Hi Blog readers,
Its been a while since I posted an article to this blog, don’t mind me, being trying to sort out IGDA Nigeria’s registration as a non – profit organization in Nigeria.
However two weeks ago, was when all my team’s effort to achieve this registration came to fruition as we received our certificate of incorporation from the Government’s Corporate Affairs Comission. I was gladened by this achievement – finally I wont sound like a broken record tape to all the Chapter Leaders during our weekly Skype chat.
Anyway the week after that week, I found myself at the Bristish Council Nigeria Creative Industries Expo, that was held on December 4th -7th 2011. The event was pretty well organized by the Council, with international speakers like Ian Livingstone OBE, Life President of Eidos UK, Dr Martin Smith – Special Adviser, Ingenious Media UK, Margaret Bolton -Consultant, UK Third Sector Policy, Tom Broughton -Digital Media Strategist and a host of others.
Also in attendance at the expo, was the Minister of Culture and Tourism, Cheif Edem Duke and the Governor of Cross River State – H.E Senator Liyel Imoke.
With this roll call of special guests for this event, I felt like this was the opportunity for the youth entrepreneurs in this country. An opportunity that will be long – lasting in their memories, for just having to show up at this conference and discuss the issues we all have been facing trying to start a business that should be independent and life lasting.
As the speakers spoke on their industries and what they have achieved a lot of the attendants were really pumped up to speak about the challenges facing every entrepreneur in Nigeria, it was now time for these budding entrepreneurs to ask their questions and they really did.
Issues raised during the Questions and Answer time at the event focused on issues like sources of funding for entrepreneurial projects, piracy and copyright laws and how it affects the creatives in Nigeria, Lack of spaces with the urban environment for creative people to practice their art and so on.
These issues were answered pretty well by the speakers as most of the answers came from their experience of this problems in the UK.
Though there was a constant repition by the speakers that this was also a problem the creatives in UK and other parts of the World were facing today. The Nigerian panelists made a constant repitition of a certain 200 million naira grant given to the creative industry by the incumbent President during his campaign, before he was elected by the President.
The major issue with this fund that they pointed out was that there were no guidelines as to how this fund was to be deployed to the banks that will later grant these entrepreneurs access to it.
Some things in this country are just odd some times. However not to spoil a good time, the event did end well, at least for me. I finally had the opprtunity to take a picture with the legend himself – you all know who am writing about.
Yes, Mr Ian Livingstone OBE, Life President Eidos UK, the man behind games such as Dungeons & Dragons,Tomb Raider etc, taking a picture with him was my moment and I did. This was the point I felt that yes I am really getting somewhere with all this gaming efforts I am making. After all those Skype chats and really getting frustrated here – Its finally making sense now. I leave you ardent readers of this blog, with the picture of my moment at this expo here it is.
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Happy New Year to all those who have been ardent readers of this blog, we at IGDA Nigeria are glad that you all made it to this year!
We would improve on our services to you all this year, as we are currently registering this group with the local authorities in Nigeria.
From all of us, “Happy New Year!” once more.
The Director General, National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Prof. Cleopas Angaye made a pledge to sponsor Python Programme training all over the country in order to develop software programming.
This was disclosed at a five day training programme titled “Python Africa Tour, Nigeria” for Open Source Software Capacity Building, which was recently held at the African University of Science and Technology, Abuja
The DG expressed the desire of the Agency to consolidate on capacity building on the “state of art computer programming language for Free and Open Source Software”, (FOSS).
He said ” This capacity building which NITDA sponsored was organised by a Non – Governmental Organisation in respect to our mandate in the area of capacity building, and NITDA decided to collaborate with the NGO in order to foster and develop Nigerian skills in the area of usage of Free and Open Source Software, (FOSS)
The DG further reiterated the Agency’s desire to extend the training to other zones in the country although, financial constraints might restrict the agency from achieving this in earnest. He however, assured participants at the end of the event that the challenge to deter it from carrying out its mandate.
