Micro8 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Micro8 - Essay Example e Americas Cup sailboat races increases interest in sailing, it will have two effects: raising the equilibrium quantity and raising the price of sailboats. There will be a shift towards the right for the demand curve, driving price and quantity. b) If producers expect the price of sailboats to rise next year, there will be two effects: the lowering quantity supplied and raising the price of the sales boat. The will be a leftward shift of the supply curve. c) If the cost of fiberglass used in the production of sailboats increases the supply of the sailboats will lower and the price will increase. The supply curve shifts rightward driving the price and quantity as indicated in the graph. a) Price elasticity of demand for food is higher in Tanzania than United States because of the difference in average income. The larger the amount of income spent on food purchases, the larger is the price elasticity of demand for food (Parkin, 2007, p.93). The average income in Tanzania is very low when compared to that of United States, implying that the proportion of income spent of food is large. This high price elasticity imply that much of the income in Tanzania is spent on food purchases while only a small amount of income is spent on food in US. Note that the high price elasticity does not mean that food purchases in Tanzania are more compared to US, but only indicate income spending on food. b) Tax on gasoline will provide more tax revenue than tax on restaurant meals. This is because gasoline does not have really close substitutes like restaurant meals. Despite the price changes in gasoline, automobiles must drive on the product. However, if restaurant meals became expensive, people may opt to cook by themselves and evade the high prices of restaurant meals. Therefore, tax revenue which is dependent on the quantity of goods sold and tax will be higher for gasoline than restaurant meals. a) Consumer surplus at the competitive equilibrium = the area above the price

Korean Baptist Church Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Korean Baptist Church - Term Paper Example The church believes that there’s only one God reveals himself in three personas as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Its platform is the Holy Scripture which is the foundation and the basis of all the doctrines the church stands. The official website of the southern Baptist convention (sbc.net) states: It has God for its author, salvation for its end, and truth, without any mixture of error, for its matter. Therefore, all Scripture is totally true and trustworthy. It reveals the principles by which God judges us, and therefore is, and will remain to the end of the world the true center of Christian union, and the supreme standard by which all human conduct, creeds, and religious opinions should be tried. All Scripture is a testimony to Christ, who is Himself the focus of divine revelation. As the church committed to relational, positive evangelism, the outreach is centered on reaching the â€Å"unchurched† one. It takes seriously in developing, educating and empowering the called for service. It is dedicated to serve people as they’re active in many charitable projects. It’s been giving home for the homeless, feeding the hungry and serves as a refuge for many who were devastated by calamities. It’s also supporting missionaries to spread the real teaching of Christ. Furthermore, it is a home for what they called â€Å"true† Christians. Denton Korean Baptist Church located at 2810 N Locust St. Denton Texas is one of the active Korean Baptist Church today. Just like any other Korean Baptist church, Denton Korean Baptist Church is just a traditional one headed by Pastor Hyoung Min Kim. The altar is decorated in a simple fashion which hastens the tranquility of the place. It is a perfect place to discern. A place where God speaks and people listen. Indeed, it refreshes one soul. Yet, the peacefulness outside is still superseded by the warmth of the people. The burning

Harmful Effects Of The Concentration Of Media Ownership Media Essay

Harmful Effects Of The Concentration Of Media Ownership Media Essay There has been a tendency in the media world that companies merger into larger media giants in order to reach a better, more secure financial status and to constitute stronger firms. Hunt and Ruben highlighted another aspect to media company mergers. They say, the world had become one large marketplace and, as the investment jargon suggests, a few players dominate the distribution and the production of services and the goods in the world.(140) This is also true to the media business. As the mass media offers huge and fruitful monetary opportunities, some of the most influential businessmen and investors dove into the media industry, forming huge media branches with concentrated ownership, like the Australian Rupert Murdoch, who became the strongest and richest media mogul of our time. By controlling such large percentages of the mass media, Murdoch has great power in his hands, which might mean certain dangers towards the public. In our modern society, the media enjoys enormous importance, since the overwhelming majority of the people familiarize themselves with current affairs, the happenings of their surroundings and the happenings around the world through the mass media. I strongly believe, that such concentration of media ownership, overall, is harmful to the public. According to Dominick, the media system currently working in the United States of America and many European countries, (by now, most probably in most European countries), is a model with decentralized control and private ownership.(62) This model of course may seem better than a system of media supervised and controlled by a central power, probably by a government, as common, westward looking, sense dictates. This system gives the opportunity of exercising freedom of speech, and the accessibility to all materials and information, excluding of course information concerning homeland security. This seems fair and nice, but in reality, I believe, the system works a bit differently. Since the moguls of media industry are virtually the owners of the mass media, they enjoy complete authority over their property, and authority over what their companies publish or broadcast. This is a power that can very easily be abused. Since for the owners of giant media branches, the mass media is just another field of financial opportunities, they usually customize their material in order to attract the largest audience, giving the opportunity of advertising on a huge scale. The money oriented nature of this kind of media ownership puts the quality of information published to the people under dispute. As Wilson pointed it out, a particular example of this phenomenon is Rupert Murdoch and his actions in the United States, where he purchased a number of newspapers, including the New York Post, and managed to turn them into papers publishing sensationalist articles in order to boost the selling. Wilson goes on saying that this demonstrates that Murdoch was not particularly interes ted in providing quality information and journalism to the public, but was more into making profit.(410) Consequently, the quality of the information declined in these papers, not informing the public properly. Apart from the ethical question of the example above, it also raises issues concerning the response of the public to the sensationalist information. It is also possible that these articles may contain information that cannot be proven, or worse, not true at all. This may result in the misdirection of public opinion, and can lead to serious consequences. Another important issue concerning the concentrated ownership of media chains is the question of objectivity on the side of the journalists. Since the resident Gods of the media chains have expectations of profit and ,in some cases, forming the overall opinion of the medium in crucial topics like politics or economy, there may be a multi-layered system of pressure in the hierarchy of the owners and workers of these firms, all concentrated on the journalist. The simple worker crumbles between the principles of objective journalism and the thoughts of the editor not letting their work to be published, or worse, losing their job. In the giant media chains owned by powerful media moguls, journalistic objectivity may be under pressure, so in this way the quality of information presented to the public may be biased, or faulty. Conflict of interest can also be a major factor in the mass media, and within the media giants with centralised ownership, the phenomenon may exist on a considerable scale. Wilson brought up an example for this issue as well. He writes about a case in 1987 when a congressman from Kansas called for an order by the Congress to require General Electric, the second largest producer of defense weaponry of the United States, to sell its company owned television network, NBC. The congressman disputed how the television network could give an objective report about the Strategic Defense Initiative without having conflict of interest.(405) This example of Wilson highlights a very important issue concerning media chains, journalistic objectivity and the quality and quantity of information presented to the public. It is most probable, that a news agency such as a chain of newspaper or a television network cannot report objectively about the affairs of those businesses, in which they own corpor ate holdings, because such a situation would include heavy biasing, filtering information, and of course withholding information. The very last point is the issue of the possibility of political bias of media giants. Reliable Sources, a programme on CNN gave a short coverage on Rupert Murdoch and his appearance in an interview with Marwin Kalb, at George Washington University, in which Murdoch openly criticised his rival television networks, MSNBC and CNN. Murdoch said his rivals tend to be Democrats while his own network, Fox News are not Republicans. Later on at the question and answer round of the interview, Murdoch said they have people at Fox News who are affiliated with the Democratic party, but when he was asked to name people, he struggled to name even one worker. Consequently the information output of Murdochs network may be politically biased. When it comes to the effects of this sort of bias on the public, I believe it may be the most harmful. Political bias may result in dividing the public, may induce reactions from people who feel exposed or vulnerable, and may as well make people paranoid. I beli eve, that in some cases, this can be the aim of such enterprises motored by corporate power and driven by profit. For example in election time, the media support or attack of a certain political party has enormous force, and helps to bias and persuade the electorate. In concluison, I strongly believe that the concentration of media ownership is harmful to the public, concerning the following points made. Firstly, the profit-oriented nature of media chains with concentrated ownership can affect the quality and quantity of information published to the people. Secondly, conflict of interest may be a major factor in information publishing by such media powers. Lastly, biasing, and namely politically biased information dissemination has large grounds in these chains. (1162 words) Sources: Brendt, D. Ruben. and Hunt, T. Mass Communication: Producers and Consumers. Harper Collins College Publishers, 1993. Print. Dominick, J. R. The Dynamics of Mass Communication. McGraw-Hill Publishing Company, 1990. Print. Wilson, S. L. Mass Media / Mass Culture: An Introduction McGraw-Hill, Inc., 1993. Print. Reliable Sources Highlights Murdochs Inability to Name a Democrat Employed by Fox News. Media Matters for America 11. April 2010. Web. 13. April 2010.

Great Gatsby Essay -- essays research papers

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby is about a man named Gatsby, in love with a woman, Daisy, who is married to Tom Buchannan. He dreams that one day he and Daisy will get together. Gatsby has worked hard to become the man that he believes will impress Daisy. Even though he has an extravagant house, lots of money, and wild parties, he is without the one person he wants, Daisy. Even befriending Nick deals with Gatsby getting Daisy, because Daisy is Nick’s cousin. In a meeting arranged by Nick and Gatsby, Daisy is invited over for tea and she sees Gatsby. It seems as if time is suspended for a moment, as they look at each other both thinking something. Then Gatsby tips over Nick’s clock, symbolizing that he is running out of time to try to capture what he and Daisy once lost. Through the lonely and careless characters of: Jordan Baker Jay Gatsby, Myrtle, and G. Wilson, Fitzgerald is able to illustrate the lack of spirituality in this novel.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The main place in The Great Gatsby that shows the lack of spirituality is the Valley of Ashes, where Myrtle and her husband, George Wilson live. It is a bleak, desolate valley including only one building, a car garage. One day while driving around Tom and Nick stop off at the valley to see Myrtle, Tom’s mistress. Nick describes this valley as being: â€Å"about half way between West Egg and New York... a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens† (27). The co...

Ageing Population â€Any Resolutions?

Ageing population –any resolutions? According to the World Health Organization , a country or a city is defined as an ageing society if the number of elders who aged 65 or above exceed 7% of the whole population. With 14% of elders in population, the country would be considered as an aged society. Worse still, if the amount of elders still keep on increasing and reach 20% of the population, the country would be classified as an hyper-aged society. Recently, the ageing population has been under the spotlight all over the world.This worldwide issue has aroused public concern and surely Hong Kong is not an exception. According to the Hong Kong Population Projections published in July, 2012, there are in total 13% of elders who aged 65 or over in our population, which means that Hong Kong is going to transform into an aged society. What’s more, it is predicted that we would turn into hyper-aged society in 2026, with 23% of elderly people in population. Such shocking data ac tually did a good warning effect , which successfully remind government to take long term measures at once to tackle the problem.Or not, ageing population would lower Hong Kong’s labour force, which would then affect Hong Kong’s productivity and hence our competitiveness in the world market. Furthermore, the ageing population would also burden the health care system. To solve the problems, people from all walks of life have raised different suggestions. It is proposed to import talents from other parts of the world, and implement effective policies to convince children born here to non-local parents and their families to stay here in order to alleviate the shortage of labour force.On the other hand, the tension in existing health care system can be eased by several programmes held by the hospital authority, like the psychological support programme , which can help strengthen staff morale and address their work stress. As the above mentioned, one of the severe problems provoked by ageing population is the shortage of larbour force. According to the Summary Results of the 2011 Population Census published in February,2012, the labour force participation rate has dropped from 61. 4% in 2001 to 59. 7% in 2011.In addition, with reference to the Hong Kong Population Projections , the overall dependency ratio is predicted to rise from 352 to 712 ,which is over a double increase. Besides, it is also estimated that every three persons in the workforce will need to support one elder by 2029. Therefore, we can see that ageing population not only lower our larbour force, and hence Hong Kong’s productivity and competitiveness in international market , but it would also put more burden to the workforce, which bring great challenges to Hong Kong economy. To increase the supply of labour force in near future, it is believed there are few ways to do so.Firstly, we can introduce more talent admission schemes and seriously investigate both push and pull facto rs affecting talents to stay or to leave Hong Kong. For instance, the government are now expanding the international school system. There would be in total 5000 additional international school places in the coming four years. Furthermore, the government is planning to invite the international schools to express interest in expanding their school by using several vacant school premises. These actions definitely help import talents from other countries, but the government should note that it should not be a short term measure.The government should keep improving the education in international school and try best to assist international school to have more resources so that more school places are available for the talents and talents would stay here for better education. Or not, the students from outside Hong Kong may choose to study in other countries with better education, other than Hong Kong. Yet, there are some critics believes that it is totally not enough to solve the population problem by only those talent admission schemes.Therefore the babies born in Hong Kong to non-local parents have been seen as a simple way to alleviate the problem. But whether those babies and their families would stay here or not later on, it mainly depends on the government efforts to implement policies for that purpose and see whether the city can promise them a stable and good enough future. Compared to the talent admission schemes, it is a more effective means to meet the uprising demand of manpower as the number of mainland families who stay here is greater than those talents.This can be proved by the results of our 2011 Population Census . According to the Hong Kong Population Projections, about 77% of the Mainland women whose husband is a Hong Kong Permanent Resident, would bring their children back to Hong Kong later. And about 53% for those Mainland women whose husband is not a Hong Kong Permanent Resident would also later bring their children back to Hong Kong. Other tha n the shortage of labour force, the ageing population would also burden the health care system. More elderly people would definitely increase the demand of medical services and it would ncrease the work stress of frontline staff in hospital and the financial burden to the government. To strengthen the staff morale and ease their work stress, it is suggested the Hospital Authority can hold more relaxing measures , for instance, improving the working conditions, recruiting more full-time and part-time staff and preventing excessive overnight duties. All these are useful ways to reduce frontline workload, and it is believed it can help lower the staff turnover number, and hence help prevent the manpower shortage in public hospitals.Just like the psychological support programme which help staff deal with work stress has lower the overall turnover rate of physicians in public hospitals from 5. 2 % in 2010/11 to 4. 8% in 2011/12. And the overall turnover rate has further decreased to 4. 4 % in the first 4 months of 2012/13. All in all, it is the responsibility of the government to stop our aging situation from being worse. The government should plan detailed and long term policies to solve the aging situation. Or not, Hong Kong will be suffered badly with economic and social problems in the near future. Word count: 1035 words) REFERENCES Peng,P. (2012, February 24). The problem is not ‘non-local’ women but intermediaries. Retrieved from http://www. cdeclips. com/en/hongkong/The_problem_is_not_'non-local'_women_but_intermediaries/fullstory_72200. html Demographic Statistics Section, Census and Statistics Department. (2012,July). Hong Kong Population Projections. Retrieved from http://www. statistics. gov. hk/pub/B1120015052012XXXXB0100. pdf Pang,F. C. (2012, October 12). Letter to the Editor . Retrieved from http://www. ha. org. k/haho/ho/pad/121016chi1. pdf Li, A. (2006,August 12). Coping with old age. Retrieved from http://www. scmp. com/article/559945 /coping-old-age Census and Statistics Department. (2012, February 21). Summary Results of the 2011 Population Census. Retrieved from http://www. censtatd. gov. hk/FileManager/EN/Content_1214/presentation_summary_results. pdf HKSAR. (2012, May 30). Government releases Steering Committee on Population Policy Progress Report 2012. Retrieved from http://www. info. gov. hk/gia/general/201205/30/P201205300456. htm

