South Africa

• 05

  Jan 08

  tags

  • 2008
  • predictions
  • South Africa
  • synthasite
  • Tyler Reed
  • Vincent Maher
  • Vinny Lingham

  • South Africa

  Web Predictions Roundup

  I posted my 7 web predictions for 2008 to my thoughtleader.co.za blog just before new year, and subsequently a couple of local bloggers have also posted their thoughts.

  Tyler Reed posted his SA startup predictions for 2008, and I thought he got it pretty spot on, especially about Zoopy and Yeigo. Zoopy have really added some cool features and are my favourite SA startup at the moment. Their association with Nokia can only be good for their business - the move towards indexing and storing mobile content is sure to pay dividends later this year. I have also just started using Yeigo - their windows mobile 6 app is way ahead of other mobile voip players in terms of ui and functionality. I reckon that they could be one of the success stories of the year too.

  Of course Tyler himself has been working on and releasing some pretty interesting things, even though he is too modest to include them in his post. Its going to be interesting to see what else he builds this year.

  Vincent Maher made a post entitled some not-so-positive social media predictions for SA in 2008, including a prediction that I would do something unexpected and very successful this year. His faith in me is flattering, and I am going to work damn hard to prove him right. Yes, I have a stealth startup on the go - expect an announcement later this month :).

  I think his other predictions are pretty accurate too. A lot of them are about the maturing of the SA blogosphere - this is a good thing.

  Matthew Buckland wrote that Vinny Lingham was the man to watch in 2008. I ended up debating Synthasite's revenue model with another commenter on the post, and I do feel that Synthasite could really do well if they can use that $5 million worth of funding to build a decent user base.

  There have also been a number of other excellent (and sometimes funny) posts on Thoughtleader with a whole of non-web related predictions for 2008 that are well worth a read.

  Internationally, ReadWriteWeb led the field with their 2008 predictions post. Also worth a read: 12 predictions for Enterprise Web 2.0 in 2008 (via Mike Stopforth), Mashable’s 2008 Predictions: Sean’s List and , just for fun, Valleywag's 25 predictions for 2008.

  As I said in my thoughtleader post, I feel incredibly positive about the internet going into 2008, and I hope I feel the same way when I make my 2009 predictions at the end of this year.

  8 comments

  posted 11:43 AM
• 13

  Dec 07

  tags

  • music
  • South Africa

  • South Africa

  Pavement Special launch is tonight

  Just a reminder that the Pavement Special launch takes place tonight at the swanky Bohemian in Melvile.

  

  My good friend Lloyd Gedye of Isolation.tv fame is behind this brilliant new music magazine, and I will be MC'ing the event and keeping the ladies entertained.

  The line up is killer too - Jim Neversink, Kid of Doom and the BLK JKS are worth the price of admission alone. Come on down - if you're stuck in Johannesburg at this time of year it's not like you have anything better to do, right?

  no comments

  posted 09:47 AM
• 17

  Nov 07

  tags

  • South Africa
  • startups
  • synthasite
  • vc
  • Vinny Lingham

  • South Africa

  South African startup Synthasite raises $5 million in Series A round

  Techcrunch reports that Synthasite, the browser based website builder that is backed by Vinny Lingham has raised $5 million in a Series A investment round from Swiss based Columbus Venture Capital. You can find more details on Vinny's blog and a formal press release here.

  This is great news for the Cape Town based Synthasite, which launched into beta two weeks ago, and good news for South African startups in general. They have proved that it is possible to get decent VC for a South African startup, but that it is much easier when you have a professional product with unique features and global appeal. So many current SA startups are clones or variations on international ideas, and our local internet population is not large enough to justify the kind of investments that these startups are looking for.

