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you won't see the Wildcat from Michigan. Just because the QB is running the ball doesn't mean its the Wildcat. The old Single Wing offense is the wildcat. We run the zone read.
Important Year for Rich Rodriguez (Revised)
The Beginning of an Era
As many of you know by now this year is supposed to be the turn around year for the Michigan Wolverine football program. Rich Rodriguez has had two years to bring his players into the system and get his offense/defense style into effect. The past two years have been dismal but showed improvement from year one to year two. Quarterback Tate Forcier is erratic but shows signs of greatness. We have a strong D-line and an amazing receiving core. All improvements aside, this is the Hot Seat year for Rich Rodriguez. Most of the players in Ann Arbor are his players so this year we will see how good his system is working.
Last years recruits for Rodriguez had many good players come into the system. Tate Forcier no doubt the most helpful as he showed he can lead this team and with effort, could become the Michigan Savior we all want. Although he was very erratic he threw for over 2,000 yards with 13 touchdowns and 10 interceptions. With a 58% completion rate, maybe he will be able to get that TD-INT ratio a little bit better.
Denard Robinson was another good recruit Rich brought into the system last year. He was not a very good QB. He had only 2 touchdowns with 4 interceptions but did not get anywhere near the playing time Forcier did. While Robinson may not be much of a starting QB, he definitely poses a threat whenever Michigan decides to run the Wildcat formation (even if it is only a couple plays all year long), Gardner has exceptional speed and is very agile.
Vincent Smith promises to be a good running back. He was second on the team with 5.8 yards per carry behind senior Carlos Brown with 5.9.
This years recruits are not amazing (with the turndown of Demar Dorsey) but some are attracting a lot of hype, such as Devin Gardner. The ESPNU top 150 recruit and Under Armour All American is predicted 3rd string but many think if Tate and Robinson falter, he could be moved up in the depth chart.
Rich Rodriguez will need to improve Michigan's defense if he wants to have a better year than last years 5-7 season. Michigan ranked 91st in rushing defense last year, 67th in passing defense, 77th in scoring defense and 82nd overall. This will have to be improved if Rich wants to get to a bowl game this year.
Although we lost Brandon Graham, who had more sacks than the rest of the line last year, this year our D-line is looking to be a strong one (although not as strong as last years) with the rest of the D-line returning.
With Donovan Warren and Boubacar Cissoko gone, J.T. Floyd and Troy Woolfolk will need to step it up this year to make our secondary not as horrendous as last years.
Rich Rodriguez will need to win at least 7 games this year if not more if he wants to coach the Wolverines much longer. While i doubt Michigan will fire him if he goes 5-7 again it will definitely be discussed at the end of the season if Rodriguez cannot turn things around in Ann Arbor. Michigan has a very easy non-conference schedule with the exception of Notre Dame this year. Starting the season off with Connecticut, Notre Dame, Massachusetts, and Bowling Green respectively. The Maize and Blue faithful will be expecting 3-1 at the VERY, and i stress very, least. After that we begin the always tough conference schedule with Indiana, although not strong they did compete with us last year. Then we have Michigan State at home, Iowa, and Penn State in Happy Valley. We than have easier games, although not definite wins with Illinois and Purdue. We then finish off the season with Wisconsin and a trip to the Horseshoe to battle Ohio State. Rodriguez will need to beat Ohio State if he wants total job security at the end of the year.
This is going to be a crucial year for Rodriguez. He will need to impress the fans more this year than ever. He will have very little excuses this year unless we have injury trouble.
My Prediction
This is looking to be an exciting year for the Wolverines. We have many good prospects coming in to go along with old ones still trying to prove they have what it takes. I personally think the Wolverines will go 8-4 this year, challenging Ohio State to the last minute, earning a bid to the Alamo Bowl or the Champs Sports Bowl and winning it. Anything less and i will be very shocked. I think Tate will develop into a better than average QB this year with very few erratic moments. I also think our secondary along with our D-line will step up to make our defense in the top 50. This will be a very important year for Rich Rodriguez and Michigan Football.
we will see the wildcat. There not going to go all year without runnign it once.
You don't know what the Wildcat is. And that's okay. But you don't need to keep insisting that you understand. Just sit this one out for awhile.
So 8-4 gets them to the capital one bowl? Where do you see iowa, penn state, wisconson, michigan state and ohio state going then?
so i guess we could have the Alamo Bowl? or the Champs Sports Bowl?
8-4 got us to our last Capital One bowl
For being reasonable
We aren't going to use it, spread-option is much like the wildcat but doesn't line up 3 RBs. Plus DRob will be torching the defenses with his arm and especially his legs =P.
how the Wildcat is different -- it definitely isn't a single-wing, at least not what Arkansas ran with McFadden. That's the first I remember hearing about it.
The wildcat formation (or wildcat offense), a variation on the single-wing formation, is an offensive Americanand Canadian football scheme that has been used at every level of the game including the CFL, NFL, NCAA,NAIA, and many high schools across America. The general scheme can be instituted in many different offensive systems, but the distinguishing factor is a direct snap to the running back and an unbalanced offensive line.
Are you talking about our WRs? Not that the potential isn't there, but they haven't even proven themselves to be a good group yet.
As for the wildcat, we never ran it last year so what makes you think they will run it this year? I know this is going to come off sounding rude, but this may be the worst diary I have ever read on this board.
but they are really good.
You can run the wildcat for one play, and its still running the wildcat.
Its not rude, if its what you think its what you think. I personally thought this was a good blog. I put alot of time and effort into it. If you think its bad then oh well.
is this the worst blog ever? Because i think our recieving corp is amazing? and you dont. Im expressing MY oppinion on something I wrote, and its the worst blog ever because we have different oppinions on the receivers? No. This is a VERY decent blog about the season we are about to have, i got a couple things a little off but because i didnt research as much as i should have, but this is not a horrendous blog by any means. In my oppinion of course.
No this is really just a restatement of what every person who's ever watched ESPN already knows. I don't know where you got the impression our receiving corps is awesome, maybe you aught to go back to the war room and watch the spring game.
this may be the worst diary I have ever read on this board
kb9704 would beg to differ with his classic "Finally Got It Right?" diary from a couple of days ago.
OP, a summary of the depth chart, a few of the most basic stats, and your guess as to schedule does not a good diary make. Also, this is flat out wrong:
Michigan has a very easy non-conference schedule with the exception of Notre Dame this year.
UConn will be tough. they are coming off an 8 win season and are bringing something like 16 starters back. If we weren't Michigan, they would likely be heavily favoured in the opener.
Did you watch the spring game? Your assessment of Denard looks quite valid from a last year POV; he looked like an athlete trying to play QB. In the spring game, though, he looked like a QB who happens to be a great athlete. Denard is fast, but that doesn't mean that a play is the "wildcat" just because he happens to be taking the snap.
As for the commenter who mentioned MSU: I'm not so sure they are even going to a bowl. And I wouldn't slot them ahead of Michigan in the BT bowl hierarchy just yet. And, for purely selfish reasons, I hope they make the Outback Bowl.
nor did I watch clips for this blog, which apparently I should have. Yes my interpretation DRob was last years.
My last sentence was ambiguous at best; Michigan is the team I hope makes the Outback bowl. It would be nice to take a sixteen mile "trip" to watch them play a bowl game. Besides, I am hoping that after this season the Outback Bowl would be considered a disappointment. This season, though, it would be considered a job well done and an indication that Michigan is "back."
Gotta neg you cause I'm smelling roses...
Just because he didn't contribute anything original is no reason to rip him so directly. He clearly wasn't trolling, and he tried, so let it go.
If you don't think Michigan State is going to a bowl game you must be predicting some sort of major catastrophy to happen. They play nobody.
i still think this is a decent blog
REALLY think its that bad?
It is this bad
This is the second time in the last two days someone new gets on to write a very poorly thought out "blog" with very poor understanding of what's going on, says a few things that are terribly obvious for their erroneous nature and gets neg-banged into oblivion.
Fortunately this was NOT another "Screw the arrogant U, we should have taken Demar" post.
The neg bang is the only penis some of these folks have.
The blog was bad though.
the criticism. I'm reading this after the revisions so perhaps the acerbity of the initial commentators is no longer viable. I agree with the general flavor of what you write, and I also feel 8-4 is doable, but I too have some disagreements on what you posted. I don't feel the OOC schedule should be categorized as 'very easy'; while Umass might fall under that descriptor, I'm not too quick to place BGSU in that category. They did graduate 16 starters, but we've seen what they can do before. UCONN appears to be up and coming, upper tier MAC quality at the very least, and that is not meant to be a snub. Also, any trip to South Bend is fraught with challenges; it is rare to escape there with an 'easy' win, let alone 'very easy'. Still, I like how we stack up against our OOC foes.
