubles for approximately every 18 months. This means that you can purchase a computer twice as fast with the same price after the 18 months period. How do we know that this concept is true? Well, let's suppose that you bought a computer 18 months ago or 2 years ago and compare it to the computers in the store today. Notice that the computers in the store today may have higher RAM, or better hard drive than the one you have right now. The difference is caused by Moore's law; chip, computer, and technology today improve their performance over time.

Will Moore's law last forever? Some said that Moore's law can not continue to last much longer due to the three interrelated forces, size, heat and power. These three forces can slow down and stop the Moore's law because as the chip get smaller and smaller, the electrons will get tighter. As the electrons get tighter and tighter, more heat will build up and eventually destroying the chip. Scientists and inventors will need to find a way to cool down the heat to solve this problem.

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Why is it important for us to learn about the Moore's law? Dr. Means pointed out several good reasons as to why we should consider Moore's law as a very important concept. It is important for us to learn about this concept because the changes that can impact towards our businesses. The rapid pace of the computer's world can impact the way a business needs to be function. As the business managers of the future, there are several questions we need to ask ourselves due to Moore's law. How long will my computer equipments remind useful? How is this going to affect my capital budget? How many maintenance cost? and lastly, how many training cost?
 
I found a funny video about the Moore's law in YouTube. Enjoy!!

Presentation and WEB 2.0 Project- Sustainable Development

My presentation topic is about sustainable development. Here is the link to my presentation project on YouTube, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5-DhDzey2s. 

I had a logical flow and sequence for my presentation. I presented a problem, a solution, why the company should use this solution, the benefits of it, other examples and a conclusion for the ending. There are always an answers to every questions that I presented in the PowerPoint. I make sure that there is a attention grabber at the beginning of the presentation. Using a picture of a trash landfill, I was able to grab the attention of my audience. The picture serve as a example of how our world can turn into a trash landfill where there are no resources to use. I also use a question under the same slide to spark some curiosity out from my audience. "Can you imagine a future with no resources but waste?", this question can also serve as a attention grabber and at the same time, it sparks curiosity.

I was very clear and explain to the audience the importance concept of the whole presentation. I make sure the audience know this presentation is use to persuade the CEO of my company to incorporate sustainable development at the very beginning. Everything is based on fact and there were no typos in the presentation. I did notice that there are clutter on one or two of my slides.Some slides were too busy and cause the audience to read instead of listening to my narration. I try to fix that problem by using animation effect on some of the bullet points. After my narration, the bullet point will then appear on the presentation. By using the animation effect, it helps me to say it then show it.

Based on the presentation evaluation rubric, I felt like I did a good job on my presentation project. I'm very shy when it comes to recording my voice over the PowerPoint. The reason why I am not confident with my voice recording is because knowing that I have an accent when I speak. I did overcome my fear and I did my best for the audio recording. I learned to say it then show it from critiquing my classmate's presentation. Instead of using bullet points, one can say it then use a picture to show the main points of the presentation. I also learned to avoid clutter on my slides. In many cases, the-less-the-better. 

The YouTube video below is my presentation. Enjoy!

Week 7: Muddy-Virtualization

I found the concept of virtualization very difficult to understand this week. At first, I thought virtualization was somehow connected to the concept of cloud-based computing. When I hear the word virtual in virtualization, internet was the first initial thought. I was wrong and so I assumed that virtualization was the same concept as "Boot Camp" or "Dual Boot". Then, Professor Olson indicated later in the video that they were completely different and then it was back to square one for me. 
  
Now the question is: "What is Virtualization?"

Virtualization is having to use a single computer system to run multiple virtual versions of operating system, server, storage device, or network resources.

Now the question is: " What is Virtualization again?"

The definition was not very helpful at all. After watching the lecture video and doing some research online, I was able to comprehend the concept. I found an IT blog on the net that provided a very clear explanation as to what virtualization is. The IT blog also uses analogies to explain the concept which makes it easier to understand.

