Orange signed to be be the main sponsor of CAF for 8 years. The competition will then be referred to as Orange Africa Cup of Nations till 2016. Through this deal, Orange has exclusive “new media” right of the game as well as TV and Mobile rights in France.

Orange has announced that it will be streaming the 8 of the 32 matches of the 2012 Orange Africa Cup of Nations through this link. The competition will also be the 28th since when it was launched and will be held in Gabon from tomorrow (21st January).

After the opening ceremony, there will be a match between Equatorial Guinea and Libya which will be the first live match of the tournament through Orange’s website.

The Independent Communications Authority of SA (ICASA) said yesterday that it has gone to court in a bid to stop Pay TV operator,  TopTV, from launching South Africa’s first 24-hour pornography channel.

ICASA’s spokesman Paseka Maleka said that ICASA lodged the application on Monday and TopTV was suppose to file an answering affidavit by Tuesday. Top TV and ICASA are scheduled to meet in court on Friday January 13th for the preliminary hearing of the application.

ICASA has refused to grant TopTV the approval certificate required before an operator can commence broadcast of a channel.

Some religious organisations and the Family Policy Institute planned to boycott TopTV  its advertisers and sponsors if it went ahead with the launch..

HP is rumoured to have chosen P-Unit to be the face of the brand in Kenya as the PC maker struggles to shed the corporate image and appeal to the masses. The endorsement deal which will be signed tomorrow (15th Dec 2011) at HP offices in Upper Hill will range in the millions according to sources privy to the whole deal.

This would a first in the region for a major ICT player to have local celebrity as product ambassador. Lets wait till tomorrow to get details of the deal.

After 5 months since the official launch of Zuku TV in Nairobi, the company has announced that it has reached over 35,000 subscribers.  Zuku provides Pay TV service and has launched successfully in 3 East African markets namely: Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania in less than 5 months.

I love my Zuku TV and the offerings. I also believe that I am well insulated against the exploitative nature of Multichoice which pegs the rates on USD while there is no tangible reason why that should be. Just paying for content in USD is no reason enough for Kenyans to be exploited by Multichoice.

The brand has been a favorite of consumers residing out of Nairobi, increasing TV penetration in the country. Zuku TV plans to offer its service to consumers in 11 countries across Africa including; Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Eritrea, South Sudan, Rwanda, Burundi, Djibouti, Malawi and Somalia. Already the brand is available in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania with a planned launch in the rest of the countries in the course of next year.

Pay TV penetration in the countries it is targeting is presently at less than 1%. Zuku TV offers a selection of entertainment channels covering news, sports, movies, documentaries and music. These include various 3rd party channels such as BBC, MTV Base, Setanta Sports, MGM Movies and E to name but a few.

The provider also offers many of its own tailor-made channels such as Zuku Africa airing African content, Zuku Life airing documentaries, Zuku Sports as well as a number of themed movie channels. The service is available via satellite throughout Kenya.

Wananchi Group Holdings, which owns the Zuku Brand, has said that in the past three years,it has invested over Kshs. 14 billion towards building the business which includes PayTv, broadband internet and VoIP services.

Tanzania becomes the third country Zuku after the September launch in Uganda and August launch in Kenya. Zuku provides great premium entertainment at affordable rates. I only don’t like the fact that special features like creating reminders for shows in not possible in the current platform.

Apart from the Zuku Classic and Premium, Zuku also targets the Asian community with the Asia Classic and Asia premium bouquets in the offerings. It costs slightly more to get the Asia bouquets. The cheapest bouquet, Zuku Classic, cost Ksh 999 in Kenya and Tsh 20,000 in Tanzania

“In the ten countries we are targeting, pay TV penetration is presently at less than 1% and we recognize that there is a need for affordable quality content which is suitable for the entire family. We also recognize that customers’ tastes and needs are evolving and there is greater pressure on companies to provide affordable quality products which offer value for money. Our Zuku TV offerings have therefore been designed to cater to meet this need,” noted Wananchi Group CEO, Richard Bell.

Zuku TV offers a wide selection of entertainment channels covering news, sports, movies, documentaries and music. These include various 3^rd party channels such as BBC, MTV Base, Setanta Sports, MGM Movies and E to name but a few. The provider also offers many of its own tailor-made channels such as Zuku Africa airing African content, Zuku Life airing documentaries, Zuku Sports as well as a number of themed movie channels.

