Video games ? Kenya's new emerging industry with 'huge scope'


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The global gaming business is a multi-billion dollar industry. During its 2012 fiscal year Electronic Arts, an American developer and publisher of video games such as ?The Sims? and ?Need for Speed, raked in revenues of over US$4 billion. Yet in Africa, the games market is relatively small with just a handful of African game developers and most of the population generally viewing gaming as ?not so serious?. In Kenya, young gaming enthusiasts like Nathan Masyoku, chief executive gamer at NexGen Ltd, a video gaming and computer business, are transforming the industry. Masyoku told How we made it in Africa?s Dinfin Mulupi more about Kenya?s emerging gaming industry.

Nathan Masyoku

How did you start NexGen?

After I graduated from Africa Nazarene University with a degree in computer studies I worked for a VoIP telecommunication company for a year as a support engineer. It was however not my passion because I wanted to do something in gaming. Gaming was the one thing that I could do, look up at the clock and find five hours had passed, but kept going.

I met one of my partners, Ayub Makimei, whose dream was to start a retail centre that would sell high-end gaming machines while my dream was to have a centre where people could come and play games at affordable rates. It is expensive to purchase gaming software. In Kenya, they sell at about $100 each. Ten games would be out of reach for most players. It seemed reasonable to have players pay cyber caf? fees as they played. We merged the two ideas to have a place where people could play and also purchase hardware.

We needed $200,000 to execute this idea but we couldn?t get funding. We decided to transform our idea and became an events company. In 2009, we held local competitions and sent a team of gamers to compete in China at the World Cyber Games, a video gaming competition. It was like going to the mecca of gaming. We met people across the world who were as passionate as we were. Upon return, we began holding regular tournaments. Every month, we hold a virtual ?FIFA? championship. This year, we are optimistic that the team we will send to World Cyber Games will perform well. There are Kenyans who compete globally and are highly ranked.

Who is your target market?

Our primary target audience is people in their 20s, however, I know people in their 30s and 40s who play. Contrary to perception, gamers are not obese, idle, anti-social types, hidden in their mother?s garage somewhere playing. They are professional engineers, news anchors and doctors. They are mostly professionals, both male and female, drawn from the low and middle classes. Gaming allows you to do things in your living room that you would not be able to do in reality. In a typical day, I can compete with Lewis Hamilton and Michael Schumacher in the Formula 1 circuit in the morning, lead Arsenal to victory in the champion?s league in the afternoon, and in the evening, I can help the Western powers defeat terrorists. It is an involving experience.

What is the state of the gaming industry in Kenya?

In Kenya ? we have seen the establishment of centres where people can play PC games and Xbox. We have also seen a rise in the spending power of the gamer. Young people are purchasing more hardware like high-end PCs that can run games selling at $1,700 going upwards.

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  • Source: http://www.howwemadeitinafrica.com/video-games-%E2%80%93-kenya%E2%80%99s-new-emerging-industry-with-%E2%80%98huge-scope%E2%80%99/23366/

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    Cape Town, South Africa ? Puppet Fundamentals Training

    Puppet Fundamentals Course

    This training course replaces the former Puppet Master course. The class teaches students a best practice approach to managing their infrastructure using Puppet IT automation software, including:

    • Developing modules/classes on a system that represent target systems.
    • Using Puppet Apply to test and iterate modules.
    • Placing modules on the Puppet Master.
    • Declaring appropriate classes in node definitions.
    • Triggering a Puppet run using the Live Management GUI
    • Collecting and analyzing results in the Enterprise Console

    Prerequisites:

    This course has no prerequisites, but to complete the course successfully attendees need to have at least the equivalent experience of a junior Unix/Linux administrator.

    Course Objectives/Goals:

    After completing this course, students will be able to deploy basic system configurations using Puppet IT Automation software in a Master/Client configuration.

    Target Audience (Who should attend):

    The target audience for this course includes newer members at an organization already using Puppet, or experienced sysadmins wanting to bring Puppet into their team as a new solution.

    Topics are covered over 3 days. Sessions will mix theory and practice, balancing 50% lecture with 50% hands-on exercises. (In order to perform the hands-on exercises, each student needs to bring a WiFi enabled laptop with VMware installed to participate in the labs, unless otherwise noted.)

    • $2,195 by April 1, 2013; $2,395 on or after April 2, 2013.

