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19:18 India’s billionaires….
» Kenyanentrepreneur.com I’m going to continue this theme of posting video’s of interviews with billionaires since I find it interesting to listen to what those who have made it have to say. Why India? because the Indians are fairly new to the list and they’ve done by overcoming many of the issues that I believe African entrepreneurs [...]
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18:25
Kenyan Bloggers’ Day 2007
» Mama JunkYard's Cross-posted from KUL Admin blog
Introduction
On June 1st 2007, Kenyans everywhere will be celebrating Madaraka Day. Madaraka Day commemorates the day that Kenya attained internal self-rule following an important milestone on the road to independence. To mark this event, we would like to invite members of the Kenyan Bloggers Webring to blog in unison under the banner ‘Kenyan Bloggers’ Day’.
Why?
This day is opportunity for members of the Kenyan Bloggers Webring to share their thoughts on the topics below. Last year’s Kenyan Bloggers’ Day featured a wide range of inspired posts. The level of support and interaction shown by our members in response was outstanding. See how members celebrated last year
How to Get InvolvedOn or on the weekend of June 1st 2007, we are proposing that we all create a post on any or all of the following suggested topics:
* Kenya
* Being Kenyan
* Being a Kenyan blogger
* Being a member of KBWThe post can be a piece of prose – 2 lines, an essay, a poem, a podcast, a photograph, your favourite quote. It is entirely up to you how you chose to celebrate this day. You don’t have to be Kenyan, just a member of KBW.
On this day we wish to use collective blogging as means of celebrating the nation that unites us as bloggers of KBW.
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10:20
Making Cash Out Of Trash
» For Love and Money 
"We must continue investing in new methods of producing ethanol -- using everything from wood chips to grasses, to agricultural wastes.” - President George Bush, 2007 State of the Union address.
With high corn prices holding US ethanol producers captive, the race is on to find an alternative way to produce ethanol to meet the ever increasing energy demand for alternative fuels. To this end there are several companies that are looking into commercialization of various ethanol producing technology. One such company, BlueFire Ethanol Inc is seeking to take the lead in the cellulose to ethanol production process. BFRE, which currently trades on the the pink sheets, uses Arkenol Inc patented process to convert post sorted municipal waste, wood waste, rice and wheat straws and other agricultural residues to produce ethanol.
Arkenol's process separates the biomass from waste into cellulose and hemi-cellulose (the main building blocks of plant life) and lignin (the "glue" that holds the building blocks together), converts the cellulose and hemi-cellulose to sugars, ferments them and purifies the fermentation liquids into ethanol and other end-products. This novel process has not been commercialized but has been tested in bio-refinery pilot plants in Japan and California. To this end BFRE has identified El Sobrante Landfill, located in California, where it intends to build its first bio-refinery. The commercial plant is expected to start producing ethanol in 2009 and the company is not expected turn any profits before then. Once BFRE opens its bio-refinery, its profitabilty will depend on the cost of inputs and price of ethanol produced conventionally from corn or sugar cane.
On the other hand, BFRE's licence with Arkenol allows for its CEO to have his cake and eat it. Arnold Klann, BFRE's CEO, is also the owner of Arkenol Inc. This relationship allows him to profit from BFRE even if it does not make any profits while he collects payments, royalties and fees associated with the commercialization and production of ethanol using Arkenol's technology. Although he has invested a lot of equity into both BFRE and Arkenol, he stands to gain the most from the exclusive licencing agreement between the two companies.
The fact that BFRE is a development stage company and it trades on the pink sheets makes it a speculative investment. As such, the stock price will experience a lot of volatility as it continues with the construction and subsequent commercialization of its cellulose to ethanol bio-refinery.
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7:06
Music, Music And Other Things
» My part of the world....... There is this dude or I would like to think he is one and not a woman with a deep voice who lives in a block of houses that is separated from the complex that I live in by a fence. But even so I can still here the music that he plays. This dude has some of the best soul I have ever heard, the kind of songs that were always in the back of your head but come screaming back to the present when you hear them. Anyway today when I was coming from a long day at the grindstone when I was met by the sounds of classic 80s soul drifting towards the door and to make things worse it was accompanied by the tempting aroma of a meat roasting. If it wasn't for the fact that you don't know who owns guns to protect their houses I may have jumped over the fence, introduced myself and joined the party. Makes me realise how much I miss home where nyama choma used to abound, unlike meat here which is packed full of steroids and drained of all flavour by the time it gets to you.
I was just going through some of the music that I "collect" online and I came across this jewel. For those of you who read my last post and M's last offering, you know how we feel about alot of contemporary music. Anyway can you tell me what rap song that tune was sampled in and better yet can you tell me where the tune was originally featured! Let's get to know the real I love the 80s/90s peeps in the house!
I also listened to a classic rap song recently and when I watched the video, tears began to roll down my face, when I began to think of what we have to listen to, I began to bawl like a baby. Anyway that is why CD sales have gone down 20% but anyway like the an apocalyptic prophet I will get lost in my own dream world before I come back screaming, "the end is nigh!"
