Saturday, October 5, 2019

How do you feel that Native Americans were portrayed in the works of Essay

How do you feel that Native Americans were portrayed in the works of Ben Franklin and John Smith Do the authors treat them in a - Essay Example However, at the same time, he started viewing Native Americans favorably on the same lines as the White Americans, degrading or belittling the Black Americans in some of his writings. In his 1751 essay, â€Å"Observations Concerning the Increase of Mankind,† Franklin wished that America could be for whites and Native Indians only, writing, â€Å"Why increase the Sons of Africa, by Planting them in America, where we have so fair an opportunity, by excluding all Blacks and Tawnys, of increasing the lovely White† (). In addition, Franklin understood the culture of Native Americans and also lobbied to protect them, against any retribution by the majority population. He wrote, â€Å"If an Indian injures me, does it follow that I may revenge that injury on all Indians? ... If it be right to kill men for such a reason, then, should any man with a freckled face and red hair kill a wife or child of mine.† (). Capt. John Smith, an English soldier, explorer and author, was known for establishing the first English settlement in North America in Jamestown, Virginia.

Friday, October 4, 2019

Did Oracle's purchase of Sun Microsystems increase HP's and Dell's Essay

Did Oracle's purchase of Sun Microsystems increase HP's and Dell's interest in 3Par (company). Explain - Essay Example This made it the direct competitor of companies like IBM (which was already its competitor before this acquisition), HP, CISCO and Dell. One of the major benefits of acquiring Sun has been the entry of its Java programming language as well as the Solaris operating system in the possession list of Oracle. This is an important platform for much of Oracle’s work (Goodwin 2009). Oracle has also now entered the hardware segment of the industry. It can now package its software products with Sun’s hardware to help boost sales which is a direct competition to IBM and HP. Dell is also aiming to achieve such integrated solutions for its customers. Sun’s MySQL database has provided further strength to Oracle. This will help the company expand the number of users that utilize Oracle database products. This is true especially from the point of view of entry into the small-to-midsize businesses where it had a significantly low presence (Schiff 2009). With the ownership of Sunà ¢â‚¬â„¢s StarOffice through this acquisition, Oracle can now even attack the laptop/desktop market which will be a direct threat to the MS office application of Microsoft (Schiff 2009).

Thursday, October 3, 2019

Computer Information Specialist Essay Example for Free

Computer Information Specialist Essay Computer Information Specialist, Inc. (CIS) filed a protest of the award of a contract to Open Technology Group, Inc. (OTG). CIS responded to a request for proposals (RFP) No. NLM-030101/SAN by the Department of Health and Human Services for telecommunications support services at the agency’s Bethesda, Maryland facility. The solicitation specified a requirements contract with fixed hourly rates for a base year with four 1-year options. The agency intended to award the contract based on â€Å"best value† with several non-price criteria as the most heavily weighted factors. Proposals were to include fully-loaded, fixed hourly rates for labor categories. The agency received numerous proposals and established a competitive range of four firms after initial evaluation. The range included CIS as well as OTG the eventual awardee. Following the contract award to OTG; CIS underwent an agency debrief and subsequently filed a protest asserting that both its proposal and the proposal of OTG were misevaluated. Issues Agencies are required to evaluate proposals based solely on the evaluation factors identified in the solicitation. Furthermore, according to Federal Acquisition Regulations, they must adequately document the reasons for their evaluation conclusions (FAR § 15.308). GAO recommended to the agency was to, at a minimum reevaluate both proposals to ascertain if they were evaluated based on the evaluation factors and to determine if adequate rationale were articulated. Decisions (Holdings) Anthony H. Gamboa, General Counsel wrote the recommendation. The protest was sustained. Reasoning (Rationale)   GAO concluded that the Department of Health and Human Services misevaluated the proposals of both CIS and OTG, contract awardee. In addition, they found that the agency’s misevaluation was prejudicial to CIS, â€Å"since there is a reasonable possibility that, but for the agency’s errors, CIS might have been selected for award notwithstanding its higher price.† Separate Opinions No dissenting opinion was published with GAO’s decision. Analysis GAO analyzed the proposals from both CIS and OTG against the RFP’s stated evaluation criteria. The Department of Health and Human Services’ source selection team consisted of five evaluators. In the case of the proposal by CIS, the initial evaluation criticized the proposal for not offering personnel that met all of the solicitation minimum personnel experience requirements. CIS revised their proposal to cure this deficiency. In further evaluation, four of the five evaluators scored this area higher than the initial proposal. However, the fifth evaluator scored the proposal dramatically differently. In the first evaluation, only cursory notes were provided to support conclusions. In the second evaluation, most evaluators still provided limited support. However, the fifth evaluator provided comments. Many of the comments were either inaccurate or held not relation to evaluation criteria. With regard to the OTG proposal, GAO determined that the solicitation failed to meet two of the evaluation criteria and should not have been accepted in the competitive range. It was also recommended that the agency terminate the contract awarded to OTG for the convenience of the government and make award to the firm found to be in line for award. Furthermore CIS was to be reimbursed all costs associated with the protest to include legal fees.

