Discussion on E-learning Offered in Malaysian Universities: Pros & Cons

Electronic learning or E-Learning is the used of technology to support the learning process. There are significant numbers on Malaysian Universities has been implementing e-learning in order to provide their student with a more flexible and convenient learning method. Below is some discussion about the pros and cons of e-learning from student perspective.

Pros:

1. More Flexible

The used of e-learning facilitates students to attend their courses via internet and also allows them to post any questions about their courses in everywhere and any time. The study hours is much more flexible as compared to study at campus where schedule has been set by the university.

2. Cost Saving

Students can cut down their expenses if studying online because they can save from cost of traveling, accommodation as well as foods. They can pursue their courses in home rather than go campus that is far from their home.

3. Wider scope of knowledge

Another benefit of e-learning is it allows the large amount of information and knowledge available for their students. Students who attend 2 hours lecturer in classroom can only obtained little amount information but study online will be more flexible and student can obtain more knowledge as online courses is available for 24 hours.

4. Better interaction with lecturers

Most students have found that e-learning can improve their interaction with their lecturers. Students can email question to their respective lecturers or tutors about any queries of their subject more quickly. Lecturers and tutors will response more quickly via internet instead of making appointment with them during consultation hours.

Cons:

1. Lack of face to face communication

The used of e-learning has eliminated the importance of face to face communication between students and lectures. There will be lack of understanding from lecturers on their students need.

2. Lack of motivation

Students will be getting lazy with the used of e-learning as there is no fixed time for them to attend their courses. Therefore, they will become less motivated because courses is available 24 hours and most of them will delay their study time.

References:

http://searchsoa.techtarget.com/news/article/0,289142,sid26_gci769787,00.html

http://www.articlealley.com/article_78603_45.html

The application of pre-paid cash card for consumers

Touch’n Go

Touch’n Go card is an electronic purse that can be used at all highways in Malaysia. The credit card sized smartcard made of plastic with Philips’ MIFARE microchip technology embedded in it. Normally, Touch’n Go card can be used in major public transports in Klang Valley, selected parking sites and theme parks. The users can use the card as long as it is pre-loaded with electronic cash. The cash can be reloaded lots of places such as toll plazas, train stations, Automated Teller Machines, Cash Deposit Machines, Petrol kiosks and at authorized third outlets. A standard card can be purchased at the price of RM20. It consists of RM10 deposit value and RM10 usage amount. The cards may be reloaded from 10 denominations ranging from RM10, RM20, RM50, RM100, RM150, RM200, RM250, RM300, RM400 and RM500. The minimum reload value for a credit card issued in Malaysia is RM100.

Touch'n Go
Maybank reload the Touch'n Go

Octopus Card

Octopus is an electronic payment system using a contactless smartcard. Octopus is a trademark of Octopus Cards Limited. In the beginning we aimed to develop a simple way to pay fares on public transport in Hong Kong. Then we extended our reach into simple micropayments for purchases in retail outlets and a simple way for cardholders to gain access to buildings and schools and to identify themselves. Today, over 2,000 service providers accept Octopus, and new uses are regularly being added. Octopus' success is important to Hong Kong people not only because it's part of everyday life - it's also made everyday life so much easier.
The Octopus card can be purchased from any public transportation company’s customer service centre such as MTR’s and KCR’s. When first purchasing the card, HK$50 is included as refundable deposit, and the remaining value will be stored in the card in the card for normal payments. The card separate for few types:
Adult: Deposit $50 + Stored Value $100 = Price HK$150
Child: Deposit $50 + Stored Value $20 = Price HK$70
Senior: Deposit $50 + Stored Value $20 = Price HK$70

Octopus card

HongKong Travel

Chicago Card

The Chicago Card and the Chicago Card Plus are contactless smart cards used by riders of the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) and Pace to electronically pay for bus and train fares in the city of Chicago, Illinois, USA and the surrounding suburbs. The blue Chicago Card is a stored value card. Users add value to the card at CTA vending machines or at select retail locations, and turnstiles or fareboxes deduct value from the card. Users usually register cards with CTA and can receive a replacement in the event of theft, loss, or damage to the card. The blue-and-gold Chicago Card Plus is an account-based card. Users link the card to either a credit card, debit card, or employer-provided transit benefit program. The cards may be set up as monthly passes or on a pay-per-use basis. The account reloads from the linked source either when the monthly pass expires or when a user-defined threshold is passed as a pay-per-use card. Because of this direct link to personal accounts, all Chicago Card Pluses are registered to users. Both cards can be obtained for free from CTA's headquarters and website. Chicago Cards can also be obtained at retail outlets throughout Chicago.

