Facebook, Cape Town and the Monopoly Board

I am really not sure why but I freakin' want Cape Town to clean up this whole Monopoly Board thing.If you don't know what I am on about then let me briefly explain why I am writing this post. I was invited to join the Vote for Cape Town on the World Monopoly Board group on Facebook. I did, that was about two weeks or so ago.At that point there were under 100 people in the group and Cape Town was situated in the top gagillion for the Monopoly board. I then blogged the situation on SA Rocks and at the same time the Facebook group took off. Since I joined the group there have been more than 4000 people join and begin voting daily for Cape Town.The effect that this has had really impresses and astounds me. In fact it renews my opinion that Facebook can be a great place to rally and market around a product, point, belief etc etc.Cape Town has gone from nowhere to a peak of #8. We now site at a great #9 and will surely soon be climbing further. With over 4000 people voting daily for our success it is almost ensured at this point. With 25 days of voting left, if you haven't voted yet or haven't been voting all day I think it's best that you get started.In general I am absolutely blown away by the success that the Facebook group has had in such a short span. Let's hope that they can pick Cape Town up in to one of the top three spots. Then we'll be top on the Monopoly Board for a very long time to come.

A Parktown Prawn in my shoe

What a way to start off the day; A Parktown Prawn in my shoe. You know one of those moments when you realise that something is in your shoe with your foot. Denial kicks in and you are 100% certain of convincing yourself that its just the inner sole of the show.It wasn't. I took it off, shook it off and shook out a Parktown Prawn. I have blogged about them before. I hate them.My toe is sore, I'm sure it bit me. I doubt they can bite, but my toe is sore. Maybe it's all in my head, not in my toe?

Worried about terrorism? - The Facebook Advert

Well someone is and I would have bet you any money in the world they are either American or some smart dude targeting Americans. But I would've lost. The advert is Australian targeting Australians.Look at this piece of crap ass advert I found on Facebook:Clicking on the advert (which took some serious debate with myself to actually do) will take you to a site where some idiots book is up for sale. That idiot has a name: Tony Haigh.The books description:

From the author of the highly successful HOW TO SURVIVE A TERRORIST ATTACK IN AUSTRALIA, Tony Haigh brings together new counter-terrorism tactics and theories. - Including reviewing recent terror attacks, outcomes, terror tactics, what do if... scenarios and self-help. A must read for anybody worried about terrorism and want to do something about it.

And I thought we had scoundrels here in SA. This is such an incredibly low way to capitalise on fear. I would've sworn the Bush administration put this all together. What a crock of shit.

God hates Heath Ledger - He's in hell for sure!

Yes, I said it... wait, no, I didn't, Reverend "I'm-a-freak" Phelps from Kansas, USA said it.Fred Phelps is, at the very least, an extremist hater who is know for "preaching with slogans and banners denoting phrases such as "Thank God for 9/11", "God hates fags," "AIDS cures fags," and "Fags die, God laughs (or mocks)," and claims that God will punish homosexuals." - Wikipedia.WHAT THE HELL IS THE MORON SMOKING????Now not only are actual gays going to hell according to christians, but so are people who play them in movies and earn money? Is everyone who sins and earns money going to hell? If so, I'll see everyone on the planet there. Discrimination is surely a sin worthy of hell? Or have I lost the plot somewhere?Reverend Dipshit is surely going to be leading the pack in this place he calls hell (if there is such a wondrous and marvelous place to look forward to).Apparently on 702 last night this was the topic of conversation. There were some interesting points raised. One of which centred around taking all that the bible says and believe it all, blindly. Which I can understand. Either you believe it all or believe it not. A bit extreme but I can grasp it to some extent.Watch this:Now you look at that genius who is literally knocking on death's door and tell me you believe?I believe. I believe he is a fool who is destined to die and realise that he flushed his life down the toilet along with those of everyone who was following and listening to him.Let's see if you can handle another laughable quote from Phelpsy-Welpsy's church:

“God hates the sordid, tacky bucket of slime seasoned with vomit known as Brokeback Mountain – and He hates all persons having anything to whatsoever to do with it.”On FOX news, the Church’s spokeswoman, Shirley Phelps-Roper, explained the reason for picketing him was because he used the big screen to spread a message of lie by portraying that being gay is OK.“He got on that big screen with a big, fat message: God is a liar and it’s OK to be gay,” Ms Phelps-Roper said. - link

Sorry Rev "freak-on-a-leash" but I think that you have been mislead. Heath is comfortably chilling wherever it is that people think they go when they pass. The only person you are making uncomfortable and dooming is yourself.

Dispatches new site boosts blog ranking

This is interesting. Or at least I thought so.I noticed that the Dispatch has just launched their new website. The site features a massive focus on their blog, From the Trenches.In one day this has boosted them up the amatomu.com rankings.The incredible focus from their website's homepage has clearly made a difference. I think I'll try and track the improvement of the blog's ranking more long term. Interesting study for sure.Have a look at the spike:And here's the site:

ShaunOakes up for a bloggie award?

