Author: Cyrus

The number of Internet subscribers in Kenya increased by 13.48 percent from 5.42 million to 6.15 million between September 1 and December 31 last year. During the same period, the estimated number of Internet users rose to 17.38 million up from 14.30 million, representing an increase of 21.55 per cent. According to the CCK 2nd Quarter ICT Sector Statistics for 2011/2012 released today, broadband subscriptions increased to 131,829, posting a 4.14% growth from the previous period. Of the total Internet subscribers in the country, broadband subscription represented only 2.14 per cent. Meanwhile, the total mobile traffic declined to 6.70 billion…

Safaricom’s subscribers in Lower Kabete, Kileleshwa, Muthaiga, Lavington, Kilimani, Westlands and Kyuna will now access the Internet at 42Mbps following an upgrade of its 3G network in Nairobi. The mobile network operator has upgraded around 14 stations from 21Mbps to 42Mbps though even the 21Mbps is still not national. Safaricom claim that these are the areas where its “core data users” reside hence the preferential treatment. I disagree but hey! who am I to be listened to. Safaricom’s further explanation on this is that “these sites have the right fibre network to support the backhaul.” Safaricom CEO Bob Collymore also indicated…

Kenyan men and women have swept the 116th Boston Marathon. The Kenyan swept 1-2-3 in both men and women races making the competitors be a topic of discussion on both Twitter and Facebook with Sharon Cherop, Wesley Korir and Metobo’s name trending all over the world. I have also discovered that the Men’s 2012 Boston Marathon champion, Wesley Korir is on Twitter. https://twitter.com/#!/weskorir Here is the winning line-up.

Higinio O.Ochoa is a 30-year-old Linux administrator from Galveston, Texas, USA. He was recently arrested by the FBI and charged with unauthorized access to a protected computer system. Higinio is a member of the hacker group, Anonymous. He is reported to have hacked into several Web sites belonging to law enforcement organisations like the FBI. He dumped proof of his hackings on a website and used a Twitter account to direct enthusiasts to the web site. But also on display on the website was a picture of a woman, her cleavage out towards the camera for all to see. There was…

Airtel Kenya has today launched a new customer reward scheme which will offer up to 16 hours of FREE talk time to its inactive customers who reactivate their lines onto the Network through MAMO. Existing Airtel customers will also enjoy exciting great value offers off the My Airtel, My Offer (MAMO) service. MAMO is a service on the Airtel network where prepaid customers can choose a range of unique and exciting offers that cater for their individual needs by simply dialing 141 from their Airtel handsets. Amongst these offers is 50% more airtime upon recharge with Airtel Money and double…

I really must confess that I looked like I was dooing PR for Nation Media Group when I did the QTV story. The funny bit is that it is very hard to really look up to East and Central Africa’s biggest media house for innovative idea. The group’s flagship TV station, NTV just came up with a show where they analysed the social media trends and talk about them in the show called #TheTrend. The obvious bit of this is that #TheTrend is a copy paste of Aljazeera’s #TheStream. Aljazeera delivers the stream in such a manner that you love…

It seems that Keriako Tobiko’s office has been hacked. The website http://odpp.go.ke/ seems to have been hacked by some Latino hackers out on an adventure. I doubt if there is any serious damage since most of what are loaded on the Kenyan government websites are nothing more than skeletons of informations. Nothing much only that it is embarassing to the office of the public prosecutor.

Pivot25, now called Pivot East, is back. This time they promise to be more open and lenient with their gate charges and say that you won’t see more friends of iHub managers win the competition than the deserving Kenyans locked out. The categories are also to match the applications entered in them unlike before where utility category had games and productivity apps had social media apps. My write-up on the competition touched raw nerves until a fatwa was issued against me resulting in the 9th February assault at the iHub. I was and still is just being honest. Problem is majority…

Facebook is looking to give you more information about your account if you decide to “Download your Information” through the same feature. Since 2010, Facebook users have been able to download their accounts’ entire history with photos, status updates, notes, friend lists and chats included. Now Facebook is giving you more including previous names, friend requests and IP addresses you used to log into your account. The archive you will download still lacks your friends’ photos and status updates, friends’ personal info and comments you have made on other people’s posts. The feature is not available to everyone now as it…

Omari works at Fraja Orphanage in Ngong’ suburb of Nairobi. Early this month, he was attacked and slashed many times by thugs who were trying to invade the orphanage. Omari stood his ground and defended the orphanage plus kids from the attackers, some of whom were armed with machetes. His friends, some of who are American volunteers working at the orphanage posted his scarred images on Reddit asking for $2,000 (Ksh 164,000) to help build a wall around the orphanage. Reddit  is a social news website, where the registered users submit content, in the form of either a link or a…

France Telecom-Orange has today announced the launch of commercial services for LION2, the Indian Ocean’s new submarine cable. France Telecom-Orange and the other members of the LION2 consortium – the Group’s subsidiaries Mauritius Telecom, Orange Madagascar and Telkom Kenya, as well as two other operators, Emtel Ltd and  SFR Réunion – celebrated in Mayotte today the launch of commercial services for the broadband submarine cable LION2. This cable provides the island of Mayotte with broadband connectivity for the first time and reinforces international network connectivity for Kenya. Following the launch of the LION (Lower Indian Ocean Network) submarine cable at the…

Safaricom and Quacomm announced today the launch of an “experiential tour” for its 3G products in Kenya. The tour will run from April 14th to June 31 and will users a chance to test-drive 3G services, experience rich content and sample the speedy internet bouquet which is accessible through Safaricom 3G enabled smartphones, PCs and laptops. Safaricom and Qualcomm unveiled two vans which have been custom-built as the “Mobile Experience Centres.” The vans have been fitted with 32-inch flat screen TVs, laptop with dongles and smartphones (from Samsung, HTC, BlackBerry, Huawei, Sony Ericsson and others) for users to try out…

Luxemburg based satellite company, SES, which has a fleet of 50 satellites orbiting the earth, is reportedly in negotiations with Ethio Telecom to provide it with backup/redundancy services. SES which is reported to be planning to invest more than 1 billion Euros in satellite infrastructure in Africa, expects to launch a satellite to dedicated in serving the East African market including Ethiopia. These were reveleaed by Ibrahima Guima-Saidou who is the African Representative for SES. SES provides satellite services to consumers all over the world and has recently launched an initiative to enter Africa and to build long term partnerships with…

Iran has come out to deny the online reports which have indicated that it plans to cut access to the World Wide Web (Internet) in August and replace it with a national intranet (Iran-ternet). The IB Times article which started the rumors apparently picked an April 1 hoax and used it as the basis of its story, Iran’s Ministry of Communication said on the ministry’s website www.ict.gov.rw. The website itself is not accessible from outside Iran. “The report is in no way confirmed by the ministry completely baseless,” the ministry statement said.

Since when Nation Media started promoting the QTV idea on TV and Print, I have been interested in knowing what the content will be like. I have been trying to get in touch with the new GM of QTV, Betty Dindi, who wouldn’t speak much or the good old Emmanuel Juma who is doing lots of work at NTV. So I just to talk to Anne Gitao,  Group Marketing Director at Nation Media. Its been long since I last saw Anne. 3 -4 years. According to Anne, QTV is first not a response to Aljazeera’s intention to launch a local…