Think Differently

My Personality

Your view on yourself:

You are down-to-earth and people like you because you are so straightforward. You are an efficient problem solver because you will listen to both sides of an argument before making a decision that usually appeals to both parties.

Answer: True

The type of girlfriend/boyfriend you are looking for:

You like serious, smart and determined people. You don’t judge a book by its cover, so good-looking people aren’t necessarily your style. This makes you an attractive person in many people’s eyes.

Answer: Somewhat true. I doubt people think I am attractive.

Your readiness to commit to a relationship:

You are ready to commit as soon as you meet the right person. And you believe you will pretty much know as soon as you might that person.

Answer: Somewhat true, but I think the second sentence is supposed to have the word meet instead of might. Also, I would like to know the person first before I commit into a relationship. 

The seriousness of your love:

Your have very sensible tactics when approaching the opposite sex. In many ways people find your straightforwardness attractive, so you will find yourself with plenty of dates.

Answer: I doubt that is true. I have been single throughout my life! 

Your views on education

Education is very important in life. You want to study hard and learn as much as you can.

Answer: True

The right job for you:

You have plenty of dream jobs but have little chance of doing any of them if you don’t focus on something in particular. You need to choose something and go for it to be happy and achieve success.

Answer: True

How do you view success:

Success in your career is not the most important thing in life. You are content with what you have and think that being with someone you love is more than spending all of your precious time just working.

Answer: This statement is mostly false. I would want to be successful and still at the same time spend as much time as I can with my love. However, if I am overwhelmingly successful, then the second sentence would be true. 

What are you most afraid of:

You are afraid of having no one to rely on in times of trouble. You don’t ever want to be unable to take care of yourself. Independence is important to you.

Answer: True

Who is your true self:

You are full of energy and confidence. You are unpredictable, with moods changing as quickly as an ocean. You might occasionally be calm and still, but never for long.

Answer: True. That is spot on! 

Rebates

Ever wondered why rebates have been issued by stores? Did you ever wonder why retailers will not always give you the rebate immediately? Well, I know some of the reasons why this has continued to be the case. There are three main reasons why rebates continue to be issued, which are mainly based on gross revenue. They range from the company to the government. Both of these entities enjoy the process of rebates.

First, the government receives sales tax prior to the rebate. Just in case if you do not realize this, just think about it. Rebates only are applied on the price of the item when it is purchased. For example, if you purchase a $40 game that is free AFTER a mail-in-rebate, you would still pay for the sales tax of the purchase price prior to the rebate, which is 9.75% in most places in Los Angeles County. This is about $4.00. Speaking about sales tax rates, did you that the sales tax in El Monte, Avalon, and Inglewood is 10.25%? However, that is not as crazy as Pico Rivera and South Gate, which gouges consumers with a sales tax rate of 10.75%! Now, that is just insane! I understand that government needs to function with the use of tax revenue in order to pay for social services, but there is a point when it starts to inhibit economic stability. If consumers are charged with a higher sales tax rate for the same product at the same price, the logical consumer would opt for the cheaper one if they are able to attain it for the least opportunity cost. Anyways, that is not the point of this blog post.          

Next, it is really important to remember that not everyone turns in their rebate. Some people forget their rebates and do not comply to all of the rules in order to obtain it. These rules include the following: turning the rebate after the deadline, not buying some/all of the products that will constitute a rebate, not turning in the UPC code, etc. This increases the company’s gross revenue since they do not have to give out the potential free money to the consumer.

Lastly, the postal service loves this too, since they can gain more revenue from people using postage stamps to mail in their rebates. Ever since the popularity of email and online bill paying services, the postal service has been losing revenue. Now, they are asking congress to delete Saturday delivery in order to remain sustainable. Interestingly, some companies support this movement while others are against it. For example, Netflix is for this change because this will reduce the amount of DVDs that they will send to their customers every month without them being directly implicated. In addition, they will spend less money on postage, since there are less DVDs that they will send out, which will decrease their shipping costs. On the other side of the spectrum, corporate companies that do not support this adjustment will cite the observation that online packages will now be sent to corporate mailrooms since their employees would be most likely working during those periods of time. If these packages do not get sent to the mailrooms of their consumer’s workplaces while they are working, then there is a possibility that these packages will be sent to the home of these employees while they are taking a sick day to make sure that their transaction has been successfully conducted. Overall, productivity would be reduced, which affect a company’s bottom line.

Those are huge problems with rebates, but that does not mean the people can fight back in order to fix some flaws in them. The first solution is the simplest, which would have the government charge sales tax before ANY rebate if their state charges sales tax to the applicable item. Remember, not all items are charged with sales tax. Next, the item would have to have all of the rebates applied at the point of purchase so they can use their time productively doing something else rather than fill out a rebate form and drive to the post office and mail it. Well, these solutions do not solve the flaws with the postal service. They need to downsize and offer mail service only five days a week, but their package delivery system still needs to be offered six days a week. The ever expanding personal shipping department this is part of a growing industry due to the growth of online shopping. This should reduce the some or most of the unnecessary overhead that the United States Postal Service (USPS) currently carries.

This should fix most of the flaws of rebates, but with most changes, loopholes will be exposed and abused. We can only hope that they are not major and preventable. 

iPhone 4

Yesterday, Apple unleashed the fourth generation of their coveted, technological phone. 

