Building a Networked Organization free essay sample

MWH is a global engineering services firm considered to be a leader in water, hydropower and environmental remediation. It was trying to turn the geographically organized department into one organized by function and the reorganization will depend on effective collaboration. The existing relationships are providing through ONA analysis, a method for mapping relationships among people in a group. This case looks into the old structure under which departments are fragmented by geography and constrained by hierarchy and other gaps in connectivity. Challenges are listed for discussion and recommendations are provided for steps to be taken to align the department’s network with MWH’s business objectives. An IT department organized by geography instead of functionality had been acceptable when MWH was smaller, which is now impossible for the IT department to deliver sophisticated, standardized solutions. The information-seeking relationships that existed at the birth of iNet were based on shared geography, not on shared functional areas. We will write a custom essay sample on Building a Networked Organization or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page . There was only limited collaboration across the IT business centers and this fragmentation results in internal customers experiencing varying levels of service, functionality and costs for technical solutions and applications. Even more crucial was service to external customers. 3. The lack of standardization. Employees had no strong process base to guide them and they got work done by turning to other people for help.The leaders of the various IT groups met two or three times a year in an effort to drive standard approaches for the company, but the groups continued to operate independently, each serving its own master and employing its own measures and processes. 4. There was limited collaboration between some locations for MWH, this imposed a big challenge for the iNet project because some are planned to be built into important serve locations globally. Some groups were not providing optimal solutions to customers because they did not leverage each other’s expertise, therefore higher than industry average IT cost lead to lower competiveness of service quality and cost. 6. There was hierarchy exist. Overall, there was a relatively high level of collaboration among the most senior iNet employees, but less connectivity was evident among those at lower levels. 7. The network size varied a lot from 1~2 to more than 25 overloaded by some people which reveals a serious asymmetry of the relationship distribution. 8.A lot of relationships existed within immediate team only; few had any ties outside of MWH. 9. The serendipitous interactions could preclude effective information-seeking. RECOMMENDATION All the issues addressed above occurred from inefficient organization structure and lack of collaboration, which can be solved by carefully designing and building a networked organization. Following are the reconditions for successfully carrying out iNet project to: 1) Increase responsiveness and adaptiveness through real time operation. 2) Maximize the knowledge potential of the enterprise by leveraging expertise companywide and share information. ) Minimize disruption and duplication, which promises delivering optimal solution and with lower cost. Recommendations are from two aspects: restructure company departments and better managing networked relationships throughout the whole organization. Organization Restructure 1. Fluid boundaries MWH need to breakdown the geography base departments and carry out a function integration to increase its capacity to respond quickly and effectively to market forces, therefore improve the quality of conformance to customer requirements and reduce costs.Centralization of like tasks or functions and management of geographically separated units will enhance a more network-oriented improvement. From exhibit we can see that the new organization structure has fewer departments and levels, all the new departments are no longer designed according to geography but functions. However, having a revised organization structure graph is far from enough. To make it work, the manager needs to make sure there is no longer geography boundaries exit. New operational structure need to push functions out or pull them back in different departments as they suit company’s strategy.Large-scale integration of functions and systems required to fully manage the operation and service p rocess. 2. Information infrastructure Executives must use powerful technology to allow information to flow seamlessly across, out of, and into the company. Well-planned technical architecture need to be set up to allow information to move freely. MWH need to build up an integrated and overarching architecture for the entire company, not just a patchwork of current system linking to individual’s solutions. A through analyze of existing technology support will be needed to balance with the infrastructure requirements of the iNet project. . New management structure Advance IT systems will help to remove some mid-level management positions and creates a flatter structure, therefore, old control and planning style will be revised. Senior managers should be able to see into a larger group of employees with technology, while push down information simultaneously. Senior management should be linked with each other, therefore be able to draw on the entire management team for input when it comes to important decision process. The entire control and planning process will then become an on-line, real-time, team-based, coordinated process.This change will create deeper understanding of issue facing each senior manager and activities need to be adopted, thus more proper coordination at the senior management level. It also provides opportunities to move decisions either up or down in the organization. Team decisions making will be easier and faster, as geographically separated departments can concurrently access and assess data and communicate at the very first time. 4. Expertise group To better utilize the knowledge of experts in the organization, expertise group need to be carefully designed and make sure they can provide help and share information easily.Every knowledge worker should belong to at least two separate teams, which helps the organization achieve cross functional co-operation as well as helping individuals gain a broader perspective. Social relationship Management 1. Management of interdependence Under iNet, there is going to be considerable interdependence among all management actives. Instead of taking full control over the immediate lower level employees in the department, managers need to cope with unclear lines of authority and decision makings which rely more on interactions from other teams and departments. The managers need to share resources more freely and perate in a more diffuse responsibility and accountability environment. 