Why Teamwork is Better

Living in a society means that we cannot work alone all the time. Sometimes, we have to work as a teammate; sometimes, we have to work individually, either at college or at work. Both have its own positives and negatives. This article will try to give some examples of the pros and cons of teamwork and draw a conclusion.

Advantages of working in a group:

1. More productive: The first and the most important advantage of group work is that it increases the total productivity. Everyone brings in their best skills to ensure the quality output. This also makes sure that there is no compromise on the quality of productivity while working in a group.
2. More resources: Another undeniable thing of working together is that the more people you have in the group, the more resources you have at the end. As the number of the group increases, the overall skills of the team also increase. And skill is not the only thing that is brought onto the table, experience of the members gets added as well.
3. More supportive: Group work also ensure the work to be done, especially, when someone cannot do their part well, they can get helped from other team members. And when someone misses their work for some reason, the job still can be done properly and efficiently by the rest of the people in the team. These are impossible to happen for someone working alone.
4. Learn things: When working in a group, people can learn new things from each other. They have the opportunity to share and learn things from others. Everyone has their own way of working. Therefore, people in a group can learn others’ ways of working and experience. Then, they can apply these things to improve their work.
5. Network building: while working in a team, people are not only working together, but also get to know each other by sharing their ideas, experience, and information; sometimes, they also share the opportunities. Especially, when they think that someone in the group may fit in a position in a company, they may refer that person to work in that company.

Disadvantages of working in a group:

1. Unequal participation: It is quite frequent that while in a group, some people work more and harder than others. This may cause some trouble for the group; especially, when someone gets credit for the work that they have even not done.
2. Intrinsic conflict: People are different in some ways. Therefore, there may be some disagreement between team members. Each person has their own ideas which could conflict with others’. Moreover, some people in the group may find it hard to accept suggestions and ideas from others. This may put an end to the workflow until the conflict is solved.
3. Time-consuming: When starting a group work, people need time to get to know each other and who is good at which part so that they can assign their work properly. And when there are disagreements and conflicts between members, they also need a lot of time for the agreement between members and for solving those conflicts.
4. Distraction: When people working together, they may get lost in talking. Some people like hanging around and talking than getting the work done. And this may distract other people while they are working as well.
5. Loss of creativity: While working in a group, the group thinking is more relevant. Whenever someone has an idea, they may get some comments from others about that idea. Some people cannot take these comments and give up presenting their ideas.

Conclusion

To conclude, it is clearly that there are advantages and disadvantages of group working. But the advantages far outweigh the disadvantages. Besides some drawbacks, people learn new things, new skills, new methods of working; know more people; building their relationships; they also learn to appreciate and respect others’ ideas, and differences. Their work can be done way easier when they do not have to do the parts that they are not good at because everyone gets the parts they are good at.

Bad and Good Effects of Video Games

Credit: Getty

Video games have become pervasive in many children’s life. According to the NPD group (Lenhart et.al, 2008), more than 90% of children play some types of video games. This number soars to 97% when considering only adolescents ages 12-17. As most of video games on the market contain some form of violence (Children Now, 2001), many people are concerned about the impacts of video games on children and adolescents. More and more people think that video game is a potential contributor to the rising number of mass homicide. Furthermore, many have claimed that due to the violent nature of the games, children tend to grow up to be more violent. A report from The American Psychological Association (2005) concludes that violent video games present a “risk factor” for elevated aggression in children. In contrast, other studies show that playing video games helps people improve their memory skills, strategic planning skills, spatial skills, fine motor skills and decision-making skills.

According to The Huffington (Swanson & Wilkie, 2013), more than half of Americans think that there is a link between violent video games and gun violence. Whenever there is a news about a mass homicide, people usually comment that it is a result of violent video games. Also, reports often show that many serial killers were addicted to violent video games. Media point out that gaming habits can be an urging reason, a method of training, a practice for these mass murderers to learn how to aim and shoot. In violent video games, they call the death toll a “score”. That means the more people one kills in the game, the more accurate they shoot, the higher score they will get. Hence, when a gamer plans to do mass homicide, he will try to kill as many people as possible. Since he is used to the thought that every gamer has “to get as high score as possible”. Take Chris Harper-Mercer case as an example, before killing 10 people, including himself, and left seven people injured in the massacre taking place on Umpqua campus, he said, “I’ve been waiting to do this for years”, on an anonymous chat room website called 4chan (Fletcher, 2015). It is more horrible that he also received supports for his evil actions from such sites. Some of the supporters even felt disappointed that he had not killed more. With all of this evidence, we cannot deny that there is no link between violent video games and mass shootings.

