I have DELIBERATELY sent this message to all the people your list, and I’m posting it here as well because… well, just because I can.

First, thanks for the information about your upcoming “Technology Transformation Seminar”. Now I don’t mean to be rude here, and I wouldn’t have bothered sending you this message if this was the first time, or if it were from a little known organization. But coming from an organization like AITI that brands itself as a “Center of Excellence”, I expected something more “innovative” (another one of your buzzwords) than your present way of mass mailing people.

Sure, I opted-in to receive updates from AITI, but I didn’t ask you to broadcast my email address to everyone like you’re doing now, for strange people to be contacting me. I believe I speak for many of the fine people on this list as well.

Get real and set a good example for others to follow. If you have the least respect for people’s PRIVACY, setup and USE a proper mailing list software so you so you don’t broadcast people’s email addresses to the entire world like you’re doing now.

Have a good day.

AITI'S ANNOYING MASS MAILINGS

Wikipedia. Some swear by it, others hate it more than anything else under the sun. But no one can deny Wikipedia’s significance in the field of literature (for better of worse) and in the art of community building. Personally, Wikipedia is a great resource which I consult several times a day.

And here’s one good old Wikipedia trick I learnt some years back which helps me learn about random stuff everyday: simply set your browser’s default homepage to Wikipedia’s “Random Page” feature (available at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random). This way, every time you open a new browser window, you’ll see a random Wikipedia article. Cool, eh?

Anyway… so this monring (after sleeping like a bull throughout the night) I fired up Firefox and the “radom page” I got from Wikipedia was Marketplace. Nothing extraodinarily about the page, except the photos depicting marketplaces around the world caught my attention.

Market in Barcelona, Spain

Market in Paris, France

Market in Mexico

Market in Uganda

I’ve come to really appreciate the notion that if one takes a firm decision to do something, anything, all the forces in the Universe seem to conspire to support your efforts.

Recently I took the plunge to execute some ideas I’ve been flirting with in my mind for years, and since then I’ve been experiencing a tremendous amount of productivity and getting so much done day after day– far beyond anything I’ve seen in recent times.

But in my zeal to make up for all those long lost years of indecision, I’ve literally been killing myself. I haven’t gone to bed in weeks– I’ve simply been dozing off behind the computer night after night. I sit here all day and night cranking out code and words, without giving the least thought to the harm I’m causing to my body.

And as you’d expect, this body just couldn’t take such nonsense any longer. I finally broke down, and after three days of self-medication and seeing no immediate results, I finally made it to the hospital today. If you’re reading this, you probably know what it means for me to visit the hospital, but as they often say on radio and TV, if after three days and you’re neither OK nor dead, go see your doctor .

So here is the big lesson for all of you who want to change world (or your community): don’t neglect your best companion. Take good care of your body, and it will take you far into your dreams.

Of couse this is common sense. But last time I checked, common sense was still not common practice for most folks. And if you haven’t figured this out yet, I wrote this as a note to myself.

Take Care of Your Body

We start our Google Search & Rescue operation with something you probably use already but may not be aware of: Google Ghana– the local version of Google’s popular search service for Ghana. This Ghana-specific Google search engine is available at http://www.google.com.gh/.

If you visit www.google.com from Ghana, Google will automatically redirect you to their Ghana website. How does Google know you’re from Ghana? It may sound and feel like it, but believe me, it’s not black magic at all: Google simply uses your computer’s IP address to determine the country in which you’re likely to be located. In our case, Google determines you’re located in Ghana, and redirects you to their Ghana website so that they can serve you search results that are more relevant to Ghana.

Fair enough. But of course, living in Ghana doesn’t necessarily mean you want to search for information about Ghana. For me, I hardly search for local stuff online, and this because there’s very little local stuff to be found online. The few times that I do go online for local content, there only a handful sites that I find useful, so I go directly to these websites. No need searching for what I know already.

On the rare occasions that I really have to search for Ghana-specific stuff on the Internet, I tend to get better results when using the generic Google.com domain than I do with the local domain (but note that I always search with highly granular query strings, not just keywords).

This is because there’s very little local content of local origin to be found online. Most of the content about Ghana on the Internet today are written by foreigners and published on websites and travel portals that are not specifically about Ghana. Even with ‘local’ websites, these are almost invariably hosted outside Ghana (usually in US and occasionally in Western Europe) using generic top level domain (like .com, .net, .org, etc), which makes it difficult for Google and the other search engines to properly ‘localize’ them.

What this means is that searching for the same thing at www.google.com and www.google.com.gh will not give you the same results. Which one gives better results? Well, that depends on your topic and how refined your search phase is, and of course, what “better result” means to you. If you’re not happy with the results from www.google.com.gh, return turn to the homepage and click on “Go to Google.com” to try the main search engine (see arrow in image below).

