Articles

Affichage des articles du juillet, 2010

Why are we happy?

From TED Talks: " Dan Gilbert , author of Stumbling on Happiness , challenges the idea that we’ll be miserable if we don’t get what we want. Our "psychological immune system" lets us feel truly happy even when things don’t go as planned." Check out the video and read the book, it's very refreshing!

Quote of the day - 15-07-2010

“There is a certain age when a woman must be beautiful to be loved, and then there comes a time when she must be loved to be beautiful.”   Francoise Sagan quoted in New York Times' article " Aging Gracefully, The French Way "

Pius Njawe, 1957-2010

Pius Njawe , pionnier de la liberté de la presse et fondateur du premier journal indépendant Camerounais  Le Messager est décédé dans un accident de voiture aux États-Unis le 12 Juillet dernier. Hommage d'Allain Jules. Pius Njawe in his own words  by Dibussi Tande. " I have been a journalist since the age of 15. I started as an errand boy at a newspaper called Semences africaines, in the city of Yaoundé, Cameroon. Over the past 34 years, I have been arrested 126 times while carrying out my profession as a journalist. Physical and mental torture, death threats, the ransacking of my newsroom, etc., has often been my daily lot in a situation where repression and corruption, even within the press, have become the norm. [...]     I entered journalism the way you enter a religion; journalism is my religion ." Rest in Peace, you fought the good fight.  

Readings : Ethiopia, VCs, Email etiquette,

Why Ethiopia is not the voice of Africa? ( Source African Prospect ) Four things some VCs do I don't like  ( Ben Horowitz Blog ) The Worst Email Habits and Annoyances You Should Avoi d ( Lifehacker ) Business Buzzwords That Make You Sound Like An Ass ( Business Insider )

Quick hits : African football exiles, East African internet outage, Is Yahoo Dead?

Football lessons from African Exiles (Source Financial Times s via African Unchained ) "Football is one of the most visible signs of Africa’s skills exodus: the very best African players are quickly snapped up to play for European leagues where they have become ubiquitous. They represent just a tiny proportion of the skilled Africans of all trades and professions who leave the continent. According to the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, about 27,000 Africans left for industrialised countries between 1960 and 1975. Now, an equivalent number leaves the continent every year." [...]  It is perhaps paradoxical to talk of benefit and the brain drain at the same time. But the brain drain is not necessarily bad for African countries. It is every motivated and ambitious person’s dream to compete with the best in their field: footballers want to play in the top leagues, students want to study at top universities, professionals want to compete and learn from the best amo

Quick hits : sex market in South Africa, Job hunting, African outtake

Failure in the sex market in South Africa during the World Cup ( source the Globe ) "In  Cape Town, for example, the most touristic country's sex workers complain that tourists only have eyes for Jabulani, the ball of the World.   Of call girls to clubs 'strip', all claim that, with the arrival of the Cup, the movement, rather than grow or remain stable, declined. Well-Educated Job Hunters still stuck ( source Wall Street Journal )   " College graduates who took a detour around the weak job market by going back for advanced degrees are beginning to emerge from those programs—and finding job prospects aren't much better than they were a couple of years ago. " African Outtake, From Diary of a Very Bad Yea r ( Source N plus Ones Mag )  

Internet Trends 2010 by Morgan Stanley Research

Mary Meeker of Morgan Stanley latest insights on the internet industry. Always useful and interesting for those of us who couldn't attend the CM Summit. Internet Trends 2010 by Morgan Stanley Research View more presentations from CM Summit: Marketing in Real Time .