Yet, do violent video games cause people to kill others? Dr. Mark Appelbaum, who chaired the APA task force, said, “Scientists have investigated the use of violent video games for more than two decades but to date, there is very limited research addressing whether violent video games cause people to commit acts of criminal violence. However, the link between violence in video games and increased aggression in players is one of the most studied and best established in the field.” He means that violent video games do not make people want to murder or shoot others but increase aggression in players. Not only violent video games but also non-violent ones make people more aggressive. Brock University researcher, Paul Adachi, said, “Whereas playing non-violent, non-competitive games did not. So, that really gets at the idea that, well, it may not be the violence, it may be the competition in games that is responsible for a link between video games and aggression.” Therefore, it is not the violent video game or non-violent video game that causes increased aggression in people. Competition and frustration do. Andrew Przybylski, a researcher at the Oxford Internet Institute at Oxford University, said, “Any player who has thrown down a remote control after losing an electronic game can relate to the intense feelings or anger failure can cause.”

But, do competition and frustration only exist in video games? No, those things exist in all types of games and sports. Why do we only blame video games for all the violent actions? Is it because other games and sports are considered good activities that help people improve their health and skills? For example, if one takes part in games such as chess, Sudoku, or crosswords, people will assume that these games will make them more intelligent and more creative by improving their reading skills, problem-solving skills, planning skills and etc. If one joins sports such as basketball, soccer, or volleyball, they will think that those games will help them with stress relief, burning calories, gaining strong arms, strong legs and etc.

Parents usually don’t encourage their kids to play video games because they assume that those games do more harm than good. They believe those games are useless activities that may distract their kids from doing homework. However, recent studies show that even playing a simple game such as Super Mario 64 results in increased size in brain regions responsible for spatial orientation, memory formation, and strategic planning as well as fine motor skills (Kühn et.al, 2013). In an experiment conducted in Berlin, scientists asked 23 adults to play “Super Mario 64” on a portable Nintendo XXL for 30 minutes a day, over a period of two months. When compared to the control group by measuring using MRI, the gaming group showed increases of gray matter in the right hippocampus, right prefrontal cortex, and the cerebellum. Those areas are responsible for complex functions such as memory formation, strategic planning, spatial navigation, and fine skill hands. These results can help patients with mental disorders in which brain regions are altered or reduced in sizes – such as Alzheimer’s, PTSD or schizophrenia. Moreover, playing video games is far more acceptable for these patients than intrusive procedures. Jürgen Gallinat, psychiatrist, and co-author of the study at Charité University Medicine St. Hedwig-Krankenhaus, said, “Many patients will accept video games more readily than other medical interventions.” Another research, carried out by Australian and Chinese researchers, also suggests that playing video games not only increases the amount of gray matter in your brain, but also promotes better connectivity between different areas of the brain (Gong et.al, 2014). A team led by researchers from the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China and Macquarie University in Sydney, used functional MRI (fMRI) scans to analyze the brains of 27 gamers who achieved professional status or at least had an ‘expert’ status. The team then compared the results with those from people who don’t typically play games and noted the results. The results show that increased activity for gamers in an area called the insular cortex – typically associated with ‘higher’ cognitive functions such as empathy and compassion, but also with the ability to focus, which is good for decision making.

In conclusion, video games are similar to other activities such as sports and games. It has both bad effects, that cause elevated aggression and addiction; and good effects like sports and other games. With video games becoming more and more realistic, we need to be extremely cautious as to what our youths are being exposed to on a daily basis. It is not good to be addicted to video games but also not bad to play moderately. Moreover, playing video games helps us improve skills such as memory skills, strategic planning skills, spatial skills, fine motor skills and decision-making skills.

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References

American Psychological Association. (2005). Review of the violent video game literature. Retrieved October 10, 2016, from http://www.apa.org/pi/families/review-video-games.pdf

Fletcher, L. (2015, October 15). 14 mass murders linked to violent video games. Retrieved October 14, 2016, from http://www.charismanews.com/culture/52651-14-mass-murders-linked-to-violent-video-games

Gentile, D. A. & Gentile, J. R. (2008).  Violent video games as exemplary teachers: A conceptual analysis.  Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 9, 127-141

Glaubke, Christina R.; Miller, Patti; Parker, McCrae A.; Espejo, Eileen. (2001). Fair play? Violence, gender and race in video games. Los Angeles, CA: Children Now.