Comparing Numeracy Theorists

There are several theorists that link to mathematical development; their views are very distinct as to how mathematical understanding develops. One theorist that is linked to this development is Jean Piaget, in his research he discovered that children’s thoughts develop through taking in information. His researches also lead him to believe that children learn in stages according to an estimated age range. These stages are as follows: * Sensori-Motor – age 0-2 years (using senses) Pre-Operational – age 2-7 years (using symbols and language) * Concrete Operational – age 7-12 years (logical thought) * Formal Operational – age 12+ years (abstract thought) He also devised the concept of schemas for children to develop, for example some children relate to the rotation schema where they learn by rotating things such as turning taps on and off, watching the wheels on toy cars and stirring water and other resources in a circular motion.Another example of a s chema is transporting, these children will enjoy moving object around the room in different ways for example moving blocks from one side of the room to the other in a bag. Another theorist linking to mathematical development is Jerome Bruner, he believed that children learned by doing and then reimagining what they have done by drawing, writing and copying symbols such as numbers.Bruner believed that children in stages, these stages are as follows: * Enactive – age 0-1 – learning through doing physical movements * Iconic – age 1-7 – developing mental images * Symbolic age 7+ using symbols such as language to transfer thoughts He believed that a child is prone to learning and there are certain procedures for the child to follow for cognitive process.

Free Essays on Metamorphosis Essay

Like many of the classics, The Metamorphosis deals with a few distinct characteristics. Firstly, a classic is original. Secondly, they tend to have plots that throw a character into a dilemma or some situation with which they must cope. These two significant characteristics can be seen in such works as Melville’s Moby Dick, Hawthorne’s Scarlet Letter, and Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, and it is these characteristics which entitle a book to be considered a classic. What do these books have to show for their classicism? Not only are they original, but they share common motifs present in past and current societies. With Hester’s story and bastard child, The Scarlet Letter brings us the feeling of alienation. The destruction of the families Montague and Capulet gives us (the readers) a feeling of grief. Finally, Melville’s Moby Dick, demonstrates how someone must adapt to a situation in order to survive it. These are prime examples of realism. Not because they focus on the day to day workings of society, or show us the daily routine of a person, but rather because they show the reader the emotions and feelings that the characters, and in fact, contemporary people have when put into certain situations. For that very reason, Kafka’s Metamorphosis is considered a classic by many. Kafka’s writing shows us the plight of a family through their eyes. We can see the grief in Gregor’s mother. â€Å"He isn’t trying to make fools of us, is he? †Ã¢â‚¬ ¦already in tears, â€Å"maybe he’s seriously ill and here we are torturing him..† Grief-stricken, Gregor’s mother has a tough time adjusting to Gregor’s new found condition. We can see the adaptation of the family Samsa to Gregor’s illness when his parents go back to work and his sister becomes the caretaker of Gregor. Similar to how Ishmael must cope and get along with Queequeg, here we see the family finding jobs, supporting themselves, and adapting to the new s... Free Essays on Metamorphosis Essay Free Essays on Metamorphosis Essay Like many of the classics, The Metamorphosis deals with a few distinct characteristics. Firstly, a classic is original. Secondly, they tend to have plots that throw a character into a dilemma or some situation with which they must cope. These two significant characteristics can be seen in such works as Melville’s Moby Dick, Hawthorne’s Scarlet Letter, and Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, and it is these characteristics which entitle a book to be considered a classic. What do these books have to show for their classicism? Not only are they original, but they share common motifs present in past and current societies. With Hester’s story and bastard child, The Scarlet Letter brings us the feeling of alienation. The destruction of the families Montague and Capulet gives us (the readers) a feeling of grief. Finally, Melville’s Moby Dick, demonstrates how someone must adapt to a situation in order to survive it. These are prime examples of realism. Not because they focus on the day to day workings of society, or show us the daily routine of a person, but rather because they show the reader the emotions and feelings that the characters, and in fact, contemporary people have when put into certain situations. For that very reason, Kafka’s Metamorphosis is considered a classic by many. Kafka’s writing shows us the plight of a family through their eyes. We can see the grief in Gregor’s mother. â€Å"He isn’t trying to make fools of us, is he? †Ã¢â‚¬ ¦already in tears, â€Å"maybe he’s seriously ill and here we are torturing him..† Grief-stricken, Gregor’s mother has a tough time adjusting to Gregor’s new found condition. We can see the adaptation of the family Samsa to Gregor’s illness when his parents go back to work and his sister becomes the caretaker of Gregor. Similar to how Ishmael must cope and get along with Queequeg, here we see the family finding jobs, supporting themselves, and adapting to the new s...

Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart” Research Paper Example

Edgar Allan Poe’s â€Å"The Tell Edgar Allan Poe’s â€Å"The Tell-Tale Heart† Paper Edgar Allan Poe’s â€Å"The Tell-Tale Heart† Paper A Guilty Conscience Shown in Edgar Allan Poe’s â€Å"The Tell-Tale Heart† The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allan Poe is an intellectual murder story told from a first-person perspective of an eccentric narrator who kills a man because he is so frightened of the man’s eye. The mad narrator ultimately is unable to maintain his innocence to the deed. The narrator is obsesses with the vulture eye of the old man who he lives with. He describes the eye as evil, like the eye of a vulture, a pale blue eye, with a film over it. The narrator has a good relationship with the old man but decides that he must kill him in order to rid himself of the eye forever. During the events of the story it is obvious that the narrator is a man in fear of the evil eye with conscience eating away at him in the events of killing the old man. Even though the narrator focuses on the evil eye and tries to justify his actions, in the end he cant escape his own conscience. The narrator has a loving and friendly relationship with the old man. He states I loved the old man. The old man had never wronged him nor insulted him and he had no desire for the old mans money. He says For his gold I had no desire. The narrator is also sure to state to the readers that he was kind to the old man, I was never kinder to the old man than during the whole week before I killed him. He was careful not to disturb the old mans sleep each of the seven nights that he watched him and every morning he spoke courageously to him, called him by name in a hearty tone, and inquired how he had passed the night before. The old mans evil eye seems to have power over the narrator. He states I think it was his eye! Yes, it was this! He had the eye of a vulture Whenever it fell upon me, my blood ran cold. For an unknown reason, the old mans evil eye has provoked insanity in the narrator though the narrator argues that he is not crazy. He says You fancy me mad. Madmen know nothing. But you should have seen me. You should have seen how wisely I proceeded with what caution with what foresight with what dissimulation I went to work! And have I not told you that what you mistake for madness is but over-acuteness of the sense? The narrators obsession with the evil is shown by his extreme precision on how he watched the old man in order to catch a glimpse of the vulture eye. Every night at midnight he would turn the latch of the old mans door and opened it oh so gently. When he had made a sufficient opening for his head he put in a closed dark lantern so that no light shone in, then he thrust his head in, I moved it slowly very, very slowly and It took (him) and hour to place (his) whole head within the opening so far that (he) could see him Then when his head was well in the room he undid the lantern cautiously-oh, so cautiously cautiously (for the hinges creaked) I undid it just so much that a single thin ray fell upon the vulture eye. And this I did for seven long nights every night just at midnight And on the eighth night he describes a watchs minute hand as being quicker than his own. All of this shows how the narrator used such vigilance in how he went about carrying out his plan to kill the old man. The extreme precision and mindfulness that he went about doing these things in order to see the old man’s vulture eye illustrates the extent of the narrator’s obsession and fear of the evil eye. Although the narrator is so cautious about how he goes about killing the old man he begins the story by letting the reader know that he was very nervous about what he had planned to do. The narrators first sentence says TRUE! nervous very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am. This is the first indication to the reader that the narrator does have a conscience. He even says that his idea to kill the old man haunted him day and night. When the narrator is hearing what he believes to be the old mans heart beating he is really just so nervous that he is hearing the beat of his own heart. The beat becomes so loud that he begins to worry; But the beating grew louder, louder! I thought the heart must burst. And now a new anxiety seized me the sound would be heard by a neighbour! After the killing is done and the officers have not found anything suspicious they sit over the dead body and begin in chat. As they are chatting the narrator, now the killer, grows anxious and his guilty conscience begins to overwhelm him. He says I felt myself getting pale and wished them gone. This caused him to begin to hear his own heart beat louder and louder again. The noise drove him to agony and he began to think the officers were making a mockery of his horror. His guilty conscience overwhelmed him so much that he couldnt bear it any longer until he finally admitted to doing the deed to the officers. Edgar Allan Poe indicates that the narrator is a mentally ill man with an extreme fear of the old mans vulture eye. Or should he be viewed as a mentally ill, mad man? Throughout the events of the story, the narrator is unaware that his plan to kill the old man simply to rid himself of the evil eye is wrong. Poe wants readers to see that this man, the narrator, does indeed have a conscience though. It just doesnt overpower his obsession with the eye and his plan to get rid of it. The evidence of the narrator’s existing conscience throughout the story shows that his natural instincts were present in knowing that even the idea of killing the old was wrong. In the event of the officers sitting and chatting for such a long period of time after he has killed the old man, the narrators guilt and anxiety becomes an extreme factor overwhelming him and causes his big plan to hurt himself in the end by telling the officers what he has done. Subconsciously the narrator hurts himself in the because of the decisions that he made to carry out his plan as a result of his guilt. : Poe, Edgar Allan. â€Å"The Tell-Tale Heart. † Literature, Reading, Reacting, Writing. Eds. Laurie G. Kirszner and Stephen R. Mandell. Compact 7th Edition. Mason, OH: Cengage, 2009. Print.

