Will try to make my quota tonight... probably won't post it til tomorrow though.
"You've got your transmission and your live wire, but your circuit's dead." - MediaThe point is, I cannot get started on my work before I finish my assignment. Which I've struck a wall owing to lack of reference.
... well, it's my fault for choosing to write an assignment about Guinea in the first place (Read: A country where Australia has no representative diplomatic office). There are pretty limited sources I can use, even on the interwebz.
Support Taleworlds!
That's a good one.
In all seriousness though, if I don't finish in two days, I will die the most horrible of deaths, so sooner or later I will have to make something up.
The question is, what?
edited 26th Jan '11 3:15:34 AM by ArgeusthePaladin
Support Taleworlds!@ Cyg: Alright, I have written up to 700-800 words tonight in relation to my assignment.
IV/ Human resources and infrastructural issues.
Guinea is not a country with an established, reliable human or industrial infrastructure. According to the CIA (2010), it suffers from a lack of skilled workers, which is confirmed by Dragotto (2005) and UNDP (2010). The mean year of education for adults was 1.9 years, compared to 7.5 years in China (UNDP, 1010) and graduates could barely fill in the needed posts (2005). This means that the company will have trouble and probably will incur costs to find local worker to cover the project’s requirement in all skill levels.
This would also lead to a greater need to either educate and train local worker, which is going to be a long term and therefore risky endeavour, or send in skilled worker from elsewhere, which is highly expensive and not very cost-effective. This, plus the fact that Australia has issued warnings to its citizen about the potential risks of travelling to this country may mean that the company will encounter difficulties to send expatriates to Guinea, and not without high salary costs to compensate for these risks.
The infrastructural network of the country also proposes much risks and costs. The country suffers from a chronic shortage in electricity (CIA, 2010, Dragotto, 2005). This will cause severe difficulties to an energy-demanding industry like iron mining. Most likely Rio Tinto will have to purchase electricity from another neighbouring country, which is both costly and inefficient. The road and transport system in the country is also highly inadequate, a risk that will be dramatically high owing to the large scale of the project the company is undertaking.
V/ Corporate social responsibility and other issues
As part of the international effort to help the country realize its Millenium Development Goal, there is now an array of international activist groups and non-government organizations working to help promote a better standard of living, human rights, political stability and financial transparency in this country. This has an indirect impact on the operations of Rio Tinto in the country.
These organizations will no doubt request the company to comply with certain corporate social responsibilities to the local population, up to but not limited to provision of employment and maintenance of infrastructure around the vicinity of the project. They will also likely put the company’s production process and its trade practices under scrutiny, so as to make sure the company is not carrying out any practices deleterious to the environment or shadowy deals with the newly-established government.
Many of this scrutiny will warrant costs on the company’s part, which can include opportunity costs for having to make options that are not optimal profit-wise. Additionally, should some of the company’s practices be criticized by these international watchdogs, the company would run the risk of having its corporate image damaged. This may result in loss of goodwill that is not easily quantified, but likely significant to the company’s operations.
However, this would also uncover opportunities for the company. In the short run, the company’s compliance with corporate social responsibility standards will improve its corporate image and goodwill. In the long run, costs that the company would incur will pay off by ways of stabilizing the infrastructural basis that would directly influence the mine’s productivity and efficiency. This would also somewhat insure the company from the risks of inadequate local infrastructure as mentioned above.
Already the company has taken steps to exhibit its willingness to work with NG Os in terms of promoting sustainable development such as Conservation International and the Royal Botanical Gardens (Rio Tinto, 2010). These organizations will likely expect more from the company, and Rio Tinto should be prepared to comply with their demands.
VI/ Conclusion
Carrying out business in the Republic of Guinea is a very risky move for the company owing to multiple causes, most importantly the innate political and social instability as well as the inherent lack of a solid legal framework to protect the rights of foreign investors. The massive scale of the undergoing project further enlarges this risk.
It is imperative that the company take early and determined steps to reduce this risk and take advantage of the underlying opportunities that the current political, social and economic situation of the country provides. Namely, the massive metal reserve the country has to offer, the chance to negotiate for a more favourable contract with the new government, as well as the opportunity to improve the company’s image through active corporate social responsibility behaviour.