I definitely would take a gander at the spring game video, as it highlights several players not in the mix last year who may be up for a big year in 2010: Cam Gordon, Greg Banks, Taylor Lewan, to name some, and of course the biggest highlight of the reel, Denard. If you are going to write a diary here, you need to do good analysis, not just shoot well from the hip.
everyone seems to think this post sucks amazingly when IMO its not THAT bad...
Read the post above you, I think he sums it up fairly, and I'm in the same boat as him with only reading it after revisions. But yeah, that's where I'd start if looking for some helpful criticism.
Do you honestly think that you are the most qualified person to judge the merits of a post you wrote for public consumption?
What you wrote was received unfavorably by a significant majority of readers here. It happens to everyone. Instead of defending it, you should just learn what you can from the reaction here and move on.
EDIT: Also, for future reference, it doesn't affect your point total when you +1 your own posts.
Keep in mind that you're posting a write-up on the pinnacle of Michigan blog sites so expectations are high. This isn't Bleacherreport.
This would probably be a featured post over there.
With some of these board posts recently is that they don't play out to the quality people around here are used to. I'm not saying that's 100% the OPs fact, but I no personally, and for many other people, before I even got a user name I looked around the site and gained a basic understanding of how things around here typically worked and what people expected.
From there I think most people only slowly work their way into posting more frequently. The thing that is so odd recently is that there have been diaries created and some odd posts, all from people that have created an account within the last couple days.
To the OP, I suggest following the path I just described. Stick around, read what people are saying and what people expect from different areas of the site. For example, typically the diaries are left for new ideas, putting old ideas in a new light through statistics, recruiting, and so on. The board is more often used for something like you just posted. Anyway, that's my suggestion, I probably would stay away from posting on this diary as it will only get worse for you because of the hole you already dug. Just stick around and watch what other people are doing. It's a good site and people will respect you more when you understand the underlying politics and rules of the site.
So 8-5 would be a shock to you? We play OSU, PSU, Iowa, Wisconsin, MSU, ND, UConn, and another team in our bowl game. I think 9-4, which is what you're saying, is our ceiling.
I think only O-state and maybe Wisconsin are the teams we don't have a realistic shot at beating. Adam Rittenberg called our best-case scenario 10-2 (with a win over Wisconsin included), so our ceiling could even be 12-1. I personally don't think that will happen b/c the QBs are still young and the defense is as green as the new bananas they trot out at the supermarket. This will cause us to underachieve some games and overachieve in others. I don't think 9-4 is our ceiling, but rather our expectation.
HartFan, I'm gonna give you some advice. Advice that I have personally, along with many other bloggers here, have experienced. With a "bad" post comes negs. With another post asking why you were negged comes more negs. From there on out every post you make on that thread shall be negged because it probably has something to do with asking why your blog was "bad" or still trying to understand why your getting negged.
My advice is to just let it go and try again next time.
...system is going to be interesting to watch this year. It seems to me that the offense clicks best when the weather's good and routes are run cleanly and precisely. I'm still not completely sold on the philosophical concept of somewhat smaller, quicker players in the B10, but I'd love to be wrong.
In my book, RR needs to deliver 8 wins this Fall. Michigan teams with less than 8 win seasons just aren't right and can never be acceptable. Success and Michigan football go together like beer and pretzels after all.
Just making it to a bowl isn't good enough because damn near everyone hovering just above .500 gets to some sort of bowl these days. I can't imagine anyone feeling good about getting 6 wins and playing against someone like FL Int'l. in some no-name bowl. It would be an embarrassment.
Although Brandon seems solidly behind RR regardless of this year's outcome, I'd start visiting the coach store if we get less than 8 wins. I guess patience isn't one of my virtues, but this is Michigan football we're talking about here -- a program with a standard of excellence that should be unparalleled.
Obviously you do not think its that bad in your opinion because you wrote it Hartfan.
In other news, the sky is blue....
thing that bothers me the most is that if your recruiting section and your entire post you never reference Craig Roh, who is probably one of our best defensive players and he is going to be a sophomore. Kind of shocking to not even bring him up. Great athlete and amazing player. so reason he should not be included in this.
The other thing bothering me is when you talk about the OOC schedule. Saying it is all easy teams besides ND. sorry sir but UConn is good. Preseason they are on the fringe of top 25 polls. so good try. A for effort. F for product.
Maybe the requisite number of points to write a diary should be raised to 1000?
You failed, horribly.
But, you tried and I can respect that.
One tip, since I on't think you are a troll, don't upvote your own posts, it is a recipe for a negbang.
Plus, as what was said below... this is THE premier college football blog, with guys like Mathlete who provide ridiculously amazing posts and make the rest of us feel horribly inferior. Or TomVH who gives deep insight into recruiting that the rest of us do not have the time, energy or access to get ourselves.
This is not the place for the average fan to have their voice expressed based off of their gut feeling, backed by a few glances at recruiting posts each week. There are places for that, like Rivals. I view myself as a diehard fan who is fairly knowledgeable on the team... and could even compose a convincing argument to support my treatise on how the team will do this year. However, I would never dream of posting it here, especially as a diary. it does not belong as a diary as it does not benefit anyone else other then my own ego, as it is not worth the pixels it is written with.
Just a thought from one passionate fan to another.
I'd really love to fix that first paragraph for you. It's screaming out for multiple fixes.
Michigan should start at least 5-1 maybe 6-0. with iowa at home, who is penn state qb. wisconsin is a revenge game, and we will beat OHIO STATE.
I like the diary's optimism. Vincent Smith promises to be good? I would say he showed promise last season @ most. I wouldn't agree that UConn is an automatic W. I am thinking they will win 7-9 games this year. You tried and that's good, but you didn't try to prove your points with any sustainment.
I will be your friend
was slammed and torn apart by the mgo-masses. Don't take it the wrong way, you just have yet to experience how in-depth this website really is. If you stay with this for a year, by this time next year your blogs will be 10x better. Take some time to figure out which blogs go on the diary section and which are better in the mgoboard section.
The "diary" section of this site is really meant for blogs that are extremely well researched and thought out. You might think this one took you a bit of time, but you should look up a diary written by the mathlete to get an idea of what we're talking about. Just post on the mgoboard until you think you've got a really good grasp of what goes where. Happy blogging, and welcome to the mgoblog family, kid.
i think this should get front paged


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2 – Acrylamido–2 Methylpropane sulfonic acid applications
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From: Chemistry chemicals

subset: commoncrawl


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The year 2013 was a busy one for politicians at every level of government, and it appears some northern MPPs are expecting to see change in the new year, possibly in the form of an election.
Sudbury Liberal MPP Rick Bartolucci has already announced he won't be running in the next provincial election, which he thinks could happen in 2014.
Looking back, Bartolucci said one highlight from 2013 was Kathleen Wynne winning the leadership race to be Ontario's premier.
"She's done a remarkable job," he said.
"A very, very important job was assigned to her with winning that leadership and that was to try and make government work."
But not all opposition MPPs agree there's been collaboration.
Timiskaming-Cochrane New Democrat MPP John Vanthof said he feels northerners don't have input when it comes to decisions about this region.
"We know that tough decisions have to be made," he said.
"But they should be made on actualities and realities and not just on what some bean counter in Queen's Park thinks."
Nipissing Progressive Conservative MPP Vic Fedeli said he thinks several major projects that would benefit their region were sidelined in 2013, including Ontario Northland and the Ring of Fire.
He said he believes going to the polls could change the future of these projects.
"I really want to see a turn-around," he said.
"This has to be our turn-around year and I think the way to do it to have an election."
Looking ahead to 2014
There are projects on Bartolucci's wish list for the new year.
"One of them being the Maley Drive extension," he said. "I think that is really important for our continued prosperity."
Fedeli said he'd like to see a clear plan on the future of Ontario Northland.
"So I think the premier should come out very quickly and say the divestment is off," he said.
The provincial government has said in recent weeks it wants to transform Ontario Northland, instead of divesting itself of the asset.
It's not clear what that transformation will look like.
To encourage thoughtful and respectful conversations, first and last names will appear with each submission to CBC/Radio-Canada's online communities (except in children and youth-oriented communities). Pseudonyms will no longer be permitted.
