I came across this post, on Marlene Paynter’s website:

Last week the web hosting service I had relied on for over 6 years disappeared suddenly, without warning taking my site and all contents with it.
The company, Lifetimehosting.com, sent a letter of apology stating that their harddrives and backups were compromised by a hacker.
So now it’s all gone.

Over the next few weeks I will be rebuilding from the ground up.
I urge everyone to do a weekly backup of their websites, blog posts, photos, etc. and not be lazy like I was, relying on a company to backup for them.

Seriously scary stuff. I don’t back up often enough, but I am definitely am now going to start making this a regular task.

Anybody know an EASY way to back up a wordpress blog?

It’s been a while since I posted anything relevant to this blog, but not because I have not been blogging! I have joined the Thought Leader blog at the Mail & Guardian, and have been busy posting there.

I need to segment my thoughts into the different blogs that I (try to) maintain, but in the meantime, anything that goes onto the M&G blog, will go here too, even if only as a summary.

Here is a list of the articles I have posted there. To read them in full, visit my Whispering Out Loud blog.

Madeleine, her mom and the media

I’ve been following the Madeleine disappearance from the start, and have been deeply touched by the story of the little girl. The latest events haven’t made me feel much better. Madeleine’s parents are now named as suspects in the case. To…

What the %^&* ?

Ever not put an emoticon into a quick SMS, Twitter, IM or email? Ever gotten one that confused the punctuation out of you? The first two emoticons were proposed by Dr Fahlman.

Are you smart enough to work for Google?

Here are some interview questions asked at Google and Microsoft. Some of these are supposed to generate a specific answer, some are asked to gauge how you estimate, analyse and approach the seemingly impossible problems. Post some of your answers…

Why corporates should force Facebook usage

Many positive and negative things have been said about the banning of Facebook access at corporate workspaces. But corporates seriously need to wake up to the fact that they are doing themselves an injustice by trying to control their employees’ on…

The man who invented the internet

I spent the better part of Monday browsing LinkedIn, and have thus read my fill of people’s CVs. It is always interesting to see how people define and describe what they do, and LinkedIn offers the full spectrum from yawn-boring, to flighty. L…

What if you and a porn star share the same name?

My name is Eve Dmochowska, and trust me, there are a lot of downsides to that name. How do you pronounce that? How do you spell it? Is it Russian? (I think I am the only one who knows the answer to all three questions) But the upside is that www.eve…

No interest in VC funding

South African entrepreneurs are obviously loaded. How else can you explain the fact that the next First Tuesday, which was meant to be a “panel discussion to determine the state of VC funding in South Africa, what funders are looking for and…

What do you do?

The Dalai Lama answers: “Nothing.” Great answer. Personally, I dread this question. First, because there is no all-encompassing answer. What I do almost depends on what day of the week it is. Second, the complexity of the answer also dep…

Talking vs Facebooking: Who’s better off?

If I hosted a dinner party for my 10 closest friends, the topics of conversations would undoubtedly include the expected ones: crime, the three Ms (Mbeki, Manto, Mugabe), the dollar, need for holidays and our kids’ lives. But here is what we wo…

For those of you who spend any time with me in the “real world”, you’ll know that my Big Dream is to open a “school for the future” in South Africa.

So when I came across this video of Ken Robinson at the last TED conference, I felt as if he was speaking directly to me. Even if you have no interest in education, I suggest you watch this video for the sheer mastery with which this man commands the stage. It seems so effortless.

From the TED website:

Sir Ken Robinson makes an entertaining (and profoundly moving) case for creating an education system that nurtures creativity, rather than undermining it. With ample anecdotes and witty asides, Robinson points out the many ways our schools fail to recognize — much less cultivate — the talents of many brilliant people. “We are educating people out of their creativity,” Robinson says.

You’ve heard of Mark Shuttleworth, you’ve heard of incuBeta. Now hear this: Gareth Ochse and Craig Corte have finally released their new baby BuzzFuse* to the market.

Created in South Africa, BuzzFuse* is a very nifty, very clever and very needed application that

• allows content creators (think music, cartoons, blogs, photographs) to spread their wares
• allows content consumers (think you and me) to discover, review and share said content.

This is how it works in its simplest version:

1. You sign up for a BuzzFuse* account (the entry one is free, the premium is $10 pmonth)
2. You create your content, say a new Wordpress theme, and post it online on you blog, website, Myspace etc
3. You register the content on your BuzzFuse account, and get a simple widget to post with the content on your website (like the one above this post)
4. Anyone who views your content can click on the widget, and get taken to your BuzzFuse page where they can:

a. Comment on your content
b. Rate it
c. Discuss it
d. Share it with their friends

5. At the end of the day, all BuzzFuse members get a personal email, which suggests new content based on their friend recommendations, rankings etc
6. You can check the interactivity around your content, the ranking and general feedback with the Reporting tools.

