Yesterday, I installed the labs edition of google talk, specifically for some of the calendar features which have been integrated. Okay, so as usual, I rush to install it, so I can tinker with the features. Anyway, after doing that, I’m trying to log in and its not working. Realising that its probably bandwidth issues, I figure that a look at the help file and new features page will be helpful. So I get there, look at a hurriedly put together faq. Skip that as well, and click the link to check out the google group for the product and see whether I can find any information…. and whooosh!

The picture tells the rest of the story. lol. How does this work?

Tell your Mommy, tell your Aunty, tell your neighbour, tell your sister. An international essay competition sponsored by the www.bidnetwork.org

Source:
http://www.bidnetwork.org/page/132622

A business plan competition for women in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

* Receive free coaching, feedback and support in writing your business plan
* Win a business trip to meet investors and business partners in The Netherlands
* Compete for a prize of €15.000
* Win €10.000 for best retail business plan sponsored by ‘Annual ING Retail Awards’
* Get expert advice to start and promote your business
* Access over 100 investors interested in financing businesses in developing countries
Submit your complete business plan before January 15th, 2010

Cambridge, MA – April 26, 2009 – The S.E.VEN Fund (SEVEN) is announcing its 2009 – 2010 Student Essay Competition. This year we are seeking essays on inspiring new models of economic development from around the globe. The competition will award one (1) student prize of $10,000. The submission deadline is December 7, 2009 at midnight Eastern Standard Time (EST). Winners will be announced on February 7, 2010.

For more information… http://www.sevenfund.org/new-models-development/index.php

What is the essay question?
“Read the article ‘Rwanda Rising: A New Model of Development” and write an essay about models of economic development anywhere in the world that subvert traditional top-down approaches, and instead use a ‘heretical mix’ of business strategy, local wisdom, culture, and mutual benefit to bring about sustainable economic change at the city, country, or regional level.”

Who can participate in this competition?
The 2009-2010 student essay competition is open to high school students, undergraduates, and graduate students. Students may be in any field of study (including professional fields, such as medical, business, or law). If you are currently in college, you must be enrolled full-time at an accredited institution. If you are a high-school student or in the process of submitting applications to enter or re-enter college, you must have active applications underway and plan to be matriculated full-time at an accredited institution by the competition’s close date.

Where do I get a paper application?
There is no paper application required for this competition. Essays should be submitted following the instructions in the section below: “How do I submit my essay?”

How do I submit my essay?

• Submit your essay electronically in an MS Word or PDF format only, using the submission form on SEVEN’s website. All information requested, including contact information, abstract, and essay should be included in a single document. The url is:
  http://www.sevenfund.org/contest-forms/new-model-development.php
• Every essay MUST, in addition to the actual essay, include a 100 word abstract at the beginning of the document.

Along with the submission, you MUST include the following information in the submission form, as well as on the first page of your submitted essay:

• Your full name and mailing address, a contact telephone number and your academic email.
• Your degree-level and field of study.
• Your University’s name, official address and main telephone number as well as the name, phone number and email address of someone we may contact at the university (Faculty member, Department Chair, or registrar) to verify that you are enrolled as a full time student.
• A brief paragraph biography of the author(s)

Why has SEVEN selected the short essay format for this competition?
We believe that the short essay format is a powerful and underutilized mechanism in development thinking. It is a versatile medium that requires succinct, insightful writing that can be published in multiple venues. 
Does SEVEN have a preferred philosophical or scientific agenda?
We see a number of experts who opine about poverty and prosperity: i.e., macroeconomists, businessmen, educators, political scientists, social scientists, etc. We rarely see enough integration, where the experts of one domain borrow insights from another, and attempt to create an even more robust intellectual framework. We intend to foster this kind of integration, at the level of thought leader and practitioner.

Does SEVEN have any guidance to students preparing essays?
Essays should be original works that directly address the topic as outlined. We strongly discourage students from repurposing papers from college courses.

Who qualifies to compete in the SEVEN Fund Student Essay Competition?
Any full time student who studies at an accredited educational institution worldwide or a student who has been confirmed acceptance and matriculation for the following academic year may submit an Essay in English to compete in the SEVEN Fund competition as long as the essay reflects the scope and guidelines stated in the call for essays. The winning student will be required to enter into a contract with SEVEN prior to final award. We welcome applicants from every field of study.

