Cambridge Analytica data scandal

Platforms like Facebook, twitter and whatsapp are important tool for politician just like everyone else to get the word out. But this tools can be used a lot more than making appeals. Because in politics influencing voters is the most crucial step.

What is Cambridge Analytica?

The U.K. headquarters of Cambridge Analytica 

Cambridge Analytica(CA) is a data analytics firm with political and marketing divisions, and offices in New York, Washington, London, Brazil, and Malaysia. According to valid sources CA’s CEO Alexander Nix is seen boasting that his data-mining firm played a major role in securing Donald Trump’s victory in the 2016 presidential elections.

CA was funded by Trump supporter and hedge fund billionaire Robert Mercer, and former Trump senior adviser Stephen Bannon once sat on its board. CA which began working for the Trump campaign in June 2016, promised that its so-called “psychographic” profiles could predict the personality and political leanings of every adult in the United States.

What is role of “thisisyourdigitallife” ?

Mr Aleksandr Kogan

In 2013 Mr Aleksandr Kogan and his company Global Science Research created an facebook app called "thisisyourdigitallife". The app prompted users to answer questions for a psychological profile  This was used to develop” psychographic" profiles of people and deliver pro-Trump material to them online.

In 2015 Mr Kogan sold data this data to CA. According to Zuckerberg this has violated the platform policies. This prompted Facebook to ban Kogan’s app. Facebook asked both i.e Mr Kogan and CA to certify that they had deleted the acquired data. However, appropriate confirmations were not received by Facebook except ambiguous assurance.

Almost 300,000 users were thought to have been paid to take the psychological test (paid $3 to $5 for taking quiz )— with the app then harvesting their personal data. Now here comes the crucial information It not only collected data from people who took the quiz, but it exposed a loophole in Facebook API that allowed it to collect data from the Facebook friends of the quiz takers as well.

How this was used in US election 2016

From politician’s point of view he/she would like to know more about target voters. Every election has voters that had not made up their mind. Facebook allows good degree of target for advertising which based on age, location and interest. CA claimed to found those voters for its client i.e Mr Trump.

Is consumer King in India?

Right now there is cash back offer from Airtel app. The offer is if a user updates KYC details on Airtel payment bank than user is eligible for Rs. 50 cashback.

So I updated my KYC details and recharged my mobile with Rs 100.

I waited for two days and used to check Airtel app for Cashback.

At first instance I thought I was cheated and decided not take any action because it would be time consuming and would result in unnecessary tiresomeness to me.

However, after making my mind I decided to call them up on customer care but later realized that it would IVR. So I decided to drop them an email.

I also tweeted them for which I didnot received a response. But I believe I made a damage on social media platform.

Suddenly on third day, I got an e-mail confirming that Rs.50 has been credited into my account.

From this experience I learnt two things:

• When we communicate with people in writing it is has more impact than verbal.
• In India consumer is not treated as king but as a scapegoat. Consumer has to fight for their rights

Can an embargo control Facebook in China

Air China was honored by Facebook for the optimal use of social network for international marketing by a company in Greater China. It utmost shocking that though Facebook has been banned in China since 2009 the airline is doing wonders on the digital platform. Other state owned rivals China Southern Airlines, China Eastern Airlines along with privately owned Hainan Airlines also use Facebook to join up with international commuter. 

Social media has become a strategic tool for Chinese airlines to persuade international travellers. About 60% of fliers used foreign carriers for their trips to and from China in 2013. Air China has more than 1,53,000 Facebook followers and has had more than 2,00,000 interactions with users since it opened its page in June 2013.

In 2012 guest at popular Asian restaurants in Sweden were encouraged to “Check in” with the carrier on Facebook as they sat to eat, which would make them eligible to win plane tickets to Asia.

