According to an email from Chris Anderson, the curator of the TED Conference, TEDAfrica due to be held in Cape Town at the end of September 2008 has been suspended. This news has also been posted on the TED Blog where I have already posted a comment and I encourage you to do so as well. This is a sad moment for Africa and more so for South Africa, which would have been the 2nd country to host the amazing TED Conference.

Last year I was blessed and honoured to attend TEDGlobal in Tanzania as a Blogger and Fellow. There were many, many connections and friendships established at this conference. George Ayittey described it as the most important conference about Africa at the beginning of the 21st century. And I agree wholeheartedly with him on this statement because never before has so many experts NOT politicians come together in support of Africa. There was a real sense of urgency among the speakers as the the aid vs investment debated heated up over the four days in Arusha.

Anyway why is this a setback for South Africa? We need to shift the focus from all the crap from Eskom, crime, Jakob Zuma, Zimbabwe and more. TEDAfrica in Cape Town would have been a dream come true for me because it represent an affirmation in our country and continent’s direction. The momentum built with the launch of the Next Einstein event in Cape Town, is a testament to the African’s ability to cope under the most severe circumstances. The students from the AIMS 2008 graduation represent the hope for future generations. So I held my breath when I first heard of the TEDAfrica announcement. But now we need to stand together more than ever before. The people on the TEDGlobal group on Facebook and members of the TED discussion group on Google need to find ways of following up and following through with promises made in Tanzania.

Remember we are the Cheetah’s and not the Hippo’s! Cheetah’s do not ask for permission from government to create value and opportunities for others. We are entrepreneurs and we stand on our own feet and make our own decisions. My dream would be that we can finally launch the annual African Bloggers Conference and an bi-annual TEDAfrica, maybe hosting the first one again, as originally planned in Cape Town in September 2009. In the mean time spread the word about TED Talks.

Popularity: 1% [?]

After many, many requests the next date for the 2008 Internet Cafe workshop has been set. Please note I only do ONE workshop every 6 months like this. The next one will be in Cape Town in November.

Now I am proud to announce I have an excellent business trainer with me, Yusuf Mahomedy, who regularly writes for The Star Workplace and HR Future on employment and jobs. He will teach all the basics of moving from employment to self-employed and running a business that employs people. While I will focus on the Internet business strategies, computer hardware and networking equipment and software for time management and billing your Internet time. There is going to be an interactive Q&A section so write out all your questions before hand and we will answer them in detail. Also bring along any documentation like business plans or application forms for government funding.

What is this training worth to you? A 4-hour half-day workshops covering:

• Small business basics
• Bookkeeping, Tax, UIF, hiring employees
• Government funding vs loans
• Internet Cafe set-up (hardware/software)
• Direct marketing strategies with flyer’s, SMS, etc
• Ongoing training for you and your staff
• Billing & Time management system to sell airtime
• VOIP set-up and packages
• Additional revenue streams
• Business plan basics
• Q&A about your situation, your location

You can save hundreds of hours of research because I have done that already for you. You will receive my recommendations on all equipment and what Internet connections to use because I have evaluated  most of the options for the best price/performance ratios. Translated this could save you thousands of Rands, which can be better spent on your own training and marketing. You can get going quicker, and have more confidence of the success of your new small business venture: An Internet Cafe or to help you have more freedom, more cash flow and create jobs while uplifting your communities computer literacy and giving them access the world through email, VOIP and the Web.

Trainers:

• Ramon Thomas BSc PDIM PMCSSA
• Yusuf Mahomedy CA(SA)

Date: Saturday, 31 May 2008
Venue: Sandton Library (on Nelson Mandela Square)
Time: 9am-1pm (4 hours)
Cost: R300 per person or R500 for 2 people

RSVP: SMS 0829407137 with your # of people and your full contact details.

You will receive a CD with audio, video resources on strategic planning, business building, marketing and sales. It also contains a  sample Internet Cafe business plan. And  1-hour consultation (value R750) with me to discuss your needs in private. This may have to be done telephonically (at your cost) as I travel frequently across South Africa on lectures and talks.

Popularity: 4% [?]

It’s been a while since I reported on the growth of MXit. And I finally found a confirmation of the current numbers from this Moneyweb article. The worldwide growth has now reached 7.5 million users with 6.5 million in South Africa. And that means 1 million international users. This is 43 million off from their stated goal of 50 million users by the end of 2008. However, their new general manager, Paul Stemmet, believes they have cracked the code of what works with its teenage users.

What is really surprising is that 60% of MXit users are now aged 18-25 years old. Not long ago (1 year) this segment accounted for 30% of MXit users, while 12-18 year olds accounted for 33% of total users. So there is now a marked shift to older users. And this demographic overlaps much more with Facebook users demographic. However, it should be noted Facebook still has less than 1 million users in South Africa.

