Twitter and Facebook: The Love story

There has been a subtle beef between heavy twitter and heavy Facebook users. By heavy I mean addicted or very consistent.
On Facebook a lot of things happen that won't likely happen on Twitter eg.
1. Someone updating his/her status and liking it. That's like tweeting and #GBAMing it yourself.
2. Someone seeing a negative post like 'My uncle is sick' and liking it. That's like seeing a negative tweet and #GBAMing it.
3. A girl posting a perfectly ugly picture and a dude saying "baby gel dis picture is so beauriful, can I have ur number?" On Twitter, she won't even twitpic it.

I believe the twitter eco system is one that encourages people to interact smarter and earn their reputation of having positive retweets (not gbagauns) and high followership (not robots or #teamFollowback) and if you are not smart enough to make sense, show ur cleavage or the whole boobs just like in real life to get attention. And a very important thing , making the most sense with 140 characters. On twitter one also gets to know what's happening around faster and in all one’s 'social' IQ is raised.
On facebook its d reverse, your friends are your friends and stalkers are your friends too whether you like it or not.
A case study is the dbanj story. After his GEJ interview, there was an outcry on twitter for his betrayal so much that dbanj had to stop tweeting, but on facebook he still posted and got a lot of ass kissing comments.
If you are a facebook user reading this I'm not hating or spiting you, its just my honest opinion.
Thanks

And as for the title? had to just think up something.

Strange Love

I'm starting to develop a strange love for my country, one I believe every youth should have. A love for change and the believe things will change. A quote hit me once and says, "if you don't take an interest in politics, it will take an interest in you" I live in a country where a lot of my friends don't have jobs and the few that have are under employed. I run a business and the cost of running it is so high. And I tell myself, if I don't take an interest in the fight for good governance, I'll keep paying the price for bad governance.

I'm encouraging all youth to take a stand, either personally or as a group, join a positive cause, spread the word and do a little extra, having power, good jobs and an enabling environment for business isn't rocket science. Its something we can demand for and get. Its time we raise our voices and hope 'they' hear before we take it to their doorsteps and if you are scared of loosing your life by raising your voice, the probability of dying from bad roads, lack of power, bad health care and insecurity is far higher than your voice being silenced.

Whether we like it or not, our immediate future will be molded by our actions, and its better if you play an active role in its making.
Thanks

If it sounds too good to be true

eThe tortoise once went to the hyena to borrow a pot. He asked for the biggest pot the hyena had and promised to return it two days from that time. The tortoise returned the pot but he also gave the hyena back a smaller pot and told the hyena that his big pot gave birth to the smaller pot while it was at his place. This obviously sounded too good to be true but the hyena accepted the pots. A few days later the tortoise comes back again to borrow a pot, this time the hyena gives him two hoping the pots will probably give birth to twins. Alas the tortoise comes back a few days later looking so dejected and told the hyena that his two pots died a few days before then and he had buried their remains. The hyena was dumbfounded but for him to have believed that pots could deliver other pots left him with no choice but to accept that pots could also die.

Someone once told me “if it sounds too good to be true then it is too good to be true”. A few years ago a lot of financial “investment” companies flooded the country telling people to invest their money and get about 100% profit in a few months if they invite more people. A lot of people fell for this and this typically runs on the pyramid scheme (that has been banned in a lot of countries) and this is a fraudulent scheme in which the perpetrators recruit people to pay money to those above them in a hierarchy on the expectation that they will get payments from those below. When the number of newly recruited people eventually dwindles, the payment structure collapses. This is quite logical because the system will get to a stage that will require the whole world population to be part of the scheme and that is logically impossible. Parallel to this scheme is the Ponzi scheme which is a more cunning and devious scheme. In this scheme people are lured to invest with a promise of huge profits in a short time but the supposed profits are paid to early investors from money actually invested by later participants. The system usually runs for a long period of time as long as new participants keep coming in or the old ones re invest their returns and one of the most recent protagonists of this scheme is Madoff. A lot of investment structures in this country run on either of these schemes or a combination of the two and the recent downturn really revealed a lot in of this even from institutions that we expected a lot from. There’s a saying that one should put one’s money where one’s mouth is. This is true and I will further add that one should also put one’s mouth where one’s money is. Know the business you are investing in and not the figures it is giving. Understand the nature of the business you are investing in and investigate to see if they are running a games on their customers because though a few people make good out of them the majority loose their money on the long run.

The Jewish Success story: A key in wealth creation

Amongst the ethnic groups in the world, some have experienced hostility for no other reason than their racial background a few of note are Africans, Indians and the Jews.

The Jews are the only people in the world who have found hostility in every country in which they settled in any numbers. The big question is - WHY?

Although they have a significantly low population (compared to Africans and indians) they have become the wealthiest ethnic group (per capita) and in America with a population of about 2% they own about 25% of the wealth in America. 139 of the richest 400 Americans are Jewish, including 20 of the richest 50. Those top 20 control some $211.8 billion in personal wealth.

One would beg to ask what the Jews have taught their children and passed on from generations that made them the most feared force in business and economy and also public enemies. The Jews have not changed since the days when Jesus Christ took up a whip and drove "the money changers out of the Temple." Jews have always united to form monopolies. Here are some keys to the Jewish success and in being a successful entrepreneur  

THE SEVEN KEYS TO JEWISH SUCCESS

1. Understand that real wealth is portable; it's knowledge: Knowledge is power and ultimately wealth. ”Do you see a man skillful in his work? He will stand before kings; he will not stand before obscure men”. Its interesting that though the jews are barely 1% of the world population, 1/5 of the recipients of the Nobel laureate are Jews and they are arguably the ethnic group with the highest average IQ.

2. Take care of your own and they will take care of you: In taking care of your own, it doesn’t mean giving fish to a man, that will only go as far as satisfying his immediate need, but the ultimate gift is actually teaching a man how to fish and when he stands on his own he can be of better help to you in future. The Jews hold this principle dearly and will rather help their loved ones learn and become self sufficient than bestow gifts which on the long run undermines the recipients innate abilities.

3. Successful people are professionals and entrepreneurs: Having sound knowledge in a field makes one a professional and the ability to accumulate and retain wealth is hallmark of having a good business. Having either or both of this qualities guarantees legitimate success.

4. Develop your verbal confidence: verbal confidence is key in winning and the only way you can guarantee that your knowledge is efficiently delivered is having good verbal confidence. In essence don’t just practice what you preach, also know how to preach what you practice.

5. Be selectively extravagant but prudently frugal: Be extravagant enough to make a statement but frugal to avoid waste. Waste might be buying a Limo for an event (which will likely go obsolete in a few years) and being frugal is renting the latest Limo which makes a good statement and also saves you good garage space.

6. Take pride in individuality: encourage creativity: A key to success is letting yourself as an individual explore your creativity not conforming to the rule the environment places on you without actually being a rebel. More of thinking outside the box without leaving the box. You need to do things differently to expect a different result.

7. Be psychologically driven to prove something: Albert Einstein a famous Jew and arguably the world’s greatest scientist was driven to prove that other laws governed motion asides the Newtonian (classic) laws. That drew a lot of controversy but today what he proved formed the foundation of modern physics.

Over the years the Jews passed this principles to their generations and that drove them to excel in whatever they put their hands to and even in the face of opposition and near extermination (the holocaust) they still maintained strong determination.

A few famous Jews on the Forbes 400 list of wealthiest Americans are

Larry Ellison (Oracle),

Michael Dell,

Michael Bloomberg

Roman Abramovich (a Russian Jew)

Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook)

Steve balmer (an American of jewish descent)

Google founders (Larry Page and Sergey M. Brin)

Sheldon Adelson

Ralph Lauren

Steven Spielberg

Leonard and Ronald Lauder (Estee lauder cosmetics)

Malcolm Glazer

 

This article was inspired by the teachings of my pastor, ‘Poju Oyemade and facts from wikipedia, forbes.com and other internet sources.

 

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Power – A panacea to our economic problems or almost.

