again by YUI

This is the opening song of the latest Full Metal Alchemist 2: Brotherhood anime series. If you wish to watch Full Metal Alchemist 2: Brotherhood online for free, you may visit Revolution Anime via the link below.

Link: http://revolution-anime.net/index.php?/Fullmetal-Alchemist-2/

When Is MLM A Pyramid Scheme? Do Yourself A Favour - Asess These Businesses Carefully

The following content is extracted from an article posted at malaysiafinance.blogspot.com and my friend, Peter told me about it. He thought the article might be useful and beneficial for the readers. I really appreciate it and thus post it here today. Perhaps this topic might offend some network marketing distributors or even companies. In fact, a direct selling business can be good for anyone who wishes to create a passive income source. Moreover, the network marketing business has been recommended by Robert T. Kiyosaki, author of the bestsellers "Rich Dad Poor Dad", as a real life business school for those who are keen on becoming an entrepreneur. So I am not trying to be stereotyping the entire industry. Instead I hope you all can distinguish between the genuine direct selling business and the pyramid scheme.

Disclaimer: The following article was written and posted at http://malaysiafinance.blogspot.com/2009/05/when-is-mlm-pyramid-scheme-do-yourself.html by Salvatore_Dali. Hence, I am not responsible for the article.

We know of Bernie Madoff, who basically ran a Ponzi scheme. A Ponzi scheme is in some ways close to a "pyramid scheme". The new phrase we use is "multi level marketing", some critics call it the new pyramid scheme. These MLMs need to be vetted properly before you go and sign up as a member or distributor. Some are genuine businesses, even though you may call them MLMs, such as Amway and Hai-O. In its intended form, MLM is a marketing strategy that compensates promoters of direct selling companies not only for product sales they personally generate, but also for the sales of others they introduced to the company. The products and company are usually marketed directly to consumers and potential business partners by means of relationship referrals and word of mouth marketing.

Independent, unsalaried salespeople of multi-level marketing, referred to as distributors (or associates, independent business owners, dealers, franchise owners, sales consultants, consultants, independent agents, etc.), represent the parent company and are awarded a commission based upon the volume of product sold through each of their independent businesses (organizations).


Independent distributors develop their organizations by either building an active customer base, who buy direct from the parent company, or by recruiting a downline of independent distributors who also build a customer base, thereby expanding the overall organization. Additionally, distributors can also earn a profit by retailing products they purchased from the parent company at wholesale price.


Danger Signs #1: Downline - Distributors earn a commission based on the sales efforts of their organization, which includes their independent sale efforts as well as the leveraged sales efforts of their downline. This arrangement is similar to franchise arrangements where royalties are paid from the sales of individual franchise operations to the franchisor as well as to an area or region manager. Commissions are paid to multi-level marketing distributors according to the company’s compensation plan. There can be multiple levels of people receiving royalties from one person's sales.


The MLM can easily be transformed into a pyramid scheme (Ponzi scheme) if you do not look at them closely. Even the insurance agents scheme we had, before it was revamped, was a bit questionable as the downline can be almost limitless. The downline depth is a first indication of how deviant the business model is. It cannot be forever limitless, because if it is it means its already a pyramidic scheme in essence, always creaming off the next level.


Danger Signs #2: Sign Up Fees - In the most legitimate MLM companies, commissions are earned only on sales of the company's products or services. No money may be earned from recruiting alone ("sign-up fees"), though money earned from the sales of members recruited is one attraction of MLM arrangements. If participants are paid primarily from money received from new recruits, or if they are required to buy more product than they are likely to sell, then the company may be a pyramid or Ponzi scheme, which is illegal in most countries.


New salespeople may be asked to pay for their own training and marketing materials, or to buy a significant amount of inventory. This is considered as acceptable. A commonly adopted test of legality is that MLMs follow the so-called 70% rule which prevents members "inventory loading" in order to qualify for additional bonuses. The 70% rule requires participants to sell 70% of previously purchased inventory before placing new orders with the company. There are however variations in interpretations of this rule. Some attorneys insist that 70% of purchased inventory should be sold to people who are not participants in the business, while many MLM companies allow for self-consumption to be a significant part of the sales of a participant.


