April 30, 2006
Posted on April 30, 2006 11:28 PM under:
Memories
I think that my upbringing, plus the fact that I grew up in Zimbabwe and also my getting to travel a lot, meeting different people and having friends from all races and nationalities, makes me one of the people who are the farthest from racism as possible. I'm not just one of those people who go on about how they're not racist but then say that it's impossible for them to marry someone from this race or that, or who feel somehow superior to people from a certain nationality or race, and that list of contradictions goes on... No, I'm...
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April 29, 2006
Microsoft will be releasing a lower-priced version of their Windows XP operating system for Africa, this July. The system will work on cheaper machines and is designed for entry-level PC users in Africa. It will also have Africa-themed screensavers and background wallpaper among its features. This is something I've been convinced software companies like Microsoft should've done a long time ago. Having one price for software worldwide is stupid, because what a person in a poor "third world" country can afford to pay for a piece of software is nowhere near what someone in the US or Western Europe can...
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April 28, 2006
So Google have added "English to Arabic" and "Arabic to English" translation to their Language Tools page. It's still in beta of course, although alpha is a bit more like it. The results are quite amusing, if not straight out funny, but then again, nobody ever said Arabic was an easy and simple language. I'm sure it'll get better with time, faster than Chinese at least. It's really good to see Google venturing into Arabic though. Hopefully the next step will be an Arabic Google News. After all there are more Arabic speakers in this world than Hebrew speakers, and...
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The other day, I read this article about how video games are poised to become big businesses for advertisers, as more and more companies pay real money for virtual ads posted in the cyber-worlds created by gaming companies. According to one of Yankee Group's latest reports, it seems that advertisers are finding greater value and return on investment from in-game advertising. The report estimated that advertisers spent approximately $56m placing ads in video games in 2005, up from $34m in 2004, and that the market shows no signs of slowing. I've already seen a bunch of games that show in-game...
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So, you're Nintendo, a game console company that is betting everything on its new game console. You're third in the world game console market, and you want to win some market share against the heavyweight champion, Sony's Playstation, and the wannabe champion Microsoft's Xbox. You came up with a cool name for your console, Nintendo Revolution, and you got people pretty hyped about it and waiting to see what it turns out like. And then what do you do in your marketing moment of genius? You scrap the cool name that everyone has gotten used to and you replace it...
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April 27, 2006
A blogospheric friend asked me, as a little favor, to post about this event that's taking place in Jordan; and as it's for a good deed, I could do nothing but help. The first charity rock festival is taking place in Amman (Jordan) next Friday, May 5th. It will be at the Haya Cultural Center, in Shmeisani of course. The open-air concert will be featuring the live local rock bands Atmosphere, Euphoria, Symphovainia and Farhan's Band playing originals as well as covers of songs by Metallica, Megadeth, Lacuna Coil, System of a Down and more. All the proceeds from the...
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April 26, 2006
Pascha, a Cologne brothel touting for clients with a World Cup-themed banner, has blacked out the flags of Iran and Saudi Arabia after alleged threats from Muslims. The giant banner on a high-rise building shows a semi-naked woman and the flags of the 32 countries in the World Cup, which kicks off in June. The slogan on the ad reads: "The world is a guest of female friends" - a variant of the official World Cup slogan: "The world is a guest of friends". The Tunisian flag - bearing the Muslim crescent symbol and a star marking the five pillars...
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A group of Firefox advocates from Massachusetts is offering website publishers and bloggers $1 for each Internet Explorer visitor to their sites they can convince to switch to the Mozilla Firefox browser. This comes after Google's recent $1 referral payout for people who install Firefox with the Google toolbar. The four anti-Microsoft activists from Massachusetts have developed a series of free scripts that website owners can add to their sites that will detect whether visitors are running Internet Eplorer. Depending on the script, the website will either show a splash page telling them to switch to Firefox or it will...
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April 24, 2006
I just read an article on NewScientist about how Malaysia's National Space Agency is trying to determine how its astronaut candidates will practice Islam in space. Three of its four astronaut candidates are Muslim, and two will be selected for a future Russian space flight. Once in their orbiting spacecraft, they will circle the Earth once every 90 minutes. Traditionally, Muslims pray five times per day, at times connected to the position of the Sun in the sky. This will make prayer observance a challenge if they accept a "day" as being just 90 minutes long. Additionally, Muslims turn toward...