By submitting a comment, you accept that CBC has the right to reproduce and publish that comment in whole or in part, in any manner CBC chooses. Please note that CBC does not endorse the opinions expressed in comments. Comments on this story are moderated according to our Submission Guidelines. Comments are welcome while open. We reserve the right to close comments at any time.
Note: The CBC does not necessarily endorse any of the views posted. By submitting your comments, you acknowledge that CBC has the right to reproduce, broadcast and publicize those comments or any part thereof in any manner whatsoever. Please note that comments are moderated and published according to our submission guidelines.


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Pope's prayer intentions for January 2011
December 31, 2010
The Apostleship of Prayer has announced the prayer intentions of Pope Benedict XVI for January 2011.
The Pope's general intention is "that the riches of the created world may be preserved, valued, and made available as God's precious gift to all." His missionary intention is "that Christians may attain full unity, witnessing to all the universal fatherhood of God."
On December 30, the Vatican Information Service announced the papal prayer intentions for January 2011 but mistakenly reprinted the intentions for January 2010.
Further information:
- Apostleship of Prayer
- Papal prayer intentions for 2011 (EWTN)
- Benedict XVI's Prayer Intentions for January 2011 (VIS)
- Pope's prayer intentions for January 2010 (CWN, 12/31/09)
All comments are moderated. To lighten our editing burden, only current donors are allowed to Sound Off. If you are a donor, log in to see the comment form; otherwise please support our work, and Sound Off!
Posted by: Justin8110 -
Dec. 31, 2010 5:57 PM ET USA
I wish the Holy Father would have specified that "full unity" means that all Christians would become members of the Catholic Church. His words are vague on this which seems to be the case almost everywhere. Why are we so afraid to proclaim what the Church taught for almost 2000 years prior to the decades after Vatican II? Even Vatican II teaches a traditional doctrine on the Church. Why the ambiguity? I pray it will stop in my lifetime.


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Are Those Helen Kellers You're Wearing?
From Overheard:
Chinese companies rarely have a very light touch when it comes to branding. Best Raiment of Jauntiness and b + ab gotta pick my precious love collection – both clothing retailers – stand out for strangeness.
But one Chinese fashion company has come up with a particularly, uh, eye-catching brand: Helen Keller sunglasses
Helen Keller is apparently a staple of China's school curriculum – an exemplary figure that overcame her disabilities to make a mark – and a socialist to boot. But picking a famously blind person as the brand name for an eyewear company still seems a little strange.
An advert for the brand shows a beautiful brunette stepping from an airplane to a waiting crowd of paparazzi. Only when she dons her Helen Keller sunglasses do the cameras start to click. The firm's motto: "You see the world, the world sees you"
Chen Wenjing, a spokesperson for the Xiamen Jinzhi, the company behind the sunglasses, said that they were aware Helen Keller was blind, but what they valued was her philanthropist spirit which spread optimism around the world.
It's difficult to top that, but if anyone is interested the copyright on Lin Biao Parachutes is still available. Tagline: "You'll wish you'd brought one."
–Tom Orlik with contributions from Yoli Zhang


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New sounds coming up soon!
Popular Posts
May 16th, 2009
Kamau at SETI
Kamau Hamilton, SETI Project Winner
I've been at SETI for the last two days doing interviews, filming, and recording. I met Claire Dworsky. I met Doug Vakoch, and Frank Drake, I also met Seth Shostak, Jill Tarter.
HEY! Go to EarthSpeaks.SETI.org and send in your sounds, pictures or messages. Tell friends, family, teachers and everyone else you know.
Maybe one day we'll send your sounds and messages into space.
May 12th, 2009
Recording Earth Sounds for the Aliens to Hear
KSC Team
SETI category winner Kamau Hamilton wants to record sounds of the earth to send into space, and he's been doing just that. In fact, he'll by flying out to the SETI Institute this week to collaborate with astronomers. Stay tuned!


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|Reviews for Two Geeks in Love
| NeverGreenMoon chapter 1 . 5/21/2013
i'm not signed in but this is my regular username. I love this story so much, I had been looking for decent Lara/Dana stories for ever. They are the only couple I found remotely relate-able. I have read just about every story with them out there, and to my surprise I only found this a couple of weeks ago, thought I would have found it sooner. I guess not every rock was turned. You did a fantastic job
| PoeticLove93 chapter 21 . 8/20/2008
i love this story! i have to say, that even though i only have caught glimpses of the actual show, i know a bit, and enough to know that Dana/Lara is one of my favorite pairings. i think you do a wonderful job of portraying exactly what it says in the title, and who they are in the show.
keep going, or i will hunt you down, and out you in a small room with adequate living arrangements, and a computer until you write more!
| danielpickering chapter 21 . 7/24/2008
I love this story. Dana/Lara is my favorite pairing. I think this
story is great and I like how you are doing all the scenes in between the episodes. I've noticed that three quarters of the story was in between episode 3-4. I am looking forward to when you do the next chapter. I just hope you don't have the break up that happens as I hated it when Dana did that. Anyway this is a brilliant story and I hope to read more of it soon.
| Jonz chapter 21 . 5/21/2008
I have to admit, this is the fourth time I read this fic. In a year or something. I guess I'm a bit of a geek too XP And a jerk. For never reviewing before. Or, I think I havn't. I don't know. I'm a terrible reviewer :s
Yeah, so, back to your fic. It's one of the rare decent DanaxLara fics on this site, and seeing as it's one of my favourite pairings, well, thumbs up ;)
Hoping to see more of you soon,
| Sayahiei chapter 21 . 1/13/2008
Wow, this is a very good fanfic, I just got into The L Word recently so...yea...*thumb up* Favorite pairing.
| NeoTroi79 chapter 21 . 11/8/2007
I'm loving this story, and I must say, the title is perfect.
| NeoTroi79 chapter 16 . 11/8/2007
That was a great last line...made me giggle
| NeoTroi79 chapter 6 . 11/8/2007
They are so friggin cute...I totally rooted for them to stay together
| NeoTroi79 chapter 1 . 11/8/2007
wow i absolutely LOVE the last scene!
| Shane Dax chapter 1 . 11/7/2007
i loved your story so much! and i really wished that dana and lara stayed together. but i absolutly love wut u've done with this! ur writing is amazing and i hope u update it!
i look kinda like Lara too. WHOO! lmfao.
Email me!
| meet.me.on.the.sunset chapter 21 . 10/27/2007
great update...you do know how to make us happy )
| SuperGirl06 chapter 21 . 9/10/2007
Yup, still adore your Lara. It was definitely a pleasant surprise to see an update from you! Loved the chapter! The only thing that made me sad was if this follows their storyline in the show closely, we're coming up to the part where Dana gets all self-conscience and has issues with the party and then the scene in the restuarant happens. I don't know if I could handle seeing your Lara get hurt. Totally trust your writing though so I'll just sit back and enjoy :)
| playmobil chapter 21 . 9/9/2007
Yeah another chapter! more please! i like it that u follow the true storyline and u did it very well , dont stop!
| WolfgalX chapter 21 . 9/9/2007
Another great chapter. That was so sweet that Lara gave Dana the rose. And I was paranoid for a second that Dana left in the morning for a really bad reason or something. I guess that's what reading a lot of angsty fics does. And the very, very hot as usual, I absolutely loved it. Hope you update soon, I was getting scared that you weren't going to but you were probably just busy, no prob. :D
| NerdyJock63 chapter 21 . 9/9/2007
I really enjoy the cuteness of this story. Dana and Lara are great together. Thanks for a great post.


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Amanda Bynes, Mom Back on Speaking Terms Despite Conservatorship Battleby Free Britney at . Comments
Despite the conservatorship battle surrounding her, a hospitalized Amanda Bynes and her mother Lynn are reportedly back on speaking terms.
Bynes is "absolutely aware of what is going on, and that her mother attempted to get a conservatorship of her," says a source close to the situation.
"She doesn't like it, but Amanda loves her mom. They have a complicated relationship, but they get along most of the time, and used to be very, close."
Before Amanda Bynes' mental health issues became so dire, "she used to say her mom was her best friend ... they have been talking daily since Friday."
Lynn has tried to emphasize to Amanda, who is said to resent her controlling parents, "that she just wants her to continue to get medical treatment."
Friday, Judge Glen Reiser ordered a full investigation before ruling on Lynn's petition to be come Amanda's conservator, which Amanda objects to.
The judge determined that there was no need to grant a conservatorship at this stage because she will remain in the hospital for another two weeks.
Bynes was hospitalized and placed under a 5150 hold July 19.The judge also wants to speak to her in person and set another hearing for August 1.