How long should the essay be?
Essays may not exceed 2000 words and must be written in English. Students may write an essay of less than 2000 words. Do not forget that you MUST submit an abstract along with your essay.

What is the abstract?
We ask you to submit, along with your essay, an abstract that states the essence of what your paper is about. This is a very useful process for both the writer and the reader as it forces the writer to concisely state his or her point and it allows the reader to enter the reading of the essay with a better understanding of the idea and subject matter.

Do Undergraduate and Graduate Students compete with each other?
For purposes of this essay competition, all students compete for a single scholarship.

Are there any restrictions on the prize money? What may the prize money be used for?
The prize money is intended for use at an accredited academic institution for the winning student’s education. SEVEN will release the money directly to the educational institution or a student loan provider, not directly to the winning student.

How will essays be judged?
All essays that comply with the call for essay rules will undergo a competitive process of a confidential jury review. Expert SEVEN Fund jurors will evaluate and rank the essays according to the criteria described in the call for essays. The winning students will be required to enter into a contract with SEVEN prior to final award.

Can I submit multiple essays?
No, each student may only submit one essay.

Can I collaborate with another author?
You may decide to submit an essay together with another student, but the prize money is per essay, not per student. The two (or more) of you would share the prize. SEVEN especially welcomes teams of students from different disciplines, as we believe that integration across domains provides the greatest insight into complex global problems.

What if I am unable to submit my application electronically?
Only applications submitted through this form on our website will be accepted. If you encounter problems, please contact SEVEN at info(at)sevenfund.org.

How is SEVEN financed?
This call for essays is supported initially by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation.

What sort of legal organization is SEVEN?
SEVEN is a non-profit 501 (c) (3) corporation under the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

How is SEVEN administered and run?
SEVEN is primarily managed by two people, Andreas Widmer and Michael Fairbanks. They are co-directors with different experiences in the high-tech industry and development, respectively. They founded and ran the only venture-backed firm in the USA to focus on selling software and strategic consulting services to developing nations. There is a board of advisors, and a board of directors with vast experience in global markets, advisory work, and enterprise solutions to poverty.

What if I have additional questions?
You may send your questions to info(at)sevenfund.org.

I just got the information from Chris Guillebeau’s website that today is world bloggers day, and every blogger is meant to write about climate change. Well… I’ll simply post up what I sent to the innovation360 people.

Unless third world governments take an active role towards supporting the production of low energy consuming devices and their distribution and use across their regions, the dream of imbibing the use of green friendly technology cannot be attained. This is not for any fancy reason… other than COST. For low energy bulbs for instance, In Nigeria, they cost as much as 15 to 20 times a normal bulb. This has created a scenario where they are viewed as luxuries for the rich alone. The singular factor that even drove the market for the expensive green bulbs was the adoption of prepaid meters which began to create waste conscious electricity consumption to Nigerians, about 2 years ago.

Don’t get me wrong, I no it is not cheaper to go green. hardly. But the truth is, if there is a cost implication of preserving our planet, most of the third world is not enlightened enough to aspire to bearing the cost, neither can they afford to, in reality. How do you bother a man about a global cataclysm when he is not winning the fight against gnawing hunger in his belly, how do you make a man an advocate for green policies, when he is still fighting to institute good governance in his polity? Its classic Maslow.

Something to think about…. something to ponder. Till next year, at least I put my bid in for climate change. Cheers.

PS

Put off the light when you leave the room, save your bill, and the planet!!!

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=ZNCD6jUSQGq28S_2b7t3Rdrg_3d_3d

If you have benefited from the PTDF scholarship, please follow this link and participate in the survey.

If you are still looking for information on the PTDF Scholarship and want to benefit from it… keep watching their site www.ptdf.gov.ng

cheers.

Source: www.educationuk.org/nigeria-innovation360.htm

Innovation 360 is a competition designed to discover innovative minds across Nigeria; people who have the kind of ideas that will help solve challenging problems and move the country the next step up. If you’ve got what it takes, then get involved and join us on this adventure of creative discovery.
Innovation 360 is a competition designed to showcase your innovative skills and lay the foundations for a great future. You could win a full scholarship to study a master’s degree in the UK worth over N3.5million naira.

