Express Yourself

Ok Toronto, I hear you: you hate the TTC. I understand; I too am a TTC-rider. Delayed trains, haphazardly-followed schedules, mechanical problems, fare hikes, napping employees … TTC is not always The Better Way. Slower, more frustrating way perhaps.

That said, I couldn’t help but roll my eyes while rading the article in today’s Toronto Star about Lara Brown, the pregnant TTC rider who was mugged of her BlackBerry en route to work Sunday morning. Lara’s BlackBerry was taken by a group of “rowdy 20-somethings” on the southbound train; the rowdy group exited the train at St. Clair West. Here’s where the story gets interesting. Quoting the Toronto Star: “Because she’s pregnant and a mother of a 2-year old, Brown, scared and shocked, just continued to work. Once there, she called her husband and told him what happened.”

Hmm. Ok. Continuing the Star article: “Brown believes TTC Special Constables and the Toronto Police should be more vigilant in patrolling the subway and educating people about what to do should their phones or iPods be stolen. She said the TTC should tell people that if you’re a female and travelling by yourself be careful and vigilant.” The Star article also included a quote from Brown herself, who was moved t write to Adam Giambrone about the incident: “I’m very angry (Giambrone) wants to run for mayor and do good things for Toronto.”

Wow. Let’s take a look at the story here, piece by piece, and see exactly what’s wrong with it. 

1. “Because she’s pregnant and a mother of a 2-year-old, Brown, scared and shocked, just continued to work. Once there, she called her husband and told him what happened.” Get on a subway. Look above the windows, on the inside of the subway car. You will see a BRIGHT YELLOW HAZARD STRIP. It is to be used for passenger safety issues, vandalism, illness, and other emergencies. It’s there to help passengers in a variety of situations. Press the strip! If Brown herself was unable to press it, someone else in the car could have, assuming her car was not empty. She could also have pressed it after the goons got off at St. Clair West. She could also have gotten off the subway at the next stop and spoken with the employee driving her subway, or any of the employees working in the station.
2. Calling your spouse instead of the police – don’t crack on the police not being vigilant in protecting citizens if you’re not going to call them when something happens. By the time she got to work, called her husband, and then her husband called the police, the chances of the police finding any of these thugs greatly diminished. Toronto Police are extremely helpful and effective in their roles, when they are permitted to do their jobs. Want the police to help you? Call them – they’re not telepathic. 
3. In addition, she wants the police to be more vigilant about patrolling stations. There are more than 65 stations in Toronto! Does she want to take police officers off our streets so they can mosey around TTC stations? I agree that perhaps during peak times, at stations shown to statistically have higher incidents of crime, police presence might be a good idea, but overall, it’s not a reasonable idea. TTC Special Constables maybe, but not police officers. They have enough going on in our Thug Haven of a city, without adding TTC stations to their beats. (However, if you CALL them, I’m sure they’ll be happy to help you.) 
4. Brown claims people need to be educated about what to do when mugged. Really? She wants the City to spend money on an education program, to tell people that if you get mugged, you need to call the police? Please lady, give the people in this city some credit. I’m sure what you went through was traumatic and scary, but to be honest, this isn’t something the City needs to be spending money on. For most people, calling the police after a crime has taken place is an automatic reaction. Let’s save the money (that we don’t have) for something else. 
5. “The TTC should tell people that if you’re female and travelling by yourself, be vigilant and careful.” Really? Again, this falls into the “obvious” category. Women have always been told to be careful. The TTC offers Request Stop for women bus riders during evening hours, in an effort to help them get home safely. Women are often the target of violence because they tend to be smaller; they are generally easier to manipulate. I guarantee you that no woman who read this story read this quote and said, “Holy cow! I didn’t know that women need to be careful! There should posters!” EVERYONE should be careful, anyway; men get mugged too, though perhaps not as often.  
6. Adam Giambrone…. Ok, let’s talk about Mr. Giambrone. He’s the TTC Guy, and generally I would say that since he wanted the job, he needs to look after the problems. However, Mr. Giambrone is NOT personally responsible because a group of morons caused a problem on a subway train. Was he there when it happened? Did he sit across the aisle from her and watch her get mugged? Somehow I doubt it. What would she like him to do? Put up signs, “Please don’t be rude and steal from people on the subway trains!” Come on. Blame him for some of the business problems, sure – but this is not his fault. Also, Mr. Giambrone has NOT declared intentions as of yet to run for Mayor of Toronto, just to point that out.  

Bottom Line: What happened to Lara Brown on the subway was too bad. I do genuinely feel sorry for her. No one should have to put up with this kind of behaviour; no one has the right to take your stuff. I think we’re all in agreement there. However, for her to lash out and criticise the TTC, Toronto Police, and Adam Giambrone for what was not their fault, ignores that she herself did not handle the situation very well. Be careful when you travel. If someone is creating a problem, use the hazard strip on the train. Speak to the employee driving the train. Speak to an employee at the next station. CALL THE POLICE. Use common sense.

