Ban Fire Crackers

Diwali is celebrated with great vigour all across the nation. Bursting firecrackers is a tradition on Diwali. Diwali is also known as Deepavali in India. Firecrackers! Just the term creates joy and excitement in one’s mind. The heart flutters with thrill and enthusiasm developed by the sight those colorful showers and sparkles from the fireworks in the sky. But is it all about fun? Have you ever wondered how many harmful effects and disadvantages do these fireworks create for the environment?. It is yours, theirs and everyone’s duty to take care of the environment, fellow humans and other living beings. You may wonder why and how.You may be having a great time celebrating and enjoying, bursting those boisterous fireworks. But it need not be the same for the others around you! What about your neighbors? Your neighbor could be sick, or many may have an important appointment the next day. He/she could also be having a test or an exam the next morning and they may need some rest. Burning firecrackers late at night at odd hours disturbs everyone living in that community and disturb their sleep and make them less concentrated in their next day.Firecrackers produce very high level of sound and the vibrations can travel over a long distance. These are sometimes over 140 decibels! A human ear can bear a maximum of 85 decibels. Sounds above this limit create disability in hearing and causes permanent damage to the ears. Firecrackers when burnt release a large amount of very tiny toxic particles that can easily enter our lungs and damage the respiratory system. The smoke from firecrackers contain sulfur compounds, heavy metals and other toxic chemicals and harmful fumes of gases such as sulfur dioxide, ozone etc,. People with asthma, multiple chemical sensitivity and other breathing problems suffer largely due to the toxic emissions from these fireworks.Crackers are unnoticeably affecting all of us. We should understand what it’s doing & how itâ€℠¢ll threaten our very existence in future. Governments should take it very seriously & should:†¢ban the production of crackers †¢enforce laws on its production, sales, use, & advertisement †¢popularize the idea of not using crackers among publicThere’re a lot of causes of global warming & pollution. All the other sources are important for our living despite their ill effects. But cracker is absolutely nothing more than garbage. Be smart, be civilized, use your knowledge, don’t worry about what others think, don’t care about society, & DON’T USE CRACKER.Let each one of us take a pledge this Diwali to say NO to firecrackers and invest in a safer and greener future. Diwali is the festival of lights and we must enlighten our lives with the sparkle of joy and goodwill, forget past grievances and look ahead towards a brighter and happier future.

Is Troy Maxson a “Tragic Hero?”

A tragic hero is a character who used to do good deeds in the light of others but allows for his flaws or inner struggles to overcome him. As a result, this downfall leads to the character’s death. In the case of Troy Maxson, main character from the play â€Å"Fences† by August Wilson, it is clear that he constantly struggles to keep up with good deeds for his family, but unfortunately allowed his inner flaws to lead him to his lonely and tragic death. Therefore, Troy Maxson is indeed considered a tragic hero and there are pieces of evidence throughout the aforementioned play that further proves my point. Troy Maxson is a man with two sons by the name of Cory and Lyons Maxson. He had Lyons before he went to jail with one woman and had Cory after jail with Rose Maxson; his current wife. His character is made up of both positive and negative attributes. He can be described as controlling because he has all the authority during the beginning of the story when Cory brings up an opportunity in getting into college football. When this idea is brought onto Troy’s table, his immediate response was to say no. The reason for this action was clear. He was protecting his son from having high hopes because he believed the color barrier was not broken. Although he said no to Cory’s opportunity, he was being a hero in his own way. Troy Maxson was known to be the breadwinner of the family. He provided for his wife and his son which is why he was respected. His characteristics were that of a powerful man. Rose asks Troy â€Å"what you all out here getting into? † And he responds â€Å"what you worried about what we getting into for? This is men talk, woman† (1. 1. 41-1. 1. 42). This quote gives an example of his strong masculinity characteristics. He struggled a lot when he was younger living with his father. His father did not provide for the family materialistically or emotionally. Growing up to this horrible lifestyle, Troy was either going to learn, grow, and live by example, or completely live his own life. He decided to live by example and do the opposite of what his father did. Although there were a couple of mistakes he made, he made sure he did not make the same mistake his dad made which was not providing for the family. Rose was Troy’s wife who respected him as a husband and made him and her children dinner every night. According to what he says, he truly loves his wife; â€Å"I love this woman. I love this woman so much it hurts. I love her so much†¦ I done run out of ways of loving her† (1. 1. 173). This quote allows the reader to realize that the Maxson family does have a foundation of love. Cory and Lyons also admired their father because in their eyes he was an excellent father figure. Bono was Troy’s best friend whom he met at a correction center and has known him for 30 years. Troy was a role model to Bono and he admired Troy's leadership and responsibility at work. After understanding the protagonist’s heroic side, it is necessary to understand that he also had a tragic downfall and that he has certain weaknesses. Troy made sure to provide for his family materialistically, but unfortunately did not expose too much of his love to his children. He was able to reluctantly give Lyons ten dollars a week but that was not enough to help him make a living. Lyons states â€Å"I just stay with my music because that's the only way I can find to live in the world† (1. 1. 153). His dream is to be a musician. But maybe he needed more than ten dollars a week to conquer his dream? Maybe he needed some father to son affection? Maybe being separated from his dad at such an early age affected him emotionally? He did not care for him so this in turn helped Lyons become more independent. Regardless of the lack of emotional support from Troy, he continues aspiring to reach his goal. Troy can also be considered a hero because he allows Lyons to be an independent man. Troy was known to be jealous of Cory because he got the opportunity to play a sport without discrimination against his race. Cory expressed his feelings to his dad in this quote: â€Å"Papa done went up to the school and told Coach Zellman I can't play football no more. †¦ Told him to tell the recruiter not to come†¦. Just cause you didn't have a chance! You just scared I'm gonna be better than you, that's all. † (1. 4. 158-1. 4. 166) Cory is clearly stressing the fact that his father said no and blames it on his jealousy, but what he does not realize is that his father is also trying to protect him from discrimination. The reason why Troy has this mentality is because he grew loving sports, just like his son, during the time of the Negro Leagues. He was discriminated against and he thinks that that is what Cory would go through. He might have been jealous, but he also played a heroic figure by protecting his son. Towards the end of the play Troy seems to be continuing his path down â€Å"tragic lane†. He betrays his wife by cheating on her with another woman, Alberta, and impregnating her. Alberta has her daughter but dies in the act of giving birth. Troy is left with no choice but to care for his daughter. Rose cuts it off with Troy, but not completely because they still live under the same roof. She is more independent now and leaves the house when she pleases. Troy’s relationship with Bono, Cory and Rose changed immensely. He has lost his respect and it will be very challenging for him to redeem it. Bono has made new friends and stops by Troy’s house once in a while. They talk about their hopes for their future and about their wives. They no longer work in the same industry so after work Troy has no one to talk to. Cory and his father are not in good shape either. The scene where Troy sits in his backyard after pay day to drink his gin and sing is when he picks a dramatic fight with his son. Cory refuses to say â€Å"excuse me† when passing by his father so Troy gets offended and tries to assert his role as a father by insisting that Cory leave his house and provide for himself since he lost his respect as the man of the house. He goes on by saying â€Å"You just another nigger on the street to me! † (2. 4. ). He also stresses to his son that he provided for him but Cory does not take that into consideration because to him that was all materialistic. He gave little loving care which ultimately made him fear his own father. Although Troy kicked his son out of his house, the fact that there was a physical blockade during their fight, it proves that it was immature on Troy’s part yet mature on Cory’s because of the way he went about the situation. Cory scolded his father for all his wrong doings and betrayals to the family. He challenges him to a physical fight, in his case involving a bat, just like Troy did to his father. Troy is a hero in the sense that he pushed Cory into manhood. Troy is alone. He is lonely. His life is not the same anymore. He tried his best by providing for his family and by showing his new daughter his better side of him. When Troy died caused by a heart attack, he left his legend as a hero behind. He supported Lyons with money each week; he provided his love to Rose; his friendship and leadership to Bono; and finally his protection and help for Cory’s future. Unfortunately, he allowed for his personal demon or flaw to â€Å"get the best of him† which led him to his death, but did good deeds in the lights of others giving Troy Maxson the title of a Tragic Hero.

Clique Pens Analysis Essay

Currently Clique pens is stuck in a situation where they are competing with other pen brands including BIC, Scripto, Pentel, Pilot, Papermate, and Sharpie. The fight for shelf space is among some of the biggest retailers worldwide such as Wal-Mart, Target, CVS, and Kroger. Because of the immense power retailers hold in this market, companies like Clique need to make sure they are allocating their funds in ways that deem appropriate to stay on the shelves. Pens are a high profit and high-turnover items which for retailers is great, but because retailers haven’t changed the price for almost over a decade, manufacturers are receiving less and less profit from their items. Retailers hold the power over the manufacturers in this market due to the amount of brands available; if one brand wasn’t working for the retailer, they could simply choose another brand. In order to remain profitable Clique’s brand managers have worked with different marketing and ad agencies to d evelop an integrated package of advertising, trade and consumer promotions to maintain the market share. Clique allocated 15% of its total promotional budget to advertising, 30% to consumer promotions, and 55% to trade promotions. Types of advertising Clique used consumer promotions and price off deals through the retailer, in such ways you would see in an ad in a magazine, â€Å"available at target†. Consumer promotions were mostly used as coupons distributed to the customer through newspapers, in-store displays, and cash register receipts. Coupon redemption rates deemed useless for the most part considering rates were about 1.3% lower than most other consumer products. Elise Ferguson (president of the writing implements division of U.S. home) has a very important decision to make; whether or not the company should spend their time and money marketing towards retailers or towards consumers, in order to grow Clique’s profits. One option that the company could choose to go with would be marketing towards the consumers rather than the retailers. Logan Chen, vice president of marketing feels that reducing trade discounts and establishing a consumer oriented MDF (Market Development Funds), coupled with additional consumer-targeted marketing programs is the way to ensure that consumers are receiving the full benefit of Clique’s promotional dollars. However, Ross McMillan, sales vice president disagrees on that course of action whole heartedly. If Clique were to use a majority of their sales and marketing funds towards the consumer the company could  lose considerable shelf space and sales to competitors, due to the reduced marketing controlled funds. Consumers in this market also do not hold much if any brand loyalty, which means they wouldn’t pay much mind to advertising. Another large factor to keep in mind would be the fact that coupon redemption rates are 1.4% lower than other consumer products, which means wasting money that was spent on this type of advertising. Going with this option would be extremely costly for Clique as well as a dangerous move in the already fragile market; one wrong move towards the retailers and Clique could kiss their shelf space goodbye.