Balance Sheet and Annual Financial Statements

The directors are responsible for the preparation and fair presentation of the annual financial statements of the Company and Group, comprising the directors’ report, the statements of financial position as at June 2013, the statements of comprehensive income, changes in equity and cash flows for the year then ended, and the notes to the financial statements, which include a summary of significant accounting policies and other explanatory notes, in accordance with International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRSs) and the requirements of the Companies Act of South Africa. The directors are satisfied that the information contained in the annual financial statements fairly represents the financial position at year-end and the financial performance and cash flows of the Company and Group. The directors are also responsible for such internal control as the directors determine is necessary to enable the preparation of financial statements that are free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud or error, and for maintaining adequate accounting records and an effective system of risk management as well as the preparation of the supplementary schedules included in these financial statements. The directors believe that the Company and Group have adequate resources to continue trading as a going concern in the foreseeable future. The annual financial statements support the viability of the Company and the Group. The Group’s external auditors, PricewaterhouseCoopers Incorporated, audited the Company and Group annual financial statements, and their report is presented on page 5. The external auditors were given unrestricted access to all financial records and related data, including minutes of all meetings of shareholders, the board of directors and committees of the board. The directors believe that all representations made to the independent auditors during their audit are valid and appropriate. Approval of Annual Financial Statements The Company and Group annual financial statements of Shoprite Holdings Ltd, as identified in the first paragraph, were approved by the Board of directors on 19 August 2013 and signed on its behalf by: CH Wiese Chairman JW Basson Chief Executive Officer Certificate of the Company Secretary In terms of section 88(2)(e) of the Companies Act no 71 of 2008 (as amended) I, PG du Preez, in my capacity as Company Secretary, confirm that for the year ended 30 June 2013, the Company has lodged with the Companies and Intellectual Property Commission, all such returns as are required of a public company in terms of the Companies Act and that all such returns and notices are true, correct and up to date. PG du Preez Company Secretary 19 August 2013 Directors’ Report Shoprite Holdings Ltd and its Subsidiaries 2 NATURE OF BUSINESS Shoprite Holdings Limited (â€Å"Shoprite Holdings†) is an investment holding company listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange Limited (â€Å"JSE†) in the â€Å"food retailers wholesalers† sector. Secondary listings are also maintained on the Namibian and Zambian Stock Exchanges. supermarket premises or developing new shopping centres to accommodate one of the Group’s supermarket formats. New retail developments and the redevelopment of existing properties are supervised through every stage of the planning-, design- and construction process. SHOPRITE INVESTMENTS LTD: SHOPRITE HOLDINGS COMPRISES OF THE FOLLOWING MAIN SUBSIDIARIES: As a wholly owned subsidiary of Shoprite Holdings, Shoprite Investments conducts the Group’s treasury function and financing of credit sales to third parties. SHOPRITE CHECKERS (PTY) LTD: Supermarkets: Serves a broad customer base through our Shoprite, Checkers, Checkers Hyper and Usave store formats. Supply Chain Management: Supplies the Group’s outlets in South Africa and 16 Non-RSA countries. The Group prides itself in running a state-ofthe-art distribution operation and became the first South African retailer to receive the ISO 9002 accreditation for import and export handling. Fast Foods: The Hungry Lion chain now boasts modern, well-designed stores with an inescapable focus on fried chicken and operates outlets within South Africa, Botswana, Zambia, Lesotho, Swaziland, Namibia, Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Franchise: The OK Franchise Division’s stores offer a wide range of perishable and non-perishable food items and liquor under the OK, Friendly Grocer, 7-Eleven, Megasave en Sentra brands. Freshmark: Freshmark is the Group’s fruit and vegetable procurement and distribution arm and supplies fresh produce to the Group’s retail outlets. As one of the largest buyers of fresh produce in South Africa, Freshmark also imports fruit and vegetables to ensure a wide variety and continuity of traditionally seasonal fresh produce. Liquor Stores: Trading under the Shoprite and Checkers LiquorShop brands respectively, the liquor shops have extended the Group’s offering by providing a selection of wines, beers and a wide range of premium spirits to its customers. Meat Markets: The Group’s meat market division is the largest retailer of fresh meat on the African continent. Customers are served through in-store butcheries that employ qualified butchers and technicians. Money Markets: Money Markets offer a comprehensive range of financial services and products to the Group’s customers through dedicated in-store service counters. Furniture: The Furniture division offers furniture, electrical appliances and home entertainment products to customers for cash or credit through its OK Furniture, OK Power Express and House Home outlets in South Africa, Botswana, Namibia, Swaziland, Lesotho, Zambia, Mozambique and Angola. Pharmacies and wholesale distribution: MediRite’s in-store pharmacies offer consumers an easy access to affordable healthcare and healthcare professionals. These in-store dispensaries currently operate throughout South Africa and also in Angola and Swaziland. The Group’s pharmaceutical wholesaler, Transpharm, sells and distributes a wide range of pharmaceutical products and surgical equipment to hospitals and clinics, dispensing doctors, veterinary surgeons and private and corporate pharmacies. Properties: This division is tasked with the responsibility of expanding the supermarket portfolio through the identification and leasing of new SHOPRITE HOLDINGS LTD ANNUAL FINANCIAL STATEMENTS 2013 COMPUTICKET (PTY) LTD: As a premier ticketing solution provider and one of the most recognised brand names, Computicket offers theatre, concert, festival, sport and cinema tickets along with bus tickets and gift vouchers through a network of outlets located across South Africa and Namibia, a call centre as well as the Computicket website. Computicket also offers travel packages. SHOPRITE INTERNATIONAL LTD: Incorporated in the Republic of Mauritius, Shoprite International is the holding company for the majority of the Group’s non-South African retail and property investments. SHOPRITE INSURANCE COMPANY LTD: Provides first and third party short-term insurance to the Group and its customers. OTHER GROUP SUBSIDIARIES: The interests of Shoprite Holdings in other subsidiaries are set out on page  69 of the Annual Financial Statements. FINANCIAL REVIEW The Group’s headline earnings per share amounts to 675,4 cents for the year (2012: 607,0 cents). Details of the profit of Shoprite Holdings and its subsidiaries are contained in the statement of comprehensive income on page 7 with reference to the operating segment information on page 23. The financial position of Shoprite Holdings and its subsidiaries are recorded in the statement of financial position on page 6. Further details are furnished in the notes to the annual financial statements on page 10 to 68. The Group’s net asset value per share as at 30 June 2013 was 2  837 cents (2012: 2  382 cents). DISTRIBUTION TO SHAREHOLDERS PREFERENCE DIVIDENDS Details are reflected in note 27 to the Group’s Annual Financial Statements. ORDINARY DIVIDENDS An interim cash dividend (no. 128) of 123 cents per share was paid on 18  March 2013. A final dividend (no. 129) of 215 cents per share, is payable on 16 September 2013, bringing the total dividend for the year to 338 cents (2012: 303 cents) per ordinary share. 3 SHARE CAPITAL The authorised share capital of Shoprite Holdings remained unchanged at 650 000 000 (six hundred and fifty million) ordinary shares of 113,4 cents (one hundred and thirteen comma four cents) each. There was no movement in the number of issued Shoprite Holdings ordinary shares which remained at 570 579 460 shares of 113,4 cents each. On 28 June 2012, shareholders approved the issue of an additional 13  803  405 non-convertible, non-participating, no par value deferred shares in the share capital of Shoprite Holdings to Thibault Square Financial Services (Pty) Ltd pursuant to the issue of 27  100  000 ordinary shares during the previous reporting period. These deferred shares were however only issued on 25 July 2012. As at 30 June 2013, 35 436 472 (6,2%) ordinary shares were held as treasury shares by a wholly owned subsidiary of Shoprite Holdings. GOING CONCERN The annual financial statements of the Group were prepared on a going concern basis. The Board has performed a formal review of the Group’s results and its ability to continue trading as a going concern in the foreseeable future. The directors of Shoprite Holdings confirm that they are satisfied that the Group has adequate resources to continue in business for the foreseeable future. During the reporting period the following special resolutions were passed by main Group subsidiaries: SHOPRITE CHECKERS (PTY) LTD – Special resolution number 1: Approval of new Memorandum of Incorporation; and – Special resolution number 2: Financial Assistance to Subsidiaries, Related and inter-related entities. SHOPRITE INVESTMENTS LTD – Special resolution number 1: Approval of new Memorandum of Incorporation. COMPUTICKET (PTY) LTD – Special resolution number 1: Approval of new Memorandum of Incorporation. SHOPRITE INTERNATIONAL LTD Special resolution number 1: Approval of new Constitution. SHOPRITE INSURANCE COMPANY LTD – Special resolution number 1: Approval of new Memorandum of Incorporation. BORROWINGS DIRECTORS AND SECRETARY Shoprite Holdings has unlimited borrowing powers in terms of its Memorandum of Incorporation. The Group’s overall level of debt increased from R4  035 million to R4  151 million during the financial year under review. The directors’ names and details are furnished on pages 8 and 9 and the company secretary’s name, business and postal address on page 67 of the Integrated Report. In terms of the Memorandum of Incorporation of Shoprite Holdings (â€Å"the MOI†), no less than one third of the non-executive directors shall retire by rotation at each Annual General Meeting. Dr CH Wiese, Messrs EC Kieswetter, JA Louw and JF Malherbe retire as directors, in terms of paragraph 33. 5. 1 of the MOI of the Company, at the Annual General Meeting. Dr CH Wiese, Messrs EC Kieswetter and JA  Louw have offered themselves for re-election as directors of Shoprite Holdings. The board supports the re-election of these directors. SPECIAL RESOLUTIONS At the Annual General Meeting of Shoprite Holdings held on 29 October 2012, shareholders approved the following special resolutions: – Special resolution number 1: Remuneration payable to Non-Executive Directors; – Special resolution number 2: Financial Assistance to Subsidiaries, Related and inter-related entities; – Special resolution number 3: Financial Assistance for Subscription of Securities; – Special resolution number 4: General Approval to repurchase shares; and – Special resolution number 5: Approval of new Memorandum of Incorporation as proposed by the Board. Directors’ Report (continued) The company’s directors are responsible for the preparation and fair presentation of these consolidated and separate financial statements in accordance with International Financial Reporting Standards and the requirements of the Companies Act of South Africa, and for such internal control as the directors determine is necessary to enable the preparation of consolidated and separate financial statements that are free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud or error. AUDITOR’S RESPONSIBILITY Our responsibility is to express an opinion on these consolidated and separate financial statements based on our audit. We conducted our audit in accordance with International Standards on Auditing. Those standards require that we comply with ethical requirements and plan and perform the audit to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the consolidated and separate financial statements are free from material misstatement. An audit involves performing procedures to obtain audit evidence about the amounts and disclosures in the financial statements. The procedures selected depend on the auditor’s judgement, including the assessment of the risks of material misstatement of the financial statements, whether due to fraud or error. In making those risk assessments, the auditor considers internal control relevant to the entity’s preparation and fair presentation of the financial statements in order to design audit procedures that are appropriate in the circumstances, but not for the purpose of expressing an opinion on the effectiveness of the entity’s internal control. An audit also includes evaluating the appropriateness of accounting policies used and the reasonableness of accounting estimates made by management, as well as evaluating the overall presentation of the financial statements. We believe that the audit evidence we have obtained is sufficient and appropriate to provide a basis for our audit opinion. OPINION In our opinion, the consolidated and separate financial statements present fairly, in all material respects, the consolidated and separate financial position of Shoprite Holdings Limited as at 30 June 2013, and its consolidated and separate financial performance and its consolidated and separate cash flows for the year then ended in accordance with International Financial Reporting Standards and the requirements of the Companies Act of South Africa. OTHER REPORTS REQUIRED BY THE COMPANIES ACT As part of our audit of the consolidated and separate financial statements for the year ended 30 June 2013, we have read the Directors’ Report, the Audit Committee’s Report and the Company Secretary’s Certificate for the purpose of identifying whether there are material inconsistencies between these reports and the audited consolidated and separate financial statements. These reports are the responsibility of the respective preparers. Based on reading these reports we have not identified material inconsistencies between these reports and the audited consolidated and separate financial statements. The  most significant assumptions and estimates used in applying the Group’s accounting policies relate to the following: a) Impairment of assets: The Group performs a review of loss-making stores and considers the need for the impairment of assets under these circumstances. This determination requires significant judgment. The Group evaluates amongst other things, the duration and extent of the losses, the near-term business outlook for the store, and the possible redeployment of the assets between stores. Refer to notes 3, 9 and 26. Useful lives of assets: In determining the depreciation and amortisation charge for property, plant and equipment and intangible assets, management applies judgment in estimating the useful lives and residual values of these different asset classes. Refer to notes 3, 9 and 21. c) Income taxes: The Group is subject to income taxes in numerous jurisdictions. Significant judgment is required in determining the worldwide accrual for income taxes. The Group recognises liabilities for anticipated uncertain income tax positions based on estimates of potential additional taxes due. With regards to deferred income tax assets for unutilised income tax losses, judgment is also required to whether sufficient future taxable income will be available against which these losses can be utilised. Refer to notes 1. 11 and 28. d) Allowances for doubtful debts: Trade receivables include instalment sale debtors and franchise debtors for which allowances for impairment are made in accordance with the accounting policy in note 1. 15. These calculations involve the discounting of projected future cash flows and require the use of estimates. Details regarding the allowances are set out in note 12. e) Employee benefit accruals and provisions: Various assumptions are applied in determining the valuations of post-retirement medical benefits, share based payment accruals and long term employee benefits as set out in notes 1. 20, 1. 22, 14, 17 and 35. Estimates and assumptions that have a significant risk of causing a material adjustment to the carrying value of assets and liabilities in a subsequent year relate to the following: income taxes; allowances for doubtful debts and employee benefit allowances. All estimates and underlying assumptions are based on historical experience and various other factors that management believes are reasonable under the circumstances. The results of these estimates form the basis of judgments about the carrying value of assets and liabilities that are not readily apparent from other sources. Actual results may differ from these estimates. The estimates and underlying assumptions are reviewed on an ongoing basis. Revisions to accounting estimates are recognised in the period in which the estimate is revised and any affected future periods. Use of adjusted measures The measures listed below are presented as management believes it to be relevant to the understanding of the Group’s financial performance. These measures are used for internal performance analysis and provide additional useful information on underlying trends to equity holders. These measures are not defined terms under IFRS and may therefore not be comparable with similarly titled measures reported by other entities. It is not intended to be a substitute for, or superior to, measures as required by IFRS. a) Trading profit on the face of the statement of comprehensive income, being the Group’s operating results excluding foreign exchange rate differences and income or expenditure of a capital nature. b) Income or expenditure of a capital nature on the face of the statement of comprehensive income, being all re-measurements excluded from the calculation of headline earnings per share in accordance with the guidance contained in SAICA Circular 3/2012: Headline Earnings. The principal items that will be included under this measure are: gains and losses on disposal and scrapping of property, plant and equipment, intangible assets and assets held for sale; impairments or reversal of impairments; any non-trading items such as gains and losses on disposal of investments, operations and subsidiaries. c) Interest received on the face of the statement of comprehensive income, being only interest received on call and operating bank account balances. Subsidiaries Subsidiaries are entities (including special purpose entities) which are, directly or indirectly, controlled by the Group. Control is established where the Group has the power to govern the financial and operating policies of an entity so as to obtain benefits from its activities. The existence and effect of potential voting rights that are currently exercisable or convertible are considered when assessing whether the Group controls another.

