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What East Africa could Teach the Continent about Economic Growth
The 21st century is widely touted as the ‘African Century’, a period promising unprecedented economic and technological growth for the continent. Africa’s future looks bright. The continent features five of the ten fastest-growing economies in the world. Its population is the most youthful, with 60% of all African citizens under the age of 25. And the world’s largest free trade area in terms of participating countries, the African Continental Free Trade Area, is now active and expected to boost intra-African trade by as much as 52% by 2022. With Africa’s fortunes continuing to improve, one region stands out as a possible example to the rest of the continent. As the world starts its slow recovery from a year of constant disruption and immense challenges, a closer look at the continued econo...
How COVID-19 has Impacted Africa’s Wealthiest Countries by GDP
Sourced from IDG Connect Spanning 54 countries, Africa is a powerhouse in the world of natural resources and innovation. And despite the social and political issues the continent faces, there’s was no doubt that it was on track to see an abundance of opportunities to grow in the coming years – however, there was no telling what impact COVID-19 and subsequent national lockdowns would have on local GDPs. Here is a quick look at the richest countries in Africa in a COVID-19 economy: Nigeria A key component of the African economy, Nigeria has a population amounting to half of West Africa (just over 202 million). With an abundance of natural resources, it remains Africa’s number one producer in terms of GDP output, roughly $446,543 Billion at the end of 2019. The country is Africa’s large...
Netflix Documents Michigan Man’s Attempt to Contact Aliens With Kraftwerk’s Music
Deep in the woods of rural Michigan, John Shepherd spent years attempting to contact extraterrestrial life. In the new Netflix short documentary John Was Trying to Contact Aliens, Shepherd shows filmmakers the array of inventions he used in order to beam sound into outer space. Avant-garde style music was the medium by which Shepherd sought to communicate with alien life. John frequently broadcasted sounds from legendary electronic groups Kraftwerk and Tangerine Dream in an attempt to make a connection. Any sounds deemed “non-commercial,” including jazz and reggae music, were fair game in his eyes. Eventually, Shepherd’s determination escalated into building an addition onto his grandparents’ house where he lived, creating an enti...
These WhatsApp Messages could cause your App to Crash
A flaw in WhatsApp allows users to send “Scary Messages” that can cause the recipient’s app to crash, or even worse, result in the loss of their chat history/media etc. According to a report by WABetaInfo, these messages often make no sense to users but WhatsApp interprets the characters differently – “sometimes WhatsApp is unable to render the message totally, because its structure is so weird: the combination of these characters create a situation where WhatsApp isn’t able to process the message, determining an infinite crash.” An infinite crash occurs when users try to open an app but it freezes or closes and restarting the app doesn’t restore functionality. I receive this report every day, really, in particular from Brazilian users.Unfortunately it’s not a fake news.@WhatsA...
Is Africa Heading towards a Cashless Society?
Sourced from Redbubble and iStock. Cash may have traditionally been king, but Covid-19 has contributed to a faster pace of digital payment adoption. Recently, two global fintech players discussed the emergence of a plethora of digital payments and debated if cash is on its way out. Omosalewa Adeyemi, Head of Global Partnerships and Expansion at Flutterwave and Nicolas Vonthron, co-CEO of Mama Money; explored the future of payments and banking in an increasingly digital world. Sending money home during the lockdown Vonthron says Mama Money’s digital offering grew five times during lockdown as users look for ways to send money home online following sudden border closures. “There are 5 million migrants in South Africa who came to find a better future for their families. At Mama Money, w...
The Role of Connected Technologies in the Automotive Sector
After many months of downtime, the much-anticipated resumption of major motorsport races has begun. However, like all other real-world sports, there have been various changes brought about because of the COVID-19 pandemic. For example, a series of amendments were made to almost everything in Formula 1 – from the race-start procedures and team operational rules to podium ceremonies. Some say the Coronavirus may change motorsports forever. However, what has already changed both motorsports and vehicles forever is connectivity, which has thrived in the past decade. How did the decade change both racing and ordinary cars? Motorsport enthusiasts may characterise the past decade as the era of two outstanding racers – Sebastian Vettel and Lewis Hamilton. But for F1 engineers and the bigger backst...
