Note: A public service message.

1. You should not be looking for ways to access Facebook in first place. If authorities have blocked it, bear with it!
2. If you still want to access Facebook, you should travel outside Pakistan so that you can access Facebook.
3. You could also ask your friend abroad (if any) to check Facebook for you, harvest your crops in Farmville, feed your Fish in Fishville and whatever other important tasks you had.

If you have any of such cool ways in your mind, do share in comments.

Ban is due to failure of Facebook to remove controversial fan page promoting “Draw Muhammad Day” despite huge number of reports made for the page to be removed. Citing this proof, it sounds fair to block Facebook temporarily.

This could also be a potential scam though, as Zynga is not very popular for the way it handles user data and there have been reports for privacy abuse. So, users will be hesitant to give their cell numbers to a company like Zynga. Some addicts will of course do, and it may open doors for new stream of revenues for Zynga provided they don’t storm users with unsolicited offers as they do on Facebook. They have already been focusing on virtual currency with Zong.

Then there may be some issues in Farmville becoming a brand outside Facebook. So far, the farming game has been utilizing Facebook’s huge user base and viral marketing tools. This will go missing in standalone version of Farmville. At current, Farmville.com is open for all through Facebook Connect but it won’t be much of effort to transfer them to their own network.

The Marketing Paradigm

Idea really is to hire brand ambassadors at virtually no cost to expand the brand name and presence across the society and get access to those areas where establishing a franchise would be ineffective and a financial burden when compared to benefits. And since there is no fixed sum of money for the services they’ll get from students, Zong will be saving big lot of operational cost that otherwise makes the fixed salary part of their sales people.

Program will work well for Zong though, in more than one ways:

• Saving operational costs, they may even consider sacking some of their salespeople based on the success of the program
• Brand Awareness – Zong can use the large number of students’ pool to enhance their brand visibility and explore new areas
• Customer Loyalty – More of Zong affiliates or so called “Entrepreneurs” will at least eventually become loyal Zong subscribers
• Lucky Grabs – Some of “Entrepreneurs” might actually be able to sell 100+ Zong sims to earn the “huge” amount of money worth PK Rs. 10K to 20K.

Entrepreneurs???

What the ….! Does this make you an entrepreneur? It would be among the cheapest of definitions of Entrepreneurship. It can be called an entrepreneurial idea though, on Zong’s part, luring the youth to become part of corporate marketing efforts in the name of entrepreneurship, for sake of pocket money rewards. The word “entrepreneur” here is the emotional bait, rather an effort to rename “Recycle Bin” as “Control Panel”. The program should rather have been named as “Student Pocket Money Program”.

Earning Potential

So if you sold 1 sim per day, you’ll get Rs. 1800. Given that the initial investment is Rs. 1000, this will earn you “massive” Rs. 800 which you think is worth of your time?

And What About Studies?

Zong Student Entrepreneurs Program is open to Intermediate, Bachelors and Masters level students. Not to mention the harm that this so called entrepreneurship opportunity can bring to their studies, it should be looked at as an unnecessary attempt to involve the youth in easy money making.

Grand Offer!

Oh and wait! There’s also an incentive plan for achieving the impossible. On sale of 100+ Zong sims, a fiat that even a seasoned Zong salesperson will achieve once in a lifetime. Here goes the chart:

There’s no doubt that Zong is the ultimate winner here, they’re giving you 5 sims for a sum of PK Rs. 1000 to start with. And when you sell the 100 sims, you get the profits and rewards and blah blah! But when would that be? Selling 100 Zong sims, are you kidding ME?? This is a crap of opportunity guys; don’t bother wasting your time. Rather work on a better business idea, for that is what makes you an entrepreneur and contributes to your personal development.

It’s very ridiculous, that there is no worth of genius and loyal people in Pakistan. I have got 85.68% marks in BSc Chemical Engineering and I have applied for HEC South Korea Scholarship 7th batch, approximate cost for applying for scholarship was:
400 for verification of original Certificate by HEC per result card + provisional certificate (400×5)= 2000
200 for single photocopy and that I have submitted(200×5)=1000
HEC scholarship application applying fee through HBL online (300+350(HBL online fee)=650
through total is Rs. 3650
AFTER taking all other pains I successfully submitted my application well ahead of time, I still got no response, not even the intimation of rejection.
This all felt very much like that we now are living in frustrating situation but you can say me I am mad because I am, now, once again going to take common wealth scholarship test on 4th October 2009.
Let’s see what happens this time around.

Original comment can be seen here

PS: The comment is a personal view of Mr. Omer Bin Sohail and in no way presents my personal opinion as I have no experience of NTS Commonwealth Scholarship Test 2009.

Absence of glass covers can easily be noticed. And it’s not the first time, sometimes they’ll serve you Fries in a plate, you’ll get burger wrapped in a piece of paper and even more. Even while ordering for it, I saw a person complaining about the quality of KFC Rice as they looked like baked some 2 days back. Add to this the “Next counter please” messages at each but one counter on the outlet coupled with delay in orders and the scenario gets even worse.

The purpose of posting it here is just to remind the KFC management to take care of quality of service and make sure you have proper equipment to serve the orders. Or you should please STOP coming up with “new products” if you don’t have the capacity and resources to offer those.

Note: This is based upon repeated poor quality of service at KFC Y-Block, DHA Lahore.

Image Credits: TheDogHouseDiaries.com

PS: This one is for you FM!

Value to Entrepreneurs

Finding the right venture capitalists and expressing their investment opportunity in a way that is easily understood by all potential investors.

Venture firms are very careful regarding the information they reveal to the public because by divulging too much information will result in a flood of business plans and proposals.
However with the help of internet gatekeeper, venture firms can afford to divulge their prized investment criteria-provided the gatekeeper uses the information wisely. Internet armed with the investment criteria information can help thousands of entrepreneurs to reach the right venture firms, and information on internet can change in an instant, a shift in a firms investment criteria can be reflected immediately, which is not in the case of books.

But finding the right venture is only half the battle..

Value to Professionals

Main concern center for the venture capitalists is on the number of deals and the quality of deals. A trusted gatekeeper needs to ensure select, top quality deal referrals that don’t require extensive review. A trusted gatekeeper must know the investment criteria of each investment firm so well that the number of deals referred remains small enough for the firm to feasibly manage, while precisely matching the firm’s pre-specified investment criteria.

When referring deals, one must always take into consideration the issue of quality as well. All the venture capitalists seeks a specific criteria in a quality deal (also called “the four m’s”)

1. Magic
2. Management
3. Market
4. Money

These are elaborated in detail below:

1. Magic
The company must visualize and be committed to its dream, whats the difference between the company and its competitors.

2. Management
Intellectual property rights doesnot necessarily make the great companies-but people do. Venture firms invest in people, not in ideas only.

3. Market
The appropriate market research, comprehension and selection of the target industry, market and potential competitors are critical to the potential success of any company. In order for a company to receive venture funding, it must operate in a large market that has the potential to reach mammoth proportions.

4. Money
The money factor is a largely dependent on the factors above. Venture firms live and die by numbers, and they must ensure that when all is said and done, the firm is looking for investments that will get them as close as possible to its desired rate of return.