May
10
2012
Account Executive
Author: joyceb
An opportunity in our Edmonton office Continue reading
May
10
2012
Marketing Coordinator
Author: joyceb
Venture Publishing, the award-winning publisher of Alberta Venture and Alberta Oil magazines, seeks a marketing coordinator in our Edmonton office. This individual will work closely with the Vice President and President with primary responsibility for the development and implementation of … Continue reading
May
9
2012
You Need Klout
Author: Canadian Marketing BlogKlout is a scoring system that weighs the influence of an individual in social media.
There is a great book "Return on Influence - The revolutionary Power of Klout, Social Scoring, and Influence Marketing" by Mark Schaeffer that inspired this post. His book explains Klout and how it works in detail (although the nature of these things is they always keep a mystery about how they arrive at the numbers and they always change).
Klout asks you for access to your blog, Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin, Flickr etc. They then have an algorithm by what you say and what others say about you to determine a Klout score which they call influence.
The Problems with Klout.
The downside I see to publishing a Klout Score is people may greatly increase their volume (to try to get a higher score) in a world that already has too much information volume. In my opinion, more people need to "do not speak unless you can improve the silence". I even worry myself that sometimes my contribution is not needed or not adding value. People may try to increase their Klout score but not their real influence.
I worry that what get measured gets attention so people may focus too much on social media and not enough on real interaction.
Klout is not yet complete. It misses some of the newer social media sites like HonestlyNow, LoadnVote and Pinterest. It even misses blogs that are not hosted by wordpress or blogger (so would miss the influence this blog has). In time, I am sure they will refine their scoring to be more complete. It freely admits that they are only scoring online so any offline influence is not included.
I worry that people might spend too much time on social media. (On my own blog, I wrote a post on Limit Computer Time)
As with SEO, I worry people will try to figure out how to game the system.
May
9
2012
Does The UK Government Give A 100-year-old Expat Pensioner Elder Abuse
Author: Barry Welford | The Other Blokes BlogPreventing Elder Abuse Is A Priority
Many countries are now making the elimination of elder abuse a priority. The UK Government has a website, which encourages all to Recognise and report elder abuse. Elder Abuse comes in many forms that may cause harm to older people. It includes intending to harm, harming without intent and the neglect that leads to harm. The website notes that elder abuse includes actions relating to financial or material matters, including theft from the abused person, fraud, or coercion regarding wills and any financial transactions. Another website has been set up to promote ‘Action on Elder Abuse’.
One would hope that all this is not just to encourage citizens to take action but would also set the standard for how government policies should apply to elders. This is blatantly not the case for the Frozen Pensions Policy that is applied to some expat pensioners, if they are resident in the Commonwealth rather than in other foreign coutries.
The UK Government Frozen Pensions Policy
If you decide to move to Australia, Canada, South Africa or one of 170 other countries, your basic UK state pension won’t increase annually, as happens if you are resident in the UK. It will be permanently frozen at the date you retire or when you arrived in that country, and it will never increase, no matter how rich or poor you are, or how much you’ve paid in National Insurance contributions.
However, if you move to an EU country, the US, or one of a seemingly random list of other countries including Israel and the Philippines, your state pension will increase in line with inflation exactly as if you had stayed in the UK.
The International Consortium of British Pensioners has been working for many years to persuade the UK government to remove this unfair inequity, which affects over 550, 000 pensioners. Their new website, pensionjustice.org, describes the unfairness of the present policy and the severe hardships it creates for some who have been heroes in defending the values for which the UK stands.
How The UK Government Frozen Pensions Policy Hits One Centenarian
When you look at some of the people affected by this unfair policy, your heart bleeds. An extreme case of this ‘abuse’ was documented in Australia where a 100-year-old woman has a UK state pension frozen at just £6 a week.
Is there an expat pensioner who is getting a worse deal than 100-year-old Annie Carr? Mrs Carr, who was born in Sunderland and emigrated to Australia in 1970 to join her only daughter, receives a UK basic state pension that is frozen at just £6.12 a week. Yet if she had stayed in the UK, or emigrated to a country such as Spain or the US, she would be getting up to £107.45 a week. Instead, she is out of pocket by more than £5,000 a year.
That treatment is clearly abusive. The UK Government may insist that it is merely applying the legal arrangements that have been set in place. However that is hardly an acceptable excuse for such treatment. There are undoubtedly many other cases that are similar to that of Mrs. Carr.
UK Expat Centenarians At Least Deserve The Royal Treatment
After exhausting the legal process, the International Consortium of British Pensioners has now decided to appeal directly to the Queen in her diamond jubilee year. Mrs. Carr may well have received a telegram from the Queen on attaining her 100th birthday. How much more appropriate it would have been to right the wrong that has been perpetrated on her and on so many others for so many years.
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Does The UK Government Give A 100-year-old Expat Pensioner Elder Abuse
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