Look South

If Christmas is a time for giving then why am I doing so much receiving? Since the beginning of December my email has been under a seasonal spam siege and I know I am not alone. It is estimated that at least 60% of all email traffic is unsolicited. Most email users are plagued by adverts for cheap medication, bargain jewellery, unwanted links to pornography and products guaranteed to enlarge our most intimate body parts. Bill Gates, the most spammed person in the world, gets four-million spam messages a day. He has a department dedicated to sifting his email for legitimate messages. Gates is also worth $46-billion and the richest man in the world. Clearly there must be a correlation between the amount of spam you get and your wealth. In fact, Gates gets as many spam messages a day as there are Internet users in the whole of South Africa. This is currently estimated at 3 523 000 or 7,4% of the population according to World Wide Worx. South Africa is relatively advanced compared to...

England's November and December 2004 cricket tour to Zimbabwe has been receiving extensive coverage in the British press. Last week nearly 60 000 words were printed on it in the London-based tabloids alone. The whole matter has been a fiasco to say the least with particularly the South African and British governments flailing about the issues with no clear direction being given. The South African government is deathly quiet. The British government is prevaricating about taking firm action. The various cricket authorities seem to be ducking the issue and pointing the finger at each other. But, given the desperate situation in Zimbabwe, the time has come for some leadership on this matter at the highest governmental level. The British government say they are opposed to the tour, given Zimbabwe's track record on human rights. But they claim that they risk being sued if they forcibly prevent it. They also say in a democratic country they cannot tell sports bodies what to do...