Some speculate that Amanda is no longer as angry at Lynn because she is considering dropping the conservatorship bid under the right circumstances.
"Lynn is ready to drop the petition to become Amanda's temporary conservator, if her daughter agrees to continue to get treatment," says a source.
"It broke Lynn's heart to have to do it, and she is really leaning toward dropping it."
It's a strange twist to an already strange case and has left some wondering if Amanda will simply continue her bizarre antics if and when set is free.
She's on medication now, however, so that can only help.


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YES – There are PRIZES for you to WIN!!!! Just read this: . A few weeks ago I redesigned the look and feel of this site. I have mixed feelings about the new design however. Here is the old look: (By the way, I could have never fit a picture this large on the …Continue reading
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Tuesday, March 07, 2006
Going Up
Earth is constantly spinning. So if you attach a counterweight to it with a cable, and put it far enough away—62,000 miles—the cable will be held taut by the force of the planet's rotation, just as if you spun around while holding a ball on a string. And if you've got a taut cable, you've got the makings of an elevator.
As strange as that sounds—push the "Up" button, climb in, and soar off into weightless bliss—don't be surprised if it happens. The space elevator is where the PC was in the 1960s: The theory is solid, the materials exist, and people in garages are starting to tinker with the next step. Two Seattle startups are competing to build the elevator. Both believe they can do it within 15 years at a cost of $10 billion. NASA and China's space agency are eager to help make it happen.
And no wonder: A working elevator would reduce the cost of launching anything into space by roughly 98 percent.
Read more here.
Bill C adds: I have read about this also. There are a lot of issues but producing enough carbon nano tubes for the cable and connecting it to the earth is the biggest cost and engineering problem.
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text: Coming from a "semi-hardcore" raiding guild that is 10man with a semi-flexible healing roster, I am the "swing healer" for 3 healed fights and other than that I'm either sitting or playing elemental for 2 healed fights. I have multiple ranks ranging from 4-60 this tier and last tier, so I know I'm not TOO bad of a healer, but as gunner said: "It's that when it comes to the chopping block, shamans are generally first to go." It basically all comes down to this question: If your roster has healers who are all good, why not just bring in the best classes for each fight? When it's put that way, which is the realistic/progression-minded way, the only fight you should ever need a resto shaman for(again, 10man perspective) is Megaera.


text:
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text:
Micaiah C.
Nanny in Greenacres, WA 99016.
Looking for full or part-time work as a nanny.
Enhanced Background Check not run.
Enhanced Background Check(Not Run)
Basic Background Check not run.
Basic Background Check(Not Run)
Motor Vehicle Records Check not run.
Motor Vehicle Records Check(Not Run)
Greenacres, WA
- Age 26
- 1 year paid experience
- Female
Last signed in: More than 6 months
Preferred Rate $9-$20 per hour
Micaiah's Bio
I am a 21 yr. old female student (recently completing my certification through Integrity Worship Institute.) Being the second eldest of 7 kids, I have been surrounded by children my entire life. I have served in my local church children/infant ministries, along with completing an internship as a youth/worship intern. I am comfortable with all ages of children and I have been a nanny/babysitter off and on most of my life. I have completed and passed CPR,STARS,HIV,Blood Borth Pathogens, and First Aid within the last 3 yrs. I also have my own vehicle for transportation.
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1 year of paid child care experience with:
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Special Needs Experience
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Skills & Abilities
Additional Services:
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text:
Quick Details
- Type: Ornaments
- Place of Origin: Fujian, China (Mainland)
- Brand Name: Willken hot new product for 2015
- Model Number: SYL-D14023
- Material: Fiberglass, polyresin
- Description: Handmade decorative sandsone buddha head statue ornament
- Color: customized color
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- MOQ: 120pcs for one design
- Sample time: 7days
- Usage: outdoor garden decoration
- Loading port: xiamen
- Keyword: decorative sandstone buddha statue
Packaging & Delivery
|Packaging Details
|Fiberglass laughing buddha hot new products for 2017
normal export packing,PE bag + polyfrom+inner box+master carton
|Delivery Time
|30-45days after 30% deposit received
Handmade decorative sandsone buddha head statue ornament
Product Description
|Handmade decorative sandsone buddha head statue ornament
|Item No.:
|Resin/Polyresin/ Polyurethane
|customized color
|Sample time:
|7 days
|Mould charge:
|$100~$150 each mould(can be refunded after order confirmed)
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|30 days after receiving 30% TT deposit and approving samples
|OEM Service:
|bubble bag and brown box with standard export carton.
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|Payment terms:
|1. 30% TT deposit +70% TT against the copy of B/L
|2.L/C at sight
|4.Western Union
|1.Home decoration
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|3.Garden decoration.
Packaging & Shipping
Company Information
1.We are manufacturer with more10 years.
2.The factory is more than 3000 square meters with 100 workers, near by Xiamen Airport.
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Transaction History of the Supplier
Below is the information about the supplier's transactions conducted via Alibaba.com. If you require further details regarding the transaction data, please contact the supplier directly.
Transaction Overview
Export Markets
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This supplier has completedtransactions with buyers from .
Shipping Destination
Transaction Value
Transaction Date
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text:
The USG Corporation/Boral Limited joint venture, which was originally slated for completion Jan. 31, has been delayed about a month over regulatory procedures.
The completion of the 50/50 strategic joint venture is now expected to occur on or before Feb. 28, 2014.
The joint venture, to be named USG Boral Building Products, will include Boral's Gypsum division, which includes its plasterboard operations in Australia and Asia, and USG's Asian and Middle Eastern businesses.
The move is aimed at harnessing both companies' branding, geographic footprint and positioning within the burgeoning plasterboard market.


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Services on Demand
Related links
- Cited by Google
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Journal of theoretical and applied electronic commerce research
On-line version ISSN 0718-1876
J. theor. appl. electron. commer. res. vol.7 no.1 Talca Apr. 2012
Journal of Theoretical and Applied Electronic Commerce Research
ISSN 0718-1876 Electronic Version VOL 7 / ISSUE 1 / APRIL 2012 / 21-33 © 2012 Universidad de Talca - Chile
Exploring Tourist Adoption of Tourism Mobile Payment: An Empirical Analysis
Runhua Peng1, Li Xiong2 and Zhenqing Yang3
Shanghai University, Institute of Management, Shanghai, China, 1 firstname.lastname@example.com, 2 email@example.com 3 Guangxi Normal University, Institute of Economics and Management, Guilin, China, firstname.lastname@example.com
With recent developments in mobile technologies, tourism mobile payment(m-payment) is beginning to offer interesting and beneficial new services. This research aimed to identify the factors determining tourists' acceptance of tourism m-payment. Based on literature relating to the TAM theory, the conceptual model is developed and tested in this research. This research extends the applicability of the TAM in tourism m-payment context, by adding the system characteristics' constructs and tourism characteristics' constructs to the model. Data collected from 421 tourists in China were tested against the extended TAM, using the structural equation modeling approach. The empirical results show especially strong support for the effects of perceived security, perceived compatibility, destination m-payment knowledge, and tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence. The findings provide a foundation for an enhanced theory on tourism m-payment adoption and for the practical development of tourism m-payment service.
Keywords: Tourism m-payment systems, Tourism m-payment adoption, Tourism mobile commerce, Technology acceptance model (TAM), Mobile payment
1 Introduction
The development of the "mobile" Internet facilitates tourism mobile commerce (M-commerce) transaction, which is defined as the use of electronic methods, means and procedures to conduct various forms of tourism business activity in cyberspace [3]. As tourism mobile commerce increases in popularity, tourism m-payment will continue to facilitate secure electronic commercial transactions between organizations or individuals [28]. In this study, tourism m-payment or tourism m-payment is defined as the use of a mobile device to conduct a tourism payment transaction in which money or funds are transferred from a payer to a receiver via an intermediary, or directly, without an intermediary in the tourist destination. This paper focuses on examining the tourist willingness to use a mobile device as a payment instrument in tourism transactions where money is transferred from a tourist to a provider in exchange for tourism products or services.
Because tourism commerce organizations may perform a competitive superiority via the provision of tourism m-payment to tourists, the issues associated with appropriate tourism m-payment usage are of critical importance [24]. Specifically, the tourist's intention to use tourism m-payment is of considerable interest to researchers and practitioners, because payment service providers, financial institutions, trusted third parties, and systems, software and supporting service providers can benefit greatly from enhanced understanding of the key factors underlying tourists' intention [20].