Danger Signs #3 - Recruitment: The Federal Trade Commission in the US advises that multi-level marketing organizations with greater incentives for recruitment than product sales are to be viewed skeptically. The FTC also warns that the practice of getting commissions from recruiting new members is outlawed in most states as "pyramiding". In April 2006, it proposed a Business Opportunity Rule intended to require all sellers of business opportunities—including MLMs—to provide enough information to enable prospective buyers to make an informed decision about their probability of earning money.


Rules and regulations are getting tougher in developed countries, which is why many MLMs are moving to emerging markets to ply their trade. Be very careful with them because in MOST cases, they are pyramidic schemes rather than businesses that offer a genuine product. I would be even more wary if they were from a stand alone product - i.e. one product solely. NAME ME ONE MLM COMPANY WITH ONE PRODUCT THAT YOU HAVE BOUGHT FROM OR USED THEIR PRODUCT THAT IS STILL AROUND AFTER 3-5 YEARS (that's about the length of time for the founders to make their pile... remember Noni juice, what about Lampe Berger, Bel-Air). The danger in many Asian countries with MLMs is that the rules and regulations have NOT CAUGHT UP yet with some pyramid schemes which may be masquerading as MLMs. The second point is that even some MLMs are more sinister in that it obtains more profit from members recruitment than actually from selling the product. Our rules and laws are NOT ADEQUATE for the time being. I would strongly advise the Ministry Of Domestic Affair/Local Biz to have all MLMs properly registered, have a Complaints Bureau with teeth, have a Commission that looks at the integrity and credibility of the people behind these businesses.


I do not wish to attract legal repercussions by saying the following businesses are pyramidic schemes, but I would like to highlight that they need to be looked at and over many times, and if you still want to be a member, go talk to a psychiatrist or a really rational friend or write to me or the Securities Commission, maybe they can help you in the legitimacy of the businesses:


These are some well know MLMs, its been passed around a bit, do feel free to add your views. Up to you to consider if they are worth getting involved with... to me, they are not worth your time and heartache.The key takeaway from this posting is that: of course pyramid schemes are evil and absolutely wrong, but you don't have to be a purely pyramid scheme to have evil intent, and MLM being what it is, a multi level scheme / binary scheme needs to be vetted thoroughly.

To continue reading, please visit http://malaysiafinance.blogspot.com/2009/05/when-is-mlm-pyramid-scheme-do-yourself.html

Some Random Updates

I have a couple of unrelated things to write in this post. Therefore, I cannot think of an appropriate title. Anyway I have come back to Kuala Lumpur to prepare for the new semester in my University.

Just the day I was going to leave my hometown in Johor Bahru, I found out that I actually missed the lessons of the first week of a subject that I am taking under another department, the American Degree Program(ADP). The reason was simply the schedule of the school of ADP is different from the Department of Information Technology and they started the new semester one week earlier than us. My classmates and I were not aware of it and we were still enjoying our holiday. So I was a bit irritated at that moment but fortunately I managed to enroll the subject online and write off the outstanding tuition fee within the due date(I am a scholarship holder).

After grumbling for the entire paragraph, I am going to provide a solution to my disciple's recent problem. Kai Chiew is applying for a Google Adsense account and he/she(sorry, I forgot your gender) is having problem with submitting the tax information. To be frank with you, I forgot how I did it. After all it was something happened at least a year ago. So I searched for the solution on the Internet and I found a post written by a popular Malaysian problogger, Liew CF. Man, he is earning full time income by writing on blogs and he isn't even a native English speaker! Anyway you may read it at http://www.liewcf.com/blog/archives/2006/05/submit-google-adsense-tax-information/. It is dead simple and if you still have any problem, ask someone else. Sorry about it but I really forgot how I did it as I said.

Regarding a comment left on my blog, someone called chokilala made a post on how to delete message on shoutmix on his/her blog. Unfortunately, the website is having an error with establishing database connection. If you are reading this, chokilala please check it out and fix it.

Finally, here's a very good news for me! My last semester result was released today and I just checked it online. Guess what? I got straight A's for all four subjects taken in the previous semester! In other words, I scored at least 90 marks for the four subjects. In my first semester which was a short semester, I only got A- and B- for two subjects. So I sort of lost confidence in myself. I thought I could never achieve A since the bencemark here is relatively high. Fortunately I managed to obtain good result for the second semester and it definitely helps in ensuring my next scholarship. I am not trying to show off my result. Instead, I am trying to show that everything is possible. Do not dismay even if you do not get what you want at the beginning. As long as you work hard and stay focused, you will get what you want, provided you plan everything well beforehand. Good luck everyone!