Apple Competitive Strategy

Apple Competitive Strategy Apples practices, procedures and policies reflect the differentiation strategy to target the wide range of customers as the overall competitive strategy of the company. The company serves a wide range of differentiated product to the customers ranging from the classy power user to the new first time users. The differentiation is based on unique design, reliable quality and customer services driven by high customer values. The innovation strategy allows the improvements in new product development and development in the existing products. The differentiation strategy provides such innovative products to a wider range of customers. Through the integration of these strategies the company aims to meet the demand evolving in the market. The implementation of unique designing and development of operating system and software has been a source of strong competitive advantage. The company has diversified its market to digital electronics and computer market in addition to personal media player industry as the target market which proves that the strategies of the company are still at evolving stage due to new diversified market. Apples has also entered to the tablet industry through the products such as iPad and mobile industry through the products such as iPhone (Masi, 2009). Question 2: What are the key elements of Apples strategy in computers, personal media players, and Smartphone? Have its strategies in its core businesses yielded success? Explain. Answer: The business strategy of Apple aims to design and develop its own OS, hardware, software applications and services uniquely which facilitates the customers with the innovative and new product solutions having unique features such as easy usage, flawless additions, and innovative designs. The companys strategy of continual improvement and research and development leads to the development of new innovative product which enhances the market position of the company. With the integration of the strategy, the company consistently builds and hosts the dynamic platform for identifying and releasing the third party digital content and its application through various stores of iTunes. This store comprises of the Apps store and iBookstore which helps the users to use and access the third party applications either in MAC or through iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch. The company strategy also includes the expansion of distribution channels so as to enhance its wide customers reach, high quality service s and after sales services to the customers. The company has also uniquely positioned itself as a superior and highly incorporated digital lifestyle and productivity solution provider (APPLE INC FORM 10-K (Annual Report), 2011). Question 3: What does a competitive strength assessment reveal about Apples computer business, as compared to the leaders in the personal computer industry? Use the methodology in Table 4.2 to support your answer. Does it appear that the companys competitive positions in personal media players and Smartphone or stronger or weaker than its position in computers? Answer: Competitive strength assessment of the company reveals following factors as the strength of the company: Highly Differentiated Business Strategy: The company provides highly differentiated product to its wide range of customer in highly diversified market including personal computer, Tablets, mobile, portable media player industry. It also provides highly innovative and new product integrating with its own hardware, software and designs to solve the problems of the customers and meet their demands (Danesi, 2011). Diversified Product Offering: Apple provides its various products in multiple market segments i.e. MP3 players market, PC market, Tablet Market, and other wireless communications market within the digital and consumer electronic industry. Apple is considered as the true innovator in the consumer electronic industry and this has exposed the existing products to gigantic market opportunities (Danesi, 2011). Other strengths: Other strengths of the company as per the advisors and critics are as follows: Apple Hardware Design. Apple Marketing. Leadership. Competitive Advantage (Apples Competitive Advantage, 2004). The market analysis suggest that the Apple stands at 3rd position in the PC market with the market share of 10.6 % while in the mobile market, it stands at second position with 24.2 % of market share. The company holds the share of 78 % in the overall media player market. This reveals that the market share of the company in this industry is much stronger than the personal computer industry (Slivka, 2012) (Keene, 2012) (Macale, 2011) Question 4: Does it make good strategic sense for Apple to be a competitor in the computer, personal media player, Smartphone, and tablet computer industries? Are the value chain activities that Apple performs in computers, personal media players, tablet computers and Smartphone very similar and compatible or are there very important differences from product to product? Which of the four products linescomputers, tablet computers, personal media players, or Smartphonedo you think is most important to Apples future growth and profitability? Why? Answer: The value chain of the Apple Inc suggest that the company is efficiently handling the chain of activities in innovative and design leading to management of all the activities and operations which provides it a great competitive advantage. The procedure at Apple Inc is moved in following manner: As per the market growth and stock report, the iPhone generates 42.1 % of the total revenue for the company while iPad generates 21.8% of the total revenue. Mac Contribution to the total revenue is 18.9 % while iPod contributes for the generation of 7.3% of the revenue and other peripheral services contributes 9.8 % of the revenue. From this data, it is clear that the Smartphone market and revenue share is the highest contributing segment for the company. However equal emphasize should be given to all the other segments also in order to achieve the total competitive advantage (Danesi, 2011). Question 5: What is your assessment of Apple Computers financial performance the past three years? Answer: The above graph depicts that the profitability of the company increases form 25 % to 40 % consecutively from 2006 to 2009. The graph also depicts that the revenue of the company have been increased from 10 billion to 17 billion in due course of time which depicts that the company is continuously growing with the total competitive advantage of the global international market. The ratio analysis suggests that: The current ratio of the company is continuously increasing showing the increase of current assets and decrease in current liabilities with some downturn in the year of 2009. Debt equity ratio remains the same with small fluctuations which shows that the company is balancing effectively between the current liabilities and the shareholders wealth. Efficiency ratio and debtor turnover ratio is continuously increasing with a certain down turn in the year of 2009 which shows that credit sales are going down and cash sales are increasing (Apple Inc). Question 6: What recommendations would you make to allow Apple to strengthen its position in its most important markets? What steps should it take to ensure that the iPad becomes a success in the marketplace and a major contributor to the companys overall performance? Answer: Following recommendations are being recommended for the company in order to strengthen its position in the market: The Ultimate Convergence Device. Modern Medical Device Platform. Environmental and social efforts in partnership. Dual Band GSM/ CDMA iPhone Worldwide. Collaborative Recycling benefits. Capturing Convergence Device Market. iTune Stores eBook Distribution. Implementing First party quality check in OEM Factories. Productive use of unused cash. Continues implementation of expansion strategy. Differentiated Lifestyle Branding. Following strategies are recommended for iPad: Flash player should be added as one of its feature. It should also be comprised of USB and camera. It should be compatible with the iPhone applications. Develop a separate marketing strategy for iPad.

