obituary: ken kesey Fuelled by psychedelic drugs and dressed in a jester’s outfit, Ken Kesey, who has died aged 66 of liver cancer, embodied an ancient tradition of the Merry Prankster and became the protagonist of Tom Wolfe’s ground-breaking book, The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, but the work that will last is his darkly humorous […]

Lynda Gilfillan There’s a baby grand piano laden with candelabra and kitsch in a magical dining room in the middle of the great Karoo. Just when you thought you couldn’t face another Ultra City, and there’s no way you can turn back, because you’ve travelled 700km and there’s still 700km to go before you hit […]

David Shapshak The death of the desktop PC has long been prophesied by the technology industry, which is always conscious of the next big thing. First came the laptop, then the handheld computers, cellphones and gaming platforms. But the new hub of our increasingly digital homes may well be the fridge, certainly if Korea has […]

analysis Judith February Louis XIV’s financial adviser was once quoted as saying: “The art of taxation consists in plucking the goose so as to obtain the largest amount of feathers with the least amount of hissing.” Have we in South Africa come to the end of the road as far as major tax reform is […]

Five women have battled the odds and become successful entrepreneurs Thuli Nhlapo An age-old tradition and a pastime for herdboys in rural communities bee honey harvesting is becoming a thriving small-business activity that has diversified to produce other products such as candles and cosmetics. This is the success story of a group of women from […]

A SECOND LOOK Don Glass and Ruth Sack Imagine a place where creative, innovative and critical thinking is highly valued. Imagine a place where multiple ways of knowing are recognised, explored and celebrated. Imagine a place where you can learn about the heritage and cultural practices of your community and others, a place where you […]

Paul Kirk Between 1995 and 1996 the Ministry of Defence conducted a strategic defence review a stocktaking of the equipment the South African National Defence Force needs to acquire. The review presented a “force design” that amounted to little more than a wish list because, as the Department of Defence conceded, funding was unavailable. In […]

This system means cellphone users pay for data not time David Shapshak The failure of wireless application protocol (WAP) has dented the confidence of cellphone users who thought they could get the Internet on their phones. WAP promised a Web-like interface that would be ideal for small transactions and ticket purchases and for accessing information, […]

The latest discovery adds weight to the call for an inquiry into Swiss relations with the apartheid regime Evidence wa ka Ngobeni Former apartheid president PW Botha secretly awarded the highest national honours to Swiss industrialists for supplying the apartheid regime against a United Nations arms embargo with war matriel. Some details of the secret […]

Zenzile Khoisan Western Cape police chief Lennit Max this week refused to answer claims that he met National Intelligence Agency (NIA) officials as his detectives were gearing up to investigate an alleged cover-up by the same officials. The Mail & Guardian last week reported on an affidavit by Andr Lincoln, the suspended top policeman who […]