Descriptive paragraphs

A teacher's way of teaching and leading can have a significant impact on the emotional and mental development of his or her students. As I step into my math class, I see eight students lining up in a row with their hands out in front of them. Mercilessly, the teacher swings his stick at their hands, counting from one to ten. Each time the stick beats down, I can feel as if a nail is hammered into my eardrums. My heart continues to pound as some of the students cries. The mad teacher finishes up with his beatings and yells out, â€Å"Getting 50% and under is unacceptable!The sudden scream from the teacher scares me as my hands squeeze together. â€Å"l am calling each and every single of your parents and letting them know the shame you brought to my class,† he shouts. The day ends with me lying on my bed trying to fall asleep as the crying of my classmates haunts my brain making me uncomfortable. After two hours, I am finally able to get some sleep. Next morning, I feel pain f rom the beatings slowly concentrate on my legs as I suddenly wake up. The dorm supervisor wakes us up with his rod at 6:30 in the morning. While I fold my bed and brush my teeth, the supervisor rushes us and shouts, â€Å"Hurry up!Lazy bums! † We sloppily get ready and Jog to the main school building. Terrified, I step into the classroom and notice that a quarter of the class didn't show up. I wait for the teacher, convincing myself that it won't be the teacher from yesterday. I wait patiently as I hear footsteps approaching the classroom and suddenly, everyone stops chattering. The same teacher walks in. He glared at us with his angry face getting ready to force his lesson on us. The teacher concludes his lousy lecture and five pages of homework. I take out my notebook and start tackling the questions.A student pproaches the infuriated teacher asking for help. miou don't even know how to solve this? † He questions as if he were talking to a three year old. â€Å"Why a re you even in my class? † he mocked. â€Å"l suggest you go back and learn one plus one. † The teacher sends the student away in embarrassment as he returns to his corner. Please don't let any of this happen to me, I pray. The bell rang. I rush outside of the prison and finally was able to relax my muscles. The supervisor picks us up and walks us toward the cafeteria. I had no stomach for food, after all the nasty events that I have witnessed already.I chew on some dry bread as if my life is hopeless. I head outside my classroom, looking at the grim towers of my school. I took a breath of the smoky air as I mentally prepare myself for my next class. With my next class in session, the grumpy teacher walks around scanning us while we write our quiz. There is a lot of pressure because of the thought of getting beaten that lies within my mind. My hands shake as I try to solve these complex questions. The danger of me even making one mistake me tremble as I let go of my pap er into the pile. I wipe off the sweat on my forehead and wait for my quiz mark.With my fingers crossed, the marking is finished. The look on the teacher's face isn't friendly as he walks up to the front of the room. He announces, â€Å"The following student get to the front desk and put your hands out, Sam, Tom, John, Sarah, Jack†¦ † He continues as I beg that he would not call my name. â€Å"Ethan, Justin, and†¦ Tony,† he ends. My heart stops as I think to myself, it's over. I toddle back to the dorm with my hand dreadfully bruised. I lay on my bed thinking about my home and my parents . Tears sta rt rolling down my cheeks as the day ends, along with what little desire I had left to stay.

Psychological Testing Essay

Psychological testing refers to as a field which is characterized by the use of samples of behavior in to the way of generalizations of every given individual. In psychological testing, however, it is usually not possible to control all the extraneous variables, but the metaphor here is a useful one that forces us on the standardized procedures, on the eliminations of conflicting causes on experimental control and on the generation of hypotheses that can be further investigated. Thus, psychological testing a narrower concept referring to the psychometric aspects of a test. The actual administration and scoring of the test and the interpretation made of the scores. Tests Test is define as an objective and standardized measure of a sample of behavior. objectivity is at least a theoretically, most aspects of a test such as how the test is scored and how the score is interpreted, are not a function of the subjective decision of a particular examiner but are based on objective criteria. Standardization: that is, no matter who administers scores and interprets the test, there is uniformity of procedure and a sample behavior. A test is not a psychological X-ray, nor does it necessarily reveal hidden conflicts and for-bidden wishes; it is a sample of a person’s behavior, hopefully a representative sample from which we can draw some inferences and hypotheses. Tests are used for a wide variety of purposes that can be subsumed under more general categories. These categories include classification, self-understanding, program evaluation and scientific inquiry. (Kline, 2000). Major Categories of Tests Classification  Classification involves a decision that a particular person belongs in a certain category, For example, based on test results we may assign a diagnosis to a patient, place a student in the introductory Spanish course rather than the intermediate or advanced course, or certify that a person has met the minimal qualifications to practice medicine. Self-understanding Self-understanding involves using test information as a source of information about oneself. Such information may already be available to the individuals, but not in a formal way. For example, a student studying electrical engineering her high GRE scores confirm what she already knows, that she has the potential abilities required for graduate work. Program evaluation Program evaluation involves the use of tests to assess the effectiveness of a particular program or course of action. You have probably seen in the newspaper, tables indicating the average achievement test scores for various schools in your geographical area, with the scores often taken, perhaps incorrectly as evidence of the competency level of a particular school. Program offered by a mental health clinic, or the effectiveness of a new medication. Scientific inquiry If you glance through most professional journals in the social and behavioral sciences, you will find that a large majority of studies use psychological tests to operationally define relevant variables and to translate hypotheses into numerical statements that can be assessed statistically. (Kline, 2000). Major Users and Uses of these Tests  Tests are tools usually used by professionals to make what may possibly be some serious decisions about a client: thus both test and the decision process involves a variety of ethical considerations to make sure that the decisions made are in the best interest of all concerned and that the process is carried out in a professional manner. There are serious concerns on the part of both psychologists and lay people, a about the nature of psychological testing and its potential misuse, as well as demands for increased use of tests. Kline, 2000). Concepts of Reliability and Validity The word reliability refers to the extent that a measure is relatively free or random error and is consistent in the numbers assigned to objects or events while validity refers to whether the number obtained truly reflects what the user intended to measure. Therefore, validity requires reliability because validity is not a property of the measure, but instead it is to the truthfulness of the inferences that are drawn from the measure. However, a concept of reliability usually gives the accuracy of a measurement, while the concepts of validity it relates to the truthfulness of a measurement. The concepts of reliability and validity can be explain as when estimating parameters from some data with statistical methods, it is important to understand the uncertainty of parameters. The uncertainty comes from two sources: sampling and measuring the study units. Often the data is a (random) sample from a population. (Hoshmand, 1994). The first error then comes from collecting the data and generalizing the results to a population level. Another source of error is present when measuring the study units when assessing the quality of the collected and measured data set, we end up with questions: Are we measuring the right thing? How accurate our measurements are? The former question leads us to the concept of validity which is the most important property of measurement. The latter question is related to the concept of reliability. The concept of reliability and validity has a major impact in the field of psychological testing. this is because that since generalizability theory is for investigating and designing the reliable observations, thus, each has test score, a single true score, single reliability and validity coefficient and belong to one family of parallel observations, but the generalizability theory which serves both may produce error which is due to multiple scores. (Rush, First, & Blacker, 2008).

Philosophy Plato Essay

A way of life not just a specialised and technical activity in about 387 BC, he attended The Academy  ­ lasted for a 1000 yrs. Socrates was only interested in  ­ ethics. While Plato was interested in  ­ ethics, metaphysics, politics, aesthetics, Mathematics Plato’s Allegory (story in which there is a fact & a true story) of the Cave Plato asks ; â€Å"What would happen if one of these prisoners were released from his chains, were forced to stand up, turn around (conversion) and walk with his eyes lifted up towards the light?† Eventually, he would be able to see the real object for and in itself ;  ­Lifting his eyes upward, he would find it easier to look at the stars at night Finally, he would look right at the SUN in its Natural position in the sky and ;  ­ Not at its Reflections from or through anything else How would the liberated prisoner feel about his previous life in the cave?  ­ He would recall what his fellow prisoners and himself took to be Wisdom.  ­ He would recall how they used to give prizes to the one who had the sharpest eye for assign shadows and the best memory for the order in which the shadows followed each other. â€Å"If they could lay hands on the man who was trying to set them free and lead them up, they would kill him†. The implications of the Allegory ; Many people dwell in the Darkness of the cave †¦ They have oriented their thoughts around the blurred world of Shadows †¦ Education  ­ leads people out of the cave of Darkness into the world of light. (Education means  ­ to bring out. (of the cave) ). Just as the prisoner had to turn his Whole Body around so that his eyes could see the light instead of the darkness. It is also necessary for the entire should to turn away from the deceptive world of change and appetite that causes blindness in the should. Education according to Plato is ; A matter of Conversion  ­ A complete turning around from the world of Appearance to the world of reality. † The conversion of the soul is not to put the power of sight in the soul’s eye, which already has it, but to insure that, instead of looking in the wrong direction, it is turned the way it ought to be†. Plato’s rejection for the sophist’ skepticism ; The dark world of the cave ( particular  ­ many  ­ change  ­ finite) , Vs the bright world of light ( light is knowledge for plato  ­ sun  ­ absolute  ­ one  ­ permanent / changeless  ­ infinity). Dramatic contrast between; 1) shadows > 2) reflections > 3) The actual objects (ultimate knowledge) (process of education ^) With the Sophists, Plato and Socrates agree that knowledge derived from Sense experience is Relative, but he maintains that ; Not all knowledge is relative  ­ therefore, Absolutism Plato’s Divided Line ; (top 2  ­ The world of thought  ­ changeless) (bottom 2  ­ The world of Opinion  ­ change) (The line that divides every stage is not equal, meaning that it is more difficult to reach from level 3 to level 4 than from level 1 to level 2). (Outside the Cave) (Objects of knowledge)

Researching Educational Leadership Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Researching Educational Leadership - Assignment Example The Falk article draws data from a dozen vocational education programs and training sites throughout Australia. The facilities are known as vocational education and training sites. (VET) the accumulated data is derived from a series of 44 written surveys including interview responses. Five focus groups were also included from the various facilities around Australia, resulting in a total of 64 respondents to the questionnaires. In essence the data paints a picture of a four stage cyclical process, a process of leadership interventions which is characteristic of greater effectiveness. The cyclical process culminates with a leadership style that is enabling for the teacher leader and of the achievements of professional associates. Every individual, including teaching professionals possess their own unique traits, strengths, and personal aptitudes. Among these personal abilities natural leadership qualities can and will emerge in virtually any professional setting. The Falk study identif ies the necessary role of these individual capabilities, and their contribution to the classroom setting. But it also illustrates a higher-level process of leadership that exists within the organization and which is defined by the cyclical process of the leadership intervention cycle. The key issues involved in this particular study hinge upon a question of whether or not the organization will have better overall direction with many individuals that display leadership qualities, or whether a single over all leader/administrator has more of an influence upon the success of the organization. The collective skills of individual teachers according to the study, are not sufficient to explain the overall culture of enabling leadership. A healthy organization, in which leadership principles are nurtured and developed will accrue a form of social capital, this can be instrumental in easing management burdens as well as facilitating diplomacy within the organization. Within a school district , as with other hierarchies often there can be tensions between the demands for efficient leadership as it pertains to risk management, as well as the necessary drive towards innovation, as it pertains to superior efficiency, and the vigorous fulfillment of the organization's mission statement. Thus, an over arching mediator becomes the crucial link in the chain that connects the resources of leadership as they exist on the individual level, amongst teachers themselves. Within the healthy organization this is required to achieve a synergistic effect that provides leadership, and improves the quality of lower – tiered leadership for the institution. This of course, raises questions about the potential of leadership training. Additional professional development to facilitate training of the institution as a whole in some cases can provide more effective leadership for the organization from a top-down perspective, as well as strengthening leadership potential amongst individuals within the organization. The benchmark establishment of professional goals for the school or institution can assist in this process. Q2 Many researchers in this field will cite a community of inquiry model, as core to their theoretical framework (COI). This model comes in many shapes and sizes, with a considerable breadth of information therein.