    Register for Puppet Fundamentals Training: Chicago in Chicago, IL  on Eventbrite

    Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/PuppetLabs/~3/oWIzXnebJJ0/

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    Personal Finance Daily: 10 things your office won't tell you - Wall ...

    From: MarketWatch.com - Top Stories - 4:47pm - January 14, 2013

    How are desk chairs, keyboards and co-workers bad for your health? Find out in today?s Personal Finance Daily. Plus, learn what to look for in the fine print of your bank?s disclosures, and what steps for boomers to take when starting a business.

    Continue reading this article ?

    Share This Article:

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    Source: http://ewallstreeter.com/personal-finance-daily-things-your-office-won-t-tell-you-5951/

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    Gene promotes drug resistance in cancer

    Jan. 14, 2013 ? Scientists from the University of Iowa and Brigham Young University (BYU) have identified a gene that may be a target for overcoming drug resistance in cancer. The finding could not only improve prognostic and diagnostic tools for evaluating cancer and monitoring patients' response to treatment but also could lead to new therapies directed at eradicating drug-resistant cancer cells.

    Drug resistance is a common problem in many metastatic cancers. It leads to failure of chemotherapy treatments and is associated with poor patient outcomes, including rapid relapse and death.

    The research team, including Fenghuang (Frank) Zhan, M.D., Ph.D., and Guido Tricot, M.D., Ph.D., from the UI, and David Bearss, Ph.D., from BYU, initially focused on identifying genes linked to the development of drug resistance in multiple myeloma, a bone marrow cancer that affects more than 20,000 Americans and causes almost 11,000 deaths annually.

    Working with serial biopsied cells from 19 myeloma patients, the researchers analyzed genetic changes in the cells that occurred over the course of treatment with very intensive chemotherapy drugs. This approach identified a gene called NEK2 that is strongly associated with increased drug-resistance, faster cancer growth, and poorer survival for patients. The study was published Jan. 14 in the journal Cancer Cell.

    Having established the relationship between high expression of the NEK2 gene and poor patient outcome in myeloma, the team then examined the relationship in other common cancers -- including breast, lung, and bladder cancer -- by analyzing gene expression profiles from 2,500 patients' cells with eight different cancers in Zhan's lab.

    "In all cases, an increase in the NEK2 gene was associated with rapid death of the patient," says Tricot, who is director of Holden Comprehensive Cancer Center's Bone Marrow Transplant and Myeloma Program at UI Hospitals and Clinics. "So this finding was not unique to myeloma; this is basically seen in every single cancer we looked at."

    Taking the findings back to the lab, the team then examined the effect on cancer cells of either enhancing or blocking the expression of the NEK2 gene.

    "Our studies show that over-expression of NEK2 in cancer cells significantly enhances the activity of drug efflux proteins to pump chemotherapy drugs out of cells, resulting in drug resistance. Furthermore, silencing NEK2 in cancer cells potently decreased drug resistance, induced cell-cycle arrest, cell death, and inhibited cancer cell growth in vitro and in vivo," says Zhan, UI professor of internal medicine.

    The research team is now developing compounds to inhibit NEK2 by collaborating with David Bearss, Ph.D., associate professor of physiology and developmental biology at BYU, in the hope that these compounds may overcome drug resistance in cancer cells.

    "We were able to show that if we inhibit NEK2, then we can actually restore sensitivity to drugs that we use right now," Bearss says.

    Although development and clinical testing of such drugs for use in patients is not imminent, Tricot notes that the findings may have clinical use within the next several years.

    "NEK2 expression may be a diagnostic or prognostic marker for drug-resistant cancer," he says. "If NEK2 is high, that would suggest that the prognosis is poorer and the patient might benefit from more aggressive treatment. The other potential use is for monitoring the cancer's response to therapy. If NEK2 levels increase, that would suggest development of increased drug resistance and might indicate that a change of treatment would be helpful."

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    Story Source:

    The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of Iowa Health Care, via Newswise.

    Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.


