erica m

I'm thinking of getting rid of my smart phone and getting a tablet in its place. I can think of plenty of benefits (e.g. save money on voice plan and use VOIP, etc) but I need to hear more reasons why this might be a bad idea. Can you provide me with some points to consider and some challenges this might present? I'll also take recommendations for Android-based tablets if you have them.

I'm working on a case study for an accounting class and need to know whether leased equipment (i.e. airplanes) would be depreciated the same way as purchased equipment? If so, does leased equipment have a salvage value since you can't sell it when you're done?

I'm doing a project for my market research class and I need to develop a plan for measuring the effectiveness of a current anti-smoking campaign. I have already included conversion measures in the plan, such as calls to the quit smoking hotline and website clicks and I need to create a survey. What kind of questions might the survey contain? The measure of effectiveness is the number of times a person has tried to quit smoking, which I want to link back to that person having seen the ad.

I am looking for any kind of research data that indicates how many people the average person meets OR encounters. It can be the average number of people met per day, week, year, or lifetime as long as it is somewhat scientific (no speculation please) and you can provide sources. Thank you in advance.

I'm graduating undergrad school in December and entering graduate school in January 2011. Since I'm currently enrolled in undergrad for Fall 2010, I already filled out my FAFSA for the 2010-2011 academic year. Is there a way to carry my FAFSA info over to graduate school or do I have to fill out a new one? How do I roll it over?

I am running a survey for my client and I need to know how to calculate the sample size that I need to survey in order to get generalizable data. The survey is to find out whether or not an organization should build a social networking tool for its employees to use internally (think employee profiles, message boards, etc). The total population is about 160,000 employees of Company X, which means that the audience is very captive and this tool is relevant to everyone. The tool will be very expensive to build, so I want very accurate data that will represent the whole company's opinion of whether or not employees will use this tool. Out of the 160,000 employees, how many should I survey? If you can tell me how you arrive at your answer, that would be most helpful.

We were trying to create a totally sustainable room. The problem is, the contractors have already painted the room with regular, non-green latex paint. Is there any way we can put a twist on this to say it's eco-friendly as compared to worse alternatives, like oil-based paint? Even though it's not as "green" as some of the new, sustainable paints that are out.

On a recent trip, I saw a woman with an adorable laptop bag so I asked where she got it and she said, "off a website called 'Book.'" So I've looked all over and tried many different search terms but came up with nothing. Has anyone ever heard of such a brand? The bag looked like a regular neoprene laptop sleeve, turned on its side, with a messenger bag type strap. It was very sleek and simple.

I just had a crazy idea. I am a PC user by birth, but my job requires me to use a Mac so I am facing a crisis. I am looking into buying a Mac just so I can run the software I would need for work (mostly Adobe, Omnigraffle, etc) but I also need a PC to coordinate with classmates in a school that is all PC-based. I know I could buy the same software for Windows but I feel like I would be caught in a never-ending compatibility struggle. Is it possible to hook up a Mac Mini to my HP laptop and just use the laptop as a monitor? This way, I could own a Mac for relatively cheap but not have to carry around ANOTHER laptop?

I am at work and my sweater dress is clinging to my tights a little more than I would like it to. Are there any quick fixes I can use with things around the office? I don't have any dryer sheets or Scotchguard handy...

If I buy CS4 for my PC, will the files be compatible with Macs? For example, I am a PC user but I have to use a Mac at work...will I be able to work on InDesign at home, put it on a portable drive, and open it on my Mac at work without any problems?

How do you write the possessive form of an already possessive proper noun?

For example, imagine you have a salon called Danielle's Salon, but you refer to it as just "Danielle's".

If I want to ask: Who are ________ competitors, how do I write that?

I defragmented and ran a disk cleanup then shut my computer down. When I went to use it the next day, I got a blue screen with the error message: page_fault_in_nonpaged_area. Below were the following numbers: 00x00000050 (0x80098004, 0x00000001, 0x80515103, 0x00000000)

Currently I'm running Windows XP Home on a Dell Inspiron (desktop, not sure exactly which model but it's about 3 years old)

I tried F8 during boot and none of the options work (I tried booting last known settings, safe mode, etc) and it keeps redirecting me to the blue screen. Then I did F12 and ran a whole list of tests by symptom and they all passed. Also, I haven't downloaded anything recently or added new hardware. How can I fix this?? If I try reinstalling Windows, will it delete all of my files?

Does anyone know roughly when the next generation of the Macbook Pro will come out? I want to buy one but the way technology changes, I don't want to buy one now and have a anew model come out next month and then have mine be outdated. If you could provide a source as to where to you got your info, that would be ideal.

Turn on your marketing brains! My professor asked us to imagine that we are loan company. We have given loans to car dealerships to buy inventory. Now, we want to run a marketing campaign to help the dealers liquidate these cars so that they can repay their loans. What kind of strategies can we use to sell JUST the cars that have been financed by us? So, if a dealer sells Toyotas and Hondas, and we gave them a loan to buy their Toyota inventory, then we only care about liquidating the Toyotas. The catch is that we cannot use our company name because the end consumer doesn't care who the inventory was financed by...so it has to be a generic tactic that will draw attention to just the Toyotas in the lot. Legally, we also cannot run a sale using the Toyota brand.

I am conducting market research about banking habits and I will be using mostly business owners and financial professionals as my subjects. The format will be personal interviews and I would like to ask about their personal financial habits as well as their business banking needs. I have a feeling that these financial professionals will not be too open to sharing their personal information in a "B2B" interview. How can I get information about their socioeconomic status (generally) without directly asking the dreaded income question?

My cousin wants to go to school to be a Special Effects makeup artist. I would like to buy her a high-quality, comprehensive starter kit and I'm looking to spend around $50. I also looked into buying the components separately on Amazon to save money and get a broader range of things. Can anyone suggest a good kit within my price range or list some key items I could buy separately? What are the "basic staples" of a Special Effects artist's toolkit?

How do you calculate the derivative of 2^x + 3^x where x = -0.1?

I accidentally ripped a $50 bill clean in half (it was in an envelope and I thought I took everything out of it and began to tear up the envelope). What can I do??? Will the bank/stores accept taped bills? I have seen ones and fives that have been taped back together, but usually they use the anti-counterfeit markers on 50s so they're more picky about what they accept.

Are there any semi-normal names that begin with a U??

The best I could find was Ursula or Ulysses. Please nothing made up or odd-sounding like Ugo.