Braden Scale for Predicting Pressure Ulcer Risk Research Paper

Braden Scale for Predicting Pressure Ulcer Risk - Research Paper Example They include sensory perception, activity, skin moisture, mobility, nutritional intake, friction and shear. Each subscale measures the capability of the patient that cause high intensity and duration of pressure, or low tissue tolerance (Braden, 2009). Low Braden score shows that the patient has a low level of functioning; hence, high level of risk of developing a pressure ulcer. Braden Scale for Predicting Pressure Ulcer Risk The Braden Scale for Predicting Pressure Ulcer Risk was developed by Nancy Bergstrom and Barbara Braden, in 1987, and it has been in use since then (Braden, 2009). The aim of this tool is to help health professionals such as nurses and other health care givers to assess a patient’s risk of developing pressure ulcers. Braden scale measures the functional capabilities of the patient that cause lower tissue tolerance for pressure or high intensity and duration of pressure (Statts and Gunningberg, 2007). It is used with patients of all ages, as well as setti ngs, and it is considered more accurate than other scales like the Waterlow and the Norton scales or clinical judgment are. The Braden scale consists of up to six subscales scored from 1-4. They include sensory perception, activity, mobility, skin moisture, nutritional intake, friction and shear. ... Pressure ulcers are a significant problem in older adults who are hospitalized. For instance, in Canada, America and parts of Europe, prevalence for pressure ulcers ranges from 14% to 25% and frequency from 7% to 9% (Braden, 2009). In addition, about 280,000 hospital stays were noted to have adult patients with pressure ulcers, in 1993, and this number increased to 455,000, in 2003, which is 63% increase. According to Statts and Gunningberg (2007), three processes contribute to the development of pressure ulcers. The main one is the pressure that is put on tissues by the weight of the body, as the tissues are squeezed between bones and a hard surface. The friction created when the body slides over sheets, and upholstery among others, also irritates the skin leading to pressure ulcers due to factors such as too much moisture, poor blood circulation to the tissues, and poor skin quality. The pressure ulcers result when the pressure cuts off the blood supply, and blood is not supplied t o tissues, which eventually die and slough off (Statts and Gunningberg, 2007). As stated by Braden (2009), the main risk factors for pressure ulcers are immobility i.e. not being able to move. This includes bed or chair confinement where a person must sit in a wheelchair or stay in bed all day a result of illness such as stroke, cancer, surgery, and heart failure among others. Thus, lack of movement due to confinement increases the risk of developing pressure ulcers. Inability to move such as changing positions without the help of a caregiver increases the risk too. For instance, a person in a coma, or a paralyzed person is at a higher risk of getting pressure

Western Heritage Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Western Heritage - Essay Example , women such as Bianca and Emilia are more open in their interpretation of obedience and may even go against the wishes and desired of their husbands/lovers to get what they want. Of course, this is certainly not the real world image of what women do or what a person does but in Shakespeare’s times such behavior would have been perfectly acceptable given the shape of the characters. It is certainly easy to compare Desdemona to other gentle and kind ladies who were in love with their lords from other plays of Shakespeare as they are the paragons of virtue and not at all led to enter into fights with their lovers as opposed to women who were evil who vexed their lovers justly or unjustly. At the same time, it must be noted that misogyny has been a part of literature for centuries and was part of the dramas presented by Shakespeare so again, it is difficult to fault him for thinking in a particular manner about the women he represents. The common man is essentially the mouthpiece in A Man for All Seasons simply because he says what the audience needs to hear concerning the progress of the play itself. There are a variety of roles assigned to the common man ranging from More’s jailer to More’s servant and even the individual who executes him. In all these roles the common man interacts with More in meaningful ways of which one example is at the execution the executor asks for More’s forgiveness which I feel is the common’s man apology for not rising up to help More and do what is right simply because the singular common man is too weak against the power of the state. The story and the acts of the common man clarify the position as well as the nature and the strength of the common man who is often nothing more than a spectator to the events of history, the corruption of the strong and the piety of those who stand up against them. The character is neither positive nor negative but only an element in the story which does not interact in any significant way

Project Management Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words - 1

Project Management - Essay Example There is a great time lag between the conception of a facility and the actual construction and startup. Operating at designed capacity can cause rapid wear and breakdowns. Generally, operating at design capacity basically means operating at the organization’s productive limits. The designed capacity is 20,000 kg. Effective capacity Effective capacity of a facility is important in determining the extent to which a facility can produce. It is therefore defined as the ratio between design capacity and the expected capacity of the intended facility.It is worth noting effective capacity is affected by a firm’s production schedule, production mix, maintenance standards and age of equipment’s. The formula for effective capacity is given by: Effective capacity=expected capacity/design capacity. Effective=16000/20000=0.8=80% The effective capacity=16000 Actual output A production facility can produce a certain amount of product at a given time period. The actual amount of product that can be produced by a production facility at given time period is called actual output. This is different from amount that the facility could produce if it were to run at full theoretical capacity. Specifically, the actual output is given by: 60/100X20000=12000 kg Utilization Utilization is the percent of design capacity. It is given by actual output/design capacity =12000/20000=60% Efficiency Effective capacity is the actual output as a percent of effective capacity. It is given by the formula: actual output/effective capacity =12000/16000=75% B) Capacity of a system is its ability to produce goods or enhance the delivering of services over some time period. For a system to realize its full potential a proper capacity planning is inevitable. That is, the long term and short term plans to help the system achieve its full potential. Short term concerns relate to the variations in capacity requirements as a result of random, seasonal and irregular fluctuations in demand; while long term considerations relate to the overall level of capacity. There are several factors that affect a firm’s productive capacity. Some of these factors are within management’s control while others are not. Factors such as physical resources and utilization of labor are within the management’s control. Organization capacity also faces management challenges such as personal issues, technological maximization and output controls. A firm can profit significantly from efficient resources management. The actual output may be even less than the system capacity since it is affected by short-range factors such as actual demand. Therefore, managing actual output is important for effective production of a firm. As a project manager, I will advice the human resource manager to undertake the following strategies in managing the actual output and to cope with major changes in products and services. These options include; developing a new product line, expanding exis ting facilities and construction or phase out production plants. In some instance, the firm may be forced to use phase-in-strategy for introducing the next model of the same product or service to retain and/or improve its actual output. In general, the firm should be comfortable producing between 80 to 90% capacity utilization because of low fixed costs per unit and there is some scope to meet new orders or carry out maintenance and training. Efficiency should hold a more vital role as it can

Religion and Theology Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 2

Religion and Theology - Essay Example From this report it is clear that Christians are authorized to preserve the environment and make it a better place to live in. As a Christian, one should preserve the environment to ensure its survival. The destruction of the environment always results in the suffering of human beings. For instance, deforestation has caused desertification in many parts of the earth. On the other hand, desertification has led to drought and consequently famine in which many humans end up losing their lives. From this discussion, Christians should preserve the environment tirelessly as a way of saving humankind and the rest of God’s creation.This discussion declares that  the Christian belief in evil is that anything that is evil does not come from God.   Evil is anything that causes suffering to humans as well as their environment. For instance, wildfire is seen as being evil since it causes deaths to many animals while others are forced to migrate from their habitats. Similarly, war is se en as evil by Christians since it results in many people dying while others migrate to other places where they might not be welcome. To the majority of the Christians, one inherent characteristic of God is that He is good.  As such, goodness flows from God while evil comes from Satan.   Notably, the Bible states that God is good, and His love endures forever. This is one belief that Christians have maintained for centuries and has kept them to stick to the Christian faith.

New York City Project Part 4 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

New York City Project Part 4 - Essay Example Similarly, the economic recovery of the city as reflected by the improved activities at Wall Street would enable the local government in attaining the projected revenue in the budget drawn (Hillman, 2009). Consequently, the ability of the New York City local government to deliver services to the population of the city is strong due to the availability of funds to finance the government operations. Indeed, the economic recovery within the city saw the revenue collection forecast for the fiscal year of 2012 exceeding by $2.4 billions that will be useful in closing the financial gap of 2013 financial year (Bloomberg, 2013). Similarly, the fiscal budget that has been prepared by the local government of New York City allows for future modification on the allocations that have been made to the different departments. This will help the city in avoiding the current shut down crisis that is facing the federal government organs currently. Furthermore, the reducing deficit projection in the bud get implies that the financial stability of the firm is strong in allowing the city to deliver it services to the public. This will boost the ability of the New York City local government in meeting it obligations and development objectives. The financial budget for New York for the year covering 2013 financial year has projected deficit of $1.6 billion that is a reduction of $0.4 billions of the previous year deficit projection of $2 billions. The city is projecting to collect revenue of $49.2 billions from the tax and levy fees it charges to business operating in the area against an expenses projection of $50.8 billions for the financial year 2012-2013. Consequently, the municipal government of New York City has come up with a plan of issuing a municipal bond to finance it core development projects for the 2013 financial year. This will help the municipal government of New York City in closing the deficit gap. Similarly, the revenue collection that exceeded the financial forecast of 2012 has been cited as the remedy that will be utilize in closing the deficit gap that is expected in the financial year of 2013. Another strategic measure that has been cited by the local government cabinet in solving the projected deficit is contracting private firms to undertake a number of the government tasks on a long-term basis due to the improving economic environment that will enable the firm to earn high revenues to settle for the contract (Seidman, 2008). The outsourcing mechanism that has been adopted by the municipal government of New York City will help in the necessary services to the public even with the limited financial resources been projected in the budget. One of the measures that should be undertaken by the New York City municipal government to reduce the budget deficit it is facing is to downsize the number of workers (Anderson, 2011). The recurrent expenditure of the city government is biggest proportion in the budget allocation. This implies that the city government is facing unsustainable labor force that is straining it financial resources. Thus, the government should eliminate some traditional job classifications that have been overtaken by adoption of information and technology platform with the various department of the government (Titos, Makondo, & Nsingo, 2010). This will help the municipal government of New York City to reduce the current budget deficit it is facing. The trend of the New York City budget over the last five years