Earlier this year Wananchi Group raised $57.5 million in growth from a group of international investors which is going towards supporting the roll out of Satellite services in 10 countries. Zuku TV is expected provide numerous employment and business opportunities to Tanzanians through its distribution network.

I followed the launch of Google’s new product “Google Music” with keen interest. From my initial experience after the launch, I have come to the conclusion that Google Music is not close to even being an iTunes killer. It is still in the 90s and just cant match the power and cool experience iTunes gives.

All-in-all, I was able to access it from Kenya by using tricks I always employ to view the restricted web offerings. One of the tricks I employ on such situations is to use an Open VPN software to “cheat” the web servers that I am based in USA. You can download the Open VPN software from the net easily.

One such app is Tunnel Bear. The other is Hotspot Shield or TOR. You can also use the programs if you believe that someone is monitoring your web activities from countries like Syria, Egypt, Iran and wherever.

With the Open VPN software, I have been able to gain access to Hulu, Spotify, Pandora and any geo-restricted website you can imagine. I even follow programs like EastEnders on BBC iPlayer.

So what is Google Music ?

• Google Music is  “a broader platform” that lets users find and purchase their favorite music and share them with friends.
• Significant difference with iTunes is that Google Musicwill give you access to more than 20,000 music tracks for free.
• Google Music lets you upload the music to the cloud and the access it on all the supported devices.
• The service is free of charge and all can access it by going to music.google.com.
• Once your music is uploaded or purchased you’ll be able to pin it to various devices (like your Android phones) and then use the  device to listen to the pinned tracks even offline.

If you want to access the Google Music service from an iPad, check the Hotspot app on the iOS store.

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Uganda’s latest home entertainment pay television service, Zuku TV, has set high ambitions for the Uganda market. Having launched and set in place an elaborate countrywide distribution and customer service network, Zuku believes it is confident of breaching the One hundred thousand subscriber mark in Uganda within the first two years.

Zuku TV is ramping up Ugandan distribution by boosting the team of resellers with additional agents that will complement the Simba Telecom outlets. The company has completed a training module for 150 agents who will work with Simba and installation team to deliver the product to customers doorstep and provide after sales support.

Wananchi group CEO, Richard Bell, said that Zuku was uniquely positioned in the Ugandan market as a truly dedicated African service made by Africans for Africa. “For the first time in the history of Uganda’s film and television industry, the local producers and creative writers have a platform to showcase their work not just for audiences in Uganda but across ten eastern African countries,” he noted.

Zuku is looking for more local content after recently starting to screen the popular ‘Hostel’ series. The company will try to help clients manage the power problems in most parts of Uganda by introducing decoders which can run on Wet Cell (Car Battery).

There are DSTV subscribers and there are also real DSTV subscribers. The real ones are the ones who buy decoder and set up connection at home, office or in their business premises but the simple DSTV subscribers aka cable pirates are the ones who actually buy a a full DSTV set but make money out of it through illegally connecting other users by looping. They invest in modulators, receivers and cable hubs just for that purpose. The police knows not much about them but just go through Jamhuri, Highrise, South B, Ngummo, South C and any middle-class estate and you will just realise what kind of complicated world of crooks we live in.

The connection happens mostly with the knowledge of DSTV installers or even their help and like in one neighbour-hood I know, it is police officers who owns such establishments. So DSTV did pull the SuperSport plug on them recently and made it impossible to distribute the SuperSport channel to others through cable. But to defeat the system, the cable pirates bought new decoders and got the business going.

Today the pirates have all been disconnected and we sought to inquire from Multichoice Kenya General Manager, Mr Stephen Isaboke, after two of them called me to ask what was happening. Looping cables without proper authority is stealing and MultiChoice Kenya will not fail to act on such. Mr Isaboke added that the Kenya Copyright Act treats the the offence as a civil and not criminal offence which is wrong in away since it should be a criminal offence.

DSTV has a package for home user or Single User Decoders (SUD), Public Viewing package and apartment packages. The SUD is where the users buys a decoder and dish and get set at home which a Public Viewing Package is for businesses like Pubs, restaurants, Sporting Clubs and Resorts while the apartment package if where an apartment owner installs a single dish which will be accessed by a cable run through all the suites in the apartment.