What Does It Mean To Be a Democrat an a Republican in 2012 Research Paper

What Does It Mean To Be a Democrat an a Republican in 2012 - Research Paper Example The United States first began to experience what could be termed political parties nearly as soon as our government was established. At this time we had many political debates between what were deemed federalists and anti-federalists. Ironically, this would serve as a harbinger of the two party system that invariably developed within the United States. Although third parties existed and successfully sought office as last as the 1830s, their lifespan was short-lived by the emergence of two leviathans of political power that have successfully dominated the political environment in the United States for the better part of the past two hundred years. For the casual observer, party affiliation has a strong connotation with regards to what belief systems the voter identifies himself/herself with. However, party affiliation is a figment of a given election cycle. This is mainly due to the fact that there are no discernible party values or issues which can be definitively traced throughout h istory and once analyzed – deemed as either firmly Republican or firmly Democratic issues/values. This intrinsic lack of definable/discernible values has disheartened many voters and forced them to become apolitical and/or apathetic. The Republican Party (Grand Ole Party) as we know it today hardly resembles the party that was born in 1854 out of an opposition to slavery. Elements of the nation’s political forces, fed up with the â€Å"sin of slavery† and determined to forge a path ahead for the United States that was free from this vice, opted to create their own political entity. This Republican Party elected its first President in Abraham Lincoln. What is interesting to note, as far as an irony is concerned, is that the Republican Party’s slogan in 1854 read, â€Å"Free Labor, Free Land, Free Men†. This slogan had strong connection with the time due to the ongoing battle over slavery; however, there appeared within it a uniquely socialist concep t that most individuals have not considered. The statement â€Å"free land† referred to the fact that rich plantation owners were buying up all of the good farm land and leaving the poorer farmers left with the unwanted scraps and rejects/unviable land. The fact that the original Republican Party was entirely against the ability of a few wealthy individuals to lord over and control the fate of the poor was, at that time, an issue worthy of polarization between the Democratic and Republican Party; interestingly, this is no longer the case as it appears as if both parties only perennially work towards the benefits of those entities and corporations/individuals that bankroll their electoral campaigns. The Democratic Party on the other hand was born out of the Anti-Federalist movement of the 1790s. The Democratic Party of that time was of course defined by its rabid disagreement with Hamiltonian economics. Similarly, the party was promoted originally as what would become known as the â€Å"Democratic-Republican Party† and had a decidedly constitutionalist approach as well as one that advocated the supreme authority of state’s rights as a doctrine of further self-determination among the young republic. This traditional understanding of the Democratic party survived more or less in tact up until the Civil War. At this time, the Democratic Party, under the leadership of key firebrands in the South, pushed for the continuation of slavery as well as

High Level Customer Satisfation and Competitive Advantage Essay

High Level Customer Satisfation and Competitive Advantage - Essay Example Amazon UK has been in the front line in ensuring that its market is diversified (Chaffey 2012). This paper is going to evaluate how Amazon has continued to achieve high-level customer satisfaction and competitive advantage. Service Operations Concept Amazon UK has been a key player in the electronic commerce. Its vast market has been as a result of application of high levels of management and customer satisfaction (Chaffey 2012). Generally, electronic business has evolved over time to include all aspects of interworked technologies. The company’s stated strategy is to focus on customer experience by offering low prices, convenience and wide selection of merchandise (Chaffey 2012). First established as a pure online book retailer, Amazon decided to expand its products and services offering. As a result of new expansion strategies, new business models were introduced in 1999. When Amazon went online, the book industry was highly fragmented with the largest retailer Barnes & Nobl e only representing 11% of total book sales (Chaffey 2012). Amazon redefined traditional books retailing through a radical different approach: online through the internet. This move can be termed as a strategic one with Amazon analysing traditional book retailing drawbacks and focusing on new approaches that would revolutionalise the market (Hunt 2000). With the traditional book retail market, it is impossible to provide a customerised store for every customer. One of the key issues Amazon considered before venturing into online book retailing was advantages accrued from this approach. For example, internet retailers have advantages of centralized inventory management and low occupancy costs. On the other hand, a large number of global customers can be reached from a single central location (Chaffey 2012). Competitive Objectives Competitive objective is realised by a company that operates more efficiently or in a high quality way as compared to its competitors, which then results to the benefits that the company will realize (Barney and Clark 2007). It can also be defined as the benefit realized by a company and one which can provide the same value as that of its competitors but at a lower price, or setting a higher price and provide greater value by way of differentiation (Barney and Clark 2007). It is a result of the match of core competencies of the organization to its opportunities. An organization can also be said to have competitive advantage over its competitors if it realizes greater profits as compared to the average profits realized in the industry it is in (Grant 2005). Most businesses have the goal of achieving sustainable competitive advantage. In order to achieve this, Amazon can be argued to have utilized the concept of competitive objectives in order to conquer the market (Chaffey 2012). However, the underlying principle is quality and customer satisfaction. One of the most important concepts in achieving high levels of customer satisfaction is through track of customer purchasing patterns and need to evaluate their consumption behavior (Hunt 2000). This helps anticipate demand and to provide personalised services. All these can be achieved through online retailing approach. Amazon offers more than one million titles online, but only stores less in its warehouse. This was a big venture and success Amazon experienced unlike when it could have concentrated

Outlining serves Coursework Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Outlining serves - Coursework Example Having the outline in place helped me overcome the initial blocks encountered in writing. The outlines helped in breaking down the writing into its main ideas with supporting details. The outline helped in the identification of weaknesses in the argument. It helped in realizing where the supporting details to the main idea were insufficient. The outline was of great importance in tracking points that were misplaced as supporting arguments that were in the fourth paragraph instead of the second paragraph (Working Center Staff n.d.). The outline further helped in motivating me to write and stay focused on the writing process. That resulted in organizing the ideas in a manner that made the most impact. The organization involves including strong supporting details at the start and end of paragraphs that will help capture the reader’s attention. Some strong details were omitted in some parts of the paragraphs to use them at the end of the essay so that it could have a strong bang t o the reader. The outline was of value in creating a guide that results in the writing being easy and time-saving. Finalizing the outline helped in approaching each section with known intentions of what to include. The outline helped in ensuring my draft has balance. Looking at the outline, it is easy to tell some parts of the writing that are less or more substantial than others. The outline, therefore, helped in organizing the draft in a way that the ideas were balanced both in quality and quantity against each other (Working Centre Staff n.d.).

The Hollywood Renaissance of the 1960s and Early 1970s Essay - 1

The Hollywood Renaissance of the 1960s and Early 1970s - Essay Example The decade of the 1960s and into the early 1970s marked a period of turbulence and change in the American socio-political landscape. Among the events giving way to this landscape were the civil rights movements, the hippy culture, radicalism among students, the new left, feminism, the gay rights’ movements, the anti-Vietnam war movements, the Kennedy assassination, the Watergate scandal, the US withdrawal from Vietnam and the oil crisis among other events (King 2002, p. 14). The period of the 1960s and early 1970s was also the Cold War era and many Americans feared a nuclear attack (Neve 1995, p. 221). Arguably these events were quite dramatic and imposed on American culture in a very short period of time. I.The Hollywood Renaissance One of the most striking features of the Hollywood Renaissance was Hollywood’s departure from an attempt to idealize American life and culture. Instead, a majority of the films produced during the era of the 1960s and 1970s appealed to America’s conscience and adapted a social expression. The arts in general gave voice to the socio-political underpinnings of the times and attempted to contribute to change. Man (1994) observed that Hollywood cinema depicted â€Å"common themes† that: ...included the breakdown of traditional values, socio-political oppression, the psychology of sex and violence, moral ambiguity, alienation, solipsism, paranoia, and disillusionment (p. 1). During the 1960s and the early 1970s, filmmakers had greater creative freedom in that the studio system faded out and filmmakers had the ability to be more critical of social issues and could be more innovative (Ryan and Kellner 1988, p. 6). The Production Code was also eliminated during this period and a rating system much like the current system was started. As a result, filmmakers were able to take on topics and issues that were not previously permitted (Ryan and Kellner 1988, p. 6). Kramer (2005) identified three common themes that characterize the films attributed to the Hollywood Renaissance of the 1960s and the early 1970s. First, the films of this period were described as a â€Å"large number of challenging films† (Kramer 2005, p. 2). Secondly, a majority of the most successful films were produced by a select number of young film directors many of which had graduated from film schools such as Francis Ford Coppola who had graduated from the University of California in L os Angeles. Finally, the â€Å"intense formal and thematic innovation† that marked the films of the 1960s and early 1970s ended with the production of block-bluster films such as Steven Spielberg’s 1975 Jaws and George Lucas’ Star Wars of 1977 (Kramer 2005, p. 2). Nystrom (2009) explained that this new class of directors and producers began to perceive its audience as youthful and intellectual (p. 26). This was the main factor that influenced the culture depicted in film production during the 1960s and the early 1970s. The prevailing view was that the audience was such that it was no longer enough to simply entertain. This new audience was open to the examination of ideas and issues. Michael Laughlin, Two-Lane Blacktop (1971) reportedly said that: Our generation has gone beyond mere entertainment. We are too well educated, too intelligent to be just entertained (Nystrom 2009, p. 26). Buck Henry screenwriter for The Graduate made a similar observation. Henry note d that during the era of the Hollywood Renaissance: Heroes can now be intellectual, which they never were in American films. Perhaps it’s because, until recently, the audience was so profoundly anti-intellectual itself. But the younger generation identifies with the melodrama of ideas (Nystrom 2009, p. 26). Paul Williams, director of Out of it (1969) and The Revolutionary (1970) linked the Hollywood

Gender differences in the African American community Research Paper

Gender differences in the African American community - Research Paper Example However despite all the efforts and achievement by the women, they still face some challenges when it comes to employment. Even though some parts of the world and community are still fighting gender equality, the African American communities have made some great achievements. It is true that the community has made some great achievements. However, the government should be involved in addressing the challenge the Africa-American women face when it comes to employment. Gender inequality is one of the issues affecting the whole world of today (Benerà ­a, 2003). Although the determination of the world in solving the problem of gender equality. For complete eradication of gender equality, much is yet to be done. Gender equality is a lack of the provision of equal opportunity for both the feminine and the masculine. Gender equality is where both the groups are not given equal opportunity in terms of education and work. The mainly affected group on the issue of gender equality is the female sex (Collins, 2004). Female are the group that started to face unequal opportunity just from the time they were young. The boy child is given privileges to various opportunities as the girl child never got the same opportunities. Gender equality was mainly due to communities believed on the responsibility of women in the society. Women were mainly perceived to be responsible for taking care of the family and the children. Their responsibilities were mainly to feed the children, clean the house, and cook the food for the family, and the most important one is to be submissive to their husbands (Cook, n.d.). However, gender equality has drastically changed over the years. The number of women going to school has an increase in a point that it is almost equal to that of the boys attending school and in some region in the world the number has outdone the male. The major problem that the women of today face is majorly at the workplace. Considering the families of the

Outlining serves Coursework Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Outlining serves - Coursework Example Having the outline in place helped me overcome the initial blocks encountered in writing. The outlines helped in breaking down the writing into its main ideas with supporting details. The outline helped in the identification of weaknesses in the argument. It helped in realizing where the supporting details to the main idea were insufficient. The outline was of great importance in tracking points that were misplaced as supporting arguments that were in the fourth paragraph instead of the second paragraph (Working Center Staff n.d.). The outline further helped in motivating me to write and stay focused on the writing process. That resulted in organizing the ideas in a manner that made the most impact. The organization involves including strong supporting details at the start and end of paragraphs that will help capture the reader’s attention. Some strong details were omitted in some parts of the paragraphs to use them at the end of the essay so that it could have a strong bang t o the reader. The outline was of value in creating a guide that results in the writing being easy and time-saving. Finalizing the outline helped in approaching each section with known intentions of what to include. The outline helped in ensuring my draft has balance. Looking at the outline, it is easy to tell some parts of the writing that are less or more substantial than others. The outline, therefore, helped in organizing the draft in a way that the ideas were balanced both in quality and quantity against each other (Working Centre Staff n.d.).