Gong, D., He, H., Liu, D., Ma, W., Dong, L., Luo, C., Yao, D. (2014). Enhanced functional connectivity and increased gray matter volume of insula related to action video game playing. Scientific Reports, 5, 9763. doi:10.1038/srep09763

Kühn, S., Gleich, T., Lorenz, R. C., Lindenberger, U., & Gallinat, J. (2013). Molecular psychiatry – abstract of article: Playing super Mario induces structural brain plasticity: Gray matter changes resulting from training with a commercial video game. Molecular Psychiatry, 19(2), 265-271. doi:10.1038/mp.2013.120

Lenhart, A., Kahne, J., Middaugh, E., MacGill, A., Evans, C., & Vitak, J. (2008). Teens, videogames and civics.Washington, DC: Pew Internet & American Life Project. Retrieved October 14, 2016, from http://www.pewinternet.org/files/old-media/Files/Reports/2008/PIP_Teens_Games_and_Civics_Report_FINAL.pdf.pdf

Swanson, E., Wilkie, C. (2013, April 12). Poll: Majority link gun violence and video games. Huffington Post. Retrieved October 14, 2016, from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/12/video-games-gun-violence_n_3071632.html

Advantages and Disadvantages of Celebrity Endorsement

It has become very popular, nowadays, that many brands use celebrities’ image to push their products, increase their sales and change the perception of the viewers regarding their brands. Celebrity marketing is a strategy that a famous person offers the endorsement of a product. The bigger image the celebrity has, the larger the audience base catches the attention. Celebrities not only get more attention from the viewers, but also make the advertisement look more glamorous. This action is so popular that it seems usual that many celebrities make money from endorsements more than what they actually make from their work. This article will try to give some examples of advantages and disadvantages of this action and draw a conclusion.

There are several benefits of using celebrity’s image to advertise:

1. Build brand equity: When a celebrity endorses a brand, that brand earns the respect of the media and the audience; most of their fans may join the brand. That results in an incensement of the brand’s market value and reputation. For example, the successful Nike-Jordan partnership has led to a multi-billion dollar subsidiary company, Air Jordan.
2. Help people remember ads: Consumers are more likely to remember an ad linking with a celebrity endorsement. This also means that when a consumer searches for a product, they may pick the one that is stuck in their head and purchase for the specific product, which can result in additional sales.
3. Stand out: Whenever there is a celebrity’s name associated with an ad, that ad becomes stand out from the others. People like watching their favorite celebrities more than local doctors and dentists.

There are also some risks of this strategy:

1. Images change: Celebrities are humans, that means they sometimes make mistakes. And when they do, they can affect the brands they endorse. Take Tiger Wood’s case as an example, the golf industry experienced a major revenue slow-down when Tiger Woods’ public image collapsed in 2009.
2. Celebrities can overshadow brand: Some celebrities are so popular that their popularity can eclipse the brand. In this case, spending millions of dollars on this campaign will be useless. Also, if the advertisement focus on celebrities so or the media is focusing more on the work of the celebrity on the brand’s press meet, there will be no turning back.

Conclusion

In conclusion, there are pros and cons of celebrity endorsement. It is undeniable that using celebrities’ image can bring in huge revenue for business. Business should consider carefully in choosing a celebrity’s image to determine if it fits with the company’s plan moving forward.

A Guide for Effective Research Writing

Credit: papershelps.com

Writing a research paper is an important skill for academics. For most of the college programs, students are required to do some kinds of research about their fields of study. The purpose of this practice is to teach students how to find information and deciding what they think about a topic, a concept or a theory without being told by their instructor. Students often think that conducting research for an assignment is just finding resources and taking direct quotes from those sources. However, finding resources is not the main goal of writing research papers, instead it is how they use this information from their own ideas that matters.