Shipping Logistics in the UK Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Shipping Logistics in the UK - Essay Example Data for the research will be gathered from both primary and secondary data where all participants will be selected randomly to reduce biasness in the research. Questionnaires will be used to help in data collection where telephone interviews will be used to help reduce cost of travelling. After data has been collected it will be analyzed using computer programs such as Ms. Excel and SPSS and presented using tables and graphs. Confidentiality will be observed as a strategy for enforcing ethics sin research. Background of the Research The term shipping has changed from what it was associated with in the past to include any form of transport moving goods from one point to another (Lun, Lai and Cheng, 2010, p. 12). Previously, the term the term was associated with water borne transport. Consequently this extended meaning makes the industry a complex and dynamic. Logistics is described as the management of the flow of commodities from the point of production to target point with an aim o f meeting the needs of customers and companies. Logistics calls for assimilation of information, inventory, transportation, warehousing, handling and packaging of materials and security of the goods. According to Fremont (2009, p. 1), for the last 50 years, containerization has turned into the prop of globalization. Additionally, this period has seen increased international trade and consequently this calls for efficient shipping logistics. Companies and businesses demand for better synchronized shipping activities in terms of location and space by development of logistics chains. The total value of the UK logistics industry was $105.7 billion in 2010 having grown by 9.9 percent in the 2009-10 fiscal years. This sector employs thousands of people and supports a significant proportion of the country’s economy. However, the sector is facing various constrains which may impede the efficient discharge of its responsibilities to different stakeholders. One primary concern in the s ector is the security threats caused by pirates and increased terrorism cases (Askins, 2012, p. 15). The other issue facing the UK shipping sector is that fact that with enlargement of European Union, competition has increased with the newer member states to the EU who have lower operational costs. Moreover, in the late 1990s, there was increased demand for bigger containers and tanker ships overstretched the capacity of the available ports thereby impeding trade. In light of these developments in this sector, it is critical to carry out a research into the shipping logistics in UK to understand the processes and procedures implemented by different companies to ensure smooth trade between UK and other countries. Aim and Objectives of the Research The aim of this research is to understand shipping logistics in United Kingdom; the process, procedures and policies that control shipping in UK. Moreover, the research will help understand any impediments to the shipping logistics in UK an d the problems faced by shippers in UK in relation to other shippers in the European Union. Objectives of the research 1. To find the security issues facing shippers in UK 2. To assess handling of goods at the port in UK 3. To investigate whether there is adequate capacity for shipping in UK Justification of the research Findings from this research will be help regulatory authorities make better informed decisions on

Consumer Behavior Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words - 1

Consumer Behavior - Assignment Example Many individuals have convictions that the theory not only provides the platform for individual performance but also for the success of the businesses. The theory illuminates that people or human needs can be faceted using five sets. The existence of these needs is in a particular order of which if one is fulfilled, the desire to fulfill the next one crop up. The first need encompasses the basic needs that aid in the functioning of the body. The examples of such need are activities such as eating, drinking et cetera. At times, the sexual needs are usually category. The next need entails the deep inherent desire to be secure and safe. Security in this context refers to having the knowledge that those basic are to be fulfilled in future. The third needs involve the need for love, company or friendship. Humans tend to forget that once they had forgotten that they were hungry in the past, they cared little about love. The immediate subsequent stage consists of the social needs (Kremer & Hammond, 2014). The social needs may involve the need for an individual to belong in the highest status, social recognition, and the need for respect. In the last set of the needs is the self-actualization need. Maslow’s initial work did not entail the used of either triangle or pyramid to represents the human motivational needs. However, the contemporary Maslow’s needs have the illustration of the needs in a pyramid format where the preferential order of the needs begins at the pyramid’s based to the top. In the management approach the needs were as follows: the physiological needs, safety needs, social needs, esteem needs, and self actualization needs. Managers often use the model to identify the employees’ needs with the aim of aiding them to fulfill the needs. These needs are so essential in the life of individuals that if not met, makes it difficult to move up the pyramid. In the physiological needs, the basic needs hotels can offer are in

Linux Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Linux - Assignment Example Enterprise version of Red Hat supports both server and workstation systems, which eradicates the compatibility issues that could have occurred if other versions may have used. Various different flavors of Red Hat make it beneficial, which can be purchased depending on the services that are required. For a full working IT department in an organization a simple version of customer support can be also be purchased for reducing cost. A complete version of support is also available upon requirement. When it comes to reliability, Red Hat Linux is considered to be the most stable and reliable Operating System. (Negus, & Boronczyk, 2008, p. 191-192)The main disadvantage of using Red Hat is that it is not free. Even downloadable version also involves cost and also subsequent support services. There are various versions different versions of Red Hat are available in the market. These version can be purchased directly from Red Hat Inc or through there distributors. They are as follows: Workstat ions Specifications Basic Workstation Dual CPU supports, memory support is unlimited, no virtualization available Multi OS Workstation Dual CPUs, unlimited memory, and virtualization available Server Specifications Red Hat Enterprise Linux Dual CPU server supports. Available for both 32bit and 64 bit architecture. Support available in three forms basic, standard and premium Has four virtual guests support Its advance version support server of all sizes along with unlimited virtual guests and storage Community Enterprise Operating System (CentOS) CentOS was developed by CentOS project community using the source code of commercial Linux (Red Hat). (Baclit,  2009, p.  xxi-xxii) The purpose behind this development was to provide a free and stable version of commercial Linux distribution and also to keep up with the requirements of an Enterprise. CentOS enabled the Enterprise standard Linux for general public without requiring purchasing it or signing a service contract. CentOS have pre-installed GUI interfaces GNOME and KDE, which makes it easier for the user to use this system. For avoiding legal issues CentOS doesn’t included DVD player software in it which can be termed as its drawback, but users can install a DVD payer through internet if required. It is most popular distribution of Linux used for web servers today. (Membrey, Verhoeven, & Angenendt, 2009, p. xx-xx) Reliability, low cost and ease of use are major factors for its popularity. CentOS do not require different license for each machine as compared to Microsoft Windows products. Once loaded on disk, then can be installed on as many servers or workstation as the user required, allows greater compatibility between both without any major performance issues. Online blogs, forums and websites are general support for CentOS. Feedbacks around globe shows that people using CentOS as workstation or server had never faced any serious issue. Several people who have used this distribution reported that no serious issue has been faced in both of its form i.e. workstation and server. Novell Novell is a known Linux leader; its distribution is formally known as openSUSE. Major advantage this OS has is its relatively bug free distribution. During development, lots of concentration is given to compatibility and functionalities between openSUSE and programs that will interface is it. (McCallister,  2006, p.  255-256) OpenSUSE is considered as a bit difficult to be installed. But