  Congratulations to Vinny Lingham and the Synthasite team

  1 comments

  posted 09:24 PM
• 12

  Oct 07

  tags

  • blogs
  • Bolton Deventer
  • SEO
  • South Africa
  • Vincent Maher

  • South Africa

  Bolton Deventer is my hero

  Ermelo is famous for producing two of South Africa's most famous musicians, Lucky Dube and Jennifer Ferguson. According to Wikipedia it is also known for producing beans, wool, pigs, sunflower seeds, lucerne, sorghum, anthracite and coal. Ermelo's latest well known export is Bolton Deventer - one of my personal heroes, and an all round  good guy. Lately he has been involved in a blogwar with Guy Mclaren who is a less well known SEOxpert from Nelspruit. A few bloggers including Vincent Maher have even questioned whether he exists, which is ironic seeing as Bolton was working his SEO magic when most of these bloggers were still in diapers.

  

  Bolton first helped me out in the early days of the internet, back when Google was still known as "The Google". We were struggling to get our net-site which promoted the Stellaland Agricultural College Sunday Fete listed on any of the search engines. He quickly pointed out that we didn't have enough sexy images and introduced us to his TEP program (he had not come up with the W part of W-TEP yet).

  Following his advice we placed some racy pictures of our produce on the net-site.

  

  It worked! Within weeks we were the number one result for "Sunday Fetes" on Inktomi, Altavista and new startup Ask Jeeves. Unfortunately the success of the site went to the committee's heads and petty squabbling and an extra marital affair led to the closure of the net-site a year or two later.

  I would heartily recommend Bolton's services to anyone wanting to know more about the mystery of SEO. He knows his stuff, prices his services fairly and is a humble and down to earth, unlike those big city cowboys who have recently attacked him so unfairly.

  Update - 16 October 2007: Bolton has announced his demise. Farewell Bolton, we will miss you 

  5 comments

  posted 11:05 AM
• 21

  Jun 07

  tags

  • music
  • South Africa

  • South Africa

  Arno Carstens is supporting the Rolling Stones in Spain this weekend!

  Yesterday I got a call on my landline from Arno Carstens looking for Jerome, my housemate. Jerome is the ex-drummer for Cape Town rock pioneers Nine, and nowadays he splits his drumming duties between Arno Carstens' New Porn and my band The Diesel Whores. It turns out that Arno and his band had been selected to open for the Rolling Stones in San Sebastián in Spain this Saturday the 23rd June.

  A few minutes ago Jerome left for the airport and the band flew to Spain tonight to what is certainly going to be one of the best gigs of their entire lives. This is a huge break for Arno Carstens, and potentially massive for South African music in general. As a musician I cannot think of anything better than supporting the Stones in front of 35000+ people in Spain during the summer, except perhaps playing the Bohemian in Melville on a Monday night :).

  Its been a pretty huge two weeks for the band. They have just returned to South Africa from playing the Isle of Wight festival alongside bands like Muse, Wolfmother and the Stones, and they obviously made enough of an impression to get this support slot in Spain. I much prefer the Springbok Nude Girls catalogue to Arno's more middle of the road solo fare, but he is one of the hardest working musicians in this country, and a genuinely good guy to boot, and he deserves every bit of success that comes his way.

  Jerome said to me he was more excited about attending the afterparty on Saturday night than playing the actual gig - I think the Isle of Wight afterparty had a deep and lasting impact on his fragile drummer psyche.

  Arno Carstens será telonero de los Rolling Stones en Donostia, junto a los bilbaínos Zenttric (Spanish Press Release)

  4 comments

  posted 06:50 PM
• 26

  Apr 07

  tags

  • South Africa

  • South Africa

  Rain Spider Nest

  Vincent Maher's monster worm post from yesterday inspired me to post this picture of a rain spider nest in my garden that I took in February:

  

  The nest is about the size of a large grapefruit. The spiders that make these nests sometimes come into the house - particularly before a rainstorm. You can see other nests here, and here (with the spiders on them), as well as a close up of a rain spider here.

  I am not scared of death by drowning, Joburg taxi drivers or circus clowns but these spiders really freak me out. People have told me that they are harmless but I am not convinced. I found this article at Museums Online South Africa: 

  These spiders were previously listed as potentially dangerous. After tests where they were induced into biting guinea-pigs it was established that although the guinea-pigs had died within 3 minutes, it had been from shock and not the effects of any venom.

