week 4 EOC: There's an app for that!

The app that I came up with is for singers who write their own music, or for anyone who doesn't know how to read notes but wants to convert a melody into notes. Basically, you just record any type of melody from vocals, guitar, or piano, into your phone and the app will pick up the melody and convert it into notes/sheet music for you. I came up with this idea because I myself am a singer but I don’t know how to read notes. I learn everything by ear, which makes it hard for me to write my own music or communicate/play music with other musicians.  This app is a quick and easy way to write music or share your own music with other musicians, so that they can jam with you. After doing some research on my idea, I found that similar apps exist. There are four main apps that I found upon research which are Audio Midi Connect ($2.99), Audio to Midi recorder ($2.99), Magic stave Midi Recorder ($2.99), and SongCatcher (full version: $14.99). As I looked more into the programs and read some reviews, I learned that Magic Stave is the best out of all four apps and it does what it’s meant to do for a reasonable price. Audio to Midi recorded picks up too much excess sound and interferes with the audio. Audio Midi Connect got mixed reviews but most reviews said that it’s too slow and it crashes. Lastly, SongCatcher got the worst reviews because it barely picks up any sound, but surprisingly it was the most expensive out of all the apps of its type. If I were to create this app, I would want it to be free of glitches/crashes so that the customer can actually put the app to use and enjoy writing music. 

Week 3 EOC: My Demographics

“Demography is the study of human populations in terms of size, density, location, age, gender, race, occupation, and other statistics. The demographic environment is of major interest to marketers because it involves people, and people make up markets. The world population is growing at an explosive rate. It now exceeds 6.8 billion people and will grow to more than 8 billion by the year 2030.⁵ The world’s large and highly diverse population poses both opportunities and challenges.” (Armstrong & Kotler (2011). Marketing: An Introduction, 10th Ed. Prentice Hall Publishing, page 71) The demographic group that I belong in, is called the Millennials. The Millennials are the 83 million children of the baby boomers that are born between the years of 1977-2000. “One thing that all of the Millennials have in common is their utter fluency and comfort with digital technology. They don’t just embrace technology, it’s a way of life.”(Marketing: An Introduction, 10th Ed. Prentice Hall Publishing, page 74) This is true because we were born in the era when technology was becoming more prominent.  We pretty much grew up with technology. With our generation, if you give us some kind of new technology, we automatically figure out how to use it, where as the generations before us like the Baby boomers (1946-1964) and Generation X (1965-1976) take longer adjusting to the new technology. Many people say that the Millennials don’t communicate well, face to face or on the phone because they are used to text messaging or online messaging. I agree that this is true for most of the people in my generation and myself. Because most of the people that belong in the Millenials are always online or always texting, marketers take advantage of this and try to reach out to them through networking online or sending them messages. "Marketers of all kinds now target the Millennials segment, from automakers to political campaigns. However, the Millennials are bombarded with marketing messages coming at them from all directions. And rather than having mass marketing messages pushed at them, they prefer to seek out information and engage in two-way brand conversations. Thus, reaching these message-saturated consumers effectively requires creative marketing approaches."  (Marketing: An Introduction, 10th Ed. Prentice Hall Publishing, page 74)

Week 3 EOC: Making Money for Good

There are companies and businesses out there that mostly focus on the best way to make money or how to make a better profit, but then are some businesses that want to make a change. The companies that actually want to make a change focus on how they can help people in need and how they can donate their time and money to those who don’t have certain necessities. Amongst those companies, there is one In particular company called Blanket America. So what exactly does this company do to help people? “Blanket America is about more than blankets. It is about changing the way charity and business works. Most of all, it is about encouraging consumers to demand more.” “For every Blanket America product sold, we make a donation. We call this BUY 1, GIVE 1.” (source)Their goal is to address and end domestic poverty and to build a brighter economic future. They do whatever they can to raise awareness and they network through websites like Facebook and twitter, where they have ongoing discussions with over 150,000 subscribers. “We believe that, when consumers are given the option to do good, they will. Given this option enough times, they will come to expect it. If this expectation is not met, consumers will demand it from other brands.”(source) Blanket America also created a movement called, “Choose Haiti”. It is an ethical consumer movement that is helping support the rebuilding of Haiti’s economy after the devastating earthquake in 2010. “CHOOSE HAITI strives both to connect buyers and suppliers of all and any type of goods, and to generate demand for Haitian-made products in consumer markets. We believe that branding is important to achieving sustainable demand. Consumers that "CHOOSE HAITI" spur specific interest in unique, high quality Haitian goods.”(source) I really admire what this company is doing and I hope more companies will follow in similar footsteps to help people in need. 