The cable pirates have been connecting clients to the DSTV network allowing them access for even up to 25 premium channels like MNET, SuperSport, Movie Magic, MTV, History, NatGeo and Discovery for as low as Ksh 500 a month.

DSTV recently introduced a package where sports lovers could access the premium sports channels for as low as Ksh 900. The pulling off-air of the cable TV vendors by DSTV will lead to a good number of subscribers not being able to watch their TV.

Zuku TV has today announced that it was ramping up its roll out in Uganda with the acquisition of broadcast rights for a hugely popular Ugandan TV Drama series, Hostel. Richard Bell, Chief Executive Officer of Wananchi Group (Zuku TV holding company ) confirmed that the Zuku TV has secured broadcast rights for airing the national football match between Uganda Cranes and the Iraqi national team.

Both teams are set to play a friendly match in preparations for their FIFA World Cup qualifiers. The match will be exclusively aired under the Zuku Sports menu on Friday August 26^th at 9.30 pm East African time. The match is historical to the Iran because it will be their first home fixture in nearly ten years.

The match is scheduled to be staged in the northern city of Arbil at the 28,000 capacity Franso Hariri Stadium.

“This is the first of a series of exciting live viewing and event coverage that we are going to be showing on our platform as we seek to be the preferred home entertainment provider,” he said noting that it demonstrated the Zuku TV commitment towards delivering valuable content.

Bell noted that Zuku TV had now reached a holistic national rollout phase in Uganda after a highly successful pilot and soft launch phases.

He noted that Zuku TV would also air UBC, NTV Uganda and Bukudde TV initially as the free to air channels that will be available as Ugandan content but pointed out that the potential for growth of a locally produced content industry remained large.

“Uganda’s pay TV market penetration is still under 1% which presents a huge growth sector for Zuku TV. We believe that Pay TV today is what mobile phone telephony was nearly a decade ago and as we witness a growing middle class, there is definitely hunger for valuable, affordable home entertainment,” he said adding that the population of households with television sets was expected to hit the 9.6 million mark in 2015.

In addition to pricing the Zuku TV offering in local currency the Zuku TV decoders are designed to be used in places without electricity.

“Zuku TV decoders are designed to use DC electrical supply from a used car battery,” Bell added.

Kenya Premier League side, AFC Leopards is said to be in the process off launching a TV station through the Smart TV network. The launch which is slated for Wednesday 10th August might be a first in the region for a club. Clubs like UKs Arsenal and Manchester United all owns TV stations featuring club fixtures and related activities. The TV station will be called Ingwe TV. Dan Kagwe, the Smart TV CEO, has confirmed this saying that it will be a change in sports broadcasting in the country.

There is unlikely to be any clash with Supersport since the Ingwe TV might not air any Live matches yet.  AFC leopards is one of the oldest soccer clubs in Kenya having won the Kenya Premier League title 13-times. Smart TV promises to have 90% local content.

Zuku officially launched on Friday during a spectacular party held at the Junction Mall rooftop. The party, attended by all industry partners as well as members of the public, marked the launch of Wananchi’s satellite service Zuku TV and the re-launch of the groups cable offering Zuku Triple play.

Wananchi Group Chairman Mark Schneider pressed down on a remote setting off a montage about Zuku on all the screens within the area, followed by a brilliant fireworks display and dance performance to the delight of all the guests.

“We’re proud and excited to be launching Zuku TV in Kenya,” said Richard Bell, Wananchi Group CEO. “It is a great milestone for us and we are pleased to be able to provide quality home entertainment for all.”

Zuku TV offers a wide selection of entertainment channels covering news, sports, movies, documentaries and music. These include various 3rd party channels such as BBC, MTV Base, Setanta Sports, MGM Movies and E to name but a few. The provider also offers many of its own tailor-made channels such as Zuku Africa airing African content, Zuku Life airing documentaries, Zuku Sports as well as a number of themed movie channels. The service is available via satellite throughout Kenya. Wananchi’s cable offering, Zuku Triple play offers high speed broadband, cable TV and VoIP all under one affordable bundle.

“Competition is good for the market as well the end consumer,” said Information Minister Samuel Poghisio during the launch. “We are proud to see a Kenyan company has taken the initiative to provide quality pay TV and communications services to the masses. It’s a very good step from the communications industry and we hope to see more from the Wananchi Group.”

