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Facebook dials in live audio streaming option

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Facebook on Monday began testing a live audio streaming service that will let people essentially broadcast radio-style on the leading online social network. Partners working with Facebook to test “Live Audio” included BBC World Service, book publisher HarperCollins, British talk radio station LBC, and authors Adam Grant and Brit Bennett. The new feature comes as an alternative to a Facebook tool that lets people stream live video at the social network. “We know that sometimes publishers want to tell a story on Facebook with words and not video,” Facebook product specialist Shirley Ip and software engineer Bhavana Radhakrishnan said in a blog post. An audio-streaming option promised to be useful in areas where telecommunication networks have trouble handling the larger data demands of video streaming, according to the post. Listeners can discover live audio content in the Facebook News Feed, ask questions and leave reactions in real time during broadcasts. Facebook said it would be
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Instagram launches 15-second video feature.

On Thursday, the company announced its 130 million monthly users will now be able to shoot and share 15-second videos, dressed up with one of 13 special filters. The new video feature was made available to all iOS and Android Instagram users around the world Thursday as a free update to the existing Instagram app. The basic look of the app is the same, but a small movie icon has been added that takes you into video mode. The changes were announced by Instagram co-founder and CEO Kevin Systrom during a press event at the headquarters of Facebook, which bought Instagram last year. "It's everything we know and love about Instagram, but it moves," Systrom said. The video-sharing feature was widely expected and puts Instagram in direct competition with Vine, the popular Twitter-owned app that lets users share looping six-second video clips. Vine has skyrocketed in popularity in the six months since it launched, attracting more than 13 million users. Many o
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Ondo Elections: The people's will, Mimiko's Victory.

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Ondo - The Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) in Osun says the victory of the Labour Party (LP) in the Oct. 20 Ondo State Governorship Election was a reflection of the peoples’ will. Mr Diran Odeyemi, Director of Publicity, Media and Strategy of the party in Osun, said this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Osogbo on Sunday. Odeyemi, while congratulating Gov. Olusegun Mimiko on his re-election in Osun, noted that his victory showed that the people still wanted him in power. “Democracy has worked this time around, and what it means is that the era of election rigging or manipulation of results is gone forever with this election in Nigeria,” he said. According to him, ``it is very unusual for the opposition to congratulate the winner of an election and for the winner too to be magnanimous in victory as contained in Mimiko’s reaction to the election’’. He observed that the election went smoothly not because of politics or an inducement of the electorate before they c
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Lagos turns Fela’s home into Kalakuta Republic Museum

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The Lagos State Government has turned the house of the late Afrobeat legend, Fela Kuti, into a museum to “promote cultural heritage and mark the 74th birthday” of the legendary musician. Inside the museum located at 8, Gbemisola Street, Allen Avenue, Ikeja, to be and managed by Total Consult, are Fela’s trademark items like dresses, shoes and household materials. The dresses are about 3,000. Others include covers of the albums of the late musician. Images on the album covers bear a variety of styles and typefaces which echo and comment on the works and politics of the artiste. According to the state Commissioner for Tourism and Inter-Government Relations, Mr. Disun Holloway, the Kalakuta Republic Museum is to bring back the old social life and culture to Lagos. He noted that it was impossible to overstate the importance of Fela to Lagos and the global musical village. He said, “It is only appropriate to have chosen a day as this to declare this monument
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The Swedish Academy to announce Nobel Prize in Literature Winner.

Accompanied by rampant speculation that is rarely accurate, the Swedish Academy prepared on Thursday to award the 2012   Nobel Prize   in Literature, the cultural high point of a week of accolades to scientists, writers and peacemakers. Since 1901, 104 Nobel literature prizes have been awarded, the most recent to Tomas Transtromer, a Swedish poet, whose more than 15 collections of poetry, the academy said last year, offered “condensed, translucent images” through which “he gives us fresh access to reality.” The panel selecting the winner prides itself on its inscrutability and, according to the Nobel Web site, “the nominations and the opinions written by the members of the Nobel Committee in Literature each year are kept secret for 50 years.” The selection of a European writer for the 2011 literature prize — the eighth in a decade — complaints revived that the award is too Eurocentric. The last American writer to win a Nobel was Toni Morrison in 1993. Philip Roth has been a perenni
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South Africa's foods company moves to acquire more stacks in Dangote Flour Mills

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 South Africa-based foods company Tiger Brands, who recently completed a 63.3 percent stake acquisition of the $150 million-valued Dangote Flour Mills Plc (DFM), may be up for more stakes as reports indicate plans to buy off minority shareholders in the company. According to Nigerian newspaper  THISDAY , disclosed that a reliable stock market source said: “We see a tender offer coming but we cannot say the exact time. However, it is very certain that Tiger Brands would want to settle the minority shareholders and be in total control of DFM.” Dangote Group, a conglomerate owned by Africa’s richest man, Alhaji Aliko Dangote, had last week concluded the sale of 63.3 percent of its flour mills stake to Tiger Brands, retaining only 10 percent and leaving a 26.7 percent holding shared amongst diversified minority shareholders. However, Aliko Dangote would remain as chairman of the DFM. The aggressive expansion  strategy of the South African food company, which earlier acqui
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Vodacom beats MTN as it Launches 4G LTE service.

Vodacom launched South Africa’s first commercial LTE service in Johannesburg today, in a surprise announcement by CEO Shameel Joosub, winning the race for 4G against rival MTN. Joosub surprised attendees at the 2012 MyBroadband Conference this morning, announcing that Vodacom’s Long-Term Evolution network is switched on and commercially available. In a further sensational touch, Vodacom’s Chief Technology Officer Andries Delport, and Jannie van Zyl – who rejoined Vodacom in 2010 –  went on to make the first commercial LTE call in South Africa using two Samsung Galaxy S3 phones in front on onlookers. Jossub announced that the next generation service is already live in 70 sites – for now, only in Johannesburg – but promised that the company would have 150 sites live by the end of October, with up to 500 sites available for commercial use by the end of the year. Vodacom has launched its commercial 4G network using re-farmed 1 ,800Mhz spectrum, however the CEO noted that ex
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