Before individual starts the process of research, it is important for them to plan everything. Through planning, they can get the clearer idea of what the point of the topic is and what steps they will do. This will help them from wasting time looking for unnecessary information. Often these assignments are designed to develop students’ critical thinking skills. These skills are helpful for them to process information, translate it in their own way, and anchor their work with scholarly or credible sources. The second step of this process is looking for sources such as books, e-books or journal articles with a focused approach based on their understanding of the topic. After having all the needed information, they can organize their thoughts according to what they know and what they have learned. One of the best methods of organizing information is mind map. This visual will help organize and connect your thoughts. At this point, when their thoughts and information are organized and connected, they can start analyzing ideas and writing.

In conclusion, knowing how to write research papers effectively are essential for college students. The most effective way of doing research for writing is through a focused process of planning, searching, organizing and writing.

HOW-TO Take Good Photos with an DSLR

Step 1: Before you start, get to know your camera

Source: Steve

• Take the time to discover the camera and to read the manual to make sure that you are using it properly.
• Learn the basics such as framing, zooming in and out, using the flash, and how to focus on the right object.
• You may find it helpful to look for some online tutorial videos on your camera. 

Step 2: Turn on your camera

Source: http://blog.stefanvds.com/

• Make sure your camera has at least a charged battery and a memory card inserted.
• Set your camera to a correct shooting mode.
• Some people prefer automatic modes, others choose the manual mode. While manual mode gives us full control of the settings, auto modes or pre-determined settings will guide us ideal settings for different conditions and can be helpful when we are in rush and don’t have enough time to adjust the settings.
• You may want to try all the modes to find out which one you prefer for usual shooting and become familiar with all the modes. 

Step 3: Set your camera’s resolution as high as possible

art editor shots,camera details

Source: JOYCE

• Low-resolution photos make it difficult to edit later.
• Shoot in high resolution even though you don’t need high-resolution photos. You can resize them later. It’s better to downsize photos than upsize them.
• High-quality photos take up more memory, so you may want to get a larger memory card. 

Step 4: Hold your camera properly

Source: http://www.snaphappymom.com

• It is important to hold your camera with both hands so that you can have the most control of it. Use your right hand to hold the camera body and your left hand to hold your lens.
• With both hands, it is easier to keep your camera steady and to adjust the camera settings.
• Hold your camera as steadily as possible if you don’t want blurry photos. Holding your elbows close to your body also help steady the camera. 

Step 5: Find your subject

Source: https://lumoid.com

• Look for something you find interesting.
• It can be a person, an animal, some flowers or landscape.
• Observe the subject carefully so that you can see and avoid distracting elements, and find an emphasis for the subject. 

Step 6: Look for the light source

Source: Paul Moore

• Identify where the light is coming from to ensure your subject get the best lighting.
• Make sure the light is illuminating your subject properly or you may need some techniques to diffuse the light such as get your subject into a shaded area, or using a diffuser.
• Avoid taking pictures when the main light source directly behind you. Because this makes your subject look flat in the photo.
• Taking photos outdoor during golden hour can add visual effects to your photos. 

Step 7: Framing your shots

Source: Danny Eitreim

• Give some time to think about the composition of your shot. Think about the story you want to tell with your photos.
• Make sure you are filling the frame with your subject(s). Because unnecessary empty space can take the emphasis away from the subject.
• Try framing with different angles and ranges to find the right spot.

Step 8: Focus on your subject and take the photo

Source: Gordon Goble

• Pressing halfway down the shutter button to focus on the subject.
• Then press all the way down to take a picture. 

Step 9: Review your photo

Source: digitalcamera.com

• You may want to take a few more pictures to ensure quality and satisfaction.
• Review those photos to make sure all or some of them look good.
• If not, try taking pictures again.

 

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References

A. (n.d.). Take a Digital Photo. Retrieved September 26, 2016, from http://www.wikihow.com/Take-a-Digital-Photo

Morgan, S. (n.d.). Take Better Photographs. Retrieved September 26, 2016, from http://www.wikihow.com/Take-Better-Photographs

 

 

 

 

The Secret Life of Pets – An Interesting and Colorful Pets Party

Cute characters, detail processing graphics, and energetic music help “The Secret Life of Pets” become an entertaining and attractive film.

The Secret Life of Pets is a 2016 American 3D computer-animated adventure comedy film produced by Illumination Entertainment, the American animation film production company behind Despicable Me and its sequel. The storyline started with the question: “What do pets do every day when we are not home?” In fact, that is not an entirely new idea because Toy Story (1995) had such a similar question, but the characters are toys.