Effects of Taiping rebellion Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Effects of Taiping rebellion - Research Paper Example In addition to actual deaths, the rebellion disrupted the lives of many Chinese people, especially the peasants. In the heightened euphoria of the war, they abandoned their farms and joined in the campaign against the ruling dynasty. Some got displaced from their farms as the revolt intensified. The Taipings also wreaked havoc wherever they went, destroying infrastructure and especially irrigation canals that were vital in sustaining agricultural production. As a result, famine struck the nation since neither labor nor agricultural infrastructure could sustain food production. Poverty, which had already affected the Chinese due to opium consumption and the Opium War some years, was accentuated by these conditions since the peasants had nothing to sell to earn income. Another immediate effect of the Taiping uprising was the fundamental change in the Chinese people’s way of thinking. This is because the Taipings adopted beliefs derived from a version of Christianity. The people were swept by the widespread propaganda of a heavenly kingdom. The Taipings made the Chinese people to discard their past beliefs in Confucianism and instead adopt beliefs from a derivative of Christianity. The Taiping rebellion also raised a nationalist force among large factions of China’s society. It fuelled the bitterness and animosity that many people had towards Manchu’s rule and the entire Qing dynasty. Therefore, the insurgence was instrumental in promoting nationalist spirit amongst Chinese people. Lastly, perpetrators and supporters of the Taiping uprising had political objectives that they intended to execute once they had established their utopian society. For instance, they aspired to bring exploitative practices characteristic of the Qing Dynasty to an end, by implementing military, political, social and economic reforms. They achieved this, albeit to a limited extent. The Taipings also altered the content of the exam that qualified candidates for the Mandarin gentry. The exam that was previously based on Confucian principles was changed to one founded in the Bible.6 The Taiping administration abolished the right to ownership of private property, declaring that all land would be allocated to the public by the government. The Taipings even replaced the lunar calendar with a solar one and granted women equal rights, making it possible for them to even take exams for admission to the gentry. The Taipings banned the Chinese custom of foot binding, in addition to gambling, opiu m, tobacco, prostitution, polygamy, alcohol consumption

Mischeif and miscarriage in the criminal justice process Assignment

Mischeif and miscarriage in the criminal justice process - Assignment Example 397). Nevertheless, the advancement in the legal practice and in the administration of public affairs makes it possible to have criminals released from confinement allowed the freedom to participate in their social and economic lives without much deterrence. Such a process is sustainable on the basis that such persons are given corrective services while in their homes or with the society (Cohen 2002; p. 41)1. Prisons have served as a useful institution of isolation of criminals. It is however useful to have criminals effectively observed because they are in a different state of social cognition characterized by many altered feelings about social order, governance and public life. Prisons have ceased to deliver their corrective capacity as a result of the challenges in the economy today and therefore better methods should be gradually tested and ratified that will ensure more of the criminals are free in the society and are engaged into more meaningful work. Supervision in the community will offer the best option for correction due to the fact that there are technologies to monitor or aid the monitoring of criminals and that may assist in their correction. The community approach will also create an environment for the other civilian to be familiar with the restrictions that are attached to criminal activity and hence facilitate psychological adjustment and abhorrence for crime. The condition that crime must be established beyond and reasonable doubt in a litigation process is a very high bar to attain in many litigation processes. Due to these high standards, it is meaningful that the program is obtained that will manage the loopholes for which many criminal have evaded justice through the criminal justice system (Ramsey, Latessa, & Travis 2003; p. 3). Suffice it to mention therefore, governments should seek to collaborate widely with many institutions in the process of administering justice. In the United States, the Megan’s law was

THE EARLY REPUBLIC Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

THE EARLY REPUBLIC - Essay Example Then there was the end of the war, and finally the Revolution with everything being left for the citizens to control1. Our struggles eventually bore fruits. Thereafter, several things changed in terms of the economic, social and political lives of our people; not just considerably but immensely. For a start, we now have our social freedom with us, something that was barely evident in the times of the colonial government. The peaceful coexistence evident between the natives was not something to talk about. Instead, there were colonially steered wrangles with the colonial government engineering wars between different kinsmen all to their benefit. Living together as a family without worries of being summoned to join the military is yet another achievement we cannot underestimate. Indigenous warriors would go as far as Fort Duquesne leaving behind wives and children in desolation. The social recognition the citizens enjoy right now is yet another achievement that cannot be taken for granted. To the colonialists, we were just elements of war and bridges to their unending endeavors. Secondly, we now have a grip of our economy; something that was beyond our reach back then. This very land we cultivate testifies to that. We can bravely produce our food crops without having to work on the British plantations. Most importantly, we now have land titles as opposed to the temporary land ownership that the colonialists bequeathed as after successful conquests. They would later come back to drive out the natives through devastating raids. The flourishing trade our kinsmen enjoy locally and beyond the regional borders is yet another dream come true. Back then, most Ohioans who ventured in business were small scale shopkeepers who only supplied local products. Moreover, we can boast of political freedom at this particular moment; one of the

Troubleshooting electric circuits Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Troubleshooting electric circuits - Essay Example As part of the pre-qualifying parameters, it is significant to identify the defected system, whether it is electrical or mechanical. This should be followed by a thorough analysis of the fault found in the identified system. Carrying out the troubleshooting steps would then follow for repairs. These techniques would make the troubleshooting a lot faster. In the scope of troubleshooting an electrical circuit, it is likewise of utmost importance to identify the controls and loads, clearly understand the sequence of the operation in a system, and the mastery of the basic circuit theory which will help in the analysis of the individual components at hand. To make the troubleshooting more systematic, I should look at the problem from a smaller view to a larger view which will project the picture as a whole. To carry the troubleshooting process effectively, I would extensively utilize the three important measuring devices: ohmmeter, voltmeter and ammeter. Nevertheless, these would not be e nough without having a view of the backbone of the system. This can be addressed by using schematic diagrams, electrical wiring diagram (EWD) and test lights. What should I do if the problem remains undetected after exhausting all the troubleshooting process? The answer depends on you

Education Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Education - Essay Example As such, the shareholders within the university system can bolster the extent to which they can engage with prospective students by applying management concepts to the way in which a defined and effective strategy can be engaged. For instance, when a strategy is put together by a group of shareholders who are not in constant communication with one another and are aware of the ultimate goal that is to be effected, a type of non specific result that does not maximize potential is almost guaranteed. However, when shareholders are brought together and the goals are clearly defined and elaborated, a type of group collaboration between all of the elements seeking to increase student attraction within the university is greatly enhanced. For this reason, understanding management concepts and the means by which collective work can be accomplished under the guiding rubric of effective management can expressly enhance the rate and effectiveness of key business level decisions. How do you think planning in today’s organizations compares to planning 25 years ago? Do you think planning become s more important or less important in a world where everything is changing fast and crises are a regular part of organization life ? Why? With regards to 25 years ago, planning has become much more integrated into the business process. For instance, 25 years ago, the rate of change that a given organization or business might experience was somewhat limited. Due to this fact, the need to expert planning was necessarily reduced as a result of the relatively slower pace that external change was exhibited within the operational environment. With regards to the importance of planning now as compared to previously, it is the strong belief of this author that the need for planning has become even stronger in a world where sudden and unexpected change can rapidly redefine the operational environment. The main reason for this is due to the fact that only through planning can the firm or e ntity hope to gain a competitive advantage and seek to anticipate some of the changes that might be upcoming in the very near future. Though one might be tempted to believe that since change is so rapid and unexpected within the current model that planning is non necessitated, the fact of the matter is that the rapid level of change implores the entity or organization to take an even more aggressive approach to planning than an environment in which change occurs slowly and gradually. For this reason, integrating an appropriate level of planning at each and every level of an organization is a primary function that can help to determine whether or not the entity will be able to survive the changes that it must integrate with. Chapter 8: Analyze three decisions you made over the past six months. Which of these were programmed and which were nonprogrammer? Which model- the classical, administrative, or political- best describes the approach you took to make each decision? The three deci sions that have been chosen for analysis within the context of this particular question are as follows: locating and renting an apartment, deciding upon what course selection would maximize efficiency, and considering picking up a minor field of study while in university. As such, all of these decisions which will be analyzed represent non-programmed choices

YOUR CHOICE Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

YOUR CHOICE - Essay Example The total amount of survey replies was used to minimize deviation. The methods of examination and analysis allow for an understanding of the averages and deviations associated with the deliverables, as will be further defined and shared within the research domain. In total, the survey and computer-assisted questionnaire objective is to define the statistics and deviations associated with the occupation and make recommendations for further investigation and possible solutions This analysis of overall job satisfaction rating will allow the research team to quantify the employees mental state and occupational desires by pointing to the positive and negative connotations. Understanding overall job satisfaction is important to gauge the satisfaction of an occupation as described: Job satisfaction is a combination of cognitive and affective contentment for an individual within a company. Affective satisfaction is that founded on an overall positive emotional assessment of the employee’s job. This satisfaction focuses on their mood when working; i.e., whether the job evokes a good mood and positive feelings while working. (Reudaver et al p 793. 2002) The benefit to AIU is to gain a quantitative analysis of employee satisfaction in general and attitudes toward their work environment, allowing AIU to provide a national consideration for employee mental welfare. The questionnaire for overall job satisfaction was based on a scoring system of 1-7, with 1 being the lowest satisfaction and 7 being the highest on 155 points of data collected with the results for each employee organized in Graph 1.0: The data analysis was performed using Excel with the results in Table 1.0. The mean is 4.39, significant of the average score of satisfaction. The median score was 4.6, which is the number in the middle of data organized from lowest score to highest score. The mode character 5.8 is the largest

There Is a Fine Line Between Reality and Illusion Essay Example for Free

There Is a Fine Line Between Reality and Illusion Essay How can we distinguish between reality and illusion? Is reality an illusion, or is an illusion simply reality? Albert Einstein once stated that ‘reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one’. The statement suggests that what we interpret to be real may well be an illusion and this is evidenced mainly through dreams and aspirations. For example if someone has dreamt of one day being a doctor their reality, which is described as the state of things that actually exist, shifts or changes in order for that idea to become real. Reality is tangible while illusion is a faculty or activity of imagination. What may be reality for one person may be an illusion for another and this is clearly evidenced through many situations that we as individuals face. What is real is often clouded by the concept of illusion for example the idea of what is glamorous, the difference between what is beautiful and what is real is distort by the media and its false interpretations. However it is not only the media that can distort reality from illusion, the virtual world of computer games and Internet socializing has revolutionized the Nintendo 64 and the plain old phone call. We are now able to find solace inside the world of an Avatar or pet puppy that our parents never let us bring home, and instead of having real friends we can have as many as one thousand without even meeting them. Our emotions and mental state also contribute to the way in which we interpret our reality; it has proven to be a major impact of how we see things and importantly how we react to it. The reality of today is what Einstein most famously predicted, that we as individuals sometimes find it difficult to interpret the real world from illusion. It may often occur that an individual chooses to disregard what is real and accepts their illusions. This can be portrayed when we are faced with a really dismal time in our lives and in order to cope we convince ourselves that one-day it will change, as T. S Elliot suggested ‘humankind cannot bear too much reality’. Blanche DuBois from ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’ has a similar reaction to her reality. Her reality is that she has lost the love of her life to suicide, no longer remains a teacher and does not own any assets as she has lost the property known as Belle Reve. In order to endure her life Blanche rejects her reality and manipulates it with lies, makeup and lighting in order to hide from the truth. ‘I don’t want realism I want magic’, Blanche desires for a life of pure happiness and excitement, however her imagination is indistinguishable from her reality and the series of lies and dimmed lights soon begin to fade as she is met with Stanley Kowalski. Stanley Kowalski, a brutish and arrogant realist finds it difficult to understand Blanche’s reality. Unlike Blanche, Stanley needs reassurance that what he knows is perfectly real and reliable. In the play the two characters continuously disagree with each other and eventually Stanley’s animalistic behavior threatens Blanche’s safety. Blanche and Stanley are a great example of how one individual’s reality is different to another’s, these conflicting ideas and perceptions of life occur often between people and have been proven to cause disagreement. People around us have great influence of how we perceive things although there are other major influences that contribute to our perceptions for instance the media. The media has brought forward many deceiving images of models and famous Hollywood stars. These images of super skinny models with perfectly shaped bodies and teeth are portrayed to convince the audience that what we see is not only real, but also normal. We are lead to believe that if we wear special stockings that our fat will magically disappear, but who said that fat was ever ugly? No one just decided one day that a little cellulite was atrocious; it is the media that guides and influences our perception over what is socially acceptable. The Hollywood stars of today seem almost out of this world if you like, for example Lindsay Lohan who appears to have a ‘perfect’ and glamorous life is forced to steal a necklace, so how perfect is her life? Each time a magazine reports Charley Sean drunk and causing a public nuisance the world is captivated by his actions. Why is it that we find other peoples realities so fascinating? And why is it that we enjoy the escapism of entering the life of another? The twenty-first century has allowed Internet gaming to create fictional characters such as an Avatar to represent the virtual life of an individual gamer. Amy Taylor, 28, whose online avatar alter ego is named Laura Skye, divorced her husband because of his betrayal to her in the online game known as Second Life. She claims ‘it may have started online, but it existed entirely in the real world and it hurts just as much’, the online virtual world of gaming caused such an influence over Amy Taylor and her husband’s life that real life and the game were clouded. Reality and illusion in this case seems bewildered. Our emotions are a major influence over the way we interpret life, when one is in a state of depression, your reality is surrounded by negative energy and therefore it is influenced by our state of mind at that present time. In my personal experience I have witnessed the life of depression through a family member and often their reality is surrounded by the boundaries of fear and anxiety, and nothing can develop beyond those walls, happiness seems a mile away. Similarly Stella Kowalski’s love for Stanley has a major influence over her life and what she perceives to be real. It appears that she is blinded by their lustful relationship and can see no faults in his brutish behavior. Stella undoubtedly chooses Stanley’s reality over Blanche’s and this is evidenced in the ending scene of the play where she allows her sister to be taken away even after the suspicion of Stanley abusing her. Behavior like this is also conveyed in everyday situations where woman who have been viciously abused and beaten remain with their partners because of fear that they will be alone. Stella finds Stanley to be a safe haven; she ran away from her life in the South to a life in a one-bedroom apartment in New Orleans and despite the diversity between the different lifestyles, she much prefers her life with Stanley. It is clear that her love for Stanley is great, and that regardless of his behavior she finds solace within his presence. The difference between reality and illusion can sometimes be unclear due to factors such as the media, our emotions and also our state of mind. Reality is not a fixed idea and in the end is controlled by the individual; there are aspects that manipulate reality however it is solely in the individuals view to separate the conflicting worlds of reality and illusion.