Onto non musical matters, while trolling this site seeing if some lass had decided to defame me (sadly when they can't have me they want to destroy me), I came up with this theory. A man's skill in the bedroom and physical endowment is directly proportional to how good he is as a boyfriend. When a man is the lover dreams are made of his skill and endowment in the bedroom rise to epic proportions but when he falls out of favour he instantly becomes a one minute, two inch man. Lesson learned, in relationships reality is nothing but perception is everything.
Is this how little we value our children? How can this group of women get only 2 years in jail for kidnapping a child? Try kidnapping a child here or in a European country and you will spend the better part of 20 years behind bars if not longer. Plus the Ugandan lady who claimed to have been pregnant for 16 months added some gloss to my day, what was she carrying in her womb? A baby elephant?
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5:54
On A Personal Tip
» My Life is...Mochalicious! Click pic for other pictures I have never been so psyched up for an event like rugby sevens. I am still buzzing from this past weekends’ shenanigans and there is still more to come in Edinburgh, come rain or shine. My voice too suffered as a result…..husky as ever! This is one social event where you meet-up with [...]
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5:01
Free SMS in Kenya
» Kenyan Pundit On the heels of free wireless (for some only apparently), there’s a free sms promotion going on at this website. EDIT: Looks like the promotion is now over. EDIT 2 (June 15): The website is back up.
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2:56
Mobile Toolkit Workgroup Meeting in Kenya
» White African Fahamu and Tactical Tech have joined forces to put on a Mobile Advocacy Workshop in Nairobi. I had the chance to attend the afternoon sessions today, and will be taking part in the Mobile Toolkit Workgroup tomorrow.
The first 3 days were taken up with examples and stories of how mobile technology is being used as an effective tool within NGO’s that have a focus on human rights and social advocacy. A typical question at these sessions would be, ” What do you need to make your work with mobiles more effective?”
A few of the answers:
- Access to service reports (SMS)
- User-friendly software
- Tables with the list of providers that are able to send messages to other providers
- Alternative power (solar power, charging and energy saving techniques)
- A glossary of the technical jargon
- Text-to-voice techniques
- Mobile-to-blog techniques
Tomorrow, just the tech guys will remain and we will discuss what tools and information will be included in the “Mobile Toolkit” so that future programs will have a starting point to reference for their projects. The first three days of hearing what is being done, and what is needed, is critical if a toolkit is to be developed that is both useful and informative. A typical question here would be, “What is the toolkit going to look like?”
A few of the answers:
- It should have a web presence
- It should be a package with a clear guide on how to use it and a navigation system with links to other users
- It should include CDs
- A book (multi language)
- It should be downloadable
While here I’ve had a chance to meet two blog/email acquaintances too, Sokari Ekine of Black Looks and Ken Banks of Kiwanja.net. They’re both experts in their fields, and it’s been great getting to know them on a face-to-face level. Sokari works at Fahamu and has been a social activist for quite some time. She has a particular focus on women’s rights, as can be seen on her blog. Ken Banks is a technologist who developed Frontline SMS, the system used to monitor the Nigerian elections amongst others.
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0:14
CALM DOWN MR. NYACHAE!
» assidous Before the Cross Country came back home, Mombasa had roads not worth writing home about. Then things changed. Street lights were lit, Mama Ngina drive turned into a gem and the roads, well- they were re-carpeted. At least that is what we all thought until the rains started pounding the region for seven straight days unraveling the mystery that is road re-carpeting.
The Mombasa beautification was overseen by none other than the Chief Government Spokesman, Dr. Alf Mutua! Chief, because he is the only one mandated to explain government policy to Kenyans in a lingua franca easily understood not the legal gobbledygook! But being Kenya, we have other spokesmen/women who never know how irritating it is listening to their prattle!
When he returned to Mombasa after the Cross Country had come back home and returned to wherever it came from, and much later after the rains, he was shocked to find the roads were back to the pre-homecoming. Visibly enraged and angry at the shoddy job, he called for the arrest of the contractors and away they were taken by the police.
In Parliament, Nyachae was angry and threatening to resign because of Mutua’s actions!
My advice to him - RESIGN ASAP!
Mutua was angry and rightly so, as any right thinking Kenyan would after putting all their energy on something and paying for it through the nose only for it to crumble due to a shoddy job and worker! But we must, try as we might, and am not justifying the contractor’s actions, that Nyachae belongs to a clique of the old moneyed guard for whom anything goes as long money has been made. To them, service delivery and shame are words from the Martian vocabulary!
The contractors did a shoddy job and Nyachae threatening to resign over this is rather weird. Resigning because your corrupt cohorts have been nabbed? Get Real Nyachae! Why are you siding with a lot that deserves to be put into the coolers and the keys thrown to the ocean floor? Nyachae, his ilk and these type of contractors are the people who have made Kenya what it is today. Roads are poor; hospitals are under funded, drugs rotting at the supplies dept …… Isn’t he ashamed that barely two months after re-carpeting, the roads have crumbled to poor state? But conscience is alien to this geezer.
Mr. Nyachae, don’t you know that you and your ilk are a curse on the Kenyan people and the faster you get out of the scene the better for all of us for you have overstayed your welcome.
And spare us the theatrics and child-like tantrums Mr. Nyachae.
And Mutua, keep them old timers on their toes as well as the under-performing government officials!