Wednesday, October 2, 2019

Balancing Politics and Pedagogy :: Bilingual Education Classroom Language Essays

Balancing Politics and Pedagogy Thesis: Research over the past thirty years shows conflicting evidence for or against bilingual education leading to a heated debate between educators and politicians with bilingual education becoming a scapegoat for a number of educational issues, perhaps hiding the real causes of Hispanic difficulties from the critics. Proposition 227, the so-called "English for Children" law, abolished thirty years of bilingual education in California in June, 1998, forcing students who are not fluent in English into all-English classes in all subjects all the time. Bilingual education, according to Krashen, is the target of critics who list a number of objections (1). Newspapers and TV are often against bilingual education. They say that bilingual education is not functioning, while students learn English very well without it. They also say that the majority of parents and teachers are not in favor of it. Another argument is that bilingual education is only for Spanish speakers and not for those who have different writing systems. In addition, it is true that there are not enough teachers for bilingual education (1). Furthermore, the dropout rate of Hispanic children in the U.S. is still high even after thirty years of efforts. Research of the past thirty years shows no justification for bilingual education, clai ms Porter (28). However, it may be a fallacy to conclude that bilingual education is not working. Bilingual education has become a scapegoat for a number of educational issues, perhaps hiding the real causes of Hispanic difficulties from the critics. The issue of bilingual education is not new. In fact, its history in the U.S. has vacillated between acceptance and rejection. During the nineteenth century, instruction was given in a wide variety of foreign languages, such as German, Polish, Italian, Dutch or any other language that parents demanded. Between 1897 and 1915, thirteen states changed their policies to requiring English instruction in basic subjects such as math, science, and geography from fears of a so-called "babel of tongues" (Zimmerman 39). By the end of World War I, thirty-seven states had limited foreign language instruction including explicit prohibitions on German in favor of "100 percent Americanism" (39). After the war, public schools became open to a wide range of foreign language instruction; however, in fact, only 20 percent of high school students were taught in any non-English language class by 1949. Immigrant parents, says Zimmerman, wanted their children to learn English as a vehicle of social mobility in America instead of taking courses in their native languages (39).

