Mandy de Waal's Blog

Brand alert!

What do Ludicras, Pink, Kid Rock, Kanye West, LFO, Weezer, Nelly, Mariah Carey, Black Eyed Peas and Puff Daddy have in common?

If you give them enough of the green stuff they’ll include your brand in their next hit song. That's the news from Wired who shows how artists are approached by agencies to include brand placements in their songs. And if you check out the opening flash sequence for The Kluger Agency there's a couple of product placement jingles that will sound mighty familiar. You can even read an approach the agency made whilst looking for lucre in return for product placement in a star's lyrics.

The Kluger Agency calls it "brand dropping". Nauseating, isn't it?

Even more so when you realise that this isn't a new trend, just that there are now brand agencies that service this market.

Did Sharemax silence Deon Basson?

There's a great tribute to Deon Basson by top financial journalist Bruce Cameron in which he talks about Basson's investigation of Sharemax saying: "In my view, the Sharemax court action was pure intimidation. Personal Finance also took a close look at Sharemax at about the same time as Deon and came to much the same conclusions, which we published. The articles are on our website: www.persfin.co.za. We have yet to be sued by Sharemax.

For the past few years Deon devoted his time and limited resources to fighting Sharemax. He started writing a book called Public Interest Warriors about the saga, and recently published the first couple of chapters online, on his website www.deonbasson.co.za

You should read what he had to say, particularly if you are contemplating investing in any property syndication scheme.

Sharemax again retaliated with court action, attempting to block publication of the book.

I wouldn't be surprised if the stress of all this contributed to his death."

You can read all about Deon Basson's investigation of Sharemax here, while Moneyweb covered Sharemax's attempts to block the publishing of this book at length.

Speaking to journalists this week about Basson's death I got the distinct impression that many feel a great deal of anger towards Sharemax. This because of how Sharemax sought to muzzle Basson, the vitipuritive nature of their legal attack and because they singled out Basson in his private capacity. Most feel that the stress of dealing with Sharemax was a contributing factor to Basson's death.

He is dead

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
- Funeral Blues, W. H. Auden (1936)

I was lucky enough to spend time with some great writers this week, including Sue Grant Marshall, Gus Silber and Denis Beckett. One of the things we talked about was the passing of Deon Basson. Silber made a telling comment when he said that Basson's death was symbolic of the demise of investigative journalism in South Africa.

Moneyweb's Alec Hogg wrote a brilliant tribute to Basson, which is poignant particularly given that Basson had largely finished his book "Public Interest Warriors" and was planing to return to journalism.

Although I never knew him well, I was highly honoured to have spent time with Basson before his death. We had some email interchanges on the Naspers/Mugabe story, and met for lunch during which we talked about investigative journalism. I had deep respected for Basson, and followed his career and writing over an extended period so it was a great priviledge for me to meet him and talk about his career and life. Part of our discussion was recorded and was transcribed for Moneyweb, then there are a few video interviews with him on Zoopy.

Is this the symbolic death of investigative journalism? Fortunately investigative journalism is alive and well in our country at a time when it is most needed. However forensic journalism has suffered a huge loss.

Basson was unique in that he was a forensic business journalist with significant depth and huge experience which shows in his reporting on corruption and greed. He was relentless in his investigation and unafraid to uncover corporate rot. As such he often went where few journalists were prepared or dared to go. This is well explored in Reg Rumney's Thought Leader piece "In memory of Deon Basson, a great forensic business journalist."

Empassioned by the public interest, Basson's book will be an living tribute for his life's work, for Basson was South Africa's Public Interest Warrior. Peerless and fearless, he sacrificed much and fought for truth and justice to the end. I doubt if our country will see the likes of him again.

IEC snubs open source

“Free and fair” says electoral body while forcing digital citizens to adopt Microsoft’s browser technology.