Physico-Chemical Structure or Bonding Essay Example for Free

Physico-Chemical Structure or Bonding Essay Hydrogen bond is one of the most essential concepts in supramolecular chemistry or molecular sociology. It has significant ramifications on molecular biology and materials science. The term and concept ‘hydrogen bond’ has only emerged after 1930; however the general notion of weak but specific interaction that involves hydrides is much older (Webmaster 2005). Hydrogen bond refers to the attractive force between the hydrogen that has attached to an electronegative atom of a molecule and an electronegative atom of an unlike molecule. It is a special case of dipole forces wherein the electronegative atom is usually an oxygen, nitrogen or fluorine—elements that have a partial negative charge, except for hydrogen which possesses a partial positive side (Ophardt c. 2003). Hydrogen bonding happens when two electronegative atoms, for instance nitrogen and oxygen, interact with the same hydrogen. Normally, the hydrogen is covalently attached to an atom which is referred as the donor. But it interacts electrostatically with the other, known as acceptor. The interaction is primarily because of the dipole amid the electronegative atoms and proton (Day 1996). It is the strongest molecular force and passes on some strange properties to a myriad of substances namely water, proteins and nucleotides (Structure and Bonding: The Hydrogen Bond n. d. ). Hydrogen bond is one of the most important components of biological life. If there is no hydrogen bond, there will be no life because it holds the double helix of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) together (Emsley 2000). Hydrogen forms and structures covalent bonds with other molecules to produce and make molecules that are stable than the free atoms. The electron of the hydrogen is shared between the hydrogen and the atom to which it is bonded. The other electron from the bonded atom is also shared between the two (The Structure of DNA n. d. ). It is done through charge attractions. If hydrogen is bonded to oxygen or nitrogen, it evolves to be slightly positive charged. That fact allows the hydrogen bond to attract a center of negative charge on another molecule—it can be another oxygen or another nitrogen atom. Thus the hydrogen bond is written such as O-H=N (= signifies hydrogen bond). There are O-H=O or N-H=O and N-H=N—it is the weakest bond (Emsley 2000). That is the effect of hydrogen bonds on DNA. On the other hand, there is a study that has been conducted by Eric Kool, a professor of Chemistry from the University of Rochester, wherein a finding has been implied that â€Å"hydrogen bonds are not the key to DNA pairing after all† (Bradt 1997). The study suggests that it is more possible that the distinguishing and distinct shapes and sizes of each of the four DNA bases strengthen and suggest the 99. 9 percent accuracy of DNA replication. It has been illustrated like a space in a jigsaw puzzle wherein that space in the puzzle can only be filled by a piece that matches the shape of the space. That analogy means that there is only one base capable of squeezing into a DNA strand on its opposite given partner (Bradt 1997). According to Myron Goodman, a biologist and DNA expert from the University of Southern California, â€Å"the apparently inescapable conclusion is that hydrogen bonds (H-bonds) are not absolutely required,† this means that the results give a momentum and impetus to consider the role that the H-bonds play in stabilizing the DNA and enhancing the fidelity of DNA polymerase (Bradt 1997). Furthermore, there are still a number of factors that are responsible for the stability of the DNA double helix structure. Hydrogen bond is just among them. Although the hydrogen bond is weak, the millions of H-bonds showcase an extremely strong force that enables and keeps the DNA strand together (Rafael B. 2009). List of References Bradt, S. (1997) â€Å"Study: Hydrogen Bonds Aren’t Key to DNA Pairing After All. † Bio-Medicine [online] available from http://news. bio-medicine. org/biology-news-2/Study-3A-Hydrogen-Bonds-Arent-Key-To-DNA-Pairing-After-All-15262-1/ [13 February 2009] Day, A. (1996). â€Å"Hydrogen Bonds. † Birkbeck: University of London [online] available from http://www. cryst. bbk. ac. uk/PPS2/projects/day/TDayDiss/HBonds. html [13 February 2009] Emsley, J. (2000). â€Å"A New Way to Investigate the Hydrogen Bonds of DNA. † Science Watch [online] available from http://archive. sciencewatch. com/sept-oct2000/sw_sept-oct2000_page7. htm [13 February 2009] Ophardt, C. (c. 2003). â€Å"Intermolecular Forces: Hydrogen Bond. † El nhurst College: Virtual Chembook [online] available from http://www. elmhurst. edu/~chm/vchembook/161Ahydrogenbond. html [13 February 2009] Rafael B. (2009) â€Å"DNA Structure: Hydrogen Bonds. † Bright Hub [online] available from http://www. brighthub. com/science/genetics/articles/23384. aspx [13 February 2009] Structure and Bonding: The Hydrogen Bond. n. d. Prince Georges Community College [online] available from http://academic. pgcc. edu/~ssinex/struc_bond/hydrogen_bond. htm [13 February 2009] The Structure of DNA. n. d. Cambridge University [online] available from http://www-outreach. phy. cam. ac. uk/camphy/dna/dna11_1. htm [13 February 2009] Webmaster. (2005). â€Å"The Hydrogen Bond. † Gottingen University [online] available from http://www. hbond. de/ [13 February 2009]