Satisfied?
edited 26th Jan '11 5:14:07 AM by ArgeusthePaladin
Support Taleworlds!Thanks.
Oh, and apparently I stalked your vent in YF - I am sorry for your misfortune and hope the situation would improve soon.
If you need something, you know who to ask
733 words today.
And somehow after I posted yesterday, I managed 1500 more words. Mainly because I've switched from the story I was working on to working on a liveblog. (I'm hoping I'll be able to post the first installment Saturday. I'd like a few episodes of buffer before I start posting, though.)
Almost 1600 words, though I doubt it will serve a purpose. Here you go.
A wasted youth is better by far than a wise and productive old age.
-Meat Loaf
I hang out in the gamer-anime-nerd-freak crowd (I think I’ve mentioned this) and sometimes I’m really surprised by it. Ok, so that social group has a reputation for social repression. But, I remember the days when being the “freak” was cool and accepted.
I guess it’s a case of time and place; when I rolled into this scene (in the Mesozoic Era also known as the mid-90s) Anne Rice was still trendy, clove cigarettes were the thing and being a gamer-geek didn’t mean you had an aversion to bacchanalia. “Emo” was called “Goth”, long hair and trench coats were the fashion, free love and the occult the order of the day. Indeed, when I started hanging with the crowd, such rowdy behavior was par for the course. So, being teenaged and impressionable, I grew my hair out, stuck a cig in my mouth and went with the flow. And what a flow it was.
The freaks of my youth didn’t throw keggers; they threw wild bashes that would make Bluto and Bacchus both sit up and shout “ok, what the fuck is going ON over there?” Hard alcohol, nudity, fire-breathing, sword fighting (usually with foam weapons but NOT always), casual semi-public lovemaking, and philosophical rambling all combined into a series of hazy, crazy nights. Hardly anyone got sick or hurt (though there was the occasional injury, accident, or trip to the hospital for stitches and stomach pumping); people mostly just had a good time and dealt with the hangovers. I still remember my first serious gamer-party; within an hour I was making out with a twenty-year old sex kitten sporting a tongue piercing, blue hair and a tattoo, thinking I’d died and gone to heaven. Sometimes I miss being sixteen and easily amused.
I can recall, with wistful clarity, being shown the proper way to imbibe Whidbey’s Liqueur; off an attractive female’s nipple or stomach. I also remember, with somewhat less clarity, on another occasion drinking “spodi” (a flammable and potentially lethal combination of diced fruit and strong spirits left to macerate in a trash can for several days) until I passed out. I greeted the cold dawn that day wearing nothing more than leather pants (that weren’t mine) and a hickey collection; as to the origins of both, don’t ask me, I’m still not sure.
I had bad times, I had good times. I screwed some women, kissed some boys, did some drugs and had awesome intoxicant-drenched adventures in an era when being a hard-drinking, chain-smoking freak was not yet the anachronism it currently seems to be. I never once got horribly injured or arrested (though my grades suffered and I scraped through some horrific morning-afters) and I learned a little something about the seamy side of life. Also, I came away with some great stories to tell in my old age should I ever, you know, decide to grow up. Someday, if I’m drunk and sitting at my computer, I’ll do a post about the six hits of gelatin LSD, the ten foot alien, and the woman known as “Aleena, the Potato Queen” (word to the wise; no matter how much I may advocate youthful misbehavior, do yourself a favor and never EVER drop acid at a sci-fi convention).
But that, dear reader, is why the current generation of teenaged gamers make me more than a little sad. Oh, they’re good kids; they are fun to be around and just as bright and bushy-tailed about the RPG cosa nostra as I once was. I try and listen to their “unique” character concepts and in-game braggadocio with as much interest as I can muster; I remember being 17 and thinking I was pushing the boundaries of gamer-dom, and I know that learning you really aren’t is something that only comes with time. Besides, if I actually take a moment to listen, I find that more often than not they are indeed being insightful, unique and creative. Just because I’m a jaded old gamer-carcass doesn’t mean that I have to be an egotistical prick about it (as so many gone-to-seed roleplayers I know tend to be; more on this in another post).
But these bright, loveable kids just aren’t taking any risks. These days, I sit and tell stories of my “misspent” youth (only exaggerating a little when pleasantly drunk), and I either have a rapt audience of wide-eyed youngsters, or a bunch of said youngsters giving me the “oh, bullshit” look. (That thing with the Potato Queen really happened, I swear). My life can’t have POSSIBLY been that interesting, unless everyone else’s suddenly became boring by comparison. And considering I steered clear of more than I tried, that fact is a little depressing.