Three Different Types of Transition Essay Example for Free

Three Different Types of Transition Essay Transitions in life are a fundamental part of development in children and young people. From an early age a child will experience some form of transition, and how well they deal with these changes as they are growing up will be depend on their stage of development, their confidence and the support and positive relationships they may have. The affects of transitions vary from child to child, so it is important to consider them on an individual basis. That said, it is possible to gain an idea of how a childs social development may be influenced by a range of changes and the type of transition must firstly be considered. Emotional for example bereavement, the divorce or separation of parents Many children will have experienced warm, consistent, predictable care and will see adults as reliable, supportive and caring. But when there is a major change within the family unit such as parents separating or divorcing, it can have such an impact on the parents that the childrens emotions may be forgotten. This can have a traumatic affect on them and its likely that a childs emotional development will be affected. They may start to misbehave at home and/or at school to seek attention or become shy and withdrawn and lose confidence. It may cause a long-term problem as some children may find it difficult to form trusting relationships with adults. Physical for example moving to a new home or class room From something as simple as moving on to a new activity within the classroom to moving to a new home, a child or young person may find physical transition traumatic and unsettling and may affect their development. If for example a child is progressing with age to a new school or moving to the next year group within the same school, the transition may have positive effects as they wont be making the changes alone, they will be with their friends. They will be able to see their old friends in the new environment and the transition will seem a lot less daunting and they will feel comfortable of their new surroundings more quickly. However, if the move is to a new school where they are making the transition on their own where they wont know anybody they could become shy and withdrawn. They may not want to join in any of the activities and be socially awkward. Intellectual for example moving from nursery to school, primary school to secondary school, secondary school to college or college to university Some children are unable cope with intellectual transition even if there are some familiarities such as still seeing their old friends. Progressing from primary school to secondary school or secondary school to college may be difficult for some children and young people to cope with. After having familiar surroundings of the same classroom and teacher for a year it suddenly all changes and may cause some children to panic. They may become shy and withdrawn or start to exhibit antisocial behaviour. Whatever the change or transition is, children should be given the opportunity to talk about what is going on, what is happening and how they are feeling. In some situations it can be discussed prior to the event, such as moving class or moving up a year. Giving children and young people the warning of what the change will entail and the opportunity for them to ask questions can reduce the harmful effects the change or transition may have on their development. In some cases, such as bereavement, talking with the child or young person prior to the event may not be possible. However, the opportunity for them to discuss what has happened and how they are feeling should still be given. It is important that all children and young people have positive relationships during periods of transition.

The Disposable Camera

The Disposable Camera The Disposable Camera Brief This report aims to explain and understand the fundamental workings behind the popular and revolutionary disposable camera. The connection between the Lens and the Film will have most emphasis and explanation where appropriate. This will be achieved by a physical dismantling and any online information available. Introduction Photography is undoubtedly one of the most important inventions in history. It has enabled people to capture and cherish moments in time and preserve them for years to come. During its developing life the disposable camera has become inexpensive to manufacture, and thus cheap to the consumer compared with other more ‘user adjustable opposites. The basic technology, first conceived in 1814, is fairly simple. It requires 3 standard elements; an optical element (the lens), a chemical element (the film) and a mechanical element (the camera body). It is the manufacture and assembly of these parts that create a precise image of what we see before us. The basic overview of the device Disposable cameras are all manufactured in the same manor; not to allow removal and reloading of the film. Instead, these single-use cameras are built around the film, with the main process of rolling it from one side of the camera to the other without a protective casing. When the user is ready to take a picture, they â€Å"point and shoot† at the desired subject and press the shutter release button. This button activates a spring-loaded piece of plastic that flicks open for a pre-defined length of time. The length of time is usually defined by the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO); this is commonly regarded too as the â€Å"shutter† or â€Å"ISO† speed. The, now open shutter makes an impression on the film. All cameras work with the process of light thus the inside of a disposable camera must be very dark. The light that entered the camera is focused and captured on a portion of the photosensitive film, creating a photo image. This printed film is then advanced into the container on the right to stop any more light from continuing to expose the film. As this happens a new section of the film is moved into position. Once the film has been exposed, the physical camera body is no longer needed. To get the photos of the film it needs to be taken to a professional developer; here, the film is removed and developed (usually in a professional darkroom or in a commercial photo developing machine). The developed photos are then collected by the photographer while the casing is discarded or recycled. The FujiFilm 35mm Disposable Camera Under exposed photos have always been a criticism of disposable cameras, where not enough light is gathered through the pre-defined shutter mechanism. To combat this, the FujiFilm 35mm has a built in flash. To activate the flash, a little flap on the front of the camera has to be pulled up, See Fig.01. This flap connects a metal strip inside the camera to the circuit board causing a charge to flow. This moves electrical energy from the pre-installed battery to the transistor ready for the shutter release to be activated. As the user presses the shutter release button, the charged transistor releases its energy to the flash causing light. However, this only happens if the red LED is lit on the top of the camera (indicating the flash is fully charged and ready to use). The flash is usually in sync with the shutter to â€Å"Freeze† the image. The process in which the chemical film is pulled the correct distance for use with a new image is controlled by a series of gears on the top right of the camera. As the user turns the top right gear, the white gear (Fig.06) is pulled by the holes in the film; this pulls another gear until it reaches a â€Å"stop† position. This is how the camera knows when a new section of film is ready for exposure, also releasing the shutter button for the user to take another photo. Simply, the film that the light image is produced upon is useless on its own. It is actually the chemicals that are on the film that react to the input light to cause the end photo result. The chemicals on the film are Silver Halide salts which are bonded by gelatine. The variable crystal size determines the sensitivity, contrast and resolution on the film. The shutter mechanism is possibly one of the most important processes the camera must undertake through the capture process. Within the FujiFilm 35mm is relies highly on the springs to operate the removal of the shutter from the lens. As the user presses the shutter the white arm is released pushing a flap connected to the shutter. This pushes the shutter away from the lens, while the spring relocates it into the correct position. See Fig.07. At the same time the two circuit strips are connected, Fig.08. The Lens The optical element is an essential part to any camera as it angles the light entering the device into a standard that the camera can read. At its simplest, a lens is just a curved piece of glass or plastic, which can slow down and angle the light to redirect it into a â€Å"real image† what is in front of the lens. This make/model of camera incorporates a fixed lens; this basically means that the lens is not customisable by the user. In terms of taking a photo; an object cannot be focused upon if its too close to the camera. The process of taking a picture can be explained very easily. As light travels into a denser medium, at an angle, it changes speed; as glass and plastic are denser materials than air, the light slows down as it enters the camera. Due to the light hitting the medium at an angle, some of the light will slow down before the rest, causing a resultant change in angle. This is commonly referred to as â€Å"Refraction†. Put simply, imagine you are swimming through water; eventually you reach a patch of oil at an angle. The side of your body that hits the oil first will slow down while the opposite side will keep the same potential energy and momentum as before, thus causing a change in direction. In a standard converging or â€Å"Convex† lens, the glass curves out (away from the camera body). This makes the light bend towards the centre of the lens on entry. Effectively, this reverses the image horizontally. (Fig.09) A standard disposable camera gives a minimum distance from the â€Å"real image†. This is its focal range. Anything below the given distance will be processed blurry as the lens cannot refract the light enough to focus on the film. The amount the light is angled on entry is proportional to the structure and curvature of the attached lens. (Fig.10). Standard compact disposable cameras have an aperture (size of the shutter hole) in the range of f/11 to allow the image to be in focus from 4 feet to infinity. The standard lens used in cameras today is most commonly manufactured from a single moulded plastic sheet and mechanically pressed into the camera. Camera Recycling With the government clamping down on waste due to over consumption and the lack of re-using acceptable products, many companies now recycle disposable cameras. There are two options currently available; the first is to re-load the film and replace the original battery to brand new ones. The second is to send of the plastic parts, which are all fully recyclable, off to be remade into something else. Conclusions The disposable camera has become cheap, user friendly, inexpensive to manufacture and a brilliant way to capture images in time. Through many years of development, they have become smaller and more manageable becoming the device we all could not live without today. Although, by making it increasingly smaller and compact, its now fairly complex and contains a large number of parts, increasing the overall sale price. As a result, manufacture and assembly of the components would be very time consuming. The time has come for a completely robotic production and possibly a compact disposable camera that has the ability to place your SD card into and remove once the camera has been used. Bibliography 1. Overview of how the camera works http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/camera.htm 2. Camera electronics http://www.howstuffworks.com/framed.htm?parent=camera-flash.htmurl=http://www.exo.net/~pauld/activities/camera_electronics.html 3. History of the Camera http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_camera 4. What is photographic film? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photographic_film 5. Manufacture of a disposable camera http://www.ehow.com/how-does_4925657_how-disposable-camera-manufactured.html

My Philosophy of Education Essay -- Teaching Careers Teachers Essays

My Philosophy of Education There are all different kinds of students and each of them deserve the chance at a fulfilling education that improves their self - esteem and self - efficiency in the world. Every child deserves a teacher that is fair and understanding of the different ability levels of each student in their classroom. This is my philosophy of education. In preparing to become a teacher who truly tries to understand the vast differences between children, I want to address the nature of students, the nature of knowledge, the purposes of public education, the methods of teaching, and the curriculum area that I am studying. First, I believe Rousseau?s theory of people being born with a blank slate. Children are not good or bad by nature. They are brought up in different households by different groups of people. I have noticed in my observing that there are shy children, rambunctious, leaders, followers, those who do neither they just play by themselves, the ones that talk all the time and those who only speak when they are called upon. These characteristics are not determined always at birth they are learned behavior. Some children are not allowed to talk at home unless they are spoken to, and you can tell when a child does not get much attention at home because they crave your attention in school. But, above all, children want to learn. When children enter elementary school, most of them are so open and creative, and these students need a teacher who will use that openness to keep that child interested in school. Secondly, the nature of knowledge. I believe that knowledge is relative and absolute. There are some people who can learn from experience and others that need to learn from memorization. I be... ...mentary school. And finally, I would have never passed literature in high school or college without learning what character, setting, and plot were in elementary school. The basics have never really changed since the beginning of public education and the time of reading, writing, and arithmetic. Teaching is probably the most important field a person could ever go into. I hope that I am a teacher who will not only benefit the overall education of the students who come into my classroom and make them better students, but that I will benefit and learn from each one of those students so that I can become a better person and teacher. With all the different types of students in the world, there is not one way to teach. I hope that I can learn to adapt myself to meet the educational needs of every student. If I did not do that, what kind of a teacher would I be?

Connecting McCarthyism and The Crucible Essay -- Literary Analysis, Hi

The horrors of history are passed on from generation to generation in hopes that they will never occur again. People look back on these times and are appalled at how horrendous the times were; yet, in the 1950s, history repeated itself. During this time, Joseph McCarthy, a United States senator from Wisconsin, began accusing people of being communists or communist sympathizers, which is parallel to the Salem witch trials in the late 1690s when innocent people were accused of practicing witchcraft. One of the people McCarthy accused was author and playwright Arthur Miller. To express his outrage at McCarthy’s actions, miller wrote The Crucible, intentionally drawing similarities between the McCarthy hearings and the Salem witch trials. Miller directly targets McCarthy through the character Abigail Williams in The Crucible. Abigail is portrayed as a sneaky, manipulative girl, not unlike McCarthy. Abigail desperately yearned for John Proctor, begging him to â€Å"give [her] a word†¦a soft word,† but when John pushed her away and told her â€Å"that’s done with,† Abigail felt that the only way she could have John to herself was to accuse his wife, Elizabeth Proctor, of practicing witchcraft (Miller 1246). Although Abigail had no evidence that the people she accused were practicing witchcraft, the court took her accusations seriously because Abigail had credibility. Abigail accused Tituba of witchery, and when Tituba confessed that she had, in fact, conversed with the devil, it proved to the townspeople that Abigail had told the truth (1262). Similarly, McCarthy accused innocent people of being communists in order to get what he wanted: popularity in the political race for reelection for sena tor of Wisconsin (â€Å"Persecution† 1). McCarthy gaine... ...eb. 27 Dec. 2011. . "McCarthyism: The Aftermath." Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, Massachusetts. Web. 29 Dec. 2011. . Miller, Arthur. The Crucible. Prentice Hall Literature: Timeless Voices, Timeless Themes. Kate Kinsella, et. Al, New Jersey: Pearson Education, 2002. 1233-1334. Print. "Persecution." Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, Massachusetts. Web. 29 Dec. 2011. . "The Red Scare: McCarthyism." Essortment Articles: Free Online Articles on Health, Science, Education & More... Web. 29 Dec. 2011. . "Whittaker Chambers." Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Web. 29 Dec. 2011. .

Organs and Organ Systems to Organelles :: essays papers

Organs and Organ Systems to Organelles The human body consists of many different organs and organ systems, which are made up of billions of cells. Inside these cells there are à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“tiny organsà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬,or organelles. These organelles act in many ways like the organs and systems of the body. To better understand the relationship between them, I am going to compare and contrast their differences and their similarities. The brain is the control center of the human body. It sends and receives messages to the rest of the body. The brain is made up of many different parts, and each part has its own job. The nucleus of a cell is very similar to the brain because it is the control center of the cell. It too sends and receives messages, only throughout the cell. The nucleus is made up of many other parts, which have all have special jobs also. The brain and nucleus are alike in several ways, but contrast in one primary area. The brain sends messages by neurons and electric impulses, while the nucleus does it by means of messenger RNA. The body has a shape that is contributed to by the muscular and skeletal systems. Bones provide the body with framework, and the muscles allow movement. The cell has similar organelles, the cytoplasm and the microtubules, which provide the cell with form. The microtubules are tube-like structures that act like bones do in humans, they give shape and support to the cell. The cytoplasm is a jelly-like substance that keeps things in place, and restricts the movement of organelles in the cell. The main difference between them is the fact that microtubules arenà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢t joined by anything like a ligament or a tendon and cytoplasm doesnà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢t contract like muscles do. The digestive system of the human body is made up of several organs that work together to break down food so it can be used in the body. Similar organelles in the cell are endoplasmic reticulum, ribosomes, and the golgi body. Endoplasmic reticulum is used in the synthesis of molecules entering the cell. The ribosomes produce protein and send them to the places in the cell that needs it. The golgi body is the à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“packaging siteà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬. All three of thes organelles play an important role in processing molecules in the cell.