Personally, I do really understand the hype to line up and get the phone. In this age of constant technological upgrades, there are plenty of alternatives to that will either match or beat the iPhone. I will acknowledge that the iPhone has the largest apps store compared to other mobile operating systems. Although, it is not the most open or offer certain killer apps such as Google Voice or Adobe Flash (only available to Android OS 2.2 also known as “froyo”), which the Android operating system offers. In my opinion, this is not a new “great” technological device since most of the features can be matched or beaten by other phones that are widely distributed to other wireless companies.  

There are several flaws with the iPhone 4.

1. At&t- I know that most people who have this wireless carrier are fairly satisfied with the service. I am forcefully tied to this company until late September (thank gosh!). I had frequent problems with this wireless network in one certain spot in my hometown and during several community service events where there are plenty of people using the network. 

2. Limited data usage- Due to the high traffic demand from network users onto At&t and the fact they want to maximize profits by limiting upgrade costs and the desire to extend market share, they set a cap on data usage before you have to pay an overage charge for data. 

3. Video chatting is only limited to wi-fi and between two iPhone 4s- I understand that At&t is preventing any more potential problems that can happen to their network, but Apply should not limit it to between two iPhone 4’s. They should expand this to their IM chat platforms. This is an attempt for Apple to make more money since it is proposed as a killer feature. There is an alternative that does not restrict you from wi-fi and that would be the Evo 4G from Sprint. This phone has video chatting that can be accessed anywhere their network is along with the capability of connecting to a 4G network, depending on your location. I do not know if it has to be between two Evo 4Gs.

4. Covering the ends of the integrated antenna can kill the reception- I did not anticipate this flaw, but some iPhone 4’s have this problem of killing a call or killing the connection to the network when they hold their fingers come into contact with a certain place of the phone since the antenna makes up the exterior of the chassis of the phone.  

5. Phone exclusivity- most of the problems mentioned above would have been solved if the iPhone was open to multiple wireless networks. Unfortunately there are exclusive contracts that restrict the freedom to have the handset to multiple networks. In addition, there are different forms of these networks (CDMA or GSM) as well as the bandwidth. This is not the iPhone’s fault, but it is the FCC’s fault. They should standardize the network to one form of technology with multiple bandwidths so that phones can be able to connect to multiple bandwidths thus, leading to phones that can be used in multiple networks; they should also ban phone exclusivity and completely open it up to the whole market. This would boost competition and reduce the price.

Overall, the iPhone is a great device to have, but it is not the best at everything. It has its advantages and disadvantages much like many other technological devices. Although, most people who want an iPhone do not consider alternative phones that are able to fulfill most of the iPhone’s capabilities. At times, these capabilities have exceeded the iPhone. The main objective of this blog entry is to make the reader consider other devices before selecting the iPhone.  

If you have any suggestions or comments, then please post them up on this page.

BP Oil Spill

It has been over two months since the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill started and it is still gushing oil into the Gulf of Mexico. Unfortunately, there were plenty of flaws that led up to the environmental disaster and the management to contain the oil spill has been slow. I’m not going to explain the whole scenario. Instead, I am going to explain what BP and the Obama Administration has to do.

1. Allow state authorities to coordinate the cleanup effort 10 miles offshore to the coastline. BP has so far controlled everything and they have not been effective thus far. Also, the states have a huge economic interest to maintain their coastline since it is one of the main parts of their economy. 

2. Allow the media to access the work site with protective clothing that the workers are also using. This has to be done in order to preserve one of the great rights in this country: the freedom of the media. 

3. Make BP contribute to the $20 Billion fund immediately so that the checks can be sent to the people who have been affected either directly or indirectly can survive. 

4. Include health problems connected to the oil spill to be part of the compensation spent for the innocent humans who have been affected.

5. Allow independent government funded companies inspect new deepwater rigs all over the nation or within one hundred miles of the coastline of any part of the nation before they continue their operations. There are many flaws that led to the downfall of the Deepwater Horizon. Many of those flaws are incorporated into the shortcuts they used.

6. Destroy the Minerals Management Service (MMS) and fire the people who are in charge of that terrible government agency. The Obama Administration needs to remake and rebrand the MMS into a new agency that is not corrupted with a new purpose to maintain strict regulations.

7. Hire everyone who has the equipment to skim the oil after health and safety training. There are plenty of fishermen and fisherwomen with boats who are not able to do anything since of the fishing ban due to the oil spill. You have to utilize them! 

8. Stop using the dispersant, Corexit. This has been proven dangerous during the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill. Even the Environmental Protection Agency (E.P.A.) has requested BP to stop using Corexit, but they have not yet complied. The main purpose of the dispersant is to prevent the oil from getting onshore and avoiding further public relation nightmares. This is just like hiding the evidence! I agree dispersant can be used, as long as it does not cause environmental damage to the flora and the fauna of the area. 

9. Research more effective ways to prevent and fix tragedies like this. The oil industry has reached more effective ways to drill for oil, but the oil recovery plans have been in the dark ages because the oil companies do not foresee tragic events like this. You just need to look at the oil spill plans to see that the oil industry is incompetent to care. Currently, we need oil to make the economy function, since nearly everything is connected to it in one way or another. In the near future, I hope we stop using this form of energy and switch to more renewable sources of energy.

10. Promote more funding for renewable sources of energy. This disaster has proven that we cannot delay investment into green energy for any longer! Research and development pays off in the long run when you look at the whole picture.

These are some suggestions to BP and the Obama Administration regarding the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.  

If you have any suggestions or comments, then please post them up on this page.