Well done to our athletes!

 So the Olympics have just finished and we ended up with 6 medals, including 3 gold! I’d like to start off by congratulating our whole team. You guys are fantastic and we’re all proud of you!

It is a truly incredible feat, considering the relatively insignificant amount of money that our government puts into the Olympic program and the ton of political B.S. that goes on around it. I hope that our leaders pay attention to the upwelling of positive emotion coming from the populace. I hope that they decide to put some serious clout behind our athletes and out athletic programs.

Community enrichment through sport is a very solid plan for improving disadvantaged communities and could go a long way to work against the thriving criminal sector in SA. People who feel that they have an opportunity to improve their situations through sport are far less likely to fall into a life of crime.

Just a thought. Use it, don’t use it.

-Odd

“The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not winning but taking part; the essential thing in life is not conquering but fighting well.” –Pierre de Coubertin

Geeks, Games and Greatness Podcast - Episode 4

Your next installment of the Podcast is here! In which we talk about Doctor Who, Horse Riding, AFDA, Animation, GeoCaching, South African politics, Microsoft Surface tablets and privacy on the internet.

As you might have noticed, we're playing around with the name. If you have a suggestion for us as to what it should be, please leave us a comment, get hold of us on twitter (@OddModlin and @i4n0fd00m) or drop us a mail (oddcastblog@gmail.com)

So have a listen, share it around and tell us what you think :)

Thanks,
-Odd

OddCast - Episode 3 - Storm Awesome

Here be the 3rd installment of the OddCast featuring our first ever guest: Storm Awesome. We chat about music, live shows and the industry in South Africa, photography, TV shows..... and also nipples.

WARNING: This podcast contains adult language and massive tangents :WARNING

Download

You can (as always) get hold of us on twitter @OddModlin and @i4n0fd00m or email OddCastBlog@gmail.com

Storm Awesome can be found EVERYWHERE on the internet:

www.facebook.com/StormAwesomePhotography

www.facebook.com/StormAwesomeDrummer

www.twitter.com/#!/StormAwesome

www.myspace.com/548172902

www.overtone.co.za/musician/stormawesome

http://za.linkedin.com/pub/storm-awesome/1a/42b/55

http://www.skillpages.com/drummer-percussionist+johannesburg-south-africa+storm.awesome

https://talent.me/storm-thomas

www.reverbnation.com/stormawesome

His bands are here:

www.energyrelated.co.za

www.jennasighed.com
www.facebook.com/thecarnies

www.facebook.com/DeathValleyBluesBand

And his sponsor Music Mate:

www.musicmate.co.za

America showing a trend against evolution

Last week saw the death of Professor Phillip Tobias, arguably South Africa's foremost scientist and a world renowned expert in the field of palaeoanthropology. He was a giant of the academic scene and he will be greatly missed by his family, colleagues, students and thinking people the world over. 

At the same time as this great man was leaving us, The Gallup Group released the results of a survey asking the American public if they believed in evolution. The results are shocking... or at least they should shock you.

The results show a marked increase in the number of people who disbelieve evolution. Not just those who believe that evolution happened with God guiding the process. No. There is a rise of the number of people who believe in Intelligent Design. Against all evidence, argument and rationality there is a growing number of people who would forsake science for religion.

This is terrifying to me. The USA is still the ruling power of the world and it is sliding more and more towards a willfully ignorant and uneducated population.

I simply don’t understand how anyone can ignore such a huge body of evidence with such ferocity.

-Odd

"...evolution is not a religious tenet, to which one swears allegiance or belief as a matter of faith.. It is a factual reality of the empirical world. Just as one would not say "I believe in gravity," one should not proclaim 'I believe in evolution." - Michael Shermer

The SKA

For those of you who didn't hear, the announcement for who will host the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) was a while ago. The two big contenders were South Africa (with other African partners) and Australia.

In true committee style, it was decided to go for a compromise and give it to us both. >.< This may sound like a disaster, but while it complicates the management of the project - it doesn't really have any effect on the science.

The SKA is made up of many smaller radio telescopes and will use essentially two different set-ups. There will be a medium-frequency  array (hosted mostly in Africa) and a low-frequency array (hosted in Australia). The two arrays would have been technically distinct from one another even if only a single country had won the bid.

The South African portion of the SKA will be mostly in the Northern Cape, but installations will also be done in Namibia, Botswana, Zambia, Mozambique, Kenya, Ghana, Madagascar and Mauritius.

It's nice to see an international scientific project happening in Africa, and I just hope that it doesn't get bogged down or disrupted by politics - either international or internal.

You can find out more about the SKA at their website: http://www.skatelescope.org/

-Odd
"ET phone home"


P.S. I've added a download link to the PodCast post below... as I know I prefer listening to my 'casts in my car rather than streaming, and I'm sure you do too.

