David Shapshak

The Internet is unlikely to replace traditional classroom-based education for sometime yet but it is an extensive and valuable resource. This was the conclusion of a group of 16 teachers, educational publishers, parents and learners who got together to examine several of the country’s top education websites. The evaluation, at the Hof Street eCentre in […]

If the mix is right, sports can be an extremely lucrative market for a publisher. David Shapshak looks at the newspapers and magazines favoured by the fans.

How do you introduce first world computer and Internet technologies into the rural heartland of a developing country? You don’t. You introduce appropriate technology to suit the circumstances and users. In Limpopo’s Mogalakwena municipality, this is the guiding principle behind the launch of the HP i-community.

The new Multimedia Rural Initiative is attempting to surmount the various difficulties in training teachers in rural areas, overcoming obstacles such as distance and the lack of telecommunications infrastructure.

It may be little consolation to the victims of the online identity thefts whose Absa accounts were defrauded but they are in illustrious company — among the likes of Steven Spielberg and Oprah Winfrey whose ‘identities’ were stolen.

Because consumers generally carry their cellphones with them there has been a lot of speculation that the device could emerge as the next major way to access the Internet and to make or verify payments.

The success of Apple’s iTunes Music Store, where music fans pay to listen to their favourite tunes, has cheered Big Music, the five major labels that backed it in a trial run in the United States by making 200 000 songs available.

The world’s largest information technology merger is over, but analysts remain sceptical about how the new-look Hewlett-Packard will fare against competitors IBM and Dell.

In a week Apple has managed to do more than the entire music industry in a year. When it launched an online music service that uses its iTunes music management software, eyebrows were raised at what was seen as an attempt to distribute music over the Internet in the face of rampant piracy.

The Internet is infiltrating every electronic appliance in our homes — and the television set is the next target.

As a journalist for 40 years and editor for some of them, I am concerned about the stated intentions of the new owner of the Mail & Guardian, Trevor Ncube ("Africa’s best read charges into the future," July 26). There is no argument that the paper needs to be commercially viable, but his editorial ideas are another matter.

I read the article "The making of a man" (July 19). I am a Xhosa man who, like the anonymous author of the article, got initiated the traditional way.

Once again South Africa has cause to be embarrassed by its leaders at the 14th International Aids Conference in Barcelona. It is time for Minister of Health Manto Tshabalala-Msimang to resign. She clearly not only does not understand much about HIV/Aids, its treatment, prevention and care, but she has forgotten that government ministers are employed by the people who voted for them.

One of the biggest computer revolutions of the 1990s remained hidden from most consumers, in spite of being extensively used by anyone who worked for a large company.

It seems more than fortuitous that Mbongeni Ngema’s rabidly racist song, AmaNdiya, saw the light of day in an atmosphere of crisis in Zulu politics: Minister of Home Affairs Mangosuthu Buthelezi is struggling to maintain his authority in his ministry and in the Cabinet. This came to a head on the debate around the Immigration Bill, the most important piece of legislation in Buthelezi’s tenure.

Long before I began using iPhoto I had heard it described as the final piece of the puzzle in the new Unix-based Apple operating system, known as OS X (as in the Roman numeral 10).

It has taken 20 years to sell a billion PCs. The next billion are expected to be sold over the coming five or six years. The phenomenal growth of the personal computer has been driven by three forces, the first of which was the decision by IBM, then maker of the dominant mainframe computers, to license the manufacture of two key elements of personal computers in the early 1980s — the software and the microprocessor.

I found your article on Deputy President Jacob Zuma’s views of oral sex ("Does oral sex really suck?" June 21), quoting so-called sex experts and Hillbrow prostitutes, misleading.

Learning a new language is difficult, but it can be much easier if done interactively, in "conversation classes" or the "language labs" that I attended in the 1980s when I studied French at school.

Advances in technology have not only made musicians’ lives easier, they have enhanced the listening experience for their fans. The leap from magnetic-based tape cassettes to digital CDs dramatically improved quality, and now a new trend is developing that might be similarly enhancing — using DVDs (Digital Versatile Discs) to disseminate not just the music, but videos and much more.

My biggest concern about using the new iMac was whether I would still be able to work in my most useful programs and access all my archives.

Why are we so afraid of admitting our racism/s? Media coverage of racism often extends only to sensational killings or attacks, or the media defending itself against being racist. There is little space for open, honest debate on race, and when there is, where are the voices of ordinary people? And why are the voices so often male? Do women experience racism?

I’ve been dialling up to the Internet for the past two weeks using my cellphone — and getting speeds twice as fast as my ISDN line.

South Africa’s biggest free Internet access service ended last week when Absa turned off its "freemail" Internet service, which appears to have left thousands of users in a virtual no-man’s-land.

For a while it seemed that the controversy over Internet domain names would overshadow this week’s information and communications technologies (ICT) summit in Midrand. The government’s new Bill sparked an outcry from the current overseer of the .za domain.