If you are exploring the business of buying and selling domains, you may wonder about some of the terms such as ccTLD. This term is an abbreviation for country code top-level domain. It is used to indicate a country, a sovereign state or a dependent territory and the code itself is usually two letters long. You may wonder what this has to do with you and your new website.

Why ccTLD Matters

A lot of the importance for having an appropriate ccTLD comes down to search optimization. If you are targeting a website to a country such as Italy, you do not necessarily care if your site comes up first for all the people searching for the right keywords in America or India. If you had to get web hosting in every feasible country, you would have many months of work ahead of you just to do that. By having the appropriate ending, the search engines can show your website in the right countries which gets you more of the hits that you want.

In some countries, such as Sweden, the search results will show preference to websites with the appropriate ccTLD. In others, such as America, barely any websites even use the ccTLD and it does not affect search results as heavily. If your target audience is only in America, then it may not matter whether you purchase a domain with a ccTLD or not.

Benefits

Some of the benefits of having a ccTLD are that people are slightly more likely to trust them and they will rank better in certain countries. Anyone in the world can get a.com address and having the extra few letters in front of it may seem more trustworthy and official.

Another benefit is that you will have more options of domain names because so many of the.com names are already taken. However, be careful of just adding a few letters to an already registered domain name as you could get in trouble in certain situations, especially if your business is lucrative.

You can also use the fact that it is two letters long to your advantage. Since some of the endings can also be the endings of words, such as the.us, you can make an address that incorporates that into it. Any word that ends in -ous or -us that is not already a registered domain name could be made into your address and people would be able to remember it more easily even without the popular TLD endings like.com or.net.

Things to Be Aware Of

You must look into the specific rules for your new domain name. Some potential things that you may find out are that there is a higher annual registration price if you have a ccTLD. Some countries offer free ones, but this is uncommon. You also may face restrictions about DNS providers and have a harder time registering or renewing your name through these providers.

All in all, a ccTLD can serve many great purposes for your website. Whether or not you want one depends on your target audience and your preferences. Using creativity can help you greatly because one of the main barriers will be that people are simply so used to their.com ending that they will have a harder time remembering anything else!

Setting up a new company in Qatar, the world’s most successful business arena is not as simple as one may think. Company formation requires a list of very important steps that cannot be avoided. For one that is unfamiliar with the market there, it can be challenging to say the least.

Many choose to hire a company consultant to help with company formation in this desirable market. Regardless, below are the steps listed out. Take a look and consider how a consultant can help.

Step One: Company Name

A completely unique company name must be chosen as the first step to company formation. If the name is already registered at the MBT or Ministry of Business and Trade it cannot be used. An in person visit to the Commercial Registration area of the MBT is required in order to do a search and then register the name.

Step Two: Open a Temporary Bank Account

Once a letter is obtained from the MBT, one can take this letter that is addressed to a bank in Qatar and open an account with the amount of capital approved by the MBT. There are no fees associated with this step.

Step Three: Approval for Articles of Association

The business owner must obtain approval for the Articles of Association. This also comes from the Ministry of Business and Trade. These meet the standards set forth by MBT and include the name of the company, home address, and objectives.

Further they contain the fixed term of duration, capital amount, any restrictions upon transfer of shares, shareholder names, capital structure, profit and loss distribution plans, and names of management. Company formation in Qatar depends on this step and the previous three, all of which take at least a day each.

Step Four: Deposit Required Capital

The business professional must then deposit the capital as set forth in the agreement at the bank they’ve opened the account with. The bank must give them a letter as proof that the deposit was made. The bank will need the letter from MBT listed in the second stop, and copies of the shareholders’ ID’s. This step can take up to a week.

Step Five: Obtain Other Necessary Documents

There may be several other documents necessary for commercial business registration. Tourism and engineering sectors require extra documents, as well as others. The Industrial Project Licence from the Ministry of Energy and Industry is necessary for all industrial businesses. These are just a few examples.

Step Six: Approval for Incorporation

These documents are obtained from the Ministry and are easily obtained by a law office. The Articles of Association are an example,this step can be skipped by establishments as it is not required.

The articles are then authenticated by the Ministry of Justice which should take no more than one day.

Step Eight: Commercial Registration

• There are a variety of documents needed for this step at the Commercial Registry of the MBT. The step takes at least a day. Owners will need:

• The application signed by the GM and owner for the company.