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Posted on April 24, 2006 10:33 AM under:
Tunisia
Yesterday we had our 13th Tunisian blogger meetup in Zaghouan. All fears that this meetup would be a failure because there was one a week before disappeared when we found that we were 18 people gathered in the meeting spot in downtown Tunis. We drove to a café/restaurant at the foot of the Zaghouan mountains, right next to the historical temple of waters. Zaghouan is one of the main sources of mineral water in the country, and cold water was taken from there to Carthage by aqueduct in the roman era. The place was really nice. We set up four...
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April 22, 2006
So Angelina Jolie is buying her own country to help impoverished Africans. The 'Tomb Raider' star, who is currently pregnant with boyfriend Brad Pitt's child, is buying a man-made version of Ethiopia, located in Dubai's The World project. The project consists of 300 country-shaped luxury island developments built, to form a map of the world, being sold to anyone rich enough to afford them. The 30-year-old actress, who is due to give birth early in May, is reportedly planning to turn her new purchase into a fair-trade paradise for hundreds of Africans. It seems Angelina has been obsessed with Ethiopia...
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I've added a new option to the blog for people who don't use feed readers and would rather have a little digest sent to them by email with the latest entries that I've put up here. The service is powered by FeedBurner and will send a daily email with my newest entries. The email addresses are kept private, and I personally promise that I won't use them for any other reason. To subscribe to this service, you can use the following form, or the one on the blog's right sidebar. Enter your email address here to get a little digest...
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Posted on April 22, 2006 10:48 PM under:
Music
Neil Young's newly recorded protest album "Living With War," including a song calling for the impeachment of President Bush, will be posted for free Internet streaming next week. Starting April 28, fans can log onto Neil Young's Web site, and listen to the 10-track collection in its entirety, free of charge. The Canadian-born Young, 60, who has tackled social and political themes through four decades as a singer-songwriter, wrote and recorded his latest studio offering over a two-week period this month, backed by a 100-member choir. Much of the album conveys a sense of outrage, vowing repeatedly in the title...
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April 21, 2006
I've finally gotten around to putting some of the photos I took in Paris online, and I thought I'd post the link here for you guys to see: My Paris photos. I should be adding more soon, so stay tuned......
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April 20, 2006
Shit, it turns out I'm evil!!! I just took the Machiavelli Personality Test on Salon. The results say: Your Machiavelli score is: 78 You are a high Mach, you endorse Machiavelli's opinions. High Machs constitute a distinct type: charming, confident and glib, but also arrogant, calculating and cynical, prone to manipulate and exploit. (Think Rupert Murdoch, or if your politics permit it, President Clinton.) But come on, I'm not like that, I'm not an arrogant, manipulative, exploiting person, in fact I'm the complete opposite. Is this my multiple personality thingie kicking in again? Nah, it's most probably just a crappy...
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April 19, 2006
Posted on April 19, 2006 11:41 PM under:
Music
Michael Jackson has returned to the studio and plans to release a new album next year for a record label owned by the son of Bahrain's king. 2 Seas Records, which is owned by Sheikh Abdullah bin Hamad Al Khalifa, said Tuesday it had signed an exclusive recording agreement with Jackson, and the new album was tentatively scheduled for release in late 2007. The label, which is due to release Jackson's long-promised Hurricane Katrina benefit single, "I Have This Dream", said British music executive Guy Holmes had been named chief executive of the company. It said Holmes would oversee the...
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Ok, this might be one of those posts that leave you thinking "Why the hell am I even wasting my time reading this?!", but well you're here and you might as well read it anyway. Well, the whole thing is that I think Asterix & Obelix cartoons are very unfair. I've felt this way ever since I was a child, and everytime I read one of the new books, I get pissed off again. I was introduced to Asterix & Obelix by my very cool uncle, who is a big fan and used to collect all their comic books. They...
