I am starting to like Google Squared.
«
Expand/Collapse
-
19:14
State Of The American Union
» For Love and Money State Of The American Union
-
18:13
Interactive Marketing in Africa
» White African Last week I had the opportunity to sit down with two people that I have a lot of respect for in the interactive marketing space in Africa. First was Rob Stokes, CEO of the well known Quirk marketing firm in South Africa. Later in the week I got to catch up with Joshua Wanyama of Pamoja Media.
Before I get into that though, you should take a look at these numbers.
Africa’s exploding internet growthCurrently, Africa is the second fastest growing internet market after it was passed with the Middle East in terms of connectivity. The growth rate is 1,100% with only 5.6% of Africa’s 975 million people online.
The 10 largest internet markets in Africa are seen below. These 10 countries account for a staggering 86% of the 54.2 million Africans online:
1. Egypt – 10.5 million
2. Nigeria – 10 million
3. Morocco – 6.6 million
4. South Africa – 4.6 million
5. Algeria – 3.5 million
6. Sudan – 3.5 million
7. Kenya – 3 million
8. Tunisia – 2.8 million
9. Zimbabwe – 1.4 million
10. Ghana – 0.9 million(Research number are from the Internet World Stats)
Education and CharlatansQuirk is successful, and they’re looking to expand into other parts of Africa. However, one of the hurdles that they face is that there just aren’t that many people who understand why web marketing is needed, and that there is a need for a real strategy behind everything from your website to links to emails. It’s a problem of education in the business sector, and it comes with two problems.
First, low-bandwidth has caused most internet usage to be lower than normal in Africa. So, a lot of businesses don’t recognize the value of good web marketing, since most of the executives never get online to see their work anyway. For instance, think about the tourism industry in Africa, it is plagued with slow, ugly and hard to find websites. Most of them don’t even realize the business they’re missing out on.
Second, there are any number of people who will tell you that they can do your internet marketing or help with your online strategy and execute upon it. However, that’s simply not true for many claimants. There are likely only a handful of real experts in online marketing in any sub-Saharan African country. In Kenya alone, I can only think of a couple firms or individuals who really know what they’re talking about, and even fewer who can execute upon what they speak.
So, Rob has a challenge in addressing this market in Africa. It’s a big market if it can be cracked, but it takes more than just sales skills, it takes someone with the patience to educate and grow an industry.
Redefining yourself for the marketJoshua Wanyama found himself in a bind. He had just moved back to Kenya after growing a successful web firm in the US. Now he wanted to put Pamoja Media on the map in Africa, and he realized quite quickly that there was a major knowledge-gap in the interactive marketing space. How could he sell the connections that his ad network gave him if the very people he was selling to didn’t have an online strategy at all?
This realization caused him to change his strategic direction of the Kenyan operations to gain a customers. He changed it from being just about his ad network, and added on 5 more areas of expertise that would really give his clients positive returns:
- Interactive strategy – how to scale a company’s operations and marketing online
- Creative Development – Interactive ads, landing pages, enewsletters & micro sites
- Placement – We run ads on the Pamoja Media Network, Yahoo, Google and Facebook network of sites
- Social Media Marketing – This works for clients seeking long term social engagement with customers. We handle blogging, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Flickr and other accounts for such clients
- Online PR – We also handle online PR for companies seeking to grow their reputations outside of advertising African Market online
It’s a lot of work to sell yourself into new accounts and then keep up with the demands of high profile clients. I know, I’ve been there. I know Joshua, and I know he’ll be successful with this.
What I also know is this, it’s terribly hard to scale a service organization. It takes more people. My hope is that Pamoja Media will be able to gather enough clients in the ad network space so that that remains the core business. This can scale, and it can be done efficiently.
-
11:03
Festival: Sigana International Storytelling Festival 3rd - 5th July '09
» Kenyanpoet From the 3rd, 4th and 5th July 2009, Zamaleo Arts & Culture Trust (Zamaleo ACT) will host the very 1st Sigana International Storytelling Festival at Alliance Francaise, off Loita Street Nairobi-Kenya.
Eight world-renowned professional Storytellers coming from the regions of Eastern Africa, Europe and the Americas shall present memorable performances using words, visual touch, music and movement. Through these presentations, we will experience the special richness of storytelling through a journey of different cultures, traditions and artistic styles. The highly skilled group of international Storytellers shall share with the Kenyan audiences the theme of “Our Words Our Lives”.
Sigana International Storytelling Festival is set to happen every year within Eastern Africa and is making its beginnings in Kenya this July 2009. We invite you be part of its great beginning. Please plan now to be there to witness, reflect and celebrate the new Sigana way of contemporary storytelling performance.
