As our site grows every day we want to share some information with you on the way we are operating the project. We call this section «Business Blog» as it is similar to doing a log book where data is recorded in a chronological order. «Blogging» is gaining popularity with more and more people picking up the habit of publishing their experiences and thoughts on the Internet. Our Blog covers various topics — from TOEFL, TOEIC, MBA, GMAT, ESL/EFL test preperation to cultural traditions and current political events.
There will also be some Internet marketing terminology and if you have any questions regarding the information simply let us know.

The Business Blog is written by Torsten Daerr and edited by Alan Townend.

2006 — February 17
Do you know how many people are currently using the Internet in China? The estimated number is more than 100 million. This means, China has the largest Internet population in the world. And the Chinese Internet community is literally growing by the hour. One of our forum users is from China, he is studying in Beijing to obtain a Master Degree in Automative Engineering. Interestingly enough he is also preparing for the TOEIC and he has read a book on learning English called «Absolutely Don't Study English». We have started a conversation about various subjects such as student life in Beijing, Bill Gates in China and internal combustion engines. If you want to join in on our discussion you can do so by clicking here: TOEIC in China.

2006 — January 31
If are interested in sharing your ideas on questions like how to learn a language or how Germans and Americans differ, you might want to join this discussion: wasting money teaching English. I know the subject might sound a bit provocative and that's exactly what I intended because you tend to change your views and opinions only if you feel that something is wrong about the way you think. When it comes to teaching English I think there's a lot that should be changed. The whole concept of teaching is somewhat open to debate. Do you really think that anyone is actually able to teach you anything? After all you can only learn something from somebody. This might sound like a «no brainer» but the vast majority of people who sign up for a language course at a so called language school happily disregard this fact. Let's take a look at some numbers. A week has 7 days, each of which has 24 hours. That makes a total of 168. Now if you enrol on a private language, course you'll probably spend about 2 hours a week «learning». 2 hours is about 1,2% of the length of a week. How many «students» are there in a typical English class? OK; you have opted for the «small group» package and there are «only» 4 to 5 others like you in your class. This means a substantial part of your precious 2 hour training is spent listening to your class mates trying to create sentences in English. your trainer might correct one or two mistakes made by the other students but you will still be exposed to «bad English» because even the best English teacher can't correct every single mistake a person makes in grammar, pronunciation and syntax. Nevertheless you go on and pay for the course and attend it because that's what everyone else does and you're probably not likely to start looking for an alternative. Or have I got it all wrong?

2006 — January 28
If you want to learn a language, prepare for the GRE, TOEFL, TOEIC or any other exam you have to create your own training program. Don't rely on a teacher or a school to do the work for you. It is pure fantasy to think that when you pay for an exam prep course or a language class you have done your bit. Far from it. You are still responsible for developing your skills and acquiring new knowledge. What we can do at english-test.net is provide you with materials, tests, articles and ideas that will help you find the information you need. One key element is our ESL/EFL newsletter which you can subscribe to for free. It is written by Alan Townend, an author and English language expert with lots of experiences under his belt. Alan also answers any of your grammar or vocabulary questions regarding his tests on our forum. Or maybe you want to discuss cultural issues? Then this discussion Questions in Russian? might be interesting for you.

2006 — January 07
What do «GRE» and «SEO» have in common? Yes, both terms are popular abbreviations on the Internet. If you google each of them you will get millions of search results. Now, if you look for the phrase «GRE forum», Google returns more than 2 million entries and guess which page is on top? Exactly it's GRE Prep Forum / GRE Forum by english-test.net — a section of our forums that has been gaining exposure ever since we set it up on March 1 of 2005. One of the most active threads so far is called GRE score 1410 which was started by Vineeta. So far this discussion has 31 posts and has been viewed more than 1000 times. Quite recently our GRE was joined by a contributor who is also running his own GRE blog called «my gre tips-n-tricks». In this blog he provides a lot of detailed information on how to prepare for the GRE and he shares GRE resources and GRE prep materials. Maybe, we can collaborate with him more closely in the near future?