Most of the time, our computers use only a small percentage of their total resources ( CPU, memory, disk, network). By using virtualization, we are able to fully utilize the resources that we have. Multiple operating systems will be allow to run in a single physical computer host; sharing the same resources. Instead of having multiples individual computers using only 25% or less of their total resources, we can have 3 computers, sharing a single physical computer host,  running at 80% of their total resources.

I have fun learning about virtualization this week because this topic can relate to my presentation topic. My presentation project for the class is about sustainable development and this concept is very much saying do not waste resources and be green.

Creative Common Attribution-Non Commercial-Share Alike-Some Rights Reserved by BOB Merhebi

 http://techpp.com/2011/02/09/half-a-dozen-virtualization-mistakes-to-avoid/

The Youtube video also has a very clear explanation of virtualization. If you have a chance, please watch it.

Citation:
http://itknowledgeexchange.techtarget.com/virtualization-pro/what-is-virtualization/

Week 6: Clear-ERP

Enterprise resource planning (ERP) is a type of enterprise application software built to integrates information from different types of business functions such as finance, HR, purchasing, customer relationship and etc, in an organization. The main purpose of the ERP system is to manage the flow of information and data between all the business functions of an organization and also the connections to outside stockholders. The ERP system system can also be use to measure and improve (analytic applications) the performance of business operations base upon the information it gathers. The ERP system can be very expensive and some companies spend millions of dollar to implement the ERP software.

There are many benefits for an organization to use the ERP system. It is more accurate when it gather information and data when using ERP. These date and information are also easier to access and manage. It is easier to measure and observe the performance of the operations of the organization. It can improves cost control and improves efficiencies through out the company.

It is very important for us to learn about ERP software because the companies that we will work for or our own company will most likely be using an ERP system. In the video lecture, Professor Olson gave us examples of how different types of ERP can have both good and bad effects towards different companies. We need to learn to distinguish what ERP software is best for the company to use to minimize losses.

This is a YouTube video that I found to explain more about the function of ERP software.

Week 5: Clear-Making Your Presentation Stick

Anyone can create a presentation but making your presentation to stick is no easy task. During this week's lesson, we came across the concept of making your presentation to stand out and stick to the audience. Throughout my life, my experience with PowerPoint was not very pleasant at all . PowerPoint, to me, was a pointless presentation filled with bullet points and cluster of images. The word "fun" was the last thing to emerge into my mind when it comes to describing my feeling for PowerPoint. The book, Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die, by Chip Heath and Dan Heath, points out the criteria needed to build a successful presentation.

Creative Commons Attribution,Some Rights Reserved by Fizzr

There are five rules to help your presentation to stick:

1. Story and examples are the building blocks of the presentation

2. Don't preamble, parachute in

3. Let your main points hog the spotlight

4. Tease, don't tell

5. Bring reality to the room

These five rules can help us have a better understanding of how to create a PowerPoint presentation that can stick to the audience. The first rule is "Story and examples are the building blocks of the presentation". Story and examples can help your audience have a better understanding of the ideas you are trying to present. Story and examples can also connect with your audience in a more emotional level. The second rule from the book is "Don't preamble, parachute in". What it means is to not start your presentation with a boring introduction of what you are about to present, but instead be creative and surprise your audience.The third rule is a very important rule because it happens very often to all of our PowerPoints. "Let your main points hog the spotlight", let your main idea shine instead of putting more and more bullet points into another slide. The fourth rule is "Tease, don't tell", we need to tease our audience and make them demand more of our presentation. The last rule is "Bring reality to the room", this rule is easier to said than done. Instead of looking for images to present your main point, try bring reality into your audience. Show them what your main point is about by bringing objects and tools into your presentation.

In Conclusion, it is very important for us apply these rules into our future presentation because we want to be remembered. In today business world, no matter if you are trying to make a speech or making a PowerPoint, we need to make the presentation to stick.


This is a YouTube video from Dan Heath, one of the writer from the book. In this video, he explained the importance of remembering these five rules.

References
¹Heath, C., and D. Heath. Made to stick, why some ideas survive and others die. Random House Inc, 2007. Web. <https://elearning2.courses.ufl.edu/access/content/group/3daf3da5-cf1c-4806-853a-97219fc6c45a/ISM3004/MakingPresentationsThatStick.pdf>.

