Sunday, October 17, 2010

Has Capitalism Finally Won?


Had Stalin Expected the Failure of Communism?
Had Stalin ever expected that his country would be the absolute follower of the U.S?


Had Stalin ever expected the USSR's strongest technology in aviation would have to serve the capitalists in order to survive?


The title of the news article directly tells everyone, that, the Soviet Model, has totally been beaten by Capitalism.


As an alternative of capitalism, the Soviet Model could be generally explained in ways of politics, economy and culture. It had created great achievements. However,  the forced collectivelism in economy; repression of free expression and democracy; ultra centralization of decision-making in the party were also the reasons for its  failure.  

In economy, there were appropriate strategies of rapid industrialization . The industrialization was the only fully reliable means of developing a socialist economy.

In industry, the state assumed control over all existing enterprises and understood an intensive program of industrialization. There had been the successes of the economy. There had achieved extraordinary rates of economic growth at a time when capitalist world stumbled through great Depression. Therefore the Soviet Model was prototype for the post colonial world. Prior to its collapse, the Soviet Union had the largest centrally directed economy in the world. The government established its economic priorities through central planning, a system under which administrative decisions rather than the market determined resource allocation and prices.
The author mentioned that the aviation technology of Russian, is still  very top in this world, but ironically have to beg money from free market because the government doesn't support anymore. And the author analyzed the current situation of the aviation business in a very comprehensive way with rational thinking, including the details and shortages in service and regulation parts of Russian business in the transition period. I am happy to be fulfilled.
Russian's Technology in Aviation is Still Very Advanced Today.
 

However, as a reader from the biggest communist country in this world, I desperately want to see some decent  future prospects to the communist countries in the third world, in today's new political and economic environment. I believe every reader from the communist countries would have the same feeling.

The Soviet Model’s ideology offered a model of social development which attracted the Third World. Many on the left in the Third World and even in the West had looked to the Soviet Union as a viable alternative political and economic system to that of capitalism. By the 1950s, the Soviet Model had become one of the two models which had been in irreconcilable conflict over global hegemony. This encouraged the growth of communism throughout the Third World.

However, the author didn't think about these issues and I can't access to relevant information following the links of other business stories below this article.

Currency Intervention Can be Praised Is a Ugly Lie



http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-11311802

The author of this news article indicated his opinion very clearly in the title , currency intervention is right , and has been successful so far.

"Plaza Accord" was the start of disasters of Japanese Economy.
It disgusted me. Dear liar, are your serving for the US presidents and the evil new liberal economists? How much money they paid you? As someone writing for BBC News, don't you think you need to publish something at least looked like the facts instead of telling the bullshit?

Poor Yen, you were the first victim.
Globalization, so far, is institutional enmeshment rather than economic transactions or the reconfiguration,  of social space that has most constrained the state. On this view, states are increasingly rule-takers over a vast array of rules, laws and norms that are promulgated internationally but which affect almost every aspect of how they organize their societies domestically . And of course, many states lost their rights  in deciding the currency.

Then, who can decide everything? Yes, the Americans and their followers.

The current global governance are full of U.S hegemony. The most typical example of currency intervention is "Plaza Accord" in 1986, which changed everything in Asian economy and was the true reason for the bubbles which has lasted more than 20 years in Japanese economy.

With looking at the sub titles, I saw that the author analysed all parts of the world, how the currency intervention was necessary for more balanced competition between nations and  brought benefits to the people.

You westerners are jealous with our, the developing countries', rise. That's all.

I had studied political economy for years and I have never heard about that currency intervention can be good. Everyone who has little common sense in this area knows that currency intervention is totally robbery.

Dear journalist,  the readers are not idiots. Shame on you.

Thursday, August 26, 2010

New Challenge for Media Arts

http://money.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=7950739&rf=true

As an advertising student, I am familiar with a new term, "Media Arts". Media Art describes the way
iTunes Dancer was the pioneer work of "Media Arts"
to make the packaging of touch points of the products and consumers (the retail presence, the content of the website, the PR program, the CRM initiatives etc.) tell the brand’s story gracefully and artfully.

The news article attracted me because the title told me that the pioneer success of Media Arts, iTunes, was reported to be insecure in protecting the consumer's account privacy. This was the first doubt about iTunesI have seen in the mainstream media.  

However, I would never read this article is I was not familiar and interested in Media Arts. This article was published without any pictures to attract readers' attention and show the key information.

I used to believe that iTunes is the most perfect strategy which combined marketing and advertising  in a creative way. A brand engages the audience in the new digital world is the key for its success and the pioneer works have helped the silhouette iPod dancer, paired with the revolutionary iTunes Music Store, to hold the largest share of the fragmented portable digital MP3 music player market at 50%.  

This multi faced story reported  different opinions from both the side with complains and the side rejecting the complains. These conflicts showed that the new technology creates new marketing opportunities as well as creates problems. I believe there is no perfect computer system ;you can't imagine how intelligent the human beings are in breaking these system.

I was expecting some future analysis about the future of marketing and advertising in the new digital time. Should the government limit the new application of marketing and advertising? Should we update the relevant law?  Unfortunately I cannot find any answer from this and other news article with similar topic.

