Posted inArtificial Intelligence
Posted inConnectivity
Technology is NOT killing the music industry
An interesting article by Fred Zindi titled “Technology killing music industry” appeared in the Herald of the 6th of December. Fred Zindi is a professor at the University of Zimbabwe. He is also a musician and an author of several books on music.
His case is based on the assertion that the ability by people to make copies of music illegally, easy and cheap access to blank CDs and CD writing equipment which was impossible when he started his career as the ultimate source.
Posted inConnectivity
Econet launches MMS
Over the weekend, Econet Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS) on trial to all its customers. The trial runs until end of December and for that period, subscribers will be able to and send free unlimited MMS messages on the network. After the trial period, a single SMS will cost US 15 cents during peak periods and a cent less off-peak. All SMS messages will have a 1 megabyte (MB) limit.
Posted inBroadband Connectivity
Utande on the reasons broadband is expensive in Zimbabwe
Local Internet access provider (IAP), Utande, published a column titled “Techno Talk” in a local weekly last week. First, we’d like to commend them for this and we hope the column is going to be a regular one. It’s not every day that an internet provider comes out to say their view of connectivity issues, so it’s quite a welcome development.
Posted inConnectivity
Zimbabwe ICT Achievers Awards winners announced
The Zimbabwe ICT Achievers Awards ceremony was held tonight at the Crowne Plaza hotel in Harare. The annual awards are in their second year. Guest of honor at the event tonight was Zimbabwe Prime Minister, Morgan Tsvangirayi.
Posted inBroadband Connectivity
Nollywood on YouTube: Nigerians and Ugandans get ‘local’ YouTube
Over the past two weeks, Google has launched it's video service, YouTube, in Nigerian and Uganda. According to the announcements on the Google Africa blog, the local versions of the world’s most popular video service will provide by default more relevant content to the two countries. YouTube in the two countries will show visitors the most viewed and most subscribed-to channels in in the country.
Posted inBroadband Connectivity
Review: The Huawei Ideos U8150 from Econet. Great value for money
We spent most of last week with three gadgets we got from Econet for review: A Huawei Ideos U8150 smartphone, an Ideos X5 Pro smartphone and an Ideos S7 Slim tablet. This review will focus on the U8150 pictured below. We’ll post separate reviews for the other two devices.
Posted inConnectivity
Press Release: Drishti and Africcs join forces to serve the CIM Industry in Zim
Drishti-Soft, a leading CIM technology innovator, and Africcs, Zimbabwe's leading customer care consultancy firm, enter into a business alliance to tap the huge contact center market of Zimbabwe and neighboring countries. With a presence in more than 15 other countries of African Continent, Drishti further strengthens its base through this partnership.
Posted inConnectivity
Fes’bhuku play: The impact of social media on Zimbabwe’s rural communities
If you’re in Harare, you love theatre, and have an interest in the impact of the internet and social media on social and political issues, here’s something you’ll not want to miss: From 7 December (Yesterday) to 17 December 2011, a play called Fes’bhuku will be showing at Theatre in the Park in Harare. The term "Fes’bhuku" is a loan translation of "Facebook" into the Shona vernacular.
Posted inConnectivity Startups
Digital music sales in Zimbabwe. Taking it to the next level
Online music stores have been on the rise globally and continue to gain momentum. Selling music files on a per-song, albums and/or subscription basis at lower prices has become a phenomenon. Online music stores such as iTunes and Amazon MP3are now the biggest music retailers in the US, selling almost 25% of all music in the US. This represents opportunities for businesses in developing ICT markets like Zimbabwe and can help revive the countries' music industries which have been on a downward spiral.
Posted inConnectivity
Firewall of China: paranoia or sovereignty shield
From ancient times, the Chinese have been characteristically paranoid about their security. Many years later, the types of attacks to fend off have mutated, but the paranoia remains; and understandably so. With cyber warfare increasingly becoming important, the People’s Liberation Army has inevitably bolstered efforts to fortify its information firewall.
Posted inConnectivity
Subscribers annoyed with “@Econet Wireless” labelled SMS messages
Starting last week, Econet has been appending the name of the company to some SMS messages sent from the network. It reads “@ Econet Wireless”. Most people we’ve talked to say they started receiving the ‘labelled' SMSes last week on Friday. But that the appended text doesn’t come with every SMS. It’s random.