Southwest Airlines in 2010: Culture, Value, and Operation Practices

Coursework Header Sheet198322-169 | | Course| RESE1031: PPD3 – Thematic Independent St| Course School/Level| BU/UG| Coursework| Essay 1| Assessment Weight| 35. 00%| Tutor| N Stair| Submission Deadline| 14/12/2012| Coursework is receipted on the understanding that it is the student's own work and that it has not, in whole or part, been presented elsewhere for assessment. Where material has been used from other sources it has been properly acknowledged in accordance with the University's Regulations regarding Cheating and Plagiarism. | 000731054 Yezhou Liang Tutor's comments |Grade Awarded___________| For Office Use Only__________| Final Grade_________| Moderation required: yes/no| Tutor______________________| Date _______________| University of Greenwich TIS Essay 1 Advertising Industry Name: Yezhou Liang Tutor’s name: Nola Stair Submission data: 14/12/2012 Contents I. Introduction II. Definition, history of advertising * Definition * History III. Marketing and Advertisi ng * Marketing concept * The concept of Exchange * The concept of branding * The concept of added value IV. Advertising management * History of the advertising management * How advertising works * Method of advertising management V.Advertising strategy * Advertising planning and decision making * Advertising strategy content VI. Conclusion ; Summary VII. Reference Introduction Advertisement can be found everywhere in our daily life, such as at street, at bus station, at Internet, at TV etc. As long as there is business action, advertisement must be used. For example, Apple Company would make a number of advertisements in order to increase the attention before Apple company release new product. Although advertisement pays a significant role in our society, someone might do not recognize the advertising industry. This essay will focus on advertising industry.Advertising industry is a very popular project. Each year many graduate choose advertising industry to work on, and majority of high school students hope to research the project which relate to advertising industry in university. Some Famous stars and directors also take part in the industry. For instance, great director David Lynch made an advertisement for Dior in 2010. Because of a wide range of advertising industry, it is important that the advertising management and strategy. How manage advertising industry, how make a effective strategy, and what is the relationship between the advertising industry and marketing.These three questions are key point which the essays discuss. The first section of this essay will introduce to the definition and history of advertising. Next this essay will separately analyse to aforementioned three questions. The last section will give a short summary and conclusion to this essay. Definition and history of advertising Definition: In the past, there are a great numbers of definitions about advertising. Industry icon Leo Burnett defined it as â€Å"selling corn flakes to peo ple who are eating cheerio† (Bendinger B. 1993 P. 60). U. S president Calvin Coolidge called it â€Å"the life of trade† (Bradley, Daniels and Jones 1960, P. 3), and in a advertising textbook, Daniel starch (1923, P. 5) suggested â€Å"the simplest definition of advertising, and one that will probably meet the test of critical examination, is that advertising is selling in print† A more modern definition can be found in the American Heritage Dictionary (2000) â€Å" the activity of attracting public attention to a product or business, as by paid announcements in the print, broadcast, or electronic media. † Although many scholars have defined advertising, on comparing most of them, it can be summarized as these key points: broadcast, force and education.According to Printers’ Ink (1963, p. 20), he gives his own opinion to the 3key points â€Å"Advertising is one of the east expected and most productive results of the Constitution. By offering and in formation, advertising has helped to break down class barriers. By educating and persuading, advertising has been a major force in promoting public health. † Indeed, advertising create a new method which is mare fashion, rapid and direct to broadcast some product information, so that audience can easier accept product. Thee successful advertisement of IPhone is a good example.On the other aspect, advertising should take advantage of educate audience, such as antismoking advertising, protect the environment etc. History: Advertising application can be traced back to ancient times, it almost accompanied by the appearance of commodities. Early form of advertising were signs such as huckster, the inn sign, the red-and –white striped barber’s pole, the apothecary’s jar of coloured liquid and the wheel wright’s wheel etc. (Frank J. 1988, P. 1-2) In the ancient Egyptians and Greeks, there were number of huckster to sell slave and livestock by shouting some rhythmic advertisement, but it is doubtful that the ancient Egyptians and Greeks were insensible to the benefits of product promotion. The Romans certainly knew how to make a convincing sales pitch, and early example of advertising were found in the ruins of Pompeii, and the earliest store signboard originated in the ancient city of Pompeii. (Mark T. 2007, P. 10) In modern time, with the development of business, there were a variety of goods in the market. Thus, advertising have been used more and more broad, and advertising took a leap forward.Of course, with the appearance of the printing press and movable type – and invention generally credited to German former goldsmith Johannes Gutenberg in 1447. (Mark T. 2007, P. 10)Theophraste Renaudot, a French doctor, journalist and unlikely adman, created in1631 the first French newspaper to disseminate seeking and offering work, buying and selling goods information, and public announcements of all kinds more widely, which he calle d La Gazette. Thus he became the first French Journalist – and the inventor of the personal advertisement. Mark T. 2007, P. 10-11) In the United Kingdom, the first advertising agent was probably one William Tayler, who opened an office n London’s Warwick Square in 1786. The firm later became known as Tayler ; Newton, and it acted as an advertising sales representative for printers – several of whom had launched newspapers promote their trade. (Mark T. 2007, P. 11) To sum up, advertising have a long history, but the form were old and terrible effective in ancient. Advertising have developed rapidly since the mid – 15th century.At present, there are variety kinds of advertising form, and it has been an important dissemination tool, which become indispensability in our daily life. One of the purposes of advertising is disseminate product information. Therefore, researching the relationship between advertising and marketing is necessary. The following section will analyse what is the connection between both. Marketing and Advertising In modern society, a majority of goods compete to each other in the market, and advertising is undoubtedly the quickest and most effective dissemination form.Whether the goods has a high market share in fierce competition, which depend on successful advertising. Thus, marketing and advertising must have some internal connection. If the market marketing practice is still in development, however, some concept is very important and our knowledge of theses concepts as it is today: exchange, brand value, the marketing concept. All of these concepts have a great impact to advertising and the role of advertising marketing. Let's look briefly at each.Marketing concept: â€Å"Marketing is consumer – oriented, that is, it is planned and implemented to facilitate exchange between the buyer and seller on the basis of identified consumer wants and need. Note that the emphasis in modern marketing is on buyer â₠¬â€œ seller exchange and consumer satisfaction. To induce consumer to engage in exchange, markets develop a marketing mix – a combination of decisions about products price, distribution channels, and promotion. Advertising is an essential part of the promotion element of the marketing mix, which includes sales promotion, public relations, and personal selling. Dean M. K, Leonard N. R, S. Watson D, Arnold M. B, 1989, P. 11). In a word, marketing is seller products to consumers more effectively, and advertising is one of the methods of marketing. The concept of Exchange: â€Å"Marketing helps to create exchange, that is, the act of trading a desired product or service to receive something of value in return. The company makes a product and offers it for sale at a certain price; the customer gives money to the company to buy that product. Money is exchanged for goods. † (William W, Sandra M, John B, 1995, P. 2-33) How to make the customer recognized your products, and the y would like to use the money to buy your product, which depend on successful advertising to promote your product and show the detail of your product. If your advertising could attract customers, your products must popular in the market. So in the market exchange has two meanings, communication is particularly important in the advertising. In other words, people must understand it before they can buy or registered it or to the donation. So marketing is the practice of effective communication in order to be realized their products by customers.The concept of branding: â€Å"Branding is the process of creating a special meaning for a product, one that makes it distinctive in the marketplace and in its product category, just as your name makes you unique in your community. That special meaning, or brand image, is the result of communication, as well as your own personal experiences with the product. † (William W, Sandra M, John B, 1995, P. 33). In generally, customers prefer to buy some famous brand. For that reason, a famous brand is important when customers choose a product that they think necessary such as fashion items, cars, laptops etc.Because people always believe a theory: the more famous goods, the better quality of it. This is â€Å"Famous brand name effect†. A most striking feature of famous brand is that it has a wide influence around the world, and there is no doubt that advertising contribute to broad the influence. For example, Chanel is a famous fashion brand in the world, and Chanel No. 5 perfume is most classical. There have been many super stars to endorse this perfume since it was published in 1921, it include Marilyn Monroe, Nicole Kidman, Brad Pitt etc. they are all super star in at that time. This shows that Chanel Company invests much money to advertising.Thus the successes of Chanel No. 5 depend on advertising. The concept of added value: â€Å"The reason marketing and advertising activities are useful, both to consumers an d to marketers, is that they add value to a product. Added value means a marketing or advertising activity makes the product more valuable useful or appealing. Advertising not only can showcase the product’s value but it also may add value by making the product appear more desirable or more of a status symbol. Providing news and useful information of interest to consumers is another way that advertising adds value. † (William W, Sandra M, John B, 1995, P. 5-36). NIKE is a good example. They have a kind of products in their all products: NBA basketball star product. In NBA, a great number of basketball stars is the NIKE’s spokespeople. According to the star’s characteristic, achievement, and habits, NIKE company design and produce a series of product for the star, the product has a different logo and different technologies to another product, and these are more expensive than the others. One of most famous series is Jordan series, Kobe series and LeBron ser ies. These products have own special logo, such as Jordan series’ logo is an Air Man Michael Jordan.Furthermore, these products are more expensive than ordinary product about 30%. In China, the price of NIKE NBA star series shoes are 1200 Yuan or more, but these ordinary NIKE shoes is no more than 900 Yuan. The more than 300 Yuan gap is added value by advertising. Thus, advertising really can take added value for products. At above statement, the relationship of advertising and marketing was analyzed from the four concepts, and through some examples, it proves the correctness and feasibility of this proposal. Next section, the essay will continually analyze advertising management. Advertising managementAny industries cannot do without management, and advertising will be no exception. Advertising management belongs to the category of economic management. It based on some advertising management laws and some relevant policies to guide, supervise, coordinate and control to the a dvertising industry and advertising activities by the government, advertising industry associations and advertising community supervision. It make the advertising activity to adapt to the economic situation for the advertising industry development, make the advertising industry gradually from disorderly to orderly, from chaos to health.Advertising can play its proper role in this background. Firstly, the essay will shortly introduce to the history of advertising management History of the advertising management: Compared with the production of advertising, advertising management appears to be late so much. At the end of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the 19th century, the industrial revolution was outbroke in Britain, the United States and other west countries, and it led to the rapidly develop of economy. The prosperity of social economy and the development of industry and commerce created a good condition for the emergence of the advertising.However, due to without the right management system, there has been confusion and disorder in the competition of advertising, and it threaten the healthy economic development in some western countries. Therefore, after the 20th century, western governments set out to legislate for advertising and supervise to it. This is the beginning of modern advertising management. How advertising works: In order to better manage advertising, firstly, managers must know how advertising works. Advertising is a form of communication, it provide a variety of product information to consumers. â€Å"However, advertising is not a conversation.Most advertising is not as personal or as interactive as a conversation because it relies on mass communication, which is indirect and complex. † (William W, Sandra M, John B, 1995, P. 99) There is an advertising communication model, it can clearly reflect how to advertising works: Feedback Feedback Noise: Internal Perceived Needs Information Processing Attitudes and opinions Other N oise Noise: Internal Perceived Needs Information Processing Attitudes and opinions Other Noise Noise: External Public opinion Marketing strategy Competition Other noise Noise: External Public opinion Marketing strategy Competition Other noiseReceiver: Consumer reception and response Perceive Understand Feel Connect Believe Act Receiver: Consumer reception and response Perceive Understand Feel Connect Believe Act Media mix: Channels Media mix: Channels Message: Encoding (by agency) Message: Encoding (by agency) Source: Advertiser (Objectives) Source: Advertiser (Objectives) Advertising communication model (William W, Sandra M, John B, 1995, P. 100) According to the figure, it begins with a source which is provided by advertiser. The source information will be encoded a message by professional agency, and put it in some words and pictures.And then, the message is shown through the media mix, such as newspaper, poster, radio, TV etc. Through the media mix decode to the message, the sou rce information will be received to audiences. After that, audience give some feedback to assess the source information to advertiser. Noise is inevitable in the whole process, it includes internal noise and external noise. it can disturb and interrupt the encoding process and decoding process. Thus sometimes the message cannot be received completely by audience. Through analysing to how advertising works, we can deeply understand details of advertising management.Following, the essay will research the method of advertising management. Method of advertising management: Method of advertising management is a means which advertising management personnel perform the administrative functions in order to achieve the management goal. However, there is different method of advertising management in different country. Thus the essay will find a representative case to analyse method of advertising management. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is an institution which manages all advertising around the United States.Therefore, FTC has own the methods of advertising management, and these method can reduce to 5 key methods. â€Å"They are Substantiation, Affirmative disclosure, Cease—and—desist order, Consent order and Corrective advertising†. (William L. W, Dennis L. M &Michael B. M, 1984). Next the essay will separately analyze the five methods. Substantiation: FTC requires advertiser issued their certificate and provide some evidence for their description in advertising. This method is in order to save the evidence for all advertising, and conveniently provides this evidence to deceptive advertising.After the implementation of the method, a number of advertising had been cancelled because of cannot provide evidence for the false content in their advertising. For example, Borg-warner air conditioner advertising claims that their products are able to release clean and healthy air, but Borg-warner Company cannot provide the evidence for the clean and health y air. Thus their advertising is forbidden by FTC. Affirmative disclosure: FTC require the product which related to the safety and health in the ad, it is necessary to accurately show the characteristics of the product , the advertising also must expose its shortcomings and imitations , that is not only to advertise what the product can do , but also what it cannot do. â€Å"Amway Nutrilite† is a famous health care product in the world. In their products packaging, so many good information could be found on it, such as Nutrient content, function introduction etc. However, a warning also could be seemed: the product cannot replace any medicine. Cease—and—desist order: there is enough evidence to judge that advertising have deceived or misleading, FTC can release â€Å"Cease—and—desist order â€Å". Once the FTC come up with the application of this order to court, orders can be effective immediately.Advertisers can only be signed according to the r equirements, admit the illegal advertisements. Thus, this order can timely cancel the deceptive advertising. It replaces the multifarious legal procedure, and makes the market to keep the normal competition as soon as possible. Consent order: In order to supply a gap which is costing long time to find the evidence, as soon as possible stop to broadcast the false advertising, which the kind of product relate to physical and mental health with people, such as food, medicine and cosmetic.FTC can issued â€Å"Consent Order† in necessity, this judgment not specify why the advertising should be forbidden, and the advertisers also can write the signature to agreed to stop suspected advertising even though he do not admit his fault, . If advertisers continue to publish or broadcast the suspected advertising after he writes the signature, he will pay a great number of fines for it. Corrective advertising: FTC come up with the corrective advertising suggestion to misleading advertising which deeply impressed in consumers’ mind. It is in order to eliminate wrong impression.Although there are different methods of advertising management in the different country, they have the same purpose that they hope advertising industry healthier and healthier in the rapid development by these methods of advertising management. Next part, the essay will discuss advertising strategy. Advertising strategy Advertising strategy is that advertising publisher grasps the advertising decision in the macroscopic. Researching advertising strategy is necessary. Because it can improve the advertising effect, make the enterprise with the lowest costs to achieve the best marketing target.In modern society, market competition becomes more and more fierce, a company or product want to outstanding in the market environment, or beat the competitor in order to ensure development, almost connect with correct using the advertising strategy. A successful advertising strategy always includes an advertising planning and decision making. Following, this essay will analyse advertising planning and decision making. Advertising planning and decision making The major activities of advertising management are planning and decision making.In most instances, the advertising or brand manager will be involved in the development, implementation, and overall management of an advertising plan. A complete advertising plan reflects the results of the planning and decision – making process and the decisions that have been made in a particular product – market situation. (Rajeev B, John G. M, David A. A, 1995, P. 38) There is a figure of framework for advertising planning and decision making. Consumer / Market Analysis Competitive Analysis Consumer / Market Analysis Competitive Analysis Situation Analysis Situation AnalysisRole of Advertising, Sales Force, Price, Promotion, Public Relations Role of Advertising, Sales Force, Price, Promotion, Public Relations Marketing Program Marketing Program The Communications/Persuasion process The Communications/Persuasion process Objectives/Segmentation/Positioning Message Strategy and Tactics Media Strategy and Tactics Objectives/Segmentation/Positioning Message Strategy and Tactics Media Strategy and Tactics Advertising Plan Advertising Plan Facilitating Agencies Social and legal constraints Facilitating Agencies Social and legal constraints Implementation ImplementationFramework for advertising planning and decision making (Rajeev B, John G. M, David A. A, 1995, P. 38) According to the figure, advertising plan include three aspect: Objectives, Message Strategy and Tactics and Media Strategy and Tactics. Every advertisement plan will at least reflect planning, decision-making, and the three main components are connected each one. ‘Objective’ means choose a good target for advertising. Because advertising has wide influence, if the product has some problem, advertiser would have huge trouble. For examp le, in 2008, if you advertised for dairy industry in China, you must go bankrupt.In that time, Chinese dairy industry environment became quite terrible because of poison milk powder. But if you advertised for Olympic product ,you would make considerable money. â€Å"Message strategy and tactic is executional decisions, such as the choice of a spokesperson, the use of humour or fear or other tones, and the selection of particular copy, visuals, and layout. Media strategy concerns decisions on how many media dollars to spend on and advertising campaign; Media tactics comprise the decisions about which specific media or media vehicles to use. (Rajeev B, John G. M, David A. A, 1995, P. 50-51) Thus whether advertising planning and decision making is successful, it depend on the three aspects. Advertising strategy content In generally, the advertising strategy has the following components: 1. Strategic objectives – direct advertising campaign to reach target. 2. Performance strate gy – that is, to select the most effective performance point of view and the way. 3. Trademark strategy. In the advertising, a trademark publicity is often occupies an extremely important position.Because people buy life data, especially consumer goods, often only knowledge trademark. In the rapidly developing society, new advertising strategies are made continually. Modern advertising strategy can be divided into quantity strategy and quality strategy two aspects. The former focuses on the form, and the latter focuses on the content. 1. The quantity strategy: Mainly refers to the number of advertising themes and objectives, how much the screen image and text, advertising appear amount and frequency, etc. 2. Quality strategy: The object of advertising is the consumer.Only to obtain the trust of consumers, advertising is easy to achieve efficiency, honest, objective, and truthful advertising to attract consumers. The five strategies are usually to use in advertising industry. It is so popular in advertising industry, how to use it better is the key of success. Making advertising strategy should be based on the general demand of target market, and should carefully analyse and research products or enterprise information, market details, consumer information, and relevant data of environment.Based on these study and data to make multiple plans, and compare with each other much times. Only in this way, the correct, scientific, creative advertising strategy is able to be made. Conclusion & Summary The emergence of commodity trade has created advertising industry, and with the development of the business, advertising industry has becomes a complex industry, a successful advertising need several industries to cooperate, such as design industry, media industry and business etc. It appears everywhere in our daily life.In the essay, three main questions are analysed: what is the relationship between the marketing and advertising, advertising management and adverti sing strategy. From the analysis to three questions, we can see the development of advertising. Through research the relationship, people know the advertising industry become more and more influent in the marketing. Studying advertising management, citizens recognize that the advertising industry is more regular and healthier. Analysing the advertising strategy, advertising has a clear direction. These are performance of advertising developing.However, advertising industry has some problem in the process of rapid development, such as deceptive advertising. These problems might be solved through the new method of advertising management or new advertising strategy in the future. Advertising is never-ending pursuit to excellence. Just like a famous advertiser said: â€Å"There is no such thing as a permanent advertising success† (Leo Burnett, 1891—1971) In the modern society, there is a rat race in every industry, advertising industry is without exception. How to compete with each other in the industry and what strategies will be used in the competition.Thus advertising compete will be focus in the following essay. Reference: American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Ed. (2000), New York: Houghton Mifflin Company. Bendinger, Bruce (1993), Copy Work Shop Work Book, Chicago, IL: The Copy Workshop. Bradley, John P. , Leo F. Daniels, and Thomas C. Jones (1960), The International Dictionary of Thoughts, Chicago, IL: J. G. Ferguson Publishing Co. Dean M. Krugman, Leonard N. Reid, S. Watson Dumn & Arnold M. Barban(1989) Advertising Its Role in Modern Marketing. Florida: Harcourt Brace College Publisher.Mark Tungate(2007) Adland: A Global History of Advertising, London, Kogan Page Limited Rajeev Batra, John G. Myers, David A. Aaker(1995) Advertising management, Upper Saddle River, Prentice Hall. Starch, Daniel (1923), Principles of Advertising, Chicago, IL: A. W. Shaw Company. William L. Wilkie, Dennis L. Mcneill, & Michael B. Mazis(1984) â €˜Marketing’s â€Å"Scarlet Letter†: The Theory and Practice of Corrective Advertising. ’ Journal of Marketing, Vol. 48 11-31 William Wells, Sandra Moriarty, John Burnett (1995) Advertising Principles and practice, Upper Saddle River: Pearson Education.