  Family Sparassidae - Museums Online

  Anything that can scare a guinea pig to death like that deserves some respect and a very wide berth.

  32 comments

  posted 11:41 AM
• 24

  Apr 07

  tags

  • newspapers
  • South Africa
  • urban legends

  • South Africa

  Dead dog foils poison plot - really bad journalism

  I found this story in the Citizen last week (please don't ask why I was reading it) when I came across this wonderful story that was just too good to be true. The story has been given a great South African flavour but sadly it is a variation of one of the oldest urban legends ever - Snopes.com has a version dating back to 1946

  A DEAD dog was at the centre of a huge rumpus last week which involved faction fights, police, ambulances, the local municipal disaster management service and the regional hospital.

  It could only have happened in Zululand, and it’s no urban legend

  The story began on Friday afternoon when a cow with a broken leg was found in a ditch at a rural settlement.

  The suffering animal was mercifully killed and preparation was made by its owners for the community to feast on the meat.However, it was pointed out that the beast had been returning from the direction of the opposing faction when it landed in the ditch.

  Fears were expressed that the other group may have poisoned the cow and deliberately set up the accident, knowing that the animal would end up on the plates of their enemy.Grey heads decided that a portion of the meat be given to a dog: if it survived, they could all feast to their hearts’ content.

  The mongrel did indeed survive the night and Saturday saw the party proceed in full swing...until a child reported that the dog was dead.Panic set in, with the group of about 60 rushing for traditional herbs and swallowing water from a dirty stream to induce vomiting.KZN Ambulance Services were summoned and Ngwelezana Hospital was placed on standby.The municipal disaster truck was brought in and police reinforcements arrived to assist the on-duty members.

  At some point in the chaos and fear, someone thought to ask where the dog was - no doubt, so that the type of poison used might be identified. Upon being called in for questioning, the same child said the dog was ‘still lying in the road where the vehicle struck it’!

  The government official who passed the facts of story on to the Zululand Observer could not say whether the feast continued after the child’s revelation.
  Be that as it may, we are sure our readers will feast on this true tale for many a year.

  Dave Savides - Zululand Observer

  I could not find the original story on the citizen website (great search function guys!), but I managed to find a google cached copy from the website of the Zululand Observer. IANAJ, but isn't there some kind of code of conduct against printing blatant untruths, even in a small regional paper. It took me less than 30 seconds to find out that the story was not true. At the very least the Citizen should have checked their facts before printing the story.

  I am really disappointed that it is not a true story - the South African angle almost makes it believable, and it is by far the best version of the urban legend that I have read. It would make a really funny short film - someone should make it.

  1 comments

  posted 03:42 AM
• 24

  Apr 07

  tags

  • South Africa

  • South Africa

  A Challenge for 1time Airlines

  I love 1time - they are my airline of choice whenever I need to fly to Cape Town to visit my mom in Port Alfred. Of all the budget airlines they seem to have the best service, the most comfortable seats and the most legroom (important when you are 6"4). They are also really band friendly. I fly with my band The Diesel Whores to Cape Town on tour 4 times a year and they take extra care with our equipment and go out of the way to accommodate our bulky, fragile instruments. Its pretty funny to fly on the Friday afternoon flight to Cape Town with 1time - there are normally 4 or 5 bands on the flight - on one flight last year it was Arno Carstens' New Porn, Cassette, 340ml and ourselves. I really think they should do a "1time - the airline of rockstars" advertising campaign.

  The main reason, of course, that we fly 1time is that they are invariably cheaper than even the other budget airlines. When other flights are booked solid you can normally get a seat on a 1time flight (this is really useful because drummers have a lot of difficulty reading a calendar). I think the reason for this is because their website has a couple of near fatal flaws that cause people to leave it before they make their booking.

  The Challenge

  If anyone from 1time is reading this, here is my challenge. I can point out three flaws on your site that can be fixed in under an hour with a mininum of downtime. I am convinced that if you fix these three flaws you will gain a measurable increase in bookings through the site and the call centre.