2. Management of role complexity In old MWH organization structure, ONA analysis revealed the existence of highly hierarchy: senior and highly relied people had full control over the resources while lower level and highly peripheral employees with limited access to resources and authority. Within the networked organization, as the complexity of shared work, decision making, expertise and accountability increase, employees need to be involved in more complex network recourses to gain stronger skill to adapt the new responsibilities.The manager’s challenge here is to give employees confidence and resources to gain these skills including tools/techniques necessary, conceptualization, experience and interpersonal skills necessary to work efficiently with other. This can be achieved from assigning expertise groups to help and trainings. 3. Management of information seeking In the old structure, many employees seek information from their immediate teams and many others tend obtain inf ormation mainly from serendipitous interactions.The social capital was tight, informal relationships was unseen among employees, while the new networked form company functions efficiently with its flexible relationships. On one hand, managers need to improve the information seeking process for more efficient result. Formal relationships are best cemented by having agreed written process and common members in all teams. Higher trust and openness rather than higher formality environment need to be created for critical linkages. Frequent communication throughout the network must be encouraged; small groups developing its own communication dose not foster the net work spirit.On the other hand, besides of formal relationships, employees should be encouraged to maintain their personal and professional networks, even beyond the identifiable needs of the current team. 4. Management of culture Another big challenge the manger need to work on to foster iNet is creating trust culture in the organization. Transforming from the traditional structure, trust is one of the most important forces. Employees must have a clear understanding of task intent, information, and trust in the people, resources and technologies available.As a global company, establishing a trust-based culture is more difficult for MWH because of the diversified locations and mixed nationalities, there is no control over individual’s location, training, and experience. The relationship between people is fluid. Moving information in the networked organization and more complex roles demands a higher level of trust and dependence between managers and employees. This trust-based culture can be grown from joint training, team work and other continued integrations and reinforcements.

Free Essays on Tim Obrien

Tim O’Brien â€Å"†¦The literal truth is ultimately, to me, irrelevant. What matters to me is the heart-truth. I’m going to die, you’re all going to die; the earth is going to flame out when the sun goes. We all know the facts. The truth – I mean, does it matter what the real Hamlet was like, or the real Ulysses – does it matter? Well, I don’t think so. In the fundamental human way, the ways we think about in our dream-lives, and our moral lives, and our spiritual lives, what matters is what happens in our hearts. A good lie, if nobly told, for good reason, seems to me preferable to a very boring and pedestrian truth, which can lie, too.† -Tim O’Brien 1999 Tim O’Brien manipulates the reader’s customary understanding Tim by giving the narrator of â€Å"The Things They Carried† his own name and many of his own biographical details (date of birth, military record, and so on) while simultaneously stressing, throughout the narrative, that all the characters (including the narrator) are fictional and all the stories (including those in which the narrator takes part) are invented. It could be said that, in â€Å"The Things They Carried†, everything is true but nothing is authentic (Wharton). O’Brien’s readers have experienced immense difficulty when trying to get to grips with the slippery nature of the so called â€Å"authenticity† (or in fact the inauthenticity†) of O’Brien’s writing. Of all the devices used to blur the boundaries between truth and fiction, the books narrator seems to present the most difficulties for the reader. To understand O’Brien’s writing, it seems to be essential to make a clear distinction between Tim O’Brien the fictitious narrator (â€Å"The I-narrator) and Tim O’Brien the real, living author (â€Å"Tim O’Brien† or â€Å"O’Brien†). Tim O’Brien is an author still living and writing. He was born in 1946, in a small town in Minnesota (Gale Group, 1999). After graduating... Free Essays on Tim Obrien Free Essays on Tim Obrien Tim O’Brien â€Å"†¦The literal truth is ultimately, to me, irrelevant. What matters to me is the heart-truth. I’m going to die, you’re all going to die; the earth is going to flame out when the sun goes. We all know the facts. The truth – I mean, does it matter what the real Hamlet was like, or the real Ulysses – does it matter? Well, I don’t think so. In the fundamental human way, the ways we think about in our dream-lives, and our moral lives, and our spiritual lives, what matters is what happens in our hearts. A good lie, if nobly told, for good reason, seems to me preferable to a very boring and pedestrian truth, which can lie, too.† -Tim O’Brien 1999 Tim O’Brien manipulates the reader’s customary understanding Tim by giving the narrator of â€Å"The Things They Carried† his own name and many of his own biographical details (date of birth, military record, and so on) while simultaneously stressing, throughout the narrative, that all the characters (including the narrator) are fictional and all the stories (including those in which the narrator takes part) are invented. It could be said that, in â€Å"The Things They Carried†, everything is true but nothing is authentic (Wharton). O’Brien’s readers have experienced immense difficulty when trying to get to grips with the slippery nature of the so called â€Å"authenticity† (or in fact the inauthenticity†) of O’Brien’s writing. Of all the devices used to blur the boundaries between truth and fiction, the books narrator seems to present the most difficulties for the reader. To understand O’Brien’s writing, it seems to be essential to make a clear distinction between Tim O’Brien the fictitious narrator (â€Å"The I-narrator) and Tim O’Brien the real, living author (â€Å"Tim O’Brien† or â€Å"O’Brien†). Tim O’Brien is an author still living and writing. He was born in 1946, in a small town in Minnesota (Gale Group, 1999). After graduating...