Wow.
I can easily picture a time, in the not too distant future, where content providers are going to be adding the BuzzFuse* widget as readily as they are adding the Digg This feature.

What that means is that we have a locally developed application with global appeal. Now we must just spread the word. If you are a content provider, I suggest you sign up and give this a go.

Have you noticed how your email box is full of messages that aren’t spam exactly, but also are not a one-to-one meaningful communication? Notifications from facebook are a good example, as are comment links for blogs I have commented on myself. As Andy Quale from Techburgh puts it: “Notifications you want. But not right now.”

Now there is a new word for them: bacn (as in bacon). Better than spam (which for those who don’t know is a yucky canned, processed pork luncheon meat).

Start setting the trend - use it in your everyday speech. As in

• “Got thirty emails this morning, and twenty of them were bacn”
• “Facebook is great, but its bacn can overwhelm your inbox”

Apparently, this term originated with Podcamp Pittsburgh.

The Dalai Lama answers “Nothing”. I love it.

Personally, I dread this question.

First of all, because there is no all-encompassing answer. What I do almost depends on what day of the week it is.

Second, the complexity of the answer also depends on who is asking it. If you are my hairdresser, the chances are you don’t really want to hear that yesterday I “helped a client recognize and act on synergies between his offline and online marketing efforts, and thus facilitated a deployment of a new project to harness the value of his market-community”.

Thirdly, because I am involved in such diverse projects, the conversation often turns awkward. If I tell someone I am in “the Internet business” and he says he is an artist, is it then necessary for me to mention that I am also hugely involved in some of the best art galleries in Pretoria?

My business card says I am an Idea Facilitator. Take that at face value, I always say. People either look confused or actually thrilled at the concept. The latter group is the one I really like ☺

The truth is, that I cannot envision myself being pigeon-holed into a limiting job description. I am, of course, lucky in that I work for myself , and thus do not really answer to a boss. I am free to be grabbed by projects that I find inspiring, challenging or simply fun.

But the best part of all this is that most people that I meet through the blogosphere and Internet in general, even if they have a specific title in the job, are not really tightly bound to specific functions. I know a copywriter who is also getting involved in community building via her company’s website. I know a web application designer who is a powerful voice in promoting the open source movement. I know a venture capitalist who opened up a chain of fashion stores on the side. We are now more free to do what drives us, which means we are more likely to be living our “optimal life”.

Theo Aspeling recently pointed me to a though-provoking article on “Being Yourself For a Living”, by Robin Wheeler. The crunch of it is that any career should be premised on three cornerstones:

1. You must do what you enjoy
2. You must make a contribution to the world
3. You must generate money

Wheeler says that if any of these three are missing, you’re not going to be fulfilled. On the other hand, if all three are present, you are living an optimal life. He goes on to offer suggestions on how to implement “being yourself” in your life, your organization and your community.

If you are reading this blog, then I venture to say that you also struggle to define what it is that you actually do (although the answer in inherently known to you).

So tell us – what DO you do? And don’t worry – we’ll understand, even if your hairdresser won’t.

I received this in my email box recently. Stinks of some sort of scam, but I cannot prove it. Some warning signs are:

1. Even if I wanted to help out, South Africa isn’t on the PayPal list either
2. The email from which this was sent is not the email to which they want you to reply
3. And the contact page of the company has been hacked!

Good day!

I m Cathryn Sneed from BelsysGroup, located in Republic of Belarus, Minsk.

Over the 10 years Belsys specializes in truck transportations across the countries of Western and Eastern Europe, Russia, and CIS through its owned and operated truck transportation units. Since 1993 the company is the member of the National Association of International Road Carriers.

We have a lot of payments every day and some clients want to pay via Paypal for our services.

We visited Paypal site and didn’t find Belarus in country list of registration form!

You can check it here: https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_registration-run

This way we can’t work with Paypal directly and need to recruit exterior co-workers.

BelsysGroup is pleased to offer you a position of Paypal Manager in our company. It’s a part-time job and we need fast reliable partner, who can help to solve this little problem with Paypal payments. You can do this job without leaving your main job. There are no any fees involved!

REQUIREMENTS:

+ Only English speaking employees!
+ Premier or Business PayPal account!
+ Ability to be on the connection during the working day (phone, email)!
+ Ability to make operations so fast, as we require!
+ Precisely follow all our instructions!
+ Western Union, Moneygram office in your city and must have little experience of work with this systems and Wire Transfers system also.
+ Possibility to visit a bank or cashing location any day of the week if needed.

More priority to candidates who have a Paypal CARD with high withdrawal limit!

SALARY

The Employee will be paid on a Commission basis, daily on the day when working operations be carried out, into Paypal or bank account nominated by the Employee. We’ll pay 5% from total value of every transactions. All additional charges (like WU, MG and other comission payments) will be paid by the Employer. You can earn up to 2000 EUR per month.

