South Africa’s brilliant 22-year-old 400m hurdler LJ van Zyl issued a gutsy warning when he defeated a world-class field at the IAAF Golden Gala meet in Rome’s Olympic Stadium on Friday night. His time of 48,24 seconds was a career best in a nail-biting finish against American Kerron Clement, 2007’s fastest runner.
Double amputee runner Oscar Pistorius of South Africa claimed second place in a 400m race at the Golden League stop in Rome on Friday. Pistorius, who wants to compete at the Beijing Olympics next year among the able-bodied stars, clocked 46,90 seconds in a B race at the meet, beaten only by Italian race winner Stefano Braciola.
South Africa continued to dominate swimming at the All Africa Games, winning five out of six gold medals on Friday. Amanda Loots won the women’s 50m butterfly in 27,60 seconds, Melissa Corfe the women’s 200m freestyle in 2:02,45, and Suzaan van Biljon the women’s 200m breaststroke in 2:32,30.
The arrival of an ageing midfielder at a struggling team currently second-bottom of the Major League Soccer western division should not have needed a club official to insist it was ”meant to be low key”. David Beckham’s first day in his new job as footballer, one-man-brand and international ambassador for LA Galaxy was, however, anything but.
Facebook is now scything through companies thanks to its compelling combination of MySpace, Flickr, forums and Friends Reunited, all done with a bit of taste. It was started at Harvard in 2004 and spread virally through universities and colleges, but two things have made Facebook the hottest thing on the web this year.
Last week, Microsoft announced a joint initiative with the British National Archives. There is concern that billions of public documents will soon be obsolete. Microsoft has stepped in to offer its "software virtualisation" solution, Virtual PC 2007, as well as a bunch of old operating systems. Isn’t it about time we had a similar endeavour for video games?
Disgraced media mogul Conrad Black faces a lengthy stretch in a United States jail after a court convicted him of looting millions of dollars from his Hollinger empire by embezzling funds from shareholders. After more than 70 hours of deliberation, a jury delivered verdicts of guilty on three charges of fraud and one charge of obstructing justice.
Swedish anti-copyright website the Pirate Bay has been targeted by police before — most notably last year when it was shut down for three days. But this week it survived a different sort of challenge, after reports emerged suggesting that officials in Stockholm were considering whether to add it to the country’s internet child-abuse blacklist.
Ben du Toit, a millionaire farmer jailed for 32 years for murdering his wife, wants to be released on parole and the chance to prove his innocence. This emerged in the Pretoria High Court this week when Du Toit sought an order to set aside a decision by the parole board at the Pretoria Central Prison, refusing to release him.
The mystery of the disappearance of millions of rands invested in manufacturing plants to produce biodiesel has deepened, despite a case in the Pretoria High Court this week. Three applicants on Friday sought a winding-up order against De Beers Fuel, the company that promised to produce biodiesel from algae.