The internet milieu: individualization within a globalised community

Communication technologies have become deeply embedded in our lives, mediating the ways in which information is presented. Due to the global nature of this channel of communication, the world has shrunk and members of the internet may share similar cultural norms of thinking and behaving. Yet, paradoxically, the Internet is personal in that each individual has an interactive opportunity in choosing the options that can expand the breadth and depth of the information they are reading, who they interact with, and the means to achieve that interaction. These options can be expressed through a variety of media techniques. This paper is based on a study of selected websites hosted in English. It looks at language use in the Internet and illustrates the paradoxes between global and individual mediations of meanin

The Degree of Decoupling of Direct Payments for Korea's Rice Industry

Agricultural and Food Policy,

Agricultural Policy Reform and Structural Adjustment: Historical Evidence from Korean Experience

Korean agriculture has been facing several structural problems resulting from rapid structural changes since 1960's, some of which are preventing a smooth policy reform in accordance with the WTO regime. Political burden from rice monoculture, policy ineffectiveness from too large farm employment, and inflexibility in policy options from high dependency of farm household income on farm income are pointed out and discussed in detail.direct payment, market price support(MPS), producer support estimate(PSE), rice monoculture, two-tier price scheme, Agricultural and Food Policy,

IS A BEEF DEFICIENCY PAYMENT PARETO-SUPERIOR IN SOUTH KOREA?

South Korea uses a quota and a tariff on beef imports to keep farm prices high. Part of the quota rents are used to support indirect benefits to producers. The welfare costs of these policies are analyzed. Following a suggestion of Hayami, a deficiency payment financed by tariff revenues from increased imports is considered as an alternative to the quota. As Anderson (1983) found for Japan, a deficiency payment is Pareto-superior only if indirect benefits from the quota revenue are ignored.International Relations/Trade,

In Search of a Breakthrough for the Korea-EU FTA Negotiations

The purpose of this paper is to seek a breakthrough for the Korea-EU FTA negotiation in agriculture which started last year, but has not made much progress yet. The EU has been asking Korea to open its agricultural market to the same extent that was agreed upon in Korea’s free trade agreement with the U.S. while the Korean government firmly opposes the EU’s request, saying that FTA negotiations differ from multilateral trade talks as in the WTO. An examination of agricultural trade among Korea, the EU, and the U.S. shows that there may be many niche markets of which the EU can take advantage over other agricultural exporting countries including the U.S. Also, it is expected that the EU could gain much from its agricultural trade with Korea through an FTA, even without a market access level equal to one stipulated in the Korea-U.S. FTA accord. As far as agriculture is concerned, the slower does the talk proceed, the better to Korea, with the EU losing huge expected trade gains. It is suggested that the EU needs to be more flexible in the talks by focusing on a new strategy that can maximize trade diversion effects stemming not only from price but from non-price factors, rather than simply asking for the same level of market opening as in Korea-U.S. FTA. This would be the better way for the EU to become a winner in the battle for Korean agricultural market.Korea-EU FTA, Agricultural Trade, Trade Diversion Effects, International Relations/Trade,

Design and performance evaluation of migration-based submesh allocation strategies in mesh multicomputers

Master'sMASTER OF ENGINEERIN

Indiana's Children's Book Award: The Young Hoosier Book Award

What do the books The Monster Who Ate My Peas by Danny Schnitzlein and illustrated by Matt Faulkner, Ghost Cadet by Elaine Marie Alphin, and The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants by Ann Brashares have in common? They were all 2004 winners of the Young Hoosier Book Award. The Young Hoosier Book Award Program (YHBA) allows children throughout the state of Indiana to read a variety of books and vote for their favorite one

Preparation of Fatty Amides from Metal Soaps Under Microwave Irradiation

An efficient, high yield method of preparation of pure fatty amides was found through this research. from the 3 - reactant system that consists of fatty sodium soap, a source o f ammonia (or amine) and ammonium chloride, the fatty amides were formed when they were premixed and sealed in a glass vessel and then exposed to microwave irradiation. Primary amides were formed from the reaction of fatty sodium soap, urea or ammonium carbonate and ammonium chloride, whereas secondary amides were formed from the reaction of fatty sodium soap, amines and ammonium chloride. Primary amides successfully synthesized through this method are myristamide, palmitamide, o leamide and stearamide, whereas secondary amides synthesized from this method are N-butyl myristamide, N-butyl palmitamide, N-butyl stearamide, Nhexadecyl myristamide, N-hexadecyl palmitamide, and N-hexadecyl stearamide. Product identification was done through lR, NMR and CHN . The syntheses of myristamide and palmitamide were optimized by varying the irradiation time, reactant ratio and volume of reaction vessels. These optimized conditions were used for other primary amides syntheses. It was found that the best reactant ratio (sodium soap : urea: ammonium chloride) is 1:0.5:1 with 2.5 cm³ volume of reaction vessel when 0.5 g of reactant mixture were irradiated for 9 minutes. In the two or three-reactant systems involving fatty acids and, or sodium soap with urea or ammonium carbonate as the source of ammon ia, the presence or absence of ammonium chloride in these reactant mixtures were studied. The reaction involving soaps required the three-reactant system, where ammonium chloride is present in the reactant mixture. A kinetic study of the synthesis of palmitamide was done. The decomposition of sodium palmitate was found to fit first order kinetics and hence a reaction mechanism was proposed. Palm oil soap was also used in the amide syntheses and mixtures of primary amides were successfully synthesized from the reaction between palm oil soap, urea and ammonium chloride