This thread aims to highlight some key entrepreneurs in the South African context (and ICT context) who are highly regarded as thought leaders globally. It is by no means a definitive list but a start of something to proud of as South Africans…If you feel the urge to add on to this list…Add on with great gusto! Recently on MyDL there was some talk of Venture Capital/ists or the lack thereof in SA…Then I read about someone that blew my proverbial socks off!
Roelof Frederik Botha (grandson of Pik Botha – former foreign affairs minister). He’s a partner at Sequoia Capital (arguably one of the biggest & most successful VC firms in Silicon Valley). He was instrumental in Sequoia Capital’s early investment in quite a few notable start-ups (like YouTube). He also makes the Forbes Midas List (magic makers in the VC world). He’s also on the PayPal Mafia list (which seems to have spawned lots of interesting start-ups & have collectively turned Silicon Valley on its head). He was CFO at PayPal at one stage.
Talking about the Paypal Mafia List (many of the huge successes in Silicon Valley can in some way or the other be traced back to the PayPal Mafia viz. Facebook, Digg & YouTube) …Elon Musk (Pretoria Boys High lad) , co-founded a company called X.com which later became PayPal. He’s since moved on to other endeavours including Space Exploration & Tesla Motors (electric car production). He too is considered to be part of the Mafia List.
Then there’s my personal favourite, Vinny Lingham. He’s had his paws on several initiatives locally. One of them involves SEO. Then he started Synthasite (a free online website development platform – Now called Yola). Yola needed funding & a global presence & we know that VC’s in South Africa are like the Dodo…So Vinny got the funding from outside South Africa & re-located Yola to Silicon Valley (you have to be in the right place right!).
Who can forget Mark Shuttleworth? The guy has made incredible strides globally with regards to open source & Linux. Ubuntu in particular is very highly regarded as a world class operating system & has proven to be rock solid on the security side of things. The guy has a string of accolades longer than my arm.
Feel free to add more reasons to be Proudly South African on this list…
I decided last night that I was going to spend some quality time watching the Protea's cricket match against New Zealand in the Twenty20 World Cup (against my better judgement cos I put Prison Break on the back burner for a little while - thanks PVR ).
Shock Horror! We did end up winning the game but we made it pretty darn difficult for ourselves with the comedy of errors that led up to the win. I also accept that the guys won't always make the right descisions but c'mon guys:
- A B de Villiers (wholly considered to be the best player in world cricket at the moment) , it was a dumb ass descision to push him so far down the order. The lad got run out trying to save the situation for us 'once again'...
- Getting Jaques Kallis to open I thought was a great idea, we need solid Jaques to see out the new ball especially when there's a fair amount of movement off the pitch & in the air.
- Lest we forget, this is Twenty20 cricket, what the heck is a big hitter like Albie Morkel doing coming in so late? That guy has the potential to single handedly destroy any bowling attack in the world, he can even hit fours off yorkers for crying out loud. I'm even convinced he has the eyes of an eagle
The crux of my story really revolves around Gibbs & Boucher. The 2 guys have really been supreme for South African cricket & apart from A B de Villiers, I haven't seen a player with more raw talent than Gibbs. They have served us well but unfortunately the game of cricket doesn't revolve around sentiment. I don't believe they are adding much value to the setup. We need guys that score consistently, not guys that don't score consistently & get big scores on the odd occassion. I feel they need to make way for up & coming talent.
I'm soooo tired. I'm tired of hearing all this propaganda that we're fed. I'm tired of hearing biased opinions of commentators in all spheres. I'm tired of hearing the hogwash that we are being fed daily.
A few examples:
- Daily we hear Economists painting rosy pictures about the housing market for example. These economists are appointed by the major banks so what they say would be tainted. It's in the banks best interest that people start to look at things differently so that they can fleece us even more.
- Then we hear the boss of Seacom saying that Seacom would significantly reduce broadband pricing in South Africa & that it has already come down by 50% when we all know this isn't true.
- Since the announcement of Seacom, speculators far & wide in the telecoms industry have touted the fact that the cost of broadband would significantly reduce with the arrival of Seacom because Telkom's stranglehold would no longer be a factor but Telkom has a vested interest in Seacom too.