The SA Public's Silly Priorities

I'm constantly finding myself dumbstruck by the South African public. I find it fascinating (in the same way as an exploding volcano) to watch what we as a country get incensed about, what we find worthy of our attention as a group of people.

We've recently had two large upwellings of public protest about two very different issues: The whole Zuma Spear controversy and the toll roads in Jo'Burg. I've already put in my two cents about both those issues so I won't go into them again. What I interested in is that the people of South Africa obviously feel that these are the most important matters facing our country at the moment.

Seriously? Paying tolls (which happens EVERYWHERE else in the world) and a picture that is in (arguably) bad taste? That is what you think is important? Regardless of what you think of either of those issues, surely we have bigger fish to fry? Don't we have a couple blue whales sitting in the background?

Apart from nebulous concepts like crime, corruption and education there are some very serious, very specific problems that I would think take precedence over anything as trivial as what we get worked up about. For instance:

The DA recently had a match to COSATU’s head office that ended in violence when COSATU supporters clashed with the DA. We should be screaming our heads off about this! The right to protest is one of the basic freedoms that the ANC (and COSATU) fought for and it must work both ways… it’s not just the ANC and its partners that can protest.

Bheki Cele is still a member of our government. After every complaint, report and investigation, this man is still collecting a paycheck out of our pockets. The fact that he still has any form of authority is due a failure of us as a people to call for his head. You think he would still be there if we cried about that as much as we do about tolls?

The death toll on our roads is sitting at about 14000 people a year. 14000 people! We had 900 people killed in December last year. It beggars belief. Sure this is due to number of factors, but it could be significantly reduced by enforcing drinking laws and holding Taxi associations accountable for the maintenance of their vehicles.

All of these problems have solutions; they’re not nebulous policy decisions that are open to debate. All that is needed is the political will to make it happen, but that will never materialize until the South African public hold their elected officials accountable for what they do. We need to make a noise about what really matters to us… not about a stupid little painting.

-Odd

P.S. I really do love this country... I think it's the best place to be in the world, and I'll have something more positive next time :)

“Too many leaders act as if the sheep... their people… are there for the benefit of the shepherd, not that the shepherd has responsibility for the sheep.” –Ken Blanchard

Third World Internet Lament

My illustrious brother recently visited us from down under, full of amazing stories of technology from the first world. It was awesome to see him again (it's been 4 years since he was last out here), but it was sometimes difficult not to strangle his bragging self.

Hearing what sort of infrastructure and services they have in the first world (even one that is on the other side of the world from EVERYTHING) really put our own situation into perspective for me. My boet has a 4mb line at home... for home use... privately. Our businesses are seen as super-advanced if they have that kind of speed!

Australia is also improving their network speeds by rolling a full fiber-optic network. Back at home, I'm pleasantly surprised if my exchange stays online for more than two days running.

We also have a dearth of gadgets in South Africa. I've been meaning to start a podcast for a while now, and in the interests of such I'm trying to get my hands on a midlevel microphone. Something like the Samson Meteor... think I can find in SA? Think I can find something comparable? Think I can find a shop that sells ANY sort of microphone? If you answered no to all of those questions... you're both extremely cynical and absolutely right.

I love this country, I think we have the best weather, people and scenery in the world... but I do sometimes wish we could catch up to the first world just a bit. Maybe just make the attempt? I'll take false hope, really... anything?

-Odd

"The Internet is becoming the town square for the global village of tomorrow" -Bill Gates

Thoughts on democracy

So we've got our local government elections coming up tomorrow. Which is great because there's a possibility that together we can make a change for the better... and the fact that we get a public holiday doesn't hurt either.

I was chilling out with some friends yesterday and I made a comment about voting and one of the guys said that he isn't going to vote because he's protesting 'the system'. I had to restrain myself from strangling him on the spot...

I almost wasn't successful...

Give me a second to calm down...

...

...

...

Ok, I'm fine... Homicidal impulse controlled... nothing to see here... move along.

Sure, democracy isn't the perfect form of government... but it's the best we've got, and it only works if everyone participates. I think it was Alexis de Toqueville who said that we get the government we deserve and that really strikes a cord with me.

In a democratic system (even one like ours that is heavily weighted towards one party) the public are responsible for the people governing them and only though continuous pressure and engagement can we ever hope to improve the woeful governance we experience.

Personally, I'm hoping that the DA can take Joburg... or at least some the municipalities in Gauteng, but if they don't I'll go back next time and cast my vote again... in hope... and in the knowledge that if I don't, nothing will ever change.

And if you don't vote, you can't complain - about anything - period. If I hear you complaining and you didn't vote... I probably won't try to control my reaction.

-Odd

"A politician thinks of the next election. A statesman, of the next generation" -James Freeman Clarke