    Journal Reference:

    1. Wen Zhou, Ye Yang, Jiliang Xia, He Wang, Mohamed?E. Salama, Wei Xiong, Hongwei Xu, Shashirekha Shetty, Tiehua Chen, Zhaoyang Zeng, Lei Shi, Maurizio Zangari, Rodney Miles, David Bearss, Guido Tricot, Fenghuang Zhan. NEK2 Induces Drug Resistance Mainly through Activation of Efflux Drug Pumps and Is Associated with Poor Prognosis in Myeloma and Other Cancers. Cancer Cell, 2013; 23 (1): 48 DOI: 10.1016/j.ccr.2012.12.001

    Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

    Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

    Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/most_popular/~3/INMEfPKz1Y0/130114124932.htm

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    Horsemeat found in beef burgers

    Horse DNA has been found in some beef burgers being sold in UK and Irish supermarkets, the Republic of Ireland's food safety authority has said.

    The FSAI said the meat came from two processing plants in Ireland, Liffey Meats and Silvercrest Foods, and the Dalepak Hambleton plant in Yorkshire.

    The chief executive of the FSAI, Professor Alan Reilly, said there was no risk to the public.

    However, he added that eating horsemeat "was not in Irish culture".

    "Whilst, there is a plausible explanation for the presence of pig DNA in these products due to the fact that meat from different animals is processed in the same meat plants, there is no clear explanation at this time for the presence of horse DNA in products emanating from meat plants that do not use horsemeat in their production process," he said.

    "In Ireland, it is not in our culture to eat horsemeat and therefore, we do not expect to find it in a burger.

    "Likewise, for some religious groups or people who abstain from eating pig meat, the presence of traces of pig DNA is unacceptable."

    The burgers were on sale in Tesco, Dunnes Stores, Lidl, Aldi and Iceland.

    A total of 27 products were analysed, with 10 of them containing horse DNA and 23 containing pig DNA.

    Horsemeat accounted for approximately 29% of the meat content in one sample from Tesco.

    Retailers have said they are now removing all implicated batches of the burgers.

    Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-21034942#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa

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    Personal Injury Lawyers Sue Other Personal Injury Lawyers Over ...

    I can?t say I?m sorry to see this kind of lawsuit. Citing unfair trade practices, several Florida personal injury firms have brought suit against their brethren. The problem? Accusations of using ?runners? to get clients, also known as ambulance chasing.

    The concept of chasing cases has long been a stain on the profession. I know I am not alone in being upset to see our reputations tarnished by the less reputable. Whenever any member of a community acts inappropriately, it affects the reputations of others. Decent cops and priests know all about this concept when they see wayward others from their insular communities in the news in unflattering ways.

    Personally, I think outing chasers is a good idea, something that I have written about before (Ambulance Chasers, Runners and Other Creeps). In that 2009 post I wrote:

    The message should be loud and clear: If you employ runners to chase cases at the local hospitals you shouldn?t be practicing law. And it should be equally clear that the vast, vast majority of attorneys look down with utter disdain on such conduct. Without question, most of the lawyers that I run into, on both the plaintiffs and defense side, practice law conscientiously and ethically. The corrupt ones should not expect others to come to their defense.

    When lawyers practice unethically it tarnishes the entire profession and makes it more difficult to represent those in need of legal services.

    According to the brief article I read, these are the?firms that brought the suit (in other words, those pissed off at seeing others chase): Lawlor, Winston, White & Murphy in Fort Lauderdale; Metnick, Levy & Long in Delray Beach; Balkan & Patterson in Boca Raton; and Gary E. Susser in Boynton Beach. Suit was filed in Broward Circuit Court on Jan. 4.

    Those firms are alleging that the bad guys are: Bader, Stillman & Adler in Margate; Madalon Law Firm in Hollywood; and Gregory Schwartz P.A. in Hollywood are using runners as middlemen to sign up suits.

    I am sure that I am not alone in wondering what the evidence will look like. My gut reaction is that the firms that brought suit will have learned of the alleged chasers from clients that they have, who had been approached by ?investigators? for the chasing firms. In other words, someone gets handed a business card in a hospital and is pitched on legal services, and the patient goes elsewhere and lets the lawyers that they actually hire and trust what happened before they wanted in the door.

    The case should be very interesting to watch.

    Tags:

    Source: http://www.newyorkpersonalinjuryattorneyblog.com/2013/01/personal-injury-lawyers-sue-other-personal-injury-lawyers-over-solicitation.html

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    Earth Science Week 2013 theme announced: "Mapping Our World"

    [ Back to EurekAlert! ] Public release date: 15-Jan-2013
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    Contact: Geoff Camphire
    gac@agiweb.org
    American Geological Institute

    Alexandria, VA -- The American Geosciences Institute (AGI) is pleased to announce that the theme of Earth Science Week 2013 will be "Mapping Our World." This year's event will promote awareness of the many exciting uses of maps and mapping technologies in the geosciences.