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Posted on April 19, 2006 12:12 PM under:
Tunisia
In my post about the last blogger meetup, I hinted that the long talked of Zaghouan blogger meetup would be following shortly. Well guess what, it's this upcoming Sunday; organized by our friend Karim. The program is as follows: - Meeting at 1PM in front of the Municipality on Carthage Avenue. - Drive to Zaghouan. - Lunch - Picnic in the mountains of Zaghouan As not everyone has a car, we'll all be meeting together so that we can split ourselves between the available cars and then go together. Please try to confirm your attendance by leaving a comment here,...
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A Canadian man who set out to trade a paper clip to get a house says he is coming close to achieving his dream. After a year of swapping items on the internet, Kyle MacDonald, 26, has been offered a year in a house in Phoenix, Arizona, rent-free. Mr MacDonald, who lives in Montreal, initially exchanged his paper clip for a fish-shaped pen. A series of trades ensued till the latest deal to exchange the Phoenix house for a music contract. He says that he's going to keep trading for bigger or better things until he gets a house of...
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April 18, 2006
Posted on April 18, 2006 03:40 PM under:
Tunisia
As some of you already know, for the past months I've been covering the Tunisian blogosphere on Global Voices Online. Global Voices Online is a non-profit global citizens’ media project, sponsored by and launched from the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at the Harvard Law School. And recently an alliance between Global Voices Online and global media company, Reuters, was announced. A growing number of bloggers around the world are part of this project as “bridge bloggers:” people who are talking about their country or region to a global audience; making Global Voices a guide to the most interesting...
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April 17, 2006
Posted on April 17, 2006 08:39 PM under:
Tunisia
One of the things a lot of people I know have been shocked by when they came to Tunisia is the inexistence of any international fast food chains. Yep, no McDonald's, no Burger King, no KFC, no Domino's, no Popeye's, nothing. Even the couple of Pizza Huts we had here, which I'm not sure had the rights to the trademark, have been shut down. Ok, I know, a lot of people think good riddance! And that we're better off without those fast food chains for many reasons, starting with health on to other anti-globalization ideas. But, let's start by exploring...
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April 16, 2006
Posted on April 16, 2006 08:28 PM under:
Tunisia
Emirati company Emaar Properties PJSC yesterday announced its plans to develop the $1.88 billion Marina Al Qussor project on Tunisia's eastern coastline.The 442 hectare Marina development is located within the governorate of Sousse towards the southern end of the Gulf of Hammamet and will offer a mix of living options and tourist attractions with a large Marina Village at its centre. Emaar Chairman Mohamed Ali Alabbar presented the high profile project to the Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali yesterday. The various components of Marina Al Qussor range from over 4,000 residential units with villas, townhouses and apartments located...
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April 15, 2006
"I am not a psychologist, but I think that everyone who lives with the contradictions of Zionism condemns himself to protracted madness. It's impossible to live like this. It's impossible to live with such a tremendous wrong. It's impossible to live with such conflicting moral criteria. When I see not only the settlements and the occupation and the suppression, but now also the insane wall that the Israelis are trying to hide behind, I have to conclude that there is something very deep here in our attitude to the indigenous people of this land that drives us out of our...
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Posted on April 15, 2006 10:42 PM under:
Tunisia
We got back from the 12th Tunisian blogger meetup a while ago, and what a meetup it was. This meetup marks a year since we've been holding blogger meetups in Tunisia, and what a long way we've come ever since that first meetup that I organized, not knowing what to expect, and never dreaming that it would become such an anticipated monthly event, with different people eager to get involved with the organization every time. When I look back on it all, it makes me so proud and so happy that I took that initial step. Today's meetup broke the...
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A New York man got two charges after a car chase with cops; He thought he could outrun police because he did it in the video game Grand Theft Auto. Tyrone McMillan was taken into custody last year after leading police on a car chase when officers attempted to pull him over for a parole violation. After slamming into two cars, McMillan told police that he thought he could outrun them because he played games from Rockstar's controversial Grand Theft Auto franchise. McMillan, in his 30s, apparently thought that his gaming skills translated to the real world. His experience navigating...
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Yet another new way to propose for marriage... Really cool one too... Via a satellite shot on Google Earth... [Link: Google Earth]...