Chicago Card

The application of pre-paid cash cash for consumer

Credit Card debts: Causes and Prevention

Causes of consumers Overspent & Credit Card debt

Nowadays, consumer always deals with problem of overspending. The creation of credit card is the main root of overspending. However, why most of the consumer will encounter with this problem ???? Below are some relevant reasons:

1. Lack of knowledge of money management

As we know that most consumers do not have the knowledge on how to manage their money. Why is this problem occurring? Most of the time is due to there is no budgeting made by consumer. Without budgeting, consumers will not know how much they spend as well as how much money they have. Therefore, they tend to spend more than their income. This is problems often happens on those credit card users whereby they will only make payment a payment after purchasing.

2. Do not have the habit of saving money

Most of the consumers do not have the habit of put a portion of money to their saving accounts. During inflation, all goods and services has become relatively expensive than before. Consumer need spend more money to buy same value of goods or services. Moreover, there is no saving in their bank account to meet the unexpected expenses and thus consumer will be faced with the problem of credit debt.

3. The used of credit cards

Another cause of credit debt is the increasing relies on credit card. Most consumers will have a wrong perception that they have enough money to make payment a month after purchasing goods and services. There is increased amount of consumer is preferred to purchase something by using credit card rather than paying cash. Although it is convenient but actually it is a way leading to high debt. Consumers have to pay for principle portion plus interest rate that is charged by bank. It is more expensive as compared to make cash payment.

4. Reduced in income

Due to economy downturn, consumers’ income has decreased significantly. Consumers often do not adjust their spending to match with the reduction in income. Without preparation of budget, consumers would not know exactly how much they have spent and thus overspending will be occurred.

5. Excessive Medical expenses

Medical expenses can not be avoided by almost every family. We often deal with problems when our family members have faced with illness or serious diseases. The medical bills are high and most of the time people tend to make payment by using credit card. If they are not able to pay if the amount is due then the debt will carry forward to the following month. Eventually, debt will be accumulated month by month.

Ways to prevent and control credit debt

1. Prepare your own budget

It is advisable to have monthly budget to prevent credit debt. Budget should be prepared based on your income. Consumer should control themselves to spend according to the budget. They should spend their money on necessary goods or services instead of spending on those unnecessary spending.

2. Self control and discipline

The most important element to solve credit debt is the consumer itself. They should
manage their money properly as well as make spending wisely. It is advisable to spend on necessity goods and services especially during economic downturn in order to avoid debt.

3. Avoid using credit card

It is recommended do not to rely on credit card as it will lead to creation of debt. Consumer should not use future money because we could not predict what will happen in the future. The used of debit card can be substitute of using credit card because you can only spend money that you are actually owned.

4. Keep your money in saving account

Consumer should save a portion of their money in their saving accounts. This is important to pay unexpected expenses or during financial problems. Holding cash is relatively important particularly during economic downturn in order to prevent incurring excessive debt .

References:

http://www.creditcards.com/credit-card-news/5-simple-credit-card-debt-rules-1267.php

http://ezinearticles.com/?Why-We-Overspend-Our-Dollars&id=237361

http://www.3debtconsolidation.com/creditcardmistakes.html

Electronic Currency

Do you know what is money? Do you ever seen it before? Do you touch it before? I think everyone will answer "YES". Money basically in the form of physical notes and coins, and it involve in our daily transactions. However, money can be intangible nowadays because of the evolution of technology information.

Electronic currency is known as money that just transacted electronically by computer networks or internet. There is no physical asset for electronic currency. It is a system which allows to pay for goods and services by transmitting a number from one computer to another computer. Funds will be transfered from one party to another party, by using a strong encryption to prevent payment risk to the payer. Electronic Fund Transfer and direct deposits are some of the examples for electronic currency.

Electronic currency have been used widely in banking world for currencies depositing and online payment. It is extremely convenient via electronic currency where no any physical cash involved. There will be an account in the digital world, user have to verify the ownership of the account. After that, the user can withdrew money from the electronic account. The digital bank will send a seriel number like electronic coins to the user, which the bank will sign it by using encrypted keys. Users can use this electronic coins to purchase online goods.

