Month: November 2011

In most cases, you would use online sites such as Expedia or Priceline to get a cheaper price for a nice hotel or vacation by booking in advance.  However, what has happened recently with a few cases is that somehow the servers that these online travel sites use has not been updated with the appropriate information regarding availability of rooms for various different hotels.  This means that individuals and families who have booked their relaxing stay in advance, have gotten to their destination only to be told that they “do not exist in the system.”  The online businesses have ensured its dissatisfied customers that this kind of thing happens from time to time when there is an overload of requests and hits on their sites and that they will be refunded of their deposits.

I personally believe that this is a very risky game to play as an online business.  If your going to create a website that is attached to thousands of different hotels then you must ensure that your servers are updated with the statuses of each and every hotel that is featured.  It’s incredibly unfair to put someone who is just looking to get away and relax in a situation that can ruin a vacation.

Article Used: http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2011/11/23/online-travel-mistakes/?iid=HP_River

I found Nolan Killeen’s post on the new Google android phone very interesting and shows how dominant companies with almost all of the market share can still be in jeopardy of losing popularity.

Throughout my high school days and even now the only two phones that people have been remotely interested in were as follows: A Blackberry or an Iphone. Now all of a sudden with the huge problems RIM has been having with bringing in an entirely new system and with the let down apple brought upon its customers after releasing the “Iphone 4s” instead of a much awaited Iphone 5, the android market has been taking complete advantage of the situation.  These failures combined with the release of the new “Google” android phone which offers all of the fancy features included with the Blackberry or Iphone have created a very promising gain for the less hyped part of the market.  Suddenly now Google inc controls a whopping 52.5% of the mobile phone market from just 25% previously.

In my opinion, Apple and RIM had it coming.  I believe that the two giants simply thought that they were untouchable behind their incredibly popular products, but now have realized that this may no longer be the case!

I found Devin Spence’s analysis on how twitter can actually be used to predict market trends incredibly interesting.

I’ve been an avid internet user ever since I was in 5th grade and so I’ve been able to see the rise in social media first hand.  I’ve found websites that let the public express their personalities on the world wide web very iffy to take part in, but now it’s evident that researchers, such as Johan Bollen, have actually found a way to correlate emotions expressed online with market trends.  All of a sudden just tweeting or posting on Facebook allows analysts to predict behaviors of stocks and translates your typing into cash.

I personally agree with Devin’s thoughts regarding that there will be a huge increase in attention towards emotions expressed on Twitter, but I also believe that this exemplifies just how much economies have advanced in the past few years.  If between the time that I was in 5th grade and first year university researchers are now able to predict market trends with social media websites, then I can’t wait to see what happens in the next 7 years!

The title of this article blew my mind and so I just couldn’t resist reading up on what could possibly be going wrong talent wise in the eastern world.

The problem in a nutshell is is quite simply as follows: “For a country like China, the sheer velocity of the economy’s transformation means that the increase in demand for skilled and suitable workers is outpacing the increase in supply.”

Firms in the eastern world have reported that 40% of them are having trouble finding experienced enough candidates with the right skill sets to fill the positions that they are looking to satisfy, especially higher up ones such as managerial and executive positions. This is partly due to lack of creativity, but most interestingly due to the increase in interest of working for western world companies.  However, given that the overall economic slowdown has caused many western firms to decrease the amount of newly recruited employees, many Chinese companies have become aggressive to keep the top talent within their own country.

In my opinion, I agree with the theory that economies are growing faster than talent, especially in the eastern world.  It is clear that if you want to land the perfect job then you will not only have to be a smart leader, but also be able to differentiate yourself easily from the rest of the crowd.

Article Used: http://www.bwob.ca/topics/human-resources-topics/big-on-opportunity-short-on-talent/

We have all heard harrowing tales of how companies were created and the ingenious minds behind them.  In this particular case, I’ve chosen to read up on just how the now very famous company Bungie Studios, creators of the Halo series, came to fruition.

As per most entrepreneurship stories, this one begins with the founder, Alex Seropian, studying at the University Of Chicago pursuing a mathematics degree.  While at school, he designed a game called GNOP!, an imitation of Pong which then led Seropian to decide to create his own game company; Bungie.

Years later in 1999, after having met various key players such as Jason Jones (programmer), Bungie announced its release of Halo.  Microsoft immediately made offers to acquire the firm and allow the talented developers to work with the Xbox as a development base under the name of Bungie Studios.

Soon after this, Halo 2 was released in 2004 bringing in more than $125 million on its first day followed by Halo 3 in 2007 bringing in over $170 million.

I personally love these stories of incredibly successful entrepreneurship as it inspires the world to really chase your dreams and work hard at what your good at because actions never go unnoticed, especially revolutionary ones.