The Internationalisation Process Of Sime Darby Berhad Economics Essay

The Internationalisation Process Of Sime Darby Berhad Economics Essay This study will describe and analyse the internationalisation process of a leading Malaysian-based MNC called Sime Darby Berhad (SDB). The assignment will identify the structure and actions of this company in forming its expansion processes including the motivations for international investment, competitive strategies, and selection of foreign entry approaches. CASE COMPANY: SIME DARBY BERHAD (SDB) The following are reasons why Sime Darby was chosen as a case sample: It was the first multinational corporation in Malaysia is one of the largest corporations in the whole of Southeast Asia. The company has a long history of international trading activities and is one of the most internationally integrated companies. The company, which has focused concentration on how the management gained internationalisation knowledge and experience when operating the organisation, has been a Malaysian multinational from its foundation as it became a Malaysian unit through acquisition by the Malaysian Government in 1977. The group is widely diversified with interests in almost all economic sectors as well as plantations, energy, heavy equipment, motor vehicle delivery, travel and tourism, healthcare, and property development, both nationally and internationally. Sime Darby Berhad consequently represented the countrys leading business organisation as a diversified corporation. THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES ON DEVELOPING COUNTRY MNCS It has been realised that theories on the internationalisation of companies are mainly based on Western multinational corporations. Starting from Vernons product life cycle theory, (1966, 1971) through the Uppsala international expansion stage model (Johanson and Weidersheim-Paul, 1975; Johanson and Vahlne, 1977) and the more recent works of Dunning on his eclectic paradigm theory (Dunning, 1993, 1995). However, the model does appear to be relevant in the early stages of internationalisation, however, the model is unreflective on issues regarding strategic elements, situational contingency, considerably still and competitive forces. In addition, as the trend of outward investments from developing countries began to increase in the 1990s (United Nation, 1988, 1993) the body of literature concerning these latter investments and entry modes has been developed and enlarged notably. Referring to the scholars on developing country MNCs, ownership advantages of these businesses vary, and there are two separate waves of development: Differing as regards historical background, nature of business, extent of the role of government in operations and transactions, geographical direction, and mode of internationalisation activity. Scholars have described developing country MNCs in the 1980s as those more anxious with cost competitiveness or their competitors (van Hoesel, 1999). On the other hand, developing country MNCs in the 1990s placed bigger stress on the development and direction of business strategies in reaction to the changing forms of world business structure brought about by trade liberalisation and economic globalisation (Dunning et al., 1997). They also resulted in more stress on technological capability as the source of competitive advantage (Pananond and Zeithmal, 1998). The gradual growth of skills, technological and information effort has led in growing the sources of ownership advantages for developing country MNCs. Such views are reliable on the internationalisation process literature (Johanson and Wiedersheim-Paul, 1975). Known now as the Uppsala Internationalisation Model, this literature discusses the importance of internationalisation knowledge and its process throughout a firms internationalisation expansion. The model outlines that lack of knowledge of foreign markets generates an obstruction to internationalisation, and that this knowledge can only be obtained by experience of international markets. The Uppsala school spread the idea of incremental international development to the whole process of a firms internationalisation from exporting to foreign direct investment (FDI). Considering the fact that Malaysian MNCs are new and emerging to the international field, mainly in terms of outward investment, internationalisation theory is of value in explaining the appearance of these corporations. BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT OF THE COMPANY The structure of the group, the product and geographical diversification is a process which is complex and overlapping. However it can be categorised by four chronological periods: the early development where it transformed from a plantation based to a trading business (1910-1929), then came its domestic expansion which was in 1929-1950s. Next came conglomerate diversification (1950s present day), and finally the companys international expansion (1970s present). It is vital to be aware of the groups history because this then offers knowledge about the organisational development and provides us with insight that may act as a basis for decisions about the future (Eisenhardt, 1989; Gummesson, 1991). Early Development: from Plantation-based to Trading -based business (1910 1929) The company Sime Darby was established in 1910 by two British planters, a Scottish man, William Middleton Sime and Henry Darby, got together and formed a company so they could manage 500 acres of Radell Rubber estates in the state of Malacca. This would bring them a capital of US$20,000. The company was first known as Messrs Sime Darby Co Limited (Malaysian Business, 1 September 2003). As it was a managing agent for several plantation companies, it then began doing general trading as the demand for the rubber estates goods and services grew. The company then set up a branch office in Singapore in 1915 and with its increasing volume of trade, it soon became an agency that did many general trading activities. These included acting as selling agents for various different firms and manufacturers, importing and exporting businesses and supplying a wide variety of consumer products both domestically and internationally. They then set up an office in London as a network branch to market the companys rubber. They then bought more plantation land from the profits they were making from the rubber. The company then bought the British competitor R.G. Shaw Co in 1926 and also began discounting, insurance brokering and money brokering (Utrecht, 1981). Domestic Expansion (1929 1950s) Due to the success of the plantation based business, the group had their first wave of expansion particularly in the rubber, cocoa and palm oil plantations. In 1929 the company acquired the Sarawak Trading Company which owned a franchise of Caterpillar equipment and this proved to be a huge milestone for them. The land they were frequently purchasing needed heavy earth-moving equipment for its development. Sime Darby began entering other lucrative business fields such as engineering, electronics and management services after the Second World War in 1952 (Allen and Donnithorne, 1957). After years of hard work, the company grew to include activities such as finance, supply, sales and shipping products for several plantations and by 1954 the company had a total of 18 offices in Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei and the British North Borneo and managed over 80,000 acres of rubber land. Then in 1946 they purchased Ewart Co. Conglomerate Diversification (1950s present) Due to their success, by the late 1950s, the company had become large enough to have a holding company in London known as Sime Darby Holding Limited. Naturally the company decided to extend their activities from just trading to manufacturing. In 1971 Sime Darby had been established as a major force in the plantation industry through the acquiring of Seafield Amalgamated Co. and Consolidated Plantations. Even prior to Malaysian independence, Sime Darby gained multinational status due to its rapid growth and extensive diversification. (Ragayah, 1999). Because of this strategic significance as an MNC, and to guard the national interest whereby various critics viewed the largely British management of the company as a painful reminder of imposing utilisation, the Malaysian Government through its trust agency Pernas or National Corporation acquired the company in the mid-1970s. Sime Darby became among the first Malaysian multinationals in the country through this process. The company originally expanded within plantations but because of the groups desire to grow further into non-core activities they were led to major diversifications in many industries, starting in the early 1980s. These included motor vehicles, paint and tyre manufacturing in 1981, oil and gas in 1983, property and insurance in 1984, health and hospitality in 1990, travel and tourism in 1991, power generation in 1994, finance in 1996, hypermarkets in 2000, and retail petroleum in 2001. Through its own subordination, Sime Darby diversified into a range of projects such as hospitals, housing expansion, manufacturing, gasoline and motor fuel circulation, shipping operations, shop lots, golf courses and various others. Sime Darbys national growth was due to three major waves. The first wave of development was fixed in the plantations sector. The second wave was rooted in geographical growth of its trading business, and finally, the third wave covered a variety of diversified business strategies both upstream and downstream, such as oil and gas, financial services, property development, energy, and motor vehicle distribution. The group used a market sector approach to enlarge its business operations both domestically and internationally. International Expansion (1970s present) As Malaysia was the biggest producer of rubber and cocoa in the world during the 1970s, Sime Darbys global exposure began through international trading with the exports of commodity products such as the above mentioned. (Allen and Donnithorne, 1957). The companys astonishing expansion, both geographically and sectorally began in the early 1970s with the purchase of China Engineers (Holdings) Limited, Harpers International Limited, and Amoy Canning Corporation (Hong Kong) Limited, which are all based in Hong Kong (United Nations, 1985). Each came with its benefits, Amoy Canning provided the production of canned food, China Engineers provided many things such as engineering, manufacturing, shipping activities and insurance. Harpers provided Sime Darby with the franchise for the distribution of Ford, BMW, and Mitsubishi automobiles (ibid). Sime Darby obtained the company Shaw and Co. in the United Kingdom which was involved in investment, shipping and trading with substantial investments in South Asia. With the acquisition of Clive Holding Ltd and Guy Butler Robt Bradford Co, Sime Darby moved into discounting, broking and insurance (United Nations, 1985). Having been successful market players since 1928 and the sole Caterpillar dealer in Malaysia for over 70 years, Sime Darby managed to penetrate the market in Singapore via tractors. Caterpillar is so successful, that 95% of Sime Darbys business in the sector of heavy equipment comes from the sales of Caterpillar products. The company also worked closer to home by venturing in downstream processing activities by purchasing Edible Products Ltd which is a major vegetable oil refinery in Singapore. Organisationally, the international expansion of the Company can be categorised into four main regions. Neighbouring Asian countries with similar cultural backgrounds were given priority. Sime Darbys international operations, like its domestic business activities, involved five core areas which were energy, property, heavy equipment, plantations and motors. During the study, the group consisted of 185 additional and associated companies that were participating in various different business activities in the Malaysian market. In regards to the companies international operations, the group collectively had 46 companies in Hong Kong, 9 in the Philippines, 72 in Singapore, 11 in Australia, 5 in Indonesia and 19 in other developing countries. Of these developing countries, the group had 12 companies in the United Kingdom, 2 in the US and 15 in New Zealand (Sime, 2006). The major strength that Sime Darby has lies within the region of Southeast Asia with a smaller, restricted coverage in other areas of Asia. When looking at the groups gross revenue and pre-tax profits over the past four years, it can be noted that the overseas operations accounted for 60% 35% respectively with Malaysia, Hong Kong, Singapore and Australia collectively, taking the lead for posting revenues in excess of RM 1 billion. Due to the fact that Sime Darby has operations in 20 different countries, it is clear that international business is one of the key sources of growth for the group. The following section will identify and explain how the company has built up its ownership advantages and its business strategy. DISCUSSION: AN ANALYSIS OF SIME DARBY INTERNATIONAL EXPANSION Â  Normally, a company becomes multinational by undergoing three different stages. Firstly, the firm begins as a domestic company and acquires technological, management and marketing capabilities through the normal process of development, to become a domestic leader. Then, due to the limitation of the domestic market forces, the company is motivated to begin exporting abroad so as to increase its revenue. Finally, when these exports come under threat by tariff protection or competition, the company uses its competitive advantage ad produces goods abroad which directly involve them in investment (United Nations, 1985; Johanson and Vahlne, 2003). Following this inspection, a close look at Sime Darbys development as a national MNC, uncovers that the company was in fact internationalised prior to its emergence as a Malaysian conglomerate. Overnight, through the acquisition of a British firm operating in the country, the group became a Malaysian MNC. Up until the companys residence was transferred from the United Kingdom to Malaysia in 1979, Sime Darby had been a British controlled corporation. After consulting investment bankers Rothschild, the Malaysian government purchased several shares in the London Stock Market in line with the New Economic Policy (NEP) which increased Malay equity. In 1977, Sime Darbys equity became Malaysian owned largely due to the efforts of Tradewinds Sendirian Berhad. Sime Darby had international corporations in numerous countries before its foundation as a Malaysian MNC. This included offices in Singapore and London to further support their international operations. The discussion presented here is that the procedures adopted by the Malaysian government via its state agencies indicated a revolution in the ways of internalisation and also went beyond traditional theories of FDI as illustrated by most scholars. However, it could be argued that the company had overcome important internal and ownership advantages created by nationalisation and favourable treatment by the Malaysian government as had been noted by Dunnings OLI theory (Dunning, 1993, 1995). Nonetheless, the situation of SD outlines an attractive and appealing option to companies trying to become international by purchasing an existing MNC. Government intervention and nationalisation are in doubt to happen in all circumstances, but sometimes government can increase MNC development in different. The emergence of SD as a Malaysian MNC supports the theory raised by Oviatt and McDougall that the firm can be internationalised from its setting up. They may begin their international involvemen t directly from foundation instead. Nonetheless, this theory stresses that such companies gain ownership advantages even before to their establishment. In the United Kingdom, the group bought Carboxyl Chemical Ltd, which manufactures wires, lubricants and defoaments. Clearly, the international expansion of the SD group creates challenges to the internationalisation literature, which suggests that firms may minimise the risk of involvement when they first enter the international market and that it will assume a higher degree of involvement and resource commitment. However, the groups common use of equity participation through acquisition of firms operating in the country and abroad seems contradictory to that proposition. This contradiction may result from narrow assumptions about developing country firms which have been portrayed as small, having limited resources and lacking in management capabilities (Yeung, 1994). Another alternative for SDs participation in international expansion is joint venture with foreign partners. In some countries, the group decided to set up joint ventures with local partners in the host countries to the shared benefit of both sides. There are several reasons for SD to expand internationally and choose a particular country to be the recipient of its investments. Such as finding new markets, home government disincentives, higher returns on investment, diversifying risks cheap and abundant resources, competition to enter new markets, overcoming import restrictions and to exploit technological innovations and the production process better. These may be classified as push or pull factors. As with these views, SDs international growth was driven by its goal to hunt for growth continuously through entry into new markets abroad and to ease the export of products to another country, especially in other developing countries. This was the reason for the group to set up regional divisions in countries like Singapore, the Philippines, Hong Kong and Australia to maintain its business. This is because the developing countries offered opportunities for growth and also shared some similar characteristics with which the group were familiar. From the interviews of key executives in the company, there are three main reasons appear to be important for SD to invest abroad. The first is to take advantage of market opportunities. The second is to diversify risks. And, the third is related to motivations which consistently counts on diversification to escape high costs, labour, and other resource limitation in Malaysia. An equally important factor is the familiarity of the countries where the investment is directed, in the sense of common or shared experiences in history, culture, economics and even politics. From the point of view of location strategy, familiarity with the country and closeness to Malaysia will be the main criteria. Diversifying risk is also an important determinant of the choice of overseas location. SD emphasises that the very nature of its organisation is to diversify risk by having a spread of products or geographically located businesses. The diversification strategy has worked for the group, since it may be that one business is declining but that it will be compensated for by the other businesses. The groups strategy in its investment is to be a long term player and try to make business work in every economic condition. In some countries, the groups business strategy was to start in trading; this then provided a window on opportunities, enabling SD to identify both new businesses and partners for establishing joint ventures. With regard to its long-term strategy, SD wants to strengthen its position in the Asian regional market, and then the next logical step for SD is to be truly global. For this, it has to aim at inclusion in the Fortune 500 companies and thus must strengthen its presence in the European Community and the North American markets. Although it has set up subsidiaries, joint ventures and acquisitions in the United Kingdom and the United States, these are still inadequate. Moreover, it needs to be rather more aggressive about growing the business that it already has, as well as establishing new ones (ibid). Managerially, there are many lessons to be drawn from the case analysis. They include the following: Managers need to avoid narrow or parochial views with regard to potential MNC development. There are many and diverse routes to such. Strategic initiatives such as joint venture are not purely dependent on cultural criteria, but on competitive circumstances, government support or lack of it, technological innovation, capitalisation, and managerial skills and know-how. The rationale for going abroad relies on opportunism, risks aversion, and managerial motivation. Strategies for entry will vary based on individual country criteria coupled with the three items mentioned above. With regard to relevance and transferability to other Asian, national, company or cultural contexts, undoubtedly, new and old business models and modelling processes for FDI and internationalisation processes abound. Few, however, have concerned Malaysian-owned, Malaysian-managed MNCs. CONCLUSION This piece of work has studied both domestic and international development of the Sime Darby group, which is one of the largest Malaysian multinational corporations. SD can be viewed as a new model of internationalisation process due to it being internationalised from its foundation through the takeover of foreign companies operating in the country. The company grew through expanding its capacity as a widely spread corporation. The groups different internal and external sources, such as extensive marketing, strong brand names and good management capabilities have resulted in gaining ownership advantages amongst other rivalries. Also, Sime Darbys special relationship with the Malaysian government through its state agencies and trust played an important role in the groups development. Its domestic and international development was also achieved by maintaining the groups ties with foreign partners in developing its technological capabilities. SD is at the front line of Malaysias drive into the international ground as one of Asias leading corporation. SDs strongest ground is the Asia Pacific and its energy has mainly been directed to this area, but projects have also been made further for some of its investment, such as in the United Kingdom, the USA, Egypt and South Africa. Sime Darby has grown beyond the boundaries of the region and will continue to expand its perspectives in future FDI. After acknowledging the need to become familiar to the confronts of internationalisation, the group has outlined the broad strategies that it believes are important for it to compete successfully in the international field. With these are: Planning for continuous growth in related businesses through horizontal and vertical combination SDs overall strategy is to keep its reputation as Malaysias leading conglomerate, focusing mainly on the growth of the Asia Pacific region through products and services of excellent quality. Consider a learning culture which supports the contribution of knowledge across geographical partitions and organisational limitations. http://www.business-and-management.org/download.php?file=2008/3_221-36-Ahmad,Kitchen.pdf

