A near the end of the year celebration and some cyber security stuff.

HOORAY, SCHOOLS IS ALMOST DONE! And now that I have expended my daily allowance of enthusiasm, on to the topic of the day, fraud. There are two major types of fraud (to me anyway), corporate fraud and scamming. Corporate fraud is when you are given an unfair deal or otherwise taken advantage of by a corporation or business that ends up in you losing money, personal info, or just about anything else. Then there is the usual fraud we always hear about. Nigerian princes asking for meager sums of money ($500) in return for larger sums of money. Although fairly obvious (Nigeria doesn't actually have a royal family IIRC), some are more subtle. Getting an Email from skype asking you to download their new client, or microsoft giving free upgrades for your PC (even though you are using a Mac or Linux). Usually, they have you download either an .exe or a .jar file that they have you run. It runs, and the virus is in and is doing what it pleases.

Thankfully, most people don't really pay attention to those emails (skype auto updates, and microsoft offers a prompt when you boot up or auto updates). Sometimes you get viruses disguised as legitimate software that try to sneak in that way. Pop ups or "free_arcade_games.exe" can be signs that you may have gotten something suspicious.

You can always download an antivirus software (don't download free ones unless you can verify that it is legitimate) like McAfee or Norton (shudder). If you are too cheap for those (in which you shouldn't be), then just being smart or taking the hands on approach of "sniffing" your own network is always another option to add on top of your existing options. Basically, if it looks suspicious, it is probably dangerous and should be reported, verified, or deleted. Hope I didn't make you paranoid, and stay safe out there.

Well I have quite the credit score to live up to...

So, when I asked my parents what their credit score was, I was expecting it to be high (2 star in the USAF and no debt) but I was not expecting it to be 780 high. That is well into the Excellent range, almost guaranteeing that my parents could get almost any loan or credit card that they wanted to. I hope some that transfers into me in some form or another. If that is even possible.

One of the ways you can get a credit score like this is to join the military and join the officer corp. Higher paygrade, more job security, and you get invited to at least a million different events a year (which can vary between socials and funerals so be prepared for that). Housing and utilities is covered by the military since you will likely live on base. If you get high enough in the ranks they will give you a staff car for official business (you have to pay for gas). You also have access to some of the best banks available for military service members. Insurance is in the benefits (can't have out maintainers and pilots getting sick can we?). The downside is probably that no matter where you live, you always wake up in the middle of the night hearing the "SCREEEEE" that is jet engines. The disadvantages do not outweigh the advantages, and people love and respect you for what you do.

[Insert witty title involving investments here]

Although I am missing a good title, an interesting thing we did today is we looked at investment. Investing is when you put money into an account and the account (over time) generates more money than what was put in it in the first place. Investing with more risk grants a larger return but investing with less risk gives you return with less of a chance of losing everything. Its a great way to make money by literally doing nothing (in a sense).

It makes sense to invest early, you have a few more years to fix your mistake before you retire. You could invest $50 now (which is around 10 lattes if I recall) in a high risk fund and eventually degrade the fund till it is a far safer investment. Oh, and 401ks/IRAs are always a good option once you get employed (Starbucks is surprisingly generous for a national chain, especially compared to Walmart).

I have realized how hard it is to be an adult 0_0

No seriously, we haven't even gotten to taxes and already I don't like it. Checks, bills, losing money over trivial things such as super tag days... Being an adult is harder than one expects. I can't imagine it will be that much different with real dollars. Today some people even went into the negatives on their weserville accounts. I stayed positive with 67 dollars left, others could only pay a bit of their bill on order to stay afloat. It was interesting, but as stated earlier, I stayed out of debt and with spare money. I do kind of regret buying $15 of bathroom passes, but I got $4 back for running the shop.

It will be interesting, see who comes out on top in all of this. Hopefully I do, but we will see.

WOAH-OH, LIVING ON A DOLLAR. WOAH-OH, POOR GUATEMALA

As per the title, I found the dollar a day concept enthralling. Just my lunch today costed me $4.50. The micro finance system was also an interesting concept. Small loans that were not associated with formal banks or loan sharks benefit the community far more than a traditional loan would. Less cost to take the loan and more money for the village.

So, in some relation to the thought question, how much is your everyday in dollars, and what would you have to give up to get it down to $1 spent?

Witty Titles are up 5.1%, Invest now!

This week we ended our chapter(s) on markets and started up on types of businesses. We also invested $100,000 money in to the stock market. Well, some of us did. I started off with a loss, but with several exchanges planned and stock in Google (always a safe bet) virtually nothing could go wrong, hopefully. If it does go wrong, I can sell those stocks and buy more into Google and Walgreens, which are my two bets for being the best to invest in. But I shouldn't reveal too much since I do plan to try and win this (or at least get in to the top 5). Gentleman/Woman/Goat, the stock race is on! And may the best living organism win!

Supply Reflection

We learned this week all the wonders of supply. Supply is the other part of demand and judges how much the supplier is willing to supply for at a current price. Naturally, the supplier would want to sell a product at a higher price, but a consumer would want to buy a product at a lower price. So if you put the curves of both of them together, you get the price that people would actually buy them at if they were also supplied at that price. This is fundamental to how a product is produced, marketed, and sold.

I apologise for the late post. The Internet at the hotel was choppy at best. Thank you for understanding.