You’ve thought long and hard about it, and you’re finally ready to adopt unified communications (UC), including its foundation, Voice over IP. Part of the attraction is the rich application benefits of this technology, but you’re also painfully aware that its array of predecessors, including TDM (time division multiplexing) switched telephony, won’t be around or […]
2011
Posted inGeneral
Leadership starts with us
By Kayeye Cedric Ntumba According to a paper delivered in 2004, “Strengthening African Leadership”, by Robert I Rotberg, the Director of the Programme on Intrastate Conflict at Harvard University’s John F Kennedy School of Government and President of the World Peace Foundation, Africa has long been saddled with poor, even malevolent, leadership: predatory kleptocrats, military-installed […]
Posted inGeneral, Lifestyle
Can DJ Fresh tweet what he likes about suicide?
This afternoon while scrolling through Twitter as I do, I noticed an unusual exchange. You don’t usually see a hugely popular DJ in a back and forth with the South African Depression and Anxiety Group (Sadag), so I followed the conversation to see what it was all about. And quite frankly, I was appalled. Here […]
Posted inBusiness, General, Lifestyle
Are Christmas gifts just a horrible waste of money?
December is almost upon us and Christmas is less than a month away. Already the malls are heaving with hollow-eyed wrecks ticking off mental lists of people on their Christmas gift lists (some of them fantasising, no doubt, about bombing a place that approximates Dante’s fourth circle of hell). Ernst & Young is predicting a […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Arch Makgoba: Secrecy bill evokes memories of apartheid, fear
By Archbishop Thabo Makgoba Dear Mr President, I write to you as one who grew up under a system that oppressed and censored the media — a system that invoked fear in anyone who dared to read, or embrace, different views to those of the government of the day. The passage of the Protection of […]
Posted inGeneral
What is creativity?
How does it work? Is it mere imitation, or transformation, or could it be — under rare circumstances — “pure” creation, that is, out of thin air, as it were? This last possibility is captured in the Christian doctrine of “creatio ex nihilo”, which is attributed to God — the creation of the universe out […]
Posted inGeneral, News/Politics
COP17: A critical look at SA’s role
By Alex Lenferna South Africa hosts the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change — the 17th Conference of the Parties (COP 17) — in Durban, starting today. But what about South Africa’s own response to climate change, and how coherent and meaningful is our response, really? Firstly, let’s look at South Africa’s emissions reduction […]
Posted inGeneral
2011: The year of big data
This was the year of big data. In the last two to three years we have accumulated more data than ever before[1]. This provides both a challenge and an opportunity for companies, and the ones who get it right fastest are going to lead the pack. There are three trends related to this growth in […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Criminalising adolescent sexuality — murky waters
I went to a thrilling dialogue at the Commission for Gender Equality last week. The topic was the ages of consent for sex, in terms of our legislation, and the complications that the current legislation has. At the moment the law (the Sexual Offences Act) says that if you’re 16 years and older you can […]
Posted inGeneral
Times are a-changing for Test cricket
I have read and listened with great worry over the last two months at the threat which Test cricket is perceivably under — made even more flamboyant by a media contingent keen to increase the content in their publications, on the Twitter pages and on their radio shows. I do see some level of threat […]
Posted inGeneral, Lifestyle
Durex: ‘Let copulation thrive!’
It’s just more embarrassing to watch oral sex on the big screen because it is just that much more in your face. The sexy Hollywood actor slid down the gorgeous Hollywood actress’s quivering body towards her you know what. Courteously — or rather in line with movie ratings — the camera did not pan across […]
Posted inGeneral
E-commerce that suits you and converts customers
SA e-business is on the up and up. MasterCard’s recent survey of online shopping habits shows that 51% of connected South Africans shop online — 75% of them in the last three months. With these encouraging findings in mind, businesses know they have to start carving out an e-commerce strategy. Unfortunately, there is no magic […]