Is Oracle Dying

Oracle Corporation was founded in Jun 1977 by Larry Ellison, Bob Miner, Ed Oates. Over the years, it has risen to become almost indisputable leader of the Relational Database Management System (RDBMS) market with 44% (Source: IDC 2009) – at least, for now, though, no one is sure how long that numero uno position will last. There were heady days of 1996-2008 or so when Oracle ruled the world of RDBMS. It was unchallenged crown king that could do no wrong. Hundreds of thousands of Database engineers, architects, administrators spoke of Oracle as if it was actually the famed â€Å"Oracle of Delphi†.Conference passes to Oracle Open World were so coveted that it was distributed to star employees in any company using Oracle Products. However, after 2008, the downward spiral has been very perceptible to the database communities. The hush-hush talks could now be heard very loud and clear. Only that Oracle was perhaps hearing but valiantly choosing not to listen. It continued to maintain the arrogance of a star past its prime – denying that it was aging, claiming that the talent would always trump the age.I think the Oracle Goliath had forgotten that for every arrogant Goliath, there is a David that is bound to introduce it to its nemesis. But my guess this downward spiral perhaps set into motion long before 2008 or so when world started noticing it. Time machine Let us trace Oracle Journey through its very meager beginnings and how it lost its course along the way. The chronological sequence of this journey could be roughly as I have shown below:- 1977   SDL (Oracle's predecessor) founded 1978    Oracle Version 1 developed 1979    First commercial SQL RDBMS 983  Ã‚   Oracle Version 3, first RDBMS developed to run on mainframes, PC, minicomputers, VMS 1984  Ã‚   first RDBMS to offer read-consistency 1985    Released of Oracle Version 5, first RDBMS in client/server environments 1986  Ã‚   Oracle IPO (NASDAQ) 1987  Ã‚   Rises to numbe r one in the world for RDBMS, Oracle gets into building enterprise applications 1988  Ã‚   Oracle Version 6 with several new features: PL/SQL, Row-level locking 1989  Ã‚   Oracle provides DB support for OLTP and moves its HQ to Redwood Shores, California 1990  Ã‚   Launches Oracle Applications Release 8 992  Ã‚   Launched Oracle 7, offers full applications implementation methodology 1993  Ã‚   Client/server environments enhancements 1994  Ã‚   Oracle receives the industry’s first security clearance 1995    Debuts first 64-bit RDBMS 1996  Ã‚   Releases feature rich 7. 3, with different types of data types – text, maps, audio, video, or images, develops an open standards-based, web-enabled architecture 1998  Ã‚   Oracle8 Database ; Oracle Applications 10. 7 – first enterprise computing company to use Java 1999  Ã‚   Offers its first DBMS with XML support 2000  Ã‚   Oracle E-Business Suite Release 11i 001  Ã‚   Oracle9i Database with Oracle RAC,   first RDBMS to complete 3 terabyte TPC-H record 2002   Oracle RDBMS passes 15 industry standard security evaluations – first RDBMS to achieve this 2003   Oracle debuts Oracle Database 10g, more robust clustering software 2004   Declares Oracle â€Å"the Information Company† and spreads into many other areas 2005   Acquires rival PeopleSoft, releases first free database, Oracle 10g XE 2006  Ã‚   Declares a 30-year commitment for open standards computing, giving customers â€Å"Unbreakable Linux† 2008   HP Oracle Database Machine/Exadata storage 009  Ã‚  Gets into too many things – including BEA products, launch of Oracle Fusion Middleware, 11g advance Oracle 2010  Ã‚   Oracle acquires Sun Microsystems, announces Sun based Exadata/Exalogic machines 2011  Ã‚   Keeps adding bells and whistles to same Exadata/Exalogic machines 2012  Ã‚   Announces initiative focused on Cloud Rise of Oracle Most of the engineers in software industry were not even born when in late seventies, it struck young Larry Ellison, after reading paper written by Dr Edgar F.Codd (1970) on relational database management systems titled â€Å"A Relational Model of Data for Large Shared Data Banks†, that a software could be designed that could follow the principles of relational databases. His belief was reinforced when he read another article, published in the IBM Research Journal, and authored by Ed Oates (IBM) about the IBM System R database. System R itself was based on Codd's theories. In 1977, Ellison co-founded Oracle Corporation with Bob Miner and Ed Oates under the name Software Development Laboratories (SDL) and in 1979, SDL was rechristened as Relational Software, Inc. nly to change its name again in 1982 to Oracle Systems Corporation. In 1995, Oracle Systems Corporation changed its name to Oracle Corporation. From 1979 through 1992, Oracle primarily focused its attention on making its flagship product, Oracle RDBMS, strong . Oracle was getting complacent after version 5 and then it came out with version 6 – this was huge fiasco product and it was nightmare for customer support and Oracle support. Corporate customers were threatening to pull off Oracle.Version 6 was quickly followed up by version 7 which saved the day for Oracle. 7. 34 turned out to be very stable product. Version 8i, 9i and 10g added to Oracle RDBMS core competence. These versions by themselves attracted customers to Oracle. If everything was so good, continues to be good then why do I particularly feel that Oracle could be dying as a company? Lack of Level 5 leadership Oracle has been led by Larry Ellison all these years. Larry is a level 4 leader – wish he was level 5.Under his leadership, Oracle has always focused on â€Å"what† should be done and â€Å"how† will it be done. Level 5 CEOs first focus on â€Å"who† and then on â€Å"what† and â€Å"how†. People part of the equation rem ains very flaky, to say the least, with Oracle. It has been notoriously uncaring about exodus of top talent. Many ex-Oracle top performers have gone on to form companies, rise to be C staff, unleash innovations but Oracle didn’t really do anything specific to stop the fleeing top talent.Also, like many other celebrity CEOs, Ellison is getting two distracted by things that his company should not be focusing on – example, Oracle’s American Cup sponsorship, Ellison’s many prime properties, Ellison’s unflinching support for former ousted HP CEO and great friend Mark Hurd, Ellison’s purchasing Lanai Island. All these have direct impact on Oracle’s future – why? Because all these are issues that distract the CEO. Same thing happened with Lee Iacocca – once he turned around Chrysler, he focused more on politics, image building, helping White House ith many initiatives which distracted him from his duties as CEO. And Chrysler sl id back into the mess that it had recovered from. Mark’s hiring into Oracle forced Ellison to send Charles Phillips off. Charles was a great executive and leader recognized for his talent in and outside Oracle. Letting a great leader go in favor of a friend whose moral ethics are somewhat doubtful never went well with the employees. Also, Oracle doesn’t have conversations like â€Å"what can we do to stop you from leaving† with most of their top talent attritions. 5 Phases of a perilous corporationAny company going through the general growth, if not managed in a disciplined manner, can hurtle itself into peril. Jim Collins brings this out very succinctly in his book â€Å"How the Mighty Fall – any why some companies never give in†. The 5 stages of this journey from greatness to perish are very perceptible when they happen. The Path to Destruction I suspect Oracle’s downward spiral started after 2001-2002 (or at least sometime during that per iod). It could not come to terms with the ever high stock price of more than $45 and started becoming greedy.Perhaps under some implicit or explicit mandate from Uncle Larry, the sales people were sent marching to see how much more they could milk out of their unsuspecting and totally Oracle dependent customers. And perhaps the sales people came back with the message that customers would not mind paying more for the crown jewel product – core RDBMS as well as Oracle ERP Suite – 11i. Oracle (read, Larry Ellison) could not stand competition – especially those then started looking at how to kill rivals – hostile and non-hostile acquisitions of rival JD Edwards, PeopleSoft and Siebel.Every growing company reaches a point where growth starts flattening – happened with Apple, happened with Google and will happen with next big shinning company as well – Oracle was not particularly immune to it so in an attempt to resuscitate its flattening growth, largely due to its flagship core RDBMS product, Oracle started developing another front that it could open – this was business of application servers – an exploding market back in the day.An application server is packaged software that developers use to write and deploy web specific applications. The market had exploded past decade or so since many application server vendors were trying to build dynamic applications for the web and mobile devices. For Oracle the lure was that the market had the potential to perhaps become as lucrative as their core database market.Oracle was very late entrant into this market but it quickly acquired BEA Software (leader in the space at that point) and started competing neck to neck with IBM WebSphere. Within Oracle, Application Server business is viewed as â€Å"third business† besides core RDBMS and ERP. Oracle built its business around data bases and from the very beginning it has dominated the database market, providing the d ata stores and central repositories to store critical business information that businesses must maintain, use and safeguard to complete transactions.This has given it almost a monopoly and a very superior position when negotiating with customers. Oracle’s sales team that is always scavenging to find new sources of revenues, capitalizes on such an edge and leverages it to squeeze every dollar out of the customers – rightfully earning a fearsome reputation of being â€Å"hard-line negotiators† – and they are squeezing where it hurts the customers most – at their licensing and support costs.However, like it had opened a third front by getting into Application Servers market, it has since then opened many more such fronts via its acquisition spree – Oracle has expanded well beyond just the databases and application servers and entered the business software domain as well, acquiring leader companies in domains related to technology infrastructure , sales, employees, inventory and customers. People typically use products from these acquired companies to track information related to these important entities. Undisciplined growth In their pursuit to keep up with their YoY growth, Oracle has descended into a very undisciplined growth.There was also very unreasonable desire to grow into every domain. While growing via acquisitions, Oracle Executive Management has forgotten that it is not simply enough to acquire good companies, it takes good and dedicated diligence to grow them into great companies. Some of the companies Oracle acquired are as under (source – http://www. oracle. com):- 2013 Feb-13Acme PacketNetworking hardware for telecommunications service providers 2012 Dec-12Eloqua Marketing Automation platform for managing sales and marketing leads across an enterprise.Dec-12DataRakerCloud based Analytic platform to transform meter, customer, network and asset Big Data into actionable business intelligence. Nov-12Insta ntisCloud and premises-based PPM – Project Portfolio Management applications. Sep-12SelectMindsCloud-based social talent sourcing and corporate alumni management application Jul-12Xsigo SystemsProvider of network virtualization technology that simplifies cloud infrastructure and operations Jul-12SkireSolutions provider for managing capital projects, facilities and real estate Jul-12InvolverSocial media development platformJun-12Collective IntellectCloud-based social intelligence solutions May-12VitrueSocial Marketing Platform provider Mar-12ClearTrialCloud-based Clinical Trial Operations and Analytics products Feb-12TaleoTalent Management Software 2011 Oct-11RightNow TechnologiesCloud-based CRM Oct-11EndecaE-commerce & Business Intelligence Sep-11GoAHead Service Availability and Management Software Jul-11InQuiraService Knowledge Management Software Jul-11KspliceRebootless Linux kernel updates Jun-11 FatWire Software Web Content and Web Experience Management (WCM and WEM) Soft ware Jun-11Pillar Data Systems Storage systemsApr-11Datanomic Data Quality Software Feb-11Ndevr – Select IP only Environmental Reporting and Business Intelligence 2010 Nov-10 Art Technology GroupEcommerce software vendor May-10 Pre-Paid Software Payment Solutions May-10 Market2LeadApplications May-10 Secerno Data protection hardware and software Apr-10Phase Forward Applications for life sciences companies and healthcare providers Feb-10AmberPoint Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) management Feb-10Convergin Telecom Service BrokerJan-10Sun Microsystems Computer servers, storage, networks, Java, MySQL, software, and services Jan-10Silver Creek SystemsProduct Data Quality Solutions for connecting Enterprise Systems, Customers, Suppliers and Partners. 