  What do I want out of this? 12 return tickets to Cape Town over the next year in the form of sponsorship for my band. We can work out the details if this all works out. You only have to sponsor the band if my suggestions work to your satisfaction. You have nothing to lose. Contact me at jaxon@soup.co.za or on 082 824 0914.

  no comments

  posted 12:04 AM
• 20

  Apr 07

  tags

  • music
  • South Africa

  • South Africa

  MyKakFest - Guns and Roses withdraw from the concert

  Guns and Roses have just announced their withdrawal from MyCokeFest due to an injury to legendary ex-Replacements bassist Tommy Stinson. To be honest, Tommy Stinson was the only reason that I would have attended the gig at all. Some of the South African acts are worth watching (Dirty Skirts, Taxi Violence, Parlotones and maybe the Nude Girls), but the rest of the line up was lame as all hell.

  Hey, now that they don't have to pay Guns and Roses (which should have changed its name to the Fat Axel Experience by now) maybe they can afford to actually pay the South African acts. Word on the street is that the Nude Girls and Parlotones are getting paid, but that the other SA acts are playing for the "prestige".

  If you would like to see some real rock and roll then check out Taxi Violence and the Hellphones tonight at Back2Basix in Westdene. It costs R40, you can leave the venue and come back in again later, and you don't have to queue for three hours to get a R15 bottle of water.

  Guns n' Roses withdraws from My Coke Fest

  5 comments

  posted 01:01 PM
• 20

  Apr 07

  tags

  • South Africa
  • startups
  • video

  • South Africa

  SouthAfricaTube - another video sharing site

  I was surfing the net this morning when I saw a Google adsense ad promoting a new South African themed video sharing site called SouthAfricaTube.com. I am not sure what scares me more about the site - the fact that it does not even host its own videos, the "designed in Front Page by my cousin Dwayne in 1996" retro look, or the fact that someone would spend money advertising something like this on Google. On further investigation I managed to find Kenyatube.com and Nigeria-tube.com, all using the same code and shit design, and all with around 10 actual videos masquerading as content.

  As much of a waste of time that the site is, it poses interesting questions for the nascent South African video sharing sites like Zoopy, myvideo and Twac. How are these sites going to differentiate themselves from the rest of the local herd, and how are they going to provide local users with an incentive to post videos on their sites instead of YouTube? Tyler Reed has written an detailed comparison of the three current local sites that is well worth reading. Twac has an interesting model - professionally made (and genuinely funny by the looks of things) content that you have to purchase or buy a subscription for, as well as free user submitted content. Myvideo is offering (somewhat controversially) to pay a R1000 bounty for newsworthy video content, while Zoopy, by far the most professionally designed of the three, is going for the social networking angle and letting users share video as well as photos.

  The problem that all of these sites face is that the barrier to entry into the market is so low. Anyone with a credit card can go and buy a domain and a  $99 Clip-Share php script (look familiar MyVideo.co.za?), and launch their own video sharing site. The key, as always, is content. I reckon the key to all three of these sites future success lies in figuring out how to gain traction with the schoolkids that make most of the user generated video content. Once you have a social group or school using a specific service then the growth will be exponential. The first one to figure out how to do this will be the winner here.

  7 comments

  posted 12:07 PM
• 15

  Apr 07

  tags

  • newspapers
  • South Africa

  • South Africa

  A hell of a cup of tea

  

  I wasn't drunk at all...I had been with one of my colleagues earlier that night drinking tea.

  Judge Nkola Motata, quoted on IOL - High Court judge held for drunk driving (7 January 2007)

  That must have been a hell of a cup of tea:

  Prosecutor Anna-Marie Morton said forensic results of Motata's blood test showed high levels of alcohol intake.

  "The results show substantial high levels of alcohol," she told the court.

  Morton declined to tell reporters outside the courtroom the blood alcohol percentage. "I cannot say how much," she said.

  IOL - High levels of alcohol in Motata's blood (13 March 2007)

  At least its a change from the regular "but I only had a beer and a half a glass of wine" excuse that the cops normally hear at roadblocks.

  no comments

  posted 11:12 AM

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