The technology acceptance model (TAM) is a well-recognized model used to interpret IS adoption behavior [4], [9], [27], [36]. According to the TAM, adoption behavior is determined by the intention to make use of a particular system, which is, in turn, affected by the perceived usefulness and the perceived ease of use of the system [37]. One major advantage of using the TAM is that it supplies a framework by which the effect of external variables on system usage can be sized up. In order to adapt the TAM to the tourism m-payment context, we integrated it with perceived destination complexity and destination m-payment knowledge. Moreover, in order to further our understanding of the tourists' adoption behavior, we study the variables of perceived security and perceived compatibility.
The objective of this research is to explore the relationship between antecedents and tourists' acceptance of tourism m-payment by way of the TAM framework, which is based on the survey of tourists. In particular, the objectives of this research are: (1) to look into what lead to the formation of perceived risk and how perceived security affect perceived usefulness of tourism m-payment and intention to use tourism m-payment; (2) to examine the impact of perceived compatibility on perceived usefulness and perceived security of tourism m-payment; (3) to estimate the effect of destination m-payment knowledge on perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness and perceived security of tourism m-payment; (4) to investigate the impact of perceived destination complexity on perceived usefulness and perceived security of tourism m-payment.
This article has two main contributions. From a theoretical viewpoint, we develop a model that is based on various conceptual fields which are relevant to the consumer motives for using mobile payment solutions. This allows us to draw a broader and more holistic picture of the drivers of tourist acceptance of tourism m-payment services compared to previous studies From an empirical viewpoint, we test this model with a large sample, which enables us to conduct several stability tests in order to increase reliance in the findings. Providing credible evidence regarding the relevance of various acceptance factors is particularly important since prior studies on tourism m-payment have mainly been qualitative in nature.
2 Literature Review and Hypotheses
In this section, the theoretical background of our research is developed with the literature review of the technology acceptance theories, mobile payment system characteristics (such as perceived security and perceived compatibility), and tourism characteristics (such as destination m-payment knowledge and tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence).
2.1 Technology Acceptance Theories
The origins of TAM can be traced to the theory of reasoned action (TRA) [2]. As a simplification to TRA, the TAM suggests that the users' decisions to accept a new information technology are based on two rational assessments of its expected outcomes: (1) perceived usefulness (PU), defined as the degree, which a person conceives that using a system would increase his or her job performance, and (2) perceived ease of use (PEOU), defined as the degree of which a person believes that using a system would be free of effort [8]. Numerous empirical studies provide strong evidences that PU and PEOU do directly influence users' intention of adopting a new technology [14], [21], [22]. Also, most empirical studies show that PEOU is the antecedent of PU because, through PU, PEOU indirectly influences the intention [1], [7], [32]. Based on the literature review, three hypotheses are posited:
H1: Perceived ease of use (PEOU) has a positive effect on perceived usefulness {PU).
H2: Perceived ease of use (PEOU) has a positive effect on behavior intention (BI).
H3: perceived usefulness (PU) has a positive effect on behavior intention (BI).
2.2 Extended TAM and External Variables
To forecast technology acceptance, earlier researches found that the external variables of a TAM can affect the beliefs of perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness [6], [23], [25], [34], [39].
Davis et al.[9] recommended that the external variables of a TAM can affect the beliefs of perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness. In this way, much research has verified the external variables of a TAM [1], [7], [14], [21], [22], [32]. To predict technology acceptance, these studies found external variables such as personal features (personal knowledge and susceptibility to interpersonal influence), and system features( perceived security and perceived compatibility) were the determining factors.
In this study, destination m-payment knowledge and tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence as extended tourism variables of TAM are examined. And since the acceptance of tourism m-payment must be accessed from the standpoint of mobile commerce acceptance, the perceived security and perceived compatibility are judged to play an important role in the positive attitude towards usage. The following subsections provide further discussion on these extended variables.
2.2.1 Perceived Security
Besides perceived advantages, innovations usually also come with risks. Security is being defined as a threat which creates ''circumstance, condition, or event with the potential to cause economic hardship to data or network resources in the form of destruction, disclosure, modification of data, denial of service and/or fraud, waste, and abuse" [17]. Earlier research suggests that perceived security in payment systems is a significant determinant of mobile commerce success [24]. In the context of the tourism m-payment, the importance of security is emphasized. Firstly, services are inherently more difficult to evaluate and are thus perceived as more risky [16], [29], [33]. Secondly, many people have not had any previous experience with tourism m-payment systems and it increases the perceived risk of tourism m-payment services [13]. Finally, the spatial and temporal separation between buyer and seller is often associated with a relatively high loss potential when buyers are required to give detailed personal information such as their address or credit card number to the seller.
According to Kuisma et al. [19], many customers are afraid of losing money while performing transactions or transferring money over the Internet. According to Yiu et al. [40], sudden breakdown of web services may lead to unexpected losses while conducting online payment. Featherman and Pavlou [10] found that a high frequency of website breakdowns and disconnections inhibits m-payment services evaluation (e.g. perceived usefulness). According to Milind [26], security risk is a significant impediment to the adoption of e-services. Similar to previous research [10], [19], [26], [40], perceived security (i.e., low perceived risk) plays a dominant role in the users' intention of adopting m-payment services. Thus, the following hypotheses are proposed:
H4: perceived security (PS) has a positive effect on perceived usefulness (PU). H5: perceived security (PS) has a positive effect on behavior intention (BI).
2.2.2 Perceived Compatibility
We further extend the original TAM by including the perceived compatibility of tourism m-payment services as an additional factor. Perceived compatibility encompasses the reconcilability of an innovation with existing values, behavioral patterns, and experiences [12], [41]. In information system adoption research, the compatibility of the technology has been found as a significant determinant of mobile technology and service adoption [13]. Further, there is a reason to believe that perceived compatibility play an important role in the adoption of tourism m-payment services. And prior research that combined TAM and the perceived compatibility construct found that perceived compatibility has a direct effect on perceived usefulness: Gerhardt et al. [13] in mobile payment adoption; Wu and Wang [37] in mobile commerce acceptance; Wu et al. [38] in mobile health care, etc.
In addition perceived compatibility is the degree to which the innovation is perceived to be consistent with the potential users' previous experiences [35], and perceived security is produced by the users' perceiving potential risks from immature technology and a certain degree of uncertainty [37]. So the users' previous experiences (high compatibility) will reduce the degree of uncertainty. Thus, perceived compatibility is incorporated as a direct antecedent of perceived security. Therefore, this study hypothesis perceived compatibility as follows:
H6: perceived compatibility (PC) has a positive effect on perceived security (PS).
H7: perceived compatibility (PC) has a positive effect on perceived usefulness (PU).
2.2.3 Destination m-payment Knowledge
Web novices tend to rely on the most basic and attractive features of the website interface, while Web experts use their experience and can utilize their knowledge to facilitate their information processing and to differentiate between relevant and irrelevant information [18].
In the context of travel and tourism, the factors which affect tourist behaviors not only include the tourism destination image, but also include destination knowledge of tourists. Tourists with a high level of destination m-payment knowledge are likely to find the destination m-payment systems to be easier to use, to be more useful, and to be more secure than tourists lacking such knowledge. Given that the limited amount of research has been conducted on this subject, this study attempts to determine whether any relationship exists between destination m-payment knowledge and other variables. Hence, the destination m-payment knowledge is essential in tourism m-payment settings and the following hypothesis is proposed:
H8: destination m-payment knowledge (DK) has a positive effect on perceived security (PS).
H9: destination m-payment knowledge (DK) has a positive effect on perceived usefulness (PU).
H10: destination m-payment knowledge (DK) has a positive effect on perceived ease of use (PEOU).
2.2.4 Tourist Susceptibility to Interpersonal Influence
Tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence involves two different manifestations: an informational one, the tendency to seek information from others and a normative, the willingness to conform to the others' expectations [5]. In this study, we defined the informational influence as the tourist's general tendency to accept information from others as evidence about reality. And the normative dimension is reflected when tourists comply with expectations of others to gain rewards or avoid punishments.
In addition, in the context of mobile payment, mobile devices and services allow people to move around while maintaining access to services and staying connected. Mobility, availability, and personalization, may also be important perceived benefits of mobile services [30]. Mobile services are adopted for both functional and nonfunctional reasons [31]. When members of a person's social group believe a behavior is correct, it elevates a user's standing within the group. Somebody's attitudes, behavior, and perceptions are affected by the information he or she receives from the social environment [15]. Tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence may shape his or her confidence in or ability to use a technological system. Potential users of advanced mobile services may feel that tourism m-payment system is useful and reliable if others in their social environment say that the system is credible [22]. On the other hand, others' perceptions couldn't be affected significantly by interpersonal influences.