Religious Service Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Religious Service - Term Paper Example A case of observation is the name. For Christians, the place of worship is called a church, for Islam a mosque, while for the Buddhist, a temple. It is also evident that the religions have unique symbolic cultures that differentiate them from one another as I observed with Islam when I once attended a religious service. This paper will describe the material and non- material culture of the mosque, a place of a warship by Muslims. Mosque A mosque is a place of worship for the Muslim faithful. It is evident from my observation of Muslim congregation and the mosque building that the design and building materials used in the construction of the place of worship mostly depends on heritage, culture and the resources in the community that hosts the mosque. However, it is noticeable that there are certain architectural features common to all mosques. For instance, the mosque’s parts are practical and show a sense of tradition and continuity among all the Muslims across the globe (Penn ey 10). Common architectural features include a minaret which is a slender tower rising at the top of a mosque (Penney 12). The minaret usually varies in height, number, and style. It may be square, octagonal, or round in shape and are in most cases covered with a pointed roof as noted by Penney (12). In the case of the mosque I attended, I was able to observe that it had a tall, slender and round-shaped minaret (Penney 14). On the minaret, there is a loudspeaker used to sermon people to prayers commonly called adhan (Hephaestus Books 14). The mosque is divided into two sections in which, men and women attend the service in different rooms. However, the services are conducted with the leadership of an Imam who is stationed on men’s side. The dress code is usually a veil gown mostly white in color for men and black for women. Every member of the congregation is required to remove the shoes before entering the mosque and put on the shoe shelf. This is mainly to preserve the cle anliness of the mosque and a sign of humility to God. The shelf is placed near the door to prevent pilling of shoes at the door.

Reading Music and Eroticism in Late Ming Texts Assignment

Reading Music and Eroticism in Late Ming Texts - Assignment Example The late Ming texts have played an important role in preserving the erotic-music notations of the Ming cultural society, owing to the fact the Ming music has long vanished and the only way through which it is preserved is through the textual notations. The factors that account for the vanishing of the Ming music is the secrecy with which the late Ming society would treat erotic emotions, impulses, and practices. In this respect, the erotic impulses, emotions, and impulses in the late Ming society were treated as private matters, only reserved for specific reasons and targeted for specific audiences, thus making their understanding highly complex. The carnal longings and desires of the Ming society were expressed through music, where music and sex were intertwined through dynamic and creative negotiations, allowing music to express and characterize the erotic desire of the time. The sexual desires were expressed through Ming music in a series of manipulated musical aspects such as pro cesses, objects, and sites, where the musical components such as instruments, sounds, and sonic components strategically aired the erotic agenda of the musical performers. The specific times and places where such manipulated music would be played then created the musical sites, while the projection of the sonic and the non-sonic sounds at the specific times and places constituted the music negotiations and processes, which would, in turn, work together towards the formation of erotic musical expressions. The discursive negotiations, processes and musical objects applications allowed the music performers to assert their erotic and sexual desires, thus serving not only as a means of expression but also as a catalyst for interactive bargaining the desires with the audience.

