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Showing posts from December 4, 2016

Week 9 [05.12 - 11.12] How to get funds for your first business?

For the majority of entrepreneurs, the first source to raise capital are 4 Fs. That ’s means founders, friends, family and fools. When someone launches any project, it is typical to raise money from these groups.  First three seems to be obvious, but why fools? Due to risk at this stage of project which is unbelievable high. Experienced financial investors would assess such a project as not worth investing in. However,  fools are not   professional investors. They lend money mostly because of  empathy. The second possible step to raise money is seed fund. Sometimes it is common to use all F's and seed fund  - the seed money. Seeds can offer to an entrepreneur a lot more funding, but in this case an entrepreneur must have also something to offer: a business plan, market research and “ know-how“ to for convinc ing fund suppliers. The more info you give - the less risk an entrepreneur and an investor takes. That way an entrepreneur gives away less share of his future compa

Week 9 [05.12 - 11.12] eSports – is video gaming real future of sport?

The history of video game competitions began in the early 70s at Stanford University with Spacewar game.  Throughout the years nothing has changed in this matter. People gather, watch competitors and have fun. But what is eSport? Basically speaking, it  is a form of multiplayer video game competitions between professional players. The most common genres associated with eSports scene are fist-person shooters, MOBAs, real time strategies and sports simulators. Older people tend to wonder what is so interesting in watching a bunch of guys playing games but it doesn’t differ at all from admiring competing athletes on TV. South Korea has founded several organizations similar to the well-known FIFA or NFL, gathering licensed pro gamers  called cyberathletes. 1981 - Space Inavder Championships I’ve recently compared pro gamers to athletes and let me explain you why. They act like regular sportsmen. They train every day to be  better. They are on their salaries. Yes, they are paid regu

Week 9 [05.12 - 11.12] The art of fighting without fighting

Fighting accompanies us every day. Everybody fights for something from grades, attention to love and many other things. As you can see fighting isn't always physical contact, you can fight in many different ways. As the person practising Kung Fu for nearly 7 years I have noticed that the hardest part of fighting is to not fight at all. I know that it looks as if I was beating about the bush but I will try to explain it presenting two examples. To understand better this topic, it is crucial to refer to times when combats and wars happened on a daily basis. Let's have a quick look at the quote of Sun Tzu, a Chinese philosopher, a general and  the author of the oldest textbook of the art of war: “Supreme excellence consists of breaking the enemy’s resistance without fighting.” Sun Tzu This supreme Chinese general and strategist tells us that you can crush your enemy even without engaging in a fight. What about a famous Kung Fu movie star and also master of Kung

Week 9 [05.12 - 11.12] Salsa dance

I started dancing Salsa dance around 3 years ago. It got my heart from the first classes because of its fast and energetic moves. In this article I would like to show what salsa is about, its different styles, which have gained a lot of popularity recently. Salsa is a Latino American dance with Caribbean origins and with very strong influences of Cuba and Puerto Rico. Salsa does not mean only dance, it is also a music genre and well-known hot sauce. It originated in New York City and was danced by immigrants from Cuba and Puerto Rico. As everyone knows (I hope) their sense of rhythm is amazing so it is nothing surprising that they have combined music and dance of their homeland together with the disco fever. It evolved from such dance forms like Cha cha or Mambo which were popular in Latino communities in New York in the 40s. Unusual name It is believed that it is called salsa because it is hot dynamic. Some other believe that the name means many different styles mixed tog

Week 9 [05.12 - 11.12] Favourite childhood games

Our generation remember the times when the internet speed didn’t exceed 128kb/s or maybe some of us did not have the internet access. Do you remember how you could get a new game? In my case that was 3,5 inches floppy disc with capacity 150MB or CD(but it was little later). My first computer was terribly weak. I don’t remember its parameters, but when I was starting it, I could go to the kitchen, prepare some food and eat it. I had a black and white screen, which was very big because it was about… 15 inches. The first game I ever played was Aladdin. This is an old DOS game published in 1994 by Walt Disney. The game was inspired by the animated film of 1992 with the same name. It’s based on the movie and you are placed in the same areas as the hero in the movie - streets and rooftops of Agrabah. The main genre of this game is action. http://16bit.pl/download/games/screens/aladdin/2.png If you want to try this game, here you have a link to its web version: http://ga