• ID card copies for the general manager, owners, shareholders and partners if any.

• The deposit bank letter from step four

• Receipt for proof of payment for review of Articles of Association from the MBT

• A signed declaration form by Qatari shareholder (if necessary)

• Approval of the new company’s name

Company formation then depends on registration with the Qatari Chamber of Commerce and Industry. The fee for this is 560 QR to 5510 QR in 2015, or dependent upon the amount of capital and company objectives. The final steps include the company seal, trade license and signage license. So as anyone can see, this process will take at least two weeks. Obtaining a consultant in Qatar that is skilled in company formation can save anyone a huge headache.

Phonics learning is a method of teaching English speakers to read and write English. The principles of phonics learning are to teach English speakers to connect the sounds of English with letters or groups of letters in order to speak pronunciation of unlearned words. Basically in a nut shell, phonics is the teaching method of reading and decoding words by training beginners to associate letters with their sound values. Children learn to read using phonics usually around the age of five or six by connecting letter pattern with sounds. During this process, learning the rules and patterns of phonics are necessary.

What are the basic Phonic rules?

The basic Phonic rules are as follows:

• Cognitive reading skills
• Alphabetic principle
• Vowel phonics patterns
• Consonant phonics patterns

And these rules to the average person may be difficult to understand. Basically children learn how to sound out words by learning the rules of speaking the English language instead of only relying on picture and word association, such as in the “look-say” Dick and Jane books that were popular in the 1950s.

When did the word ‘phonics’ become very popular?

The word ‘Phonics’ became a household word in the 1990s after the language program ‘Hooked On Phonics” was introduced and sold in the USA. And this program continues to be very popular and proven to be very effective in teaching young children to read and spell by parents and educators alike.

Phonics Instruction Debate

Using Phonics in the classroom has not come about in an easy fashion since teaching phonics has caused much debating for many, many years in the realm of educators even though teaching reading by using the phonic method has been in existence for long time. However after much studying and reviews by professionals, Phonics was given the stamp of approval from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development at the National Institute of Health. The appointed panel by Congress in 1997 reported Phonics as word identification as one of the critical reading skills for good readers. In addition to helping children to read, phonics instruction benefits all ages in learning to spell as well.

In this article we’re going to discuss the tricky aspect of marketing strategy when applying for a patent.

Getting a patent is a tricky process under normal circumstances. Under laws of the United States a company or person is entitled to a patent unless the invention was on sale in the country for more than one year prior to the application date of the patent. This applies to both sales and offers of sales. Therefore, companies conducting marketing campaigns must be careful not to destroy their patent rights. In a perfect world, application for a patent should be filed before any sales begin. But then that would hurt the company’s bottom line because that ultimately puts profits on hold. In a competitive marketplace this could spell disaster for the company.

Therefore, it is important for a company to understand just what it is that starts the one year clock ticking. In other words what can they do and what can’t they do in order to avoid their product being put on the timer?

In order to answer that question we have to understand what exactly, according to law, starts the clock running. There are basically two conditions. The first one is that the invention must be ready for patenting at the time of the sale. If it can be shown that the inventor had sufficient drawings that would enable another person to use the invention then this would satisfy the first criteria.

The second criteria is that there has actually been an offer for sale. In other words, the inventor or company that owns the invention approaches another company and offers to sell them the invention. This can either be in the form of a letter to the other company or in an actual physical meeting between the two companies. Usually the meeting follows a letter.

In the form of a letter the owner of the invention will usually draw up a letter stating that they have such and such an invention and go on to say that they feel this is something that would enhance their business. In the letter they would describe what the invention does and how it would help them. They would then ask the other company to get back to them if interested.

When it comes to the meeting the inventor will bring drawings of his invention and present them to the company interested in acquiring the invention. Maybe the inventor even has a working prototype he can show them. This is always a plus. Companies actually like to see that the invention they are interested in works.

Where the law comes in, and this is where inventors can delay the clock, is that the following items do not fall within the two criteria. Solicitation of customer pricing information from distributors and sales representatives; publication of preliminary data sheets and promotional information on invention features; communications to sales representatives; sales representatives providing customers with preliminary data sheets; and sales representatives’ requests for customer samples.