- Then recently we hear iBurst's boss (Mr Briggs) say that Seacom would not have a significant impact on pricing, we need to wait for 2 other under sea cable's (WACS & EASSy) to land before we start seeing a significant price drop. Personally I feel that even if this was the birthplace of broadband we still wouldn't see a significant price drop.
Where are all the independent analysts that don't have a vested interest in anything?? We don't need this other stuff that's being dished out at the moment. We need independant viewpoints on eveything so that we can make more informed descisions. We'll still do our own research before we make a descision but it would be nice to hear an independant view too.
Would the independant speculators, economists, commentators please stand up!
The Rand is Officially the Best Currency in the World
In terms of performance anyway...It strenthened for the fourth month in a row. Bloomberg is also reporting it to be the best performing 'Major' currency. There's one more reason why South Africa is not looking like the shabbiest place to be right now in these dodgy times. Sure we have our issues with crime & unemployment & expats coming back home mostly in the guise of the Homecoming Revolution (I think it's cos they got their asses retrenched abroad :-) ). All in all, it can't be all bad because we supposedly have a skills shortage (I have my own therories around this one too - I think the Employment Agencies just don't know how to look for the necessary people properly, a topic for another discussion).
Big up to the Rand! The 10 rand note in my pocket all of a sudden grew a pair!
Ex Military General has been appointed as new Communications Minister
Ok, we all had our issues with Poison Ivy, may her soul rest in peace. What does the future hold for the ICT sector in South Africa?? It's looking pretty bleak at the moment. President Jacob Zuma announced his cabinet & hey presto! We now have an ex Military General as Communications Minister. Minister Siphiwe Nyanda.
This really emphasizes that , in the greater scheme of things (the South African Economy), the government considers the ICT sector to be a non event. Let's face it, at the moment, we are in a rut in this sector. What we really needed is someone with their finger on the pulse & not just someone that will toe the party line.
Why would you appoint someone to head up a ministry that has no prior experience in that ministry? Do you not see value proposition that the ICT sector brings to the table to boost the economy? I have no more kind words to say regarding this...Tsk!
SchoolTool is a full open source software solution that is designed to aid schools in managing their day to day administration. It's licensed under the GNU General Public License, Version 2. It's another initiative from the Shuttleworth Foundation which seems to be making strides in their drive for making South African Schools pro Open Source.
The solution in it's current rendition caters for most of a school's administrative functions and a report writing facility. Also, there are plans underway to develop the solution to cater for financial management, communication with local authorities & inter-school information sharing. If you sit down & think about this for a second you can kinda gauge the power potential of this solution & where it's headed. It's a great initiative & allows for a certain level of autonomy while also catering for information sharing so that local authorities & government can better plan & implement changes to our schooling system for the better.
Our education system seems to need a shake up & I think this is a great start. I have to admit also that I strongly second Mark Shuttleworth's sentiments that the South African education system needs to go completely open source. This is imperative in Africa of we want to bridge the 1st & third worlds (digitally, educationally etc.). At least the South African government is seriously considering impelementing open source solutions in all government departments to cut down on costs
I'm not sure who would design an app like this or how it made it through Apple's App Store approval process. The 'Baby Shaker' iPhone application works as follows:
A crying baby comes up & the smartphone user has to vigorously shake the phone to stop the crying. Once the baby is quiet, the baby then appears with crosses on it's eyes implying that the baby is dead!
Being a dad myself, I'm can't see what kind of a person would devise this application & also what kind of person would find this application amusing & download it. I probably sound a bit touchy about the subject but this kind of app & those that promote it have to be slammed especially knowing what kind of damage can be done to a baby that suffers from Shaken Baby Syndrome. Naturally this caused a furore in various circles & the app was subsequently pulled from the App Store & drew an apology from Apple. But it still begs the question, how was it approved to start off with? Apples apology also didn't sound that sincere & they have also refused to diclose how the app actually made it to the App Store. Shame on you Apple! Everyone loves someone that's takes responsibility for their actions...
Unemployed Developer?? Get a Free Adobe Flex 3 License!
Call it what you want or question Adobe's motives all you want, I think this tactic is a stroke of genius.
Adobe has decided to provide some restbite in this economic turmoil for developers that are unemployed. Just prove that you're unemployed & Adobe will give you a personal license for Flex Builder.
It's a great initiative to take full advantage of the upswing in the economy (when it does arrive). It's a great idea & will benefit both Adobe & unemployed developers wanting to upskill on Flex & become more marketable.
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