Gender differences in the African American community Research Paper

Gender differences in the African American community - Research Paper Example However despite all the efforts and achievement by the women, they still face some challenges when it comes to employment. Even though some parts of the world and community are still fighting gender equality, the African American communities have made some great achievements. It is true that the community has made some great achievements. However, the government should be involved in addressing the challenge the Africa-American women face when it comes to employment. Gender inequality is one of the issues affecting the whole world of today (Benerà ­a, 2003). Although the determination of the world in solving the problem of gender equality. For complete eradication of gender equality, much is yet to be done. Gender equality is a lack of the provision of equal opportunity for both the feminine and the masculine. Gender equality is where both the groups are not given equal opportunity in terms of education and work. The mainly affected group on the issue of gender equality is the female sex (Collins, 2004). Female are the group that started to face unequal opportunity just from the time they were young. The boy child is given privileges to various opportunities as the girl child never got the same opportunities. Gender equality was mainly due to communities believed on the responsibility of women in the society. Women were mainly perceived to be responsible for taking care of the family and the children. Their responsibilities were mainly to feed the children, clean the house, and cook the food for the family, and the most important one is to be submissive to their husbands (Cook, n.d.). However, gender equality has drastically changed over the years. The number of women going to school has an increase in a point that it is almost equal to that of the boys attending school and in some region in the world the number has outdone the male. The major problem that the women of today face is majorly at the workplace. Considering the families of the

The Seduction Of Unreason Essay Example for Free

The Seduction Of Unreason Essay Postmodernism suffers many critics, some arguing for its responsibility in practically destroying the study of literature in America and Europe with a Leftist bent. Richard Wolin, professor of history and comparative literature at the City University of New York, disagrees and his own critique is that Postmodernism’s founding fathers were fascinated almost obsessed with the far-Right fascism of 1920s and 1930s. Wolpin demonstrates in his book that basic tenants of postmodernist thought considered politically Leftist in origin, come actually from the ultraconservative far-Right. At the same time, he does not consider Postmodernism a serious threat to literary study or society: â€Å"Conservatives hold postmodernists responsible for the latter-day decline of the West, accusing them of promoting relativism by undermining the traditional concepts of reason and truth. But they seriously overestimate postmodernism’s impact and influence, which has—happily—largely been confined to the isolated and bloodless corridors of academe† ( Wolin 2004, 313).   However, he states that postmodernist thought is a â€Å"celebration of heterogeneity and radical difference risks abetting the neotribalist ethos that threatens to turn the post-communist world order into a congeries of warring, fratricidal ethnicities† (Ibid.).   In this, he believes these identities and related demand for political correctness will replace reason, to the detriment of society. Wolpin considers a few select thinkers, namely Bataille, Blanchard, and Jung; comparing their ideologies to those of Heidegger, Nietzsche and a few others. He claims that the similarities between the two camps are not coincidence and in fact, these philosophers are all conservatives. Bataille, Blanchard, Jung, and their followers simply repeated the antidemocratic ideals and reactionary teachings of Nietzsche and Heidegger to varying degrees. Many Leftists rejected French Enlightenment ideals of liberty, equality, and fraternity. Postmodernist thought is currently dominant in academia, the media, literature, and world politics. Rejection of power in Postmodernism seems to be a distrust of politics in general and this rejection attempts to hide within a sense of special identities and political correctness. For example, European neo-fascism once spoke of white supremacy, but now promotes national and ethnic identities, or multiculturalism. Wolin shows that the current ideal of multiculturalism is merely political and anti-democratic. He sees associated secularism as moral decay and societal downfall in a grand conspiracy of thought tracing back to the enemies of the French Enlightenment who felt reason and critical inquiry to be evil. Replacing a belief in reason and progress, there is now a Leftist obsession with political correctness and a cult of identity in cultural factions. In The Seduction of Unreason, Wolpin successfully demonstrates the seductive but obvious and radical element of thought that spurs the rejection of reason in Postmodernism, and it is fascism. References Wolin, Richard. 2004. The Seduction of Unreason:   The Intellectual Romance With Fascism From Nietzsche to Postmodernism. Princeton University Press.

Impact of Social Determinants on Health

Impact of Social Determinants on Health Song et al (2011) studied the influence of social determinants of health on disease rates. They specified AIDS as the disease of concern and utilized data from American Community Survey. They used correlation and partial correlation coefficients quantify the effect of socioeconomic determinants on AIDS diagnosis rates in certain areas and found that the AIDS diagnosis rate was mutually related with kind, marital status and population density. Poverty, education level and unemployment also determine the cause of disease in an individual. In developed and developing countries socioeconomic status proved to be an important cause of cardiovascular disease. Survey studies showed that education was the most important socioeconomic determinant in relation to cardiovascular risk factor. Smoking was also a major cause of cardiovascular disease. Low socioeconomic status had a direct relationship with higher levels of cardiovascular risk factors (Yu et al, 2000; Reddy et al, 2002; Jeemon Reddy, 2010; Thurston et al, 2005; Janati et al, 2011 and Lang et al, 2012). Lantz et al (1998) investigated the impact of education, income and health behaviors on the risk of dying within the next 7.5 years with longitudinal survey study. The results of cross tabulation showed that the mortality rate has a strong association with education and income. Habib et al (2012) conducted a questionnaire based survey to measure the social, economic, demographic and geographic influence on the disease of bronchial asthma in Kashmir valley. After analysis in SPSS they concluded that non smokers, males working in farms and females working with animals have a high incidence of Bronchial Asthma. The study also showed a significant relationship between the age and disease. Arif and Naheed (2012) used â€Å"The Pakistan Social and Living Standard Measurement Survey 2004-05† conducted by the Federal Bureau of Statistics to determine the socioeconomic, demographic, environmental and geographical factors of diarrhea morbidity among the sampled children. Their study found a relationship between diarrhea morbidity and economic factors particularly ownership of land, livestock and housing conditions. Child’s gender and age, total number of children born, mother’s age and education and sources of drinking water did show significant effect on the diarrhea morbidity among children. Aranha et al (2011) conducted a survey in Brazil’s district Sà £o Paulo, to determine the association between children’s respiratory diseases reported by parents, attendance at school, parents’ educational level, family income and socioeconomic status. By applying chi square test they concluded that the health of children is associated with parents’ higher education, particularly mothers. Family income, analyzed according to per capita income did not affect the number of reports of respiratory diseases from parents. Deolalikar and Laxminarayan (2000) used data from 1997 Cambodia Socioeconomic Survey to estimate the influence of socioeconomic variables on the extent of disease transmission within villages in Cambodia. They concluded that infectious diseases were the leading cause of morbidity in the country. Younger adults were less likely to get infected by others, but it increased with age. Income and the availability of a doctor had a significant effect on disease transmission. Survey studies based on different countries showed a strong association between socioeconomic factors (income, education and occupational position) and obesity. After analysis there was a significant effect of consumption of low quality food due to economic factors on increased obesity. For men, both the highest level of occupational position and general education completed were found to have a significant effect on obesity while women in the lowest income group were three times as likely to be obese as women in the highest income group (Kuntz and Lampert, 2010; Akil and Ahmad, 2011 and Larsen et al, 2003). Yin et al (2011) used data from the 2007 China Chronic Disease Risk Factor Surveillance of 49,363 Chinese men and women aged 15-69 years to examine the association between the prevalence of self-reported physician diagnosed Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) and socioeconomic status defined by both educational level and annual household income. Multivariable logistic regression modeling was performed. Among nonsmokers, low educational level and household income were associated with a significant higher prevalence of COPD. Siponen et al (2011) tried to study the relationship between the health of Finnish children under 12 years of age and parental socioeconomic factors (educational level, household income and working status) by conducting population based survey. The analysis was done by using Pearson’s Chi-Square tests, and logistic regression analysis with 95% confidence intervals. The results showed that parental socioeconomic factors were not associated with the health of children aged under 12 years in Finland. Washington State Department of Health (2007) examined Washington adults and inferred that adults with lower incomes or less education were more likely to smoke, obessed, or ate fewer fruits and vegetables than adults with the broader culture, higher incomes and more education. In cultures where smoking was culturally unacceptable for women, women died less often from smoking-related diseases than women in groups where smoking was socially accepted. Lack of access to or inadequate use of medical services, contributed to relatively poorer health among people. In lower socioeconomic position groups health care received by the poor was inferior in quality. People of higher socioeconomic position had larger networks of social support. Low levels of social capital had been associated with higher mortality rates. People who experienced racism were more likely to have poor mental health and unhealthy lifestyles. Hosseinpoor et al (2012) took self-reported data, stratified by sex and low or middle income, from 232,056 adult participants in 48 countries, derived from the 2002–2004 World Health Survey. A Poisson regression model with a robust variance and cross tabulations were used deducing the following results. Men reported higher prevalence than women for current daily smoking and heavy episodic alcohol drinking, and women had higher growth of physical inactivity. In both sexes, low fruit and vegetable consumption were significantly higher. Braveman (2011) concluded that there was a strong relationship between income, education and health. Health was improved if income or education increased. Stressful events and circumstances followed a socioeconomic incline, decreased as income increased. Lee (1997) examined the effects of age, nativity, population size of place of residence, occupation, and household wealth on the disease and mortality experiences of Union army recruits while in service using Logistic regression. The patterns of mortality among recruits were different from the pattern of mortality among civilian populations. Wealth had a significant effect only for diseases on which nutritional influence was definite. Migration spread communicable diseases and exposed newcomers to different disease environments, which increased morbidity and mortality rate. Ghias et al (2012) studied the patients having HCV positive living in province of Punjab, Pakistan. Socio-demographic factors and risk factors were sought out using questionnaire. Logistic regression and artificial neural network methods were applied and found that patient’s education, patient’s liver disease history, family history of hepatitis C, migration, family size, history of blood transfusion, injection’s history, endoscopy, general surgery, dental surgery, tattooing and minor surgery by barber were 12 main risk factors that had significant influence on HCV infection. REFERENCES Song, R. et al (2011) â€Å"Identifying The Impact Of Social Determinants Of Health On Disease Rates Using Correlation Analysis Of Area-Based Summary Information† Public Health Reports Supplement 3, Volume 126, 70-80. Yu, Z. et al (2000) â€Å"Associations Between Socioeconomic Status And Cardiovascular Risk Factors In An Urban Population In China† Bulletin of the World Health Organization Volume 78, No. 11, 1296-1305. Reddy, K. et al (2002) † Socioeconomic Status And The Prevalence Of Coronary Heart Disease Risk Factors† Asia Pacific J Clin Nutr Volume 11, No. 2, 98–103. Jeemon, P. Reddy, K. (2010) †Social Determinants Of Cardiovascular Disease Outcomes In Indians† Indian J Med Res Volume 132, 617-622. Thurston, R. et al (2005) â€Å"Is The Association Between Socioeconomic Position And Coronary Heart Disease Stronger In Women Than In Men?† American Journal of Epidemiology Volume 162, No. 1, 57-65. Janati, A. et al (2011) â€Å"Socioeconomic Status and Coronary Heart Disease† Health Promotion Perspectives Volume 1, No. 2, 105-110. Lang, T. et al (2012) â€Å"Social Determinants Of Cardiovascular Diseases† Public Health Reviews Volume 33, No. 2, 601-622. Lantz, P. et al (1998) â€Å"Socioeconomic Factors, Health Behaviors, and Mortality† JAMA Volume 279, No. 21, 1703-1708. Habib, A. et al (2012) â€Å"Socioeconomic, Demographic and Geographic Influence on Disease Activity of Bronchial Asthma in Kashmir Valley† IOSR Journal of Dental and Medical Sciences (JDMS) ISSN: 2279-0853, ISBN: 2279-0861, Volume 2, No. 6, 04-07. Arif, A. and Naheed, R. (2012) â€Å"Socio-Economic Determinants Of Diarrhoea Morbidity In Pakistan† Academic Research International ISSN-L: 2223-9553, ISSN: 2223-9944 ISSN-L: 2223-9553, ISSN: 2223-9944, Volume 2, No. 1, 490-518. Aranha, M. et al (2011) â€Å"Relationship Between Respiratory Tract Diseases Declared By Parents And Socioeconomic And Cultural Factors† Rev Paul Pediatr Volume 29, No. 3, 352-356. Deolalikar , A. and Laxminarayan, R. (2000) â€Å"Socioeconomic Determinants of Disease Transmission in Cambodia† Resources for the Future Discussion Paper, 00–32. Kuntz, B. and Lampert, T. (2010) â€Å"Socioeconomic Factors and Obesity† Deutsches Ärzteblatt International Volume 107, No. 30, 517-22. Akil, L. and ; Ahmad, H. (2011) â€Å"Effects Of Socioeconomic Factors On Obesity Rates In Four Southern States And Colorado† Ethnicity Disease Volume 21, 58-62. Larsen, P. et al (2003) â€Å"The Relationship of Ethnicity, Socioeconomic Factors, and Overweight in U.S.Adolescents†OBESITY RESEARCH Volume 11, No.1, 121-129. Yin, P. et al (2011) â€Å"Prevalence Of COPD And Its Association With Socioeconomic Status In China: Findings From China Chronic Disease Risk Factor Surveillance 2007† BMC Public Health Volume 11, 586-593. Siponen, M. et al (2011) â€Å"Children’s Health And Parental Socioeconomic Factors: A Population-Based Survey In Finland† BMC Public Health Volume 11, 457-464. Washington State Department of Health (2007) â€Å"Social and Economic Determinants of Health† The Health of Washington State Volume 1, No. 3, 01-07. Hosseinpoor, A. et al (2012) â€Å"Socioeconomic inequalities in risk factors for noncommunicable diseases in low-income and middle income countries: results from the World Health Survey† BMC Public Health Volume 12, 912-924. Braveman, P. (2011) â€Å"Accumulating Knowledge on the Social Determinants of Health and Infectious Disease† Public Health Reports Supplement 3, Volume 126, 28-30. Lee, C. (1997) â€Å"Socioeconomic Background, Disease, and Mortality among Union Army Recruits: Implications for Economic and Demographic History† Explorations in Economic History Volume 34, 27-55. Ghias, M. et al (2012) â€Å"Statistical Modelling and Analysis of Risk Factors for Hepatitis C Infection in Punjab, Pakistan† World Applied Sciences Journal Volume 20, No. 2, 241-252.

Ethnics of Shermans March :: essays research papers fc

Your Name Teacher Name Class and Section  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Date Ethics of Sherman’s March   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  General William Techumseh Sherman’s March through Georgia and South Carolina was the turning point in the American Civil War. After heavy fighting in Tennessee and Kentucky General Sherman requested permission to take a large force of men on a campaign to the Atlantic Ocean through North and South Carolina, Georgia, then turning North back through the Carolinas and Virginia. The goal of the campaign was to divide the Confederate states by going through the middle of them and destroying anything of military value. General Sherman’s March did achieve its goal from a military standpoint but the manner his army accomplished its goal was ethically improper. Perhaps the most famous portion of Sherman’s March was his campaign from Atlanta to Savannah and then to Colombia, South Carolina.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The unique aspect of Sherman’s March was they would go without a supply line. â€Å"Sherman took from his three armies a picked force of sixty-two thousand, culling out what he called ‘the sick, the wounded, and the worthless,’ leaving the balance of his army with General Thomas to deal with General Hood.† (Kennett) Also included Sherman’s force was Brigadier General Judson Kirkpatrick’s contingent of Union cavalry. Feeding an army is a most difficult task when operating without a supply line. Thanks to Union spies Sherman found â€Å"that he would have no trouble feeding his army on what could be found locally, ‘eating out’ the country he passed through.† (Kennett) Food would be collected for the majority of the army by special foraging teams organized by divisions. This left Sherman’s wagons free to carry ammunition and other supplies necessary to military operation.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  General Sherman had several objectives in mind when setting out from Atlanta aside from reaching and taking Savannah. Important objectives included destroying any buildings that could assist the Confederacy. Other valuable targets to the Union included excess livestock, railroad tracks and depots, and cotton and tobacco fields. Perhaps most critical to General Sherman was to defeat the Confederate spirit. â€Å"When requesting permission to proceed with his campaign Sherman wrote to General Grant ‘I can make this march and make Georgia howl.’† (Woodworth) Sherman’s presence in the heart of the South was an insult to the pride of local residents, and the fact the Confederate Army could do little to stop it severely belittled national unity.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Perhaps the most difficult obstacles General Sherman faced in his march to the sea were weather and terrain.

