I, like many, have been following the Oscar Pistorius saga on Twitter. The plethora of tweets on one topic is something that I have not seen before. Almost everyone seems to have an opinion, a view on what happened and how it went down, and some, maybe even most, have a verdict. Yesterday Pistorius was […]
social media
Posted inNews/Politics
Disgrace
By now much has been written about the tragic tale of Oscar Pistorius. I don’t feel that I can contribute directly to this debate. Until such time as the courts have done their work, we must all reserve judgement. I will say though that I feel that not one but two young people have lost […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Prejudice, racism and entertainment
“South Africans here in New Zealand have a reputation for being aggressive — especially the Afrikaners,” groaned Mark, a fellow English-speaking South African, over a beer. “Why Afrikaners?” I asked. He shrugged his shoulders. “They arrive here with a huge chip on their shoulder, walk into our workshop demanding a WOF for their car and […]
Posted inLifestyle
Why is 50 Shades selling?
Like Prof Ron Nicolson, writing last week in ‘Maritzburg’s daily The Witness, I’m hesitant to criticise a book I’ve never (and have no urge to) read. But why has EL James’s 50 Shades of Grey caused pandemonium? Why is it selling so much, asks Nicolson and many others? Forty million copies later, the book’s stirred […]
Posted inLifestyle, Tech
Twitter won’t give you Aids but…
Twitter is not the healthiest of habits. It sucks hours. It sucks days. It requires dedication. It requires long stretches of inactivity. It makes you lie to yourself. It makes you tell yourself that you are learning something by continuously refreshing your feed to read the latest article or tweet from such and such opinion […]
Posted inMedia, News/Politics
The ANC’s bullying will fail to quash freedom
There has been much gnashing of teeth at the decision made by the editor of City Press, Ferial Haffajee, to remove a photo of Bretty Murray’s The Spear from the newspaper’s website. When it comes to the media, the ANC has brought all its indignant rage down on one publication – it has been useful […]
Posted inGeneral, Lifestyle
The rise of the slacktivist
We’re all guilty of it. Some more than others, but nonetheless, we’re all culpable. Log on to Facebook or Twitter, hit the “like” or “favourite” button and, for a fleeting moment, we feel like we’re somehow making a tangible difference in the world. But surely it’s slightly more complicated than that? In 1970, poet Gil […]
Posted inMedia
What does LinkedIn have to do with nude yoga?
More than you’d expect, actually. I’ll state this right upfront: I love to hate the world’s largest business social network. The random, irrelevant contact requests from so-called “friends”. The dull, tiresomely self-promoting discussion topics. Half the people on it haven’t updated their profiles since the Rinderpest. Oh yes, and then there’s the fact that after […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Africa = Social + media + revolution
By Rick de Kock In the space of barely a year, our continent has injected a unique African meaning into the phrase “social media revolution”. Only in Africa has tangible meaning been attached to each of those words in such dramatic ways. In addition to social and political revolutions, Africa’s tremendous economic progress in recent […]
Posted inNews/Politics
The secrecy Bill: Why wearing black matters
Sanef, the National Press Club and the Right2Know campaign have issued a call to wear black on what has been dubbed Black Tuesday: when Parliament votes on the Protection of Information Bill. It’s a cause that has resonated with many, and there’s been plenty of discussion on social media platforms; #POIB and #SecrecyBill are top […]