Zuku TV will be officially launched tomorrow. The company expects to launch bouquets of up to 80 channels for as cheap as Ksh 2,000. Kenyans have expressed the need to have a strong competition locally to the DSTV monopoly which looks exploitative.

But the Multichoice network is not taking the Zuku TV challenge lying down. The President of MultiChoice Africa, Collins Khumalo, will lead a high powered delegations into the country next week. We don’t know what the mission is but we expect lots engagement with the local media and also other key stakeholders.

You know competition is great. When DSTV recently boycotted Gor Mahia matches, they were later forced to eat humble pie and come begging for the chance to screen the matches as the club was being sweet talked by Zuku TV and Smart TV. The same happened recently when we had Zuku TV and KTN screen the LIVE rugby matches from Nyayo Stadium as DSTV was still bragging how important they were to Kenyan sports.

Today, the compaany is announcing that it is introducing an extra channel named SelectSport which will screen LIVE  matches from major European and Africa leagues to all subscribers including the DSTV Access, Compact and Family bouquets. With Zuku introducing bundled Pay TV and Broadband access for just Ksh 2,000, DSTV is really scared.

The SelectSport  channel will be available from August 1st and will not attract any further charges. Most Kenyans have been complaininng of the charges of DSTV services considering that the Kenyan government through KBC holds a good chunk of Multichoice Kenya shares.

The recent incident where Multichoice Kenya also cried how they thought that they needed to tame some fans was also not received well since most Kenyans have seen the exclusive granting of DSTV the right to KPL matches prohibitive and a move which only deny the average Kenyan access to watch their favourite teams.

Other African countries have also complained to DSTV on the priority they give to South Africans above other markets in launches of new products. DSTV has launched the Drifta and the BoxOffice services which are yet to reach most African countries.

The DStv Access bouquet, with 35 channels goes for a monthly subscription of Ksh. 800 . The DStv Family is available at a monthly subscription fee of Ksh. 2,000 with up to 50 channels. On the other hand, the DStv Compact is available at a monthly subscription of Ksh. 2,500 with over 60 channels.

DSTV Premium subscribers in South Africa can now rent Blockbuster Movies from the comfort of their homes. The Pan-African Pay Tv provider has today launched the Video-On-Demand service. The service, named Box Office, allows for qualifying subscribers to download movies straight onto their PVR decoders at R25 in HD or SD format and watch at their convenience.

A release on DSTV SA website reads;

The BoxOffice service will be rolled out in several phases. The first phase is today’s launch of a satellite-based value added offering to DStv Premium subscribers via their PVRs. The next phase of the BoxOffice roll-out will be an online offering, available to all South African broadband users by the end of this year.

Using the service is easy: Press the green button on your PVR remote and follow the steps on your television screen. BoxOffice movies are readily available for viewing, as they are pre-loaded onto your PVR decoder.

Payment is done through monthly debit order, by pre-loading funds into your account or by credit card. Once a movie is rented, it can be viewed multiple times within a 48-hour period. For launch, the first BoxOffice movie will be free.

A maximum of 15 movies will be available at any one time, with new movies added as they are released for the BoxOffice service by Studios. The number of movies is limited due to storage constraints on the current PVRs. Approximately 150 blockbuster movies from most of the major Hollywood studios will be released on the BoxOffice service during the course of a year. Studios generally release VOD movies in a similar timeframe as they become available for home DVD rentals.

John Kotsaftis, CEO of DStv Online; “BoxOffice positions DStv as a front-runner in the VOD market in South Africa. This service aligns South Africa with global developments in on-demand video. Offering a VOD service via satellite initially, allows us to make it widely and instantly available to our subscribers, regardless of constraints in broadband availability in South Africa.”

This service will be launched to DStv Premium subscribers with PVRs from Friday, 22 July 2011, at an introductory price of R25 per title.

Most of the innovative DSTV products are rolled out in SA before elsewhere in Africa. The company also plans to roll-out the service to its PC and tablet users by end of the year. We asked DSTV when other African countries should expect to enjoy the service and we were told that this is a phased roll-out which might come other markets later.

CCK has awarded Kenyan digital broadcasting signal distribution license to  Pan African Network Group (PANG), a company with some Chinese shareholding. Major shareholder of PANG are Star Times of China. Nation Media Group and Royal Media formed part of a local  consortium to bid for the signal distribution tender.