The Greatest Commandment Essay -- Bible, God

The Greatest Commandment â€Å"to love God† is the first and greatest commandment of all. In researching this commandment I have found that to love God is truly what God really wants from all of us. The commandment is referenced in all four of the gospels of the New Testament as well as being referenced in the Old Testament through the Ten Commandments in which the New Testament was based on. This commandment is so powerful it is found in Luke 10:25-37, Mark 12:28-34, John 13:34-35 and Matthew 22:34-40. It is also found in Deuteronomy 6:5 and also based on the Ten Commandments in Exodus 20:1-17. Take for instance the gospel of Matthew in where the New Testament begins with the book of Matthew revealing the fulfillment of the prophecies in Jesus Christ, the long-awaited Messiah. Matthew was a Jewish tax collector for the Roman government who was called upon by Jesus to become one of the 12 apostles which often in his gospel will give us an eye witness account. Matthew wrote the gospel while living in Antioch, Syria after following Jesus between the years of A.D. 50-70. Matthews’s gospel provides an essential link between the Old and New Testament. Matthew 22:34-40 teaches us of the greatest commandment and what God wants from us foremost. In the scripture of Matthew 22:34-40 where this commandment is told by Jesus to the religious leaders, the Sadducees and the Pharisees who were attacking him and challenging him with one of the Pharisees in particular who was a lawyer decided to test Jesus in hopes of embarrassing him by asking: â€Å"Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law?† (NIV, Matthew 22:36) Knowing that this was a difficult question because of the Ten Commandments in the Old Testament in which all are from ... ...merciful, for they will be shown mercy" and "Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God" (Holy Bible, Matthew 5:3-11). These scriptures say a lot to us reinstating what Matthew has written in how we should live our lives and follow the laws stated by Jesus in The Greatest Commandment so that we can obtain our peace of heart and give our love, ourselves selflessly to God. For when Jesus answered this question, the religious leaders and the Pharisees knew that he had answered well. After this question was answered Jesus also asked and answered a question about his son ship to God and from then on his answers showed his wisdom and those that questioned him never dared to ask Jesus any more questions. They knew that he was the son of the Lord. All knew and understood that these two Greatest Commandments were to be the law and the prophecies to live by.