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April 13, 2006
Posted on April 13, 2006 07:18 PM under:
Tunisia
So it turns out that Tunis is ranked 94th in the world wide index for quality of life. That's down one spot from last year, although it's index score is the same at 82.2. It seems someone jumped a spot ahead of us or something. The two leading cities in the quality of life index are Zurich and Geneva in Switzerland. The only Arab cities ahead of Tunis are Dubai at the 85th place and Abu Dhabi at the 92nd. The lowest ranking city is Baghdad at the 215th spot. The analysis is part of Mercer's annual World-wide Quality of...
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Posted on April 13, 2006 06:57 PM under:
Tunisia
So there will be a Tunisian blogger meetup this upcoming Saturday. This will be our 12th meetup in Tunisia, marking a year of great fun meetups. This one is organized by Skydancer who is a Tunisian blogger living in France and who will be visiting Tunisia in this period. So, the details are as follows: Saturday, April 15th, at 16:00 in Biwa (Les Berges du Lac). I know it's a bit on short notice, but please do your best to be there. We're expecting some new faces in this meetup, and it should be a lot of fun as usual....
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After several months of development and a bunch of rumours and screenshots being leaked, Google has finally released their new service Google Calendar. Like most Google services, the Google Calendar has a nice, clean, uncluttered, straightforward interface. A small "mini-calendar" on the left side of the screen shows the current month, and a larger view to the right shows either the current day, week or month view, the "next 4 days," or an "agenda," which is a linear list of all of your scheduled events. A cool feature for Gmail users will recognize events in mail messages and give you...
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April 12, 2006
Muhammad Ali, one of the world's most recognized people, has sold 80 percent of the marketing rights to his name and likeness to a firm for $50 million. The 64-year-old former heavyweight champion, who suffers from Parkinson's disease, will retain a 20 percent interest in the business. The new venture will be operated by a company called G.O.A.T. LLC, an acronym for "The Greatest of All Time." Wow... Ok, it's decided, I'm selling marketing rights to my name, likeness and whatever else you want. It all goes to the highest bidder. Let the war begin :P Oh whatever... [Source: Yahoo...
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April 11, 2006
Posted on April 11, 2006 10:04 AM under:
Memories
I remember when I was a little kid, I had this big fear of dogs, especially ones that liked to bark a lot when running up to you, no matter how small they were. It scared the hell out of me, I'd panic and run away at the sight of a dog. My mom used to tell me that dogs smell fear and that I had to try and act all cool about it so they wouldn't bother me. But being a kid, that was all blah blah to me, how was I supposed to keep myself together while a...
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April 10, 2006
"It's not acceptable to punish the Palestinian people. We cannot say to the Palestinians: 'it's good being democratic and at the same time we punish you'. The EU must find a mechanism to get aid to the people..." Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority After the US, the European Union moves to stop payments to the Hamas-led government in Palestine. So, yeah, it's good to be democratic as long as you choose who they want you to choose. Simple. [Source: The Guardian] [More: EU observer] [Via: Je Blog]...
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A few of days ago, on my way home, I bought a couple of new games for my PlayStation 2, one of which was The Godfather by Electronic Arts. I've basically been playing the game ever since I popped it into the console. It's so good, I went to bed yesterday thinking of what I'd do in it today when I get back from work. The game is closely tied to the story of The Godfather, and even has bits from the film that you unlock while playing. It puts you into the action of the legendary films, letting you...
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Posted on April 10, 2006 12:23 PM under:
Music
So, for the first time in the history of the Arab Star Academy show, someone who really deserves the title has won; Joseph Attia from Lebanon won the title last Friday night. The three finalists, competing for the title, were: Hana Idrissi from Morocco, Hani Hussein from Egypt and Joseph Attia from Lebanon. The guest stars for the final prime were: Wael Kfoury and the one and only Tina Arena. Tina was awesome as usual, as always better live than on tape, which is something we can't say for that many singers in the world. I felt that the show...
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April 06, 2006
Ever since Apple machines started using intel processors, hackers have been working away to try and get Windows running on them. They did get to do that eventually. But well it seems they didn't really have to go through the whole fuss; Apple has launched a new piece of software called Boot Camp, which will allow people to dual boot Windows XP and OSX on their intel based Macs. The software even includes Mac specific drivers for networking, graphics, audio, Airport wireless, and bluetooth (amongst other things). Apple stock rose 8% to the news, and everyone is all excited...