In the context of travel and tourism, looking for information about tourism m-payment services and the intention to follow the advice obtained there are voluntary actions that do not imply gaining rewards or avoid possible punishments by others. The informational influence makes tourists internalize information from others and appear when tourists either search for information or make inferences based upon the observation of others' behavior. Tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence is thus expected to impact the perceived usefulness and perceived security of tourism m-payment. Consequently, we hypothesize the following:
H11: tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence (TS) has a positive effect on perceived security (PS).
H12: to Perceived risks a positive effect on perceived usefulness (PU).
2.3 Hypothesis and Model
Based on the proposed conceptualizations, this study added perceived security, perceived compatibility, destination m-payment knowledge and tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence as expected factors.Thus, in the context of tourism m-payment, we proposed an extended TAM having seven constructs. The model is depicted in Figure 1.
3 Methodology
This study employs a structural equation modelling (SEM) approach to develop a model that represents the relationships among the seven variables in this study. Data were collected through using a survey questionnaire comprising questions on demographics and multiple items for each variable in the research model.
3.1 Measures of the Constructs
A questionnaire survey was used to test the research model. There were three parts in the questionnaire. In the first part, the respondents were asked what kinds of the tourism m-payment system they had used. In the second part, there were demographic questions about the participants. In the third part, the questions were designed to measure the constructs in the research model. A Likert-scale with seven-point anchors was used to measure all the relationships in the study. Response options ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree. We adapted the items from the extant literature, and the constructs, the number of items used to measure each construct, and the sources of the items were summarized in Table 1.
Figure 1: Proposed hypothetical model.
DK: destination m-payment knowledge, TS: tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence,
PC: perceived compatibility, PS: perceived security, PU: perceived usefulness,
PEOU: perceived ease of use,BI: behavior intention
After the questionnaire was drafted, six academic experts were asked to review the questionnaire. And then the questionnaire was revised to make the wording of the items more precise according to their suggestions. After that, we conducted a pretest among 43 frequent tourism m-payment tourists. All Cronbach's Alpha exceeded the threshold value of 0.7 and indicated good reliability and the results showed good convergent and discriminant validities.
Table 1: Construct reliability, convergent validity and discriminant validity
3.2 Data Collection Procedure
This investigation used the structural equation modeling (SEM) for hypotheses testing. Due to unknown population of tourism m-payment users, a convenience sampling technique was employed for data collection in this study. A face-to-face questionnaire survey was administrated in Guilin, China, a famous tourist resort. The survey was conducted at the hotel and restaurant in Guilin. Respondents were first asked whether they had ever conducted traditional e-commerce payments; if they replied in the affirmative, they were asked to participate in the survey. The screened and qualified tourists were recruited, and research assistants briefed participants about the survey to ensure each questionnaire was fully completed. Respondents were asked to circle the response which best described their level of agreement with the statements. Aside from the measurement scale, the questionnaire also included some questions regarding tourists' backgrounds and their experiences of using m-commerce.
To increase the generalizability of the results, the respondents were spread across ten popular tourism m-payment categories, including booking passenger tickets, booking entrance tickets, restaurant table reservations, mobile learning, playing mobile games, mobile stock trading, mobile map services, buying tourism products by tourism m-payment, mobile entertainment payments, taking part in mobile auctions.
To obtain a sufficient and effective sample modeling the research structure, 618 surveys were distributed, 515 of which were filled out. After removal of the incomplete forms, 421 complete and useful samples were included in this study, yielding a response rate of approximately 74.5%. The ratio of the number of observations to the number of variables (items) also approached the appropriate ratio, implying a sufficient sample for further analysis. Table 1 shows the profile of the participants.
4 Results
The statistical analyses in this section include assessing the reliability and validity of the measurement items used in this study. This is followed by testing of the hypotheses by assessing the model fit through using various fit indices and evaluating the path model.
4.1 Measurement Model
First, content validities should be relatively acceptable since the various parts of questionnaire were all adapted from the literature and have been reviewed carefully by practitioners. Next, confirmatory factor analysis in AMOS software was used to analyze construct validities, basically the analytical procedure including three stages as described below. First, a measurement model should be assessed for goodness-of-fit. The literature suggested that, for a good model fit, chi-square/degrees of freedom ( /df) should be less than 3, adjusted goodness-of-fit index (AGFI) should be larger then 0.8, goodness-of-fit index (GFI), normal fit index (NFI), and comparative fit index (CFI) should all be greater than 0.9, and root mean square error (RMSE) should be less than 0.10 (Henry and Stone, 1994). Second, convergent validity is assessed by three criteria. Item loading is at least 0.7 and significant, composite construct reliability is a minimum of 0.8, and average variance extracted (AVE) for a construct is larger than 0.5 [11].Finally, discriminant validity is assessed by the measure that the AVE of each construct should be larger than its square correlation with other constructs [11].
The indices for the measurement model indicate a good fit with /df (238.7/254=0.94), AGFI (0.945), GFI (0.957), NFI (0.972), CFI (1.00), and RMSE (0.001).The results of reliability as well as convergent and discriminant validities for this model are reported in Table 1. The item loading for these constructs ranges from 0.729 to 0.912 and is also significant at 0.01 level, construct reliability ranges from 0.86 to 0.94, and AVE ranges from 0.63 to 0.81. Moreover, the AVE of each construct is all above its square correlation with other constructs. Thus, this measurement model indicates a high degree of reliability as well as convergent and discriminant validities.
Table 2: Overall model fit indices of the research model
4.2 Structural Model
The technique of structured equation modeling was used to examine the causal structure of the proposed model in this study. The evaluation of this research model can be carried out in three steps. First, a GFI for the structural model was examined as the same GFIs applied in assessing the measurement model. Second, the standardized path coefficients and their statistical significance for the hypotheses in this model were estimated. Finally, as a measure of the entire structural equation, an overall coefficient of determination was calculated, similar to that found in multiple regression analysis.
The commonly used measures of model fit, based on results from an analysis of the structural model, are summarized in Table 2. In practice, a Chi-square/degree of freedom of less than 3, GFI, NFI, CFI greater than 0.9, an AGFI greater than 0.8 and a RMSR of less than 0.05 are considered indicators of good fit. As seen in Table 2, all goodness-of-fit statistics are in the acceptable ranges. This study examined the estimated coefficients of the causal relationships between constructs, which would validate the hypothesized effects. Figure 2 illustrates the estimated coefficients and their significance on the structural model.
Table 3: Hypothesis testing results
DK: destination m-payment knowledge, TS: tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence,
PC: perceived compatibility, PS: perceived security, PU: perceived usefulness,
PEOU: perceived ease of use, BI: behavior intention
SEM was performed to investigate the relationship between variables which affect the intention to use tourism m-payment. As shown in Figure 2 and Table 3, Hypotheses H1, H2, H3, H4, H5, H7, H8, H10 and H11 are supported as shown by the path coefficients. However, tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence and destination m-payment knowledge exert no impact on perceived usefulness, and perceived compatibility exerts no impact on perceived security. Therefore, Hypothesis H6, H9 and H12 are not supported as shown by the path coefficient. The following subsections provide further discussion on these results.
Figure 2: Results of structural equation model.
DK: destination m-payment knowledge, TS: tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence,
PC: perceived compatibility, PS: perceived security, PU: perceived usefulness,
PEOU: perceived ease of use, BI: behavior intention
1. Figure 2 and Table 3 further illustrate the significant structural relationships among the study variables. Hypotheses 1 and 2 postulate that perceived ease of use has a positive influence on intention to use tourism m-payment (H2) and perceived usefulness (H1). The results show that perceived ease of use has a strong direct effect on intention to use tourism m-payment (H2: â = 0.377, p<0.001) and perceived usefulness (H1: â = 0.368, p<0.001). Results from the study also support that perceived usefulness is a consistently important factor in intention to use tourism m-payment (H3: â = 0.395, p<0.001). Therefore H1, H2 and H3 are supported. This result is consistent with the findings of most TAM related studies. Results suggest that TAM was capable of providing an adequate explanation of tourist adoption decision making process to use the tourism m-payment (see Table 3). One of the objectives of this study is to examine the suitability of TAM in explaining tourism m-payment adoption intention in China. The hypothesized model is tested, and empirical data from this study support the suitability of TAM and its robustness to study tourist acceptance outside the U.S. context. This suggests that, in implementing a tourism m-payment system, the focus should be placed on fostering the self-confidence of individuals and their perceptions concerning the system. If tourists are struggling, they may actually believe that the system is too hard to use and that the benefits of using the system in terms of performance are outweighed by the effort of using it. Eventually, tourists may become reluctant to use the technology, thus defeating the purpose of introducing it. Future studies can extend the results of this study by investigating the area of self-confidence which addresses one's belief in one's abilities to be able to accomplish a specific task. As a future direction of research, we will include self- confidence as a factor for further investigation.
