Thoughts on Youth Day…

It seems unreal how far South Africa has come since the beginning of the fall of apartheid, that infamous day, June 16th, 1976. This day always serves to make me realise how important it is for us, as human beings and as South Africans, to remember our vibrant past with all its struggle and adversity as well as our progression and success. We cannot allow the same oppression to exist anywhere, let alone our own country.

The xenophobic attacks were a shameful reminder of how close can come to reverting to the worst of ourselves. The thin line between Love and Hate. I understand there were many factors around these attacks but the fact remains, we had intolerance and discrimination vividly emblazoned on the screen around the world. How far a cry is it from the days when we seen the pictures of Hector Pietersen being carried away dead during the June 16th, 1976 uprising… and not forgetting the sacrifice of other youth across the world, Mohammed Al Dura in Palestine being shot while his father tried to protect him; or Victor Hugo Daza in Cochabamba, Bolivia who was killed by the military in protests against Bechtel trying to privatise Bolivia’s sources of water.


We need to also be aware of oppression around the world and either fight against it physically or by some action or at least to speak out against it. We owe it to ourselves as human beings and South Africans to do this at least. China’s oppression of Tibet and support of oppressive regimes in Africa, the conflict in Sudan, The oppression of the Palestinian people on a daily basis, the Middle East, etc. We can not sit back and idly nod as we read about these things in news papers and through our RSS feeds. We need to do something, say something.

We are all too aware of chaos theory and how little things affect greater outcomes and events. We could be that little change.

Let’s hope for a greater world… and one in which we have played our part.

Peace.

Link: The Front Line

South African Twitter Story Competition

Welcome to the South African Twitter Story Competition!

Here’s how it works…

1) You need to write a story that’s exactly 140 characters long.
2) Being that it is South African, you need to include at least one word from any of the 11 official languages excluding, ofcourse, English.
3) Post a link to your story tweet in the comments section of this blog post. (You have to post a comment with the link because if you just replied on twitter “@mkarim” it wouldn’t be 140 characters :P)

Example: “Who took my bloody biltong?” Oom Jan shouted at no one in particular, knowing for sure those bloody monkeys had invaded his home yet again. Twitter Link

The stories submitted will be judged by a panel of seasoned South African writers/bloggers

The Judges
Saaleha Bamjee-Mayet – Blogger, Writer and Journalist
Mandy de Waal – columnist, writer for hire and freelance journalist.
Eve Dmochowska – Writer, Blogger and Web Strategist.

The Prizes

1st Prize: Up for grabs is a SpringLeap T-shirt proudly sponsored by the guys at Springleap.com – Check out their site for awesomely designed T-shirts by some of South Africa’s Brightest Designers :)

2nd Prize: A $20 Amazon Voucher from Qatarliving.com the biggest social networking site in Qatar and owned by a South African Startup!

This should help with shipping costs now that Amazon has Banned the SA Post Office for theivery and fraud *sigh*

3rd Prize: The winner gets a 40 minute free wi-fi access voucher from Telkom Business which will allow access at any wi-fi hotspot in the country.

The competition was to end on 21st June 2008 at midnight, but has been extended to Thursday, 26th June 2008. All submissions after this time will not be considered.

COMPETITION OFFICIALLY CLOSED… WINNERS WILL BE ANNOUNCED SOON :)
: Competition, Twitter, Social Media, Web 2.0

Poster for Oliver Stone’s “W”

I just love the typography of this poster, and it’s sucha drastic move from traditional movie posters, I love it. The movie itself is going to be a killer. I can’t wait to see this one. Apparently Oliver Stone went all out in making it an extremely powerful satirical look at the Bush Administration.

Link: Screenhead
: GW Bush, Oliver Stone, Movie Poster

Design: The Surf Chair WorkStation

Now this is want in my Office…

The Surf Chair Workstation brings some ingenious ideas to the table. First, the monitor is suspended smartly in front of the user’s eyes, at a perfect distance. This design also helps you maintain a healthy back and a comfy position while spending hours and hours in front of your computer.

This cool design is called the Surf Chair Workstation and is designed for ergonomic support for your back at the same time being very comfortable as well as suspending the screen at a suitable distance so you don’t get what Masseuse’s call “computer neck” or fry your eyes. So now you can spend hours and hours in front of the computer, comfortably :)

via

: Design, Ergonomics, Chair, Technology

Why the New iPhone is So Damn Great…

Yes, you have standalone GPS devices; yes, you have phones that support GPS. But tell me, how many third-party applications have you used on either? Not many, I reckon, because the platforms weren’t very tempting for developers, and the screens and GUIs of most devices other than the iPhone simply aren’t good enough. Standalone GPS devices, on the other hand, were closed affairs; what the manufacturer put in, that’s what you got.

GPS can do so much more. In its most basic sense, adds another dimension to your life: it knows where you are. It knows where everyone is. Geotagging your photos? That’s just the surface being scratched. Think social networking; in fact, we already have that, and it’s called Loopt. It’s an application that alerts you when your friends are nearby and allows you to share your location and photos with them. Yes, we’ve had such applications before, but now the location is going to be very precise – you’ll be able to know which club, street, or coffee shop they’re in.

