SA Rocks

I have just completed the SA Blogosphere Census called SPEAK UP! presented by 24.com, Afrigator and Amatomu.

Interesting concept this census is. I was asked for my input before the census went live. I think that there are some interesting questions that are sure to yield some VERY interesting results at the end of it all.

There are some questions that worry me and I am sure will worry others such as the finances, users, pageviews and that sort of information. I was reluctant to give away some of the information but at the end of the day, I’m not pulling in a million people a day on the site and everyone knows it, so who cares!?

So, do yourself and the rest of us a favour and let’s end the debate about blogs, how many, how big, how much etc etc, head over to the PushPlay sponsored SPEAK UP! census and get started now!

I’d like to also suggest that you blog about the census and tag people who you think should take the census and blog about it too!

So I am tagging Mike, Matt, Tertia, Cherryflava, Charl and Chris.

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I would like to draw your attention to the fact that it’s Nelson Mandela’s month of celebration. Let’s be honest, a man like Madiba can’t merely have a single day to celebrate his 90th birthday.

He held a 46664 concert in London, a friend of mine sat next to him on the plane back from that wearing shorts and a t-shirt and Mandela still spoke to him for a while. That’s incredible.

And now it seems as though the trend online is to create special reports, dedicated pages or homages to the man himself.

I have picked my favourite two and suggest that you visit them.

First off the gentlemen from Zoopy have once again impressed me with their incredible design touch and depth of content. Their Madiba page leaves little to the imagination, everything you could possibly want in multimedia content is there for your to see.

Their dedicated page is filled with pictures, video, photos and you are able to leave your comment to Mandela on the page. I suggest you do that! If you have a Zoopy profile and have content of Mandela that you would like to share be sure to tag the content with “madiba90″ and it will pull through to the page. If you don’t have a Zoopy account, get one.

Next is the News24 Mandela page.

This page screams of class, sophistication and honour. The perfect way to dedicate a page to Nelson Mandela.

Their content is much more historical and educational. You can read/listen to speeches from Madiba, you can view a timeline of his life, watch video, see photos and view soundslides of his past. All in all a fantastic tribute to Mandela on his 90th Birthday.

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It’s not a secret anymore that 24.com has bought out a controlling stake in Blueworld Communities (BWC).

Why am I blogging this in Product Week? Simple. A product was born, developed, promoted and bought out.

This is a milestone for online media, business and startups in SA. It has set a president and has proven that the “average joe” can make it if they are exceptional. Mybroadband broke the story (sneaky sneaky):

24.com recently acquired a controlling stake in Blueworld Communities, a social media company founded by Bradley Voges, Brendt Brooks and Charl Norman which focuses on building and maintaining web technologies such as social networks.

Blueworld Communities owns and runs the websites Blueworld, Zoopedup and Gaypeers and generally targets a younger audience through its social media platforms.

24.com CEO Russel Hanley says that the acquisition gives the company access to both Blueworld’s established online community and their social networking technology.

People touted Facebook as THE social network and it almost is, almost. But the BWC buyout proves that there is definitely a need for niche products. This is where things can happen. You would be stupid and naive to think that you can outdo Facebook, MySpace, Google or Youtube at what they do. You can’t and wont. But you can get a piece of the pie. You can stake your claim in a niche within the markets that exist and this is what BWC has done. Their niche is clear, present and in demand, clearly.

So what’s the point? The point is that the possibilites are endles, that success is atainable and that drive is essential. I have it on good authority that one of the BWC founders, Mr Charl Norman, doesn’t sleep much but works plenty. Dedication is essential and the pursuit of online success is real and present.

This week I have focused on inventions, products, interviews, consumerism, principals and businesses. They all interact with one another, they all co-depend on one another and they are all ingredients to a successful product and a successful brand.

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