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.

2007 — July 05
Ever since the Internet emerged in the mid 90ies, email based newsletters have grown in popularity and a large number of people got used to receiving valuable information through their electronic mail box. The English Language Newsletter by Alan Townend is one of the most widely read Internet publications today. Alan shares his experiences and ideas with more than 20.000 subscribers from all over the world. Every month you can learn something new about English idioms, life in the UK and of course British humour. In addition to being an author Alan also travels a lot, especially through Europe. Maybe in his July newsletter issue he is going to tell you something about his recent trip to Germany -- at any rate you should make sure to sign up for his newsletter today.

2007 — June 03
Have you ever heard of Mr Blair? No, not Tony Blair but Adam Blair, a British entrepreneur who claims to be building a new search engine that will aspire to be as popular as Google within the next five years. That's pretty bold, isn't it? On April 29 in 2007 Adam launched his search engine by the name of Windizzi and his plan is to share his potential success with the users of his site: Anyone who is interested in this venture can register for free to become a so called "founding member" of Windizzi. So far close to 10.000 people have joined this project and maybe Windizzi will the next Internet success story?

2007 — June 02
Alan Townend is challenging the world wide English language community. Yes, you heard right. The email based newsletter Alan has been publishing for the past couple of years has become one of the most popular circulations amongst the online English language community. As a matter of fact, his newsletter is probably the number one worldwide. Oh, you might say but what about Mr Michael Quinion, doesn't his World Wide Words newsletter have close to 50.000 subscribers? Of course Michael's list outnumbers Alan's in quite a few categories but the World Wide Words newsletter focuses on weird and hardly known English words. And while I have a great respect for the amazing work of Michael Quinion, I really think that Alan Townend's writing style is so unique and refreshing that once you subscribe to his newsletter you can't wait to receive the next issue. Fortunately there is also an archive where you can read all the essays he has published so far. So, I take it you are an ardent reader of Aan's newsletter? If not, you should sign up today and you will be excited too.

2007 — April 22
After discussing the laptop question, it might be a good idea to explore all the benefits you would get from mobile UMTS Internet connection. For example, you would be able to do the following things:

• read and answer your email when you travel
• look up any information on the web while you are away from your office or home
• make cheap calls to any phone number through Skype (using your headset)
• speak with people from all around the world through Skype
• check your email while you are sitting in a park or caf?

Now, if you work and live in Germany you can access the Internet while you are on the move by using a broadband UMTS connection. There are two major providers you can choose - it's either British based Vodafone or the German giant T-Mobile. While both may be offering the same plans when it comes to UMTS/HSDAP, only T-Mobile's package comes with WLAN access too. I'll explain the difference between UMTS and WLAN in a minute...

Now, let's say you want to replace your current DSL account with a mobile Internet connection. DSL might provide you with high speed Internet access but the problem is it's a fixed connection which means you can use it only at one place: either at home or at your office (or wherever your DSL line might be). With a UMTS connection you can decide where you want to work. It gives you the freedom to access the Internet from any place in Germany. Both Vodafone and T-Mobile are operating a UMTS network that allows you to access the web at DSL speed. I know, there are different DSL data transfer rates but for the sake of simplicity we might just compare DSL with UMTS.

So if you want to replace your DSL connection with a UMTS account, both Vodafone and T-Mobile currently are offering packages that include a 5 GB of data traffic at around 59 Euros. However, on top of the 5 GB UMTS data traffic T-Mobile includes 200 hours of WLAN usage. WLAN means you can access the Internet inside buildings that host a so-called "HotSpot" which basically consists of a DSL connection with a wireless router. T-Mobile operates thousands of those access points in Germany, Europe and the US. For example, all the McDonald's stores in Germany come with a T-Mobile HotSpot. In addition, there are T-Mobile HotSpots at all German airports and railway stations. T-Mobile is the single biggest HotSpot operator worldwide. That's why T-Mobile is probably the better choice when it comes to selecting a mobile Internet provider.