Introduction To Keyword Sniping

Here's a small guide on how to make money from the Internet with a technique called "Keyword Sniping". This guide was actually written by a popular online keyword and SEO guru, Court and was posted on his blog at courtneytuttle.com. Nevertheless, the original post was pulled down by Court and I don't know why he did so. Fortunately I managed to find a same copy elsewhere on the Internet. This guide is absolutely impressive despite it's free. I turned the guide into a pdf file and uploaded it to Scribd.com whereby I can use it to embed the document here.
Introduction to Keyword Sniping

Like it or not, leave me your comment!

p/s: Just realized that it's a bit difficult to read the pdf file on my blog because of the post width constrain on my blog. It's more pleasure to read it on scribd and you may do it by clicking here.

My Favourite ShoutMix Widget Has Been Removed From The Sidebar

After getting more spam messages, I decided to remove my favourite ShoutMix widget from the right sidebar. Apparently I still have not found a way to fight against the spammers. EliteVillain said that I can only block their IP addresses but there are simply too many spammers out there. Therefore I think I can barely implement the method. Eventually removing the widget is the last resort.

ShoutMix, I Hate It, I Like It!

Most of the personal bloggers would like to place a little chat box widget on their blogs. I know many friends of mine use cbox and I also tried using it few years ago. You may have noticed that I am using ShoutMix here instead of cbox. There is no significant reason for me to do so. It's simply because I admire the success and entrepreneurial spirit of the founder of ShoutMix. I forgot his name but he is a young Malaysian who dropped out from MMU. He dropped out so that he could focus on the development of ShoutMix. This is what Bill Gates from Microsoft and Mark Zuckerberg from Facebook did, isn't it?

I am not sure whether the founder of cbox is also a college drop-out, but anyway I am writing this post because I saw something on my shoutmix widget. Check it out!

Yes, there are SPAM messages! What ridiculous is the person who spammed my ShoutBox used "admin" as his nickname and people could probably mistake it as my message! Thanks to EliteVillain for informing me about it although I have seen it earlier.

I actually tried to find a way to delete the spam messages but I could not find the delete button on the widget itself. So I thought I might have to log into my shoutmix account to delete the messages. After logging into the user panel, I finally saw the "Delete" tab and quickly clicked it. It led me to the page where it prompted me to select which batch of messages to delete.

Oh no! I only want to delete certain messages which are the spam messages. It seems I can't do so. Too bad. That's why the spam messages are still existing on my ShoutBox. Arrrggghh!

If anyone from ShoutMix is reading this blog post, I hope you can modify the settings so that the user can delete any selected message, as few as one. I don't want other messages to be deleted. Any solution my friends please post it on the comment section. Thanks a lot!

I just finished the "I Hate It" part. Now it's the "I Like It" part. ShoutMix is definitely one of the best chat box widget services on the Internet. It provides convenience for visitors who are lazy enough to leave comments on blog posts. Lol, I am just joking. In fact, it is a also good tool for visitors and bloggers to communicate with each other on topics that might be irrelevant to the blog posts. For example, "how r u?", "u come back jb ad?", "i added u on my blogroll, check it out", "sheng loong lazy blogger"(lol!) I can say that a chat box, whether it's cbox or shoutmix, is important and everyone should place it on his/her personal blog. The only drawback is you have to deal with the spam messages. Just like what I have described above.

Here's a good news I got from my ShoutBox. There are two messages left on my ShoutBox. Kai Chew from kafechew.com told me that he/she(sorry for not being able to know your gender) read my blog last year in May and got inspired to start his/her website. Now he/she had earned more than $250 USD (>RM875) online. Although the figure is not big enough to surprise you, but it proves that making money online definitely works, only if you take action and are willing to learn. I believe Kai Chew will earn stable income online as long as he/she persists on it. Another person called "Malaysian actuary" (obviously not a real name) also left a message. But I believe both of them are the same person. I have some advice for you, Kai Chew if you are reading this. You can learn the basics of SEO from the Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide, released by Google itself. You may download it instantly by visiting the link. It provides enough information for newbies to start performing SEO on their websites. However, SEO is a very broad topic on its own and the information you receive can be obsolete very quickly as Google and other search engines are changing their algorithms constantly. There are many other good ebooks on SEO but I would advise you to read the one I mentioned above first. Once you have finished it then only I will introduce other books to you. Good luck!