As the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) launched their 2009 campaign in Midrand promising to bring South Africa a free and fair election, their Web site contradicted that claim by locking out open source users. Currently if you go to the IEC Web site you can only access information there using a Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) browser.

A serious oversight says top Web and technology expert and analyst Arthur Goldstuck. “The development of the IEC Web sited has been very short sighted as they are locking out a significant proportion of users. More and more people prefer Fire Fox because it is an efficient browser, and as a matter of course the IEC should develop for all mainstream browsers. What they have been doing is forcing people into a technology choice which is not what you would expect from a national organisation that champions democracy,” says Goldstuck who believes some 20% of all internet users will currently not be able to access the www.iec.org.za.

No doubt this will leave a sour taste in the mouth of the open source community, and Goldstuck agrees that the ‘lockout’ has damaged the IEC’s reputation in this technology sector. “I don’t know whether the IEC cares about the open source community, but this certainly will affect the IEC’s reputation there.”

This issue was first raised by Aslam Raffee, Chairperson of government's OSS on his blog Vulindlela (Open the path) on the 28th of July 2008. Calling the move “digital apartheid” Raffee and the Shuttleworth Foundation joined forces to petition the IEC after pointing out to them that their web presence was undemocratic, and receiving no satisfactory response. Despite knowing and acknowledging this and with the petition in hand, the IEC choice to launch their ‘free and fair’ campaign to political parties and civil organisation at Gallagher Estate this week. "There will never be political compromise, that will never and not happen in South Africa," chairperson Brigalia Bam sought to reassure South Africans while the organisation was while compromising online voting citizens by determining their technology choices or locking them out of crucial electoral information.

If you go to the site you will read: “Welcome to the IEC web site! Our server detected that you are using a browser or operating system (e.g. Netscape, Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome etc.) which is currently incompatible with our website. The current website is only compatible with Microsoft Internet Explorer V4 (and upward) on the Windows operating system. The website is under construction in order to rectify this. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause.” Despite petitions from the open source community it appears the IEC elected not to change this in time for their launch.

TypePad & SixApart

Two days ago I blogged about the problems I have been having at TypePad and SixApart. I expected that it would take time for my problems to get resolved because when I had a number of problems in June this year that's what happened. I had an open ticket for days and days, and the issue was only resolved a week later after I wrote to SixApart's PR department.

This time round I am please to report that support got back to me in a day, identified my problems and resolved the. Then I have got numerous comments, email and input from people on TypePad or who are working with SixApart.

It appears I need to revise my opinion of TypePad and SixApart. My initial perception that there were an offshore company not that concerned with bloggers outside of their biggest market (US). This appears not to be the case. There's a vibrant TypePad community who want to help. More so it appears the SixApart support service has undergone a revolution.

Kudos TypePad/SixApart. Serving the consumer is the only way to create a sustainable, long term business.

The spam hall of shame

Damn but I am sick of spam. Aren't you? Think of how many hours you waste each year simply deleting the untargetted, irrelevant, useless and mindless spam that reaches your in box. It drives me insane.

Spamnation offers a telling graph that shows how huge the spam problem has become worldwide:

I will be focusing on spam in a series of articles I am doing, and am also going to start name, shaming and blaming local companies that appear to encourage spam or use spam and cause damage to our fledgling online advertising economy, and waste time and interfere with productivity.

First under the spotlight is http://www.passive-income.co.za a web site that is owned by Pieter Pretorius who claims to have gone from being a salary slave to being a self made millionaire. It appears that Pretorius luxuriates in Langebaan while spawning a multi-level marketing machine in which South Africans under financial pressure gather email addresses, expose themselves to prosecution by flouting the ECT Act and spam the world in the hope of making money. The dream of wealth is an easy one to fall prey to, and from my perspective it appears that Pretorius may just be exploiting the vulnerabillity of the less fortunate while exposing them to legal risk so he can cream the rewards as the kingpin at the top of the multi-level pile.