VENUE: Alliance Francaise , Loita Street Nairobi City-Kenya
DATES: Friday July 03, Saturday July 04 and Sunday July 05
TIME: Friday July 03 – 11am, 3pm, 6.00pm
Saturday July 04 – 11am, 3pm & 6pm
Sunday July 05 – 3pm & 6pm
CHARGES: Advance: Adults Ksh300; Children 150
At the Door: Adults Ksh 400, Children Ksh 200
CONTACTS:
Aghan Odero Agan tel. 0722739894
Alumbe Hellen Namai 0721764622
Githanda Githae Tel.: 0722815361
Grace Wangari Tel.: 0724884327
Email: zama_leo@yahoo.co.uk
-
10:22
Perils of Polarized Police Force and AP
» You Missed This If Major Hussein Ali ever thought he is the overall boss then he better stop living the lie and smell the coffee. Ali must be aware that AP Commandant Kinuthia Mbugua is an authority unto himself answerable to those calling shots.
Forget all those glossy proposals by Ali to modernize Kenya’s police force. Retired Judge Philip Ransley’s task force, just like the myriad commissions before him, is nothing but a stop-gap measure meant to fool Kenyans of an apparent motion with no intended movement.
Any member of the disciplined forces would readily tell you that Kinuthia’s contradiction of his boss Ali amounts to gross insubordination. But who cares, Kinuthia is on the right side of power. He knows Ali would never dare question him lest the police boss wants to kiss his post goodbye.
True Kinuthia said AP operations are crucial to security in every corner of the country. But wait a minute, between the regular police and AP who is better trained to cope with complex security challenges outside raiding changaa dens? No prizes for guessing because it is all politics, period.
Political errands
APs are symptoms of acute dearth of any progressive post-colonial reforms. They are relics of colonialism that the black boss inherited from the departing white boss with the exclusive purpose to subjugate his own people. No wonder the villagers aptly call them TP for TRIBAL POLICE.
Kinuthia Mbugua must have thought of himself being very intellectual in proposing more autonomous police divisions including border police. Nothing could be further from the truth in his quest to propose parallel command lines that will leave him more powerful at the expense of the wider good.
The world over, a country’s police force must have a central command with different specialized divisions answerable to one authority. But not in Kenya where modernization acquires a whole new meaning exclusively designed to serve parochial interests.
Just look back to 2007 and see how our APs are perfect vehicles to run political errands.
Tribal police
Only within our deceptive shores do you find such skewed logic spewed to package division as source of strength. All those grandstanding about merger of competing police units to foster effective service delivery are just clever tricks to keep us engaged as the looters scheme on their next prey at our expense.
Kenya’s gatekeepers will not allow tranaformatio of the police with commensurate power to operate independently. Doing that will deny the power to unleash official militia to further their narrow political agenda.
We have been warned of Armageddon come 2012 by both Judges Kriegler and Waki should there be no comprehensive reforms before then. Well, it is just about 1000 days to go. OLE WETU.Kumekucha
-
9:44
The Sheng Collabo [Part 2]
» The African Accent 
... Continued from The Sheng Collabo [Part 1]
Google gave me some insight, but my curiosity was unsatisfied. A 'Question & Answer' with Dunkie was the only solution I saw.
I caught up with Dunkie on Facebook. His page exhibited signs of massive activity, and I was afraid that my 'friend request' would be drowned by it all. To my surprise, Dunkie found the time to add me quite promptly. In addition, he also sat down, and answered a few questions I had:
The African Accent: What is Sheng.co.ke?
Dunkie: It is an online repository of Sheng and Engsh words. It seeks to provide translations, meanings and histories of these words.
TAA: Sheng, is a mix of English, Swahili, Kikuyu, Kamba, Luo, ... and that does not even encompass all the sources that Sheng draws on. In the early to mid 90's, there was an attempt at a printed Sheng Dictionary in Nairobi. It failed miserably. What inspired you to take on this challenge, and how successful have you been?
D: The print form of the the Sheng dictionary failed because of one simple reason. Publication took so long that by the time a full text was done, several new words had surfaced. I've been relatively successful in my attempt to keep the dictionary alive.
Relatively because the rate at which I'm getting new words online is not as high as I'd wish or worse still, as high as it was back when I started the online project. I used to pay for new words to be collected and verified, now I don't have as much money and time as I did before so the rate is lower.
What inspired me? Languages fascinate me... I speak several other languages... and Sheng just stood out because I was raised in a Sheng environment and there was so much myth and mystery about the language that I took it upon myself to "debunk the theory" that Sheng was corrupting other languages.
TAA: The Swahili purists have always complained that Sheng is nothing but a corruption of a beautiful language. And It should not be encouraged. What is your response?
D: Swahili itself is a corruption of Arabic and several East African coastal languages. I suggest they look elsewhere for a fight. My take on language is that it's a means of communication between two or more parties. If I speak in Sheng and you understand me, what's the fuss? I'm not sure there's a country that doesn't have it's own version of pidgin or some form of the same.
TAA: Tell us about the Mchongoano, Lyrics, and Graffiti angles related to Sheng.co.ke.
D: Graffiti (www.graffiti.co.ke) is a very old form of art that's recently gotten prominence on Kenyan streets via Matatu works. Most of the graffiti are in Sheng and painted by young people who seek to express themselves artistically via their work on the said Matatus. It is the visual form of the language.
