In Thenuka Karunaratne’s blog, he mentioned that eBook sales are actually dropping.In a world surrounded by screens of all sizes and shapes, people often turn to print books as a retreat from looking screens and digital media all day.

As far as I am concerned, in the modern economic conditions, the author from income profitable purpose, most new book exists in the form of traditional books. Meanwhile, traditional books is printing production listed, general beautifully printed chart and so on, and explain, facilitating ,understanding, of course, because the computer is now widespread, many electronic text re
ading function, so ebook also has its necessity of existence, and there were many electronic magazine also do good, sound and color, and vivid animation, see this kind of books and more than reading the traditional books much a few minutes fun. When I above analysis, I think ebook won’t replace traditional books, each has his strong point, each have each market.

https://blogs.ubc.ca/thenuka/2015/10/04/print-books-the-lone-rebel-of-the-digital-era/

I’ve browsed one of the students’ blogs and one of them catches my attention. The blog is about Alibaba, which is featured by the world’s largest online commerce company and the world’s fastest growing e-commerce market by some measures.She talks about the potential and challenges of Alibaba, while I’d like to talk about Alibaba’s revenue stream.

When it comes to Alibaba’s revenue stream , advertising revenue may be one of the most important part of it’s income . Actually we know that at the first few years , Alibaba could not earn enough money , because it is free for many things . So Alibaba had to put much money in it until taobao declared that it would start it’s network advertising business . Now taobao had already launched many kinds of advertising , such as banner ads and those hit ads . This is the first profit model that taobao official declared . It is the development of it’s volumn a day and large number of users that lead to this . Taobao’s official said in this way they can focus on using their own distinct advantage to give their guests accurate and efficient services , such as help their guests to impove their brand and help them to promote their sales . At the same time , taobao also launched some value-added service plan to its advertisers . It contains brand promotion , market research , consumer research and community activities . The way it help its consumers to promote their sales it to develop the network marketing channel.

Reference:https://blogs.ubc.ca/jieyuzhu/2015/10/03/the-potential-and-challenges-of-alibaba/

I am opposed to the ‘one for one’ business model because in my opinion, it is just a kind of formalism. The model is more likely to be a publicity stunt to motivate consumers to purchase their products instead of solving the social problem.

The “One for One” model means that if you buy a shoe from Toms, they will give a shoe for charity, which is based on the consumption of buyers. If  Toms use this mentality of consumers to sell products, they are bound to not put emphasis on the quality and style of the product. It would be a vicious circle.

In the other hand, it is obvious that the donation cannot last forever.  The people from the third world will stop purchasing from the local market as soon as they begin to rely on the free donations from ” One for One” model. Their local economies will be damaged by the donations. In this way, people will not not be willing to work hard to change their life any more because of the free donations. As soon as the donation stops , people will still face the same problems (lack of clear water, daily necessities, etc) as before, or even worse. So I think “One for One” model totally makes no sense.

Nowadays,Tesla, Nissan Leaf, and Chevy Volt – these cars all seem to find a way to differentiate themselves using focus strategies and build a strong competitive advantage against others.  However, this competitive advantage will not last forever. So the question is, what does the future of our roads look like?

The autonomous cars came up with an idea during a group’s presentation.  Companies like Tesla are in a war to produce self-driving cars.   General Motors has recently announced that they are now ready to test them first cohorts of “fully autonomous fleet of Chevy Volts”. Google has already created a self-driving car prototype and said that the technology should be ready to hit the ground running by 2020.

As far as I am concerned, there is no doubt that the self driving cars will exist by 2020 , especially with the continuous development in technology.  However, my feelings and thoughts towards autonomous cars are ambivalent.  There’s excitement with the idea that it’ll revolutionize human travel and bring independent mobility for the elders and the blind.  But there are so many safety precautions and liability issues that follow.

http://web.b.ebscohost.com/ehost/detail/detail?sid=57975615-cc71-4085-8924-0724e47d2fcf%40sessionmgr113&crlhashurl=login.aspx%253fdirect%253dtrue%2526hid%253d4109%2526db%253dbth%2526AN%253d87715835%2526site%253dehost-live%2526scope%253dsite&hid=128&vid=0&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZSZzY29wZT1zaXRl#AN=87715835&db=bth

In order to revolutionize the fast food industry, McDonald’s Canada is making massive changes to re-invent its customer experience. The main transformation is the addition of the digital kiosks where customers can customize their own premium hamburgers.Besides, McDonald’s is also adding restaurant greeters and servers to enhance customer service.  The addition of the kiosks and extra staff will cost McDonald’s Canada more than 200million over the next two years.

As far as I am concerned, this is a global decision by McDonald’s Canada, which I feel will soon extend to many other countries around the world.  Although still being a fast food restaurant, McDonald’s is trying to entice customers to enjoy a nice sit-down meal with their  friends and family now, specifically focused on the personal customer experience. What’s more, by adding the digital kiosks, McDonald’s will gain more advantages by allowing customers to enjoy a personalized meal.  These new changes  will not only add significantly extra value to customers, but it will also rapidly transform their brand and public image. During the past years, restaurant renovations and the introduction of healthier menu options set McDonald’s on the right path for the future.  Now with this announcement , the company appears poised to regain a stranglehold in the fast food industry.

November 25th, Apple’s stock price reached $119.75. Meanwhile, the market value reached $702000000000, becoming the first company whose market value breaks through $700000000000. If  taking the inflation rate into account, Microsoft is the company who owns the highest market value because Microsoft’s market capitalization in 1999 reached $613000000000,which converted to the equivalent of $874000000000 in 2014. However, Apple’s Icahn Carl believes that Apple’s share price is still undervalued and its reasonable price should be $203 by 2015,which means that Apple’s market value will reach more than one billion dollars.

However, as far as I am concerned, there was none country or company in the history can get rid of the natural rules that when a thing reaches its extreme,it reverses its course.Since Jobs died 3 years ago , Apple has been speculation when will be the turning point to the boom-bust. From the perspective of the income structure of the third quarter, Apple’s dependence on the iPhone strengthens. In this way, if Apple do not no launch new and attractive iPhone product , Apple’s turning point probably not far away.