Now, before anyone bristles at my glib romanticizing of drug use, rampant alcohol consumption, and casual sex, listen to this. I am fully aware that I could have been hurt doing what I did. I could have caught AIDS from one of those girls I so casually bedded, or made a trip to the hospital (or a six foot hole) from a bad reaction to the drugs I did. I could have been arrested, or saddled with a child. One of those freakazoids who I partied with could have knocked me unconscious and cut my kidneys out for sale on the black market, or simply buggered me, taken my wallet and left me in a ditch. And I DID do a bunch of puking in the bushes (though not as much as some), got horribly grounded and had to deal with more than one scary situation. A thousand bad things could have potentially happened to me, and more than a few did.
But I am still here.
I’m still mostly healthy, with all my mental and physical faculties intact. I am not a father or a felon, and the only scarring I suffered from my youth was a bad high school GPA and some parent-child fighting (and you’ll have some of that no matter HOW good you are). I came out of my freak time without any addictions (except to cigarettes, stay away from those WHATEVER you decide) or serious life-altering consequences. And, I consider my life fully enriched by my shenanigans; having felt the joyous adrenaline of saying “Oh my god I can’t believe I just DID that and got AWAY with it” more than makes up for the pain of having occasionally, well…not.
Life is risk, and risk makes you feel alive; ignore that fact at your peril. Youth is the TIME for indiscretion. Waiting until you are older just means that you are behaving badly when people (children, spouses, employers) are depending on you. And the midlife crisis happens because you look back at 40 and think, “damn, I missed out; I’ve spent my whole life being good and now I’m bored, I want to play”. By then, it’s usually too fucking late. You have a mortgage, kids, a good job and a body that’s not up to the things you want to put it through. And outlandish, childish, hedonistic behavior causes people to shake their heads in disgust because you are, at that point, “old enough to know better”.
So if you’ve gotten an invite to a party that involves things that aren’t EXACTLY legal, aren’t EXACTLY healthy, and aren’t EXACTLY safe, take it if you think you can come home intact. I’m not advocating anyone to go smoke crack with five-dollar whores, or shoot up in alleyways, have rampant unprotected sex with animals (I’m not merely being hyperbolic; some sub-groups of homo sapiens constitute a lower form of life). Just get a little crazy, confront the risks with a hefty measure of good sense and you don’t have much to fear. Remember, though, that you are taking a risk and that there always is a chance that you can get seriously messed up. And even if you don’t suffer permanent damage, chances are it will hurt a bit, but that’s ok. A serious, stomach-shredding, head-pounding oh-my-god-its 3am-where-am-I-FUCK-these-pants-aren’t-my-pants hangover is something I think everyone should endure; it at least imparts upon one a gut-level respect for the power of controlled substances.
Here’s a bit of hard-won advice. When choosing to be daring, make sure you do a good cost-benefit analysis, educate yourself on potential consequences and NEVER let anyone make important choices on your behalf (remember; your friends don’t have to live with the fallout from drinking/smoking/fucking that, you do). If you are informed, perceptive and somewhat careful, you should get through with nothing more than a headache and a colorful anecdote. And if the damage is permanent, learn the lesson Fate is handing you and take your scar as a badge of honor; it was earned in an error of commission.
Hopefully, when you do decide to settle down, you can have some “been there, done that” wisdom to impart to your children when THEY start getting into their OWN trouble. The fact that my parents misbehaved, lived to tell about it, and gave me a no-BS rundown on drugs and alcohol is the reason I survived my bad behavior mostly intact.
Pleasurable stupidity can hurt. But, you only get one chance to be young enough not to care.
Take it.
Ouch, now you guys are making me look bad
Alright, I am not going to sleep tonight before 1500-2000 words are done. This is the words of honor from a historian, in the name of Manuel I Komnenos and the Byzantine Empire!
Support Taleworlds!

Argeus:
The entire purpose of this thread is to make you do it instead of fooling around on the forums.
Start doing it, or else you're going to be one of the people I'm harassing tomorrow.
There are too many toasters in my chimney!