Computer Ethics And Impact Of Society Information Technology Essay

Computer Ethics And Impact Of Society Information Technology Essay This report is a study of computer ethics and its relevance to todays society .We live in the age of super computers where everything comes to us in our finger tips. Children get exposure to Internet much before they start their formal education. Computers are electronics devices invented by humans for the convenience and welfare of themselves which does not have any kind of thought process internally about the ethical behaviours. The dos and donts in the information technology and Internet are unknown to many computer users. As new evolving technologies come in and these technologies pays way to create challenges in the areas of privacy and security of people around the world. Ethics refers to code of principles by which people live .Computer Ethics is the branch of information technology which deals with the nature and computer technology and the end users and their varying characters. It sets a certain standards or rules for the will be smooth sailing. Some common computer ethics are intellectual property rights copyrighted electronic content, privacy concerns, by which how computers affect society. It involves social issues, such as access rights, working place monitoring, censorship and junk mail; professional issues such as professional responsibility and code of conduct; legal issues such as legal obligations, data protection, and computer misuse and software piracy. The computer ethics field consists of the problems with computer software and hardware malfunctions by the misuse by humans. Our society depends on the computer and its network to leverage the business and social life, hence both social and personal ethicals issues exists . Without computers and its networks most of the industries will not survive in todays work and will come to a halt. Most of the electronic communications do not guarantee any security and privacy. This report is a journey through the history of computer ethics the pioneers and their perceptions and slants on computer ethic s. Later on walks through the influence of computer ethics at work and the various factors that affects to determine the ethical behaviours. (Bynum, 2008) 2. HISTORY OF COMPUTER ETHICS 1940s As the technology evolves, the studies related to this field evolved as well. The introduction of computer ethics as a study came in the year 1940. Norbert Weiner was known as the father of computer ethics. In 1940s, Norbert Weiner who was an American mathematician and professor of Massachusetts Institute of Technology created the Cybernetics during Second World War. 1950s In 1950 Weiner publishes his second book The Human Use of Human Beings [Page 16 of second edition of 1954] When I communicate with a person, I impart a message to him and when he communicates back with me he returns a related message which contains information primarily accessible to him and not to me. When I control the action of another person I communicate a message to him and although this message is in the imperative mood, the technique of communication does not differ from that of a message of fact It is the thesis of this book that society can only be understood through a study of the messages and the communication facilities which belong to it; and that in the future development of these messages and communication facilities, messages between man and machines, between machines and man, and between machine and machine, are destined to play an ever increasing part. 1960s Later in 1960 Don B. Parker, an Information Security Researcher and Consultant -associated with the ACM(Association of computer machinery) started watching the unethical usage of computer and information technology by computer professionals (Parker, 1999) (Bowling Green State University., 2001) In 1966 a professor from MIT Joseph Weizenbaum wrote ELIZA A Computer Program for the Study of Natural Language Communication between Man and Machine. The first computer crime was in the year 1966 in the United States, a computer engineer manipulated the programs of a banks computer system to prevent the banking account being used flag as overdrawn. In 1966 the Freedom of information Act (FOIA) was the first computer law legal right to access the governments information 1970s 1970s were the time period where the computers revolutionized and Walter Manner who is a Professor of Computer Science and Director of the Artificial Intelligence Project at Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio introduced the term Computer Ethics . Manner offered the university students a course on an experimental Course on the subject at Old Dominion University. During the late 1970s through the mid of 1980s, being a lecturer Mr,Maner was much interest in university-level Computer ethics courses. He offered a variety of workshops and lectures at Computer science conferences and philosophy conferences across America. In 1978 he also self-published and disseminated his Starter Kit in Computer Ethics, Which contained curriculum materials and pedagogical advice for university? Teachers to develop computer ethics courses. In 1976 Joseph Weizenbaum published a 300 page book, Computer Power and Human Reason which set the benchmark in computer ethics as a field and is still considered as the classic in computer ethics In 1976: Abbe Mowshowitz published an article, titled: On approaches to the study of social issues in computing. It identifies and analyzes technical and non-technical biases in research on social issues in computing. Five positions-technicism, progressive individualism, elitism, pluralism, and radical criticism-which reflect major streams of contemporary social thought are examined- The ACM digital library, volume 24, issues 3, March 1981 In 1979 Terrell Ward Bynum s Professor of Philosophy at Southern Connecticut State University 1980s In 1985 James H Moor who is a professor of Dartmouth College in Intellectual and Moral Philosophy published an influential article entitled What is computer ethics. In the same year followed by moor, Deborah Johnson of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute published Computer Ethics This is referred as the first textbook on computer ethics. The Electronic Communications Privacy Act ECPA of 1986 which prohibits the lawful access and disclosure of the law prevents government entities from requiring disclosure of electronic communications from a provider without proper procedure. (AOL Legal Department, 2003) 1990s Donald William gotterbarn in 1991 his paper work Computer Ethics: Responsibility Regained. explained computer ethics as a branch of professional ethics concerned with standards of good practice (Gotterbarn) (computerethics.org, 2000) In October 1992 the executive council of Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) voted to adopt the revised the ACM Code. It is also called Software Engineering Code of Ethics and Professional Practice ACM code of Ethics and Professional Conduct consisting of 24 imperatives formulated as statements of personal responsibility, identifies the elements of such a commitment [http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_ACM_code] In 1995, Dr,Simon Rogerson professor of computing at De Montfort University in Leicester, UK created the Centre for Computing and Social Responsibility (CCSR) to organize the first computer ethics conference in Europe, which was named as ETHICOMP95.lateron Rogerson added computer ethics to the curriculum of De Montfort. In 1995 Gordian Kocikowska, predicted on computer ethics giving a statement computer ethics eventually will evolve into global ethics in her article The computer revolution and the problem of global ethics In 1999 Deborah Johnson stood opposite to the statements of Gorniak and told computer ethics will not revolution rather than ethical thinking and analysis, computer ethics is the same ethics with a twist in the flavour. (Comphist, 2004) (Bynum, 2008) VIEWS OF PIONEERS Norbert Wiener Norbert Weiner in his book Cybernetics or control and communication in the animal and the machine in 1948, Cybernetics is formally defined as the science of control and communication in animals, men and machines. It extracts, from whatever context, that which is concerned with information processing and control. His essential goal of cybernetics is to understand and define the functions and processes of systems that have goals. Weiner said that the human nervous system can be compared to It is enough to say here that when we desire a motion to follow a given pattern the difference between this pattern and the actually performed motion is used as a new input to cause the part regulated in such a way to bring its in a state of what is known as ataxia.An ataxia of this type is familiar in the form of syphilis of the central nervous system known ad tabes dorsalis where the kinetic sense conveyed by the spinal nerves is more or less destroyed [page 7 and 8]. Amount of information in a sy stem is the measure of its degree of organization, so entropy of s system is a measure of its degree of disorganization. And one is simply negative the other.study of Maxwell demon [Page 11]. Donn B Parker In an interview with Donn told that he has interviewed more than 200 cyber criminals to understand the motive to get into computer crimes which shows the evidences of common behavioural psychological patterns. Computer criminals universally fear unpredictable circumstances, environments and events that could cause their crime to fail. Unpredictable systems would create an atmosphere of uncertainty (Bowling Green State University., 2001) Parker describes the scenario methodology in computer ethics, a need to identify the participant in the scenario. Sorting the act and non-act classifying as ethical or non-ethical or not in the category Deborah Johnson Deborah has a different view on computer ethics. She said pose new versions of standard moral problems and moral dilemmas, exacerbating the old problems, and forcing us to apply ordinary moral norms in uncharted realms, even though she do not agree with computer creating new moral problems James H Moor As per Moor in his article What is computer ethics ? defined ethics due to policy vacuum and conceptual muddles with regards to social and ethical use of computers and technology. Computers provide new capabilities and new choices for action. His advices to analyse the framework which results in policy for that action. He also added that computers are logically malleable which can be moulded to do any kind of activities Donald Gotterbarn According to Gotterbarn computer ethics should be considered as branch of professional ethics with focus on standards of good practices for computer professionals whom all are engaged in the design and development of in the everyday activities will add value to their professional value. Co-ordinating with ACM he released code of ethics for computer professionals. (Gotterbarn) (Bynum, 2008) 4. COMPUTER ETHICS IN SOCIETY Computers and human life are inter-related , we relish it in many areas of our day to day life in traffic signals, banking system, tax, and police. People blame on computers for cash machine crashes traffic signal failures where human designed these softwares and networks. the dilemma are the blunders associated with computers like ozone layer remained undetected due to programming error Y2K problem was not detected till we approached 2000.If we dig into the actual history of the computer ethics it started with the use of first computer. Computer and information technology is not limited as it is spreads with branches like a banyan tree; information technology has its branches in all the fields of Industry medical, automotive like that the list is not closed. Internet which is a by-product of ICT is revolutionary link to all these branches. We connect officially as corporate, be in touch with our loved ones, search engines, mail, instant messengers. As a medium of storage of critical to personal data, everything are on fingertip irrespective of the physical location as we can say the information technology moves with us and is available in the same or expected form on the web. (Herold, 2006) (Bynum, 2008) 4.1 COMPUTER CRIMES Most of the cyber criminals are anti-social element who gets motivated by the prior worst personal experience resulting in the crimes. Computer crimes can result in financial loss, information loss. Some major computer crimes in info space and as listed below which affects both work and personal life. (Herold, 2006) Hacking Virus Fraud Identity theft Denial Of Services DoS Child pornography IRC crime Software piracy Hacking Computer hacking has become a status among many youngster.. Hackers are tend to have better understanding of coding and break into computers and are aware of bypassing the security or can remain undiscovered in the network for a certain time without leaving footprints for the forensics by wiping out the log files. When we talk about the evil we should see the other side of the coin the virtuous which is ethical hacking .Ethical hacking is meant for attacking the computer system or network with the full permission of the sole. The most common ethical hacking technique is penetration test by inducing the code to the system and to be aware of the vulnerabilities by negligence as the hackers look for loop holes and create back door. Many corporate create their own IT security policies to secure their network. Virus Computer viruses are in the top most list of threat faced by the Information world. Computer program created to do nasty works inside which enters into a computer by mean of downloading softwares or mp3 files which calls them as Free softwares. Worm is much similar to the virus which gets replicated by human intervention; until and unless provoked remain quiet in the corner of the system. Trojan horses are interested in creating a back-door for the intruders in a compromised machine. Deploying a powerful anti-virus with the latest released virus definitions can help us in leading a peaceful life (Williams, 2003) Identity theft Financial identity theft is the widely asserted crime happening in the Internet. These intruders get into the system pretending the account holder of the bank by inputting false identity. A criminal identity thief uses the personal information including the national insurance number and social security number to do crime and leave it as the proof of identity. Medical identity theft is done by using another persons identity to obtain medical care or drugs where law restricts to purchase drugs. Computer security is the ultimate solution for identity theft by sanitizing the obsolete data in system and spam mails by installing anti-virus software which has powerful tools to protect online transactions. Most of the nations have law in place against these kind of identity thefts which includes heavy financial fine and imprisonment Denial of Services-DoS Denial of service wont affect neither the system security or destruct information loss any files make financial theft but can affect the targeted business by putting on fire ranging from second to days by making unavailability of a critical server, email or website which provides service as business . A buffer overflow with a prior assumption that of the weakness of