Therefore, an inventor can engage in any of the above activities and NOT start the one year clock running. This allows the inventor to get as much preliminary leg work done for his patent without actually “technically” starting the process.

This is important information for any inventor to have if he is trying to gain as much ground in his quest for a patent as possible.

The teaching profession is a very competitive one and when applying for a new teaching post either as an experienced teacher or as a newly qualified teacher, making the right impression from the outset is vital. And the first impression, when applying for a teaching post, is made by the cover letter.

Many teaching posts require applicants to write long, in-depth personal statements to support their CV or application. However, where this type of statement is not specifically requested then a more standard cover letter should be written.

A top tip for writing a cover letter is to split the letter into three paragraphs. The first should be a short summary of the purpose of your letter and any enclosed attachments. This does not have to be complicated, simply a sentence to detail the exact post you’re applying for, perhaps where you saw the job advertised, and then what the rest of your letter will be aiming to do.

As an example;

I am writing to apply for the position of Year 2 Teacher, as advertised in the Primary School News. I am very keen to become part of your school community and I hope that my enclosed CV will demonstrate that I have the appropriate skills and experience to fulfill this role successfully.

Paragraph two should be the bulk of the letter and should aim to demonstrate how the vision and ethos of the school, and the requirements of the job specification and/or person specification, align with your aims and experiences. You should therefore write one or two sentences which demonstrate that you have knowledge of the school and its values, and then pull out a few significant points from your CV to illustrate how you would be suited to that post and to the school.

The final paragraph is simply a section where you can sign off and clearly point the reader to the ways in which you can be contacted, either by email, telephone or post. These details should be provided at the top of your letter, in the right hand corner. Always remember to provide as many different contact routes as possible. Your final paragraph can also allow you to reiterate once again how passionate you are about that specific role and/or school.

Once your letter is written, be sure to check the contents for spelling mistakes and grammar errors, as a teacher who can’t spell, or indeed, can’t ‘correct’ their own work, will not stand up well against the competition. Finally, format your letter to ensure that it does not exceed more than one page of A4; this can be achieved by decreasing the page margins, decreasing the font size and adjusting the paragraph spacing; always remember that for ease of reading, the font size should never fall below 11pt.

Your perfect cover letter is now ready to be submitted, and you should be on the way to securing your dream teaching post.

Continuing my series of articles on various Internet money making scams, I will today look at the now infamous ‘Nigerian Letter Scam’.

This, sometimes quite nasty, scam (I will explain later) has been around in various formats since the late 70’s. It is also probably on the files of just about every fraud officer from every country, worldwide.

Originally this scam was perpetrated with the ‘victim’ receiving an actual letter postmarked in Nigeria, and to all intents and purposes looking like an official document! In the letter, a bogus Nigerian official/civil servant informs the recipient of a large amount of money (millions of dollars) which has been ‘overpaid’ by the Nigerian Government whilst they were procuring some contract or other. This so called ‘loose’ money needs to be disposed of and to do this they need to recruit the services of a willing third party, either a private individual or company, to provide bank details so that the money can be deposited into their account.

The ultimate aim of this scammer is to convince the ‘mark’ that they have been singled out to become a partner in this (what would appear to be!) very profitable arrangement. The bogus official claims he cannot use his own bank account and so asks the ‘victim’ to accept a large amount of commission for allowing this arrangement to take place.

If they actually manage to ‘hook’ someone in the course of the ensuing correspondence, then the gullible ‘mark’ is reassured various types of documentation bearing official looking letter heading, and subsequently guided into providing all sorts of personal information including, of course, bank details. Then when everything looks set to go, a slight problem (on the Nigerian side) occurs! This is either a hiccup at the bank, a money transfer problem or even some official that needs bribing. The, now well and truly hooked ‘mark’, is asked to send a small amount of money (in relation to the principal sum), this is to allow the transaction to proceed. Needless to say, if transferred, this money is never seen again! Oh, and by the way, the millions of dollars never materialises into the victim’s bank account.

Now it has been known for meetings to be set up prior to the actual ‘stings’ and the victim or members of their families have actually been kidnapped and held for ransom. The bank details have also been used to drain any bank accounts.

These letters have now moved on somewhat and are usually received as emails, sometimes using the bogus official route, other times they are from individuals (usually grieving widows) trying to move inherited money out of the country to a ‘safer place’.