I am somewhat confuzzled and bemused.Let me start by saying congratulations to ShaunOakes.com for his nomination in the 2008 bloggies. As well as Tertia and Gladtobeagirl. Great work for SA and the SA bloggers!! I have asked all my SA Rocks readers to get over to the bloggies page and vote!!Now I have read shaunoakes.com before. Once or twice. Nothing more. Maybe I am stuck in a little SA blogosphere bubble but I tend to think of myself as well read and on the pulse of the sphere. In this case I missed out.Can someone explain to me how shaunoakes.com has been nominated as best African weblog of the year for the bloggies 2008? The key here is AFRICAN. I could maybe just understand or grasp the nomination if it were purely South African. But are you telling me that his blog is the best of what Africa has to offer? If so, let me know why and I'll change my mind, but I'm lost.I am not saying any of this to imply that I am any better, cause I'm not. At all in fact. I just want to understand the situation. Were the nominations not well received in general? Were the numbers low? Did Shaun's readers pull through and are they deceivingly high? That can't be the case because his blog is ranked below mine on Amatomu.com and I know that I am not doing particularly well in the whole participatory readership category. Or in the general readership for that matter!!I am also not saying that readership defines blog quality or how deserved a blog is for an award at all. It just interests me to know how Shaun managed to get nominated, what was the process, who voted, who said, who, who, who?Have a look:Below you see Tertia whipping my butt and shaun's butt. She has the readers to get the nominations.Then you can see Tertia whipping everyone's ass:Shaun's blog is friendly and arrogant to a degree (which I like). He strings together posts that are mixed, mismatched and a motley combination of funny, serious, satirical and other things. But I honestly cannot believe that this blog is up there with the best in Africa?Tertia I can understand. A long standing successful blog with proven potential and achievement. Great readership, participation and a focus throughout the entire blog, she is merciless with her blogging and rigorously sticks to a schedule. Understandable nomination.Shaun - if you have a tip for me, please let me know, cause I am interested to know how to get my readers to participate more in what I ask!Either way, whether I am blind, dumb or just plain biased I think it's great that there are a three SA blogs up for awards and I will be the very first person to email Shaun personally and congratulate him if he wins in the category.http://2008.bloggies.com/

8 F%$&ING things

Wow it's been a while since these tagging posts have gone round so I guess it was only a matter of time.Mike tagged Justin who tagged me. Joy. So here goes:1. I am an athiest... not a GO (Greek Orthodox).2. I went to a Catholic school where I was the first non-catholic Head Prefect in the schools history.3. Believe it or not, I played two years of first team rugby. I may be small but I be fast!!4. I am a pseudo-geek. The type of geek who hangs around geeks and tries to be a geek but has few geek qualities.5. Tattoos are addictive and I am an addict. I have three and am moving on to my entire left shoulder this year. Pictures will follow when the tattoo does.6. Both sets of grandparents had arranged marriages, I have been fortunate enough to avoid that tragedy so far!7. I have sadly never traveled to ANY African country outside of South Africa. yet I have visited almost every continent in the world.8. I am a capitalist through and through. Yet I often wonder if communism is the way forward.And one for good measure. I hate guns, with a passion. But I want to know how to use any and all types just in case.I'm not tagging anyone for this. If you want to do it, feel free. This is an open invitation.

I'm late so fuck you

This morning I really did try to do a nice thing in traffic. I was over road rage and had come to terms with the extensive time spent in traffic. I was chilling.Going up towards Sandton I saw a car struggling to cross the the road and get in to my lane in front of me. So I see the robot (traffic light) up ahead is red. I stop and flash him to cross over.The little red mini (if you know this story then I'm talking about you Mr Red Mini) behind me, with his toddler in a car seat next to him starts hooting at me. And carries on hooting at me.The robot is STILL red so we are losing no time there is nowhere to go and no harm is being done. But Mr Red Mini is still fucking hooting at me.Eventually the car crosses the road thanks to me being nice (I probably saved him 10 minutes on his trip - good deed done). But as we all know, no good deed goes unpunished. And punished I was. The moron behind me continued to hoot. So the robot turned green, I pulled up my handbreak and calmly asked him what the issue was. He started swearing at me as if I had ran him off the road. He told me he was late and that I was being a wanker. I simply tried to do something nice in the traffic and I got a big "FUCK YOU" back at me.I think I even mentioned that I was trying to do something nice and he told me not to do nice things in the traffic. Give me a break you idiot.I really need to say that this sort of behaviour pisses me off for two simple reasons.1. This man's child was next to him, balling his eyes out because his father is an idiot and swearing and being aggressive. That's traumatic for a child. What if I was an aggressive steroid bunny and got out of my car and smashed Mr Red Mini in the face. What would his child have done then?And 2. Do Not make your being late me problem. Because if you were an organised human being like myself you wouldn't need to swear at nice people like me in the traffic.Dick.

Guilt spam is the new black

Another great spam comment left on this blog:

sveta | mai1n@yandex.com | bestcamaro.info/eureka-tent | IP: 84.122.3.45Please, do not delete the given message. Money obtained from spam will go to the help hungry to children ugand.

