Archive for 'South Africa'
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Data shows US mobile data usage ready to pass the UK
Before long, the United States may become the world’s top user of the web on mobile devices, according to analytics and billing firm Bango. The company is releasing figures this morning showing the US at almost 19 percent of the world total, just short of the top country, the United Kingdom, which has about 19.4 percent.
In terms of absolute growth in each country, the US is growing much more quickly than the UK, so it should be surpassing its old colonial master in yet one more area soon. Bango estimates that might happen within several weeks, as the trend picks up pace in the States.
Mobile data is difficult to gather, and the numbers often aren’t dead-on. The indicators seem clear, though: Customers in the US are finally getting good options for using the web, from handsets like the iPhone, to better unlimited data plans, to the roll-out of better third generation networks.
Bango’s numbers also corroborate data released earlier this year, including Google’s report that mobile web usage of its sites is increasing.
The question left unanswered is where the usage ceiling lies for the US. While the UK has long been considered a fairly mature market, having had options for browsing available for years, the US has been behind in the race. Now that the technology is catching up, its larger population should make it easy for it to draw ahead, but it’s difficult to tell from this point how far mobile usage will penetrate into non-premium markets.
It seems reasonable to assume, however, that devices will continue to innovate (or copycat, as with the Instinct, Samsung’s version of the iPhone), and prices for both devices and data will edge down as carriers compete. Applications and services also tie in; for more on how they’re helping expand mobile web usage, check out our article on five trends driving the mobile web.
In case it’s of interest, here are the runners-up that Bango listed: India had almost 11 percent of total usage, South Africa was approaching 9 percent, and Indonesia had 4 percent.
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Int’l A-list blogger roadshow in South Africa on the cards
Have some great breaking news. Simon Barber from the International Marketing Council (IMC) and Brand South Africa is putting together an event, where some big-name international (but mostly US-based) bloggers will be doing a roadshow in the country.
Planning is at an advanced stage. Budgets have been approved and the trip is being arranged by Renee Blodgett (of Blodgett Communications) in San Francisco, who helped put together a similar bloggers’ tour to Israel earlier this year. (Robert Scoble, JD Lasica, Craig Newmark — among others — part of that tour).
Simon, who is based in Washington DC and is the US IMC Country Manager, also blogs on his own blog IZWI and Thought Leader. Simon has put together previous such events which involved a tour here of well-known US journalists. This initiative is Simon’s brainchild, conducted under the auspices of the IMC. It is being planned by local journalist Graeme Addison and is anticipated that it will take place around about the beginning of December/end of November.
I’ve been assisting Simon with a few ideas, names and contacts, but I thought I’d also solicit a few suggestions here. Also, if you’re interested in getting involved in this in any way, then please also let us know here too.
My suggestions, in no particular order, were: Technorati founder Dave Sifry, Richard MacManus of Read Write Web, Robert Scoble, Michael Arrington of Techcrunch, Markos Moulitsas of Daily Kos, the peeps from Mashable, Ryan Block of endgadget, Brian Lam from Gizmodo, Jeff Jarvis, Om Malik, Matt Drudge, Guy Kawasaki, Mr WordPress — Matt Mullenweg, Steve Rubel, Joi Ito, Arianna Huffington from the Huffington Post, Cory Doctorow from Boing Boing, Nicholas Carr from Rough Type and Anil Dash from Six Apart.
The list has a tech bias (my sphere of interest) and a US-bias (as Simon is based in the States and is the IMC US Country Manager). What do you think of the above suggestions? Are there any glaring ommissions? Are there other bloggers you can suggest from the US, or outside the US, that you would like to see come here?
Simon will be checking here to review all comments and suggestions. So please let’s have your suggestions right here, right now!
tags: Africa, Anil Dash, Arianna Huffington, Boing Boing, Brian Lam, Cory Doctorow, Craig Newmark, Dave Sifry, Graeme Addison, Guy Kawasaki, Huffington Post, IMC, International Marketing Council, Israel, Jeff Jarvis, Matt Drudge, Matt Mullenweg, Michael Arrington, Nicholas Carr, Richard MacManus, Robert Scoble, Rough Type, Ryan Block, San Francisco, Simon Barber, Steve Rubel, Technorati, United States, Washington DC, WordPress
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Blogging South African Innovation
The Brand South Africa team is planning to bring a group of top US bloggers to SA in November. The idea is to have them blog about what South Africans are doing that’s exciting, cutting-edge and not being done anywhere else. We’re looking for examples of innovation and creative problem-solving in areas such as energy, conservation, health, mining, transport, crime fighting, IT and mobile telephony. We won’t have unlimited time, so the less of it has to be spent in conference rooms watching Powerpoints the better. What we want to do is get the blogosphere buzzing at the great stuff that’s going on here but which isn’t necessarily making the headlines. Suggestions, please.