Anyway so what does this mean for parents? Well the obvious things to note is that MXit is continuing to grow at a healthy rate, easily between 10,000 to 15,000 users per day. So even with 10,000 new users per day MXit will be touching the 10 million mark by December. You know it is a given that cellphone usage, SMS messages and MXit usage spikes over the holidays as society embraces the Christmas spirit. So its a given that MXit will crack that magical number. And once they reach the double digits I believe that will open the flood gates even further for adoption.

I have said in the past that Vodacom’s The Grid and MTN’s NokNok are poor imitations, even though I have not used either. It’s simply this fact - they launched long after MXit became the de-facto chat application used by the masses. And they are simply playing catch-up with a smaller, leaner and meaner company.

However, MXit has long planned a clothing line, which goes against all the best branding strategies I have learned from Al and Laura Ries. The clothing line is what’s called a line extension and is bound to be popular initially and later on die down. This is a distraction from the core focus of the company. And if they do not partner with a specialist on this project it is doomed before they print the first t-shirt.

Parent’s and teachers need to pay careful attention to the growth of MXit users because it means that the likelihood for cyber bullying, abuse and addiction grows. The best way to combat this is through setting boundaries at home, offering guidelines to children and working with teachers and their schools to reinforce good online etiquette from the earliest ages when they first are given cellphones. The biggest elements missing in school computer curriculum’s is a combination of online safety and online etiquette.

Popularity: 10% [?]

27Dinner for the uninitiated are meetings arranged by and for bloggers or people interested in social media. They take the form of an informal dinner with a few speakers and have been a hit across South Africa. In Johannesburg and Cape Town these dinners have drawn sometimes as many as 100 people at a time. At least half the audience tends to be geeks or technically oriented people, while the others are a mixture of marketing, public relations, journalists or spectators. Last year I had the opportunity to speak at the 2nd 27Dinner in Durban, hosted by Marc Forrest and was excited once more to be a speaker because it’s may way of giving back to the community from which I have learned so much.

Now I’d like to give this some context because Port Elizabeth is often ignored by people running events, whether they be entertainment (music) or business related events. And I have taken it upon myself to find ways of bringing more important events like 27Dinner or Women4Women to this beautiful part of South Africa. After all I will be spending more time here from June 2008 while I take a mini sabbatical. The biggest thanks has to go to Alan Straton from MyPE for organising the venue, and doubly so for persuading the restaurant to open on a public holiday (27 April - Freedom Day). Greig Timkoe, my friend, and client did the introduction and delivered very short talk on handling workplace conflict created by email. This is a topic of tremendous importance that I would like to see expanded on in future talks or articles on his Peacemakers blogs.

The first speaker for the evening was Mark Bloomfield, South Africa’s only Adobe Community Expert. He gave an overview of the Adobe AIR platform which I have used to run the StomperNet Scrutinizer. The AIR platform sounds like a good idea in principle, especially if you are technically minded and understand things like bandwidth, processing power, database calls, etc. Most people don’t, not even people working in the broader technology sector. And therefore this has a limited market potential. Java is similar because it’s platform independent, however it’s different because it’s become more of a middleware application. Adobe AIR created beautiful application which run on your Desktop and reduced the dependence on bandwidth to some extent. Mark closed off with an introduction of a new development platform from Adobe who already owns Dreamweaver and Photoshop. There’s not much I can say about this software because it has not been launched yet. Now to go by the quality of Adobe’s other project this will be a boon for developers professional and amateur alike.My own presentation was an updated version of my Blog your way to becoming and Expert presentation.

Overall this was a smaller event with maybe 20 people attending. There were several who listed their names on the 27Dinner wiki page but didn’t show and that could be because of the week ahead filled with 3 public holidays and I know for a fact many people have chosen to go on holiday somewhere else.

Popularity: 14% [?]

Dan Sullivan, founder of the Strategic Coach has published an updated version of his classic, The “Scary Times” Success Manual: Transforming anxiety about the future into strategic growth, progress and achievement. These strategies seem like common sense but you rarely consider or contemplate them. And once you become conscious of them you know them to be the highest and best approach to dealing with uncertainty in the world.

There is so many distraction in the world you may be confused about what to focus on. And this list gives a solid foundation on which you can grow, slowly but surely, in the best of times or the worst of times. A great philosopher once said only human beings can know something to be rational and right choice to make and yet do the exactly opposite. As I have been saying it’s not about right or wrong; instead it’s about the highest and best approach.

Here’s a summary of the 10 strategies:

1. Forget about yourself, focus on others.
2. Forget about your commodity, focus on your relationships.
3. Forget about the sale, focus on creating value.
4. Forget about your losses, focus on your opportunities.
5. Forget about your difficulties, focus on your progress.
6. Forget about the “future”, focus on today.
7. Forget about who you are, focus on who you can be.
8. Forget about events, focus on your response.
9. Forget about what’s missing, focus on what’s available.
10. Forget about your complaints, focus on your gratitude.

You can also download and listen to an audio presentation of the Scary Times success manual here. And you can read the full list of strategies here.

Popularity: 17% [?]