NMG and Royal Media went immediately for the throat of CCK accusing it for many things including awarding tender to Chinese dictators, disqualifying locals on “minor technicalities” among other things. It was all propaganda war last witnessed during the campaign against the Kenya Media Bill in 2008. Many journalists and media personalities were forced to participate in the protest without reading the fine draft well yet the draft fought for the betterment of the life of the same journalists while only regulating the filth which has been spewing from the local media which benefits no one but the owners of the media.

Nobody in Kenya has control of media as much as Agha Khan through NMG and businessman Macharia through Royal Media Services. Any small move by anyone including other media houses to snatch control of the same has been resisted by all means including bribing politicians, government officials and strong propaganda wars. The same weapons are being used against CCK and Ministry of Information.

Five other competitors in the signal distributions were National Signals Network, Africa Link Agencies, Mayfox Limited, Signal Distributors Ltd and Globecast Africa.

The signal distribution license is awarded on conditions like;

• That it will be on an open access platform
• The distributor must have national coverage
• The investor must show proof of resources or funding needed for putting up the national infrastructure

These conditions were the ones to be met. Nowhere in the conditions did you see that CHinese must not participate. The cries from Nation and Royal Media are not specific and are very selfish indeed. The National Signals Network fronted by Nation and Royal Media failed even to raise the 120 bid bond. Now how can the CCK favour even participants who cant meet tender conditions. The consortium had an upper hand on all these but they failed even the basics like submissions. Again the claims the Chinese government will dictate Kenyan media are just hogwash.

In the whole signal distribution business, it is about the distributor providing a vehicle for content distribution and not determining the content. Control and Regulations still remains with CCK. It is stupid that every time NMG and Royal Media loose a deal in the country then they will resort to propaganda to get their way. Thinking of rallying MPs behind them while ignoring the dispute resolution procedures just shows you how much impunity is entrenched in Nation Media and Royal Media Groups.

The same Nation Media and Royal Media consortium wants us to advertise the tender internationally while they don’t want to mention that they would rather some races, cultures, tribes and nationalities don’t participate. They claim many things against “the Chinese” while they have not launched a campaign to stop them from building Kenya’s roads, rails, telecommunications and housing infrastructure. In fact in all of the areas, they have praised them. On Daily nation of 20th July 2011, the first page photo of Likoni Ferry was taken from Chinese’s Xhinua News agency. Why copy paste photos of Kenyan situation from Chinese government controlled news agency and claim the tyranny of China?

The Same media houses also have continually praised CNN for giving awards to their journalists while they have failed to reward the same journalists. Just today Citizen has been showing COKE reward journalists who won CNN awards. All the media houses have run full page adverts showing how superior they are on the basis of CNN award while there is nothing they have done locally to recognise the journalists who have worked against all odds to deliver great content. You can’t claim “colonialism” while embrace another colonialist.

If Nation Media Group and Royal Media Services wants us to believe that they have faith in the rule of law, why cant they just go to court and lay their case down? I don’t know who the PANG are but I believe in the due process.

I have talked even to journalists who did the story against PANG for the two media houses and what they tell me is that they are being pushed by their employers and they even see it not right that the employers are fighting on non issues while they were beaten in a fair game. Speaking to sources at CCK and Ministry of Information, I get it that there is no turning back on the tender.

NMG and Royal are fighting on this license while there were two licenses to be awarded and one has not been awarded because none of the other competitors fully met the tender conditions. Let NMG and Royal fight for the third license and not engage in trivality when they can’t even compete. This is IMPUNITY.

We met with the group behind the Tinga Tinga tales at the ongoing AITEC Africa’s Broadcast and Film Conference. We engaged them in a chat and we heard of their successes and tribulations in the industry. The funny bit was what challenges they were facing. They had to pay Citizen TV to show their animations.

Safaricom stepped in and covered the media cost. They are willing to do much including 3D animation but it is expensive for them. These are the people who should be getting government recognition and not some lazy drunkards lounging at iHub.

Watch the Video but forgive us for the poor sound quality;

Click here to view the embedded video.

We did cover the DSTV Drifta launch and availability in South Africa. We have been following the development in Kenya. We hear that the launch is very soon. David mentioned that Kenya, Ghana, Nigeria and Uganda might get the service on Wednesday (1st June). I have just confirmed from a source within DSTV Mobile Kenya and they say that the launch is not this week leave alone 1st June.