What is Innovation 360?
Innovation 360 is a 10 weeks national competition starting from Monday 14 September and ending 21 November, 2009. It is a competition designed to discover innovative minds across Nigeria with the hope that they will help solve challenging problems across the country with their innovative skills.

How is the competition scheduled?
Every 2 weeks, on Monday, (i.e. September 14, September 28, October 12 and October 26) we will unveil a new challenge to test your innovativeness and creativity.
If you believe you’ve got the solution to the week’s challenge, simply send the top lines of your idea in 160 characters to our SMS short code – 32326 by Wednesday of the first week (you can send in as many ideas as you want). We will send you a response text to confirm receipt of your idea.
Our in-house screeners will shortlist all SMS received down to the 30 best ideas by Monday of the second week. If yours is one of them, you then get to send in a 750 words description of your bright idea to us. This must come in by Wednesday of the second week.
The top 10 ideas are shortlisted and a telephone interview conducted. By the end of the second week, we will pick the top 5 ideas for the week that then go on to the finals.
This cycle takes place 4 times. At the end of the fourth Task (after 8 weeks), we will have 20 shortlisted people who go on to the grand finale.

The Grand Final
The Grand Final will be a Board Interview in Lagos. All 20 participants get to face a Board comprising of high profile UK Alumni, UKBA and British Council representatives, with different individual and group tasks to test their creativity and innovativeness to the utmost.

At the end of this full day process, the Board will select the final winners for the competition and their names will be announced at The Awards Ceremony which will hold in the evening of the same day.

Terms and Conditions

Take a nation rich with oil wealth and suffering from decades of corrupt governance with the new administration on a vision attempt at rebranding the nation. Add almost 20 years of tussles and bustles between the Academic Staff Union of Universities and a series of unsigned agreements and broken promises. Pick the basked of millions of youths that wake up every morning and watch people in powerful positions live in absolute luxury, with their children abroad who return occassionally to rub their parents ill gotten wealth in their faces and pick out the number who have struggled through Nigerias half baked educational system at primary and secondary levels and have entered into the University. Those few that emerged after much struggle and ‘man know man’ to afford themselves a chance at a better life… even if they get in there and realise that the system is hardly working and all but give up on themselves and on life. Then garnish the scenario with a President, Vice President and Education Minister who all have graced the corridors of Nigerian citadels of higher learning, and seen the struggle between the ASUU and FG from within. Take this mixture and place it in the steaming oven of National austerity and financial melt down (which Nigeria jumped into, uninvited) and leave all these ingredients for close to three months. Ignore the bloody kitchen, hell, take out time to celebrate your wedding anniversary while you’re at it (well deserved as it might be). What do you think will result out of this?

http://www.tribune.com.ng/18092009/news/news1.html

http://www.vanguardngr.com/2009/09/18/education-labour-ministers-escape-kidnap-plot/comment-page-7/

Three Nigerian youths (of University of Abuja) instigated and supported by a 58 year old self styled entrepreneur are reported to have been caught plotting to kidnap two ministers, demand a ransom and obtain a forced agreement to the terms of ASUU for the strike to be called off.

While I totally and completely condemn their actions, and their naivety, probably born from too much TV (that is on the signing of the agreement part), I can only afford frightened and furtive gaze into the plethora of greed and evil that has become the order of the day in our dear country and stifle a tear. In other words, water don full my eye.

The environment one finds oneself has been recognised as one of the most important factors in character and development. I do not even want to go into the ways that the average nigerian youth is disenfranchised and disillusioned… career path, the role of hardwork, attitude to cheating and malpractice, the appeal of easy money etc. Evil tenets which are continuously rubbed in daily when we see fraudulent embezzlers of the nation’s collective wealth walk the street like kings. In the words of Femi Kuti… Truth don die (truth is dead). Integrity don die (integrity is dead), and now school wey bin sick, don die ma! (and education which was struggling is dead also).

Tribune quotes the Education Minister as saying  ’it must be the work of some disgruntled elements in the system that do not want the progress of the nation’ . Well I am tempted to say that game recognises game, and you, Sir Minister and that statement are looking mighty familiar, but I wont. Why? Because the problem is bigger than one man. The problem is a tradition of institutionalised mediocrity, corruption and bigotry that has created massive backwardness in the nation, as people cry out for the government to #lightupnigeria; that has caused massive unrest in the Niger Delta; let me leave you to finish up the list.