Week 4: Clear- Five Competitive Forces

Michael Porter's five competitive forces that shape strategy was a very clear concept to me this week. Similar to what I learned in economic, the five competitive forces include: rival competitors, customers, suppliers, potential entrants and substitute products. It is hard to imagine that there are different types of competitors that can shape the industry of your business. Businesses tend to create their strategy around their rivalry companies only. Many of them do not analyze the other types of competitors in their industries and underestimate the danger of doing so.To fully understand the profitability of the industry your business is in, one must consider all of the five competitor forces.

To come up with a good strategy for your company, one must determine the forces that affect the structure of the industry the most. One industry can have strong potential entrants and substitute products; meanwhile, other industries may not. Having all five of competitive forces working together can potentially destroy the profitability of an industry, for example the airline industry. I will now explain the effect of each five competitive forces. When a market is profitable, it will attracts new competitors. With more new entrants to the market, it will decrease the profit for each firm. Substitute of products and services can affect an industry because the industry can lose profit when buyers decide to choose alternative products and services. Consumers/buyers have bargain power over many types of industries. In these type of industries, price change is very sensitive to buyers. Price war is also a constant battle between rival companies. Suppliers who provide raw materials, labor, services and etc, also have bargain power over industries they are in. When there are few substitute, suppliers can ask for high pay for their resources. Last and not least, the existing competitors is one of the most important competitive force that can affect the company's profit. Company can counteraction towards the effects of many existing competitors by practicing operation effectiveness.

In my opinion, many businesses enter the industry blindly without looking into the five competitive forces in it. It is very important for business major to learn how these five forces can shape the industries we are try to enter.We have to create our plan and strategy with the knowledge of how our industries are structured.

Here is a very creative YouTube video to explain the five competitive forces.

References
¹ Porter, M. E. (2008). THE FIVE COMPETITIVE FORCES THAT SHAPE STRATEGY. Harvard Business Review, 86(1), 78-93. Retrieved from EBSCOhost

Week 3: Muddy- Protocol

Creative Commons Attribution -Non Commercial -Share Alike 2.0 Generic- Some Rights Reserved by Holotne

Communication protocol was a difficult subject to understand this week. I found the concept hard to grasp and what threw me off the most were the proprietary protocol and the standardized protocol. My question is, "Why do we need both proprietary and standardized protocol?" Wouldn't it be easier to have just one type of protocol that everyone can use than having both proprietary and standardized? In my opinion, there is no need for proprietary protocol because it is very restricted.

From the class video, I learned that communication protocol is a set of rules that govern the communication process. The process starts when information/data are placed into packets. By using the Ethernet Protocol, these packets will each be labeled with header, payload and trailer. The header contained an IP address as to where the packets are going. By using the Internet Protocol (IP), the packets will finally arrive at the exact location as the IP address has indicated.

Proprietary protocol is when manufacturers create their own protocol and patent the protocol to restrict anyone else from using it. Business that uses proprietary protocol is limited to that specific vendor only. Standardized protocol is basically open source protocol that everyone is allowed to use and distribute it. Standardized protocol enables products from different vendors to use the same set of rules and it allows them to operate with each others.

After doing my research online (most of my information came from Wikipedia), I was able to answer my question as to why some users continue using proprietary protocol and some do not. Proprietary protocol software such as Skype was able to gain popularity due to it's free application and its user's friendly technology. Proprietary protocol such as proprietary instant messaging protocol is not used by many due to network incompatibility. People from other networks were unable to communicate with their friends due to this reason. In conclusion, many people continue to use proprietary protocol because it comes with enormous amount of benefits to their users.

I found a very interesting video from YouTube that goes into details of how network protocol works. Enjoy!!!

Week 2: Clear- Cache

What is cache? Every now and then, I see this word appeared randomly in one of my computer's files; yet, I do not know what it is or what it does. When Professor Olson brought up this subject, I was thrilled to finally have someone to explain to me what it is all about. Thanks to Professor Olson's explanation in the video, the concept of cache was fairly easy to understand.
 