2009 Oct-09SOPHOI Intellectual property management for Media & Entertainment Industry Sep-09HyperRoll Financials, software and IT services Jun-09Conformia Product Lifecycle Management May-09Virtual Iron Software Server Virtualizati on Management Software Mar-09Relsys International Drug Safety and Risk Management 2008Oct-08Haley (RuleBurst Holdings) Natural Language Business Rules / Policy Automation Oct-08Advanced Visual Technology Retail Space Planning Oct-08Primavera Project Portfolio Management Jun-08Skywire Software Document Management May-08AdminServer Insurance Policy Administration Jan-08BEA Systems Enterprise Software 2007 Dec-07MoniforceReal User Experience Monitoring Sep-07BridgestreamEnterprise Role Management software Jul-07Bharosa, IncOnline Identity Theft and Fraud Detection May-07Agile Software CorporationProduct Lifecycle Management Apr-07Lodestar CorporationUtilities Application SoftwareMar-07Hyperion CorporationEnterprise Performance Management Mar-07Tangosol IncDatagrid Software 2006 Nov-06Stellent Inc. Universal Content Management, Digital Rights Management Nov-06SPL WorldGroupUtility Billing and Customer Service Systems Oct-06SunopsisETL, Data Integration Oct-06MetaSolvOSS service activati on Jun-06DemantraDemand-Driven Planning Solution [email  protected] IP-based Contact Center Solution Apr-06Portal Software Billing and Revenue Management solutions for communications and media industry Feb-06HotSipCommunications infrastructure solutionsFeb-06Sleepycat Software Open-source database software for embedded applications Jan-06360CommerceRetail Industry Solutions Jan-06Siebel SystemsCustomer relationship management 2005 Dec-05Temposoft Workforce Management Applications sam organization Nov-05OctetString Virtual Directory Solutions Nov-05Thor Technologies Enterprise-wide User Provisioning Solutions. Oct-05Innobase Discrete Transactional Open Source Database Technology Sep-05G-LogTransportation Management Solutions Aug-05i-flexBanking Industry Solutions Jul-05Context MediaEnterprise Content IntegrationJul-05ProfitLogicRetail Industry Solutions Jun-05TimesTenReal-time Enterprise Solutions Jun-05TripleHopContext-sensitive Enterprise Search Apr-05RetekRetail Industry Solutio ns Mar-05OblixIdentity Management Solutions Jan-05PeopleSoftEnterprise Software 2004 Jun-04CollaxaBusiness process management May-04 PhaosIdentity management Jan-04SiteWorks Solutions Clinical trials management 2003 Jun-03ReliatyEnterprise data protection Jun-03FileFishEnterprise content management 2002 Jun-02SteltorEnterprise calendaring system Jan-02NetForce Adverse event reporting systemJan-02Indicast Voice portals Jan-02TopLink Object-relation mapping technology 1999 Jun-99Thinking Machines Corporation datamining technology 1995 Aug-95IRI Software OLAP products 1994 Oct-94Rdb (A division of DEC) Relational database The early acquisitions show Oracle focus on growing its databases market but acquisitions of past few years including very surprising $5 Billion acquisition of Sun MicroSystems do not give us good sense of where Oracle’s focus is. The strategic theme in Oracle’s acquisition spree is missing and seems more like reactions of leadership focusing only on â⠂¬Å"growth†.Take a look at spread of Oracle into sectors and even a layman would agree that it is stretching itself far too thin. If people outside of Oracle can’t understand why Oracle acquired Sun Microsystems, the confusion is equally evident inside Oracle as well. No one can put a figure on if Oracle acquired Sun for hardware market entry point or MySQL or Sun Solaris OS or was it a combination of all these and then some. Oracle has come out with an integrated ERP product suite – Fusion. The sales teams do not fully comprehend how to package Fusion compared to Oracle 12 version.As such Fusion itself is at least four years too late. In its attempt to create a unified platform for ERP software, it has managed to successfully scare customer who want just a small focused set of modules – like AR and GL or Manufacturing. There was Steve Jobs who made the famous statement that â€Å"†¦we tell customers what they want†¦Ã¢â‚¬ . Larry Ellison can ma ke the same claim – but to be successful at doing that, you have to be a visionary and not be distracted so hopelessly as Ellison currently is. And, customers seem to be last thing that Oracle considers while deciding these moves.For example, many of Sun’s largest former customers were large Wall Street financial institutions, and they were really miffed last year when Oracle wanted to restrict their server and operating system choices to only Sun technologies. They relentlessly pushed back and Oracle had to ultimately give in to their defiance, reaffirming deals that would let companies like HP and Dell offer Sun software on their respective hardware. â€Å"Customers will always gripe about giving too much control to any one company,† said Israel Hernandez, director of software research at Barclays Capital.Larry Ellison runs Oracle likes his personal fiefdom. The Oracle Board of Directors is merely a formality that is maintained to satisfy the Wall Street and S EC. Most decisions are taken unilaterally by Ellison and his leadership team. For example the 2010 hiring of ex-HP CEO, Mark Hurd, as a co-president after Hurd was fired by HP board due to sexual harassment allegations. Analysts viewed the hiring as a positive outcome for Oracle as it looked to expand. However, Mr. Hurd’s arrival was quickly followed by departure of one ofOracle long-timer, Charles Phillips. At one time, Charles was touted as Ellison’s protege and likely successor. Oracle customers are worried about putting all their eggs in one basket. Almost every company that they tend to do business is being bought by Oracle – much to customers’ dislike. And for hosts of Oracle’s Annual Open World program, San Francisco city officials are running into dilemma of saying â€Å"No† to Oracle at some point for hosting the event, simply because it is unlikely that city could survive the demands of an Oracle four times its current size.A look at its portfolio will tell you more about scary reach and disappointing and unfocused spread that Oracle has now – 110 product lines spread across 14 different domains. (source – http://www. oracle. com):- DATABASE DataScaler (October 2010) e-Test (acquired from Empirix) (March 2008) Innobase (October 2005) Moniforce (December 2007) mValent (February 2009) Secerno (May 2010) Sleepycat (February 2006) TimesTen (June 2005) TripleHop (June 2005) MIDDLEWARE AmberPoint (February 2010) BEA (January 2008) Bharosa (July 2007) Bridgestream (September 2007) Captovation (January 2008)ClearApp (September 2008) Context Media (July 2005) Datanomic (April 2011) FatWire (June 2011) HyperRoll (September 2009) GoldenGate (July 2009) Java (April 2009) Oblix (March 2005) OctetString (November 2005) Passlogix (October 2010) Sigma Dynamics (August 2006) Silver Creek Systems (January 2010) Stellent (November 2006) Sunopsis (October 2006) Tacit Software (November 2008) Tangosol (March 2007) T hor Technologies (November 2005) APPLICATIONS AppForge (April 2007) Collective Intellect (June 2012) Eloqua (December 2012) Haley (October 2008) InQuira (July 2011) Interlace Systems (October 2007)Involver (July 2012) LogicalApps (October 2007) Market2Lead (May 2010) Ndevr (February 2011) RightNow (October 2011) SelectMinds (September 2012) Taleo (February 2012) TempoSoft (December 2005) Vitrue (May 2012) PRODUCT LINES Agile (May 2007) ATG (November 2010) Endeca (October 2011) Hyperion (March 2007) PeopleSoft (January 2005) Primavera (October 2008) Siebel (January 2006) [email  protected] (June 2006) IMPLEMENTATION AND INTEGRATION TOOLS Global Knowledge Software (GKS) (July 2008) SERVERS, STORAGE, AND NETWORKING Ksplice (July 2011) Pillar Data Systems (June 2011Sun (April 2009) Xsigo Systems (July 2012) Virtual Iron (May 2009) INDUSTRY SOLUTIONS COMMUNICATIONS AND MEDIA Acme Packet (February 2013) (pending) Convergin (February 2010) eServGlobal's Universal Service Platform (USP) ( May 2010) GoAhead (September 2011) HotSip (February 2006) MetaSolv Software (October 2006) Net4Call (April 2006) Netsure Telecom Limited (September 2007) Portal Software (April 2006) Sophoi (October 2009) ENGINEERING AND CONSTRUCTION Instantis (November 2012) Primavera (October 2008) Skire (July 2012) FINANCIAL SERVICES i-flex (August 2005)HEALTH SCIENCES ClearTrial (March 2012) Phase Forward (April 2010) Relsys (March 2009) INDUSTRIAL MANUFACTURING Agile (May 2007) Conformia Software (June 2009) Demantra (June 2006) G-Log (September 2005) INSURANCE AdminServer (May 2008) Skywire Software (June 2008) RETAIL 360Commerce (January 2006) Advanced Visual Technology (AVT) (October 2008) ProfitLogic (July 2005) Retek (April 2005) UTILITIES DataRaker (December 2012) SPL WorldGroup (November 2006) LODESTAR (April 2007) Failure to Admit Reality It is also felt that Oracle executive management is out of touch with reality.The typical strategy is to first make fun of competitors, then ridicule them and finally scare the wits out of the customers who were even thinking of adopting competitors’ products. If the competition still survives all this and continues to grow then Oracle does one of the two things – either it buys the competition or simply buys the number two in that space. They did this for Sun, HP, NetApp, EMC, VMWare, Siebel, PeopleSoft, Salesforce, Microsoft (for MS SQL Server). Most of the times, customers can see through this and continue their adaptation of new products from customers.Most recent examples are Oracle’s taking potshots for two consecutive years in Oracle Open World 2010 and 2011 at Salesforce. com and then when it couldn’t wean away customers from Salesforce. com or slow down the ramp up, it launched its own versions of cloud offerings in 2012 Open World. Sun MicroSystems â€Å"Millstone† Around the Neck Whatever be the underlying rationale for purchase of Sun MicroSystems, Oracle is now challenged to make th e whole acquisition viable. It now finds itself in the territory of hardware market that its sales team is so ill-equipped to sell.The only option it had was to turn the Sun hardware into Exadata, Exalogic and Exalytic Servers and try to hoodwink the customers into buying this â€Å"supreme† computing machines. Much to its chagrin, not many customers are biting this new set of baits. Dark â€Å"Cloud† Space For a long time – almost three years – Oracle made fun of Salesforce. com, Amazon and Microsoft – specifically for their cloud services. It positioned the Exadata and Exalogic servers as new cloud servers that could provide as much computing power as tens of commodity hosts from these vendors cloud offerings.However, around late 2011-2012, it became very clear to Oracle that Cloud hosting and cloud based multi-tenancy software are the future and it scrambled to buy as many Cloud services based companies as it could – examples are RightNow , Taleo, Virtue – all acquired within months of each other in 2011-12. Oracle needs to realize that just acquisition of a company by and in itself doesn’t position Oracle as a leader in that space – acquisition is just the start – Oracle thereafter needs to retain the talent in that company, invest and grow the company, integrate it seamlessly within Oracle’s other relevant product lines.Unfortunately for Oracle, these are also the areas where it has failed most of the times in the past. Grasping for straws Good news first, Oracle has not yet reached this stage yet – in this stage, very perceptible symptoms are – changing CEOs and executive staff in quick rotation and changing the product directions every so often. However, there is bound to be a moment, not in very distant future, when we will find that eople will become so weary of Oracle products that Ellison will be either dislodged by a hostile board or will leave on his own. He has essentially no succession plan in place except bunch of execs like Thomas Kurian or Mark Hurd who can stake their claim to the crown. Thomas is well respected within the company but lacks charisma and chutzpah of Ellison. Mark may not be as respected but has good experience of cutting costs – like he did at HP. Death KnellIn this stage, a company either slowly vanishes into irrelevance or is acquired or merged into another competitor or goes belly up. For the sake of hundreds of thousands of professionals using, preaching and earning their bread from Oracle Technologies, I just hope Oracle never reaches that stage. Out of hundreds of companies that passed through this stage and vanished into oblivion, only two companies have thus far ever recovered from this stage – Xerox and Apple. Once again, I am sincerely hoping that Oracle never reaches this stage.Will it be able to recover from this downward spiral? Oracle can arrest this dance towards its vanishing into obli vion – question that really begs for an answer is – will it have the honesty to first admit and then stop this march? First of all, Oracle should focus and determine its core strength and then focus on building up on those. There is no prudence demonstrated in draining money on acquisitions and then selling those companies at markdown, or worst, writing off the charge as a loss.It is about time Oracle give up its greed on squeezing more money out of its customer and first create products and value that customers will willingly play obscene amount of money for. References: http://finance. yahoo. com http://www. oracle. com http://www. nytimes. com/2010/09/22/technology/22oracle. html? _r=0 http://www. forbes. com/2001/10/29/1029orcl. html http://www. zdnet. com/oracles-customers-a-bit-baffled-by-fusion-strategy-says-report-7000011143/ http://www. networkworld. com/news/2013/011713-oracle-cloud-265922. html How the Mighty Fall: And why some companies never give in â€⠀œ by Jim Collins, Is