Nmtp03zhiqian's Blog

I have made comparision between the MDAS and MDA.  MDA, or Muscular Dystrophy Association, have used more social media tools than MDAS. For example, since 1966, a variety show had been made to entertain, educate and raise funds for service and research for the MDA. Different celebrities were invited in each performance. they have also stay connected on social website such as Twitter, Facebook, myspace and youtube. they did not only use the traditional way,phones call to get donation from the public. they had use media tools such as emails and online transaction to transfer donations to the organisation.

In the webpage of MDA, they had provided informations about the different types of muscular dystrophies. They also allow users to subscribe to newsletter to get the latest MDA news and also updates for the research news.

They keep their youtube updated with videos of the performances done during the variety show.their twitter is updated regularly/ daily with information about the funds raised. the facebook page that was created have more than 1000 fans. Users can share their stories and current status on the wall. Photos and links were added to connect the user to the MDA website.

therefore, between MDA and MDAS, MDA is more successful in using new media tools to create awareness among the public, one of the most successful one is the variety shows that lasted for more than 50 years and is still ongoing.

Muscular Dystrophy is a disease that can be passed on through generations. It is the progrssively weakening of muscles due tothe missing or wrong genetic information that make the body stops making protein that build and maintain muscles.

There are many different symptoms for different types of muscular dystrophies. Generally, the signs are:

1. Weakening of muscle
2. Coordination problems

There are nine main types of muscular dystrophy:

1. Myotonic
2. Congenital
3. Duchenne
4. Becker
5. Limb-girdle
6. Facioscapulohumeral
7. Oculopharyngeal
8. Distal
9. Emery-Dreifuss

1. Myotonic

It is also known as Strinert’s disease. It causes the muscle to be stiff and unable to relax as well as the signs mention in the general section. This dystrophy does not affect its carrier until adulthood though it can affect children too. The symptoms of adult-onset myotonic dystrophy are:

Weakening of different muscles

Feeling dizzy or fainting

Unable to get a good night sleep and feel sleepy in the day, unable to stay focus

Balding in men

Mild diabetes

Cataracts

2. Congenital

This type of muscular dystrophy is present in the victim since birth. Signs may include:

Serious weakening of muscles

Breathing problem

Swallowing problem

Cognitive impairment

3. Duchenne

The most severe type of dystrophy and most common among children. Most of the victims are young boys and the signs normally show at the ages 2-3. Symptoms includes:

Falling frequently

Large calf muscle

Having difficulty in running and jumping

Unable to get up from a sitting position easily

Mild mental retardation

4. Becker’s

It’s a less serious type of dystrophy. Most of the victims are male teenagers. The symptoms are similar to Duchenne, but the signs only show around an age of 11 or even later.

5. Limb-girdle

The muscle at the hip and shoulders area will be affected first, followed by the arms and limbs. The process is slow and it may start from early childhood to adulthood.

6. Facioscapulohumeral

it’s also known as Landouzy-Dejerine dystrophy. Signs are weakening of muscles at areas such as face, shoulders, stomach, feet, arms and pelvic area.

7. Oculopharyngeal

Signs normally start at the area around the eyes, follow by the face and neck, which causes breathing problem. This normally occurs to a middle age person.

8. Distal

The dystrophy starts between the age of 40 and 60. It involves muscle at areas such as hands, feets and other body parts that are furthest away from the main body.

9. Emery-Dreifuss

This form normally occurs in the shoulder and upper arms muscle. Feeling stiff at the spine area is also one of the signs and Emery-Dreifuss starts at early teens of males only.

Currently there is no cure doe the disease but medication is availableto slow down the process.

Opinion

through my research about the disease, i had learn alot more about the disease. i didnt know that there is so many types of muscular dystrophies and that some of them only affect the males. Also that the disease can start since birth.

Who Are They?

• The Muscular Dystrophy Association (Singapore), MDAS, is a self-help organisation that is committed to uplift the lives of people with Muscular Dystrophy.

• Mission :  To maximise the quality of life of people with Muscular Dystrophy and their families, to integrate them into society and support research towards a cure.

What  do they do?

• They provide care and help to the victim
• they provide education on Muscular Dystrophy
• they support medical research on Muscular Dystrophy

What service do they provide?