the business model of Apples itunes

the business model of Apples itunes Evaluate the business model of Apples itunes. In particular you should address:- 1. To what extent can the itunes business model be described as an ecosystem and what is the role of IT in enabling the collaboration between Apple, its economic partners and consumers? 2. How does itunes compare with competitors? 3. What new technologies could disrupt the current market by enabling a new form of business model? Introduction Business model in a basic sense deals with the method of doing business in order to generate revenues by which a company sustains itself in the competitive market place ( (Rappa, 2009).According to (Amberg Manuela) analysis on music industries, there are lots of media websites and companies following different business models fallen prey to file sharing tools and peer-peer networks which allow consumers to illegally copy and share the content for free. As a consequence , companies like Apple iTunes and Sony Connect have come up with internet based business models based on pay-per-download and dependent on the technology of the supplier for whom long-term customer relations are very crucial and customers are allowed to use the digital media content particularly with regard to technology of the supplier thus getting advantage and benefitting from selling hardware components because the offer of digital media content advances it. These business models replace the traditional business m odels which are generally based on selling physical media.This paper shows the fair understanding of Apple iTunes business model for its dominance over the current music market and tries to describe the business model with respect to ecosystem and compares iTunes with its key competitors in the market. The biological term ecosystem in this paper refers to the IT ecosystem. (Iansiti Richards, 2005) describes IT ecosystem as network of organizations that drives the creation, innovation and delivery of Information Technology products and services. According to (Cusumano, 2008) the term ‘Platform, is defined as â€Å" Foundation product or key technology in a system like the PC or a web enabled cell phone and should have relatively open technical interfaces and easily licensing terms in order to encourage other firms to contribute complementary product and services. So this can be accounted to an ecosystem around the platform and the platform becomes more valuable when the exter nal entities creative more innovations around it. This should cause more users to adopt the platform and more complementors to join the network. iTunes as an ecosystem Online music hit a new milestone after Apple computer,Inc.(Apple) launched the iTunes application in January 2001 follwed by launch of 1st generation iPod and 2 years later online music store in April of 2003.The two businesses, the production of MP3 players and the online music shops were initially considered as different units and after the invention of new hardware iPod these two businesses were merged. iTunes is a software designed with an intuitive and user friendly interface and iPod is an hardware designed with an eye on fashion. These two together helped Apple to enter and succeed in the music player market infact actually cross promoting the iPod hardware device. Because of their service and innovation Apple retained to grow in the online music field in a better way when compared to its key competitors like Dell, Sony and Samsung( (Li Chang). According to (Schonfeld, 2009) statistics, iTunes have now sold 6 billion songs and 10 million different tracks are now available on iTunes. iTunes is software and iPod is hardware as said by (Li Chang) are two different business units and Apple conjucts these two different products into one new business model. Using ecology to analyze this model(iPod and iTunes) it has set a nice example for ecotone between two species to drive the music industry into new ecosystem. A strong platform is apparent from the combination of both the software and the hardware. The below shows the evolution of new ecosystem with combination of two stand-alone ecosystems. ‘Most companies today inhabit ecosystemsloose networks of suppliers, distributors, and outsourcers; makers of related products or services; providers of relevant technology; and other organizations that affect, and are affected by, the creation and delivery of a companys own offering†¦.. as said by (Iansiti Levien, 2004) shows how business industry can be closely compared to biological ecosystem. Like every individual in the biological ecosystem every organization in the business ecosystem shares the fate of the network as a whole regardless of that members apparent strengths. Comparing this with the Apple business, iPod is not really an innovative technology by itself but the company creates a new ecotone for digital music where all the hardware(iPods) and software(iTunes) are related to it enhances its platform. According to (Koster, 2007) There is a continuous decline in the traditional sale of music sources like retail music stores and the on-going music industries ar e restructuring themselves by merging with other partners to face the loss of revenues and to adopt with the new business strategies and models in the music industry to compete with the counterparts. Even in the digital music world today, legitimate music downloading is continuously changing. Initial music sites have very strong limitations on access catalogs of music, on what could be done with the downloaded music, number of copies, time limits, where to copy. Though Apple iTunes works on this model, it is successful in negotiating a very large music catalog from the four labels from its music site. He says that one large advantage and success for Apple is because of its hardware device iPod where normally music is stored and playback. The revenues from iPods sales continue to grow after the introduction of iTunes. Though Apple had gotten permission from four majors to store their music on its website for consumers to download by promising the copyright protection authority DRM, i t is now planning to get away