Saturday, December 5, 2009

Mary Kay




Mary Kay was founded in 1963 by Mary Kay Ash. Mary Kay Ash had been working in the direct selling business for 25 years and was tired of seeing men continually be promoted and paid higher rates than women. Because of this, she decided to make her own company which focused on women’s success. Her natural choice: women’s beauty products.



The Mary Kay product line features a vast array of different products. They especially feature products for skin care, anti-aging and makeup. In addition there is sun care, perfumes and fragrances and a Men’s line. Mary Kate is in over 35 countries all over the world with over 1.8 million people involved, including 36,000 Consultants and 500 Directors. Mary Kay has had double-digit sales growth annually ever since their creation in 1963. Dallas Texas is the location of the corporate headquarters, and they have two facilities in Dallas and in China. They do not test on animals and their scientists spend $1 million annually over 300,000 tests to perfect their products and maintain product integrity.


Even though Mary Kay rocks the direct selling world, they are not just about the money. They have many charitable causes including an anti-violence program for women and children called Break The Cycle. They also donate large sums of money towards finding a cure for many types of female cancers. Their green initiatives has them planting over 200,000 trees every year.
Mary Kay’s compensation plan was a bit difficult to find. There are three levels straight with Independent Beauty Consultant, Sales Director and National Sales Director. Consultants are paid when they recruit new consultants and through product sales. They also receive bonuses on the wholesale of the amounts of themselves and their team members. One of the highest bonuses awarded is a highly sought-after new vehicle. This must be reasonably attainable goal as I have personally seen a number of these vehicles in my own town.

Well-liked but Mary Kay is that they are well known company with amazing products. What you may not like, is that since most people have heard about this opportunity before the potential for growth for recruiting standpoint is not that great. My opinion is that movie were more difficult to sell the opportunity and much easier to sell products.
Most women recruit into their Mary Kay business by hosting parties or shows where they showcase the products and also mention the opportunity involved. This type of recruiting can be very easy for some but can be challenging for the person that doesn’t like to get up in front of people or perhaps doesn’t know that many people. It may not be duplicated below for that person who doesn’t like to present at meetings. This may limit the amount of income that can be made.


Mary Kay is absolutely not an MLM scam. They are huge, successful company with many new recruits every year.

Monday, July 20, 2009

Power Play


By Joseph Finder
St. Martin’s Press
$24.95, hardback, 384 pages,

If you liked the movie Die Hard, you’ll love this book.

Jake Landry is a junior executive with California's Hammond Aerospace. He’s a tough guy who knows all about airplane engineering, office politics, and a whole lot more. The new female CEO believes someone in the company is corrupt and asks Jake to accompany her and the rest of the company’s top executives to a remote off-site location for a corporate retreat. This place is so far in the boonies that communication with the outside world is very difficult – and it soon becomes nearly impossible.

Just as in the movie, the executives are taken captive and the only one who can do anything at all to save them is Jake. Their captors want $500 million from the company in order to free them. Jake knows that if they get the money, everyone will be killed. The time has come for action and Jake has hidden talents that make him more than a match for his brutal captors.

The heart-pounding suspense and clever plot twists are enough to feed the adrenaline junkie in any reader. Sure the characters aren’t always fleshed out and Jake turns into a one-man army, but you’ll barely notice as you turn the pages late into the night.

Thursday, June 11, 2009

hard drive died, need to plan ahead.

After about 7 years the continues beating my 120 GB WD finally gave up.

Saturday morning press the power button thinking the computer is in sleep mode. Walk by kitchen to get a cup of coffee... still sleepy. WTF, blue background with deathly font froze on screen. I kick and scream but nothing will bring this coaster back.

I knew that my last backup was about 6 month ago... which would include 2 birthdays, 1 vacation and few other events. Work related file were amount the casualty, but most current project is always on my 2 GB USB drive.

so I look online and realize there LOT of different options anything from docking station, enclosures to Network Attach Storage (NAS). I decided to come up with a backup plan for my home office.

Of course my plan will be limit by the cost.

1) Need to have access from more than one computer
2) Security
3) gotta go with RAID (I'll choose 1; mirror)

I like the idea of BYOD (bring your own disk) so it's possible to upgrade to larger size in the future.

you can google to get all the updated review.

Amazon has full list of different type of NAS.

I am split between 2 "diskless" NAS.

If you want value NAS 2000 ( it was made by Linksys, now "by Cisco").




D-Link's DNS -323, this has been around for a while, with lot of mod since it's running Linux.



for some reason Synology NAS cost a little more (~$100) but they do have nice to use interface and lot of feature bake into this little thing!




I went with Synology, because I really like their firmware that can do lot of things without me knowning my Linux commands.

Friday, June 5, 2009

compare Apple to Palm

actually you can't compare Apple to banana. Apple as a company really does kick butt.

But I must say I just handle the Pre @ Best Buy, I must say... watchout iPhone! I took some photo but my Treo 800w camera couldn't do this smart phone justification.

Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Lessons learned from Bird flu and now Swine flu

Some timeline on Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome 1st case was discovered in Winter 2002, but nobody outside out Chinese government knew of outbreak. It's not until February 2003 http://www.who.int/ was notified. The economic impact of this epidemic toll on Asia some estimated at $11 billion (World Bank).



I remember people were canceling trips to Asia (40% of flight were canceled). And I heard lot of comment on the street regard to the colorful surgical facemask people wears in Asia. It comes in all kind of size and color...

Back to present day, I'm not making fun of those masks, now the outbreak of Swine flu (H1N1) is inside the U.S (CDC) boarder. I have heard Home Depot, Walgreens in the effected area (see google map) are selling out those surgical mask.

Of course the death toll of H1N1 has not reach the speed or the spread of H5N1 (media??) but if we do not taking a drastic step and react to this "outbreak" things may get even worst(by the media??). This will effect the already WEAKEN economic. Talk about "The Wold is Flat" (yes I'm reading Thomas Friedman's book, will have blog about it later).

The sales have plunged for pork producers around the world. Egypt began slaughtering its roughly 300,000 pigs on Wednesday, even though no cases have been reported there. WHO says eating pork is safe, but Mexicans have even cut back on their beloved greasy pork tacos.


Reference:
An archive article of business week 2003 on SARS
Google's experimental Flu Trends for Mexico (there is also one for United Stats).


I'll return with more link soon... after I buy my mask from a local drug store.

Sunday, April 26, 2009

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Serp Rank.

Monday, April 20, 2009

Larry vs the Sun


Larry Ellison has decided to take over the Sun. This is totally like the way ninja would execute this buyout, right under the big blue (IBM). After weeks of speculation of IBM buying out Sun, which failed to produce a result, today Oracle have swept in and bought Sun. The deal is valued at approximately $7.4 billion, or $5.6 billion net of Sun's cash and debt, with Oracle buying Sun at $9.50 per share.

"The acquisition of Sun transforms the IT industry, combining best-in-class enterprise software and mission-critical computing systems," said Oracle CEO Larry Ellison. "Oracle will be the only company that can engineer an integrated system - applications to disk - where all the pieces fit and work together so customers do not have to do it themselves. Our customers benefit as their systems integration costs go down while system performance, reliability and security go up."


Appearly, the Board of Directors of Sun Microsystems has unanimously approved the transaction. I wonder what this means for Java developers. Are Oracle better owners of Sun than IBM? It's good for Solaris, does it have any effect on Java?

this remind me to review numbers of book on/about Larry... so much to read in so little time.

Friday, April 10, 2009

Book Review: Lone Survivor - The eyewitness account of operation redwing and the lost heroes of SEAL team 10

Taking a break from the biz related book. This book made me appreciate what our folks in the military do day in and day out for us. Also gives you great insight into how the media has changed the ways wars are fough and for the worse in my opinion. We need to hear more stories like this. I realize "human rights" and "rules of engagement," is senstive subject, but should the war time solider be held at same regard that on the battlefield? WE all owed a debt of gratitude from a nation who remains free because of their sacrifice.


Title: Lone Survivor - The eyewitness account of operation redwing and the lost heroes os SEAL team 10
Author: Marcus Luttrell (Author), Patrick Robinson (Contributor)
Publish Year: May 1, 2008

I don't want to give out too much plot, but WHAT'S UP with the communication when the team need extraction?! Some reviewer say the story was one-sided... so WHAT ....bad guys are shooting at them and there is no place to run (or take cover)! The store begin in SEAL training in Coronado, CA and some background on lone survivor, Marcus Luttrell. Once the action start you may not want to put the book down, it's one hell of the fight.

From the book:

Four US Navy SEALS departed one clear night in early July, 2005 for the mountainous Afghanistan-Pakistan border for a reconnaissance mission. Their task was to document the activity of an al Qaeda leader rumored to have a small army in a Taliban stronghold. Five days later, only one of those Navy SEALS made it out alive. Marcus Luttrell. This is his story.

Petty Officer Marcus Luttrell joined the United States Navy in March of 1999 and became a combat-trained Navy SEAL in January, 2002. After serving in Baghdad, he was deployed to Afghanistan in the Spring of 2005. He was awarded the Navy Cross for combat heroism in 2006 by President Bush.










The main characters:

Lt.Michael P. Murphy, USN, 29, of Patchogue, second in command of a platoon from SEAL Delivery Vehicle Team 1 (SDVT-1), Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.

Gunner’s Mate 2nd Class Danny P. Dietz, 25, of Littleton, Colorado from SEAL Delivery Vehicle Team 2 (SDVT-2), Virginia Beach, Virginia.

Sonar Technician (Surface) 2nd Class Matthew G. Axelson, 29, of Cupertino, California from SDVT-1, Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Known to his colleagues as "Axel."