The Invisible Man by HG Wells :: The Invisible Man HG Wells

The Invisible Man by HG Wells Griffin - Wells goes in great detail about the way Griffin (the Invisible Man) looks and acts. He writes about Griffin's bad temper and his evil scheme of stealing money and food to survive as an invisible man. He makes the character, Griffin, realistic because his emotions, like expressing his anger through shouting, are something people are familiar with. Griffin was quick to anger by the taking of drugs and stimulants. What may have begun as quick temper and impatience turns into violent rage and a wish to commit murder. Griffin's deterioration is self-induced for the most part, but his alienation from his own kind is assisted by other human beings. Fear and superstition follow him, and it seems a defensive mechanism of humans to lash out and destroy the things they fear and do not understand. Griffin had been a brilliant young chemist and researcher, confined and unappreciated as an instructor in a small English college. His brilliance had led him to investigations in physics and the properties of light. It is interesting to observe that as his passion for experimentation and his devotion to pure scientific investigations accelerated. When he required money to advance his experiments in invisibility, he stole it from his father. He finds the possibility to make something invisible. He try's it with a cat and it works. So then he made himself invisible. As an invisible man he could steal, as much he wanted. He is chased by dogs, hunted down in a department store, nearly run over in the streets, and constantly subjected to the discomfort of exposure and he gets lots of head colds. He is a man caught in a trap of his own making. Then, of course, he is betrayed by the only person in whom he placed confidence. Griffin's end is tragic, but it is the culmination of the tragic course he had followed since he first ventured into the unknown terrors of invisibility. Mr. Thomas Marvel - Griffin meets a man named Marvel and wants him to be his servant. He is very scared and does what Griffin expects him to do at first, but when they come to Port Stowe, Marvel tells the barmen at the Jolly Cricketers' pub that the invisible man could be there. Marvel got the money and the diary of the experimental investigator. He has opened an inn, and tells everybody what has happened to him after that time, when there had been an invisible man.

Tuesday, October 1, 2019

Boyz in the Hood Research Proposal

In his 1991 film Boyz N the Hood, director John Singleton crafts a world which defies the limitations of cinema to portray events realistically, depicting South Central Los Angeles in the 1980s and early ‘90's. The portrait of the neighborhood where protagonist Trey grows up is in many ways bleak and unflinching. With a casualty that suggests much about the circumstances that face impoverished black Americans in dangerous urban centers, the director marks the world of young Trey with all the trappings of the ghetto.The familiarity that neighborhood children feel toward violence, weapons and death is not as much stated as illustrated in the film, with altercations, gunfire and fatalities providing the backdrop to life. One is immediately struck by the grittiness of the depiction, with longview shots of streets and alleyways showing the constant state of peril and paranoia which came to ensconce Trey and his friends.The comfort that the director shows in dealing with material tha t has the potential to make viewers squeamish appears as a natural element of the story-telling, with the ugly realities of the film’s world taking on a role of exposition for the decisions of the young men of the neighborhood. â€Å"Singleton, having grown up in the kind of situations depicted in his film, created a world close to his heart and well within his knowledge.Thus the young writer/director followed the most-often-preached rule of storytelling – write what you know. † (Santo, 1) This qualified him uniquely to place his stamp as director on this film. Though the approach of bare-knuckled frankness in the film makes it shocking to watch for those unversed in its content, Singleton is successful at avoiding cliche or sensationalism by way of violence.The narrative is instead moved forward by the desires and experiences of the characters to resist the violence, substance abuse and unemployment that are epidemic around them. The film’s effective exa mination of these themes renders it a suitable primary text for a research examination on the treatment of such subjects in cinema. Works Cited Santo, Jason. (Oct. 31, 2003). Fair Enough Friday: You’re a Hack! MicrocinemaScene. Ret. 4/17/08 .