Cache is a memory chip built into the hard drive to stores commonly use dates or files into the RAM. The modern computer recognized that those dates will most likely be use again. The next time when you need those dates or files, the computer will be able to process them faster. The cache will made copies of those dates or files into the RAM. When you try to access those dates or files, the CPU will first check the cache before checking the hard drive. If the file in the cache matches with what the CPU is looking for, it will bring out the file in a faster manner instead of searching for it in the hard drive.

 

After doing some of my own research, I found out that there are other types of cache. There are cache built into the web browsers and the computer's CPU. Cache is very important because it allows our computer to performs faster. In the business world, everyone knows that time is money. It is important for us to learn how cache works because we can now understand how some of our dates are available instantly and some are not.We should also learn about cache because we need to know that there are times when we need to clear out the cache memory. Anyone can go into the cache file to steal important or confidential dates that were being stored in it.


The YouTube video below helped me to understand more about cache. The video contained the beginning step of how cache transfer the dates from hard drive to RAM. He also have great explanations of the different types of cache.

Week 1: Clear- Binary Numeral System

In this week's lesson, I learned the binary numeral system that is use for computer notation. At first, I thought it was going to be a hard concept to understand.  Having no knowledge of the binary numeral system, I can only recall seeing the infinite sets of 01001010100001 in the matrix movie. After watching the binary video for the class, I can officially title myself a binary scholar.

Almost all computers are built to use the concept of binary numeral system. While normal mathematics numeral system is based on the numbers 0-9, the binary numeral system is only based on two digits, 0 or 1. Using the numeral system of 0-9, humans were able to use them for calculation, counting, measuring and etc. The binary system can be described as the computer language, it is used to store memory in the computer by only using the two digit, 0 or 1, that can represent numbers, characters, or even alphabets.

To understand the binary system, let us first review our most basic numeral concept of 0-9. By using 0-9, we are able to count 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9. Once we run out  of all the numbers that we can use, we insert an additional column to continue for the higher numbers, 10, 11, 12, 21, 33, 45 and so on. Notice that the second column is worth 10 times the value compare to the first set of the digits. Once we get to the number 99, the rule will repeats itself to add another column and continue the same concept.

The binary numeral system has the same concept by using only two digits, 0 or 1. Imagine using 0 as 0 and 1 as 1, after finish using the two digits we make an additional column. The second column will be worth twice the value, for example the number 1 0 will be worth as 2. Due to the concept of (1x2=2), 1 is in the second column, which mean 1 is equal to 2, only a 0 will be needed after 1. Another example is 11 will be worth as 3, by applying the same concept, 1 in second column is 2 plus 1 in the first column is 1 will be equal to 3 (2+1=3). After using all the numbers in the second column, an additional column will be added given 4 times the value compare to the first column.

 

Table was created by Yasmin Yuen

It is Important for us to comprehend the concept of the binary numeral system in the business world because most of the computers are using this system today. Since our everyday life revolves around computers, it is crucial to learn the system that our computers are using. It is also a new way to look at numbers, we can look at this numeral system for inspiration for future creation of another powerful system. 

If you wish to learn more about the binary numeral system and prefer to watch a video for the explanation, please take a look at the YouTube video below. 

EXTRA CREDIT: Creating an Avatar

Hello Everyone! I decided to post my wonderful avatar for my first blog. The reason why I started my extra credit extra early is because I love this assignment. The idea of making an avatar of myself is so exciting that I couldn't help myself making one as soon as possible. Going through the list of sites provided in the instruction, I decided to use the "Face Your Manga" page. "Why", you ask? It is because I love reading manga and the idea of looking like a manga character is very attractive. The web page was fairly easy to use and I love how my avatar turns out. It started off with a very simple avatar (apparently bald). On the right hand side of the screen, there were tabs with different styles of hair cuts, clothes, accessories, and etc. that you can pick to apply to your avatar. After applying all of these features, I can happily conclude that I love my avatar and I had fun making it!