    Earth Science Week 2013 materials and activities will engage young people and others in learning how geoscientists, geographers, and other mapping professionals use maps to represent land formations, natural resource deposits, bodies of water, fault lines, volcanic activity, weather patterns, travel routes, parks, businesses, population distribution, our shared geologic heritage, and more. Maps help show how the Earth systems -- geosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, and biosphere -- interact.

    "With this theme, Earth Science Week highlights the ways that Earth scientists use maps to understand our planet and how humans use the land," says Geoff Camphire, AGI's Manager of Outreach. "For centuries, people have relied on maps to represent their knowledge of Earth and its systems. From old-world celestial maps and nautical charts to the satellite imaging and digital GIS technology of the 21st century, map-making provides an interactive way of knowing our world."

    ###

    Reaching over 50 million people annually, AGI leads Earth Science Week in cooperation with its sponsors and the geoscience community as a service to the public. Each year, community groups, educators, and interested citizens organize celebratory events. Earth Science Week offers the public opportunities to discover the Earth sciences and engage in responsible stewardship of the Earth. Earth Science Week is supported by the U.S. Geological Survey, the AAPG Foundation, the National Park Service, NASA, Esri, and the American Geophysical Union.

    Earth Science Week 2013 will be celebrated October 13-19. For more about this week and ways to get involved -- including newsletters, local events, and classroom activities -- please see the Earth Science Week web site at http://www.earthsciweek.org/.


    [ Back to EurekAlert! ] [ | E-mail | Share Share ]

    ?


    AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.


    [ Back to EurekAlert! ] Public release date: 15-Jan-2013
    [ | E-mail | Share Share ]

    Contact: Geoff Camphire
    gac@agiweb.org
    American Geological Institute

    Alexandria, VA -- The American Geosciences Institute (AGI) is pleased to announce that the theme of Earth Science Week 2013 will be "Mapping Our World." This year's event will promote awareness of the many exciting uses of maps and mapping technologies in the geosciences.

    Earth Science Week 2013 materials and activities will engage young people and others in learning how geoscientists, geographers, and other mapping professionals use maps to represent land formations, natural resource deposits, bodies of water, fault lines, volcanic activity, weather patterns, travel routes, parks, businesses, population distribution, our shared geologic heritage, and more. Maps help show how the Earth systems -- geosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, and biosphere -- interact.

    "With this theme, Earth Science Week highlights the ways that Earth scientists use maps to understand our planet and how humans use the land," says Geoff Camphire, AGI's Manager of Outreach. "For centuries, people have relied on maps to represent their knowledge of Earth and its systems. From old-world celestial maps and nautical charts to the satellite imaging and digital GIS technology of the 21st century, map-making provides an interactive way of knowing our world."

    ###

    Reaching over 50 million people annually, AGI leads Earth Science Week in cooperation with its sponsors and the geoscience community as a service to the public. Each year, community groups, educators, and interested citizens organize celebratory events. Earth Science Week offers the public opportunities to discover the Earth sciences and engage in responsible stewardship of the Earth. Earth Science Week is supported by the U.S. Geological Survey, the AAPG Foundation, the National Park Service, NASA, Esri, and the American Geophysical Union.

    Earth Science Week 2013 will be celebrated October 13-19. For more about this week and ways to get involved -- including newsletters, local events, and classroom activities -- please see the Earth Science Week web site at http://www.earthsciweek.org/.


    [ Back to EurekAlert! ] [ | E-mail | Share Share ]

    ?


    AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.


    Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-01/agi-esw011513.php

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    U. S. Federal Safe Routes to School program reduces child injuries by more than 40 percent in New York City

    Jan. 14, 2013 ? The national Safe Routes to School (SRTS) program was funded by Congress in 2005 in an effort to create safe environments for American children to walk or bike to school. Has the program been effective? In New York City, most definitely, according to a new study conducted at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health that evaluated the program here. Researchers found that the annual rate of injury to school-age pedestrians ages 5-19 fell 44% during the peak times for walking to school, in neighborhoods where the program was implemented. Significantly, the injury rate did not drop in parts of the city where the SRTS safety program was not in place.