2. Hypotheses 4 and 5 focus on the impact of perceived security on perceived usefulness (H4) and behavior intention (H5). The empirical data showed that perceived usefulness of tourism m-payment (H4: â = 0.278, p<0.001) in China was dependent on perceived security, and perceived security constituted significant influence over behavior intention (H5: â=0.192, p<0.001). Therefore, H4 and H5 are supported. Importantly, this finding can be used to help understand how tourists respond on system security and how they evaluate tourism m-payment system. Previous consumer behavior and information system research has highlighted the importance of perceived risk as an inhibitor on adoption of E-commerce. The majority of information systems research has focused on the importance of trust and trust building as a prerequisite to E-commerce transactions and development of business relationships. This research looked at perhaps the other side of the intention to use tourism m-payment.
3. Figure 2 shows the standardized, theoretical paths linking destination m-payment knowledge, perceived security, perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use. H8 suggests a direct path linking destination m-payment knowledge and perceived security. This path is supported by a positive estimate of 0.498 (p<0.001). H9 predicted a positive relationship between destination m-payment knowledge and perceived usefulness. This relationship is not supported by the corresponding estimate of 0.016 (p=0:797). H10 suggests a direct relationship between destination m-payment knowledge and perceived ease of use. H10 is supported by the positive estimate of 0.774 (p<0.001). One interesting observation is that, in testing the structural model, destination m-payment knowledge only demonstrated a weak direct effect on perceived usefulness. On the other hand, destination m-payment knowledge demonstrated a significant direct effect on both perceived ease of use and perceived security. One of the possible explanations of the weak effect of destination m-payment knowledge on perceived usefulness is that, tourists with a high level of destination m-payment knowledge realize not only the advantages of tourism m-payment system, but also the disadvantages of it. As a result, positive destination m-payment knowledge may not generate an increase to perceived usefulness. One thing to note is that the relationship between destination m-payment knowledge and perceived usefulness was not significant with significance level 0.016. It means that a person with enough destination m-payment knowledge does not perceive its higher usefulness. Actually, people with plenty of destination m-payment knowledge usually have high expectation towards the information technology, and then they don't find more use for the tourism m-payment system.
4. Hypotheses 6 and 7 investigate the relationship of perceived compatibility to perceived usefulness (H7) and perceived security (H6).Perceived compatibility has a positive direct effect on perceived usefulness (H7: â = 0.306, p<0.001), Although the direct effect of perceived security on perceived usefulness (H4: â = 0.278, p <0.001), it should be noted that the positive effect of perceived compatibility on perceived security is not very strong (H6: â=-0.017, p=0.379>0.05). As a result, H7 are supported while H6 is rejected. A possible explanation is that the tourism m-payment systems in China were in the early stage of diffusion and provided only limited functions to tourists. For early tourism m-payment users, the level of perceived compatibility is crucial to the users' perceived usefulness of tourism m-payment. This can be explained by the fact that the perceived compatibility gives early tourism m-payment users confidence to try complex tourism m-payment features in a variety of usage contexts. Thus, perceived compatibility has a positive effect on perceived usefulness. On the other hand, because the tourism m-payment systems in China were in the early stage, tourists particularly place emphasis on usefulness of tourism m-payment. Tourists who perceived it to be higher compatibility on a regular basis greatly reduce the frustration and make them neglect risk. Alternatively, non-significant relationship between perceived compatibility and perceived security might be the case that the compatibility perceived by tourists may not enhance their feeling of security. As a result, perceived compatibility may not be an important concern for perceived security.
5. Tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence was found to exert a strong positive influence on perceived security (H11: â=0.492, p<0.001).However, tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence has a weak and insignificant direct effect on perceived usefulness (H12: â=-0.005, p=0.913>0.05). Thus, H12 is rejected. On the relationship between tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence and perceived usefulness, the negative effect suggests that when tourists tend to accept information from others as evidence about reality, they could find the technology less useful in that they would be unlikely to be productive and efficient by using it. The ambiguous findings with respect to the relationship between tourist susceptibility and perceived usefulness may be explained by the type of tourists influenced. When, as in our study, there are few tourists who are well-informed about the tourism m-payment technology, its usefulness is less disseminated by interpersonal influence. Another possible explanation for the unexpected result was that, in the early stage of the tourism m-payment systems, early tourism m-payment users found it imperfect and inconvenient. Therefore, the result that tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence had no significant effect on perceived usefulness was also unexpected.
5 Discussion
This study derived three academic contributions which pave the way for advancing current knowledge of the tourism m-payment technology adoption. Meanwhile, some business implications are briefly described, which may be of interest to those who are interested in effectively developing the tourism m-payment system.
5.1 Academic Contribution and Future Research
The major contributions of this study are as follows. First, this study successfully extended TAM in the context of tourism m-payment, which has different characteristics from the other information systems. This study incorporated the system characteristics (such as perceived security and perceived compatibility), and tourism characteristics (such as destination m-payment knowledge and tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence) which pertain to tourism m-payment, but were disregarded in the previous mobile payment studies. The research conclusions are helpful for researchers to develop and refine tourism m-payment research models in the future, as well as for managers to develop effective tourism m-payment service systems.
Second, the results of this study suggest that tourism characteristics factors impact tourist decision to adopt and use tourism m-payments. Although most contemporary mobile acceptance research has not studied the effect of scenarios factors on mobile payments adoption, Our results appear to be exactly the same as the prior research that has found significant correlations between scenarios factors and the use of mobile services [24].The findings of this study show that scenarios factors may be important determinants to mobile services adoption and tourism characteristics factors should thus be included in the tourism m-payment adoption models.
Third, the results of empirical analysis show that perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness were determined to be significant antecedents of the intention to use tourism m-payment. Perceived security and perceived compatibility are critical determinants of the perceived usefulness of tourism m-payment. Destination m-payment knowledge and tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence are critical determinants of the perceived security of tourism m-payment. Destination m-payment knowledge and tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence have an insignificant effect on perceived usefulness.
5.2 Managerial Implications
Although the primary intention of this study is a confirmatory orientation, several managerial implications can be drawn. It is most important for the tourism m-payment service provider to effectively boost the number of users in the early days of tourism m-payment system. The six factors researched in this study provide a useful way to increase further market penetration of tourism m-payment services.
This study believes that perceived compatibility of tourism m-payment services is an important factor to tourists. Thus, the tourism m-payment service providers are challenged to develop and advertise tourism m-payment solutions so as to suit tourists for prior experience. The relevance of the perceived security of tourism m-payment service implies another managerially interesting insight. A positive relationship of this factor with adoption is found in this study, but the link was not so strong as results in prior research given the increasing importance of the perceived risk construct. This implies that perceived risk of tourism m-payment may not be at center stage when launching tourism m-payment services. Thus, managers need to focus on the long-term strategic aspects highlighted above in order to make tourism m-payment services a mass market reality.
In addition to perceived security and perceived compatibility, destination m-payment knowledge and tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence are key drivers of the tourist acceptance of tourism m-payment services. While this tourist characteristic cannot be influenced by the firm, our finding can help managers in the segmentation and prioritization of potential customers. In the current early stage of the tourism market, the tourism m-payment service provider should focus on tourists who have a strong need to pay for tourism goods and tourism services in tourism destination situation, as they are more likely to be interested in tourism m-payment services. If this group of tourists can be inspired to use tourism m-payment services, a critical mass effect may make even less mobile consumers interested in the service later on. However, it can be implied that reference groups play an important role in the diffusion of tourism m-payments. Thus, the tourism m-payment service provider needs to identify early adopters and stimulate their usage of tourism m-payment services, so that they can serve as a reference facilitating broad diffusion in the future.
The findings can provide useful recommendation to development of practice and policy making, which are customer oriented and evidence based. For tourism m-payment policy makers responsible for future strategic planning of tourism m-payment services, this study provides the following recommendations:
1. The six important antecedents (i.e., perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, perceived compatibility, perceived security, tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence, and destination m-payment knowledge) of user acceptance of tourism m-payment services were identified. Accordingly, to effectively evaluate the performance of tourism m-payment services, we suggest that policy makers can improve strategic planning for tourism m-payment services investments through monitoring these nine factors as performance indicators.