History of Computer Virus

THE HISTORY OF COMPUTER VIRUSES A Bit of Archeology There are lots and lots of opinions on the date of birth of the first computer virus. I know for sure just that there were no viruses on the Babbidge machine, but the Univac 1108 and IBM 360/370 already had them (â€Å"Pervading Animal† and â€Å"Christmas tree†). Therefore the first virus was born in the very beginning of 1970s or even in the end of 1960s, although nobody was calling it a virus then. And with that consider the topic of the extinct fossil species closed. Journey's Start Let's talk of the latest history: â€Å"Brain†, â€Å"Vienna†, â€Å"Cascade†, etc. Those who started using IBM PCs as far as in mid-80s might still remember the total epidemic of these viruses in 1987-1989. Letters were dropping from displays, crowds of users rushing towards monitor service people (unlike of these days, when hard disk drives die from old age but yet some unknown modern viruses are to blame). Their computers started playing a hymn called â€Å"Yankee Doodle†, but by then people were already clever, and nobody tried to fix their speakers – very soon it became clear that this problem wasn't with the hardware, it was a virus, and not even a single one, more like a dozen. And so viruses started infecting files. The â€Å"Brain† virus and bouncing ball of the â€Å"Ping-pong† virus marked the victory of viruses over the boot sector. IBM PC users of course didn't like all that at all. And so there appeared antidotes. Which was the first? I don't know, there were many of them. Only few of them are still alive, and all of these anti-viruses did grow from single project up to the major software companies playing big roles on the software market. There is also an notable difference in conquering different countries by viruses. The first vastly spread virus in the West was a bootable one called â€Å"Brain†, the â€Å"Vienna† and â€Å"Cascade† file viruses appeared later. Unlike that in East Europe and Russia file viruses came first followed by bootable ones a year later. Time went on, viruses multiplied. They all were all alike in a sense, tried to get to RAM, stuck to files and sectors, periodically killing files, diskettes and hard disks. One of the first â€Å"revelations† was the â€Å"Frodo. 4096† virus, which is far as I know was the first invisible virus (Stealth). This virus intercepted INT 21h, and during DOS calls to the infected files it changed the information so that the file appeared to the user uninfected. But this was just an overhead over MS-DOS. In less than a year electronic bugs attacked the DOS kernel (â€Å"Beast. 512† Stealth virus). The idea of in visibility continued to bear its fruits: in summer of 1991 there was a plague of â€Å"Dir_II†. â€Å"Yeah! â€Å", said everyone who dug into it. But it was pretty easy to fight the Stealth ones: once you clean RAM, you may stop worrying and just search for the beast and cure it to your hearts content. Other, self encrypting viruses, sometimes appearing in software collections, were more troublesome. This is because to identify and delete them it was necessary to write special subroutines, debug them. But then nobody paid attention to it, until †¦ Until the new generation of viruses came, those called polymorphic viruses. These viruses use another approach to invisibility: they encrypt themselves (in most cases), and to decrypt themselves later they use commands which may and may not be repeated in different infected files. Polymorphism – Viral Mutation The first polymorphic virus called â€Å"Chameleon† became known in the early '90s, but the problem with polymorphic viruses became really serious only a year after that, in April 1991, with the worldwide epidemic of the polymorphic virus â€Å"Tequila† (as far as I know Russia was untouched by the epidemic; the first epidemic in Russia, caused by a polymorphic virus, happened as late as in 1994, in three years, the virus was called â€Å"Phantom1†). The idea of self encrypting polymorphic viruses gained popularity and brought to life generators of polymorphic code – in early 1992 the famous â€Å"Dedicated† virus appears, based on the first known polymorphic generator MtE and the first in a series of MtE-viruses; shortly after that there appears the polymorphic generator itself. It is essentially an object module (OBJ file), and now to get a polymorphic mutant virus from a conventional non-encrypting virus it is sufficient to simply link their object modules together – the polymorphic OBJ file and the virus OBJ file. Now to create a real polymorphic virus one doesn't have to dwell on the code of his own encryptor/decryptor. He may now connect the polymorphic generator to his virus and call it from the code of the virus when desired. Luckily the first MtE-virus wasn't spread and did not cause epidemics. In their turn the anti-virus developers had sometime in store to prepare for the new attack. In just a year production of polymorphic viruses becomes a â€Å"trade†, followed by their â€Å"avalanche† in 1993. Among the viruses coming to my collection the volume of polymorphic viruses increases. It seems that one of the main directions in this uneasy job of creating new viruses becomes creation and debugging of polymorphic mechanism, the authors of viruses compete not in creating the toughest virus but the toughest polymorphic mechanism instead. This is a partial list of the viruses that can be called 100 percent polymorphic (late 1993): Bootache, CivilWar (four versions), Crusher, Dudley, Fly, Freddy, Ginger, Grog, Haifa, Moctezuma (two versions), MVF, Necros, Nukehard, PcFly (three versions), Predator, Satanbug, Sandra, Shoker, Todor, Tremor, Trigger, Uruguay (eight versions). These viruses require special methods of detection, including emulation of the viruses executable code, mathematical algorithms of restoring parts of the code and data in virus etc. Ten more new viruses may be considered non-100 percent polymorphic (that is they do encrypt themselves but in decryption routine there always exist some nonchanging bytes): Basilisk, Daemaen, Invisible (two versions), Mirea (several versions), Rasek (three versions), Sarov, Scoundrel, Seat, Silly, Simulation. However to detect them and to restore the infected objects code decrypting is still required, because the length of nonchanging code in the decryption outine of those viruses is too small. Polymorphic generators are also being developed together with polymorphic viruses. Several new ones appear utilizing more complex methods of generating polymorphic code. They become widely spread over the bulletin board systems as archives containing object modules, documentation and examples of use. By the end of 1993 there are seven known generators of polymorphic code. They are: MTE 0. 90 (Mutation Engine), TPE (Trident Polymorphic Engine), four versions NED (Nuke Encryption Device), DAME (Dark Angel's Multiple Encryptor) Since then every year brought several new polymorphic generators, so there is little sense in publishing the entire lists. Automating Production and Viral Construction Sets Laziness is the moving force of progress (to construct the wheel because that's too lazy to carry mammoths to the cave). This traditional wisdom needs no comments. But only in the middle of 1992 progress in the form of automating production touched the world of viruses. On the fifth of July 1992 the first viral code construction set for IBM PC compatibles called VCL (Virus Creation Laboratory) version 1. 00 is declared for production and shipping. This set allows to generate well commented source texts of viruses in the form or assembly language texts, object modules and infected files themselves. VCL uses standard windowed interface. With the help of a menu system one can choose virus type, objects to infect (COM or/and EXE), presence or absence of self encryption, measures of protection from debugging, inside text strings, optional 10 additional effects etc. Viruses can use standard method of infecting a file by adding their body to the end of file, or replace files with their body destroying the original content of a file, or become companion viruses. And then it became much easier to do wrong: if you want somebody to have some computer trouble just run VCL and within 10 to 15 minutes you have 30-40 different viruses you may then run on computers of your enemies. A virus to every computer! The further the better. On the 27th of July the first version of PS-MPC (Phalcon/Skism Mass-Produced Code Generator). This set does not have windowed interface, it uses configuration file to generate viral source code. This file contains description of the virus: the type of infected files (COM or EXE); resident capabilities (unlike VCL, PS-MPC can also produce resident viruses); method of installing the resident copy of the virus; self encryption capabilities; the ability to infect COMMAND. COM and lots of other useful information. Another construction set G2 (Phalcon/Skism's G2 0. 70 beta) has been created. It supported PS-MPC configuration files, however allowing much more options when coding the same functions. The version of G2 I have is dated the first of January 1993. Apparently the authors of G2 spent the New Year's Eve in front of their computers. They'd better have some champagne instead, this wouldn't hurt anyway. So in what way did the virus construction sets influence electronic wildlife? In my virus collection there are: †¢ several hundreds of VCL and G2 based viruses; †¢ over a thousand PS-MPC based viruses. So we have another tendency in development of computer viruses: the increasing number of â€Å"construction set† viruses; more unconcealably lazy people join the ranks of virus makers, downgrading a respectable and creative profession of creating viruses to a mundane rough trade. Outside DOS The year 1992 brought more than polymorphic viruses and virus construction sets. The end of the year saw the first virus for Windows, which thus opened a new page in the history of virus making. Being small (less than 1K in size) and absolutely harmless this non resident virus quite proficiently infected executables of new Windows format (NewEXE); a window into the world of Windows was opened with its appearance on the scene. After some time there appeared viruses for OS/2, and January 1996 brought the first Windows95 virus. Presently not a single week goes by without new viruses infecting non-DOS systems; possibly the problem of non-DOS viruses will soon become more important than the problem of DOS viruses. Most likely the process of changing priorities will resemble the process of DOS dying and new operating systems gaining strength together with their specific programs. As soon as all the existing software for DOS will be replaced by their Windows, Windows95 and OS/2 analogues, the problem of DOS viruses becomes nonexistent and purely theoretical for computer society. The first attempt to create a virus working in 386 protected mode was also made in 1993. It was a boot virus â€Å"PMBS† named after a text string in its body. After boot up from infected drive this virus switched to protected mode, made itself supervisor and then loaded DOS in virtual window mode V86. Luckily this virus was born dead – its second generation refused to propagate due to several errors in the code. Besides that the infected system â€Å"hanged† if some of the programs tried to reach outside the V86 mode, for example to determine the presence of extended memory. This unsuccessful attempt to create supervisor virus remained the only one up to spring of 1997, when one Moscow prodigy released â€Å"PM. Wanderer† – a quite successful implementation of a protected mode virus. It is unclear now whether those supervisor viruses might present a real problem for users and anti-virus program developers in the future. Most likely not because such viruses must â€Å"go to sleep† while new operating systems (Windows 3. xx, Windows95/NT, OS/2) are up and running, allowing for easy detection and killing of the virus. But a full-scale stealth supervisor virus may mean a lot of trouble for â€Å"pure† DOS users, because it is absolutely impossible to detect such a stealth virus under pure DOS. Macro Virus Epidemics August 1995. All the progressive humanity, The Microsoft and Bill Gates personally celebrate the release of a new operating system Windows95. With all that noise the message about a new virus using basically new methods of infection came virtually unnoticed. The virus infected Microsoft Word documents. Frankly it wasn't the first virus infecting Word documents. Earlier before anti-virus companies had the first experimental example of a virus on their hands, which copied itself from one document to another. However nobody paid serious attention to that not quite successful experiment. As a result virtually all the anti-virus companies appeared not ready to what came next – macro virus epidemics – and started to work out quick but inadequate steps in order to put an end to it. For example several companies almost simultaneously released documents- anti-viruses, acting along about the same lines as did the virus, but destroying it instead of propagation. By the way it became necessary to correct anti-virus literature in a hurry because earlier the question, â€Å"Is it possible to infect a computer by simply reading a file† had been answered by a definite â€Å"No way! with lengthy proofs of that. As for the virus which by that time got its name, â€Å"Concept†, continued its ride of victory over the planet. Having most probably been released in some division of Microsoft â€Å"Concept† ran over thousands if not millions of computers in no time it all. It's not unusual, because text exchange in the format of Microsoft Word became in fact one of the industry standards, and to get infected by the virus it is sufficient just to open the infected document, then all the documents edited by infected copy of Word became infected too. As a result having received an infected file over the Internet and opened it, the unsuspecting user became â€Å"infection peddler†, and if his correspondence was made with the help of MS Word, it also became infected! Therefore the possibility of infecting MS Word multiplied by the speed of Internet became one of the most serious problems in all the history of existence of computer viruses. In less than a year, sometime in summer of 1996, there appeared the â€Å"Laroux† virus, infecting Microsoft Excel spreadsheets. As it had been with â€Å"Concept†, these new virus was discovered almost simultaneously in several companies. The same 1996 witnessed the first macro virus construction sets, then in the beginning of 1997 came the first polymorphic macro viruses for MS Word and the first viruses for Microsoft Office97. The number of various macro viruses also increased steadily reaching several hundreds by the summer of 1997. Macro viruses, which have opened a new page in August 1995, using all the experience in virus making accumulated for almost 10 years of continuous work and enhancements, actually do present the biggest problem for modern virology. Chronology of Events It's time to give a more detailed description of events. Let's start from the very beginning. Late 1960s – early 1970s Periodically on the mainframes at that period of time there appeared programs called â€Å"the rabbit†. These programs cloned themselves, occupied system resources, thus lowering the productivity of the system. Most probably â€Å"rabbits† did not copy themselves from system to system and were strictly local phenomena – mistakes or pranks by system programmers servicing these computers. The first incident which may be well called an epidemic of â€Å"a computer virus†, happened on the Univax 1108 system. The virus called â€Å"Pervading Animal† merged itself to the end of executable files – virtually did the same thing as thousands of modern viruses do. The first half of 1970s â€Å"The Creeper† virus created under the Tenex operating system used global computer networks to spread itself. The virus was capable of entering a network by itself by modem and transfer a copy of itself to remote system. â€Å"The Reeper† anti-virus program was created to fight this virus, it was the first known anti-virus program. Early 1980s Computers become more and more popular. An increasing number of program appears written not by software companies but by private persons, moreover, these programs may be freely distributed and exchanged through general access servers – BBS. As a result there appears a huge number of miscellaneous â€Å"Trojan horses†, programs, doing some kind of harm to the system when started. 1981 â€Å"Elk Cloner† bootable virus epidemics started on Apple II computers. The virus attached itself to the boot sector of diskettes to which there were calls. It showed itself in many ways – turned over the display, made text displays blink and showed various messages. 1986 The first IBM PC virus â€Å"Brain† pandemic began. This virus infecting 360 KB diskettes became spread over the world almost momentarily. The secret of a â€Å"success† like this late probably in total unpreparedness of computer society to such a phenomenon as computer virus. The virus was created in Pakistan by brothers Basit and Amjad Farooq Alvi. They left a text message inside the virus with their name, address and telephone number. According to the authors of the virus they were software vendors, and would like to know the extent of piracy in their country. Unfortunately their experiment left the borders of Pakistan. It is also interesting that the â€Å"Brain† virus was the first stealth virus, too – if there was an attempt to read the infected sector, the virus substituted it with a clean original one. Also in 1986 a programmer named Ralph Burger found out that a program can create copies of itself by adding its code to DOS executables. His first virus called â€Å"VirDem† was the demonstration of such a capability. This virus was announced in December 1986 at an underground computer forum, which consisted of hackers, specializing at that time on cracking VAX/VMS systems (Chaos Computer Club in Hamburg). 1987 â€Å"Vienna† virus appears. Ralph Burger, whom we already now, gets a copy of this virus, disassembles it, and publishes the result in his book â€Å"Computer Viruses: a High-tech Disease†. Burger's book made the idea of writing viruses popular, explained how to do it, and therefore stimulated creating up hundreds and in thousands of computer viruses, in which some of the ideas from his book were implemented. Some more IBM PC viruses are being written independently in the same year. They are: â€Å"Lehigh†, infecting the COMMAND. COM file only; â€Å"Suriv-1† a. k. a. â€Å"April1st†, infecting COM files; â€Å"Suriv-2†, infecting (for the first time ever) EXE files; and â€Å"Suriv-3†, infecting both COM and EXE files. There also appear several boot viruses (â€Å"Yale† in USA, â€Å"Stoned† in New Zealand, â€Å"PingPong† in Italy), and the first self encrypting file virus â€Å"Cascade†. Non-IBM computers are also not forgotten: several viruses for Apple Macintosh, Commodore Amiga and Atari ST have been detected. In December of 1987 there was the first total epidemics of a network virus called â€Å"Christmas Tree†, written in REXX language and spreading itself under the VM/CMS operating environments. On the ninth of December this virus was introduced into the Bitnet network in one of West German universities, then via gateway it got into the European Academic Research Network (EARN) and then into the IBM Vnet. In four days (Dec. 13) the virus paralyzed the network, which was overflowing with copies of it (see the desk clerk example several pages earlier). On start-up the virus output an image of the Christmas tree and then sent copies of itself to all the network users whose addresses were in the corresponding system files NAMES and NETLOG. 1988 On Friday the 13 1988 several companies and universities in many countries of the world â€Å"got acquainted† with the â€Å"Jerusalem† virus. On that day the virus was destroying files which were attempted to be run. Probably this is one of the first MS-DOS viruses which caused a real pandemic, there were news about infected computers from Europe, America and the Middle East. Incidentally the virus got its name after one of the places it stroke – the Jerusalem University. â€Å"Jerusalem† together with several other viruses (â€Å"Cascade†, â€Å"Stoned†, â€Å"Vienna†) infected thousands of computers still being unnoticed – anti-virus programs were not as common then as they are now, many users and even professionals did not believe in the existence of computer viruses. It is notable that in the same year the legendary computer guru Peter Norton announced that computer viruses did not exist. He declared them to be a myth of the same kind as alligators in New York sewers. Nevertheless this delusion did not prevent Symantec from starting its own anti-virus project Norton Anti-virus after some time. Notoriously false messages about new computer viruses started to appear, causing panic among the computer users. One of the first virus hoaxes of this kind belongs to a Mike RoChenle (pronounced very much like â€Å"Microchannel†), who uploaded a lot of messages to the BBS systems, describing the supposed virus copying itself from one BBS to another via modem using speed 2400 baud for that. Funny as it may seem many users gave up 2000 baud standard of that time and lowered the speed of their modems to 1200 baud. Similar hoaxes appeared even now. The most famous of them so far are GoodTimes and Aol4Free. November 1988: a total epidemic of a network virus of Morris (a. k. a. Internet Worm). This virus infected more than 6000 computer systems in USA (including NASA research Institute) and practically paralyzed their work. Because of erratic code of the virus it sent unlimited copies of itself to other network computers, like the â€Å"Christmas Tree† worm virus, and for that reason completely paralyzed all the network resources. Total losses caused by the Morris virus were estimated at 96 millions of dollars. This virus used errors in operating systems Unix for VAX and Sun Microsystems to propagate. Besides the errors in Unix the virus utilized several more original ideas, for example picking up user passwords. A more detailed story of this virus and the corresponding incidents may be found in a rather detailed and interesting articles. December 1988: the season of worm viruses continues this time in DECNet. Worm virus called HI. COM output and image of spruce and informed users that they should â€Å"stop computing and have a good time at home!!! There also appeared new anti-virus programs for example, Doctors Solomon's Anti-virus Toolkit, being one of the most powerful anti-virus software presently. 