United Nations aims to protect human rights, maintain world peace, and develop third world countries etc. On the other hand, the Arc Initiative focuses on building internships and workshops  and program  and Social enterprise focuses on social, cultural, and environmental goals.

Arc Initiative logo

I feel that the United Nation helps restructure the ones that need help in the core section, and Arc Initiative and Social enterprise supports it. Even if United Nations were fully funded and were used to solve a particular problem, after all the funds are used, the UN can move on to solve different problem. Therefore, to support the people who are once stabilized, Arc Initiative allows young people in the country to gain work experience, which is necessary because young people who are in our age are the ones that are eventually going to support their country.

Therefore, UN boosts up the entire country, whereas the Arc Initiative and Social enterprises help support the whole community to let the country stand on its own without any help later on.

This is a response blog post to Betty Ye’s “What Do You Really Know About Diamonds?”

Diamonds are one of the beautiful, but expensive gem stones in the world. Everyone knows that it’s expensive. I agree to her blog post, because DeBeers marketing strategy is amazing, they were able to manipulate the entire country, and even the world after that, to make people believe that diamonds are rare and are necessary to give them in rings for a proposal.

Interestingly, during an ECON 101 lecture, professor Gateman talked about a same topic. He mentioned how diamonds are called “precious” because they are expensive and a little bit shiny. Would people really buy diamonds if they became cheaper? I think people are  buying diamonds for their “snob appeal” (as professor Gateman mentioned later on.) People buy diamonds because everyone knows that they are expensive. What if they become cheaper? Would people still buy them? Or, is what Betty Ye is writing is right? Are the diamond market really restricting the flow of supply to create an artificial “rarity” to diamonds and skyrocket its prices?

Diamond and cubic zirconia

Which one is the diamond and which one is the cubic zirconia (20times cheaper than diamonds)?

The right one is the diamond.

Zappos.com logo

Zappos is an online shoe and clothing shop, and is the company we focused on in lecture 19 for COMM 101. One of the word that came up was “organization culture”. I think organization culture means, the attitudes of the employers to the employees, and how that reflects the general atmosphere of the company. Zappos has a great organizational culture. There are no hierarchy, the CEO is working with other workers with the same desk, they have parties and free food. Zappos’s workplace is very different from usual companies, however that maybe the reason the employees and the CEO have such a strong teamwork.

Zappos is known for a great customer service as well. One of the examples faced was the customer service done in phones. The mandatory 4 week training for all of the people who answers the phone to the customers leads to good impression of the company, which will then allow the customers to spread the positive word of mouth. I think this is one of the marketing strategies that uses the purchase funnel. The customer who had a good customer service will definitely use Zappos again, and that person can later on bring more customers. This is definitely a win-win.

Purchase Funnel seen in lecture 11.

Looking at Zappos, it made me realize how the environment of the company can change how people can work more efficiently, which then leads to more income. In the short term, all of the parties and free food may cost a lot, however, if this is looked at in a long term, it will bring a lot of income to the company later on.

Zappos employees

LINK

This is a response blog post to Katie Applebaum’s “The importance of a middle class”

I do agree with her idea that “middle class” are important. Indeed, they support  the economic growth and help the country grow. Her blog post was about how new artists are struggling to grow and earn money due to already famous singers having the money to promote their new music, whereas middle class artists cannot afford to do so, and how pirating music makes it easier for people to download freely, which means that there are no profits being made for artists. I feel part of this is true and part of this is false.

Promoting their music and battling against singers with million hits may be almost impossible. Without money, it would be again, impossible to create music without good resources Monarch Studios holds.

The thing is, it all depends on the people who are listening to the music. For an example, Japan, my home country has a site similar to Youtube called the Nico nico Douga,  created by Dwango. co.

Nico nico douga logo

And in this Nico nico douga, are hundred million music created by amateur artists, using Vocaloids, a singing voice synthesizer. There are many people who have made a lot of money through this, as these songs become a popular hit (mostly after gaining 500~900 thousand plays), they become CDs, be used in Japanese games, and so on.

Vocaloid : Hatsune Miku

It is a hard time since technology is developing and famous artists are becoming even more famous. But remember, Justin Bieber became famous from getting a call from his current manager after watching his videos. It is so hard to predict what could happen in a music industry. A normal boy in youtube can eventually become a billionaire, and so can an anime character like Hatsune Miku too. Allowing many people to create music is great, but involves what kind of music they are presenting (whether it fits the taste of music for the listeners or not), and if they are lucky enough to become famous.