2. Tourism characteristics (such as destination m-payment knowledge and tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence) significantly affect tourists' intention to use. From the key motivational force behind tourism m-payment service use, we suggest that policy makers should make plans of action on enhancing external and internal influences for tourists and continuously increasing tourists' communication and providing resources required to use tourism m-payment services for tourism m-payment adopters.
3. Adopters ranked higher scores in perceived ease of use and destination m-payment knowledge. Accordingly, we suggest that policy makers should invest more on user training.
4. Given the fact that the usage of the tourism m-payment services is completely voluntary, and that the target user group consists of a large number of people with diverse backgrounds, the findings of this study suggest that in order to attract more users to use tourism m-payment services, it is not enough to develop a useful system and make the system easy to interact with. It is of paramount importance to develop tourism m-payment services systems that provide a solid security protection for the users. This way the policy makers need not concern themselves so much with attempting to directly influence behavioral intentions. Thus, the attention of management might be more productively focused on the "development" of belief. Especially, policy makers should employ training and promotion approaches to develop people's beliefs of usefulness, ease of use, perceived security and destination m-payment knowledge, which in turn influence their behavioral intention to adopt tourism m-payment services.
For service providers responsible for developing implementation strategies for tourism m-payment services, this study provides the following recommendations:
1. Important determinants of tourism m-payment services use are perceived security, destination m-payment knowledge, perceived usefulness, and perceived ease of use. To successfully implement tourism m-payment services given constraints in resources, we suggest that service provider can set priorities based on the relative importance of the factors. In order to increase the destination m-payment knowledge of people, the service providers can organize training courses on various computer and Internet applications to increase the people's familiarity with information technologies. Even if these courses are not directly related to the tourism m-payment system itself, they can still help the people to develop positive usefulness and ease of use beliefs about the system.
2. To increase positive behavior intention towards tourism m-payment services, we suggest that service providers should develop implementation strategies that emphasize the usefulness of tourism m-payment services, security, and ease of use. Although the tourism m-payment services have been emerging as an important travel payment channel in China, its functionalities are still at an early stage of development, compared with the established traditional payment services. Hence, to gain competitive advantage, Chinese tourism m-payment services entrepreneurs ought to react quickly and embrace innovative solutions for management and operations.
3. To manipulate subjective norms, we suggest service providers that marketing strategy should seek to produce peer impact and external impact as well. For example, encouraging tourism m-payment service adopters to enhance their peer influence through various channels; endorsing tourism m-payment service by well-known stars.
4. Different providers, such as mobile operators and financial institutions, also need closer cooperation and joint standardization efforts to overcome the barriers of low acceptance rates and lack of standards.
For system developers responsible for tourism m-payment services design, this study provides the following recommendations:
1. Perceived ease of use, perceived security, perceived compatibility, and destination m-payment knowledge are key factors influencing user acceptance of the tourism m-payment services. Therefore, we suggest that system developers should provide a user-friendly interface, reinforce security mechanisms for tourism m-payment services, and design a suitable information system flow more compatible with user's work style.
2. To support tourism m-payment service adoption, we suggest that system developers could focus on developing effective user guidance, continuously improving security mechanisms, and using community of practice on Internet for promoting the tourism m-payment services and sharing use experience. The future development of tourism mobile payments should place more emphasis on user-friendly technologies such as contactless RFID, and on the usability of the payment systems.
3. In order to develop useful, easy-to-use, and trustworthy tourism m-payment services, this research indicates that system developers need to focus on some specific areas such as: deepening and broadening of the tourism m-payment services and contents; promotion of the usefulness and convenience of these services; provision of up-to-date and useful tourism information; enhancement of tourism information dissemination; sharing and integration; enhancement of m-payment knowledge of the citizens and tourists by training and education in business and society; commitment to establishing user-friendly Web sites for all tourism m-payment agencies; promotion of the availability and ease of use of the tourism m-payment services.
6 Limitations
Some limitations must, however, be considered. Firstly, the model developed in this study relied on data gathered from visitors in Guilin, China. The generalization of the findings is bounded due to the geographic limits imposed by South China as the sole study site. Future research applying the study method in other destinations will help to establish the generalization of the model. Secondly, the tourism industry is highly seasonal, and the impact of seasonal demand variation is one of the dominant policy and operational concerns of tourism interests in both the public and private sectors. The main study sampling of tourists was conducted in summer. It is possible that different sample profiles would be derived from other seasons. Further, more longitudinal, data gathering in future research will help to understand what, if any, effect seasonality has on results. Finally, we proposed a model that was intended to increase understanding of tourism m-payment services by focusing on system characteristics and tourism characteristics. Additional factors (such as age, education, level of spending, duration of visit) may play an important role. However, this study did not include these factors because the attention was focused on DK, PS, PC, TS, PU, and PEOU of the tourism m-payment services. Therefore, future research should extend to include these factors.
7 Conclusions
Our research is the first empirical effort to examine factors affecting intentions to use m-payment services in a tourism context. Thus, the results represent an important step in unraveling the intricate relationship between the key constructs. Our results support the tourism m-payment acceptance model and generally confirm our nine hypotheses. The contributions of this study to tourist acceptance research are: first, the traditional conceptualization of TAM was successfully applied in the new tourism m-payment context.
Second, the results indicated that, in addition to perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness, tourist intention to use tourism m-payment is affected by perceived security. While perceived usefulness also is affected by perceived compatibility and perceived security, perceived ease of use is only affected by destination m-payment knowledge. In addition, perceived security is affected by destination m-payment knowledge and tourist susceptibility to interpersonal influence.
This research was supported by the Humanities and Social Science Foundation of the Ministry of Education of China under Grant 09YJC790059 and 10YJC790336.
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Received 22 November 2010; received in revised form 12 July 2011; accepted 12 August 2011


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Eagle Country 99.3 is proud to share a list of tri-state area Memorial Day parades, ceremonies, and observances.
Local News
Local Memorial Day Services
Near Record Amount Of Traffic Expected Over Memorial Day Weekend
A near record amount of motorists are expected to hit the roadways this Memorial Day weekend.
Letter: Rep. Lyness On Memorializing Fallen Heroes
With Memorial Day approaching, we have the opportunity to reflect on those who sacrificed everything to protect the freedoms we enjoy today.
St. Elizabeth Health Care To Host Career Fair June 8
Looking for work or a new job? You may want to think about attending the St. Elizabeth Healthcare career fair.
Miamitown Memorial Day Event To Feature B-25 Bomber Fly-Over
A special fly-over will highlight the Miamitown Memorial Day Parade.
Pavement Replacement Project On I-71, I-75 In N. Ky Begins June 3
Construction crews will begin a major pavement replacement project on I-71/I-75 in Kenton County on June 3.
Ohio Man Accused Of Using Phony Money At Local Casinos
An Ohio man is accused of using counterfeit bills at a local casino.
Salt Fork Road Closure Set For June 1-2
A road closure will take place in Bright next week.
Drowning Numbers Rising In Indiana
A total of 76 people in Indiana died of accidental drowning or submersion in 2014, the latest year the numbers are available.
South Dearborn School Upgrade Proposals To Be Discussed June 14
South Dearborn Community School Corporation will be holding three public meetings to discuss needed maintenance of, and upgrades to, the corporation's facilities


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Fall Season Fitness Program
I had my final outdoor swim workout so this always signals the end of my summer fitness program and the start of the new fall season one. Since the pool workouts are so effective for me, I'm going to retain them for one day each week for my fall season but of course I'll have to go to an indoor community centre pool instead.
So here's how my fall season fitness program will look like;
Mondays – martial arts & stretching
Tuesdays – martial arts weapons & stretching
Wednesdays – swimming pool workout
Thursdays – weights strength training & super stretch
Fridays – martial arts & stretching
Saturdays – martial arts weapons & stretching
Sundays – weights strength training & super stretch
I will also do a short abs set four times per week just before lunch. Personally, I like to do these as a totally separate thing from my other workouts.
In addition to the above, there will also be two walks/hikes most weeks with my groups, usually one midweek and one on the weekends. So my strength training sessions on Sundays sometimes might get shifted to the Saturdays if I feel it is needed. Same thing with the Saturday weaponry session as they can also be shifted to Sundays, depending on how I feel.
This will be a good fall season fitness program for me to help me prepare for my winter ski season. Extra exercises are always done during the strength training workouts for my legs as pre-ski season training.