Instagram isn't just about posting pictures of your lunch, or selfies with you and the pug. Like all social networks, it can actually be used as an educational tool. Here are a few South African accounts illustrating this point. @birds_by_rousseau Follow for: a wealth of information about South Africa's birds. Ran by Stellenbosch University lecturer Rousseau Lotter, this account is dedicated to documenting the bevy of bird species prevalent in South Africa. From glossy starlings to doves, to kestrels and spoonbills, this account will help even the novice bird watcher identify their featured subject. The Cape Glossy Starling shown here is distinguished from some...
Arsenal is a massive football club, but there's one thing even bigger than it: #WengerOut. The hashtag has become something of a global meme since it began as a way for fans to show displeasure towards their long standing manager's, Arsene Wenger, tactics. Hell, it even has a Know Your Meme page, and has been spotted at protests (including those against former Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe last year). While Wenger finally left the club before the 2018/19 season began, he was replaced by Spanish manager Unai Emery. But it seems that Arsenal fans just can't find a manager they like. Because memes...
With Google’s recent launch of Android 9 comes Emoji 11.0 and a bunch of new, expressive and politically correct, emojis for users. Though the entire list is 157 new characters long, here are some of our honourable mentions. The Hot Face This emoji looks like it just ran a marathon it didn’t train for, and is so relatable to everyday life. I can imagine it being used to describe anything from a terribly hot day, to disappointing food and even just the general fatigue of daily life we all suffer from. The Pleading Face Admittedly the so called pleading face looks more like the face...
If you were in central Cape Town at around 9am on Tuesday morning, you may have missed something pretty spectacular. And indeed, pretty. Instagram is this morning awash with snaps of the recent rainfall, and more impressively, an expansive rainbow. Bowing almost entirely across the sky and featuring a slightly lighter companion just above it, the broad ribbon was visible across much of the southern suburbs, Cape Flats and the city's eastern district. Here's what Instagram users across Cape Town caught on their smartphones: I tried to capture this morning's rainbow 🌈 with a panorama feature on my phone and it turned out...
At least 91 people have died after a series of earthquakes struck the small island of Lombok, Indonesia late on Sunday. USGS recorded at least 10 quakes within a 100km radius, the largest of which measured 6.9 magnitude. According to the institution, tremors were felt as far as Bali to the West, and Sumbawa too the East. The region is massively popular among tourists. Sutopo Purwo, head of information at the BNPB Information and Public Relations Center, documented the chaos from Lombok on Twitter. This video was taken from within the Karangasem Hospital in Bali. Kerusakan bangunan RSUD Karangasem Bali akibat gempa 7 SR...
Today Capetonians woke to rain, gridlocked highways, late trains, buses on fire, and a taxi strike. Yes, yet another taxi strike began in the early hours of Monday morning across the Western Cape. According to a News24 report, the strike is the result of a leadership dispute within the South African National Taxi Council. As a side effect, commuters who use taxis to travel across the province were left stranded on Monday. Folks gonna be expected to take "alternative" transport to work. Alternative being a code word for teleportation. #TaxiStrike — Sarkastik Observer 🦈🔱 (@Sindelo_) August 6, 2018 Some commuters who braved the strike...
It’s been two years since Instagram first released Instagram Stories, an interactive photo sharing feature that can be found on its main app. In August 2016, Stories gained 100-million users per day within the first two months of its release, 250-million in a year, and passed the 300-million user mark in late 2017. Now, it has over 400-million daily users. This comes as Snapchat itself struggles to keep pace with the Facebook-owned service. It's only used by 191-million users daily. Although initially slated for copying Snapchat, Instagram Stories had added a few novel features. Additions like Boomerang, camera effects, a multitude of...
Instagram and Facebook have released new activity tools that will help you understand and control the amount of time you spend using their apps. You will soon be able to access an activity dashboard on both platforms, where you will find daily limit and reminder tools too. These tools will allow you to see how much time you spend per day, per device, and on the apps, respectively. You can also limit your time, or your push notifications, and even set daily reminders for yourself to assist with time management. You can access these new features in your “settings”. On Instagram the features...