Posted inBroadband
What to consider when buying a VSAT based internet service in Zimbabwe
Before fiber came to prominence in Zimbabwe this year, VSAT was how all the bandwidth in Zimbabwe was landed by Internet Access Providers’s . This was done with much larger scale equipment than I mentioned above, think the mazoe earth station if you have seen it. Satellite bandwidth is much more expensive than fiber bandwidth, because of the costs associated with launching and maintaining a satellite in space. The change from satellite bandwidth to fibre is the main reason we have seen Internet connectivity prices come down significantly.
Posted inMiscellaneous
Entrepreneur Interviews: Lovemore Mukono, co-founder of Mukonitronics (full Interview)
Recently we held an interview with Lovemore Mukono, the co-founder and CEO of Mukonitronics. Mukonitronics is one of Africa’s leading power technology companies in terms of design and manufacturing industrial power electronic products for the local and export market. The range of Mukonitronics products include power electronics for mining, power generation and transmission, electricity distribution, telecommunications, railway and industrial automation.
Posted inConnectivity
iZimbabwe logo design challenge: Graphic designers, here’s an opportunity to win $1,000
Here’s a challenge for Zim graphic designers: Between 5 December 2011 and 31 January 2012, you have the opportunity design a new logo for the iZimbabwe online portal and stand a chance to win the US$1,000 prize money. muntu Media, the company that launched iZimbabwe last month, announced the competition yesterday.
Posted inBroadband
“We are targeting at raising our subscriber base to 1 million” says TelOne
Yesterday, a Bulawayo state owned publication, the Chronicle, carried an article about the state owned fixed line operator, TelOne. According to the article, an infrastructure upgrade exercise is underway at TelOne as part of a multi-million dollar deal with Huawei International and Alcatel Lucent. The first phase will be complete this month, the article says, and when all work has been completed, TelOne will have a subscriber capacity of at least a million subscribers.
Posted inConnectivity
Altfin and NetOne launch mobile phone based medical aid service
NewsDay reports today that an Altfin Holdings subsidiary, Altfin Medical Aid Scheme, and state owned mobile operator, NetOne, have launched a new mobile phone based medical aid scheme. The scheme is called MedAccess. NetOne is the technical partner in the project. Subscribers will be able to register for the new service using their NetOne mobile phone numbers as the medical scheme’s registration numbers.
Posted inBroadband Connectivity
Some Econet mobile broadband subscriber stats. eTXT. EconetMail
Yesterday, we got the opportunity to discuss a few things about Econet Broadband with Leon de Fleuriot, the Chief Commercial Officer – Broadband at Econet Wireless Zimbabwe. We talked about the number of mobile broadband subscribers, eTXT, EconetMail and other things. We also discussed some issues Techzim readers suggested on our Facebook Page and Twitter.
Posted inConnectivity
Of social media badges and moving with the times
You've probably seen it yourself a couple of times; a company (big often) slaps a Facebook badge on its website and print adverts despite the fact that their Facebook page has no activity at all on it. Sometimes the page doesn't even exist. It’s nothing but a statement to their visitors: We’re moving with the times!
Posted inBroadband
TelOne to benefit from additional WIOCC cables
WIOCC, the special purpose vehicle that TelOne is part of, has entered a strategic partnership with Cable & Wireless Worldwide to increase the reach and reliability of the WOICC cable system. The new partnership means WIOCC is now effectively invested in two additional submarine cable systems, the Europe India Gateway (EIG) and West Africa Cable System (WACS) that C&W owns.
Posted inConnectivity
Stimulating competition in telecoms with Mobile Number Portability
Dollar for three are the buzzwords for Telecel customers, which refers to Telecel’s popular mega-juice airtime top-up card which costs $1 but offers $3 worth of value, i.e. $1 allowing off-net calls, $1 bonus for on-net calls and a $1 data bundle worth 10MB. Tariff wise, Telecel offers a $0.23 rate across all networks. Compare this to the $0.23-0.25 depending on call destination by the other mobile operators.