Week 9 [05.12 - 11.12] World’s oddest and interesting restaurants

There is no doubt everybody prefers going to a restaurant rather than preparing something to eat. Nowadays it’s normal for us to go to a restaurant but where and when were the beginnings of those services? Actually we don’t know when the first restaurant was created. Guinness Book of Records sets Sobrino de Botin as the oldest restaurant in the world. The restaurant was founded in 1725 in the middle of Madrid by Jean Botin. As we can count, it is almost 300 years old and still offers its services. I suppose it’s a really good restaurant but now there are no differences between old and new ones. If you want to eat in a special style then I have some places to recommend. Dinner in the Sky There is high probability that you’ve heard about Dinner in the Sky . The first restaurant like this was founded about 10 years ago in Belgium but other countries rapidly borrowed this idea and now we can have a dinner in the sky in over 30 countries in the world. It   look s like you’r

Week 9 [05.12 - 11.12] Game changing propulsion engine

One of the most difficult aspects of space travel happens not in the later stages, but in the very beginning – on Earth’s surface. In recent years, scientists have struggled to come up with more efficient ways of propulsion, as those which are available and widely used today, have failed more frequently that they would want them to. A New Dawn? In the beginning of the 21 st century, a British scientist named Roger Shawyer made an extraordinary discovery – he managed to create a completely new type of engine, which he thought would revolutionize the industry. This invention, technically known as “radio frequency resonant cavity thruster”, is widely recognized under a simpler name – the electromagnetic drive, or just EmDrive. The EmDrive Breaking the Laws of Physics The invention of a new type of engine is a worthy achievement in itself. However, the most intriguing part of it is that in theory, it should not work. At first, Shawyer’s research was met w

Week 9 [05.12 - 11.12] Modern education needs

The majority of people who have gone through the modern process of education, have probably had information technology classes. Most of them were basic, teaching students about technology, and how to operate a computer in a simple way. This trend, however, is slowly changing as programming languages are becoming more common and needed. Necessity Breeds Innovation As the society advances technologically, so does (or at least – it should) its educational system. It is mostly to keep up with the needs of the market and the industry, it has been the case since the industrial revolution. New kinds of jobs demanded differently qualified employees, which schools “produced” in response. This process can also be observed nowadays. With the rapid growth of the IT industry, contemporary schools begin to adapt to the changes. Early Education and IT Most interestingly, the more popular a field of knowledge is, the sooner will the education start. Nowadays, state and private s

Week 9 [05.12 - 11.12] Oculus, Gear VR – do we actually need these things?

Now we hear about new technologies which can change our lives, make them better. Thanks to smartphones, the  internet and many other things, we can speak to each other over distance, travel, heal people... That's why we can't imagine the current life without them. An increasing number of people live more in a virtual world than in the real one. We use Facebook all the time, prefer to talk to friends via Messenger, WhatsApp instead of meeting them face to face. Oculus is the next step in making the virtual world more pleasant to the point it covers up the border between the reality and the virtuality. Now, we can buy these glasses and move into the game world at our homes, wherever and whenever we want. Some people will be very satisfied with this solution because finally impressions will be stronger, horrors - really scary, views - really thrilling. Nevertheless, I think there is a big danger that it may get out of hand and this technology can be used to control our mi

Week 9 [05.12 - 11.12] Health problems and childhood obesity

Walking on the street, we can see more and more obese children. It turns out that every fifth polish child has problem with obesity. It's an easy way to have in future chronic diseases which can decrease their life expectancy. What are the main reasons of obesity in the young generation? When a baby is discovering different things and experimenting with them, it can get addicted to bad habits easily. I'm speaking about junk food and new technologies, which also can contribute to the development of obesity. Ready-to-use products, fast food can make our life easier, but can also lead to ruin our health. Why is that happening? Every processed food includes many food additives like colours, emulsifiers or solid vegetable fat. They are "empty" and don't have any value for the organism of child. Even worse, they lead to the production of additional energy, which is one of the most important factors for the proper functioning of human bodies. Michael Ma