A recent article in the Metro newspaper (Feb 2 2010) reported complaints from university professors regarding today’s grammar. Apparently, technology like Facebook, Twitter, and text messaging are causing this generation of post-secondary students to fail spectacularly when it comes to academic writing. Let’s look at some common text/FB/Twitter/etc phrases for a moment:

K thx c u l8r xoxo ilu (Ok thanks, see you later. Hugs & kisses, I love you)

I dunno y u want 2 no (I don’t know. Why do you want to know?)

Ok – maybe they have something of a valid argument. However, I find it hard to believe that even the dumbest of students would write that way, typically, in a university research paper, exam, or essay. I would assume that most students can tell the difference between academic assignments and a blinking screen.

No folks, I don’t buy it. I don’t think this is where the egregious errors are coming from. The truth is, these problems started before all this technology happened; we can’t blame FB for grammar failings from 10+ years ago, sorry. To look at the spelling and grammar errors being committed by native speakers of English without learning disabilities, we need to look elsewhere: our schools

Curriculum. Take a look at the curricula in public elementary and public high schools. (I never attended private or Catholic so I can’t speak to what happens there!) How much time is designated for reading, writing and spelling? Not very much. Look especially at high school: students can barely write two-page essays, but core English consists of literature study, as opposed to actual grammar. Literature study is important, absolutely; but reading Margaret Atwood’s Cat’s Eye, delicious as it is, isn’t going to help those students write their essays in university. Students are graduating from public school and high school without the ability to write, period. This is unacceptable. Ask a random native speaker to break apart the parts of a sentence: noun, verb, adjective, adverb, subject, object, pronoun, etc. It will be hard for them. Look at they way people write; they mix up two, to and too; they mix up their, there and they’re. Your and you’re. These are BASICS. These are things that should be taught in the primary level. Academic writing is not like blogging, texting or casual emailing. Our systems are failing our students by not providing them with the basics; it is assumed they will pick up writing skills from reading. Reading provides a great example of sentence structure and writing flow, but it isn’t enough. Students need to be actively engaged in creating sentences and paragraphs; pretending to read them in class is not enough.

Expectations. If professors in universities are having all these problems, then we need to ask ourselves, “Why are the students in university?” If they can’t formulate sentences properly, how did they graduate? I seem to recall writing many essays in high school; someone’s reading them and marking them, so someone must be aware of the dire straights of these students. Why should they graduate from high school if they can’t put sentences together? The “no child left behind” policy is a sham; it does not help the students achieve anything other than putting one over on the system, and then getting in over their heads at college or university. Students should not be able to pass their core English courses if they are unable to do the work. Period.

Bottom line: While it is possible that the new technology and social networking isn’t helping the problem, it’s not fair to say they’re causing it, either. Facebook and Twitter, text messaging and IM may be helping students reinforce their mistakes, but the mistakes they’re making in the first place are a result of lack of solid, basic education. Post-secondary students should be able to write well; in may cases, their education depends on it. However, they are not well prepared in elementary school and high school, and no one seems to really care. We need to get back to the basics, and arm our children with the basic skills they need to express themselves. We need to engage the students in the process, and set realistic expectations: if you can’t do the work, you can’t pass the course. Universities would do well, as an extra thought, to construct a mandatory English grammar course for all first-year students, regardless of program of study. Don’t send borderline illiterate students out into the world!

As promised in my previous article (eToro’s Web Trading Platform – Best Forex Trading Platforms Out There) here is my findings about the and analysis of eToro’s software platform.

At first I was hesitant to install this too on my computer thinking it may cause some troubles. After installing this, however, I have found eToro software trading tool is very user-friendly and neat just like the eToro Web Trading Platform. I was amazed that that both tools look and feel the same and your account information is transparent. Whatever you see on your Web Trading Platform its the same on the software side. You use the same set of user name and password to log in.

However, with the eToro software version, when you start the tool, it gives you two options, “Trade For Real” and “Practice Trading.” For any new traders I would strongly recommend you use the eToro’s practice account first. It is free and it doesn’t cost you anything. You can get the feel of it before jumping into the real trading environment. You can also test your strategies in practice account.

For this article, I will concentrate on eToro’s “Trade For Real” option.

After you login you see a similar window like the one below:

You can click to close the side window. However, I would recommend you keep that on so you can see forex market moving in real time. You have the option for Top Traders’ Insight, Trading Challenge, Chat Profile. Each one has specific purpose on eToro to help the traders make the right decision to maximize their profits.

eToro’s Top Traders’ Insight allows you to see what other traders are doing. You can make a decision based on this information whether to execute a buy or sell trade on a certain pair. You can see up to 10 pairs at the same time.

eToro’s Trading Challenge lets you view how much top traders are earnings. You can sometime chat with them too to make your decision to maximize your profit.

eToro’s Chat lets you chat with Help desk or any other online users. you can communicate with them and you can find out their strategies. All the traders are very helpful.

