The CPT Book Fair is upon us. From 13 - 16 June, the CTICC in Cape Town will be host to writers, publishers, book retailers and the like. Many authors plan to launch new books here. These include Alan Boeska and John de Ruit.

There will be debates and discussions and exhibitors and guests from all over Africa and further afield.

According to the Book Fair web site, many of the country’s most prominent intellectuals come here to discuss, debate and voice their opinions. The Book Fair is an ideal forum for cross-cultural dialogue and the open discussion of controversial opinions, ideas and issues.

29 Countries will be present this year, with more than 250 exhibitors representing the full range of publishing in South Africa. South African literature has always had a central role at the fair. This year sees the pilot of the first Cape Town Book Fair Invitation Programme which introduces 12 publishers from 12 African countries at the fair. This is an important development in the growth of the fair.

So, my interest?

Of course by now there has been much said and written about the demise of the newspaper and even the book worldwide, specifically in the USA.

With about 100 newspapers either closing their doors or downsizing and with the phenomenal success of the Amazon Kindle, it seems that print is out of fashion in the USA.

Is that indeed the case in South Africa? With only about 6 million people out of about 50 million having internet ( depending on whose stats or research you believe) it seems that there is in fact much more scope for print in South Africa and indeed Africa, than there is for online.

What I want to know is the following:

• what do the South African authors think about the whole “print is dead” or ” print is dying” debate.
• what are the publishers thinking and more importantly what are they doing about this ( if anything)
• is there a hybrid or transition model for SA and Africa?
• what is the future ( and present state ) of ebooks, audio books and the like?

Oh, well, seems that I have some questions in this regard.

You?

read the full story on the Catholic Church UK’s web site.

Okay, sat down and wrote down 10 city names at random to see whether they have official twitter profiles. Got lots of stuff on Olympics, shopping, weather, jobs, etc but found very little official city profiles. See below:

• London: no
• Rio: no
• Cape Town: no
• Berlin: no
• Rome: no
• Paris: no
• Beijing: no
• Singapore: yes, visitsingapore
• New York: no
• Toronto: yes, torontocouncil

do you see a gap somewhere too?

2 services I’m thinking of using:
Glance: http://www.glance.net/
Basecamp: http://www.basecamphq.com

have you used these services before?
Any comments / advice?

Software as a service: Peter Flynn, MD of Whitewall Web, here at the netprophet conference in Cape Town.

In time all software will be internet based, they believe!

On premises use of software requires:

• license
• hardware
• network
• consultants
• maintenance
• dedicated staff
• upgrades
• many points of failure

with SaaS, the internet service model, none of those issues are relevant. You can try it before buying it, don’t require long term contract and is quick to deploy without huge analyses of what is required. The capital layout  is much smaller and the expense is more of a operational expense, rather than a capital expense.

Releases are frequent.

The level of lock-in is based on a monthly subscription rather than a long term contract required when buying on-premises software.

It also allows for a much more mobile enabled workforce, saving time, travel costs and property infrastructure.

People using internet are familiar with online and browser based services, making for easier implementation.

Cloud computing, virtualization and various other developments make this a offering that is continually evolving and improving.

A quick 10 minute exercise: think of the names of 10 South African politicians and type them into Twitter’s “find people” search tool.
My 10 names:
* zille
* zuma
* buthelezi
* holomisa
* sexwale
* mulder
* shilowa
* de lille
* lekota
* manuel

And how many did I find on Twitter? A grand total of ONE!
@helenzille

Bronwen Auret, Head of Digital, Business Day Financial Mail and Diane Charlton, MD, Acceleration Media are presenting a session here at the ICC in Durban as part of South African Tourism’s 2009 Indaba e-business seminars.

To have 2 powerful and knowledgeable  online / digital presenters in one room , doing a joint presentation is great and I’m looking  forward to hearing their presentation. The fact that they are both women makes it all the more exciting….for me at least.

Bronwen is telling us about web 2.0 and starting the conversation.  What does this mean for us?

• new travel sites and social networks
• sharing
• comparison
• referral
• target specific interests
• interactivity
• UGC

What is digital marketing?

Communicating with current and potential customers. Connections and conversations is NB.

Make sure that you have proper objectives in place before embarking on a digital marketing strategy.

Some important objectives to keep in mind for a strategy are:

• attract: visit my web site
• engage: use my website
• convert: make a purchase on my website
• retain: make another purchase or provide referral

Diane’s turn:

What tools do you have to attract users to your web site include:

• digital media: creating awareness
• search marketing: paid and natural
• social networks
• online reputation management: engage conversations, customer service opportunities
• destination management services: booking engines, portal

We were shown a South African Tourism case study involving Expedia. Due to SAT campaign on Expedia, there was a huge increase in bookings of flights and hotel rooms in South Africa via Expedia.

“Nothing starts without a strategy”

So says William Price, Global Head E-Marketing, South African Tourism at the e-business seminar here at Indaba 2009.

How does SAT think about SA as a destination: people come to SA based on interest and destination.

The most important element in the equation is the USER.

A user will come to South Africa based on either an interest ( such as a conference or hobby, etc ) or the destination ( game, nature, etc). This needs to be tied together with relevance and content when taking it online.  Access to information that matters is what is important.

SAT then looks at social media, video and related content when considering what information to provide the user.

The rest of his presentation was all about the rewriting and rebuilding of the new SAT web site.

Question 1: is South Africa heading for a recession?

• Yes, according to the panel economist, missed the name.
• Growth this year will be -0.8
• Tourism contributes more to SA economy than mining.

Question 2: is SA ready for 2010?

• Dr Dannie Jordaan of FIFA LOC, joined by a FIFA advisor from Germany.
• Here we go again hearing how ready we are for the Soccer worldcup next year.
• According the Horst, the advisor, Germany’s image changed radically after they hosted the Worldcup
• Danny believes this will be the case in SA.
• Richard: at the price tag, is it worth it:  Danny: yes
• Richard: tell me about security. A TV interview with Vishnu Naidoo, police superintendent was played, relaying all the money and effort spent by police to make the event safe. 52 000 police officers will be part of the event.
• Richard: who are you more afraid of: Al Qaeda or English football hooligans.  Vishnu: A little  bit of both says Naidoo.
• Mrs Hlahla, MD of ACSA ( airports ) explains via video how ready ACSA is for 2010.
• Richard: you have a problem, your plan is as strong as your weakest link. If you fail at the airport, the country has failed.  Hlahla: Yes, we have to give people a great experience.
• Richard to SABC CEO: do you have enough infrastructure to make sure  the  event will be covered properly by SABC?
• Richard to Vishnu: how will you make the fanparks secure? Vishnu: we have a plan specifically for fanparks or as SABC calls it, public viewing areas.

Open question time:

Various questions were covered relating to transport, what is still outstanding, what problems are there still to be solved?

All and all an interesting session, with Richard Quest really making it. All of the speakers were quite dry and boring and all sound like politicians to me!

Lots of AV hassles. Mics not working, video started playing while Richard was still talking.