Hospital Corpsman 2nd Class Marcus Luttrell, USN, from SEAL Team 10 (ST-10), Virginia Beach, Virginia

RESCUERS KILLED ON CHINOOK HELICOPTER

160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment AgeHometown
Staff Sgt. Shamus O. Goare29Danville, Ohio.
Chief Warrant Officer Corey J. Goodnature35Clarks Grove, Minn.
Sgt. Kip A. Jacoby21Pompano Beach, Fla.
Sgt. 1st Class Marcus V. Muralles33Shelbyville, Ind.
Master Sgt. James W. Ponder III36Franklin, Tenn.
Maj. Stephen C. Reich34Washington Depot, Conn.
Sgt. 1st Class Michael L. Russell31Stafford, Va.
Chief Warrant Officer Chris J. Scherkenbach40Jacksonville, Fla.
Navy Seals

Chief Petty Officer Jacques J. Fontan36New Orleans
Senior Chief Petty Officer Daniel R. Healy36 Exeter, N.H.
Lt. Cmdr. Erik S. Kristensen33San Diego
Petty Officer 1st Class Jeffery A. Lucas33Corbett, Ore.
Lt. Michael M. McGreevy Jr.30Portville, N.Y.
Petty Officer 2nd Class Eric S. Patton22 Boulder City, Nev.
Petty Officer 2nd Class James Suh28 Deerfield Beach, Fla.
Petty Officer 1st Class Jeffrey S. Taylor30Midway, W.Va.
SOURCE: Department of Defense

I salute these guys for their amazing courage and will power.


Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Automatic Wealth: The Six Steps to Financial Independence

Title: Automatic Wealth: The Six Steps to Financial Independence
Author: Michael Masterson
Publication Year: 2006

Most (good) books on wealth-building will advocate spending less than you earn and investing the difference from a young age. This is tried-and-true advice, and many of the people who follow this advice are comfortably well-off. Personally I think it's safe way to live... nothing wrong but little boring.

Michael Masterson’s Automatic Wealth also advocates saving, but beyond this he makes a bold claim: It doesn’t take 30 years of scrimping to be financially independent; he can teach you how to do it in 7 to 15 years! Michael's time table is reasonable... not sure about buying one rental property per year sounds too much like the "dollar cost average". Also I'm not sure if I want to keep lot'O cash at home or keep gold! I guess if this was 1930's I would. And "flipping" real estate is probably a no no in 2009.



I skipped part of 2-3 mostly for newbies, chapter 5 I skipped on picking the stocks.

Here are the 6 steps:
1. Recognizing reality - you won't get rich saving 10% or more in your pension plan or getting measly salary increases.
2. Plan to become wealthy - This is occurs one step at a time and requires planning.
3. Develop specific wealthy habits - basic stuff
4. Radically increase your income - Rental should yield 10%
5. Get rich while you sleep - by receiving passive income
6. Retire early - to live the lifestyle you want

Masterson believes one's primary goal is to accumulate enough capital to generate passive income to pay for life's necessities.... start with side-business, than move onto bigger things.
I forgot which chapter when Masterson talks about "pay your self first" I was smiling and thinking of the same thing.

Friday, March 27, 2009

BOOK REVIW: Rich Dad, Poor Dad aka. My Daddy is richer than your Dad

Book Title: Rich Dad, Poor Dad: What the Rich Teach Their Kids About Money--That the Poor and Middle Class Do Not!
Author: Robert
Kiyosaki & Sharon Lechter
Publication Year: 2000


Whether Rich Dad Poor Dad is fiction or not, there are valuable business principles can learn and apply.

The book is pretty easy to read and understand. The "story" begins
Kiyosaki's childhood and how he and his best friend start to make money (wish I was that smart). It wasn't that simple of course =) The book highlights the attitudes toward money, work and life of the two adult male he admirer (the two dads). The attitude surrounding YOU does make a big difference, one of the key Robert stress is the importance of teaching a child positive thinking related money... rich is not (all) evil. Too bad the educational system does not teach financial literacy at a young agr.


I really enjoy the simplicity Robert brings to light of liability vs asset. I'm guess the author means until you paid off the bank it's a
liability to you... I love the fact there are many opposition against Robert's thinking. Which is another reason why I love this book. It give you that fresh air, a perspective that the "expert" big-shot firm financial adviser don't (or don't want you to have?).




some of the quotes from the book:
"The poor and middle class work for money. The rich have money work for them."

"Pay yourself first"
--Robert quote from another book "The Richest Man in Babylon" (I'll review this later).

Where is the "plan"? Some reader were disappoint by lack of workable plan in the book, but I kind of like the idea that YOU come up with your own action plans. Everyone has and see different opportunity for example Robert found success in real estate. Does this mean that you should go and stand outside of the courthouse? it's up to you.

I took away some financial IQ and going off to found this Cashflow board game, LOL. It'll be a big hit @ my next party!


Update: Thanks to books.google.com you can read Rich dad, poor dad preview here. Enjoy
Here is John T Reed's take on Kiyosaki. You gotta read both side of the story :-)

Reading is fun!

I'll use this useless space to blog about things I read. I ain't into spelling or grammar hell this ain't no English class! But I sure like to read. I'll start writing about business related books since I enjoy them the most and later move into non-fiction.