programming or architecture of the applications used are the famous denial of service attacks that bench marked the history so far. Disabling the ICMP traffic in the firewall can prevent the ping of death. Implementing strong encryption techniques and deploying domain naming service. To overcome DoS attacks are by knowing the infrastructure and regular testing for complexity, keeping spam filters will limit mailbox getting flooded, if the business demands buying a space in the cloud or by keeping dramatically huge processor power and server volume will help to prevent such kind of issues. Pornography Pornography refers to any kind of image displaying a person who is being engaged in explicit sexual activity. In countries like Spain child pornography is a criminal offense if conventional pornography was in the paper based hard copy or video tape as technology advanced the Internet based pornography is image files or video files and on-line buffering. Severely punishing these criminals and these punishments to be brought to the notice of general public for their awareness that it will their experience if they do so. Association of sites advocating child protection ASACP was found in 1996 is meant for reporting child abuses in the society anonymously aiming to catch hold of the pornographers, they have a fully functional hot line and website asacp.org where people are report the crime . The RTA certificate helps children from accessing pornographic websites which is available Internet wide free of cost. (Barrons Educational Series, Inc, 1999) IRC Crimes Many people lose their privacy when then enter the IRC (Internet Relay Chat) rooms. The chat rooms become the playground of cyber criminals, hackers and terrorists. Verbal IRC crimes are where people get abused verbally in the chat rooms. The second category is clone attack where randomly synchronized codes are generated on behalf of usernames by robots to generate a random character which gets multiplied by the per-written code result in flooding and the chat server gets freezes due to Denial of service. Criminals use Cyber stalking to harass women and celebrities. IRC crimes can be stopped by simply ignoring or banning the user id which almost all chat sites allow. Salami Attack All these times we were talking about a crime which is relevant only to single attack , now lets talk about a series of tiny attacks which is categorized as salami slicing in computer cyber terms. The attacker steals a comparatively small amount of money from the account and the actual account holder will assume that it might be a service charge of any bank transactions or transaction which they might have done during shopping and wont be bothered to scrutinise the actual fact. such attacks will be done will multiple users which is like an atomic reaction. Botnet A bot is defined as zombie army which is an interconnected network of computers on the Internet with malicious infected software robots. The zombies army can be controlled only by the owner of the respective program. Botnet which is a malware can result in Denial of service attack. Criminals use this technique to utilize the shared processing power and memory Gradually the users system will face slow down .The solution to overcome the botnet is to install antivirus which can detect the malwares .(Parker, 1999) 4.2 INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY Intellectual property commonly referred as IP in short is associated with creativity of an artistic work, or invention of technologies. Computer professionals and students are committed not to copy other works to part of their work without their consent. Taking the credit of innovative work might not be technically a crime under law but it is unethical. According to Richard stallman the founder and pioneer of Free software , software it should not lie with certain limited people . His version is no one has the monopoly to own, it should be open to all it being claimed as information. The statement of Deborah Johnson is that softwares and applications are the outcomes of a group of professionals effort leveraged by their skill set. I would stand aside Johnson as this an industry which is the bread giving one, but outdated softwares can be release for public use and for students and financially backward people where the light of information world dint fall. Intellectual property is cat egorized into two by world intellectual property society as copyright and patent 4.2.1 Piracy Software piracy is the most controversial talk in the information space, if we never pay for free-ware used, the sharewares has to be payed depending on the usage entitled by the owner. Piracy lies somewhere in the middle where the customer need to be pay relatively small amount which is common in Asian countries. Piracy has spread to video industry as well by where the storage discs of newly released albums and movies are available in market for cheaper price .(Williams, 2003) 4.2.2 Open-source Vs Closed-source. Open-source applications are those applications available free of cost Closed-source applications are available in the market like windows operating system. Open-source softwares can be downloaded free of cost and can be manipulated using the source code. As the word refers closed source softwares are closed in many ways, so we can expect more security from them. It will not be easier for a hacker to create a threat in closed source. For an open source application the source is readily available to the end user, he can experiment the possible vulnerabilities and can create a threat from that. 4.2.3 Plagiarism Students are liable to stick on to plagiarism. Copying a colleagues crucial information is equivalent to theft. Plagiarism is a kind of cheating, school going kids do it by literally downloading and later amend it by changing the overall look by adding font colours. Arranging the referred website and book in a systematic way will help the student falling into plagiarism. Consolidating this data into bibliography will help the student in the safer side. (Bynum, 2008) (Williams, 2003) 4.3 PRIVACY AND ANONYMITY Spoofing Spoofing is the process of doing any kind of on-line data transfer where the origin of the data will be IP- spoofing and email spoofing the subcategories of spoofing . IP-Spoofing is the technique used to hide ones ip address and leverage other persons ip address to do some malpractices. In email spoofing the usually terrorists use this to send threatening email to home affairs department. Man in the middle attack is the by-product of spoofing where a person does the crime pretending the online transaction is done by the poor chap who owns the on-line account by network address translation on a cloud computing . Many corporate have security policies implemented to defend against these attacks Phishing Phishing is the tactics of sending fake emails giving an impression to the end user who receives the email mentioning he is receiving it on behalf of a well reputed organization most of the times from the billing or financial department claiming asking for the credit card details .Phishing sets either an upsetting message or an offer message which enables a psychological reaction in human Phishing scams are dramatically increasing now a day. To overcome in case of any discrepancies the link needs to be avoided and intimating the concerned person may be a good approach. Password protection Passwords are the keys to get into our privacy .Every individual have a bunch of passwords and most of them are identical for our own convenience. .If we are in a business critical position of a corporate or reputed brand. We should adhere to not sharing the passwords even with our friends; need to keep the passwords changed in a time interval of three months .need to make sure we are using complex passwords which contains alphanumeric characters as well. (Bynum, 2008) SOCIAL NETWORKING AND BLOGS Social networking in a spanning innovation of the present world. It is one among the innovations of the decade which if used in a supposed manner common population can make use of it .The advantage of social networking is wherever we go around the world we can be in touch with our loved ones and friends. Social networking can let a business man know the response of his products instantly from the blogs. As mentioned early when new invention is born with twin brother which is a crime . He looks identical twin until being as a crime. Social networking is an unavoidable part of our social life. We are kept updated by the blogs and status updates which is advantageous in many ways for a person who dont look at newspaper , improving his vocabulary, culture and will let him know what is happening around and most of them comes free of cost. An individual can upload a fake profile which can misguide many youngsters. Most of the social networking websites are privately owned and they dont rea lly look into the verification of the information provided in the user profile which might result in the misuse of profile for anti-social activities which can a celebrity or a religiously known influential person. (Barrons Educational Series, Inc, 1999) 5. COMPUTER ETHICS AND PROFESSIONAL RESPONSIBILITY Computer professionals work on many technologies in different domains. They work on different programming languages and evolving technology platforms. They are spread around the world contributing their inventions. The computer professionals are not limited to computer scientists or software engineers. The chain will be incomplete without system analysts, warehouse professionals hardware designers, networking professionals, database administrators and IT managers. The basics of ethics should start from each computer professional .there would not be no one to monitor at work. Computer ethics should be self driven. The computer professionals should voluntary test and validate the errors without leaving any loopholes when the applications are build. There is a saying Engineers build the world where the same engineers destruct the world too. This is complementary as the engineers invented concrete mixing machines and cranes whereas the same engineers invented the bulldozer. It is the sam e case of computer industry where the softwares engineers develop softwares and the same software engineers create viruses. Usage of computer or network without the owners permission physically or virtually and damaging data is unethical and is certainly a crime. This crime can be monitored upto an extend by intrusion detection systems IDS. IDS is capable of monitoring the computers and its network in an organization. The IDSs are configured in such a way that whenever a deviation from standard policies it will trigger an alert to the system administrator. The computer professionals are obliged to certain responsibility, a software developer who develops is responsible to point out the drawbacks to the society during the primitive stage of the development. The professional should we educated towards the legal responsibilities of the applications as it could become a harm to the evolving technologies . According to me the legal and moral responsibility is mutual and the professional should look into the future inflictions. This lies on the shoulder of every member in the team. The members should report any kind of issues to their supervisors. Few disasters in the past which reminds us about the importance of ethics ; 1985 Therac- 25 radiation machine fail 1983 World war 3 Due to bug the soviet intelligence applications 1987 Wall street crash known as Black Monday 1990 ATT network collapse 1995 Airane explosion 1999 Siemens passport bug 2000 I love you virus, 2004 UK child support agency bug These events in the past reminds us the importance of the software testers were morally liable to the fix could have away because of negligence. Assuming the context of software development for a medical ACM Code The association for computing machinery ACM released the code of ethics and professional conduct which is set as a benchmark for computer ethics so far. It is a 24 which talks about the contributing to the society without harming giving credit to intellectual property with respect to privacy and honours confidentiality. Professional responsibilities striving to achieve quality and dignity in work and product. Maintaining competence with respect to the law pertaining professional work. Providing professional review and comprehensive evaluation. We should honour the contract and responsibilities assigned to us. Should improve public understanding. One should access the computer resource when they are supposed to do so. In 1992 Dr.Ramon C Barquin discussed the role of computer ethics through Computer ethics institute and is being used by reputed institutions and organisation which is quoted as below: 5.1 Ten Commandments of Computer Ethics 1. THOU SHALT NOT USE A COMPUTER TO HARM OTHER PEOPLE. 2. THOU SHALT NOT INTERFERE WITH OTHER PEOPLES COMPUTER WORK. 3. THOU SHALT NOT SNOOP AROUND IN OTHER PEOPLES COMPUTER FILES. 4. THOU SHALT NOT USE A COMPUTER TO STEAL. 5. THOU SHALT NOT USE A COMPUTER TO BEAR FALSE WITNESS. 6. THOU SHALT NOT COPY OR USE PROPRIETARY SOFTWARE FOR WHICH YOU HAVE NOT PAID. 7. THOU SHALT NOT USE OTHER PEOPLES COMPUTER RESOURCES WITHOUT AUTHORIZATION OR PROPER COMPENSATION. 8. THOU SHALT NOT APPROPRIATE OTHER PEOPLES INTELLECTUAL OUTPUT. 9. THOU SHALT THINK ABOUT THE SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES OF THE PROGRAM YOU ARE WRITING OR THE SYSTEM YOU ARE DESIGNING. 10. THOU SHALT ALWAYS USE A COMPUTER IN WAYS THAT INSURE CONSIDERATION AND RESPECT FOR YOUR FELLOW HUMANS. (Herold, 2006) 6. CONCLUSION Most of the crimes are happening due to underlying vulnerabilities in the system which remains undetected due to ignorance. All the computer relevant evils cannot be sanitized. By applying hot fixes and patches these security concerns could be covered .Privacy can be recalled by adhering by not sharing passwords with friends .A sophisticated intrusion prevention system in place will hinder many intruders and safeguards the system and network. A frequent auditing in the IT infrastructure and review can help in planning and implementing security systems. According to me the best thing is to be in touch with computer professionals and joining their communities and having an eye on the blogs can help us to get rid of the computer. Individuals are the basic building blocks of the society. So the decision making factor should start from the soul of each and every computer user. A focus on the information system failure and research on them could lime light on the computer ethics. Computer ethics need to be a part of the curriculum for students as they get exposure to information world and might get misleaded without guidance. If the communities are doing good it will for sure make a good impact in the progress of a good nation and in turn a good world. To attain this we should respect others privacy, the use of any software should not harm anyone else and end-users should be willing to pay closed source applications and contribute for sharewares .If we come across any discrepancies use our internal sense to relish need to keep the legal people informed about the issue. Employees should adhere to the organizations policies. Honesty and Integrity can strive to ethics. (Tom Forester, 2001) (Stamatellos)

