RSS
 

Archive for July 28th, 2010

Some delayed in egg in the face of the World Cup – FIFA Chief Financial Officer Shot in Joburg

28 Jul

Was waiting for the day this would happen. Not all peaches and cream as it it made out to be.

From News 24

Police were on Wednesday following leads on the whereabouts of gunmen who shot the chief financial officer for FIFA’s local organising committee outside his home in Sandton, Johannesburg, a spokesperson said.

“I can’t really tell you what happened, but we were called to attend to a shooting at Gallo Manor at about 10 in the morning yesterday [Tuesday],” said Captain Kym Cloete.

Full article

This news does NOT make me happy, but it is indicative of the real South Africa, not the South Africa that was staged to the world for 30 days during June/July 2010. Now it will be interesting to see how quickly (if at all) the police apprehend the person(s) concerned, given that on an average day the police are unable to catch anything but the sniffles. I wonder with some FIFA clout if it will make any difference to catching the shooter??? Hmmm, we’ll see.

 
No Comments

Posted in South Africa

 

How many South African Millionaire’s did the 2010 World Cup Produce?

28 Jul

The road leading to the 2010 Soccer World Cup in South Africa had many South African’s thinking they were going to become Millionaire’s in a month. People were renting out their houses at ludicrous rates and then moving in with family for the month or moving into their garages while guests occupied their houses. Hotels, Lodges and Venues bumped their rates to insanely high amounts to capitalise as much as possible on tourists. But from the migration figures quoted by the department of home affairs, figures of visitors to South Africa were rather dismal. Add to this the fact that Match (FIFA’s hospitality wing) dropped huge blocks of bookings a mere 8 weeks before the events started with no remuneration to those concerned. This no doubt left many establishments unable to fill those spots at such short notice.

I know of several establishments in my area who did not go with Match, kept their rates only very slightly elevated above what they would normally charge and as a result were booked up almost the entire period whereas those who stood with empty rooms trying to catch people at R5000 pppn stood empty.

It seems many people were under the illusion that tourists are stupid and don’t know what things cost and really thought they would become rich in a month from World Cup visitors but I think many of them got a nasty surprise indeed.

I really wonder just how many millionaire’s (other than FIFA) the 2010 World Cup Produced.

Know something I don’t or have a great success story please comment about it.

 
No Comments

Posted in Life, South Africa

 

Google’s New Image Search – A Copycat of Bing

28 Jul

Many of you may have noticed a sudden change in Google’s image search function. This change appeared a mere 24 hours after a review of search engines was released publicly, the results of which showed Bing had gained significant ground on Google. No doubt Google was aware of the report to be released and did some planning to release their new image search right on time. Sure seems that way anyhow.

The only problem is that Google, the company who has been nothing short of fresh ideas, simply did an almost mirror like copy of the way Bing produces search results with one major annoyance over what Bing produces. Google image search now has the MOST IRRITATING popup of the image so when you click on it your browser gets invaded with this annoying popup. Additionally Google’s image search is now slower than before and I think it’s a big step backward for the giant of search engines. In fact a lot of the changes at Google in recent weeks have a Bing’ness about them.

In fact a lot of Google’s recent changes have NOT been accepted so well by the community. Google has taken the simplest, fastest search engine and started to clutter it with too much extra unecessary “stuff”. Google forgets that 90% of their users simply want to search and get an answer and in today’s ever speeding up world they want it RIGHT NOW !!!! I do hope Google does some serious reviews of their recent changes and start going back to the  working recipe they’ve had for years, the recipe that made them the giants of Internet search.

Many Search Engines in the history of the Internet have lost ground due to making too many changes which start to clutter the simplicity, I hope that Google is not on this same path to doom.

Also read “Bing debuts well as Google tanks in satisfaction survey” and “Does Google Have Bing Envy?“

 
No Comments

Posted in Technology and Computing

 
 
lilywhite
Afrigator
BlogCatalog