I've received a couple of spam emails from this multi-level company that allegedly is promoting a viral type spam engine, the email below being the latest missive:

Greetings!

An exciting new magazine has recently been launched that furnishes our readers with some innovative ideas for generating multiple streams of passive income.

We look at various aspects of generating a passive income, such as network marketing; real estate investments; franchising; stock markets and more. We also publish monthly motivational and personal development articles.

How many magazines do you currently read that will teach you to earn more money, instead of teaching you to spend it?

Kindly visit http://3766.passive-incomes.co.za for more information.

Kind Regards
Nicci

Fax: 086 XXX 8926
Cell: 079 XXX 6422

For more information on local spam go to ISPA. For advice on how to report local spammers go to Internet Privacy for Dummies.

TypePad sucks

On the record I think TypePad and SixApart suck. Big time. I just don't get that they are doing it for the consumer. Their service levels leave much to be desired.

Seriously I have had nothing but hassle after hassle on this platform. First I signed up for the trial for the new test platform, my design went skwonky. Opened up a service ticket. And waited. And waitied and Waited. I can tell you you'd be better of sending a letter to the tooth fairy - the reply rate is much better even with Amazon ditching the South African postal service. (Yes we heard you SAPO - you're gonna be trying harder. We need to see it first to believe it.)

Then I have had untold problems with my RSS. Friggin' hell it's a nightmare. No the font on my main blog has taken on a life of its own.

I interviewed Matt Mullenberg and what impressed me deeply was his humility. His absolute dedication to service. His wisdom. How what's most important to him seems to be delivering a quality product, because he cares.

My impression with SixApart is that it is this huge off shore corporation. Sort of like the local postal service. This has been reinforced after chatting to a local blogger who told me that Typepad 'locks you in' and makes it incredibly difficult for you to leave the platform once your blog reaches critical mass.

Then there's not a passionate local geek community behind this platform which is a problem. Apparently with WordPress if you have a problem all you have to do is holla! For me it's increasingly looking like Windows (Typepad) vs Apple (WordPress).

SA media conspiracy

A slew of legislation that looks set to curtail media freedom has local journalists up in arms. Media organizations say government and the ruling party is trying to control the media, has a sinister agenda and is obstructive when it comes to dealing with press. The ruling party’s spokesperson, the ANC's Jesse Duarte says this is nonsense and names members of a newspaper cartel that she claims is targeting the ruling political party.

Speak to members of the media and media interest groups in South Africa and at best you'll get the idea that press freedom in this country is under threat. At worst the impression that the African National Congress (ANC) has a covert plan to control the media, is hostile towards the media and is trying to influence the media agenda for its own gain.

Funny thing. If you speak to ruling party the ANC they say pretty much the same thing about the media. Jesse Duarte who heads up communications and is the spokesperson for the ANC says the ruling party is aware of a group of journalists who clandestinely get together on Thursday evenings to determine how the news will play out. "We are aware that every Thursday a night group of journalists sit together and decide what stories they will go into. This is very clear when we do our analysis. What we see is a pack approach with a story that breaks in the Saturday Star, then is repeated in Business Day with a slightly different angle, and then in The Citizen with a different angle and slightly new perspective," says Duarte who maintains that South Africa has the most free press in the world, but adds that the media do not respect that freedom.

Speaking to Duarte one gets the idea that the ANC believes there is a media cartel of journalists and editors from Caxton, Independent Newspapers and Avusa news titles that are manipulating the news to try and influence the ANC agenda. "We have a right to demur and reply, and when we do what we see from these media is that there attack intensifies."
When asked what the agenda of these media could be Duarte replies that she cannot speak on behalf of the likes of The Saturday Star, Business Day, Citizen or Sunday Times. Adds Duarte: "What we all don't want is for the media to influence the agenda of the ANC and this is a very real concern. We do believe that they do at times try to do this, particularly when it comes to the issue of media stories written citing unnamed sources."

