The smartphone industry has been leading the cellphone industry since the development of iPhone. Yesterday when I went to Apple store to fix my little brother’s iPhone, I had a talk with one of the specialist about some of the iPhone functions that I was not sure about. He suggested me to update my computer, restore my data in iCloud regularly, secure this, secure that, organize files, photos, purchase an external drive, update my account etc. I was so overwhelmed by all the information I needed to be concerned about with a single phone, or a single laptop.

Back a few years ago, nothing was this complicated because the technology was at a much slower pace. Linking back to the presentation we heard last class from Modern Craft, there are updates happening every minute, and the online world is growing at an unbelievable and uncontrollable level. This really frightens me because this massive data might eventually crash one day in the future, and security will be a very huge issue to everybody who is involved in online activities. Everything has its good and bad side, so on one hand, we are enjoying this what we have imagined to be a miracle 10 years ago, but on the other hand, there is the fear of what is going to be like in another 10 years from now?

http://www.wsj.com/articles/retailers-scale-up-online-sales-distribution-networks-1447792869?mod=ST1

“Home Depot says it opened its third U.S. distribution centre in the third quarter dedicated to e-commerce fulfillment as online sales soared”

In the recently years, many retailers expanded their e-commerce supply chain because online sales have grew tremendously; one of which is Home Depot – it can now can ship to 90% of its U.S. customers within two business days after recently opening its third online-order fulfillment center in Troy Township, Ohio.

” E-commerce revenue grew far faster than in-store sales. Online revenue increased 25% compared with the same quarter a year ago against 6.4% growth in Home Depot’s overall revenue.”

In comparison to in-store sales, online sales are more attractive, convenient for both sellers and buyers. Relating this news to what we discussed in E-Marketing class, many retailers such as Best Buy and Future Shop are shutting down stores around the world, due to waste of labour and capital. By switching to online shops or vending machines, the cost reduce by massively. There is also a trend that is causing retailers to shut down stores, which is ‘screening’. Many customers go to the stores to check out the products, and copy down the ‘code’ to search online to purchase at a lower price. It seems like online selling and marketing will keep growing until something more advanced replaces.

http://mic.com/articles/112944/anonymous-went-after-the-islamic-state-with-a-massive-hack-but-was-it-a-good-idea#.AEne4A7av

Summary of news: Breaking news on November 13th. Paris was attacked by ISIS terrorist bombs in various locations. more than 130 people dead, and lots wounded. It was a dreadful scene, and a miserable day for Parisians and people around the globe.

A few days after the attack, Hacker group named “Anonymous” responded ISIS terrorists by posting a video, declaring a war against them. The spokesperson wore a mask announced in French, “Expect massive cyber attack.s War is declared, Get prepared. Anonymous from all over the world will hunt you down… You should know that we will find and we will not let you go. We will launch the baggiest operation ever against you.”

Comments: Hackers, as we already know, have extremely expertise skills to hack the internet to steel people’s information. In our current world with so much data entered into the computer system, hackers are able to search certain information that they need. They have declared war to ISIS, which means that they will be hacking through their data to find out about their plans and conspiracy.

#prayforfrance#prayforworld

http://www.cbc.ca/news/trending/instagram-essena-o-neill-social-media-isn-t-real-1.3302045

Essena O’Neill has been “internet famous” since age 16. Her dream at the age of 12 was to become someone who is “perfect” in the audiences’ eyes. She measured her perfectness through the number of followers, likes, and appraisals from her social media accounts: Facebook, Youtube, Instagram, Twitter, and Tumblr. She would dress mature, take hundred of pictures and photoshop the best one to post them on social media to gain likes. By the age she graduated high school, she has made income off her posts and modelling for brands.

“I had all the attention I had ever dreamed of and more. And … I had never been more miserable in my life,” she wrote. “I was a living paradox of conditional self-love and constant self-hate … I liked myself based on how tight and toned my body was, how pretty my hair and makeup was, how hot the guy I was talking to was, how happy I looked in photos, how many people liked my photos … my whole idea of self-worth revolved around my appearance and my social media status.”

She decided to quit social media because she does not want to spend 50 hours online without experiencing the real world. She does not want to waste her life again on the fake world that is making her miserable and unbearable and wants to face the real self and what truly makes her happy.

Comments: I think Essena’s act is very inspiring, and I have watched her recent 20 mins Youtube video and I was very touched by her words and emotions. However, this also leads me to wonder if she is taking another route to get more fame by going against social media. Social media’s power has gone beyond imagination, which is why everyone who is involved with business or trying to make money are relying on social media to reach their objectives. These platforms are the quickest and easiest ways to reach people and gain attention. However, everything has both positive and negative sides, at the same time that we are gaining benefits from social media, many are also suffering from this “online world”. Relating this situation to Marketing, traditional marketing has evolved into E-Marketing — will this generation last?

http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2015/10/08/google-says-mobile-searches-surpass-those-on-pcs/?mod=ST1

“Google searches on mobile devices outnumbered those on desktop computers in 10 countries, including the U.S. and Japan.”