Oil prices and its consequences

Oil prices and its consequences

 
In June 2014 the price of Brent crude was up around $115 and in January 2015 it has fallen to $52. During decade oil prices were bouncing around $100 per barrel since 2010 because of soaring oil consumption in countries like China and conflicts in Iraq. Companies started production of oil from difficult to drill places.  To take advantage of high prices many companies started using state of art technology like fracking and horizontal drilling to extract oil from shale formations in North Dakota and Texas. Even Alberta’s (Canada) gooey oil sands were heated to extract usable crude. It added 4 million new barrels of oil per day since 2008. (75 million barrels of oil per day is the global oil production)

Up till now the new production of crude oil by US does not have effect on the supply. Not to forget other conflicts like civil war in Libya, Iraq conflict and sanctions on Iran. More than 3 million barrels per day production was affected because of these conflicts.

But by mid 2014 below events happens and suddenly production increased:

• Libyan crude exports rose as two key export terminals Es Sider and Ras Lanuf were resumed from disruption of rebels.
• Iraq production of oil came back online

On the contrary demand of oil decreased because of below reasons:

• Oil demand decreased in China and Germany
• USA, the world biggest oil consumer saw big cutbacks in industrial oil use after recession and increase in use of fuel efficient cars

On the other hand demand of oil decreased due in USA, Europe and Asia because of economic slowdown and switch over sustainable energy. In late 2014 the supply of oil was greater than demand and in September prices started to fall.

OPEC control prices by either cutting production or increasing production. At the crucial meeting in Vienna on November 27 countries like Venezuela and Iran wanted to control prices by reducing production in order to breakeven on their budgets.

But Saudi Arabia wanted to keep price to fall as it did not want to repeat history. In 1980, in order to control price it reduced production but Saudi Arabia lost the market share. Saudis have now decided to go for low price option as this is short term phenomenon. The government has massive foreign exchange which would helpful to finance deficits.

OPEC (world’s largest cartel) did not take any steps to reduce production. Higher oil prices were desperate for big OPEC economies like Saudi Arabia and Iran to control the budget. Saudi Arabia did not took any stringent steps to control falling crude price as it thought that it would give undue advantage to US oil boom.

Effects of falling prices on economies:

a) Russia which is highly dependent on oil and gas production with oil revenues making 45 percent of government budget will ruin the economic system in country. Many economists believe that Russia’s economy will shrink by 4.5 in 2015 if oil stayed at $60 barrel. In an attempt to stop people from selling off rubbles Russia’s central bank have increased interest rates from 10.5% to 17.5%.

b) Iran’s economy just began to recover after many years of recession. In order to balance budget Iran needs price of crude above $100 since it is much harder after western sanctions.

c) Venezuela which is highly reliant on crude sales may face potential meltdown. It is 10^th largest oil producer and accounts for 95% of its export earnings. As inflation increased up to 60%     mass anti-government protest were flared up. Scarcity of basic products is increasing including medical supplies. One of the analysts at Nomura suggested that it needed crude prices up to $200 per barrel to balance its budget

Economies of Scale

Uber's pricing mechanism became hot news during the recent hostage crisis in Sydney, Australia. According to reports the rates were increased to highest when demand of taxi increased among frightened citizen of Sydney. This pricing model is common worldwide.




In 1999, when internet was a big deal, Coca Cola experimented with a smart vending machine that would automatically raise cola prices in the summer heat. The new machine was to be fitted with a sensor to gauge the outside temperature as well as a chip that would connect to the internet.

Decline in Birthrate

The total fertility rate – the number of children the average woman will have in her lifetime based on current trends – fell to just 2.3 last year from 3.6 in 1991 India’s birth rate declined dramatically in the last two decade. India, which is set to become the world’s most populated country in the next decade, has been trying for decades to curb population growth.

Factors affecting decline in birthrates are :

• Cash incentives to women who undergo sterilization. 
• Increase in female literacy

Cash incentives given to women who undergo sterilization is around Rs. 600.

As per 2011 census effective literacy rates (age 7 and above) in 2011 were 82.14% for men and 65.46% for women.

Earn money from Stress

People nowadays are in so much stress that they are awaiting for when weekend would come and rush for movie. The era is coming back when Bollywood movies used to earn a good profits. Than came an era of video cassette affected. Today though DVD players and computers has become like a necessity commodities people prefer to watch in theater rather than on watching small screens. Even audience has become mature that family wouldn’t be hesitant to watch movie like “Ragini MMS 2”