Oracle Dying Oracle Corporation was founded in Jun 1977 by Larry Ellison, Bob Miner, Ed Oates. Over the years, it has risen to become almost indisputable leader of the Relational Database Management System (RDBMS) market with 44% (Source: IDC 2009) – at least, for now, though, no one is sure how long that numero uno position will last. There were heady days of 1996-2008 or so when Oracle ruled the world of RDBMS. It was unchallenged crown king that could do no wrong. Hundreds of thousands of Database engineers, architects, administrators spoke of Oracle as if it was actually the famed â€Å"Oracle of Delphi†.Conference passes to Oracle Open World were so coveted that it was distributed to star employees in any company using Oracle Products. However, after 2008, the downward spiral has been very perceptible to the database communities. The hush-hush talks could now be heard very loud and clear. Only that Oracle was perhaps hearing but valiantly choosing not to listen. It continued to maintain the arrogance of a star past its prime – denying that it was aging, claiming that the talent would always trump the age.I think the Oracle Goliath had forgotten that for every arrogant Goliath, there is a David that is bound to introduce it to its nemesis. But my guess this downward spiral perhaps set into motion long before 2008 or so when world started noticing it. Time machine Let us trace Oracle Journey through its very meager beginnings and how it lost its course along the way. The chronological sequence of this journey could be roughly as I have shown below:- 1977   SDL (Oracle's predecessor) founded 1978    Oracle Version 1 developed 1979    First commercial SQL RDBMS 983  Ã‚   Oracle Version 3, first RDBMS developed to run on mainframes, PC, minicomputers, VMS 1984  Ã‚   first RDBMS to offer read-consistency 1985    Released of Oracle Version 5, first RDBMS in client/server environments 1986  Ã‚   Oracle IPO (NASDAQ) 1987  Ã‚   Rises to numbe r one in the world for RDBMS, Oracle gets into building enterprise applications 1988  Ã‚   Oracle Version 6 with several new features: PL/SQL, Row-level locking 1989  Ã‚   Oracle provides DB support for OLTP and moves its HQ to Redwood Shores, California 1990  Ã‚   Launches Oracle Applications Release 8 992  Ã‚   Launched Oracle 7, offers full applications implementation methodology 1993  Ã‚   Client/server environments enhancements 1994  Ã‚   Oracle receives the industry’s first security clearance 1995    Debuts first 64-bit RDBMS 1996  Ã‚   Releases feature rich 7. 3, with different types of data types – text, maps, audio, video, or images, develops an open standards-based, web-enabled architecture 1998  Ã‚   Oracle8 Database ; Oracle Applications 10. 7 – first enterprise computing company to use Java 1999  Ã‚   Offers its first DBMS with XML support 2000  Ã‚   Oracle E-Business Suite Release 11i 001  Ã‚   Oracle9i Database with Oracle RAC,   first RDBMS to complete 3 terabyte TPC-H record 2002   Oracle RDBMS passes 15 industry standard security evaluations – first RDBMS to achieve this 2003   Oracle debuts Oracle Database 10g, more robust clustering software 2004   Declares Oracle â€Å"the Information Company† and spreads into many other areas 2005   Acquires rival PeopleSoft, releases first free database, Oracle 10g XE 2006  Ã‚   Declares a 30-year commitment for open standards computing, giving customers â€Å"Unbreakable Linux† 2008   HP Oracle Database Machine/Exadata storage 009  Ã‚  Gets into too many things – including BEA products, launch of Oracle Fusion Middleware, 11g advance Oracle 2010  Ã‚   Oracle acquires Sun Microsystems, announces Sun based Exadata/Exalogic machines 2011  Ã‚   Keeps adding bells and whistles to same Exadata/Exalogic machines 2012  Ã‚   Announces initiative focused on Cloud Rise of Oracle Most of the engineers in software industry were not even born when in late seventies, it struck young Larry Ellison, after reading paper written by Dr Edgar F.Codd (1970) on relational database management systems titled â€Å"A Relational Model of Data for Large Shared Data Banks†, that a software could be designed that could follow the principles of relational databases. His belief was reinforced when he read another article, published in the IBM Research Journal, and authored by Ed Oates (IBM) about the IBM System R database. System R itself was based on Codd's theories. In 1977, Ellison co-founded Oracle Corporation with Bob Miner and Ed Oates under the name Software Development Laboratories (SDL) and in 1979, SDL was rechristened as Relational Software, Inc. nly to change its name again in 1982 to Oracle Systems Corporation. In 1995, Oracle Systems Corporation changed its name to Oracle Corporation. From 1979 through 1992, Oracle primarily focused its attention on making its flagship product, Oracle RDBMS, strong . Oracle was getting complacent after version 5 and then it came out with version 6 – this was huge fiasco product and it was nightmare for customer support and Oracle support. Corporate customers were threatening to pull off Oracle.Version 6 was quickly followed up by version 7 which saved the day for Oracle. 7. 34 turned out to be very stable product. Version 8i, 9i and 10g added to Oracle RDBMS core competence. These versions by themselves attracted customers to Oracle. If everything was so good, continues to be good then why do I particularly feel that Oracle could be dying as a company? Lack of Level 5 leadership Oracle has been led by Larry Ellison all these years. Larry is a level 4 leader – wish he was level 5.Under his leadership, Oracle has always focused on â€Å"what† should be done and â€Å"how† will it be done. Level 5 CEOs first focus on â€Å"who† and then on â€Å"what† and â€Å"how†. People part of the equation rem ains very flaky, to say the least, with Oracle. It has been notoriously uncaring about exodus of top talent. Many ex-Oracle top performers have gone on to form companies, rise to be C staff, unleash innovations but Oracle didn’t really do anything specific to stop the fleeing top talent.Also, like many other celebrity CEOs, Ellison is getting two distracted by things that his company should not be focusing on – example, Oracle’s American Cup sponsorship, Ellison’s many prime properties, Ellison’s unflinching support for former ousted HP CEO and great friend Mark Hurd, Ellison’s purchasing Lanai Island. All these have direct impact on Oracle’s future – why? Because all these are issues that distract the CEO. Same thing happened with Lee Iacocca – once he turned around Chrysler, he focused more on politics, image building, helping White House ith many initiatives which distracted him from his duties as CEO. And Chrysler sl id back into the mess that it had recovered from. Mark’s hiring into Oracle forced Ellison to send Charles Phillips off. Charles was a great executive and leader recognized for his talent in and outside Oracle. Letting a great leader go in favor of a friend whose moral ethics are somewhat doubtful never went well with the employees. Also, Oracle doesn’t have conversations like â€Å"what can we do to stop you from leaving† with most of their top talent attritions. 5 Phases of a perilous corporationAny company going through the general growth, if not managed in a disciplined manner, can hurtle itself into peril. Jim Collins brings this out very succinctly in his book â€Å"How the Mighty Fall – any why some companies never give in†. The 5 stages of this journey from greatness to perish are very perceptible when they happen. The Path to Destruction I suspect Oracle’s downward spiral started after 2001-2002 (or at least sometime during that per iod). It could not come to terms with the ever high stock price of more than $45 and started becoming greedy.Perhaps under some implicit or explicit mandate from Uncle Larry, the sales people were sent marching to see how much more they could milk out of their unsuspecting and totally Oracle dependent customers. And perhaps the sales people came back with the message that customers would not mind paying more for the crown jewel product – core RDBMS as well as Oracle ERP Suite – 11i. Oracle (read, Larry Ellison) could not stand competition – especially those then started looking at how to kill rivals – hostile and non-hostile acquisitions of rival JD Edwards, PeopleSoft and Siebel.Every growing company reaches a point where growth starts flattening – happened with Apple, happened with Google and will happen with next big shinning company as well – Oracle was not particularly immune to it so in an attempt to resuscitate its flattening growth, largely due to its flagship core RDBMS product, Oracle started developing another front that it could open – this was business of application servers – an exploding market back in the day.An application server is packaged software that developers use to write and deploy web specific applications. The market had exploded past decade or so since many application server vendors were trying to build dynamic applications for the web and mobile devices. For Oracle the lure was that the market had the potential to perhaps become as lucrative as their core database market.Oracle was very late entrant into this market but it quickly acquired BEA Software (leader in the space at that point) and started competing neck to neck with IBM WebSphere. Within Oracle, Application Server business is viewed as â€Å"third business† besides core RDBMS and ERP. Oracle built its business around data bases and from the very beginning it has dominated the database market, providing the d ata stores and central repositories to store critical business information that businesses must maintain, use and safeguard to complete transactions.This has given it almost a monopoly and a very superior position when negotiating with customers. Oracle’s sales team that is always scavenging to find new sources of revenues, capitalizes on such an edge and leverages it to squeeze every dollar out of the customers – rightfully earning a fearsome reputation of being â€Å"hard-line negotiators† – and they are squeezing where it hurts the customers most – at their licensing and support costs.However, like it had opened a third front by getting into Application Servers market, it has since then opened many more such fronts via its acquisition spree – Oracle has expanded well beyond just the databases and application servers and entered the business software domain as well, acquiring leader companies in domains related to technology infrastructure , sales, employees, inventory and customers. People typically use products from these acquired companies to track information related to these important entities. Undisciplined growth In their pursuit to keep up with their YoY growth, Oracle has descended into a very undisciplined growth.There was also very unreasonable desire to grow into every domain. While growing via acquisitions, Oracle Executive Management has forgotten that it is not simply enough to acquire good companies, it takes good and dedicated diligence to grow them into great companies. Some of the companies Oracle acquired are as under (source – http://www. oracle. com):- 2013 Feb-13Acme PacketNetworking hardware for telecommunications service providers 2012 Dec-12Eloqua Marketing Automation platform for managing sales and marketing leads across an enterprise.Dec-12DataRakerCloud based Analytic platform to transform meter, customer, network and asset Big Data into actionable business intelligence. Nov-12Insta ntisCloud and premises-based PPM – Project Portfolio Management applications. Sep-12SelectMindsCloud-based social talent sourcing and corporate alumni management application Jul-12Xsigo SystemsProvider of network virtualization technology that simplifies cloud infrastructure and operations Jul-12SkireSolutions provider for managing capital projects, facilities and real estate Jul-12InvolverSocial media development platformJun-12Collective IntellectCloud-based social intelligence solutions May-12VitrueSocial Marketing Platform provider Mar-12ClearTrialCloud-based Clinical Trial Operations and Analytics products Feb-12TaleoTalent Management Software 2011 Oct-11RightNow TechnologiesCloud-based CRM Oct-11EndecaE-commerce & Business Intelligence Sep-11GoAHead Service Availability and Management Software Jul-11InQuiraService Knowledge Management Software Jul-11KspliceRebootless Linux kernel updates Jun-11 FatWire Software Web Content and Web Experience Management (WCM and WEM) Soft ware Jun-11Pillar Data Systems Storage systemsApr-11Datanomic Data Quality Software Feb-11Ndevr – Select IP only Environmental Reporting and Business Intelligence 2010 Nov-10 Art Technology GroupEcommerce software vendor May-10 Pre-Paid Software Payment Solutions May-10 Market2LeadApplications May-10 Secerno Data protection hardware and software Apr-10Phase Forward Applications for life sciences companies and healthcare providers Feb-10AmberPoint Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) management Feb-10Convergin Telecom Service BrokerJan-10Sun Microsystems Computer servers, storage, networks, Java, MySQL, software, and services Jan-10Silver Creek SystemsProduct Data Quality Solutions for connecting Enterprise Systems, Customers, Suppliers and Partners. 