Comments:
Google is currently one of the most successful search engines across the world. It is convenient to search and the results always match with what users are looking for. Now that google have successfully developed mobile friendly search engine, the frequency of search definitely increases. For myself, on average, I use my mobile to search on google about 3-5 times a day. Mobile friendly Apps and websites has become essential to companies because not everyone carries a laptop around or have a computer with them all the time, but they would always carry their smartphones with them. Therefore, it is more likely to catch people searching or browsing on their mobile phones in their spare time.

However, developing a successful mobile search engine has its tricks. For example Google indicates that “The smaller screens of mobile gadgets leave less room for keyword-based ads, which is why Google earlier this year rolled out a new crop of mobile-friendly ads that rely on data, such as images, product specs and prices, rather than keywords.” The sizes and placement of words and images are especially important for users to have a good experience.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/twitter-opens-pre-roll-video-ad-marketplace-1444338084

SUMMARY: Twitter introduces its new feature Thursday that enables marketers to place pre-roll advertisements as long as 6 seconds before videos that are professionally produced. Publishers are able to upload and post content through the new feature of Twitter’s video and collect revenue as soon as ads are automatically placed before it. As an agreement, Twitter takes 30% of the revenue generated from the ads and the content producer earns the 70%.

COMMENTS: Twitter’s new feature is very much like Youtube. As a youtube user for years, I have noticed the increase of the quality of advertisements and the frequency of ad occurence during videos as well. Youtube has done a good job on the ads because it certainly grabs a lot of attention from users. However most ads enable users to skip them after 3 seconds, and Twitter extends it to 6 seconds. Although this is a very smart way to generate revenue by cooperating with marketers, it may cause complaints from Twitter users.

Related to my last blog post, Here is a summary of a magazine article I read regarding the severe aging population in China.

A census over Chinese population shows that, by 2025, 25% of Chinese will be over 60. Chinese government and medical system is unprepared for the ageing citizens. The current medical care and pension systems are not adequate to meet the needs of the old. Rural areas lag far behind cities in terms of the provision of benefits.

Unlike their young counterparts, Chinese old people live alone not because of their choice, but because they have no choice. For the old, the physical condition is an important issue. Yet their psychological situation is also worrisome. Since female tend to outlive their husbands, and their children move to cities for employment, old Chinese female tend to live alone, and in many cases, TV or radio is their only companion. It’s a Chinese tradition to value filial piety and encourage families to live together. Old Chinese females, sometimes feel reluctant or ashamed to search for help from their neighbors or the society. This leads them to feel even lonelier; some of them avoid social activities.

Given this background of Chinese elderly, during 2009-2011, people over 65 constitutes to almost half of all suicides in China. China is rapidly changing its social structure; the problem of the elderly continues to be serious.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/twitter-mulls-expanding-size-of-tweets-1443554128/

Twitter Inc. is debating whether to allow users to tweet more than 140 characters in each post, which challenges one of the fundamental features of the social media service. An main issue that the company is struggling with is by how much it should extend the limit because changing the originality may “alter the basic Twitter experience”.

Personally, I think Twitter should not change the number of characters allowed because “short messages” is what Twitter is known for and what differentiates Twitter from other social media networks.  😀

https://www.techinasia.com/instagram-accessible-china-service-patchy/

As we all know, China blocks most of the popular western mobile applications for social media purposes, and imitates its own “Chinese versions”. Some examples include: Sina Weibo (Chinese Twitter), Wechat (Chinese WhatsApp), Renren (Chinese Facebook), 滴滴(didi)（Chinese Uber), etc. When I went back to mainland China this summer, I could not access my Instagram, it was available at rare occasions, but most of the time it appeared blank. I needed to download an App named “VPN express” to unblock Instagram every time I want to use it. For the entire month in China, I spent about $3.00 for a 4 GB data, which was somewhat adequate. I have always wondered when the “Chinese version” of Instagram will appear…

Today, I learned there is a new App name: 17, that looks almost entirely like Instagram. My Chinese friends posted screenshots of their accounts on Wechat, trying to get more followers. The difference between 17 and Instagram is that you can ‘like’ someone’s photo as many times as you want, and the amount of likes you receive from others on your photos appears directly on your page. Also, videos are live, which allow your followers to see what you are doing at the moment. Last but not least, you can earn money from likes, so the more likes, the more money you earn. From a brief calculation, about 1 million likes from others will earn you $1.00.

Here is what my 17 account looks like: