So who will be in the Final? well I’m not sure, I haven’t picked beyond 4 because it’s tough.  My dream scenario would be England v Argentina because of the implications; who could forget the hand of God? or the best solo play ever? Just imagine how awesome it would be if they meet in the finals with Maradona as coach.

Now the more likely final scenario for me would be Brazil v Argentina, I really want Spain to win it all, but for some reason I don’t see them being able to get there.  It’s just that the South Americans have so much football history that they are the natural favorites.  In under a month we’ll see if my picks pan out and I will probably update my final pick once I see the first few games.

In any case here are my world cup picks:

I hope you all enjoy the month-long football event as much as I will enjoy it!

-Background image based on picture courtesy of Shine 2010

This situation is just another example of how “social” is changing the way businesses deal with the customer experience. For the last five years or so, the emergence of social tools like facebook, twitter, digg and the now-less-relevant myspace, has enabled people to have a stronger voice. All of the sudden people can voice their concerns, complaints and preferences to an audience that may or may not agree with them. This is the “new” word-of-mouth, same concept as before just faster, louder and therefore more effective. This kind of empowerment has increased people’s sense of entitlement. People feel more than ever that companies must treat them with more respect.

The question raised in class was whether the whole situation was to “punish” Boeing or just a publicity stunt by Harry’s father… or both.  I don’t think John (Harry’s dad), or the people involved in one way or another, want(ed) to put Boeing back in line per se. I believe that they expected a friendlier customer experience from Boeing, or any company for that matter. It’s hard to determine if John intended to use the situation as free publicity, but the situation sure fits what his company offers. He created content and engaged the community the right way to create a buzz, enough to get the New York Times interested in the issue. The way the issue developed definitely helped him promote his image and his company indirectly.

As for the other questions raised in class (would you change airlines? and would airlines boycott Boeing?), I don’t think they are too relevant. First, Boeing’s action wouldn’t make me or a normal people switch airlines to ones who do not use Boeing planes. I do not feel offended by their action and finding other airlines would cost too much of my time, more than my perceived benefits. Second, airlines have limited options when it comes to airplane suppliers, limited options means that there’s not much airlines are willing to do to “support” a boycott. Harry’s issue is trivial when compared to the issue of changing airplane suppliers; however it would be interesting to look at the issues again if more people around the world support Harry.

Whether we like or not, as consumers or businesses, the barriers separating customers from the corporate world have shrunken. However, we should understand that as customers we can’t get everything we want; and as businesses we can no longer treat customers the way we’ve been doing for the last fifty years.

• That insurers should accept customers who have preexisting conditions.
• Children can be under their parents’ insurance up to 26 instead of 21.
• No Lifetime cap.

I do understand that they cost money, however I do not mind paying a reasonable amount of money to have them.  Just as there are things that I like about the HCR (Health Care Reform) there are things that I do not like.  Many of the things that I’m against have been put in place to finance the operation i.e. everyone must have health insurance or else; penalties for employers who do not offer basic health care plans; etc.  Economically they make sense, it is a form to pay for health care without raising taxes directly.  However, it limits the options that a citizen has… it is in essence limiting the citizen’s freedom to choose.  This issue is being raised by many states (including my home state of Florida) who question the constitutionality of the new law.  Personally I think that the Supreme court will rule in favor of the bill.  Why? because they will see the current suit as a political move –plain ‘ol propaganda.  However, I see more suits down the road where they will bring a legitimate argument to the table and challenge specific sections of the bill rather than attacking it as a whole.  At least that’s what I expect/want to happen.

I went with two guests and we were escorted to our table within a minute, but it took them about 10 minutes to return to ask us about our drinks. We might have been an exception since some other guests got their waters almost immediately, but for some reason they “forgot” about us.

After we ordered, we got our salads and soup (for me), one of the guests found a piece of plastic on his salad, and we didn’t event get an apology.

The main dishes arrived fairly quick after we ordered (about 15-20 min), and we also got our water approximately 30 min after being seated. The food itself was alright, I’ve had better sushi than the one I had there. I had a “Matsu” (6pc sashimi and california roll), I replaced the roll with their “Ultimate Roll”. In addition my guests had the “Volcano Roll” and the “Lego My Ego Roll”. I tried a roll from each of my guests and I have to say that the Volcano was alright, a little too sweet for my taste but good, the Lego My Ego was alright, I wouldn’t order it again. My dish, the sushi was good but the fish didn’t seem as fresh and a bit too much wasabi which overpowered the taste of the fish. The Ultimate roll was supposed to have spicy mayo (which I didn’t feel), it also felt too sweet for my taste.

The dessert, fried cheesecake, was probably the best part of the night.

This place didn’t blow me away and I wouldn’t consider it a top-tier restaurant let alone a top-tier Japanese restaurant. I don’t think I was the only one that came in by good word-of-mouth, but left disappointed. An older couple sat beside us and they complained from the start until they left and with good reason. They didn’t get what they ordered and were charged for things they didn’t ordered. In addition another group of people were discussing rolls that appeared on their check when they didn’t have them.

Would I go again? maybe, if someone invites me, but I would try to suggest other places instead.

Summer School

During this semester (summer 09) I’ve been using this playlist to study and write papers for my financial analysis and marketing research classes.  I like these songs because they are very relaxing and they don’t disturb my studies, with them I actually read for longer periods of time.

Work

Well this playlist for work might seem awkward to some, but these songs give me the feeling, the energy to work.  I must say that a lot of these songs where introduced to me by someone else, I don’t think I would have heard them otherwise.

I’m currently working on a winter playlist so if anyone has a great tune to share let me know, I would like to hear.

The film opens with a big sequence that sets up the story and the tone for the rest of the movie and it also kick starts the introduction of our main characters. In fact most of the characters are introduced by the half hour point where the movie suddenly shifts gears and takes us inside the U.S.S. Enterprise.

I feel that Abrams’ and his team did a great job casting all the characters, again I do not know anything about Star Trek, but the actors sure knew how to act. But I have to single out our two main characters James T. Kirk and Spock. Both characters back stories where well written and well acted on screen.

I specially liked how Zachary Quinto’s Spock portrays the conflict he is dealing with for being half human and half vulcan. There are scenes in which I really felt the pain and anger Spock was experiencing, yet he seemed calmed and logical as well. I found the portrayal very interesting and I think that Spock is a good opposite for Kirk’s character.

Kirk is played by Chris Pine, who I’ve never heard of before this movie, and he does an incredible job. I liked Kirk’s arrogance, wittiness and overall badassery. One can feel that Kirk knows he is the best of all of them and he sure demonstrates he is.

Not only did I find the cast good but the film’s cinematography is also outstanding, I loved the realistic feel the film had. Quite the opposite of the latest Star War movies where everything seems “too clean” and CGIish. The film goes by fast for a two hour long movie, an indicator that the film as a whole is entertaining and that there are no scenes that feel out of place or dull.

One of the things that I found really interesting is the way the movie kind of acknowledges the Star Trek that most people know and yet this movie clearly lets us know that this is a reboot to the franchise.

However there are some flaws. First and foremost the romantic scenes between two characters, which I thought where OK at first but where kind of annoying and over the top as the film went on. The second flaw is something I thought could have been better and that is the antagonist, captain Nero. Nero’s character does have a good story but Nero himself has little screen time and he didn’t really feel that threatening. Maybe with some more screen time Nero would have come across as more of a villain than he did.

I think that this movie will be a success worldwide and it will probably be the best if not one of the best movies this summer. I personally hope Terminator Salvation is as good if not better than this movie, but that might be tough, we will find out in a couple of weeks. Star Trek is definitely worth the price of admission and I think that it deserves a solid 4 out of 5 star rating.

I went online to try to get some info on this P90X thing and all I could find was infomercial crap and some youtube videos of people’s transformations using the program. I said to myself “heck, got nothing to lose” and got the P90X Extreme Home Fitness with Tony Horton – DVD set @ Amazon. I have to admit I was very skeptical about the P90X program, but to my surprise it is really intense.

So far I’ve been on the program for 30 days and I feel very good both mentally and physically. My actual weight has not gone down dramatically (~7 lbs) but I attribute this to my decision of not following the program’s dietary strategy. I do know that the diet plan will help me shred more weight that the just the exercise routines, but it is really difficult for me to adhere to the plan. Anyhow I must say that I still have to master all the routines, ab-ripper, plyometrics and core synergistics are IMO a bitch, the rest of the routines I can manage well. From all the routines that come on the DVD set (12 routines in all) my favorite ones are: Kempo-X, Yoga-X and Cardio-X.

I have to say that I’m very happy with the program and there seems to be a lot of community support on the internet. For instance when I started tweeting about my P90X experience, other fellow users replied back offering help and support. I have to say though, some of them where actually “spamming”, but others where real people, interested in only helping. I’ll try to make posts when I reach days 60 and 90 to document my progress. I really want to reach my goal this year, lets see if P90X can help me reach it, as Tony Horton would say bring it! I know I’m up for it.

Some bloggers who document their P90X journey:

• Chris Fehnel
• Mike Stickel
• Orlando Saez

Work

I resigned from my previous job on October 2007 and spent a little over 4 months unemployed.  In February 2008 Alienware corp. came knocking on my door asking if I wanted to take a temporary opportunity with them.  After a skills test and some interviews I was hired to start working right away.  The first week was very awkward since I wasn’t really told what my role was in the company, but after the second week I had a clear task which was that of working on a foundation for the new Alienware site.  By foundation I mean making templates, CSS and javascript for the new site based on mockups that they had.

After studying their site structure back then I decided to take the new site in another direction, I wanted to implement the use of both CSS and javascript frameworks.  My choice was met with skepticism but ultimately I was allowed to do a lot of the front-end development as I pleased.  After a month and a half of work more team members started working on the site as well, at which point, things started to get out of my control and although the end result is not exactly what I imagined, a lot of my original concepts made it to the end.

After the new site was launched my role with the company became a question mark again.  After talking with the director of our department and more skills test I was assigned the role of Flash UI developer as a full-time employee.  That meant that from then on I would have to work mostly on ActionScript 3, something I’ve never used before, but thanks to my computer science background I was able to pick up quicklly.

In my eyes the biggest accomplishment so far, at Alienware, was working on their new site.  The second biggest accomplishment was a little project that came out of one of our team meetings and its called AlienSurface.  AlienSurface is Alienware’s wallpaper maker which allows people to make wallpapers with Alienware assets right on their browser.  It was a project that took me a little over two months from the moment of conception to final release.  I wish I could be able to work on it to fix some bugs and improve it but unfortunately I have not been allowed to go back to it due to other projects on my plate.

School

After two years out of college I decided to go back to work on my MBA degree.  I started one of FIU’s MBA program in the summer of 2008 and so far I’m really enjoying the program.  I must say that It is not all good though, there are some things that I really don’t like but they are out of my hands.

The first thing is online classes, they really annoy me.  I feel that there is hardly any interaction with my other peers and the professor(s), I think that the whole point of an MBA program is to work in teams.  Working in teams is what a person would most than likely encounter in the real world, the lack of interaction really brings down the class to just a pass the exam type of mentality which is not good in my opinion.  The counter argument that the school brings up all the time is the lack of funds to have real classes (at least in the summer) which is a good argument.  But nonetheless I’m not happy with the decision of having online classes in the curriculum at all.

The second thing that really annoys me is the attitude of some of the students in the program.  I shouldn’t be judging them but there are some students who are just there to pass and “get a raise”.  I personally think they bring the rest of the students down.  Moreover when one has to work with them in team projects, they don’t contribute as much as other team members. I must say that most of the teams I’ve worked on have members who are eager to go far and beyond the task we are given, but I’ve had teams in which half the team doesn’t really care about the outcome.

Misc

In 2008 I also tried to get myself more involved with technology gatherings like FOWA Miami 2008, Ruby Enthusiast meetings and web development meetings.  However I definitely have to attend more of these events since the amount of talent in South Florida is growing and I want to be part of it.

What I Missed

There are some things I wanted to accomplish last year but couldn’t for various reasons.  One of them was getting a new car,  I already have a somewhat new car (’07 model) but I wanted a newer one (I’m so shallow, I know).  The second thing is that I wanted to develop a better source of passive income, unfortunately due to my busy schedule and some lazyness on my part I wasn’t able to achieve this goal.  These two goals are now one of the highest priorities for this year, so lets see what happens.  I think 2009 will be a very exciting year for me, at least it’s been exciting so far.   How was your 2008 and what are you looking forward to do in 2009?

This world has been evolving rapidly for the last century, yet we have not been able to solve some of the basic issues that we’ve had for centuries.  Poverty is defined as:

deprivation, the denial of access to those things which make a life of dignity possible, including not only food, shelter and safe drinking water, but also such as ‘intangibles’ as the opportunity to learn, to engage in meaningful employment or to enjoy the respect of one’s fellow …
(poverty wiki entry).

It has existed almost as long as human kind has been walking around this earth.  Poverty is a disease, it is an abnormal condition for a human being to be in.  It is a condition that I don’t necessarily understand why it happens or why it only affects certain individuals.

In my mind I strongly believe that every person in this planet is born with the same capabilities of being successful.  However there is evidence that proves me wrong, some individuals in this world are born into unfavorable positions, about 6 percent of American children that are born into poverty make it out.  The condition of poverty is similar to every person in the world who is experiencing it, it does not matter religion, race or geographic location.

So why do I think its an epidemic?

1. Almost half the world (around 3 billion people) live in poverty.1
2. Child poverty rates have increased in the US and around the globe.2
3. Poverty indirectly causes death and other diseases.

So how can we cure this disease?  As with many other diseases I don’t think there is a cure to wipe out this disease out of this world.  What we could do is try to bring it under control and help as much people as possible.  As I stated earlier I don’t understand every detail about poverty, so I cant give a full solution to the problem.  In my opinion the problem is of such a large magnitude and complexity that it requires a great deal of smart people to come up with some kind of solution that is both efficient and fair to everyone.  However a good starting point will be to rely less on the governments, more often than not governments come up with inefficient solutions and they execute their plans poorly.

In addition each government in this world has it’s own agenda and poverty is not on the top of the list.  That is why I believe private individuals and/or entities should take the initiative to try to reduce poverty.  There are multiple methods of  helping currently available like contributing to foundations such as UNICEF.  Other ways to help is by sponsoring or contributing towards scholarships for children who cannot afford education.

I know a lot of people already try helping using these methods, but I believe the number of people that can/should help can be increased dramatically.  But for the numbers to increase there must be some kind of motivation.  Some sources of motivation are already in place such as celebrities campaigning and goverments providing tax breaks.  However I think that both the celebrities and governments should rethink the way they do things.  They should try to come up with ways to attract a wider audience or to make a bigger impact on the population.

If we, those who are capable of giving, do not change our mindsets poverty will never be controlled or erradicated.  So today I invite you to learn more about poverty and visit Blog Action Day 2008 to read what others are saying about poverty.

So are we on an economic depression/recession? The National Bureau of Economic Research defines a recession as “a significant decline in economic activity spread across the economy, lasting more than a few months, normally visible in real GDP, real income, employment, industrial production, and wholesale-retail sales.“  By looking at the current situation my best bet is that we are heading into one if we have not already started going down that path.  I can already hear some friends blasting me for my claim, however facts are facts, the whole economy has been slowing down.  However the trend does not surprise me, if we look at the history of  business cycles, we can see that every ten or so years this country experiences a recession.  The last recession was in 2001 so next one should be around the corner, however there are some recessions that are just felt harder than others and this time around I believe it is coming down hard.

Now the whole point of this post is not to analyze the situation to see if we are or not in a recession.  I’m also not interested in discussing why the current situation happened.  I see enough finger pointing and I just can’t bring myself to put the blame on a single entity or a group.  What I want to discuss is what we should do from now on.

The current theme of this electoral race is “CHANGE”.  Both candidates claim that they can bring change to this country and people claim to like/want change.  However deep down I feel that people don’t really understand what change really implies.  I don’t think people realize that this country needs more from them to start a change of direction than just voting for their favorite idol.  In my opinion President John F. Kennedy said it best “Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country”.

So what needs to change? for starters our attitude, we have to stop waiting for the government to take care of our problems.  People need to be accountable for their actions.  I firmly believe that if people where to think before acting a lot problems would be avoided.  However, some times things just seem too good to be true and instinct overpowers reason, which might result in a non desirable outcome down the road.  If the outcome is good we would usually give ourselves a pat in the back; if the outcome just bad, we will blame others and try to seek help from others to take us out of the hole.  I’m not against seeking help but we should not expect to be bailed out by others, we got ourselves in the problem we should get out by our own means.

At the same time we should also change our spending behaviors.  We are a country that lives far beyond their means and warning signs have been up for years (read Proof:Americans living beyond means).  I know some people will claim that this country is driven by spending and I will not disagree with that, however we should be smart buyers/spenders.  What I mean by smart buyer/spender is that we should buy accordingly to our means and our purchases should be comprised by the right balance of assets and liabilities.  The average person’s main or only “asset” is their home which in reality also carries a liability even if its paid off.  The smart buyer should acquire other assets that are more liquid than a home, such as stocks, bonds and/or shares at small/medium businesses.  By doing this you are distributing your eggs in many baskets with different levels of risk, return and liquidity.  All that can be done while at the same time spending the rest of your money on liabilities (cars, trips, etc), albeit at a smaller degree for some time.  One easy way to start moving in that direction is by setting up both short term and long term goals, as well as having a plan of where you would like to be by the time you retire.

Lastly a single person cannot change the 200 plus years of history of this country in 4 or 8 years.  In addition a single person cannot change the agendas of a party or parties, so it is false that the next president will be able to change as much as he pleases; it is just not possible to get everyone on board for these “changes”.  So if we want change in Washington, we the people have to bring the change.  The people of this country should be more involved in all political matters all the time, not just 90 days before election day.  We have to keep our representatives in Washington checked, we must make sure that they do what we the people want, not what the few want.

I’m just sick of the current situation, fortunately theres only a couple more weeks left on the election front and then comes the real deal… cleaning the US of A.

UPDATE:

Ramit Sethi from the I Will Teach You To Be Rich blog just wrote a post, The Truth: What Obama and McCain wont tell you about your money, talking about some things that neither presidential candidate will tell the American people about the economic situation and their money.  There are some points that he covers that I would like to share:

Not all homeowners deserve to stay in their houses.
Renting is a perfectly reasonable alternative, but the idea of Americans “losing their houses” is politically untenable. Why? Because America perpetuates a mistaken culture of homeownership. Our parents tell us to buy a house. Our friends are impressed if we own a house in our twenties. The government literally encourages us to own a house by offering tax deductions. Homeownership is the American Dream! The truth is, if you’re making the largest purchase of your life, you need more than a slogan — you need to take the responsibility to do some research. (And note that you can’t advocate for increased homeownership and also argue for Americans to keep their houses. By not reducing the prices, younger people cannot buy houses at these inflated prices.)

…

Taxes: Pandering to ordinary Americans instead of telling them to stop spending on stupid stuff
The reason Obama and McCain spent so much time talking about taxes is that most Americans are historically horrible at managing their spending. Since they make a fixed amount of money (revenue) and can control only one thing (costs), both politicans use tax breaks to pander to voters. Most people have never seriously thought about how to make more money. Fine. But what’s even more outrageous is Obama and McCain’s complete lack of honesty about what people really need to do to weather the economic crisis. Did you hear either one plainly say, “You’re going to need to buckle down and save more?” Of course not. You might as well walk into a Dave Ramsey seminar and argue that credit cards are a useful tool. It’s a suicidal suggestion. But it’s true.

…

Americans don’t know how to be frugal — yet
Things will get more expensive. Taxes will eventually go up. They have to. Costs of ordinary goods will go up. They always do. If you’re expecting it to get easier, you’re wrong. The key is to make more money and cut your costs. Sadly, Americans are poorly versed in being frugal. You think it makes sense to buy a new car every few years? You think it’s normal to eat out 5 times per week (lunch and dinner)? You feel good about yourself for ordering water when you go to a restaurant, but you blew $50,000 because you didn’t take the time to understand your mortgage? You’re not frugal. But a few more years of an economy like this and things just might change.

These points are an expansion of the things that I believe are wrong with Americans and that NEED to CHANGE before we can get out of our current economic situation.