Urrggghh!

The strike will end, eventually. That is certain. But I fear that the rift and the damage which is being done to the psyche of the Nigerian youth might be around for a much longer time to come. It is already a ghost stalking our campuses, scoping out or streets, scaring our consciousness and making us fear. And the fear is a justified one. Cos I bet if the situation stays status quo, that meal is gonna cook and someone is gonna eat it. And when they eat it, MAGA MUST PAY!

PS

One of the kidnappers’  alias is kelly handsome. The reference to the song is merely for creative/humour purposes.

Nigerian Population Commission website hacked!

As if to answer my current muse on the state of cybersecurity in Nigeria, I turned up at the office and what did I discover from a google search for updated Nigerian statistics? The Nigerian Population Commission site at http://www.population.gov.ng (dont go there, by the way) has been taken down by some hackers and filled with links to all what not!

I am currently running some analytics to get a bit of a history on the attack and will update this information very soon. I think as a nation, we need to do something serious about this. A little while ago, rumour had it that one of the newspapers was taken down (won’t quote, I have no facts on this).

As a matter of urgency, the government might want to consider putting a ban on websites that do not meet stringent security requirements. While this can never solve the problem of cyber attacks altogether, it will be a step towards showing that if its not gonna be done right, it should not be done at all.

Think about the effect that routing of emails through Nigerian IPs has had on our national image as glorified 419ers. Like my friend used to say, oh gosh, oh gosh gosh.

I have resorted not to complaining about Nigeria unless a solution is being recommended, but at the same time, I cannot help but notice how alot of MDAs and Parastatals spend millions on website contracts while they really dont even need or have the capacity to utilise their web presence.

No website at all is better than a poorly run and managed (and secured) one. True for private sector establishments, truer for Government.

You can now follow whichlevel on twitter via www.twitter.com/whichlevel to get updates on opportunities, ripping commentaries and gist.
For the serious minded only!

At the African Telecommunications Development Summit yesterday, at Transcorp Hilton, Abuja, my colleague and I could not help but notice that Ernest Ndukwe had the most boring and boorish presentation of all the 10 plus speakers that took the podium. I was utterly and totally disappointed at the man who is called the Father of the Telecommunications Revolution, who failed to communicate with the slightest preponderance of verve.

I strongly suspect though, that the presentation which he painstakingly read every single word of, was prepared by one of his aides. The contrast between the speech and what we all know to be his capacity and reputation was rather glaring.

I am barely drawing attention to this because of the great love and admiration that I have for what he has done for ICTs in the continent, and on which alot of free enterprise and development has thrived.

Okay, cut the bs. I need to come across as politically correct with this one, so am ending the post on a didactic note.

Just so you avoid the obvious pitfalls and for those of you not fortunate enough to enjoy the time out we had with the upper echelons of the IT elite in the continent, enjoy this article from Business Week.

http://tinyurl.com/n99bcn

He flouted blatantly the following:

1. Misspelling words.

Mazlow = Maslow?

2. Create distracting color combinations.

There was no consistent color theme.

5. Inserting improperly sized photos that are stretched to fit the slide.

asides that, whoever prepared the presentation neglected to remove the white background around the edges of the images used, for most of the slides.

6. Looking completely and totally disinterested.

I think it must have been the heavy buffet though. Damn I need to take delivery on that iPhone. I would have had some lovely pictures to show.

8. Read every word of each slide.

This was my major PAIN POINT.
I felt like jumping on the table and screaming ‘aarrrrggghhh’, WE CAN READ TOO!

10. Don’t practice. At all.
At a point, it actually seemed like he paused to write up an additional paragraph to add to the presentation.

13. Using wild animations.

This was probably attempted to add some life to an otherwise mortuarian presentation, and it failed woefully. I could sense the massive slowing down of peoples breaths as they drifted off to sleep, which would have been sweet, if not for the tormenting drone of the NCC CEOs silky baritone boring our collective souls and testing our sanities while discussing Citizen Security in the Nigerian context.

14. Use cartoon clip art.