At the end of the day, no matter which route they take, the basic idea is the same, they promise to put a vast fortune into your bank account, but before the transaction can go through, you have to send them some money to cover some minor administration cost.

Has this actually taken in people, sure it has?

Are people still (after 30 years of it) being ‘taken in’? Unbelievably as it may seem they are. Why, do I think, this still happens. The reason is simple; greed overtakes logic!

Posted by Andrew Murrayfield

Scams | Home Business Scams| Paid Survey Scams

So, you finally finished your resume and now it’s time to write your application letter. You know in order to get noticed you need your application letter to really stand out to the employer. You want that interview, but you don’t know the first thing about writing an application letter. You understand all the key points, but you’re no good at organizing your thoughts on paper. So you turn to your computer, log on to the internet and Google “free application letters”.

Hundreds of websites pop up offering tons of free application letter samples. You can’t believe your luck. You click through a few sites and find a letter you like. Your are positive that this one that will knock the socks off the hiring manager. You feel confident, as you copy and paste it onto a word document, that this letter will pretty much guarantee you an interview. Let’s face it you found it online and it claims to be written by a professional, therefore you can’t go wrong. You change a few words around, sign your name and off it goes. Now all you have to do is wait for that phone to start ringing.

Let me tell you, you are going to be waiting a long, long time for that call. Take heed of this application letter sample warning. While these sample letters can help guide you in how to write an application letter, they should never be used as a substitution for your real work. Most employers review a countless amount of application letters and resumes daily. Do you really think that the free online application letter sample you “borrowed” is going to grab their attention? Chances are no. Is your application letter sample going to be original? Probably not. Is the application letter going to be written to show how you meet the employer’s needs? Again, probably not.

Do you think you are the first person to go looking on the internet for free cover letter samples? In this day and age of the internet where you can find anything you need, chances are you are not the first person to use a free application letter sample. In fact it probably happens more often than you imagine. These employers received countless amounts of resumes and cover letters. They are so seasoned at reading application letters they will be able to tell yours is not your own after the first paragraph. This is why your application would really need to stand out to the employer. It’s doubtful that the application letter you found online is going to do that for you.

A good application letter consists of a few key elements. Essentially it’s what you can do for the employer. The letter should show why the employer would be making a mistake not calling you for at least a interview. Your application letter needs to highlight some key points in your resume, specifically those points that qualify you for the job you are applying for. How is a letter that you found online going to do that? In order for your letter to get notice it needs to be original, and show your passion for your work. Can an application letter you get online be original? That is highly doubtful. Your letter also needs to ask for the opportunity to be interviewed and needs to give the employer options to make that happen. Again, would your sample application letter provide that? If I was a gambler, I would bet the house that the answer would be no.

Instead of using the internet to find a free application sample letter to pass off as your own, use the internet to research how to write a effective application letter. Anything that has the word sample in it, is meant to be just that. A sample. Something to sort of push you in the right direction. The most important things to remember is that applications letters should be original and they should represent you. The only person, who can represent you, is you. Why would you want to take an application letter written by someone who does not even know you? Only you know why you would be perfect for that one job. Why trust a generic letter to get that point across to the employer?

References to mythological characters that people recognize consciously or unconsciously offer a writer good examples of allusion for use in all genres, but the metaphorical quality of the archetypes in Greek mythology engenders powerful plots and characters in fiction. How many stories have we all read-or perhaps films we have watched-in which a woman saves the man she loves through her own ingenuity? The Greeks perfected this tale, the one, for example, in which Theseus volunteers to enter the labyrinth with the intention of slaying the Minotaur but is successful only because of the woman who loves him. Ariadne gives him the blueprint of Daedalus’s labyrinth as well as a ball of twine to find his way back out of this deathtrap.

Or how about Medea, whose rage leads her to destroy the ones she loves the most, her own children, to spite the man who has betrayed her? We all know real life stories of women possessed with mental illness who tragically choose this path. Even Medea’s lover Jason reminds us of the heartbreaking consequences when, despite the woman who sacrifices all for him, he shuns her and chooses another who is wealthier and more politically connected. Sound familiar? They should. These examples from ancient mythology are the sometimes dark archetypal patterns of our own lives, and subsequently the lives of literary figures whose consequences evolve from this tension. One such character is Hester Prynne, the well-known heroine of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter.

