According to the headlines in the Sunday papers, scattered among the usual hysterical rantings of the Sunday media (Eskom bonuses, the ANC firing premiers and so on), was the news that Kgalema Motlanthe has been put on to the Cabinet by the ANC NEC. This has been touted for some time and has now finally […]
Jarred Cinman
Jarred Cinman is software director at Cambrient, South Africa's leading developer of web applications. He co-founded Johannesburg's first professional web development company and was one of the founders of VWV Interactive, for many years the premier creative web business in the country, winning numerous Loeries and various international awards. In 2001, Jarred co-founded Cambrient, which has, in its six-year history, built the leading local content management system and serviced an impressive list of corporate customers. Cambrient Contentsuite is also the engine behind Moneyweb.
Posted inGeneral
The Algonquin blues
It all started when I shot down Playboy X on the roof his upper Algonquin apartment. Dwayne asked me to do it, and right now I am a gun for hire. I’m in it for the money. And I’m looking for someone. But I feel like making that choice robbed me of something, some part […]
Posted inGeneral
A time for less compassion
Like everyone else, I am horrified and sickened by the images of people being burned alive, chased from their homes, and other unspeakable acts of violence occurring on our doorsteps. However, I am not filled with a sense of charity in the light of these acts. My overwhelming response is: foreigners, go home. Everyone can […]
Posted inGeneral
The end of social networking sites
Google Friend, launched on Monday evening, brings to a close the era of social networking sites, and makes “social” a standard part of using the Web. This trend has been clear for a while: the OpenSocial initiative has effectively allowed you to share your networks of contacts across them. I doubt this was first prize […]
Posted inLifestyle, Tech
Is piracy immoral?
In a time when the latest album or movie is available, for free, to anyone, from your desktop, where is the incentive to hand over money for the identical item? Is it a moral imperative? And what is the moral issue? The line that we’re constantly being fed by the copyright folks is simple: piracy […]
Posted inGeneral
Let’s talk about the Jews
Despite their relatively small community in South Africa, and indeed their minority status in a lot of places around the world, the Jews have made a big mark. Hostile to outsiders, lavish in giving advantages to its own kind and filled with a persecution complex (all of which, it may be argued, have at least […]
Posted inGeneral
Christianity owes us
I am often accused of fighting a battle that’s already been conceded with organised religion. In fact, this is the criticism levelled at many anti-religious thinkers: basically, that we’re beating a dead horse. Religion has moved on from its horrible past. In its current form, it’s something altogether more complex and intricate. So why spend […]
Posted inMedia, Tech
The SA Blog Awards: Storm in a thimble
The “debate” about this year’s SA Blog Awards has gone from irrational to hilarious to just plain stupid. Fuelled by a tiny community of self-proclaimed experts who doubtlessly feel left out of the action, the war of words has labelled the awards as unrepresentative, elitist, exclusionist, ill-conceived and invalid. And all this over a completely […]
Posted inTech
Google sets your calendar free!
It’s been a long time since anyone thought of Google as “the good guys”. Though they have waged a war with Microsoft for everything from search to word processing, they have become more like the Redmond clan than they would ever want to admit. But, still, how can you not love them? And now they’ve […]
Posted inGeneral
The need for a new enlightenment
Enough with the pig ignorance, violence and stupidity. Enough with bowing to religious bullies and bigots, racists and sexists. And, most of all, enough limiting ourselves to the narrow confines the past has laid down. The time has come to shake all that off, like the famous workers’ chains, and rise up to the potential […]
Posted inLifestyle, Tech
Web 2.egO
I’ve been pondering, recently, the rise of narcissism as a disease of our world. Depression used to be the problem, everyone swallowing handfuls of Prozac and eating chocolate cake in their pyjamas. Now, I believe, fuelled by our inherent egomania and facilitated by (among many other things) Web 2.0 social-networking sites, a kind of global […]
Posted inGeneral
These blacks
These blacks. Sometimes I feel sorry for them. But mostly, I’m actually just tired of whites always being called racists just because we point out that things are screwed and the country is going down the toilet. We’re going to end up like Zimbabwe. And so what if Helen Zille or Tony Leon are white? […]