Nur Ahmad Furlong

Category: Web

  • WordPress Meetup Cape Town – Monday 18 Feb

    Finally it’s here, something I’ve been wanting to organise myself but haven’t managed to get around to doing, an (un)conference style wordpress meetup, and hopefully only the first of many to happen in Cape Town.

    Callum Macdonald, nomadic web worker and travelling entrepreneur hailing from Scotland was responsible for setting the ball in motion after the recent Open Coffee which was recently held in Cape Town.

    Visit the wordpress meetup google group or the blog to catch up with developments. Tomorrow is the first meetup and you’re required to register just so we can get an idea of the numbers for catering and logistical purposes.

    The River Club[1] can provide us with a venue for R175 per person. That includes tea and coffees on arrival, a light dinner in the restaurant, and reasonable use of the internet (web only, no heavy downloading). So I’ve confirmed that booking for Monday 18th.

    Leave a comment on this post to confirm attendance.

  • Web Guru Spotlight 5: Vincent Maher – Online Media Strategist

    Web Guru Spotlight 5: Vincent Maher – Online Media Strategist

    webguruspotlight-vincent

    I’m proud to say that with us today, we have someone who has had a major impact on the direction of the new media Industry in SA over the years, and who I am sure we are gong to be hearing a lot more from in the coming months and years. You must know Vincent Maher, online media strategist to the Mail & Guardian Online and key player in the social-bookmarking website, Amatomu. He’s currently in the process of re-developing the Mail & Guardian online and it’s Thoughtleaders blogging platform as well.

    Vincent’s own site www.vincentmaher.com serves as a doorway into his personal and professional journey in the online space which he calls, “My Digital Life”, and it gives us a good idea of the insightful yet witty personality behind the name.

    So! lets get dig a little deeper. I’ve been in the web industry in some way or other for the past 7 years now Vincent, but admittedly not been exposed to many strategic developments in the online space over the past years.

    I believe you have been involved in the online space for around 11 or 12 years now, what was your entry point to the industry, and what did you study to prepare you for the road ahead?

    I studied journalism at Rhodes and from 1993 – 1997 and in my final year I was supposed to finish the Bachelor of Journalism course. The department didn’t accept my transition from the 3rd to the 4th year so I did a joint honours in Journalism and English, mixing 2 Journalism courses with 3 from English. In English I did literary theory, gay and lesbian fiction – basically another name for more literary theory – and revenge tragedy. The revenge tragedy has helped me countless times in my life because I know how to wait until the time is right. In Journalism I did print design – you can see that influence in my web design – and an experimental course called online publishing.

    At the time I thought the Web was &^$@$^$, and that all networks were good for was fragging your mates in Doom. I still sort of believe that but don’t tell anyone.

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  • Web Guru Spotlight 4: Matthew Buckland GM of the M&G

    webguruspotlight-mattbuckla

    Today we will be speaking to Matthew Buckland, General Manager of the Mail & Guardian Online and co-founder of award-winning blog aggregator amatomu.com. I had the pleasure of working with Matthew years ago at iafrica.com in the early days when I just stepped into the new media space. Back then Matthew was an online editor. I can imagine it was the beginnings of what now is a real passionate relationship with digital media.

    Matthew regularly speaks at media events both locally and internationally and is at the forefront of new media developments in the new media industry & the blogosphere in South Africa.

    Hi Matthew. Firstly, let me say it’s great chatting to you again after all this time and I’m impressed with the way you’ve moved since those days back at iafrica.com.

    So tell me, what’s your current job description?

    As the GM I am responsible for the overall business and strategy of the Mail & Guardian Online. A large part of my role is conceptualising and building new sites that attract audience and provide a service to users. It’s what I’m passionate about, so I am pretty hands on when it comes to development, design and interface issues.

    Here I work closely with our Strategist Vincent Maher, who I have known since my student days at Rhodes (We did the same new media course). Our brainstorming sessions can be pretty out there sometimes. We seem to be on the same wavelength so have been a great team.

    I also had to get involved in business and sales side about three years ago, because I realised it was the only way M&G Online was going to expand and I would be able to bring onboard the fabulous talent we have working for our division: start bringing in the revenues.

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  • New School Business Idea no.1: Web 2.0 worker Spaces for rent

    Ok this is something I have been thinking about for a while now and I’ve just decided to go with it. I’ve got an overactive imagination and my mind just won’t leave me alone sometimes. There are times when I can’t even get to bed in the early hours and just have to jot down some ideas before I can get some rest from the continuous mental processes happening up in here.