South Africa's unemployment rate has increased by 0.5% to 27.2% between April and June 2018, according to Stats SA's latest report. More than 100 000 jobs were lost during this three month period. Additionally, some 6.1-million South Africans between the ages of 15 and 64 do not have a job. South Africa’s #unemployment rate was 27,2% in Q2:2018, up from 26,7% in Q1:2018 6,1m people of working age in SA were #unemployed #StatsSA https://t.co/srPxmTL6WA pic.twitter.com/UyQv8kKACY — Stats SA (@StatsSA) July 31, 2018 The worst performing province was the Free State with an unemployment rate of 34.4%. While the Eastern Cape reduced its unemployment rate by...
Vertical video is making quite the comeback in 2018. After Instagram launched its IGTV platform, YouTube's now accommodating users who upload and watch video in portrait mode. The company's web player now adapting to videos' aspect ratio automatically. According to a forum post unearthed by Android Police, the company released the update to the web to better mirror the experience on mobile. "Historically, for non wide-screen videos (not 16:9) like vertical and square videos, we would show black bars alongside the video, making the video really small," an official community manager's post reads. "This update moves away from the need for black bars....
WhatsApp on Monday announced that video and voice calling for groups is rolling out globally. Competing against the likes of Apple's FaceTime and Microsoft's Skype, Facebook-owned chat service will allow groups of up to four to engage in voice or video chats "anytime and anywhere". "Just start a one-on-one voice or video call and tap the new 'add participant' button in the top right corner to add more contacts to the call," the company explains in a blog post. For South Africans and others in low-quality internet markets, WhatsApp stresses that the service is designed to "work reliably around the world in...
Twitter has had a very bad weekend, nay, a bad quarter. The company on Friday released its Q2 2018 earnings report, and the numbers did little to inspire investor confidence. The company's share price plummeted more than 20% after the social network lost a million monthly active users -- all based in the US -- since April. 335-million is the current population of Twitter -- a figure that has ebbed and flowed but by glacial margins over the past few years. That stock droop is one of the largest in Twitter's history, but the firm's big wigs were optimistic and paid particular...
WhatsApp is simple enough in theory. It's a messaging application with voice and video call support. But that's merely its elevator pitch. When diving down into its many settings and features, WhatsApp can be tailored to your needs provided you know exactly how to tame it. If you're someone who hates visiting FAQs or haven't really tweaked a messaging service before, this article's for you. How do I change by WhatsApp number, and inform my contacts? If you have a new smartphone number and don't want to sacrifice your contacts, groups or settings from your old number, there's a setting that allows you...
Twitter is well known as an effective tool in political campaigns. Research indicates that “politically interested individuals and groups can no longer ignore the opportunities presented by Twitter to engage in political discourse and to influence the outcome of campaigns and legislation". US politicians Donald Trump and Barack Obama both used Twitter as a marketing tool in the election campaigns that resulted in their presidencies. But using the platform thoughtlessly can also be damaging. South Africa has more than 7.7-million Twitter users. In a country where racial and political sensitivities continue to run high, posting faux pas is bound to land you in...
US President Donald Trump needed little over five hours to amass over 137 000 likes and more than 50 000 retweets on his latest Twitter outburst. Addressing Iran President Hassan Rouhani directly on Sunday, Trump urged his counterpart to "be cautious". "To Iranian President Rouhani: NEVER, EVER THREATEN THE UNITED STATES AGAIN OR YOU WILL SUFFER CONSEQUENCES THE LIKES OF WHICH FEW THROUGHOUT HISTORY HAVE EVER SUFFERED BEFORE. WE ARE NO LONGER A COUNTRY THAT WILL STAND FOR YOUR DEMENTED WORDS OF VIOLENCE & DEATH. BE CAUTIOUS!" he wrote, including the all-caps section. To Iranian President Rouhani: NEVER, EVER THREATEN THE UNITED...
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