The event Programme Coordinator and Chief Executive Officer DATASPHIR, Omo Olaiya said his team was prepared to train a lot of Nigerians on Phython Language Programming adding that they were committed to take up Phyton in Nigeria and move it forward.
At the end of the workshop, certificates were awarded to the participants by the Director of Software Development and Technical Research.
Participants at this event were 60, with the next session expected to hold in Lagos.
Hey, its been a while since our last post. Sorry for this delay! We were trying to define our framework to move this Chapter forward.
Anyway, here is one company that has been around for a while and has delivered back to back LAN gaming events in Nigeria, yes its LaKraft Entertainment.
This company has been invoved with LAN events since 2004, which is quite a good omen for us, they even secured a license from ESWC (Electronic Sports World Cup) in Nigeria.
You know what! Enough blog writting, check out their website on : http://www.lakraftentertainment.com/about.php
Things are changing fast in Africa’s telecommunications industry: High – capacity undersea cables are being built to wire up Africa, with a new hope of the continent being awash in bandwith. No doubt, this year will end with a record increase of cable projects that will bring more submarine capacity to the continent, with Nigeria as a major beneficiary.
If these planned projects live up to their potential, the West African region will have more than 15,000Gbit/s landing on its shores. These plans were spoken of at a just concluded meeting with the African Development Bank, Reuters Foundation and a group of 20 African journalists, who participated in a media skill development partnership.
The five regions of Africa were represented at the conference by Nigeria, Ghana, Egypt, Morocco, Algeria, Gabon, Burkia Faso, Mozambique, Uganda, Democratic Republic of Congo and South Africa. Others countries involved are Zimbabwe, Sierra Leone, Zambia, Rwanda, Tanzania and Kenya.
After a country by country evaluation of the continents telecommunication, it was observed that there is an increase of investment in data services as operators are witnessing a growing demand of data services from their consumers. Participants at this meeting raised a common challenge faced by most operators on the continent as the fact that the backhaul, that connects high speed links to the submarine cables and to the operators access networks (base stations and telephone exchanges) remains a major challenge.
Nigeria was noted to be on the right track with its private sector operations but real revolution would be achieved with more investment in terrestial fibre networks to complement the submarine cables.
Nigeria’s telecommunications sector contributes a major chunk of official economic growth indices recorded in the last 10 years, with over $50 billion worth of investment in infrastructure in the last 10 years. This figure is mainly driven by the private sector players, including MTN, Zain (now Airtel), Globacom, Etisalat and the CDMA operators.
GSM services debuted in Nigeria in 2000 and since then,have gradually moved to 3G platform. The buzz now is fibre optics and submarine cables. Nigeria used to have SAT-3 with a monopolised operation, but now, there is Main one and Glo one, which is a good competition and promises a high benefit potential for the consumers.
This article was culled from The Nigerian Guardian Newspaper
Hey peeps, just stumbled on this! ‘Fun In Nigeria’, well this is a new MMO game made by 
Girl Games. A casual game website dedicated to making free games online. “Girl Games makes it easy to find cool games by organizing games into channels such as Dress Up, Cooking,Decorating, Sports & Skill, Puzzles, and Action.
Fun In Nigeria enables casual gamers to explore the wonderful Nigerian fashion by dressing up a doll in African clothing and then send that picture to your friends via the web. Did I hear you say “COOL”, then it may interest you to know that this game has been played 114,566 times on the site alone. Quite impressive for a start!
The site is currently owned by FPS Networks, Inc and is operated from its headquarters in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
Well we said it, that its heating up here in Lagos. 3D Labz, a company recently formed is creating new media for the Nigerian market. With services from 2D, 3D characters, animation and object rendering done for its various clients, its is poised to change the media landscape in the country. I bet that this company will soon have its portfolio full as they offer a unique service to the Nigerian and possibly African masses. Here is a link to their website: http://www.3dlabznigeria.com/about.htm
