Best of Appfrica 2008

Appfrica’s only been around about six months, but in that time we’ve had some really interesting stories. So, I decided to look back to see what the most popular content of the year was. These aren’t necessarily the most important news articles, simply the posts drawing the most attention and traffic. While the ‘most popular posts’ section of the site covers it pretty well, the end of the year is as good a time as any to reflect.

12. ‘Global’ Web Services Failing the World Market

This list rounds-up several web applications that claim to serve a ‘world-wide’ audience but who’ve fallen short on delivering to people outside of the U.S. and Europe, in most cases not for the lack of trying. They’re services that I used to use everyday in the U.S., it was only once I was outside the country that I started to notice how little ineffective they were for an international audience. I’ll do a follow up on this soon because somehow I forgot to mention video services like Hulu, iTunes and Veoh, which different rules on who can watch what, based on location.

Maneno astutely added:

Great article, although I might even add GMail to the lot as expats I know in DR Congo find it basically unusable there and other areas due to its super piggish bandwidth ways.

11. Who’s Blogging about African Tech?

Africa gets ignored by the tech community at large, save for ReadWriteWeb which has made a concerted effort to keep it’s eye on the continent this year. I wrote a three part series on African social media for them a few months ago and most recently they gave two South African apps (Afrigator and Fring) well deserved end of the year awards. So, with this post, I wanted to make sure I spotlighted all the awesome writers who were focusing on African tech and social media. I also highlighted some sample content from each blog and included an OPML file for easy subscription to all of them at once. Somehow I forgot to include iMod which is probably the most trafficked of them all!

10. Google Launches Africa Blog and Forum

Although, deemed too risky and not profitable enough for most companies, Google has made incredible strides to penetrate Africa. Naturally, they’re going to blog about their work in the region. Both the Google Africa Blog and Google.org Blog do a good job of covering what the behemoth search company is doing on the continent.

9. The Next Two Billion: SinoAfrica Rising

China’s move into Africa has the whole world’s attention. Combined, the populations of the continent and the country are two billion. What has China so interested in Africa? One word: resources.

8. Introducing Afridex: Crunchbase for Africa

When I launched Afridex, I didn’t quite expect the positive reaction it got from bloggers and developers alike. I put it online to work out some bugs and although it’s still in it’s infancy, I assure you that early 2009 it will open up as a platform for all.

7. 10 Social Entrepreneurs to Follow on Twitter

Ten people literally, using social media to change the world and they can all be found on everyone’s favorite microblog, Twitter.

6. A Breakdown of the Costs of Doing Business in Africa

When I moved to Uganda, I had no idea what it would cost to maintain a similar lifestyle to the one I had in the U.S. While I don’t consider anything I do here particularly decadent, things like $500USD a month for 64kbps in bandwidth make it hard not to be while trying to meet basic needs!

5. Can Freeconomics Work in African Markets?

Chris Anderson is known for many things but particularly as the editor of Wired Magazine, for writing THE LONG TAIL and for shouting that ‘free’ was the new business model to beat. I have no idea if his newest book FREE will still come out in 2009 but it would be rather bold in the current world economic climate. Here I applied the concept of freeconomics to Africa to see if things could work that way here.

4. The Current State of Internet Penetration in Africa

Some interesting facts about Internet penetration in Africa, and projected growth. If you want to understand why the Mobile market is growing so fast in Africa, it’s partly explained by the lack of computers and connectivity.

3. 20 Ideas for Social Entrepreneurs

I’m only one person, but like many people I’ve got enough ideas to last a few lifetimes. Rather than horde them, I thought I’d share them via the web. What’s cool is that a few of them have proven to be quite popular and some of them are being worked on (and several were already being worked on by groups I didn’t know about like Maneno and MyC4). Ultimately, I think they all can impact developing countries and the world quite significantly so I’m glad that if I can’t do them, other people can.

2. Is Developmental Aid Stifling Africa’s Growth?

The argument is one of tough love. If Africa governments are going to fail, they need to fail on their own. If they succeed, they need to succeed on their own. The interference of other sovereign nations through the form of developmental aid, creates artificial stability and no accountability for leaders. I call the movement Mwendian, named after Andrew Mwenda who’s famously raked U2’s Bono over the coals after TED Africa 2007 for their differing stances on aid. I’m inclined to agree with Mwenda. The culture of ‘begging’ and expectations in Africa is poison. But rather than blame other countries for doing it, we need to blame more Africans for taking advantage of it.

1. The Popularity of Programming Languages in Africa

African programming trends are not that different than they are throughout the rest of the world. Ruby, Java, PHP, C+ etc lead the pack. This post analyzed the popularity of these languages using Google Insights.