DSTV Mobile Kenya are located in Upper Hill, separate from Multichoice Kenya offices which are located in Westlands. In Kenya, we have just confirmed that the Drifta dongle will be initially available to DSTV Premium bouquet subscribers for free for some period before being rolled out to other users.

We are scouring places for more details which we will share as we get them. What do you think of the packaging of the dongle with the premium bouquet? Would you love to have one? Leave your comments below.

I love free things especially when we challenge the corporates using technology. With Safaricom giving you 100 Mbps home connection and Zuku also pouring broadband in Nairobi, you lack what you can do with it. Today, ManU and Barca are playing the UEFA Champions League finals and you can easily watch the match online if you are stuck in the office or somewhere with the internet only.

My best source of free online live sports is MyP2P website. There you can get to watch almost any sport you can imagine. I discovered it through some USA based friends whom we compete with in following NBA games. On the website www.myp2p.eu you will choose Live Sports then click on Football and the scroll to look for UEFA Champions League .

On your far right there is a TV-like link. CLick it and choose the station you want to watch it from. Ok! To make matters easier for you, here is the link of all the channels. You can also try this link. Or Sky Sports Link. Some of the links you will need to pay.

Be careful what links you click from the channels as free things sometimes comes with phony links. What do you think? Leave your comments below.

A great breakfast briefing by Wananchi Group CEO (Richard Bell) and the Chairman and other board members were present. Laid out were the past, the present and future outlook of the company. The greatest announcement out of the briefing was that Wananchi Group is launching Satellite TV in the market.

First, the Group has received Ksh 5  Billion from a group of investors and this brings the total investments by various investors into the company at Ksh 14 The Wananchi Group announced on Tuesday that it would launch satellite pay-tv services in Kenya in the next thre Billion. The new investors are Liberty Global Inc, Oppenheimer Funds and Sarona Asset Management which is a Canadian-based emerging market fund manager seeking impact investments. East Africa Capital Partners (EACP) and Emerging Capital Partners which is a leading Pan-African privte equity firm with $1.8 Billion in capital under management.

Wananchi will be rolling out direct-to-home satellite TV in 10 countries of East Africa. i.e Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Eritrea, South Sudan, Burundi, Malawi and even the lawless Somalia. Mr Bell, CEO Wananchi Group, says that the company will not be focusing on DSTV market which is not mass market. The mass market needs affordable yet quality technology according to Mr Bell. Already the satellite TV is at testing phase.

The satellite coverage in Africa is as illustrated in the map below

The group is also rolling out triple-play out and will not ignore any area of Nairobi in the initial phase and will roll countrywide and then regionally in subsequent phases. Wananchi claims to be the only company in Africa to have initiated triple-play rollout. e months as it seeks to increase its market share. Wananchi has corporate and consumer arms in East Africa. The consumer arm operates under the Zuku brand while the corporate division operate under the SIMBANet brand.

When I prodded Mr Bell on what the company was doing on the poor redundancy and customer care through the Zuku brand, he promised that the feedback from the tech community has been so helpful and has made them improve a lot of things. Mr Bell said that you can be assured of faster response the next time you call Zuku customer care. The company is also keen in buying and producing local content unlike competitors who bombard us with foreign content.

Mr Bell also revealed that the hiring of Robert Mugo from Safaricom was meant to address the various weaknesses in the network. When I asked him what he thought of the competitors delivering 100 Mbps, he said that Wananchi has a DOCSIS 3.0 network which is able to deliver upto 120 Mbps in not so far future. So Safaricom and Jamii should be ready for very fierce competition in the broadband sector.

Samsung is showing how popular the SMART TV is. Though still young and only with more than 550 Apps, the Apps Store today reached another milestone, according to a blog post. The apps in the store have seen downloads in excess of 5 million. You can access the app store from any of the available Samsung LED Smart TVs already even being sold in Nairobi (former SONY centre on Kimathi street opposite corner house).

The growth is encouraging since, according to Samsung, the store reached its first million in about 9 months, 11 months to reach 2 million and about 14 months to reach the 5 download million mark. The apps works in more than 120 countries and the most popular are the usual; YouTube, Google Maps, AccuWeather, Cave of Hades, Twitter, dynamic bowling etc.