New Biography Explores the Life of Wendy Carlos, Trans Woman Who Helped Develop the Moog Synthesizer
A new biography exploring the life of legendary electronic music composer Wendy Carlos has hit the shelves. Written by Amanda Sewell, music director at Interlochen Public Radio, the eponymous book offers an in-depth look into the fascinating life of the 3-time Grammy Award-winning musician. Carlos, whose pioneering developments in music production helped spawn the seminal Moog synthesizer, was also one of the first public figures to come out as a transgender woman. Robert Moog dropped the curtain on his bespoke synthesizer in 1964, introducing a sleeker, more compact version of the convoluted, analog wired walls of music studios at the time. Carlos went on to harness the power of the Moog synth to record her Switched-On Bach LP, an album that reconfigured Johann Sebastian Bach’s ...
Warung Launch Upcycled Apparel Line and Charitable Initiative Alongside New “Madness” EP
While you might know Boston duo Warung for their tech house flair, you may not know that they’ve also been using their platform for a good cause, launching an upcycled apparel line entirely handmade by their Beyond the Gates record label crew. The collection features screen prints of their logo onto thrifted clothing that they’ve bought or fans have sent in. By doing this, they’ve breathed new life into discarded pieces because—as the old adage says—one person’s trash is another person’s treasure. The upcycled apparel refers to their process of reducing waste from clothing, which ultimately cuts down on air and water pollution, landfill use, and lowers their footprint for greenhouse gas emissions. To top things off, Warung share 5% of the shop’s pro...
Happy Birthday, Beyoncé: 10 Dance Remixes Fit for a Queen
It takes the same amount of dauntless confidence Beyoncé displays on stage to remix one of her songs. Considering an artist of her magnitude—a national treasure who transcends the very industry that spawned her—there is perhaps no one more terrifying to remix due to the risk of butchering their work at the mercy of a rabid fanbase. To pay homage to Queen Bey on her 39th birthday, we gathered 10 of the best dance remixes of her iconic discography and thrust them into the limelight with the hopes of celebrating her intrepid spirit. Take a trip down memory lane and commemorate one of the greatest with these scintillating reworks of some of her most iconic tracks. “Party (Kaytranada Remix)” Leave it to the prolific Kaytranada to take on Beyoncé’s monster André 3000&...
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R3HAB, SOFI TUKKER, Riot Ten, More Share Their Favorite Festival Memories [Exclusive]
While large-scale events and festivals are still on hiatus for the foreseeable future, memories are perhaps the most powerful things we have at the moment. Until we’re able to be reunited at a never-ending festival security line, EDM.com connected with some of the brightest in electronic music to share their favorite festival memories. Ranging from hilarious, wholesome, or just plain weird, we hope these wonderful moments from Apashe, Vanic, Buku, and many more bring a smile to your face. R3HAB “One of my favorite festival memories was in Las Vegas at EDC when 20 fans all made special flags for me. That was very special for me because it brought people together from all around the world.” Riot Ten “My most fond festival memory is probably more of an emotion than an a...
5 Tech Trends to Increase your Bottom Line
Technology has been constantly innovating and expanding the possibilities for organisations across the world. From AI and data gathering to overall productivity – here are five trends that could shape your companies bottom line: 1. Employees adopt AI Employees are constantly becoming more and more open to letting artificial intelligence (AI) take over some of their tasks – especially the mundane, routine tasks. Millennials are now the largest group in the workforce, and they are instinctively more prepared to use AI solutions. Yes, in fact, in the future, millennials might even expect routine tasks to be automated. In the not too distant future, in many workplaces, artificial intelligence will sort emails, proofread texts, book meetings, etc. As a company, it is, therefore, a good idea to ...
Watch 12-Year-Old Noah Epps Perform Eerie Dance to Boombox Cartel Song on America’s Got Talent
Back in June 2020, Noah Epps stunned his America’s Got Talent audience with a spine-chilling dance routine to a song by Excision, harnessing his love of electronic music and manifesting it into a unique performance that captured the collective heart of the EDM community. Epps went on to advance to the quarterfinals of the famed competition show and poured gasoline on his meteoric rise with a mind-blowing performance soundtracked by Boombox Cartel‘s breakout trap hit “B2U.” The America’s Got Talent producers pulled out all the stops for the young phenom, who gyrated around in his signature marionette costume on a festival-grade stage and backdrop featuring polychromatic arcade consoles, a menacing claw machine, and a giant Epps-branded spider robot. &...