Lyrics [lyrics.Sheng.co.ke),] though still work in progress, is my attempt to collect lyrics to songs done by Kenyan or East Africa artists. As we know, close to 90% of the songs we listen to on our airwaves today are done in Sheng or some degree of Sheng. These artists are probably some of the most consistent introducers and mules of words. Best example is E-Sir with "ni-antaje" or Gidigidi Maji Maji with "unbwogable" or The Bugs with "Ma wezere".
Mchongoano is a traditional African form of entertainment that showcases ones speed with with, jest and humour. What the Americans call "your mama jokes" is actually practiced all over Africa from South Africa to Ghana, Nigeria, Tunisia, East Africa etc. It's about creating verbal images of a person, usually with the effect of prompting the target to come up with one joke "hotter" than the one cast at him/her. One is expected to do this very fast and creatively without necessarily being insulting.
The common denominator in all these is Sheng as the medium of transmission of the message/content.
TAA: What's the hottest Sheng word this week?
D: Mbeteka. It means rugby, in English.
For example:
Sheng: Collins Injera ni mnona mbeteka vi mayhem
English: Collins Injera plays a good game of rugby
Thanks to the efforts of Dunkie, and his project, Sheng.co.ke, The African Accent will now feature a weekly blog post: 'Sheng Word of the Week'. I think this is an excellent way to expose the world to the East African culture.
Ras Dunkie speaks with The African Accent. Do you speak African too?
var addthis_pub="mwistar";
-
7:50
Why I blog....
» REBECCA WANJIKU'S BLOG The other day one journalist asked me why I blog. It was funny because he was asking why I had not updated my blog. So my answer was; why do you visit my blog?
It was a valid question, which I never thought about. Since then, I have been wondering why I blog.
I blog in exercise of my freedom of expression; here no one can limit what I say, whether it toes the party line or not; its my opinion and it remains that way.
I blog because I love pointing out issues; mostly the ones that are not going right, just like most journalists.
I blog because it is a chance for me to vent my frustrations.
I blog because it is the only way people can learn more about various issues; not structured by the media or held down by requirements of editorial correctness.
I blog because technology is one of those boring issues that is tough for us to write about.
But most of all, I blog because I love writing!
I can go on and on........
-
7:11
Air Travel
» tHiNkEr'S rOoM Few things are simultaneously exciting and terrifying like flying. I love everything about flying except the takeoff, and specifically the bit when the plane levels out. There was a flight I once took when I was sure that the damn thing had stopped mid-air and was deciding whether or not to crash. I love the rest. flying over the clouds, taking photos of clouds and formations and leaving the air flight hostesses in no doubt that the only time that powdered gunk they call milk will be introduced into my cup I will at the time be flying not as a passenger but as cargo. There’s no way I’m paying outrageous fare to drink powdered plaster of Paris. I know there is real milk in the galley and by George I’m going to get some.
In light of the unfortunate Air France crash, I recall a few years back I was flying from Gaborone to Jo’burg, and the passengers, (both of us) were asked to strap in by smiling stewardesses. We obliged. They then began the traditional volley of instructions on safe flying and halfway through, unable to contain myself I put my hand up.
The one giving me the instructions looked taken aback at the occurrence. Clearly she had yet to be questioned.
“Now then, Kelly,” I began comfortably. “We will be flying at 30,000 feet, which is 9-10 kilometers up, and this Boeing 737 weighs about 50,000 kilos. True?”
Kelly gave her best South African Airways smile. “True”.
“Should something happen, gravity will insist that those 30,000 feet above sea level be reduced to more manageable levels. So, let’s say we have engine failure. Without the engine a 737 has the grace of an obese hippopotamus in molasses soaked weetabix. This bad boy will descend with the momentum of the gods. We will hit the ground so hard a small hill will be created in China. True?”
Kelly smiled her most professional smile.
“But we might hit the water,” my fellow passenger said thoughtfully.
“Clearly you have never belly flopped at the local swimming pool. At the speed we’ll be going by the time the plane hits the water, we might as well hit concrete. Less damp. But I digress. My point is, fortune does not favour the poor fools in a 50 tonne aircraft that had a direct hit to soil or water having descended as quickly as possible from 9 kilometers up.”
There was a brief silence and my wisdom was digested.
“Seriously, Kelly, is there any point in all these precautions? Will me putting my head between my knees, acrobat that I may be, make a difference if the plane hits the Republic Of Botswana at several hundred miles an hour?”
Kelly did not have an answer for me. But she gave me an extra dinner and several bags of peanuts and fascinating stories of the colourful life of cabin crew.
Our Father, who art in Heaven, was pleasantly surprised to hear from characters who generally used His Name in vain.
© M for tHiNkEr'S rOoM, 2009. | Permalink | 18 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags:
Copyright © 1999 - 2010 Mashada - All Rights Reserved | Privacy Policy | Terms and Conditions