Rhodes University in Grahamstown, South Africa has a beautiful campus with excellent facilities. The newest building on this campus is the Africa Media Matrix which hold the School of Journalism.
The AMM is the base for the Digital Citizens Indaba. This journalism school features brand new TV studios with professional studio equipment. Brand new radio studios. In their finally year students form media companies and these companies have offices in the building. They have massive computer labs and the whole building has wireless broadband. The walls are decorated with historical pictures, original art work, autographed books by Rhodes Alumni,and pieces of media art. In short it is a very impressive building.
The best thing however, yes even better than the wireless broadband internet which by the way is powered by some serious looking equipment, comme ca:
Yes even better than that wireless system and the historical pictures. The best thing about this building is the place where many of us do our best work, the toilets.
The tiles in the toilets are decorated with quotes on the media from various sources. It makes for very interesting reading. Here are a small selection.
From the famous historical:
Three estates in parliament; but in the Reporters’ gallery yonder, there sat a Fourth estate more important far than they all.
Edmund Burke
To the calls to action
Make it your pledge to keep Africa on the front pages of the world’s newspapers and television screens. And not just the bad news, because great and good things which take place on this continent often go unreported.
Mohammed Amin
To the beautifully surreal
Radio lets people see things with their own ears.
New York Times editorial
To the uncompromisingly honest
Only cowards and panic-mongers will think of surrendering to this threat (of apartheid).
Inkululeko
The African proverb
The cock that crows in the morning belongs to one household but his voice is the property of the neighbourhood.
Chinua Achebe
Some give advice
Never pick a fight with people who buy ink by the barrel.
Bill Clinton
To the funny
You cannot hope to bribe or twist (thank God!) the British journalist. But, seeing what the man will do unbribed, there’s no occasion to.
Humbert Wolfe
An editor is one who separates the wheat from the chaff and prints the chaff.
Adlai E. Stevenson
Yeah my camera goes everywhere with me because you never know!
Pamoja Tuangamize Ukimwi
Kaybees - Thanks for voting!
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September 19, 2006 at 1:31 am
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September 23, 2006 at 3:40 am
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September 15, 2006 at 11:12 am
Kenyan Analyst
Great quotes there.
September 15, 2006 at 1:30 pm
alexcia
I cannot reach my blog.
Can anyone get “alexcia.blogspot.com”?
Heres another site thats down.
http://whisperinginn.blogspot.com/
My suspicious mind tell me “http://www.kenyaunlimited.com/feed/out”
may be next
September 15, 2006 at 1:38 pm
alexcia
another site gone down “kenyanentrepreneur.blogspot.com”
I think we have achieved notoriety
September 15, 2006 at 1:46 pm
alexcia
if you can i suggest you do a quick full backup
September 15, 2006 at 1:51 pm
alexcia
the site are now online
sorry guys.
that was a scare
September 15, 2006 at 2:36 pm
Mentalacrobatics
All the blogs you mentioned are hosted on blogspot. It probably means that blogspot was going through some maintainence. You may want to bookmark http://status.blogger.com/ for future reference.
September 15, 2006 at 3:37 pm
sokari
Interesting quotes and everything looks lovely and modern etc but really isnt it about time they changed the name of the university? Achebe -
“The cock that crows in the morning belongs to one household but his voice is the property of the neighbourhood.”
September 15, 2006 at 4:48 pm
Mitzy
From Yvonne Chaka Chaka, to pics of skip-to-my loo. Na hio ndiyo maendeleo!
Rhodes University’s media facilities seem quite impressive. I wish Kenyan and other African universities could borrow a leaf from this, or even come up with ways of having joint knowledge sharing programs between the universities/colleges (e.g. our KIMC or Daystar folks doing a semester or year at the AMM). By taking a look at the ESSAy project’s SA-feels-hot-so-no-collaboration-from-Kenya issues going on, that might be tough, since egos are at stake.
In the long run, with proper planning and the amount of money floating around especially within the private educational institutions, there is no reason why Kenya can’t have media centers of Africa Media Matrix’s calibre….we seem to be getting there, but at a skewed pace and always playing catch up.
September 15, 2006 at 4:54 pm
Mentalacrobatics
Sokari, there is a pretty big lake bang in the middle of Africa we should change the name of as well. and lets not forget the cities and roads and universities elsewhere. Of course the name change is something that should be looked in to. That is yet another issue that Africa should deal with.
But why is it that now when this conference is on colour and names become more important than the content of what is being spoken? Why were people not calling for Lake Victoria’s name to be changed last week?
Can we please focus on what is happening here. A collection of African BLOGGERS. and believe me i am sitting in a room here with over 20 african nationalities represented. How can that NOT BE POSITIVE?
Let us leave the name change debate for another day. And when we start I will look in my own country first.
September 15, 2006 at 4:56 pm
Mentalacrobatics
Mitzy waa kenya has been bashed over ESSAy this week. waa waa. i will do a post about that. I am glad you liked the pictures.
September 15, 2006 at 5:56 pm
uaridi
Fun pics as usual, and a lot of good stuff. I hope you picked up enough stuff to educate and entertain us for the next 12 months. I am glad you represented us.
September 15, 2006 at 11:44 pm
Mitzy
Looking forward to more DCI inspired posts from you, Banks, Mat & KP while you’re all still fresh.
(Ref: “…my camera goes everywhere with me…” and “…the place where many of us do our best work, the toilets…”) hehehe…potty paparazzi!
Bring on more pics too, and thank you for censoring the Ivory Throne ones
What happens In~daba, Stays in In~daba!
September 16, 2006 at 7:54 pm
sokari
D - I hear you and await your feedback!
September 16, 2006 at 10:14 pm
sokari
I was thinking, would it be possible to have a list of the 20 or so African (blogs) bloggers that attended the conference. I hope they will be posting at least some thoughts on the event. I think it is important for all of us to hear what they have to say and for other bloggers to be able to enter into constructive discussions with them on their thoughts etc. So far the only names available are those listed on the blog front page - not sure if these are speakers, organisers or both.
Thanks
September 20, 2006 at 2:39 am
JKE
The Journey is the Destination….for us, who didn’t have the chance to attend the conferences, these stories are more important than the actual conference. Thx for the switch picture + toilet insight - greatly appreciated!
September 21, 2006 at 8:11 am
hash
Good quotes and fun post, thanks for giving us a review of the urinal too.
September 30, 2006 at 4:27 am
Anthony Arojojoye
I really enjoy the Achebe piece. Very insightful.