At this stage you can also see the main trading area of eToro. You have easy access to FOREX currency trading market and also Commodities market. Commodities you can trade right now are Gold and Silver. It has the same functionalities as the Forex trading option that I will analyze here.

My initial feeling about eToro’s software is that it is very clean and user friendly. I last used it in 2008. They have made some impressive improvements since then and I am hopping the improvements continues. Some of the things I like and enjoy are:

• One of the best options for any forex traders is the option to manipulate data. I think eToro is one of the best tools out there for that. You have access to basic and advanced charts.
• One click access to the charts of any pairs. This really helps seeing what is happening to each pair of currencies in the market between 30 days and 1 minutes intervals. It’s amazing. Anyone who likes graphs will like this. You can also follow trends.
• For some more advanced users of eToro you have “Advanced Charts” option. This allows you to use technical indicators such as Simple Moving Average, Exponential Moving Average, Triangular Moving Average and many more technical indicators. This option was not there in 2008. I like this because it gives me the opportunity to see which strategy to use.
• Executing an order to Buy or Sell is very easy.
• It allows you to view Open trades, History, News, Calendar information. All these are very useful for any traders on eToro.
• You also have access to Visual Mode trading which allows you to trade visually if you do not want to be bothered by all other information. Once you change to eToro’s visual mode you see a screen like the following:

• The depth of access to information on eToro is really vast.
• Option for practice account.

Some of the advantages for professional traders or new traders:

• Forex Trading Software is for Professionals: From my research I have found that eToro platform is designed to accommodate beginner trader, however I think one overlooked or less known benefit of eToro’s Forex currency trading software is that it offers seasoned traders who are looking for accuracy and advanced tools in their forex software.
• Advanced Charting for all users: You can benefit from this does not matter what level of expertise you have on forex trading.
• Automated Signals and Orders: To make it simpler for you to keep track of forex market activity, the eToro platform provides you with free auto signaling software for forex trading. Since the beginning of the global financial crisis, the forex market has experienced almost unprecedented levels of volatility, which means that the opportunities for profit have never been as widespread. While this is a great incentive for online investors to switch to currency traders, the increased market activity can sometimes make it difficult to keep up with all the currency pairs at once. This is where auto signaling software comes in. You can easily keep track of all the currency pairs by placing automated signal alarms according to your trend analysis. Usually traders set auto signals to notify them when a trend has become significant enough to trade, or on the contrary, when the trend is about to turn so you can change your positions accordingly.

What you should do now?

Well to be a successful forex currency trader, regardless of which platform you use, you must do your research. As always having a good strategy is a must. You must be able to take out emotion out of the trading mentality. Remember, it is about the money. Keeping this in mind, I would recommend you start at least a practice account and do some trading. Chat with others and see if it is for you or not.

Is eToro Legit?

I have been asked this question via email so many times, just unbelievable. Yes eToro is Legit. It is working for me and for many.

Will eToro give me my money when I want to withdraw?

Definitely they will give you money. Refer to my previous posts about my experience from 2008. I have put up screenshots of all the communications for money transfer. It was great and easy. Of course you have to proof that it is you. I know it is hard for first timers to understand how internet could make them money. It does work. You just have to be patient. If you are worried about anything speak with your account manager at eToro. They have been working pretty hard for me.

How will I make money?

eToro is not going to make you money. You are going to make yourself money using eToro. You have to know that Forex is a currency trading platform. Just like any other business it has its own risks. That’s why I mentioned in all my posts since 2008 that take your emotions out or that do not invest what you cannot lose. You lose money in stock market too but you don’t blame your trading agent for that. If you lose money in the stock market it is your own fault because you may not have done the research properly. Same goes for eToro. However, you can minimize risks if you follow strategies on eToro. Look for some strategies on the internet.

How much I will make with eToro?

Like everyone who wants to make money from Forex, it is a burning question. It all depends on how much you will make on eToro. Or on any other trading platforms. However, as always, I would advise you do your due diligence. It is hard to earn money but if you have the right strategy eToro can help you making the money you want.

What is making eToro different?

I would say the ability to bring up such a great platform for new traders to advanced traders is an amazing differentiation for eToro from other platforms. Another amazing thing is that their support personnel is very good at what they do. I am from Canada and every time i had problems and contacted them they were prompt in addressing all those issues. With big forex trading companies you have to wait for a response. But with eToro you can chat with Helpdesk or you can call them or you can email your account manager directly.

Well that is my observation about eToro. No one can ask you to do anything but you can learn, educate yourself and make the decision for yourself. The fact that you are reading this post is that you are searching for information on eToro. Well its just a click away. Try them out.

Download! Good luck! Start Having fun! Earn money with eToro!