So I was sitting with my son the other day eating some Corn Flakes (still love ‘em) when I saw a blurb on the box:

Hmmm…

“Mom’s know best…” no need for an apostrophe there.
“Kelloggs Corn Flakes…” there is however a need for one here (it’s your own brand!).
“Childrens energy levels”  here too.

I don’t know what’s worse, that the mistakes appear at all, or that they appear in a sentence about improving your kid’s energy and concentration levels, “allowing them to perform at their best.”

Oh the irony…!

Mobile social network The Grid today launches Mobikasi, South Africa’s first geo-tagged documentary for cellphones, which explores youth culture in Soweto. Mobikasi utilises The Grid’s LBS (location-based service) capabilities to tag real-life physical locations and link them to relevant documentary content.

Users can explore Sowetan youth culture on their cellphones from anywhere in South Africa through The Grid’s map interface, or by physically touring the famous township and watching documentary clips on their phones at the locations where they were shot.

The location-based documentary looks at people, music, fashion, social issues and places of interest. Instead of showing the twenty-five minute documentary in a linear fashion from start to finish, Mobikasi splits the content up into twenty-five inserts of one minute each. Each one-minute clip covers a different topic that is relevant to the youth in Soweto and is
geo-tagged to the location where it was shot. This means that viewers can now explore Soweto’s vibrant youth culture by virtually “travelling” through a mobile streetmap of the township and stopping off at various locations to enjoy the one-minute video clips.

The first Mobikasi ‘episode’ features, among others, a street fashion crew called the Smarteez, music producers Hempza and Vikinduku, a popular hair braider named Anna and the reigning Miss Soweto, Rochelle Mothapo. Also featured are Soweto’s premier hangouts Sedibeng, Back Room and the popular Sunday buy-and-braai spot Panyaza.

Vodacom’s Executive Head of Mobile Advertising and Social Media, Rick Joubert, says, “Soweto is a very exciting space. There is always so much happening and it’s often the youth driving this forward.

“We didn’t want to do the usual ‘township tour’ to showcase The Grid’s new LBS technology. We wanted to give people and the rest of the world a glimpse into the future of South Africa and what is hot and happening at street level. What better way than to launch Mobikasi, the world’s first geo-tagged doccie for cellphones?”

How do I view Mobikasi?
Mobikasi can be viewed on The Grid through your cellphone or through The Grid website. To get onto The Grid, simply SMS ‘Mobikasi’ to 33313 (SMS charged at 50c, normal VAS rates apply) or visit wap.thegrid.co.za/mobikasi on your phone.

Once on The Grid, visit the Mobikasi group to watch the documentary clips and explore the excitement of Soweto youth culture.

Here’s the promo:

Mobikasi Promo Video from Cow Africa on Vimeo.

I wouldn’t mind seeing a few more of these around the world, rad way to explore from the comfort of your sofa…

The problem with the iPhone is the word following the i. You see the iPhone promises to be so much more than just a phone. It’d an iPod, a calender, an email device and much more.

Here’s where this becomes a problem.

Last week I bought an official iPhone, it was faulty out of the box (constantly displaying ‘no service’ messages). We took it to Vodacare and they admitted that the problem was common and that they would replace the phone. However, they said that it would take a week as they want to send my phone in to their workshop.

That’s the first WTF?!

This is no longer my problem, a common fault, on a brand new phone, replace it and deal with your issues later. This is also in violation of Apple’s warranty.

However nice guys that we are, we said that would be fine, provided we get a suitable loan unit. They said that the best that they could do was a low-end call only handheld.

That’s the second WTF?!

When they sold me an iPhone, they sold me a device that manages many aspects of my life. As people that deal with me a lot know, phone calls probably account for 10% of my usage, the balance being email, IM, iPod, PDA, and, ummm, twitter. This is what they need to replace.

The game has changed, phone’s are so much more than phones. The networks that sell these devices need to wake up and stay with the times….

…and I want a new, err, phone…!