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PayPal has launched a new service called PayPal Mobile allowing purchases via cell phone text message. From now on, consumers can look for its "Text 2 Buy" logo in magazines and newspapers or on TV, billboards, posters or Web sites. When they see the logo, they then key a product code into their cell phones. The service will also allow people to send money to each other through text messages. I've been hearing about how PayPal and others, like Google and its supposedly upcoming PayPal killer, have been working on this feature, and I think it's a natural and practical...
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The second edition of Jazz à Carthage by Tunisiana will be held from April 12th to 22nd. This is one of the few occasions, other than the Tabarka Jazz Festival, for Tunisian fans of Jazz music to enjoy performances by some of the best performers on the world scene. The first edition last year was a big success, and the organizers are hoping this year's event will be even bigger and better. The program will be as follows: Wednesday 12 april "We Remember Clifford" Tribute to Clifford Brown feat. Benny Golson (saxophone), Randy Brecker (trompette), Eddie Henderson (trompette), Mike LeDonne...
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April 05, 2006
Posted on April 5, 2006 09:21 PM under:
Link Dump
Top Ten Coolest Laptop Cases Some of the coolest cases to carry your laptop around in. (tags: laptop cases design cool notebook case) Origami Art Really cool origami art by Robert J. Lang. Animals, insects, dinosaurs, mollusks and more... (tags: origami art) iTunes Catalog A tool to catalog and publish your music collection online for visitors to browse just as if they were using iTunes or an iPod. (tags: itunes software music web tools) Galbadia Hotel - A Video Game Music & Media Resource Archives of video game music, anime music, sheet music, midis, and even commercials. (tags: music...
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Posted on April 5, 2006 07:00 PM under:
Cinema
One of the movies I got to see in Paris was Memoirs Of A Geisha, a movie I've been wanting to see ever since its release and even more after reading the book. Anyway, even though the movie was a good one, I was a bit dissapointed. Maybe the book is just too good for its magic to be caught on film. I don't know, but it just didn't match the way I saw it all in my head while reading the book. One thing I'm sure of though is that the movie didn't develop the characters well enough,...
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Posted on April 5, 2006 12:41 PM under:
Cinema
I just came across this following plot for the next Spider-Man movie on imdb. Third film in the highly successful "Spider-Man" series sees several new villains and a new woman enter Peter Parker's life. With his secret now revealed to both Mary Jane and Harry, Peter must face the consequences of his actions and his new life together with Mary Jane as they finally form a relationship. Yet their newfound open display of love has yielded some unfortunate results, not the least of which is Peter's upset boss determined to make his life hell for causing his son emotional distress....
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Walt Disney Co. will announce a phone service designed for 10- to 15-year-olds and their parents, dubbed Disney Mobile, at the CTIA Wireless trade show. The features of this service are mostly about letting parents monitor and control how their children use the service, and the main ideas are: - A parent is the designated "family manager," able to set monthly spending limits (via the phone or a computer) on kids' voice and text message usage and on ringtone and other downloads. The manager is alerted when a kid bumps the limits and can raise them. When kids exhaust their...
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April 04, 2006
Posted on April 4, 2006 06:50 PM under:
Books
Today in the lunch break, I finished reading Angels & Demons by Dan Brown. For people who have already read The Da Vinci Code, this book by the same author isn't really that different. In fact, the structure of both stories and how they are told is pretty much identical. So, if you liked one of them, it's sure you'll like the other. This book has a bit more suspense and more twists in it, which I found really cool. In The Da Vinci Code, I was able to guess who the bad guy was pretty early in the...
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Posted on April 4, 2006 01:02 PM under:
Cinema
Empire Online have released a list of the Top 50 Greatest Independent Films. Among the listed movies, here are the ones I've already seen: - Reservoir Dogs (Tarantino's first, real cool) - Donnie Darko (Huh? What was that about? Certainly your first reaction.) - The Terminator ("I'll be back"... Well you shouldn't have come back for the 3rd.) - The Usual Suspects (Great great movie. Love it.) - Memento (Really cool movie. I truly like.) - The Evil Dead (Saw this when I was a kid, scared the shit out of me.) - Lost in Translation (Sofia Coppola's second, really...
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