with DRM because they make the downloaded or recorded music very cumbersome for the consumer. This is evident from (Johnson, 2009) article on web which says By the end of the quarter all 10 million songs will be DRM free in iTunes and iTunes plus, said Phil Schiller, Apples senior vice president of worldwide product marketing. The blog witten by (Vitalari, 2009) clearly examines at the 21st century business model adopted by Apple to become successful in the market. He believes that business platforms are the root cause for cumulative business performance. Apples competitive business platforms is the main drive for innovations like community formation, mass collaboration, social networking, ecosystems, real time analytics, transparency etc. The iPhone App store was launched in July 2008 and today iTunes store is a total set of all forms of the digital media including music, games, software application, podcasts and video assets . As his explanation, the driving factors for Apple success and points out that the effective business platforms have few key ingredients:  · iPods, iphones are not just products instead they represent individual business platforms and they create an ecosystem surrounding the product which means they create a common understanding for business transactions, technical specifications, interface standards and requirements. With the iPhone this includes all of the sub-contracted manufacturers, but more importantly it includes iTunes, the app store and app developers.This results in creating a transparency which enables and facilitates hundreds of participants to collaborate asynchronously and independently.  · This leads directly to the second point, which is that the business platform then helps to generate untold business analytics for the platforms owner.This is because of the elements of the business platform are networked and generates valuable information about the product, ecosystem and participants. Apple used this analytics to fix, improve and enhance the product and finally delighting the customers.  · This in turn creates a community of practice surrounding the business platform, as the collaborators learn how to make better things. IT in enabling collaboration with partners and consumers As a cofounder of Apple, Steve Jobss vision was to create new and different products to consumers and his notion of â€Å"one person-one computer became visionary responsible for Apples reputation for innovation and mission became changing the world by bringing the computers to masses (Richard D Vohr, 1998).Apple came back with reinvention of personal computer with Macintosh in 1980 after igniting the computer industry revolution with inventing Apple II and it is commited to bring the best computing experience to all the fields starting from students, educators, professionals and consumers all around the globe with its innovative software hardware and internet offerings. This Apples mission statements indicates it focuses on innovation and personal computing experience( (Pearlson Saunders, 2009). Apple From 1987-1997 the company suffered due to some major internal problems which affected the strategic leadership and its operations but after Steve Jobss second turn as CEO, company fixed operational problems and regains its innovative leadership dramatically. Few changes like manufacturing outsourcing and improving inventory became straight forward matching Dell, the industry leader.It moved to open industry standards rather than proprietary hardware interfaces that it had maintained for 15 years and thus in a minor way Apples product strategy became more open( (West Mace, 2007).As per ( (Apple Computer, 2006) Apple derives its competitive advantage again by its innovation giving iPod as an example. Apple entered the market with iPod in 2001and by end of fourth quarter of fiscal year 2005, iPods sales gained 33% of the total revenues. The factors which are accountable to their success and uniqueness are its computers based on its own operating system, which enabled further area of innovation.Its Mac OS operating system focuses on more simplicity and seen as graphically sophisticated. (West Mace, 2007)Recent trends have seen increasing strategy convergence be tween Apple and Microsoft .For its video game business, similar to its rivals Sony and Nintendo Microsoft buys the processor but designs its own hardware and software without licensing them to others.Meanwhile ‘Zune, Microsofts music players try to compete successfully to attain equality with Apples iPod. This shows Apple pursued a vertically integrated strategy in its music business. Vertical strategy is single firms controlling the entire platform. Apple leveraging its Macintosh installed base to establish iTunes music store and building iPod business on top of that and now iPhone business shows its expansion into adjacent markets and this loyal installed base makes any company easier to branch into a related market and this becomes a lesson for the other companies and Apple aims at satisfying the costumer not just upgrading the costumers what they have today like the other companies do. When ATT decided to make offer to iTunes many other mobile industries criticized it for making too many concessions to Apple. Due to this offer ATT gets benefit from Apple in two ways , one is Apple increases the average monthly bills for the customers who switch from ATT to iPhone and the second one is it causes existing people to switch from existing carriers to ATT as its the exclusive carrier for iPhone( (The Apple iPhone:Successes and Challenges for the Mobile Industry, 2008). Digital Record Management systems are uses to encrypt the data does not allow illegal or non authorization download of music and currently there are two main formats used for protect downloading of music. One is fairplay and the other is WMA. Fairplay is Apples proprietary technology where it secure the data encrypted in AAC( Advanced Audi Coding) format. WMA is Microsofts Windows media audio video encoding platform. iPods can play only those stuff which are secured through fairplay format and Apple has refuse to lincense this fairplay to other