• they provide grant to help their members purchase equipment to help them have a better quality of life.
• they create a scheme that provide transport services for their members to moves from places to places such as home to school etc.
• Programmes such as education on Muscular Dystrophy, counselling and similar programmes are also conducted to help their members emotionally.
• Enrichment programmes such as life skills workshop, outdoor activities and sports are also provided to help their members be more confident in themselves and also enlarge their social circle.

What do they need?

• They need volunteers, donation and sponsorship opportunities so sustain the organization.
•  Tax deductible donation will be used to buy equipment and provide services to the members. 
• The volunteers will be involved in organizing social and educational outings, workshop, programmes or training, and also to help raise public awareness and funds. Other than that, they can also be involved in the logistics and admin department etc.

Background of organisation

The National Archives of Singapore (NAS) is a place where all the memory of the nation is kept. NAS collect , preserve and manage Singapore’s public and private archival records. These records allow Singaporean to know more about the  local cultures and heritage.

The NAS uses different methods to preserve the collections. For example, microfilms are used. The collection are also available in digital but the traditional methods (eg. paper, microfilm) are still used to back up in case there is problem with the digital form.

Different processes and machines were used to preserve different type of prints. For example, the non-color print that are torn will be repaired by using fibers and border will be added. Some process that are used are anoxic treatment, deacidification, leafcasting etc. (referred from National Archives of Singapore http://www.nhb.gov.sg/NAS/services1.htm)

People who needs information from the archives can access the internet to go through the collection. However some collection can only be seen at the Nation Archives. Newsletter also can be found online for researches.

Key Points :

1. building a portfolio is important. the client will have more confidence in work with designer and also know what can be expected from the person.
2. social networking, such as twitter is an useful new media tool.
3. it is different to work freelance and attach to a company.
4. the demand of the work is totally different in the working world and the student life. more is expected in the working world and the client will not be like the teachers who will spoon-feed the students and tell them all the things that they can improve on.
5. new media tools is useful in creating a website.

things that had inspired me:

1. after hearing what the speaker says,  i realise that much more time and effort is needed to create a good website. we need to look at more things to get inspiration for our design. creativity also play a big part, it is the factor that make out work different from the others.
2. it is possible for us to be successful in this career as long as we have the determination and also self-discipline to follow the plan that was made.
3. it is important to know that what is experienced in school is totally different from the outside world. thus freelance might be a choice to start off.

yes, it is useful to have a speaker to share their expertise. for example, the guest speaker that came had let me know more about what i can expect after i leave school and also the different tools that i didnt know in school which can be used. and also, he let us know that we can be successful, like what he did, he didnt start off easily,he had been working and saving for years until he finally was able to set up a company and have what he did now.

From the article “Google Voice Search Now Understands Chinese” by Jennifer Van Grove, it have shown the next milestone of the handphone industry.

At first, handphone are only used by the minority who can afford one or the  english educated decades ago, later, other languages were introduced and the other languages educated could also use it.

Also, the function of the handphones in the early days is only for easier communication between different places , later text messaging  was introduced and in recent years, video call and wireless was introduced to the society. This further improved the communication between the people. With the introduction of wireless and GPRS, organisation such as google created mobile application softwares for smart phones like iphones, where users are able to find information on the net using their phones instead of computers. And now, google have introduced an ability for the phone to recognise voices , not only for the english language but also mandarin too. This invention could increase the number of people using handphones especially the chinese race whose mother tougue is mandarin. This would greatly help the society as the chinese economic is currently rising, it would help the chinese businessman to better do their business.

Also, in the current fast pace society, time is money, with this new function, the user can save time typing the words and finding the correct chinese words, which also help those who is weak in reading and writing chinese characters to easily find the words they want .

In conclusion, handphones had made a great impact to the society, from only phonecalls to current ability of using the internet, the phones have evolve greatly to suit peoples’ need. Everyone in the society can use it regardless of the language you learn and race you are. With the start of the invention of recgonising mandarin, the dream of the ability to recgonise other languages may also come true.

this is the tag cloud that i have been asked to do

hope i have done it correctly

today my laptop have been acting weird

kip hanging and later a bubble saying

“the display drive have stopped working and have recovered.”

sth lyk tat, my bro sae is maybe sth is loose

it only started today haiz…

hope its not a big prob

1st time using wordpress…cause NMT need us to blog for marks, so created this to do that..lol nothing much to say, school ending in a few minutes