China's online video advertising market is now worth US$330-million, up nearly 25% from the last few months of 2011. More impressively, it represents 218% year-on-year growth. According to Chinese online research company Analysys International, the sudden spike came in the wake of slow growth in the latter parts of 2011. The company says that ad revenue grew spiked after the "Spring Festival", more familiar to Westerners as Chinese New Year. It also says that ...

Microsoft is set to give a select group of early stage startups free access to its cloud offering. Under the initiative, which is part of its global BizSpark Plus accelerator programme, the software giant says it will be giving away US$60 000 of free software to South African startups over 10 years. According to Clifford de Wit, developer and platform lead at Microsoft SA, the initiative is aimed at building a vibrant local software development community in South Africa: “We ...

Looks like the acquisitions team at Google has been given free reign over the company cheque book. Just one day after the internet giant bought out social and sharing outfit Meebo, it announced the acquisition of Quickoffice. In an official press blog post, Google said that it was "happy to announce" that we had acquired the "leader in office productivity solutions". It also made it pretty clear what its intentions for the company were: Today, consumers, businesses and schools use Google Apps ...

Over 100 000 apps have now been published on the Windows Phone store at a rate of 313 a day, with nearly 10 000 added in the last month. That's according to All About Windows Phone (AAWP) -- a site dedicated to well, everything Windows Phone. It should be noted however that those numbers come with a bit of a caveat. One hundred thousand plus apps might have been published, but just under 90 000 are currently available for download. According ...

Napster founder Sean Parker has launched a video based social network called Airtime, which connects people based on their Facebook interests. The social network has been in development for the past year. In an official statement, the Airtime team claims that it "is not just a product, it’s a network service designed to create live shared experiences online, between two sets of people: those that you know and those who you want to know". "The service," it claims, "allows you to share ...

South African digital satellite TV service DStv has joined the country's national broadcaster, the SABC, in refusing to air a Nando's ad on the grounds that it could inflame xenophobia. According to the Citizen newspaper, DStv Media Sales CEO Chris Hitchings confirmed that the broadcaster had "suspended flighting of the ad. Per our terms and conditions we have the right not to broadcast any material that we believe may be offensive to viewers.” In the advert, a narrator says, “you know ...

Chinese Facebook clone Renren and Japanese mobile gaming company DeNa have signed a deal in what seems to be a bid by the latter to increase its presence on Chinese mobile devices. Under the terms of the deal Renen will feature a number DeNa titles on its mobile app for Android. In fact, the Japanese gaming manufacturer will have its own dedicated section in the app. Users can download games from the Mobage section and log in to Mobage with ...

According to the TIOBE index you’re more likely to overhear a Java, PHP, Python, Perl or Ruby developer riffing on an idea for a new web startup, than, let’s say, a PL/SQL developer. Programming languages are developer community argots. To me, the lesser-known lexicon of Oracle’s PL/SQL has been a subject of study for quite some time. I love it. Far beyond its corporate pedigree, I've seen it being used to build an online music store, course search database and ...

While social media continues to evolve world-wide on the social web, it is still a very scary medium for many organisations. All of a sudden social media means that the public, customers, and prospects now have a method with the use of all the social media channels to make their voices heard with relative ease. Despite the fact that everyone can be a "citizen journalist" online, only a small percentage of the people involved with social media are creating content. ...

For years I have been a lover of the Royal Variety Performance. The only problem is that before the days of PVR it coincided with my annual end of year festivities. So as I sit back and watch the Diamond Jubilee with old favorites like the two Ronnies, it brings back fond memories. On 4 and 5 June the UK (and the rest of the world, clearly) celebrated the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. It’s been interesting to note how companies residing ...