retailers and so it is difficult for iPod users to download music from other retailers other than iTunes music store. But recently Realnetworks in US came up with a package which allows iPod users resident in US to play secures music from Realnetworkss music store Rhapsody. Apple got furious with this and accused Realnetworks of ‘Hacker tactics and Ethics and reported to investigating on that for violating the intellectual rights. If apple is capable of putting an end to such violations then the indispensability of fairplay could be established( (The iTunes music store: does competition law hold the key to closed shop?, 2004) According to insights into IDCs lifesciences by (Swenson Golden, 2005) Apple products are getting attracted by the life science researchers who actually migrated from linux and unix platforms because of the dual nature of Mac OS and its estimated historically that the life scientists have been twice or thrice more likely than the average computer user to Apples Mac platform as client computer thus representing attractive market for Apple. It has announced about its collaboration with airlines which includes Air France, Continental, Delta, United and KLM to integrate the in flight entertainment systems with iPod and taking the current entertainment provided in these airlines to a next level for better travel experience( (Apple_Partners_with_Airlines_for_iPod_Integration, 2006). Sets Apple as an interesting example for not being an open source model in its business strategies but is thought b of being a highly proprietary company from its earlier years. Now it has jumped into open sou rce and have started projects both inside and outside its corporate firewalls. Apples OS X was a open source because it was based on Darwin. Its developer website said that Apples open source projects let key developers to customize and enhance Apple software and through this open source models it allows Apple engineers to collaborate with open source community to come up with better and more reliable products (Goldman Gabriel, 2005). On September 2007, Apple and Starbucks announced their collaboration on Apple letting costumers at Starbucks wirelessly browsing, previewing, buying and downloading music from iTunes music stores at Starbucks on their iPods enhancing Starbucks retail coffee experience by helping customers with discovering new music instantly (Rothman, 2007). These examples shows how Apple is spreading the digital media revolution with its technologically profound products. Apple believes in fully integrated and completely digital learning environment which makes conte nts to move from from application to another and easy to collaborate and share ideas. Integration even reduces the burden of technology challenge. So Apples IT team rather than spending time and money on how to get things working feels it worthwhile to dedicate the same on providing capabilities, innovations and resources for its institution (Everything Apple means everything just works). iTunes and Competitors: The majors competitors for Apple are Google and Microsoft Corporation and other competitors include Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Fujitsu, Samsung Electronics, Sony and Toshiba. Apple is designing software and hardware systems that delivers a greater user experience. Google is giving away operating systems to companies that license windows mobile today. Microsoft needs to think about their business models to compete in such a race where it probably has to decide whether it wants to compete in devices or operating systems and doing both is again at a risk which requires business models that are outside its core competencies( (The Apple iPhone:Successes and Challenges for the Mobile Industry, 2008). There is a partial collision between Apple and RIM in smartphone business in which Apples device is a entertainment centric whereas RIMs product is a communication centric.Though each company is growing into each others space Apple is got the advantage because infrastructure establishment would be too large for RIM and beside that RIMs image is all wrong for that instead it is much better to defend and grow its market by adding more features and types of business communications to Blackberry. Comparing it with Nokia, Nokias challenges are more about challenges. They sell hundred of millions handsets every year at low costs. But without it, Nokia will be really hard pressed to match with the iPhones user experiences. Competitors such as Diamond multimedia, with its Rio brand portable media players were successful in the market until Apple displaced them and all the credits for such a domination goes to the business model of the company by offerings users a seamless music experience by combining its iPod devices with iTunes and online iTunes store. Users were taken away by its value proposition and Apple had to negotiate deals with the major record companies to establish the worlds largest online music library, there giving the twist for the company to earn most of its revenue s by selling iPods while using the integration with the on online music store to protect itself from the competitors( (Osterwalder Yves, 2009).Smartphone users are going to increase in number in the next few years increasing in the PC functionalities supporting data services and voice and this is going to drive smartphone markets and Apple launching the iPhone which meets most of the required functionalities made it to third position in the global smartphone market in the third quarter of 2008. As there is rapid change in the technology there is introduction of new products with competitive prices, features and performance characteristics by all the competitors and out of all, mobile communication industry highly competitive with well funded and experienced competitors. For example in 2009, Nokia launched a new online media store in competition to Apple and this has resulted in price erosion which is now threatening to lessen the market share of the company( (DATAMONITOR, 2009). What new technologies could disrupt the current market by enabling a new form of business model. Apple has become the