Doing online purchasing by using electronic currency is more secured since it using a strong encryption code that can be said is impossible to break the code. Therefore, it become more and more popular in online world as the security and privacy is protected.

FIRSTGATE Click and Buy

ClickandBuy is one of the e-payment market through INTERNET. It makes the online payment easier by innovative e-billing system. It's also provide security to users when they are using online payment. It is leading in online payment world and provides e-payment support for more than 14,000 merchants in 26 countries, with 126 different currencies and 46 different payment methods.

Paystone

Paystone provide online payment services that is inexpensive and support small financial transaction. It provide a chance for small businesses or merchandise to generate profit more efficiently and easily. In addition, it also offer email funds transfer services which enable the account holders to transfer its fund to any email they want around the world.

Beenz.com & Flooz.com

Both of these two website developed in the early stage of online currency heat and enable users to earn online currency. Beenz.com with beenz currency, Flooz.com with flooz currency. This online currency is used to make online purchase, similar like using coupon to purchase item in real world. They have been supported by online merchant and people tends to use this kind of online currency to make payment. However, dot-com disaster happen and both of these two dot com had been shut down. The difference between these two dot com and e-payment nowadays is these two dot com ise using own kind of currency which might not be accepted by certain party. Once failure of these two dot com happen, the beenz and flooz currency become unusable and worthless.

Peppercoin
It is a system to process small payment(micropayment). Peppercoin.Inc is the company who has the idea of aggregrate transactions of all user, merchant and payment service provider and pick randomly selected small transactions and bill them in a lum sum amount of money. This can helps to save transaction per cost.

Review of " what sell best online"

Based on the post of “what Sell Best Online”, we can conclude that the numbers of e-tailing company are keeping on rising. The online transaction is very common in developed country such as US. In Malaysia e-tailing activities are still limited as most of the Malaysian still relies on traditional commerce. Generally, the online sales involve selling computer hardware and software, clothes, home furnishing, books and etc.

E-tailing is environmental friendly because it encourages paperless transaction, so that save the resources. At the same time, E-tailing is easy to be used for searching greater products information and selection to customers so that they can make comparison easily. Besides this, customers can also save their cost whereby they no need travel from shop to shop for product hunting. This is why people prefer to purchase items through e-tailing. According to the post, more and more people interested to purchase clothes through online may be because they can customize the clothes according to their preferences. If physically travel to the shop may be hard to get the design and size that they want. In the future, all of the items might be sold through e-tailing even stationeries. For example, customers might be able to customize the style of pencils. Therefore, the competition among E-tailing companies will become greater.

However, we also concern about the drawback of such E-tailing. When people all the time work with the computers and lazy to travel, it may lead to health problems. In today’s environment, a lot of people only focus on their job with computers and do not exercise. Furthermore, some computers will release greater radioactive, if people always exposed to it, cancer can be easily caused.

Review of " Online Brokerage Fraud-Millions of Dollar Loss"

Based on the post of Online Brokerage Fraud-Millions of Dollar Loss, obviously this is due to lack of internet security. E-Trade Financial and Ameritrade might already try hard to design and implement the internet security system such as firewall, anti-virus, encryption and etc. However, hackers will still find out the weaknesses of such internet security system and try to break down that system. The question is why the hacker able to hack into the company system even though the security system is very strong. We think such a criminal hacking might be directly or indirectly done by the people who are very clear with the company’s internet security system and its weaknesses. The hacker might be the staff of the company especially those who involve in designing the system. Therefore, inspection should be done on those people as well. Furthermore, IDs and passwords might be stolen by outsiders and lead to the fraud cases.

Usually, the motive of hacker is to gain unauthorized access to the database of the company to destroy the data, change the information or to corrupt the company’s computer system for their own interest. The real example is stated on the post whereby the system of E-Trade Financial and Ameritrade had been hacked and lead to millions of dollars losses.

Besides facing financial losses, company at the same time will lose customers’ confidents. Customers are always concern whether their private information is filed properly in the company database. If hackers can easily access to the database, customers might worry their confidential information will be stolen especially for online banking system. Hackers might hack into the account of customers and make unauthorized transfer of money to hackers account.

In order to minimize the chances of internet fraud, company should always renew its internet security systems and always change the IDs and passwords.