This problem is probably new for Media Arts, but it is not new for online users. Did ebay , Strawberrynet meet similar problems ? How did they solve them? If I was the author, I would make my discussion linked with broader ways of thinking , and offer the access to future information.

New Kind of Business

http://www.news.com.au/business/breaking-news/new-era-of-journalism-ahead-hartigan/story-e6frfkur-1225910555655#ixzz0xhztBdSU

 
The Future of Journalism Is Not Predictable

Everything in the new digital world changes. And so does journalism.

I didn't really understand that what is special of new era of journalism before I start a course called “online and mobile media" this semester. However, after more than 10 weeks training from my lecture, an expert from this new area, I get new thinking.

I was interested in other people's thinking when I was reading this article. In fact, journalism has been changed in many ways, from the format, audience, regulations to even the ethnics.

Since there were no pictures to remind me through what perspective the author would like to discuses, I had to read this article word by word. It was tired.

However, I was disappointed the mainly thing the author discussed was about the increasing demand of journalism in the new era because of he increasing demand of information from the Internet.

There are many people who are not optimistic with the future of the journalism because in the new digital world the mass decides everything. Journalism, which used to stand for elites' culture, is going to die.

I got different opinion. Because of increasing amount of sub-cultures because of the Internet and mobile tools, elite culture is no longer the leading one. They do have stronger competitors now. Then, journalism is going to be divided into different parts. The traditional journalism has to brand itself in the free market.

So I am different with the attitude the person who accepted the author's interview at the end of this article. Looking to the future, I am neither optimistic nor pessimistic.

I did really expect another people’s opinions from this article, about alternative development of journalism industry in the non-democratic countries such as China or North Korea. Probably If I was the author, I would at least to put set some accesses towards relevant information to the audience like me.

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Males bosses are better? There are many exceptions!

http://www.news.com.au/business/business-smarts/women-bosses-a-nightmare-finds-survey/story-e6frfm9r-1225904707948

To be honest, to discuss male or female who is better in the workplace, is not a new topic to me, who took sociology as one of the majors in the first degree.
However, this article attract my attention because it showed the very simple conclusion in its title that, male are better.
After reading this whole article, I found that what the article really discuss is different. What some survey really showed was that , sometimes female manager were less popular because of the characteristics of females' personalities.
Don't you think journalism should not put misleading information in the title because sometimes the title is the like the hypothesis. Some readers only read the title. And this article is very sensitive to the women.  

Dear Author,journalists have the responsibility make sure that his published article are ethical.
When I was study social research method, I was taught that there was rule for every sociologists that to avoid make hypothesis which might have negative impacts to the society. It means, to help to society to operate in the right track is an very important issues for every human being.



On the other hand, I think the result of this social research still need to be discussed with analysing other factors which make the female managers are less popular in the workplace.

Is it because of the predominance of the male manager? ( Male's manager's working style has probably been the standard) Is it because of the average education background of female? Is it because of other social responsibility of female?

If other factors such like these do have effect to the popularity of female bosses' popularity, then the problem is not only about being a female; the problem would be discussed in the further level. 

If you want to report some sociological economic survey result, please choose a decent survey.

No matter how much she earns, woman is always the loser in a relationship

http://www.news.com.au/business/business-smarts/men-who-earn-less-more-likely-to-cheat/story-e6frfm9r-1225906112849#ixzz0xbiWV300


So Women Are Always the Losers?

It is really rare to see articles about relationship in the "business story" . Is that reminding people that, it is wrong to be less rational and careful than doing business when you are choosing your partner?



The topic is interesting because it seems like to discuss the relationship between income and cheating.

The article is consisting with 2 parts: to discuss the case if women learn more money; and to discuss the general cases.

However, it become bored with just giving the result of study about the other factor which can affect the faith to relationship for women and men.

Thanks so much to this article. As an investment, men are full of risks.

I have no doubt there still are many nice , decent guys who are faithful in this world. However, happiness is something to be given.nothing can be important than To be who you really are.

Anyway, if i was the author, i will add some more deep discussion with some current news or issue.

Is Japan Going to The End of "Miracle Economy"?

http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/business/world-business/japans-export-growth-slow-on-waning-global-demand-20100825-13r3q.html
Japanese economy was a miracle. Although this economy was partially the product of the cold war. In the new era of global economy, Japanese economy is exhausted with the threatens from US, EU and other rising Asian powers.






Japanese Economy Was The First Asian "Miracle Economy"
The Japanese export growth continued to slow down. The title indicated the key information. At the beginning, the author indicated that all the downturn had started since the currency intervention of the US 15 years ago. This background is very important and is the true reason for bubbles. I knew at that time, the author is a person who understood this issue very well and this article was going to be successful.
In order to make this multi-faced story, the author interviewed some very big people, including the chief Japan economist at Morgan Stanley, Finance Minister of Japanese government. These interviews brought some this hard news very powerful explanations to support the title information.


Japanese Quality Vehicles Are Well-Known

In the first part, the author described the current situation of Japan's export growth rate, with analysing the causes and the effects. From currency intervention to the domestic policy making, I was very fulfilled with the information I could get.


The second part of this article was actually about the future prospects. How could the currency intervention continue to influence Japanese economy in the future? Will there be any recovery in Japan's biggest markets overseas ( China and the US)? Is the future of car and electronics export ( the leading export industries) optimistic? The author also showed official figures to support his opinion.