2009 Oct-09SOPHOI Intellectual property management for Media & Entertainment Industry Sep-09HyperRoll Financials, software and IT services Jun-09Conformia Product Lifecycle Management May-09Virtual Iron Software Server Virtualizati on Management Software Mar-09Relsys International Drug Safety and Risk Management 2008Oct-08Haley (RuleBurst Holdings) Natural Language Business Rules / Policy Automation Oct-08Advanced Visual Technology Retail Space Planning Oct-08Primavera Project Portfolio Management Jun-08Skywire Software Document Management May-08AdminServer Insurance Policy Administration Jan-08BEA Systems Enterprise Software 2007 Dec-07MoniforceReal User Experience Monitoring Sep-07BridgestreamEnterprise Role Management software Jul-07Bharosa, IncOnline Identity Theft and Fraud Detection May-07Agile Software CorporationProduct Lifecycle Management Apr-07Lodestar CorporationUtilities Application SoftwareMar-07Hyperion CorporationEnterprise Performance Management Mar-07Tangosol IncDatagrid Software 2006 Nov-06Stellent Inc. Universal Content Management, Digital Rights Management Nov-06SPL WorldGroupUtility Billing and Customer Service Systems Oct-06SunopsisETL, Data Integration Oct-06MetaSolvOSS service activati on Jun-06DemantraDemand-Driven Planning Solution [email  protected] IP-based Contact Center Solution Apr-06Portal Software Billing and Revenue Management solutions for communications and media industry Feb-06HotSipCommunications infrastructure solutionsFeb-06Sleepycat Software Open-source database software for embedded applications Jan-06360CommerceRetail Industry Solutions Jan-06Siebel SystemsCustomer relationship management 2005 Dec-05Temposoft Workforce Management Applications sam organization Nov-05OctetString Virtual Directory Solutions Nov-05Thor Technologies Enterprise-wide User Provisioning Solutions. Oct-05Innobase Discrete Transactional Open Source Database Technology Sep-05G-LogTransportation Management Solutions Aug-05i-flexBanking Industry Solutions Jul-05Context MediaEnterprise Content IntegrationJul-05ProfitLogicRetail Industry Solutions Jun-05TimesTenReal-time Enterprise Solutions Jun-05TripleHopContext-sensitive Enterprise Search Apr-05RetekRetail Industry Solutio ns Mar-05OblixIdentity Management Solutions Jan-05PeopleSoftEnterprise Software 2004 Jun-04CollaxaBusiness process management May-04 PhaosIdentity management Jan-04SiteWorks Solutions Clinical trials management 2003 Jun-03ReliatyEnterprise data protection Jun-03FileFishEnterprise content management 2002 Jun-02SteltorEnterprise calendaring system Jan-02NetForce Adverse event reporting systemJan-02Indicast Voice portals Jan-02TopLink Object-relation mapping technology 1999 Jun-99Thinking Machines Corporation datamining technology 1995 Aug-95IRI Software OLAP products 1994 Oct-94Rdb (A division of DEC) Relational database The early acquisitions show Oracle focus on growing its databases market but acquisitions of past few years including very surprising $5 Billion acquisition of Sun MicroSystems do not give us good sense of where Oracle’s focus is. The strategic theme in Oracle’s acquisition spree is missing and seems more like reactions of leadership focusing only on â⠂¬Å"growth†.Take a look at spread of Oracle into sectors and even a layman would agree that it is stretching itself far too thin. If people outside of Oracle can’t understand why Oracle acquired Sun Microsystems, the confusion is equally evident inside Oracle as well. No one can put a figure on if Oracle acquired Sun for hardware market entry point or MySQL or Sun Solaris OS or was it a combination of all these and then some. Oracle has come out with an integrated ERP product suite – Fusion. The sales teams do not fully comprehend how to package Fusion compared to Oracle 12 version.As such Fusion itself is at least four years too late. In its attempt to create a unified platform for ERP software, it has managed to successfully scare customer who want just a small focused set of modules – like AR and GL or Manufacturing. There was Steve Jobs who made the famous statement that â€Å"†¦we tell customers what they want†¦Ã¢â‚¬ . Larry Ellison can ma ke the same claim – but to be successful at doing that, you have to be a visionary and not be distracted so hopelessly as Ellison currently is. And, customers seem to be last thing that Oracle considers while deciding these moves.For example, many of Sun’s largest former customers were large Wall Street financial institutions, and they were really miffed last year when Oracle wanted to restrict their server and operating system choices to only Sun technologies. They relentlessly pushed back and Oracle had to ultimately give in to their defiance, reaffirming deals that would let companies like HP and Dell offer Sun software on their respective hardware. â€Å"Customers will always gripe about giving too much control to any one company,† said Israel Hernandez, director of software research at Barclays Capital.Larry Ellison runs Oracle likes his personal fiefdom. The Oracle Board of Directors is merely a formality that is maintained to satisfy the Wall Street and S EC. Most decisions are taken unilaterally by Ellison and his leadership team. For example the 2010 hiring of ex-HP CEO, Mark Hurd, as a co-president after Hurd was fired by HP board due to sexual harassment allegations. Analysts viewed the hiring as a positive outcome for Oracle as it looked to expand. However, Mr. Hurd’s arrival was quickly followed by departure of one ofOracle long-timer, Charles Phillips. At one time, Charles was touted as Ellison’s protege and likely successor. Oracle customers are worried about putting all their eggs in one basket. Almost every company that they tend to do business is being bought by Oracle – much to customers’ dislike. And for hosts of Oracle’s Annual Open World program, San Francisco city officials are running into dilemma of saying â€Å"No† to Oracle at some point for hosting the event, simply because it is unlikely that city could survive the demands of an Oracle four times its current size.A look at its portfolio will tell you more about scary reach and disappointing and unfocused spread that Oracle has now – 110 product lines spread across 14 different domains. (source – http://www. oracle. com):- DATABASE DataScaler (October 2010) e-Test (acquired from Empirix) (March 2008) Innobase (October 2005) Moniforce (December 2007) mValent (February 2009) Secerno (May 2010) Sleepycat (February 2006) TimesTen (June 2005) TripleHop (June 2005) MIDDLEWARE AmberPoint (February 2010) BEA (January 2008) Bharosa (July 2007) Bridgestream (September 2007) Captovation (January 2008)ClearApp (September 2008) Context Media (July 2005) Datanomic (April 2011) FatWire (June 2011) HyperRoll (September 2009) GoldenGate (July 2009) Java (April 2009) Oblix (March 2005) OctetString (November 2005) Passlogix (October 2010) Sigma Dynamics (August 2006) Silver Creek Systems (January 2010) Stellent (November 2006) Sunopsis (October 2006) Tacit Software (November 2008) Tangosol (March 2007) T hor Technologies (November 2005) APPLICATIONS AppForge (April 2007) Collective Intellect (June 2012) Eloqua (December 2012) Haley (October 2008) InQuira (July 2011) Interlace Systems (October 2007)Involver (July 2012) LogicalApps (October 2007) Market2Lead (May 2010) Ndevr (February 2011) RightNow (October 2011) SelectMinds (September 2012) Taleo (February 2012) TempoSoft (December 2005) Vitrue (May 2012) PRODUCT LINES Agile (May 2007) ATG (November 2010) Endeca (October 2011) Hyperion (March 2007) PeopleSoft (January 2005) Primavera (October 2008) Siebel (January 2006) [email  protected] (June 2006) IMPLEMENTATION AND INTEGRATION TOOLS Global Knowledge Software (GKS) (July 2008) SERVERS, STORAGE, AND NETWORKING Ksplice (July 2011) Pillar Data Systems (June 2011Sun (April 2009) Xsigo Systems (July 2012) Virtual Iron (May 2009) INDUSTRY SOLUTIONS COMMUNICATIONS AND MEDIA Acme Packet (February 2013) (pending) Convergin (February 2010) eServGlobal's Universal Service Platform (USP) ( May 2010) GoAhead (September 2011) HotSip (February 2006) MetaSolv Software (October 2006) Net4Call (April 2006) Netsure Telecom Limited (September 2007) Portal Software (April 2006) Sophoi (October 2009) ENGINEERING AND CONSTRUCTION Instantis (November 2012) Primavera (October 2008) Skire (July 2012) FINANCIAL SERVICES i-flex (August 2005)HEALTH SCIENCES ClearTrial (March 2012) Phase Forward (April 2010) Relsys (March 2009) INDUSTRIAL MANUFACTURING Agile (May 2007) Conformia Software (June 2009) Demantra (June 2006) G-Log (September 2005) INSURANCE AdminServer (May 2008) Skywire Software (June 2008) RETAIL 360Commerce (January 2006) Advanced Visual Technology (AVT) (October 2008) ProfitLogic (July 2005) Retek (April 2005) UTILITIES DataRaker (December 2012) SPL WorldGroup (November 2006) LODESTAR (April 2007) Failure to Admit Reality It is also felt that Oracle executive management is out of touch with reality.The typical strategy is to first make fun of competitors, then ridicule them and finally scare the wits out of the customers who were even thinking of adopting competitors’ products. If the competition still survives all this and continues to grow then Oracle does one of the two things – either it buys the competition or simply buys the number two in that space. They did this for Sun, HP, NetApp, EMC, VMWare, Siebel, PeopleSoft, Salesforce, Microsoft (for MS SQL Server). Most of the times, customers can see through this and continue their adaptation of new products from customers.Most recent examples are Oracle’s taking potshots for two consecutive years in Oracle Open World 2010 and 2011 at Salesforce. com and then when it couldn’t wean away customers from Salesforce. com or slow down the ramp up, it launched its own versions of cloud offerings in 2012 Open World. Sun MicroSystems â€Å"Millstone† Around the Neck Whatever be the underlying rationale for purchase of Sun MicroSystems, Oracle is now challenged to make th e whole acquisition viable. It now finds itself in the territory of hardware market that its sales team is so ill-equipped to sell.The only option it had was to turn the Sun hardware into Exadata, Exalogic and Exalytic Servers and try to hoodwink the customers into buying this â€Å"supreme† computing machines. Much to its chagrin, not many customers are biting this new set of baits. Dark â€Å"Cloud† Space For a long time – almost three years – Oracle made fun of Salesforce. com, Amazon and Microsoft – specifically for their cloud services. It positioned the Exadata and Exalogic servers as new cloud servers that could provide as much computing power as tens of commodity hosts from these vendors cloud offerings.However, around late 2011-2012, it became very clear to Oracle that Cloud hosting and cloud based multi-tenancy software are the future and it scrambled to buy as many Cloud services based companies as it could – examples are RightNow , Taleo, Virtue – all acquired within months of each other in 2011-12. Oracle needs to realize that just acquisition of a company by and in itself doesn’t position Oracle as a leader in that space – acquisition is just the start – Oracle thereafter needs to retain the talent in that company, invest and grow the company, integrate it seamlessly within Oracle’s other relevant product lines.Unfortunately for Oracle, these are also the areas where it has failed most of the times in the past. Grasping for straws Good news first, Oracle has not yet reached this stage yet – in this stage, very perceptible symptoms are – changing CEOs and executive staff in quick rotation and changing the product directions every so often. However, there is bound to be a moment, not in very distant future, when we will find that eople will become so weary of Oracle products that Ellison will be either dislodged by a hostile board or will leave on his own. He has essentially no succession plan in place except bunch of execs like Thomas Kurian or Mark Hurd who can stake their claim to the crown. Thomas is well respected within the company but lacks charisma and chutzpah of Ellison. Mark may not be as respected but has good experience of cutting costs – like he did at HP. Death KnellIn this stage, a company either slowly vanishes into irrelevance or is acquired or merged into another competitor or goes belly up. For the sake of hundreds of thousands of professionals using, preaching and earning their bread from Oracle Technologies, I just hope Oracle never reaches that stage. Out of hundreds of companies that passed through this stage and vanished into oblivion, only two companies have thus far ever recovered from this stage – Xerox and Apple. Once again, I am sincerely hoping that Oracle never reaches this stage.Will it be able to recover from this downward spiral? Oracle can arrest this dance towards its vanishing into obli vion – question that really begs for an answer is – will it have the honesty to first admit and then stop this march? First of all, Oracle should focus and determine its core strength and then focus on building up on those. There is no prudence demonstrated in draining money on acquisitions and then selling those companies at markdown, or worst, writing off the charge as a loss.It is about time Oracle give up its greed on squeezing more money out of its customer and first create products and value that customers will willingly play obscene amount of money for. References: http://finance. yahoo. com http://www. oracle. com http://www. nytimes. com/2010/09/22/technology/22oracle. html? _r=0 http://www. forbes. com/2001/10/29/1029orcl. html http://www. zdnet. com/oracles-customers-a-bit-baffled-by-fusion-strategy-says-report-7000011143/ http://www. networkworld. com/news/2013/011713-oracle-cloud-265922. html How the Mighty Fall: And why some companies never give in â€⠀œ by Jim Collins,