Essay --

Sam Culleton March 9, 2014 Research paper Jesse Owens was a very important man. He was amazing at track and went to the Olympics. He was the best in college. Even though his childhood was not really good. Jesse Owens was born on September 12 1913. He was born in Oakville, Alabama and was born with the name James. Jesse had nine siblings. His family was very poor. They were all sharecroppers which means they were owned by white people but got little money. Even the kids and to help do the job. Every Winter Jesse would get pneumonia and had to work through it. Also every year he would get a big bump. One time it got so big his mom had to get a knife and cut it off. When Jesse was nine hid father found out that the landlord was cheating them out of their money. So once they had enough money, they moved to Ohio. His father found better work there and so did a lot of his family members. Jesse had trouble in school there. On his first day, his teacher asked him what his name was and he said his nickname which was J.C. but with his southern accent it sounded like he said Jesse. That name stuck with him for the rest of his life. When Jesse was in the fifth grade, the track teacher there saw him running and asked him to join the track team. Though with all the jobs Jesse had he could not do track in the afternoon so his coach made him get there before school so he could practice track. /jesse set Junior high records in the high jump with a 6 foot jump and he set another one in the broad jump with 22 feet 11 inches and 3/4. In high school, Jesse won all his major track events. He set records in the 100 meter dash with 9.4 seconds which also tied the world record. Also in high school he set two world records. He ran the 220 yard dash i... ...rld record in the 100 yard dash and won the 220 low hurdles all in under forty five minutes. In the Olympics he competed in the 100 meter dash, long jump, 220 meter dash and the 400 meter dash. In the Olympics he got four gold medals. Jesse Owens was a very important man. He set world records in high school, the Big Ten Conference Championships, and he won four gold medals in the Olympics. He also set records that stood for twenty five years. He impacted athletes by showing no matter what you have went through as a child sand no matter how bad of a life you had you can still do great things that you will be remembered for. He impacted racism by showing no matter what race you are you can still do amazing things, face racism and compete in the Olympics just like white people. He also showed that if you work hard enough and dream big good things will happen for you.

Essay on the Illusion of Escape in The Glass Menagerie -- Glass Menage

The Illusion of Escape in The Glass Menagerie       In The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams, the characters exhibit a state of delusion that originates from their dissatisfaction with their lives. Tom seeks adventure in the movies. Amanda reminisces often about her days as a Southern Belle. Laura sits in a dream world with her glass collection, and Jim basks in the praises of his high school glory. In their respective ways, they demonstrate their restlessness. The quotation from Thoreau, "The mass of men lead lives of the quiet desperation," applies to the characters in that they are all unhappy, but take no action to improve their situation in any significant way.    Tom, as the narrator, explains to the audience the progression of the play and allots this with "the pleasant guise of illusion." When he speaks to the audience, the events he relates are in the past, and he has realized how distanced his family had been from real life. Through the play, he is angry and bitter because of his duty to his sister and mother. His father absconded, leaving Tom as the sole provider, a title neither wanted. Tom is not prepared to settle down and feels as though he "makes a slave of himself." Whether or not he had the ability to create a separate life for himself, Tom feels placed in a "nailed up coffin." He is tortured by boredom in the warehouse and aches for his own vision of life. He remarked to Laura that he did not know how anyone could "[get] himself out of a coffin without removing one nail." A primary source of his desperation is the fact that he know that if he leaves he will destroy Laura, and he does not want that. He is inactive on his own behal f for a long time, feeling enclosed by a life he cannot stand. He is... ... They scurry around trying to end their suffering, but they impede each other's efforts through their individual ones. These people seem doomed to their fates: to run away, to live in the past, or to exist continually in a intangible world.    Works Cited and Consulted Bloom, Harold. Introduction. Tennessee Williams. Ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House, 1987. 1-8. King, Thomas L. "Irony and Distance in The Glass Menagerie." In Tennessee Williams. Ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House, 1987. 85-94. Levy, Eric P. "'Through Soundproof Glass': The Prison of Self Consciousness in The Glass Menagerie." Modern Drama, 36. December 1993. 529-537. Williams, Tennessee. The Glass Menagerie. In Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing, 4th ed. Ed. Edgar V. Roberts and Henry E. Jacobs. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1995. 1519-1568. Essay on the Illusion of Escape in The Glass Menagerie -- Glass Menage The Illusion of Escape in The Glass Menagerie       In The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams, the characters exhibit a state of delusion that originates from their dissatisfaction with their lives. Tom seeks adventure in the movies. Amanda reminisces often about her days as a Southern Belle. Laura sits in a dream world with her glass collection, and Jim basks in the praises of his high school glory. In their respective ways, they demonstrate their restlessness. The quotation from Thoreau, "The mass of men lead lives of the quiet desperation," applies to the characters in that they are all unhappy, but take no action to improve their situation in any significant way.    Tom, as the narrator, explains to the audience the progression of the play and allots this with "the pleasant guise of illusion." When he speaks to the audience, the events he relates are in the past, and he has realized how distanced his family had been from real life. Through the play, he is angry and bitter because of his duty to his sister and mother. His father absconded, leaving Tom as the sole provider, a title neither wanted. Tom is not prepared to settle down and feels as though he "makes a slave of himself." Whether or not he had the ability to create a separate life for himself, Tom feels placed in a "nailed up coffin." He is tortured by boredom in the warehouse and aches for his own vision of life. He remarked to Laura that he did not know how anyone could "[get] himself out of a coffin without removing one nail." A primary source of his desperation is the fact that he know that if he leaves he will destroy Laura, and he does not want that. He is inactive on his own behal f for a long time, feeling enclosed by a life he cannot stand. He is... ... They scurry around trying to end their suffering, but they impede each other's efforts through their individual ones. These people seem doomed to their fates: to run away, to live in the past, or to exist continually in a intangible world.    Works Cited and Consulted Bloom, Harold. Introduction. Tennessee Williams. Ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House, 1987. 1-8. King, Thomas L. "Irony and Distance in The Glass Menagerie." In Tennessee Williams. Ed. Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House, 1987. 85-94. Levy, Eric P. "'Through Soundproof Glass': The Prison of Self Consciousness in The Glass Menagerie." Modern Drama, 36. December 1993. 529-537. Williams, Tennessee. The Glass Menagerie. In Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing, 4th ed. Ed. Edgar V. Roberts and Henry E. Jacobs. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1995. 1519-1568.