If you are interested in this offer, please, contact me for more information.
Please, send your offers and questions to e-mail: ****@gmail.com

With best regards,

Cathryn Sneed
http://www.transgroup.by

I don’t usually use an ATM to draw cash, but I had reason to do so this past Friday, and as a result, I was shell shocked.

There was one ATM, and there was a man using it ahead of me. I waited patiently for him to finish his transaction, but he simply took forever. I was getting frustrated and annoyed. I could see the red screen of “SORRY …” on the ATM machine, and concluded that the man was clueless as to how to use it.

Eventually, he turned around and asked for my help. He was a black labourer, still dressed in his blue overalls and was visibly distressed. The machine would not give him any money. After deciding that it was safe to help (how sad to even have to think about this) I put in his card, he entered his password and we proceed to try an withdraw R140. As it turned out, he only had R120 available, with an additional R50 in ‘reserve’ that the bank does not make available for withdrawal.

As a result, he was getting INSUFFICENT FUNDS error. Fair enough. BUT but but !!!!
HE WAS BEING CHARGED FOR EACH TIME THIS HAPPENED!!!!!!!!

Now, to someone who has R120 in the bank, the R2 or R3 charge is A LOT. And to someone who is incurring the charge because he doesn’t understand why he cannot access all HIS money, it seems decidedly unfair. He was devastated, and I was devastated for him. I helped him withdraw his R120, gave him the missing R20 from my wallet, and he went on his way.

But I’ve been bothered by this incident all week-end. How can the working class be encouraged to save if the banks are such bastards? I employ about 10 black workers in one of my businesses, and I have long encouraged them to allow me direct deposits into their bank accounts. They balk, and now I understand why. So the result is that they get cash each week, and it is obviously difficult (impossible?) to save.

The banks should be held accountable for this. It is not just a “good feel” factor at stake, but the financial future and potential of this country. I think it is hugely serious, it affects all sorts of other things (education, or lack thereof if there are no saved funds, etc).

And actually, it does not just affect the working class of course. Adii posted recently about his bank not giving him full access to his OWN money, unless he was willing to incur a R48 fee. And only because he is a student, with a student account. GIVE ME A BREAK!!!! SURELY a bank should be smart enough to recognize that if there is a student who has considerably more money (of his own) than the average student, that he should be treated extra well, instead of being charged for his success.

How are we going to put a stop to this tyranny? (I miss 20twenty.)

I often get asked to listen to pitches for new web companies, mostly with the idea of offering advice, suggestions or helping someone take a project to the next level. I am always eager to participate in these sessions, because it gives me a good idea of how people perceive the opportunities that the web presents, and it also often highlights the many misconceptions that people have of marketing in this space (If only 1% of all online people pay us $5, we’ll be very successful, and will offer ourselves to Google ….., you get the idea).

So I was THRILLED to be given the opportunity to hear the concept of a new local start up that has HUGE global potential. I cannot say anything about the company itself (yet), but I can already see that if the cards are played right here, we have the next “obvious” application, that will appear on web pages all over the world, coming right out of our shores. That is great news. But it is not often that local companies can easily go global, which is why when the founders of this particular start up launch, I wish them the best of luck.

Which got me thinking – how exactly do you go global? In South Africa, which really does have a small online community, if you only slightly network, you are no more than two degrees of separation from those who can propel you forward if they believe in your product. It is more difficult to launch big, quickly and cheaply if the whole world is your intended audience.

I suppose you can attend the many overseas trade shows and seminars to spread the word, but that is hardly cheap or quick. You can open yourself to outside funding, but that might be a bit premature and a bad early move. Your best bet is to depend on the very community that you can attract (local) to be networked enough globally to spread the word. And that can happen. Or you resign yourself that your launch will need to sacrifice at least one of the three “big, cheap and quick” requirements, and you come up with a very, very good hook – which, by the way, this particular company seems to have done.

The good news is that the company is soft launching in South Africa, and soon, so keep your eyes peeled. Or subscribe to this blog, where I will of course keep you updated!

Business Week feature an excellent chart that neatly sums up the state of the web wrt to the US audience.

They divide the web audience into six categories:

• Creators publish web pages, write blogs, upload videos
• Critics comment on blogs and post ratings and reviews
• Collectors use RSS to gather information
• Joiners use social networking sites
• Spectators read blogs, watch videos, listen podcasts
• Inactives are online but don’t participate in any social media

The audience is also divided into 7 age groups:

• 12 – 17 yrs
• 18 – 21
• 22 -26
• 27 -40
• 41-50
• 51-61
• 62 +

The chart then shows you what percentage of users fall into each category and each age group. For example:

34% of 12-17 yr olds in the US, who are online, are creators. 51% of them are Joiners and 34% are Inactives (obviously, these categories are not mutually exclusive, so you can belong to more than one)

On the other hand,

only 5% of the 62 yr+ age group are Creatives, and 70% of them are Inactives.

Gives you a good understanding of who is where doing what.