Since the movie Despicable Me first landed in 2010, Illumination Entertainment has had an incredible success from the huge box office. Despicable Me, Minions, The Lorax, Hop have achieved record sales in various degrees, and not to mention the most recently blockbuster, Frozen. Universal did not hesitate with the animation studio to launch The Secrets Life of Pets.

The Secrets Life of Pets is a vivid picture of the pets’ lives in the bustling city of Manhattan, New York. When their owners are away from home, they can have their own parties, jubilant parties. The film also focuses on the close friendship after many arduousness of the two dogs –  Duke and Max, who believed that he has a special relationship with his owner Katie. This motif may not be new. But, with unique characters and unique super adorable pets team attract viewers right from the first minutes.

With the trend of anthropomorphizing pets, this film whacks the human’s desire to know what is going on in the head of their pets. Two screenwriters, Paul and Ken Daurio Cino (co-author of all Illumination films, except Minions), along with Brian Lynch (who writes Minions), are pushing the process of anthropomorphizing pets, giving pets the ability to talk and think as humans, as well as the ability to use devices competently such as refrigerator, mixer, and sound system…

More specifically, this film also gives times for the supporting characters, not just focus on the storyline of Max and Duke. Shortly after his owner leaves the house for work, noble poodle Leonard shakes off his daily looks to be a fan of metal rock; or kinky cat Chloe cannot stop eating everything in the refrigerator… Not to mention “the rabbits boss” Snowball. Behind his petite, adorable looks, he is a “gangster”, a battalion leader of beasts of the sewers. The sequence when the group entered the “bunny cave” is one of the most thrilling and exciting moments.

The increase of other characters’ line distracts somewhat to the concentration of the buddy friendship between Max and Duke but paints a more mutual relationship of these lovely pets. This film still has moments of deposition, when Max tries to save Duke; or Snowball, after all, is still a nice bunny.

Besides the comic and dramatic chasing scenes, we have the chance to rethink about human responsibility for these homeless animals. All animal lovers understand that, in most cases, the relationship between owner and pet is always strong enough for us to forget about their disability, whether they have crooked ears or missing limbs. In the movie, Max is a terrier with four short spindly legs, looks imbalanced because of his big head; and it looks like Duke is a big dirty wool that is hard to embrace, but Katie (Ellie Kemper) love both of them with an unconditional love.

Illumination firms more inclined to humor, to approach emotions that we often encounter in the Pixar animated film. It is also a down point of the film. The Secrets Life of Pets is lengthy at the beginning, making the audiences feel like they are watching a marathon screen full of uninterrupted stupid pets’ jokes; while the emotional transition and the humane values are in the middle of the film.

As usual, the animated films of Universal are usually attached with a short film at the beginning, this time it is a film about the minions called Mower Minions. And in the last minutes, the Pug dogs appear in Minion costume. Along with this short film and humanistic values throughout, The Secret Life of Pets promises to be one of the animated feature films, nominated for the Oscar next year.

 

A Response to “Comedy vs. The Fat Jew”

The article Comedy vs. The Fat Jew, by Megh Wright, was written about the broke news of Josh Ostrovsky AKA “The Fat Jew” plagiarizing other people’s jokes. The news was started by a writer, Maura Quint, with a picture angrily written that, for years, Ostrovsky had been stealing other comedians’ work by posting screenshots of their jokes without giving them credit or asking them for permission. And he was getting profit and rewarded through many big contracts from the work of those who are struggling writers, comedians, etc.… Moreover, even when he got caught by doing so, he just ignored it or said that was some intern doing. Quint was also calling people to stop following him on social media and stop supporting him because he didn’t deserve it.

Reading this article makes me feel ironical about this industry, because, as Mike Lawrence, one of the comedians in the article, wrote, “It was easier for us to reward the Fat Jew than all of the unique, funny, hardworking people that comprise him”. People on the internet might be too lazy to follow all the unique and hardworking comedians that they needed someone like the Fat Jew to collect all the jokes for them and rewarded him more than the people who actually create the funny things or the hard work. Did they know it is wrong to copy other people work? I think they did or they should do. In my opinion, it is fine to share other people work or posts as long as they allow and while twitter has a retweet button, why didn’t he use that button in order to let his followers be aware that he just solely shared those jokes and know where the real sources are, instead of pretending those were his work or making people misconceive?