Google Ghana Search Engine

GTBank Max Advance is a salary advance product targeted at (who could have guessed?) salaried employees with a monthly income of two hundred Ghana cedis (GH ¢200) and above, and whose salaries pass through their GTB account.

To access the GTBank Max Advance facility, clients must have maintained a current account actively with GTBank for at least six (6) months.

How much can loan can you take? Of course, like most things in life, the short answer is: it depends. Note that this is a short term loan (a salary advance) meant to bridge short term financial needs against monthly salary payments. The facility amount (including interest payment) cannot exceed 80% of your net monthly salary.

To apply for Guaranty Trust Bank’s Max Advance offering, first you need to complete and submit an application form at any of GTB’s branches. As of this writing, this form was not available on GTB’s website, so you have to walk into any of their branches to pick the form, complete and submit.

The application form must be endorsed by the HR department of the company you work with. Along with the application form, you should also submit a letter of undertaking from your HR department to the Bank. GTB guarantees that your money will be ready within 48 hours after receipt of all the necessary documents and satisfaction of all the conditions.

Guaranty Trust Bank Ghana

So you want to create wealth? Get seriously rich? Probably be a billionaire? What a noble ambition! Anyway, while you’re at it, … here’s a list of the wealthiest people in the world as of February 13, 2009 — based on each person’s total net worth.

Please note that total net worth is an estimate based on the closing stock prices of the stock exchanges on which each person’s company is listed. Due to stock price and exchange rate fluctuations, this list only represents each person’s valuation on a single day — on the February 13, 2009.

The actual ranking data is from Forbes’ 2009 List Of World Billionaires, with additional data (e.g. source or worth, etc) from Wikipedia and other online sources. If you want to dig deeper, you can Google any of the billionaires’ name or source of wealth for more information.

Richest People in the World

With the recent automation of the Ghana Stock Exchange, the way is now paved for the development of online tools and services to facilitate trading on the exchange. The first of these services to launch is, to the best of my knowledge, i-BROKER, a ‘free’ online trading service recently launched by CAL Brokers Limited.

The i-Broker service is available both online at http://www.ibrokerghana.com and as a PC client (sorry fellow Mac and Linux users). There are two major components of the i-broker service; i-trade and i-track (hmmm).

i-trade gives investors direct access to the Ghana Stock Exchange to enable them buy and sell shares. To place a sell order, users must first fund their account with shares purchased through the i-broker service, or deposit previously held securities with CAL Brokers Limited. Investors can view the entire market trading activity through various screens and graphs that aid in decision making, as well as make online requests for payment from their sale proceeds.

The second component of the i-Broker service is i-track, a tool that helps investors to monitor their portfolios in real time. Investors are given access to various reports that help them keep track of their investments. Portfolio Statements are available on the portal 24 hours a day giving the investor the freedom to access his investment value at any time. Customised statements can also be printed directly from the i-track PC client or portal.

iBroker is clearly good attempt, but in its current state the service is far from convenient, and might not be enough to get lazy folks like me actively trading on the Ghana Stock Exchange. First you cannot sign up for the service online, and I find this ironic and frankly quite amusing… for an online service. Sure, you can complete a form on the i-Broker website, but the form cannot be submitted online: you still have to turn in this form at CAL Borkers’ office in person (or by post).

Then there’s the issue of funding the newly create account to begin trading. To fund their i-Broker account, users have to deposit cash or check into CAL Brokers’ account held with CAL Bank. Even CAL Bank customers have to wait at least two business days after making the deposit for the funds to reflect in their i-Broker account. I can only wonder how long it’ll take for folks who don’t have account with CAL Bank.

As for the service itself I cannot say anything about it, since I don’t have access to it yet. I’m mailing in my account form today (by post) but I’ve no idea how long it’ll take for the account to be created. If you have an i-Broker account, feel free to share your experience with the service with us.

i-Broker Ghana Website

Larry Page - CoFounder & President For Products, Google Inc.

This inspiring commencement speech was given by Google Co-Founder & President For Products, Larry Page, in Spring 2009 at University of Michigan.
Download this speech in PDF format (~420k).

Class of 2009! First I’d like you to get up, wave and cheer your supportive family and friends! Show your love!

It is a great honor for me to be here today.

Now wait a second. I know: that’s such a cliché. You’re thinking: every graduation speaker says that — It’s a great honor. But, in my case, it really is so deeply true — being here is more special and more personal for me than most of you know. I’d like to tell you why.

A long time ago, in the cold September of 1962, there was a Steven’s co-op at this very university. That co-op had a kitchen with a ceiling that had been cleaned by student volunteers every decade or so. Picture a college girl named Gloria, climbing up high on a ladder, struggling to clean that filthy ceiling. Standing on the floor, a young boarder named Carl was admiring the view. And that’s how they met. They were my parents, so I suppose you could say I’m a direct result of that kitchen chemistry experiment, right here at Michigan. My Mom is here with us today, and we should probably go find the spot and put a plaque up on the ceiling that says: “Thanks Mom and Dad!”

