I remember once, out with a friend for dinner, ranting about the hectic day I’ve had. About the different difficult users I’ve had to deal with, when they suddenly jumped in and asked: “Do these people actually pay to use your site?”

I must say, this was rather deflating. I mean, why was I doing what I do, when there is no direct monetary value attached to it? But it’s a very simple business equation really: Traffic = Advertisers = Profit.

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So, as you know, we are in the process of rebranding and personalising our mobile site (m.24.com), and I’ve been doing some research on what handsets are being used on our site.

Who would have thought that Blackberry would be the most used handset? … Continue Reading

Following on the success of Afridoctor winning the Nokia innovations competition, the labrats have done some planning to take the application to the next level.

Below is an edited version (for we cannot reveal all :)) of a powerpoint presentation, by myself and Blueworld’s Bradley Voges, which describes our future strategy. The original idea for Afridoctor came from wizz-kid Werner Erasmus — his idea beating 12 others in an “ideas” competition we had internally in 20FourLabs.
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Google’s Nexus One has officially launched and while I haven’t yet been able to get my paws on one (still sadly unavailable  in South Africa), I have managed to gather some  reviews, comparisons and useful specs to help shed-light on the first official Google Phone. However, unlike most blogs, this will NOT be a Nexus vs iPhone type post. … Continue Reading

I recently had the displeasure of having my iPhone stolen out of my hand and out my car window which happened to be less than half-way open while sitting bumper-to-bumper in traffic in Koeberg Road. Yes, you read all of that correctly.  My phone was snatched from my hand through my partially opened window from my semi-stationary vehicle. … Continue Reading

Dear Santa

Admittedly I have been a little naughty this year. For one, I didn’t always comb my hair or wear matching socks to work and my punctuality has been somewhat of late (excuse the pun). Also, I avoided pesky relatives where I could and threw moldy cheese at my ex-neighbor. And it’s not really my fault that I had to lie about that website which popped up just as the missus was walking in. … Continue Reading

20Fourlabs, the innovation and applications division within Cape Town-based 24.com, walked away with the top honours last night in the Nokia Africa Calling All Innovators app competition. Their entry, Afridoctor, won the $85 000 first prize beating 125 other entries from developers all over Africa.

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It’s a funny thing about celebrities. Upon inspection their composition appears as a hybrid mix of paranormal hype, unnatural alien-like beauty and enormous amounts of purple ego goop. Furthermore, they all seem saturated in an over-abundance of wealth and fame, both of which appear to legally allow for a constant state of inebriation or raucous moments of paparazzi eye-candy. Celebs live off media coverage often exploiting their positions in society and as recent scandals have shown, I really don’t need to joostify my argument
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Once you’ve read the article below, make sure you enter the 20fourLabs Nokia Comes With Music competition (see bottom of page) to stand a chance of winning one of two Nokia XpressMusic devices (with unlimited music downloads for 12 months) or Nokia Music Store vouchers to the value of R2,500!

[UPDATE: Competition has now closed. See list of winners below] … Continue Reading

Time and attention are both scarce commodities in this day and age, add to that the surplus of information both valuable and useless being flung at us from all directions and one may feel inclined to hide under the sheets in the morning and peep nervously at the flood of data lapping at your door … Continue Reading