Hawthorne and Greek Mythology

Hawthorne, the most celebrated writer of fiction during the nineteenth century American Renaissance, drew ideas for a number of his characters and plots from his knowledge of Greek mythology, the stories which he admired and ultimately retold for children in The Wonder Book and The Tanglewood Tales. While the structure of fiction often parallels the motifs of mythology, the three Fates, or Moirae, lend the imagery of thread and weaving destiny especially well to Hester.

Parallels between Hawthorne and Hester

Life is the stuff of literature, and Hawthorne chose to create a character whose situation, at least the emotional grief he felt, mirrored his own. He had lost his job at the Custom House, money was scarcer than ever, and he had not yet earned the distinction of an established writer that he believed he had earned. Pouring his sense of loss and injustice into Hester’s troubles, he handed his publisher Ticknor and Fields a partial manuscript of The Scarlet Letter, and the book was published on March 16, 1850, resulting in good reviews. Today scholars consider the seventeenth century protagonist of the novel, Hester Prynne-a moral and practical exemplar of the nineteenth century-a literary exemplar of modern day. The book established Hawthorne as a literary exemplar in his own time as well.

Thread and the Three Fates

In the seventeenth century patriarchal setting of the book, the Puritans consider women to be the weaker sex, an attitude that actually saves Hester from hanging, the usual punishment for the crime of adultery. Her new husband, having two years earlier sent her to Boston without him and later having been lost at sea, returns unexpectedly to find her standing in public humiliation on the scaffold with a child who isn’t his, but the name of the father of this child will be carefully and painfully withheld by the mother until the end of his life. Before the story opens, Hester has already fallen in love with her minister, the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale. Although the minister is supposed to protect this defenseless woman alone in the New England wilderness, he becomes the father of her child, yet she is steadfast in her decision not to reveal his identify and ruin his esteemed position in the Puritan community. At this point she must, if she is to remain near him in Boston, provide for the welfare of herself and her child Pearl, and she does this through her skillful sewing and embroidery.

Thread and needlework in any context seem to suggest connections or ties that bind people, places, actions, and ideas together. The Greeks personified this thread imagery in the form of the three Fates, or Moirae: Clotho the Spinner, who spun the thread of life; Lachesis the Disposer of Lots, who assigned a length of thread to each man or woman; and Atropos, who cut the thread at the end of that life. Hester Prynne embodies all three Fates as she literally uses her needle and thread to weave her own destiny, to thrive in a hostile environment and alter an entire community’s perception of her-from adulterer to angel and able-and at the end of her life to return to the place of her sin and her loving commitment in order to live out her life and be buried next to her partner Arthur Dimmesdale.

Thread as the Axis Mundi

In ancient mythology the thread passing through the sphere of the pearl is the axis mundi, and Hester’s beloved daughter Pearl, the union of fire and water, is the center of her world, a constant reminder of the mother’s sin. It is only when mother and father stand together on the scaffold in the final revelation of the truth that the demon-child Pearl will acknowledge her dying father, an act that calms her spirit and enables Pearl to move on, grow into a woman who will have her own family, which she does.

After Dimmesdale, the man who cuckolds Hester’s husband, dies, the wicked husband in disguise who calls himself Roger Chillingworth, has no will to live now that Dimmesdale is gone, and he dies as well, leaving Hester’s daughter Pearl with his wealth. Mother and daughter disappear to Europe, but Hester, an elderly woman now, returns to Boston to minister to women in need of the kind of comfort and solace that Hester desired long ago. She wears the finely embroidered A once more, though faded, and when she dies, she is buried side by side with her beloved Dimmesdale. They are separated in life but also separated in death, with a space between them, and there is just one grave marker which reads, “On a field sable, the letter gules.”

If the thread of life weaves and binds together the universe of Hester Prynne, it is also a primary motif of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s personal journey as well as the microcosm of our own lives.

For more information about Hawthorne and The Scarlet Letter, see the following sources:

Hamilton, Edith. Mythology. New York: Back Bay Books, Little, Brown and Company, 1969.

O’Connor, Susan. Dance of Language. Bloomington, IL: AuthorHouse, 2008.

Reynolds, David. Beneath the American Renaissance. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1988.

Wineapple, Brenda. Hawthorne, A Life. New York: Random