leader in the music world revolution and it justifies for its closed source system, keeping its digital music platform proprietary making it incompatible by other system by saying that it was the main reason in convincing its music labels and artists allowing them to sell their songs through iTunes assuring that those would not be pirated. But many analysts claim that that closed system was the reason for its previous failure in the computer business and Microsoft gained the masses with their open systems and now that is being seen as a gamble in this highly cometetive technology world (Williard, 2005). According to survey done by Rubicon Consulting Inc on the Apple iPhone users shows that about 43 percent of the iPhone users feels that the device would be more elegant if there is a physical change to the iPhone by adding adding a keyboard or a keypad either by making the device smaller or larger and about 40 percent of the users complain about the browser proble ms and the notably with those using Adobe flash and this shows that mobile data devices has always been segmented and its impossible for any single hardware design to please everyone. This could be an opportunity to Apple to increase its share by serving those customers by giving more importance to value propositions for their products which is again a part of business model and at the same time its an opportunity for its competitors to steal that share by addressing segments Apple failed in( (The Apple iPhone:Successes and Challenges for the Mobile Industry, 2008). Apple corporation itself has many problems but loss of competitive differentiation due to its Enterprise sytem is not counted in that because of its strong brand and its distinct operating system. For many of the other computer manufacturers cost and service are more vital for their differentiation than their products but for Apple this seems to be a unusual case says (Davenport, 1998). ‘Disruptive Business Models are emblematic of our generation. Yet they remain poorly understood, even as they transform competitive landscapes across industries (Osterwalder Yves, 2009). Conclusion: According to Sankar Dhinu, Apples senior manager of Emerging Technology, to be competitive in worlds high tech industry, one should make use of the facilities like available economic advantage of the manufacturing and distribution and Apple success goes with its interaction with dozens of trading partners , starting from resellers to distributors and OEM manufacturers which in turn helped it to form a global supply chain. Due to increased competition Apple is also facing many pressures and already working towards less limitation and freer access of digital music. Thus majors themselves are getting involved in those changes and Apples CEO Steve Jobs has called for an end to DRM because they make use of downloaded and recorded music very inconvenient and cumbersome for the consumer.( (Koster, 2007) Biblography: Amberg, M., Manuela, S. ANALYSIS OF E-BUSINESS MODELS FOR DIGITAL MEDIA . (2006). Apple Computer. The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Apple_Partners_with_Airlines_for_iPod_Integration. (2006, November 14). Retrieved December 1, 2009, from www.digg.com: http://digg.com/apple/Apple_Partners_with_Airlines_for_iPod_Integration Cusumano, M. (2008). Technology Strategy and Management, The Puzzle of Apple. DATAMONITOR. (2009). Apple Inc. Company Profile. Davenport, T. H. (1998). Putting the Enterprise into the Enterprise System. Harvard Business Review OnPoint . Everything Apple means everything just works. (n.d.). Retrieved december 1, 2009, from www.images.apple.com: http://images.apple.com/education/leaders-administrators/the-apple-ecosystem.html Goldman, R., Gabriel, R. P. (2005). INNOVATION HAPPENS EVERYWHERE. In R. Goldman, R. P. Gabriel, Open source as business strategy (pp. 3-5). San Francisco: Morgan kaufmann. Iansiti, M., Levien, R. (2004). Strategy as Ecolgy. Harvard Business review. Iansiti, M., Richards, G. L. (2005). Information Technology Ecosystem Health and Performance. Johnson, B. (2009, January 6). Apple drops DRM copy protection from millions of iTunes songs. Retrieved from www.gaurdian.co.uk: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/jan/06/apple-drops-itunes-copy-protection Koster, A. (2007). Music Industry: Toward A New Business Model? Journal of Business and Economic Research . Li, Y.-R., Chang, Y. Is the success of iPod Purely Accidental or Inevitable A Business Ecolgy Perspective. Osterwalder, A., Yves, P. (2009). Business Model Generation. Self Published. Pearlson, k. E., Saunders, C. S. (2009). Strategic management of Information Systems. In k. E. Pearlson, C. S. Saunders, Strategic management of Information Systems (p. 25). John Wiley and sons. Rappa, M. (2009). BUSINESS MODELS ON THE WEB. MANAGNG THE DIGITAL ENTERPRISE . Richard D, F., Vohr, J. (1998). APPLE COMPUTER, INC. Rothman, W. (2007, september 5). Apple partners with Starbucks for free WiFi Access to iTunes Music Store. Retrieved december 1, 2009, from www.gizmodo.com: http://gizmodo.com/296696/apple-partners-with-starbucks-for-free-wi+fi-access-to-itunes-music-store Schonfeld, E. (2009, January 6). iTunes sells 6 billions songs , and other fun stats from the Philnote. Retrieved from www.techcrunch.com: http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/01/06/itunes-sells-6-billion-songs-and-other-fun-stats-from-the-philnote/ Swenson, M., Golden, J. B. (2005). Apple and Life science research : Enabling Technologies. Life Science Insights, an IDC company. (2008). The Apple iPhone:Successes and Challenges for the Mobile Industry. (2004). The iTunes music store: does competition law hold the key to closed shop? Vitalari, N. (2009, August 10). Apple and the Rise of Competitive Business Platforms What Other Companies Must Know. Retrieved from www.wikinomics.com: http://www.wikinomics.com/blog/index.php/2009/08/10/apple-and-the-rise-of-competitive-business-platforms-what-other-companies-must-know/ West, J., Mace, M. (2007). ENTERING A MATURE INDUSTRY THROUGH INNOVATION: APPLES IPHONE STRATEGY. Williard, C. (2005). Apple worms its way into the music industry.