    I have ideas on a daily basis, ones which I think are great and just have to be acted upon, but a host of reasons prevent me from acting, mostly procrastination and lack of motivation or just feeling bogged down by earning an immediate living. I’ve decided to document these ideas and share them, to see how others react, see what kind of feedback I can get and maybe if I can find some interested parties to collaborate or invest in them or just as a bouncing board.

    IDEA # 1: Mobile Office for knowledge/web 2.0 workers

    With so many of us taking the plunge into self employment or just being on the go and out of the office it has become increasingly difficult to find the right places to meet with our clients or peers, to sit down somewhere and get some work done away from our couches & beds at home and to just have a place of refuge when the creative juices are being dried up by our dry surroundings.

    Onto the scene walks the office away from the “home” office (This is my idea). Imagine a few centralised spaces where you can go, pay a small fee for an hour or 2 or 3, have some coffee, plug in and do what you do best. It’s designed to suite the modern knowledge worker, it allows for booking spaces in advance, you can take your clients there. There’s an open plan area for collaboration, brainstorming, networking & the like, as well as some private or more quiet spaces for concentration or to cut yourself off from the world.

    They offer office services like faxing & printing, places to plug in your iPod and watch the latest TED talks or listen to your favourite podcasts. They sell the latest gadgets which keep us drooling on a daily basis. They have a few techno savvy guys & gals to help with any glitches & bugs. Maybe they even have a few in house businesses running, which offer supporting services to the knowledge worker community like people who know how to set up blogs, wiki’s etc.

    You can go and have a video conference, shoot or record something for your latest podcast. It’s a web 2.0 worker paradise. Think it’ll work? Anyone got anything to add?Anyone got some moolah to throw at an idea like this or know some open minded investors? Jump in and throw your 2 cents or 20 million at this idea. Lets see what we come up with. If anyone’s got connections at any of the big malls or centers maybe get them interested in the idea. I’m sure they wouldn’t sneer at getting peeps like us interested in spending more time in & around their malls.

    Does anyone know of something like this which really exists? If so and it’s based in Cape Town I’ll by you a coffee & a Muffin if you point me to it in the next month. 🙂

  • Allowing more customization would take facebook to the next level

    I’ve had a love hate relationship with facebook since I started using it. I deleted my facebook account twice due to being irritated by a few people sending application invitations and a few other random reasons. Each time I deleted my account, I realized what I was missing out on in terms of staying in touch with certain people and the endless networking and collaborative opportunities facebook offers, so I’m back once again.

    The news of the facebook developer’s garage which recently(30-10-07) took place in Cape Town has made me think a little further about the possibilities which lie in the facebook platform and community. All these plugins and extensions, linking up with other online applications and services and people developing any and every type of functionality imaginable, most of which I think is a bunch of nonsense though others seem to be making use of it from vampire bites to fluffy gifts etc.

    An area where I think facebook should allow more play and developers should be focusing their attention is customization. Now I know the blue bar at the top and the standard layout has become somewhat familiar and that’s fine for most, but I think it’s about time we were allowed to play a bit with our personal spaces, brand them, colour them, change layout a little more and give them a bit more of a stamp of individuality. It should make no difference to the owners of facebook, as long a their ad spaces are maintained in their places what the rest of the thing looks like.

    I’d go out there as saying that this could be one of the most significant changes that could be included into the platform. I mean, it’s about us, about the individuals, their uniqueness. If i had even half the development skills needed to get stuck in on this area I’d dive in, any takers?

    What do you guys think?

  • Think you can escape the web revolution? – Shift Happens!

    Attending the “Web 2.0 Explosion” sessions hosted by Jamaal from Jayz internet solutions gave me a fresh boost of enthusiasm about what I do and refreshed my memory about quite a few web concepts which I have packed into a few boxes at the back of my mind somewhere. Even though I have been following developments in the web 2.0 space for some time now and feel I have a pretty good understanding of the technologies and methodologies having it all presented in a clear, step by step fashion was a good way to connect a few more dots and broaden the picture.

    I especially loved the videos which we were shown explaining some key web 2.0 concepts. I’ve seen this one before but mixed in with the rest of what we focussed on Yesterday it had a much greater impact and I just have to share this with those of you who may not have seen this yet.

    [youtube 3mxbLd9r4Sc Shift Happens on You Tube]

    Now, think about the impact this is going to have on you, your career, your business or organisation, your family and your relationships in only the next 2 – 5 years. We can’t afford to hide anymore. Fear of technology is something you just have to get over unless you’re prepared to be cut off from a huge percentage of the worlds population. Developments are going digital and any strategy which does not include some aspect of these developments could be missing an essential ingredient to its success.