Isn't that wonderful? Spammers are now giving their self-confessed spam money to children in ugand, not Uganda, but ugand. Wonderful, I feel better now, let's pollute the internet and my blog with your drivel.

Eskom saved me R40 000 yesterday

Believe it. It's true.I received a call on dodgy line yesterday at work. From an agency handling some paraphernalia production for me. I thought I heard 500 in total. What I had agreed to was 500 per promotion. This would have worked out to a whopping total of R40 000.That is well, well, well over what I had budgeted for and well over what we could afford ever.An hour later I frantically realised the error of my decision. Running around the office back to my desk, sliding in to my chair I made the call to the agency.The lady on the other side of the call sounded slightly flustered by a bit happy that I had caught her in time.What had happened? Eskom had magically saved me R40 000. The power went out two minutes before I called to change the order and the agency was unable to send of the order via email.For the first time ever I have to say: Thanks Eskom.

Crude but funny - nobody's a virgin

Laugh on the Inside

Yes, it's time to get rid of the LOL and replace it with the more honest, LOI (Laughing on the Inside).I have previously blogged about actually laughing when typing the LOL abbreviation. I have found my answer, take a look:This is the perfect summation of how I feel. Truth be told, I don't laugh out loud, I actually laugh on the inside. There, I said it.

Working overtime

It's really tough to do alot of things. Why? Because there are only so many hours in the day and there are only so many things you are allowed to do at work!Things go on and time gets made use of in the end.

Dilbert Widget oh so pretty

I couldn't help myself. I don't fall for random sidebar widgets, links and addons all that often. But look at it, it's really a well designed and pretty useful widget if you like Dilbert. Which I do.I read the Dilbert blog every day and get my daily dose of humour via the RSS for the comic. But I thought that it would be a nice colourful addon to my blog to pop the widget in the sidebar.This dude is smart. There are varying sizes for the widget depending on where you want to embed it. So pop over to the site, find a size that suits you, as we know one size does not fit all and bigger is not always better, and spread the Dilbert word now.

Are 30 second videos making us stupid?

I think they might be. We want more, faster, shorter, to the point with no detail.As much as I love YouTube and the length of video is often irrelevant I think that the 30 second nature of videos is somewhat problematic.We are bouncing from source to source disregarding integrity of information or authority of source for a quickfix.This is why I think sites like Big Think will become increasingly important. I am concerned for younger generations who are taking what they read, view and listen to online as gospel. For me this is problematic. In the same way that older generations might overlook the value of the Internet I think younger gens are taking it for granted. We cannot be made or led to believe that some of the absolute idiots on YouTube or other video sharing sites are capable of actually having a relevant and worthy opinion.Yes, Yes, I hear you saying that everyone's opinion is valid, but that's really just untrue. If Hitler spoke of equality he would have been disregarded in the same way that Mandela would've been if he spoke of supporting Apartheid. The voice, the message, the source and the integrity are all relevant and invaluable when deciding what to watch, what to listen to and what to believe.I think that 30 second videos might just be making me a bit slow!

Warning: Blog Load Shedding Taking place this week

This post serves as a warning that I might not be posting very much this week as my job is taking preference. Lots of things need to be done and in a very short spam of time.See you when I see you!!

Rough times

I'm Having a bad week. Everything seems to be beyond my control, nothing is really within my grasp and I feel properly bleak about things.

7 reasons why I DO blog

I just read Sessa's post and thought that I should compile my own response to his disdain for blogging. Here goes:1. I am a writer by nature and blogging is my outlet.2. Blogging has put me in touch with brilliant people and I am hoping there are still more.3. I love to engage in debate and get people riled up.4. I am earning enough money from blogging to warrant my blogs continuation.5. Blogging got me to where I am today so I am loyal to the practice.6. Reading blogs is one thing, I like to comment on blogs and people's opinions.7. Many of the most popular blogs in SA are hogswash and I think that is about to change.Stefano makes some great points and I think his seventh point is particularly interesting. However I maintain that blogging is not for everyone and is an extremely personal choice that one needs to make.For me it has become a lifestyle, sometimes it's more tough than others but on the whole I can't not blog.

Brilliant Axe advert - Get eaten like chocolate

Hahahahaha.

According to Nike football doesn't exist in Africa

For some reason today I visited kickoff.com. Nike has a massive banner advert across the top of the site.I found myself intrigued for some reason with this advert so I clicked on it. It took me to the nikefootball.com website.The strangest thing happened. I think the website broke as soon as I landed on the page because there is no Africa option on the site. They ask you to select a region and a language but sadly there is no way to choose Africa.Does Nike think that we don't have Internet down here in deep dark Africa? Do they think that we don't know what football is (or soccer) in Africa, can't afford an actual ball or did they not notice that little thing called the World Cup in 2010?This sort of junk really gets under my skin because it's not like we are some obscure little country in the world, THEY LEFT OUT AFRICA. In case you were wondering and didn't know this, Africa is actually an entire continent that is bigger than freakin' Europe (I think). How do you leave out an entire continent that is hosting it's first FOOTBALL WORLD CUP in 2010?Ridiculous and it pisses me off.