Week 2 EOC: Boston Consulting Group - Video Games

“Five million. That's the number of traditional consoles and handhelds that were sold in the U.S. during December 2012, based on the latest retail estimates released by the NPD Group, a sales tracking firm.” (source). Video games have been around for quite a while, but they only started becoming popular in the 70's-80's. Then once the 90's hit, the technology started advancing and the video game market went up even higher. Nowadays, video games have become a part of our culture and it is the number one source of entertainment in most young children, teens, and even some adults. Personally, I have worked with young children and I have observed that majority of the kids constantly carry hand held video game systems with them, wherever they go. So the question is what type of video game or game console is in demand right now? “There are three major players in the market for video game consoles: Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo. Nintendo’s Wii is the best seller among current generation consoles.” (source). If I were to categorize the consoles on the BCG growth-share matrix, I would put Nintendo in the star category, Sony in the in the cash cow category, and Microsoft in the question mark category. As far as software, currently the top 5 most selling games are, Call of Duty: Black Ops II, Halo 4, New Super Mario Bros. 2, and Animal Crossing: New Leaf. In my opinion, the reason why Nintendo is doing so well is because they came up with the idea of taking traditional video games and turning it into a physical experience with the Wii. By doing that, they appealed to parents who thought that their children were spending too much time playing video games and not enough time being physically active. In the end, the gamers still get to play their video games but also become more active at the same time. “The Wii was the first console to feature motion-controlled games and became an instant hit, especially among casual gamers.”(source)

Week 1 EOC: Great Customer Service

I recently discovered that I need to wear glasses, after many years of having great eye sight. You can imagine that finding the perfect glasses can be a difficult task for someone who’s never experienced wearing/using them. Initially, I went to multiple eye glass stores but I didn't find the glasses that were fit for me. After nearly giving up, I decided to give Costco a try, mainly because a few of my family members had purchased their glasses from Costco and were pleased with the product. At first, I wasn't convinced that I would find a “stylish” pair of glasses at Costco, but I was surprised to find exactly what I was looking for as soon as I laid my eyes on their vast collection of glasses. Right away I was greeted by a very nice lady who took my measurements and rung me up. She was very helpful with the information that I needed and she patiently waited for me to finish when I asked her if I could take a picture of my glasses to show all my family and friends.  After I purchased my glasses, I anxiously wanted to wear them right away but the lady mentioned that they would have to be at the lab for about a week in order to customize my lenses. Sure enough, I got a phone call from Costco, no longer than a week later, saying that my glasses were ready. After I tried them on, I was very pleased with how well I could see in them but the longer I wore them, I started having a few complications. The Lady had mentioned that I could always take my glasses back, and they would fix it free of charge, so that’s exactly what I did. When I took them back, I approached another lady that worked there, and I explained to her exactly what was bothering me, as she carefully listened. She apologized that I was having issues with my glasses and she took them to send it back to the lab. Unfortunately, I kept having difficulties with adjusting to my new glasses, and I had to send my them back multiple times, but each time they changed my lens without charging me and they were very understanding about my complaints. Later I found out that due to my astigmatism, I wasn't able to adjust to the glare free coating that Costco uses on their glasses. Although my experience with wearing glasses for the first time wasn't exactly delightful, I was very pleased with Costco’s customer service. 

Week 1 EOC: My Voice

Hello fellow bloggers. Welcome to my Photography blog. This is where I will be sharing all my experience, knowledge and passion about photography, but before I begin I would like to tell you a little about myself. My name is Arda, but my family and friends like to call me Arda Moon, hence the name Arda Moon Photography. I have a passion for Art in every form but the one that called my name was Photography. I first picked up photography when I went on a trip to the Middle East about 4 years ago. I didn't have the best or fanciest camera, but I didn't let that stop me. I knew that I had to capture and document the beauty of everything that I saw. I started to see everything around me as if I was looking through the lens of a camera. At that point, I knew that I never wanted to put my camera down because I had the power of taking something and turning into a beautiful art form. From then on, I continued to take pictures but I wanted to become more serious about photography, so I decided to save up some money and buy my first Digital SLR camera. Nowadays, I’m an aspiring Fashion/conceptual Photographer and I hope to move onto bigger and better things and I’m hoping to share my journey with you.