An Italian visitor to our dear country told a friend of mine that we (Nigerians) are hard working but not productive. That was a hard truth so I took a journey into our systems to find the reasons for our unproductivity.
First I went to a government parastatal hoping to find a reason or at least a pointer. On entering I was faced with people doing a lot of paper work, carrying files, filling forms and also looking for documents under piles of files and papers. They were doing everything but intelligent work or what I would call “productive” work. I was so happy when I saw a computer but alas the computer was only used to print more paper for filing and sorting. No wonder most graduates loath working for the government. I thought to myself, at this time and age shouldn’t there be information systems that will simplify communication, use emails instead of memos, analyze data and give the staff an opportunity to work as intelligent workers, using their skills in analyzing information and proffering solutions. The only thing that stood in the way of this grand 21st century ideas is this; to run such elaborate systems one needs computers and network infrastructure but where is the power(electric) to run such systems. Imagine Mr A complaining that there was no power so he couldn’t read the mail sent by his boss. So really paper bottle-necked processes are still the best but sorriest bet. Hence the reason for backwardness and unproductivity isn’t really our mind set but the lack of power to put our minds to work.
I was shocked to discover how many manufacturing companies had left Nigeria and was even more shocked to discover that the few that stayed or came in where the few that had an unfair advantage of monopoly and price control.
I then paid a visit to a private establishment or what I call an “organized” private establishment with the hope of finding a solution since I felt the private sector was naturally more productive. I met a manager not the top-dog though. The following ensued.
Me: How’s business faring?
Manager: Bad
Me: Why?
Manager: you know I don’t use public power to ensure business runs at least 80% of the time?
Me: yes
Manager: do you know how much it costs to buy generators for our national network, maintain them and the worst part fuel them.
Me: Millions?
Manager: in dollars yes, but in naira its billions per year.
Me: wow
Manager: yes, wow. That’s like 500% more than what my counterpart in that West African country next door pays because over there public power is cheaper and more efficient.
Me: True
Manager: and who bears this overhead loss?
Me: Who? I don’t know.
Manager: YOU, yes you. Wonder how?
Me: How?
Manager: I either charge you more or steal out rightly from you and you know I can do that because you don’t read my terms and conditions before using my services.
Me: That’s unfair.
Manager: don’t take it personal, its just business. Then I have to slash salaries, fire more people than I hire and in generally “use” our staff and customers to remain in business.
Me: That’s worse.
Manager: Then I have to increase my salary and do some sharp “runz” too and my boss gets way more because we run generators at home and that cost at least 60,000 Naira monthly to run 12 hours a day.
Me: That’s ridiculous.
Manager: Well you see why we aren’t really after productivity and more profit oriented. And again its just business.
Me: Hmmmm. Thanks.
I stormed out and headed for the place of last resort or so I taught. The bureau for empowering small and medium scale enterprises. I talked to the management and the following ensued.
Me: I feel you (the agency) should be the ones powering the next generation of entrepreneurs and those that will change the economy and lives of citizens of our dear country. Even if the government or the “organised” private sector fails, Graduates and the productive youth should be able to take their destiny in their own hands and forge a way for themselves.
Agency: Yes, true talk and that’s what we are doing exactly.
Me: ok but what’s the problem.
Agency: well we provide them with information, give lectures and support them with little fund. But the ones that actually have ideas that will yield productivity need affordable and constant power supply and those two words don’t come in the same sentence here. Its either “affordable and not constant” or “unaffordable and constant” and the only ones that survive offer services like selling stuff and distribution and that isn’t gonna suffice”. Only the “organized” private sector can do much and you know better on that issue.
I look at myself and wonder how productive I am. I need at least 18 hours of power to work on my business, develop myself and do stuff that will add value to myself. I get barely half of that even on generated power which means for a part of the day I’m almost unproductive.
I asked myself, what does this country rely on for its survival, Oil was the answer. Believe me an economy that depends on a finite resource (Oil) in an infinite system (except the world comes to an end) is heading for a collapse. For the sake of posterity I believe we need a change and change we must else we will invariably suffer the fate of the cockroach.

Fate of the cockroach

A cockroach king once asked himself why the ants kill them and eat them despite the fact that they are stronger, bigerg, more intelligent, faster and can even fly. He wondered why they have to suffer and scamper around looking for food while the ants easily get food, live in castles (anthills), build infrastructure and still overpower them. So he called his aide and decided to form a colony so that they can get food easier and also solve the “ant” problem once and for all.

He called his savant to seek advice and hoped he would get a plan to gather cockroaches together and solve their problems. The savant arrives and after hearing the king speak sighs and asks him, “have you ever seen a group or cockroaches gather together in agreement and with a purpose?” the King says no. The savant replies “as long as nature has made us this way, there’s no way in the world we can be organized”. After barely taking a few steps, he sees yet another cockroach being carried by ants.

Nigeria has been baffled with myriad of challenges and despite the fact that we have the all the resources needed ,we just like the cockroach are faced with the challenge of pulling our forces together. Individually, we are great achievers but if you take a look at what we’ve been able to achieve collectively, it’s nothing compared to what the ants though fragile and small have accomplished. We like the cockroach could boast of our individual strength and ability and or like the ants come together for a much greater purpose of helping ourselves and the community, the choice is ours.

Im back

I was gone for a year now Im back with a jump off. Its been over a year I blogged last and I hope I get back to my blogging mood.