Duarte maintains that a key issue of contention between the ANC and the media is the refusal by the ANC to confirm stories based on unnamed sources. "What the media doesn't like is when they publish something which is not a fact, and we object. We cannot allow our organisation to be led or influenced by rumours. We believe that there are journalists who are exceptionally hostile to the ANC and there are those who are objective and do their job. Our analysis shows that those who are not objective are the most hostile towards the ANC."

While the ANC contends that the media is trying to influence the party's agenda, the media and media institutions in South Africa reckon the ANC is using a slew of new laws and tactics to control the media. Reams of square centimeter columns have been dedicated to various media and media organizations speaking out about what is perceived as an attack on media freedom by the government and ruling party.

Professor Anton Harber who directs the Journalism and Media Studies Programme at Wits University and is former editor of the Mail & Guardian says the slew of legislation represents a worrying government drive to reign in media freedom. "You have to see what was expressed about the media at Polokwane by a segment of the ANC leadership who were saying that the media needs to be reigned in. They say that the media is abusing its freedom. There is a strong element in ANC that wants to see the media knocked into shape and the media will resist this. It will cause ongoing and heightened conflict between government and media, which is a pity because we should be moving to mutual respect for each others space and roles."

The legislation in question is the Films and Publications Act, the National Key Points Act, the Protection of Information Bill, and provisions of the amendment to the Companies Act that could see the censoring of shareholder information. This with the recently passed Broadcasting Amendment Bill and calls by the ANC at Polokwane for a media appeals tribunal.

Executive director of the Freedom of Expression Institute, Jane Duncan believes that the media have themselves to blame. "Collectively this legislation greatly reduces the ability of the media and their respective publics to acquire information that is in the public interest, and which is considered sensitive by government. I think the media and public should be very worried, I don't think that they are worried enough. We lack an early warning system because we only know about the bills before they get before parliament which is too late. We need to get into the minds of the ruling party and executive while the bills are in their very early phases.

Journalists need to organize themselves to defend their space more vigorously. SANEF cannot substitute for the voice of the working journalist. Unfortunately we have very weak journalist organizations in the country. The SAIJ has collapsed and MWASA is not as vigorous as they should be on media freedom issues. We don't have a journalists association which is a big pity because the lack of organization gives the government the ability to erode the space that is necessary for good journalism in this country."

Chairperson Media Institute of Southern Africa Noma Regana shares the view that the media needs to take some responsibility for alienating themselves from government. "The media can fuel chaos and there has been irresponsible reporting. The media has to get it right. Investigative journalism seems to be missing and there are too many junior journalists on critical stories. Here you have to blame the editors and the media houses themselves, they are just chasing deadlines and need to spend more time on mentoring and getting the stories right. When you hear how people get their stories it is appalling. The media are in part responsible for alienation from the government. The media tends to jump to conclusions and at times do things that are against media ethics to get the story, and that is where the problem lies."

But is it useful for South Africa to have the media and the ruling party as friendly bedfellows? Absolutely not says SANEF's Jovial Rantao who believes the conflict is constructive. "The tension between the government and media is not always destructive - some of it is healthy. If the media is to play its role and hold government accountable and expose that which is not done right it will of course lead to tension. The media is acting on behalf of the public. We must always be the voice of the people and represent those who cannot speak for themselves."

The pivotal player in the ongoing drama between the ANC and the media is ANC President Jacob Zuma. Recently the ANC National Working Committee met to discuss the Zuma issue and called for clemency saying that all citizens had the right "to equal treatment before the law, to a fair trail, to be presumed innocent until found otherwise, and to protect against unreasonable and malicious actions by State institutions. It is clear that the continuation of this case does not serve the interests of South Africa. It has long ceased to be a justifiable prosecution that can be said to be motivated by nothing more than the pursuit of justice."