Everyone in my family went to school here at Michigan: me, my brother, my Mom and Dad — all of us. My Dad actually got the quantity discount: all three and a half of his degrees are from here. His Ph.D. was in Communication Science because they thought Computers were just a passing fad. He earned it 44 years ago. He and Mom made a big sacrifice for that. They argued at times over pennies, while raising my newborn brother. Mom typed my Dad’s dissertation by hand. This velvet hood I’m wearing, this was my Dad’s. And this diploma, just like the one you’re are about to get, that was my Dad’s. And my underwear, that was… oh never mind.

My father’s father worked in the Chevy plant in Flint, Michigan. He was an assembly line worker. He drove his two children here to Ann Arbor, and told them: That is where you’re going to go to college. Both his kids did graduate from Michigan. That was the American dream. His daughter, Beverly, is with us today. My Grandpa used to carry an “Alley Oop” hammer — a heavy iron pipe with a hunk of lead melted on the end. The workers made them during the sit-down strikes to protect themselves. When I was growing up, we used that hammer whenever we needed to pound a stake or something into the ground. It is wonderful that most people don’t need to carry a heavy blunt object for protection anymore. But just in case, I have it here.

My Dad became a professor at uh… Michigan State, and I was an incredibly lucky boy. A professor’s life is pretty flexible, and he was able to spend oodles of time raising me. Could there be a better upbringing than university brat?

Tim O'Reilly - Publisher, Entrepreneur, Founder of O’Reilly Media, Inc

This inspiring commencement speech was given by Tim O’Reilly in 2006 at University of California, Berkeley’s School of Information (often called SIMS, for its old name, the School of Information Management and Systems).
Download this speech in PDF format (~550k).

Thank you very much for having me here to speak to you. I know that this is an important day in your lives, and I’m honored to be the one chosen to give you advice as you begin the next stage of your careers. I hope that you will find that advice useful.

I hope also that I am able to make my comments meaningful to those who helped get you here — the spouses, parents, grandparents, and other family members who are so proud of you today. We work in a profession that can be mysterious to the layman, with a private language that sets us apart like one of the secret societies depicted in The Da Vinci Code! I still remember my first exposure to the computer industry as a humanities graduate.

I was an experienced writer, but knew nothing about technology. I’d agreed to help a friend of mine, a programmer, to land a contract job writing a manual. We interviewed two engineers about their project while I took increasingly desperate notes. It was as if they were speaking a foreign language! As we walked away, I turned to my friend and asked “Were they just pulling my leg?” It was hard to believe that this jargon-filled dialog was actually meaningful. It was an inauspicious start to my career.

There are three lessons that I took away from that moment. The first was to be fearless in what you attempt. The job I eventually mastered was an enormous stretch for me. The second lesson was that a difficulty is often an opportunity in disguise. I built my company by bridging the information gap that I first encountered that day. The third lesson was the importance of serendipity in your life choices. I never imagined that I’d build a career as a technical writer, publisher, and entrepreneur. My training was in Greek and Latin Classics! Agreeing to help out my friend proved to be a turning point in my life.

In my remarks today, I hope to elaborate on this idea of turning points. Not only are you at a turning point in your lives, we are at a turning point in the technology industry, and perhaps even in the history of the world. Most of you probably know that I’ve been evangelizing an idea that I call Web 2.0, the idea that the internet is on the verge of replacing the personal computer as the dominant computing platform.

And as you know, platform shifts are times of enormous disruption and enormous opportunity.

New companies succeed because they envision the world anew, not as a logical continuation of what went before. Microsoft became the dominant company of the personal computer age with an aggressive vision of computers in every household, while industry titans of the previous era derided the personal computer as a toy, and wondered why anyone would need one.

To kick-start things here, here is a special freebie offer you shouldn’t miss: Learning Strategies, in partnership with personal development guru, Steve Pavlina, is offering you a free download of their Peak Performance Paraliminal.

This is not a trial or sample offering, but an actual product which they normally sell for $29.95. Steve Pavlina negotiated this deal for his reads, but anyone can grab it as long as you follow Steve’s link. This free offer is available for a limited time though, so if you want to download the freebie, please follow the link to get it now.

But what are Paraliminals? Here’s how Steve Pavlina describes it:

Paraliminals are personal development audio programs designed to condition your mind for enhanced results, such as greater productivity, positive behavioral changes, better health, and more.

What’s unique about Paraliminals is that they deliver simultaneous but distinct messages to your left and right ears. One message is tailored to your left brain, the other to your right brain. No subliminal messages are used, so you can hear exactly what’s being said. The messages are of course very positive and uplifting. It feels good to listen to them.

When you listen to a Paraliminal, you hear two distinct voices — one in each ear. So to get the best results, you have to listen with stereo headphones. Listening to a Paraliminal is a very relaxing experience, much like a guided meditation session. Download Peak Performance Paraliminal for free now.