Banquo - a Spiritual Force in Shakespeares Macbeth :: Macbeth essays

Banquo - a Spiritual Force in Macbeth      Ã‚  Ã‚   Who cannot learn from Shakespeare's Macbeth this moral lesson: That crime does not pay? And who can deny that the playwright created a spiritual force in the play in the person of Banquo? This essay is his story.    Lily B. Campbell in her volume of criticism, Shakespeare's Tragic Heroes: Slaves of Passion, discusses how fear enters the life of Banquo with the murder of Duncan and his two attendants:    And as Lady Macbeth is helped from the room, we see fear working in the others. Banquo admits that fears and scruples shake them all, even while he proclaims his enmity to treason. But Banquo fears rightly the anger or hatred of the Macbeth who has power to do him harm. (222)    In Shakespeare and Tragedy John Bayley discusses Banquo shortly before his murder:    [. . .] like Banquo, who, in the tense hour before the murder, expresses in more forceful form the idea of evil speculation and possibility as ranging in the mind:    Merciful powers, Restrain in me the cursed thoughts that nature Gives way to in repose. II.i.7-9    At such a moment the activities of the mind become almost palpable and express themselves in bodily form, as they do in the other two mind tragedies. In the speech which he imagines the thoughts that may come to him when he goes to rest, Banquo hands his sword to his son Fleance, and then - with a dream-like precision - hands over his belt with its dagger too:    Hold, take my sword. There's husbandry in heaven; Their candles are all out. Take thee that too. (188-89)    Clark and Wright in their Introduction to The Complete Works of William Shakespeare comment that Banquo is a force of good in the play, set in opposition to Macbeth:    Banquo, the loyal soldier, praying for restraint against evil thoughts which enter his mind as they had entered Macbeth's, but which work no evil there, is set over against Macbeth, as virtue is set over against disloyalty.   (792)    In Fools of Time: Studies in Shakespearean Tragedy, Northrop Frye explains the rationale behind Banquo's ghost in this play:    Except for the episode of Hercules leaving Antony, where mysterious music is heard again, there is nothing really supernatural in Shakespeare's tragedies that is not connected with the murder of the order-figures.

Sports Comparing Them to Now and in the Early 1920’s

Hi my name is Gilbert I was born on September 7th, 1901 and play baseball for the Yankees. I have now been playing on the Yankees for 7 years, since 1921. Baseball for America is our most popular sport and everybody watches it. It is what everybody does and follows their players and team. We players are very skilled and this all comes to us naturally through hard work and effort. We don’t play this game for money and fame; we do it because we love it and put so much passion into it.Hi my name is Peyton Manning I play quarterback for the Denver Broncos. I chose to play here because I got offered to pay the most here. I also decided to play here because the division is going to be easy and I figured it would be easy to win. Football is a great game because it is the sport now that everybody loves in Americas, people love going to games and following their teams and doing stuff like fantasy football. Football takes a lot of skill effort but now days it is driven by money and fame .The similarities in the two stories is that both sports take a lot of effort and skill, the two sports were Americas most popular sport at the time, and lastly both were players that played on the teams. The differences is that the most popular sport used to be baseball now it is football, the players don’t just do it cause they love it, they do it for money and fame. Also some more differences is back in the day players did it naturally and now a lot of times today they use steroids.