Members of the media and media organizations are not convinced. "Jacob Zuma made the mistake of taking sides when it comes to the media, particularly with black journalists. Nobody wants to be on the wrong side of the media. He dug his own grave," says Regana.

The media legislation at issue is not a Zuma era invention, but media pundits say that it may serve a Zuma-led government well to see it through to its end point. Says Duncan: "It may be tempting for a Zuma led government to ensure that the legislation - a legacy of the Mbeki era -is carried forward because it will allow them to bury many embarrassing issues under the guise of protecting the national interest."

The power of deep listening

"It is better to be interested than interesting."

I've been chatting to Ronnie Apteker by email for the past few weeks, and a couple of gems have risen to the surface. What’s been twirling around my head though is the advice that guides him, something that a wise mentor said to him that speaks to hearing the world.

It the quote about being interested and listening. Deep listening. Being so absorbed by what the other person is saying that you depart your own shore and travel into their story.

I have been thinking a lot about listening today and whether we listen enough or whether we listen in the right way, and what happens when we start to listen deeply.

As a journalist it is part of my job to listen. More so, to listen to what is said and not said – to listen beyond the speaking. Then as a parent so much of what I do is to listen. What I have found is that the way in which I listen changes the relationship I have with my world, and the people in it. Deep listening opens doors. It enables me to walk far into the story of the other. Whether that's my son, step-daughter, husband, a person I am interviewing or a stranger I am talking to.

We're all busy people so there are times when you have conversations that are drowned out by your own 'self talk'. The laundry list of things you need to do, the books you are reading, the response you are formulating in your head and so it goes on. Then the ego is a big mitigation against listening. Of course our egos are dynamic – up and down – growing and receding like the swells of a tide. When the ego is high then often meaningful listening gets drowned out by your own self-talk or sense of your own importance. When this happens listening becomes even more difficult, or at time impossible.

Fortunately life is a great leveler and the school of hard knocks helps to control the ego together with other practices like meditation, service and of course deep listening.

The amazing thing about surrendering the self to listening is that it creates a crucible in which you are changed and can be changed. But rather than reading what I have to say, listen deeply to what Pauline Oliveros has to say about the subject.

A composer, humanitarian and pioneer in the field of sound, Oliveros says that listening can be quantum:

"Deep Listening is listening in every possible way to everything possible to hear no matter what you are doing. Such intense listening includes the sounds of daily life, of nature, or one's own thoughts as well as musical sounds. Deep Listening represents a heightened state of awareness and connects to all that there is. As a composer I make my music through Deep Listening.

Deep Listening is active. What is heard is changed by listening and changes the listener I call this the 'listening effect' or how we process what we hear. Two modes of listening are available - focal and global. When both modes are utilized and balanced there is connection with all that there is. Focal listening garners detail from any sound and global listening brings expansion through the whole field of sound.

Listening shapes culture locally and universally. Listening is directing attention to what is heard, gathering meaning, interpreting and deciding on action. Quantum listening is listening to more than one reality simultaneously. Listening for the least differences possible to perceive - perception at the edge of the new. Jumping like an atom out of orbit to a new orbit - creating a new orbit - as an atom occupies both spaces at once one listens in both places at once. Mothers do this. One focuses to a point and changes that point by listening.

Quantum Listening is listening in as many ways as possible simultaneously - changing and being changed by the listening. I see and hear life as a grand improvisation - I stay open to the world of possibilities for interplay in the quantum field with self and others - community - society - the world - the universe and beyond.

Our improvisations will soon include accelerated artificial evolution - hybrid humans - new beings born of technology - new challenges, consequences, dangers, freedoms and responsibilities - all of this in addition to the life we lead through the habits of our own traditions.

How will we meet the genius of more rapidly evolving interactive cultures? - A genius of culture that could give us freedom of perception, physical and mental limitations. Will we stop the evolution with destruction and annihilation or embrace it courageously to go forward into the new world we are creating with all its edges?"

Read the full article by Oliveros here.