In a case that could set limits on internet search engines, the French news agency AFP is suing Google for pulling together photos and story excerpts from thousands of news websites. Agence France-Presse said the Google News service infringes on AFP’s copyrights by reproducing information from the websites of subscribers of the Paris-based news wholesaler.
The Women’s Cricket World Cup got off to a soggy start on Tuesday when heavy rain descended over Pretoria, causing all four opening matches to be abandoned. At Supersport Park, a partnership of 90 between Shandre Fritz and Claire Terblanche restored South Africa’s fortunes, after Ireland appeared to have got the better of the home side.
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Supporters of President Robert Mugabe’s 25-year rule locked horns on Tuesday with opposition members in the only public campaign debate before the parliamentary elections on March 31. The stormy session, marked by catcalls and slow hand claps, ended with a walkout by members of Mugabe’s Zanu-PF party.
While changes in the rand-dollar exchange rate has increased the cost of living in South Africa, Johannesburg and Pretoria remain cheaper places to live than most Western and Asian cities. The finding was based on the results of The Economist Intelligence Unit’s (EIU) worldwide cost of living bi-annual survey.
The Brazilian police said on Tuesday that the country’s footballers were the target of a sophisticated extortion ring, after armed kidnappers snatched the mother of an overseas player: the second such abduction in a month. The local police said on Tuesday that they were still waiting for the kidnappers to make contact.
On the neo-Nazi websites where the teenage loner aired his admiration for Adolf Hitler’s notions of ethnic purity, he was known as Todesengel — German for Angel of Death. Late on Monday, in a secluded Indian reservation in northern Minnesota, he played out those dark fantasies.
The days of cheap treatments for millions of Aids patients around the world are coming to an end, health agencies warned on Tuesday night, after the Indian Parliament passed a Bill that makes it illegal to copy patented drugs. The practice of copying patented drugs has made medicines affordable for patients around the world.
Five South Africans were last month invited to address the first international conference on Restorative Justice and Peace in Colombia: Albie Sachs, Tutu, Penuell Maduna, Tokyo Sexwale and Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela. "One could say we were in Colombia as ambassadors of South Africa’s peaceful transition," writes Gobodo-Madikizela.
"Glorified secondary schools" is the derisive term coined by Nigerians to describe their country’s universities. Classrooms are overcrowded, with students sitting on the floor during lectures. Libraries lack books, and laboratories are ill-equipped to conduct experiments. And, just as facilities are decaying, so is the quality of education being received by students.
Journalists are the self-appointed custodians of the pot of public sympathy and they guard its apportionment jealously. To the good and virtuous they dole out rich, nourishing platefuls of comfort; to the undeserving, a grudging and watery dilution of feeling. Consider the very different treatment meted out by the media to Leigh Matthews and Annemarie Engelbrecht.