It’s not only about social networking. Everything: event recommendations and reviews, weather, traffic and flight info, gaming – all of it will have a “location” component from now on.

Link:Mashable

Whoever is listening… I want one! I want the new iPhone. I’m so excited about it I’m gonna go hysterical! wow.
: iPhone, GPS, Tehcnology, New, Cool, Location

Web Review: Kwippy.com

Kwippy.com is basically an alternative to Twitter and Plurk.

The functions are simple enough featuring the main aspects of Twitter… Microblogging, with permalinks to the various posts (called “kwips”) and the ability to reply. As per my previous post which put Twitter against Plurk, I have no idea if kwippy.com’s API is being shared or released. Also, it has the same downfalls as that of Twitter when compared to Plurk, where the design is not very Web 2.0 and it’s limited to passing links and is hindered by functionality to include pictures and videos. It does have IM updates via Google Talk though, which makes it a bit easier to post and deal with. Twitter used to have this before it started experiencing its problems…

So far, kwippy.com functions as Twitter, but without it’s API being widely available and having it’s functionality widely dispersed throughout the open source community and the web 2.0 community. Open Source is a major ingredient of web 2.0. Functionality in this regard and the ability to pass content easily between desktop and web applications is paramount.

This is what I see as a major stumbling block for this new Indian startup. They do have a feedback section though… so let’s hope we see some really good development from them in future… you never know, with the way things are going these days, they might surpass both Twitter and Plurk. Let’s wait and see.

Another major stumbling block at the moment – It’s invite only… I may have some available – just get hold of me if you want one – leave a comment or catch me on Twitter.

: Kwippy, kwippy.com, social media, Micro-blogging, Twitter, Plurk, Review

South Africa’s First On-line Book

Andy Hadfield at Techleader at posted about an on-line collaboration between some of South Africa’s best bloggers in order to create a book which glorifies this great country we live in, A Piece of Significance.The content of the book is a positive viewpoint on South Africa, amidst the many sad tales and general negativity about the country.

See Darren’s (the one who started the initiative) Post which covers all the Chapters.

Contents

Introduction
1. The new South Africa – is it real?
2. Is SA rich or poor?
3. What the world thinks of South Africa and what our global opportunities are
4. The importance of each individual’s contribution collectively
5. SA Inc and the business of doing business in SA
6. The beauty and grandeur that surrounds us
7. The importance of technology in SA’s global emergence
8. Building brand South Africa
9. Making the most of SA’s creative talents and abilities
10. Innovate for a better South Africa
11. The role of the younger generation in SA, and what we need to do to support them
12. Connecting South Africa – Communities that transcend technology
13. We are African – the role of collaboration in South Africa’s growth

Image above copyright Darren Gorton 2008. Content copyright of the respective authors and indicated on the relevant posts.
: South African, Blogging, Books, On-line book

Brilliant Ad for Kill Bill Premier on TV

A ‘Kill Bill’ TV premier spills blood on the streets.

: Kill Bill, Advertising, Marketing, TV Premier, Blood, Streets

Creative Design: Read at Work

A very creative campaign from Clemenso BBDO, an Auckland based Advertising agency, for the New Zealand Book Council is the launch of the site Read at Work. What this flash site does is mask your entire screen as a Windows Desktop and fill it with folders of faux Powerpoint presentations (which actually look like real work documents! but are works of literature by some of literatures greats such as Mark Twain, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Oscar Wilde and Emily Dickinson.

So for those who would like to do a little reading at work but don’t feel comfortable kicking back with a paperback, here’s the site for you to do just that… Read at Work.

P.S. The Windows desktop might arouse more suspicion if you work on a Mac :P

: Read at Work, Creative, New Zealand, Clemenso, BBDO, Books

New Era Citizen Journalism – The Instablog Video Initiative

Instablogs.com has launched a new initiative taking advantage of their wide “citizen journalist” base which blog on its site on a daily/weekly basis. What the new initiative entails is a call to one of these “citizen journalists” who will answer the phone and immediately launch into a news report of whatever news happened to have occurred in their respective countries.

This call is recorded in MP3 and Instablogs.com edits it ad inputs it with relevant video clips they have of the situation in the country or even an image or slideshow. The end result is a video show of sorts aggregating news from all over the world for that day/week and instantly downloadable from their site.

This is an example of some real creativity and utilising all forms of media for the aim of spreading news. I think this formula is similar to that used by major news organisations, however, this is raw and its opinions are not from seasoned journalists who speak in that instantly-recognisable tone in which news reports are characterised. This is from the grass roots, people who have an opinion and all this is aggregated, not in text, but in audio and video. Absolutely amazing, I can never cease to be amazed by human creativity and the application of media in Web 2.0.

: Citizen Journalism, blogging, instablogs.com, Media, Video, Audio, News, reporting, journalism

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