Samsung also launched a 3D video-on-demand service couple of months back to allow users enjoy 3D content. More than 100,000 apps are downloaded every 4 days from the SMART TV app store.

Wael Ghonim

Wael Ghonim, the Egyptian Google Executive who started the Facebook revolution which toppled Mubarak recently had a very interesting interview with Jon Snow of Channel4News. In the interview, Wael talked about “Wael the person” saying that the screen barrier brings out his bravery. He also says that the revolution should neither be called a Facebook revolution or an Arab spring. It should be called Arab Revolution. Wael was appearing at Google’s European Zeitgeist 2011.

Watch the interview below

If you are in Kenya, Raspberry Wedding Magazines, The Junction Shopping Centre, Samsung Electronics, Majestic Events, Flowers by Cathy 4 and Multichoice are bringing you the event live. Tomorrow there will b what has been called the wedding of the year, between British Royalty Prince William and Kate Middleton in London. But right here in Kenya, the six leading local firms have joined forces to host a public screening of the golden event at the Junction Shopping Mall.

The event will be beamed on the latest Samsung LED TV screens at the venue between 10:30 am and 4pm tomorrow courtesy of DSTV and Raspberry Weddings Magazine . The firms target local brides to be, wedding industry players, fashion designers and curious shoppers. Just look for the Atrium at Junction Shopping Centre. The organisers says the event is open to all brides and shoppers at the mall.

First, don’t be jealous. It was arms length but I can assure you that Amileena is such a darling. Ok! Back to blogging and stopping to have dreams and building castles in the air. I had a chance to meet to Amileena Mwenesi and Steve Nyabwa who were some of the top contestants in the Tusker Project Season 4. I grabbed them, put them down and demanded to know their views about social media and entertainment in Kenya and how they were finding it.

I found the duo easy to talk to and they were very much honest. Twitter is still not their thing and they have not started to advertise and look for engagement through Facebook where they have a presence. BTW. Amileena and Steve are managed under the Stamina (Steve and Amileena) brand.

The Video

Click here to view the embedded video.

What do you think of the opinions of Amileena and Steve on Twitter and Facebook?

The Creative Content Task Force in Kenya today launched an awareness campaign named Mzuka. It will help sensitize the creative sector,its players, business prospects and investors on the residual capacity and economic potential. According to analysts, the sector is worth Ksh 25 Billion which is a substantial amount of the Kenyan GDP.

Mzuka also seeks to establish Kenya as the hub of creative content generation in the region across the Africacontinent. The Task force has already set out a definition of the Creative Content industry in Kenya. It is the digital animation (visual effects & soundeffects), broadcast (TV, Radio and film production), visual arts, digital media (mobile apps and internet),publishing, gaming, performing arts and cultural expression.

The Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Information and Communications, Dr Bitange Ndemo formed the Creative Content Task Force in January 2011. The awareness campaign dubbed “Mzuka” main objective is to create a framework for formal recognition of the industry and its sub-sectors.

A key agenda of the Taskforce is creating a formal physical space for the sector’s players to be able to collectively harness the global creative economy trade, providing a platform for exchange of information, encourage collaboration through the registration of viable commercial units that service clients, locally,regionally and globally. The Taskforce is currently working on having the industry mainstreamed in the economy of the country and recognized as a key contributor to opening up the “new economy”, for thethousands of talented university and high school graduates.

Financial and Investment advisors, bankers were invited to the event, to give them an appreciation of the inherent economic potential of the industry.The Task force is also working on formal classification and mapping of all the current players in the local creative industry established, to help catalyze trade opportunities and accelerate knowledge and content sharing. The launch event involved stakeholders from the creative industry across all platforms includingbroadcasting, film, music, digital media, visual effects, events, gaming and publishing.

A nation’s socio-cultural growth and development is another major benefit associated with a vibrant creative content industry. If well nurtured, the sector can be used to foster social cohesion and provide a base for positive exploitation of the cultural diversity in Kenya.“Global exports of creative goods and services — products such as arts and crafts, audiovisuals, books, design work, films, music, new media, printed media, visual and performing arts, and creative services — more than doubled between 2002 and 2008, the report notes. The total value of these exports reached US $592 billion in2008, and the growth rate of the industry over that six-year period averaged 14%.”

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