    Findings of the report are published online in Pediatrics.

    The researchers analyzed motor vehicle crash data for 169,000 pedestrian injuries between 2001 and 2010 for different age groups and neighborhoods with and without SRTS interventions to assess the program's effectiveness.

    Interventions for reducing pedestrian injury included new traffic and pedestrian signals, the addition of exclusive pedestrian crossing times, speed bumps, speed boards, high-visibility crosswalks, and new parking regulations. More than 120 NYC schools were selected by the NYC Department of Transportation for the interventions because they had the highest rates of pedestrian injury.

    The researchers created a school-travel time indicator variable to further identify crashes that occurred during days and hours when school-aged children would be traveling to or from school. This time period was defined as 7 AM to 9 AM or 2 PM to 4 PM, Monday through Friday between September and June.

    "Our data show that interventions to make the built environment safer can greatly reduce injuries to children as they walk to school," says the lead author of the study, Charles DiMaggio, PhD, associate professor of Epidemiology and research director of the Center for Injury Epidemiology and Prevention at Columbia.

    The Safe Routes to School program was funded through 2012, and is now in place in all 50 states at approximately 10% of elementary and secondary schools. Under the current federal transportation bill, MAP-21, the Safe Routes program will no longer have dedicated funding. It is now one of a number of possible programs eligible for funding based on state and local priorities, making it "even more important to evaluate and demonstrate the effectiveness of programs like Safe Routes to School," according to Dr. DiMaggio.

    "Our study provides compelling empirical evidence that is essential to guiding policy makers," says senior author Guohua Li, MD, DrPH, Mailman School professor of Epidemiology and Anesthesiology and director of the Center for Injury Epidemiology and Prevention. "It indicates that the Safe Routes to School program has made a marked difference in improving the safety of school-age children in New York City."

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    Story Source:

    The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

    Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.


    Journal Reference:

    1. Charles DiMaggio and Guohua Li. Effectiveness of a Safe Routes to School Program in Preventing School-Aged Pedestrian Injury. Pediatrics, January 14, 2013 DOI: 10.1542/peds.2012-2182

    Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

    Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

    Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/most_popular/~3/kC2nhhaeo64/130114092702.htm

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    PST: Is Wilshere getting enough protection from refs?

    Talkers of today?s Arsenal-Manchester City contest (2-0 for City) included DOGSO, two-footed lunges and what we?ll call ?protection.?

    We addressed DOGSO already ? in the wonkish parlance of the refereeing world, that?s ?Denial of Goal Scoring Opportunity.?

    On Vincent Kompany?s two-footed lunge, I generally say the same thing in these circumstances: we can have a legitimate debate about true red card-worthiness here, because the City center back did get the ball, and did not get much of Jack Wilshere?s shin. (In fact, Manchester City manager Roberto Mancini has already said he plans to appeal Kompany?s ejection.)

    But the bottom line for me is that Kompany simply must be smarter there. Defenders who go in with both feet, cleats up, get little sympathy from me. Even the savviest, smoothest tackler cannot know how this is going to look to the man in the middle. We see this time and again, where a clean tackle really does look vicious, and all it takes to elicit ejection is an imperfect angle from the only set of eyes that matter.

    In this case, referee Mike Dean was certainly going to level matters and 10 on 10 if there was any cause to do so. City was never going to get the benefit of the doubt, and Kompany should have known so.

    It looked heavy and dangerous, so it just was not the smartest of actions.

    Now ? onto ?protection.?

    Gunners fans are wondering if Wilshere is getting enough of it? And they are right to do so. Consider:

    source:

    The man was kicked and hacked mercilessly. Arsenal players, clearly frustrated, let Dean know how they felt, admonishing the veteran referee with a couple of serious hissy-fit temper tantrums (pictured, as Wilshere lays on the ground).

    Meanwhile, Wilshere played it cool, proving something today, taking the punishment in midfield and returning for more. No that it surprises anyone.

    Gunners teammates are surely a little more sensitive here, seeing as Wilshere only recently got back on the field after about 14 months away from the game. He?s a real talent, this 21-year-old England international ? but he cannot take too many matches like Sunday?s.

    Source: http://prosoccertalk.nbcsports.com/2013/01/13/is-arsenals-jack-wilshere-getting-enough-referee-protection/related

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