1989 New viruses â€Å"Datacrime†, â€Å"FuManchu† appear, as do the whole families like â€Å"Vacsina† and â€Å"Yankee†. The first one acted extremely dangerously – from October 13th to December 31st it formatted hard disks. This virus â€Å"broke freeà ¢â‚¬  and caused total hysteria in the mass media in Holland and Great Britain. September 1989: 1 more anti-virus program begins shipping – IBM Anti-virus. October 1989: one more epidemic in DECNet, this time it was worm virus called â€Å"WANK Worm†. December 1989: an incident with a â€Å"Trojan horse† called â€Å"AIDS†. 20,000 copies were shipped on diskettes marked as â€Å"AIDS Information Diskette Version 2. 0†. After 90 boot-ups the â€Å"Trojan† program encrypted all the filenames on the disk, making them invisible (setting a â€Å"hidden† attribute) and left only one file readable – bill for $189 payable to the address P. O. Box 7, Panama. The author of this program was apprehended and sent to jail. One should note that in 1989 there began total epidemics of computer viruses in Russia, caused by the same â€Å"Cascade†, â€Å"Jerusalem† and â€Å"Vienna†, which besieged the computers of Russian users. Luckily Russian programmers pretty quickly discovered the principles of their work, and virtually immediately there appeared several domestic anti-viruses, and AVP (named â€Å"-V†) those time, was one of them. My first acquaintance with viruses (this was the â€Å"Cascade† virus) replaced in the world 1989 when I found virus on my office computer. This particular fact influenced my decision to change careers and create anti-virus programs. In a month the second incident (â€Å"Vacsina† virus) was closed with a help of the first version of my anti-virus â€Å"-V† (minus-virus), several years later renamed to AVP – AntiViral Toolkit Pro. By the end of 1989 several dozens of viruses herded on Russian lands. They were in order of appearance: two versions of â€Å"Cascade†, several â€Å"Vacsina† and â€Å"Yankee† viruses, â€Å"Jerusalem†, â€Å"Vienna†, â€Å"Eddie†, â€Å"PingPong†. 1990 This year brought several notable events. The first one was the appearance of the first polymorphic viruses â€Å"Chameleon† (a. k. a. â€Å"V2P1†, â€Å"V2P2†, and â€Å"V2P6†). Until then the anti-virus programs used â€Å"masks† – fragments of virus code – to look for viruses. After â€Å"Chameleon†Ã¢â‚¬Ëœs appearance anti-virus program developers had to look for different methods of virus detection. The second event was the appearance of Bulgarian â€Å"virus production factory†: enormous amounts of new viruses were created in Bulgaria. Disease wears the entire families of viruses â€Å"Murphy†, â€Å"Nomenclatura†, â€Å"Beast† (or â€Å"512†, â€Å"Number-of-Beast†), the modifications of the â€Å"Eddie† virus etc. A certain Dark Avenger became extremely active, making several new viruses a year, utilizing fundamentally new algorithms of infecting and covering of the tracks in the system. It was also in Bulgaria that the first BBS opens, dedicated to exchange of virus code and information for virus makers. In July 1990 there was an incident with â€Å"PC Today† computer magazine (Great Britain). It contained a floppy disk infected with â€Å"DiskKiller† virus. More than 50,000 copies were sold. In the second half of 1990 there appeared two Stealth monsters – â€Å"Frodo† and â€Å"Whale†. Both viruses utilized extremely complicated stealth algorithms; on top of that the 9KB â€Å"Whale† used several levels of encrypting and anti-debugging techniques. 1991 Computer virus population grows continuously, reaching several hundreds now. Anti-viruses also show increasing activity: two software monsters at once (Symantec and Central Point) issue their own anti-virus programs – Norton Anti-virus and Central Point Anti-virus. They are followed by less known anti-viruses from Xtree and Fifth Generation. In April a full-scale epidemic broke out, caused by file and boot polymorphic virus called â€Å"Tequila†, and in September the same kind of story happened with â€Å"Amoeba† virus. Summer of 1991: â€Å"Dir_II† epidemic. It was a link virus using fundamentally new methods of infecting files. 1992 Non-IBM PC and non-MS-DOS viruses are virtually forgotten: â€Å"holes† in global access network are closed, errors corrected, and network worm viruses lost the ability to spread themselves. File-, boot- and file-boot viruses for the most widely spread operating system (MS-DOS) on the most popular computer model (IBM PC) are becoming more and more important. The number of viruses increases in geometrical to progression; various virus incidents happen almost every day. Miscellaneous anti-virus programs are being developed, dozens of books and several periodic magazines on anti-viruses are being printed. A few things stand out: Early 1992: the first polymorphic generator MtE, serving as a base for several polymorphic viruses which follow almost immediately. Mte was also the prototype for a few forthcoming polymorphic generators. March 1992: â€Å"Michelangelo† virus epidemics (a. k. a. â€Å"March6†) and the following hysteria took place. Probably this is the first known case when anti-virus companies made fuss about this virus not to protect users from any kind of danger, but attract attention to their product, that is to create profits. One American anti-virus company actually announced that on the 6th of March the information on over five million computers will be destroyed. As a result of the fuss after that the profits of different anti-virus companies jumped several times; in reality only about 10,000 computers suffered from that virus. July 1992: The first virus construction sets were made, VCL and PS-MPC. They made large flow of new viruses even larger. They also stimulated virus makers to create other, more powerful, construction sets, as it was done by MtE in its area. Late 1992: The first Windows virus appears, infecting this OS's executables, and starts a new page in virus making. 1993 Virus makers are starting to do some serious damage: besides hundreds of mundane viruses which are no different than their counterparts, besides the whole polymorphic generators and construction sets, besides new electronic editions of virus makers there appear more and more viruses, using highly unusual ways of infecting files, introducing themselves into the system etc. The main examples are: â€Å"PMBS†, wording in Intel 80386 protected mode. Strange† (or â€Å"Hmm†) – a â€Å"masterpiece† of Stealth technology, however fulfilled on the level of hardware interrupts INT 0Dh and INT 76h. â€Å"Shadowgard† and â€Å"Carbunkle†, which widened debt range of algorithms of companion viruses. â€Å"Emmie†, â€Å"Metallica†, â€Å"Bomber†, â€Å"Uruguay† and â€Å"Cruncher† – the us e of fundamentally new techniques of â€Å"hiding† of its own code inside the infected files. In spring of 1993 Microsoft made its own anti-virus MSAV, based on CPAV by Central Point. 1994 The problem of CD viruses is getting more important. Having quickly gained popularity CD disks became one of the main means of spreading viruses. There are several simultaneous cases when a virus got to the master disk when preparing the batch CDs. As a result of that a fairly large number (tens of thousands) of infected CDs hit the market. Of course they cannot be cured, they just have to be destroyed. Early in the year in Great Britain there popped out two extremely complicated polymorphic viruses, â€Å"SMEG. Pathogen† and â€Å"SMEG. Queeg† (even now not all the anti-virus programs are able to give 100% correct detection of these viruses). Their author placed infected files to a BBS, causing real panic and fear of epidemics in mass media. Another wave of panic was created by a message about a supposed virus called â€Å"GoodTimes†, spreading via the Internet and infecting a computer when receiving E-mail. No such virus really existed, but after some time there appeared a usual DOS virus containing text string â€Å"Good Times†. It was called â€Å"GT-Spoof†. Law enforcement increases its activities: in Summer of 1994 the author of SMEG was â€Å"sorted out† and arrested. Approximately at the same time also in Great Britain there was arrested an entire group of virus makers, who called themselves ARCV (Association for Really Cruel Viruses). Some time later one more author of viruses was arrested in Norway. There appear some new unusual enough viruses: January 1994: â€Å"Shifter† – the first virus infecting object modules (OBJ files). â€Å"Phantom1† – the cause of the first epidemic of polymorphic virus in Moscow. April 1994: â€Å"SrcVir† — the virus family infecting program source code (C and Pascal). June 1994: â€Å"OneHalf† – one of the most popular viruses in Russia so far starts a total epidemics. September 1994: â€Å"3APA3A† – a boot-file virus epidemic. This virus uses a highly unusual way of incorporating into MS-DOS. No anti-virus was ready to meet such kind of a monster. In 1994 (Spring) one of the anti-virus leaders of that time – Central Point – ceased to exist, acquired by Symantec, which by that time managed to â€Å"swallow† several minor companies, working on anti- viruses – Peter Norton Computing, Cetus International and Fifth Generation Systems. 1995 Nothing in particular among DOS viruses happens, although there appear several complicated enough monster viruses like â€Å"NightFall†, â€Å"Nostardamus†, â€Å"Nutcracker†, also some funny viruses like â€Å"bisexual† virus â€Å"RMNS† and BAT virus â€Å"Winstart†. The â€Å"ByWay† and â€Å"DieHard2† viruses become widespread, with news about infected computers coming from all over the world. February 1995: an incident with Microsoft: Windows95 demos disks are infected by â€Å"Form†. Copies of these disks were sent to beta testers by Microsoft; one of the testers was not that lazy and tested the disks for viruses. Spring 1995: two anti-virus companies – ESaSS (ThunderBYTE anti-virus) and Norman Data Defense (Norman Virus Control) announce their alliance. These companies, each making powerful enough anti- viruses, joined efforts and started working on a joint anti-virus system. August 1995: one of the turning points in the history of viruses and anti-viruses: there has actually appeared the first â€Å"alive† virus for Microsoft Word (â€Å"Concept†). In some month the virus â€Å"tripped around the world†, pesting the computers of the MS Word users and becoming a firm No. 1 in statistic research held by various computer titles. 1996 January 1996: two notable events – the appearance of the first Windows95 virus (â€Å"Win95. Boza†) and the epidemics of the extremely complicated polymorphic virus â€Å"Zhengxi† in St. Petersburg (Russia). March 1996: the first Windows 3. virus epidemic. The name of the virus is â€Å"Win. Tentacle†. This virus infected a computer network a hospital and in several other institutions in France. This event is especially interesting because this was the FIRST Windows virus on a spree. Before that time (as far as I know) all the Windows viruses had been living only in collections a nd electronic magazines of virus makers, only boot viruses, DOS viruses and macro viruses were known to ride free. June 1996: â€Å"OS2. AEP† – the first virus for OS/2, correctly infecting EXE files of this operating system. Earlier under OS/2 there existed only the viruses writing themselves instead of file, destroying it or acting as companions. July 1996: â€Å"Laroux† – the first virus for Microsoft Excel caught live (originally at the same time in two oil making companies in Alaska and in southern African Republic). The idea of â€Å"Laroux†, like that of Microsoft Word viruses, was based on the presence of so-called macros (or Basic programs) in the files. Such programs can be included into both electronic spreadsheets of Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Word documents. As it turned out the Basic language built into Microsoft Excel also allows to create viruses. December 1996: â€Å"Win95. Punch† – the first â€Å"memory resident† virus for Windows95. It stays in the Windows memory as a VxD driver, hooks file access and infects Windows EXE files that are opened. In general the year 1996 is the start of widespread virus intervention into the Windows32 operating system (Windows95 and WindowsNT) and into the Microfoft Office applications. During this and the next year several dozens of Windows viruses and several hunsdreds of macro viruses appeared. Many of them used new technologies and methods of infection, including stealth and polymorphic abilities. That was the next round of virus evolution. During two years they repeated the way of improving similar to DOS viruses. Step by step they started to use the same features that DOS viruses did 10 years beforehand, but on next technological level. 1997 February 1997: â€Å"Linux. Bliss† – the first virus for Linux (a Unix clone). This way viruses occupied one more â€Å"biological† niche. February-April 1997: macro viruses migrated to Office97. The first of them turned out to be only â€Å"converted† to the format macro viruses for Microsoft Word 6/7, but also virtually immediately there appeared viruses aimed at Office97 documents exclusively. March 1997: â€Å"ShareFun† – macro-virus hitting Microsoft Word 6/7. It uses is not only standard features of Microsoft Word to propagate but also sends copies of itself via MS-Mail. April 1997: â€Å"Homer† – the first network worm virus, using File Transfer Protocol (FTP) for propagation. June 1997: There appears the first self encrypting virus for Windows95. This virus of Russian origin has been sent to several BBS is in Moscow which caused an epidemic. November 1997: The â€Å"Esperanto† virus. This is the first virus that intends to infect not only DOS and Windows32 executable files, but also spreads into the Mac OS (Macintosh). Fortunately, the virus is not able to spread cross the platforms because of bugs. December 1997: new virus type, the so-called â€Å"mIRC Worms†, came into being. The most popular Windows Internet Relay Chat (IRC) utility known as mIRC proved to be â€Å"hole† allowing virus scripts to transmit themselves along the IRC-channels. The next IRC version blocked the hole and the mIRC Worms vanished. The KAMI ltd. nti-virus department has braked away from the mother company constituting the independent one what, certainly, is considered the main event of 1997. Currently the company known as Kaspersky Labs and proved to be a recognized leader of the anti-virus industry. Since 1994 the AntiViral Toolkit Pro (AVP) anti-virus scanner, main product of the company, constantly shows high results wh ile being tested by various test laboratories of all world. Creation of an independent company gave the chance to the at first small group of developers to gain the lead on the domestic market and prominence on the world one. For short run versions for practically all popular platforms were developed and released, the new anti-virus solutions offered, the international distribution and the product support networks created. October 1997: the agreement on licensing of AVP technologies use in F-Secure Anti-Virus (FSAV) was signed. The F-Secure Anti-Virus (FSAV) package was the DataFellows (Finland) new anti-virus product. Before DataFellows was known as the F-PROT anti-virus package manufacturer. 1997 was also the year of several scandals between the anti-virus main manufacturers in US and Europe. At the year beginning McAfee has announced that its experts have detected a â€Å"feature† in the antivirus programs of Dr. Solomon, one of its main competitors. The McAfee testimony stated that if the Dr. Solomon's antivirus while scanning detects several virus-types the program switches to the advanced scanning mode. What means that while scanning some uninfected computer the Dr. Solomon's anti-virus operates in the usual mode and switches to the advanced mode – â€Å"cheat mode† according to McAfee – enabling the application to detect the invisible for the usual mode viruses while testing virus collections. Consequently the Dr. Solomon's anti-virus shows both good speed while scanning uninfected disks and good virus detection ability while scanning virus collections. A bit later Dr. Solomon stroked back accusing McAfee of the incorrect advertising campaign. The claims were raised to the text – â€Å"The Number One Choice Worldwide. No Wonder The Doctor's Left Town†. At the same time McAfee was in the court together with Trend Micro, another antivirus software manufacturer, concerning the Internet and e-mail data scanning technology patent violation. Symantec also turned out to be involved in the cause and accused McAfee of using the Symantec codes in the McAfee products. And etc. The year completion by one more noteworthy event related to McAfee-name was marked – McAfee Associates and Network General have declared consolidation into the new born Network Associates company and positioning of their services not only on the anti-virus protection software market, but also on the markets of computer safety universal systems, encryption and network administration. From this the virus and anti-virus history point McAfee would correspond to NAI. 998 The virus attack on MS Windows, MS Office and the network applications does not weaken. There arose new viruses employing still more complex strokes while infecting computers and advanced methods of network-to-computer penetration. Besides numerous the so-called Trojans, stealing Internet access passwords, and several kinds of the latent administration utilities came into the computer world. Several incidents with the infected CDs were revealed – Some computer media publishers distributed CIH and Marburg (the Windows viruses) through CDs attached to the covers of their issues, with infected. The year beginning: Epidemic of the â€Å"Win32. HLLP. DeTroie† virus family, not just infecting Windows32 executed files but also capable to transmit to the â€Å"owner† the information on the computer that was infected, shocked the computer world. As the viruses used specific libraries attached only to the French version of Windows, the epidemic has affected just the French speaking countries. February 1998: One more virus type infecting the Excel tables â€Å"Excel4. Paix† (aka â€Å"Formula. Paix) was detected. This type of a macro virus while rooting into the Excel tables does not employ the usual for the kind of viruses macro area but formulas that proved to be capable of the self-reproduction code accommodation. February – March 1998: â€Å"Win95. HPS† and â€Å"Win95. Marburg† – the first polymorphous Windows32-viruses were detected and furthermore they were â€Å"in-the-wild†. The anti-virus programs developers had nothing to do but rush to adjust the polymorphous viruses detecting technique, designed so far just for DOS-viruses, to the new conditions. March 1998: â€Å"AccessiV† – the first Microsoft Access virus was born. There was no any boom about that (as it was with â€Å"Word. Concept† and â€Å"Excel. Laroux† viruses) as the computer society already got used to that the MS Office applications go down thick and fast. March 1998: The â€Å"Cross† macro-virus, the first virus infecting two different MS Office applications – Access and Word, is detected. Hereupon several more viruses transferring their codes from one MS Office application to the other have emerged. May 1998 – The â€Å"RedTeam† virus infects Windows EXE-files and dispatches the infected files through Eudora e-mail. June 1998 – The â€Å"Win95. CIH† virus epidemic at the beginning was mass, then became global and then turned to a kind of computer holocaust – quantity of messages on computer networks and home personal computers infection came to the value of hundreds if not thousands pierces. The epidemic beginning was registered in Taiwan where some unknown hacker mailed the infected files to local Internet conferences. Therefrom virus has made the way to USA where through the staff oversight infected at once several popular Web servers that started to distribute infected game programs. Most likely these infected files on game servers brought about this computer holocaust that dominated the computer world all the year. According to the â€Å"popularity† ratings the virus pushed â€Å"Word. CAP† and â€Å"Excel. Laroux† to second cabin. One should also pay attention to the virus dangerous manifestation – depending on the current date the virus erased Flash BIOS what in some conditions could kill motherboard. August 1998: Nascence of the sensational â€Å"BackOrifice† (â€Å"Backdoor. BO†) – utility of latent (hacker's) management of remote computers and networks. After â€Å"BackOrifice† some other similar programs – â€Å"NetBus†, â€Å"Phase† and other – came into being. Also in August the first virus infecting the Java executed files – â€Å"Java. StangeBrew† – was born. The virus was not any danger to the Internet users as there was no way to employ critical for the virus replication functions on any remote computer. However it revealed that even the Web servers browsers could be attacked by viruses. November 1998: â€Å"VBScript. Rabbit† – The Internet expansion of computer parasites proceeded by three viruses infecting VisualBasic scripts (VBS files), which being actively used in Web pages development. As the logical consequence of VBScript-viruses the full value HTML-virus (â€Å"HTML. Internal†) was born to life. Virus-writers obviously turned their efforts to the network applications and to the creation of full value Network Worm-Virus that could employ the MS Windows and Office options, infect remote computers and Web-servers or/and could aggressively replicate itself through e-mail. The anti-virus manufacturers world was also considerably rearranged. In May 1998 Symantec and IBM announced the union of their forces on the anti-virus market. The collective product would be under the Norton Anti-Virus trade mark distributed and the IBM Anti-Virus (IBMAV) program is liquidated. Response of the main competitors, Dr. Solomon and NAI (former McAfee), followed immediately. They issued the press-releases offering the IBM product users to promotionally replace the dead anti-virus with their own products. Less then one month later Dr. Solomon â€Å"committed suicide†. The