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Maemo 5 is a Debian Linux-based operating system that is installed on the Nokia N900 cellular phone. As it's a customised version of an operating system that is designed to run on all sorts of devices, including desktop machines and laptops, it has lots of productivity features and tools. This is a showcase of some of what the OS has to offer the phone.
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 5 March 2010 |
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Réunion, a small island in the Indian Ocean, offers the fantastic contrast of a little bit of France in Africa and a little bit of Africa in France. Plus, there's great surf, strong rum, breathtaking vistas, and a very active volcano.
By: Alison Westwood |
Posted: 26 November 2009 |
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Category: Travel > Réunion > Features
For Americans, pumpkin carving is an integral part of celebrating and enjoying Halloween, and has become a form of fine art. brainwavez.org presents some interesting jack-o'-lantern and carved pumpkins from a massive collection available on Flickr. We hope these will serve as a source of inspiration (for the artistically minded) or consternation (for those who are artistically inept (or undead)).
By: Jase Luttrell |
Posted: 19 November 2009 |
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Category: Culture > Features
The 2009 FNB Whisky Live Festival is the largest whisky festival in the world. It's running in Cape Town and Johannesburg, South Africa, this month so we went along on the opening night to bask in warm, golden glows and determine just how much whisky one can sample in an evening. (The answer: not nearly enough!)
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 6 November 2009 |
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Category: Culture > Features
What do you end up with once you're picked the best? A lot of weird stuff. Here's a selection of zombie shorts that didn't make it into our
recent film festival. In these, "horror" really stands for "horrorble" (including that joke) but if you're open to it there's still lots of fun to be had watching this crazy selection. Once again, you need to be an adult to access these videos.
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 28 October 2009 |
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Category: Screen > Shorts > Features
What better way to kick off our Halloween festivities this year than with zombies? We lumbered around the Rockstar Games Social Club TV web site to find the undead lurking in sometimes surprising places and, therefore, we compiled a film festival, as one does when confronted with horror! Watch in order, or pick and choose - either way, we hope you enjoy it! (Although there are no brains in this showcase it's still not suitable for minors. If you fall into this category, we recommend a few years of growth and, in the meantime, "
A Tale Of Terror: The Boise Zombie Walk".)
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 19 October 2009 |
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Category: Screen > Shorts > Features
If you are in the Portland, Oregon, area in September, you have the option of viewing Vaux's Swifts during their annual migration, a marvel of nature, which is either inspiring or vaguely Hitchcockian, depending on how paranoid you are.
By: Jase Luttrell |
Posted: 8 October 2009 |
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Category: Travel > US > Oregon > Activities
Many web sites were launched as part of the online viral-marketing effort to promote District 9. In this showcase we will look at those sites (collectively referred to as "The District 9 Movie Experience"), and more, to see how they related to, and complemented, the real-world marketing campaign. (Plus, for fans, find out about some amazing items and downloads you may have missed on each site.)
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 1 October 2009 |
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Category: Screen > Film > Features
The marketing campaign for District 9 was one of the most extensive ever seen... if you lived pretty much anywhere but in Africa, where it didn't exist. Simultaneous campaigns were run in the real world, using traditional marketing techniques that included billboards and posters, and online, using social-networking sites and web sites. This article focusses on the real-world campaign, most notably as was seen in key cities in the US in the run-up to the movie's release.
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 18 September 2009 |
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Category: Screen > Film > Features
brainwavez.org is taking a slight detour from a focus on books but is keeping the alliterative spirit alive by shifting to beer. It's summer in the United States, which means there are ample beer festivals aimed at quenching thirst, surviving heat waves, and making ugly people beautiful. The first festival of the summer in the Portland, Oregon, area was the North American Organic Brewers Festival, a delightful and sustainable romp through some of the best organic beers available today.
By: Jase Luttrell |
Posted: 13 August 2009 |
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Category: Culture > Features
Your phone is your lifeline but it can also be used to control you, art is (partly) alive, and corporations control (almost) everyone in Moxyland, Lauren Beukes' debut novel in which the lives of four characters intersect in an imagining of Cape Town, 2018, that will make most very uneasy. In this exclusive interview the author talks about her influences, her writing process, and exciting projects that were birthed as the book's release gained momentum.
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 31 July 2009 |
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Category: Books >
Features
In the last in our series of photo essays on the 2009 Cape Town Book Fair we highlight some of the interesting discussions that took place during various panel sessions with authors and academics. Visitors to the fair can attend almost all the panel discussions for free, which makes them a popular feature of the fair every year. As a special bonus for this essay we have included video clips from two of the most popular sessions.
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 15 July 2009 |
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Category: Books >
Features
The opportunity to meet authors - both local and international - and hear them talk about their writing processes and experiences is one of the most exciting aspects of the Cape Town Book Fair. Here is a selection of some of the authors that were manning stands, launching books, and signing autographs for fans at the 2009 fair.
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 30 June 2009 |
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Category: Books >
Features
Thousands of people braved crazy winter weather over four days to attend the fourth Cape Town Book Fair, which was held earlier this month at the convention centre in Cape Town, South Africa. Here is a showcase of some of the highlights from the stands and exhibition areas, in the first of a few reports we have compiled.
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 26 June 2009 |
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Category: Books >
Features
In 500 years' time what will the legacy be that we have left on this planet? With wars, clashing religious ideologies, and climate change threatening to decimate the world as we know it Earth - The Comprehensive World Atlas, with its detailed descriptions of countries and cultures as they stand today may become one of the few remaining published records of the time we spent here during one of this planet's most tumultuous periods.
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 15 June 2009 |
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Category: Books >
Features
The South African Music Awards are the highlight of the country's musical year and a celebration of its diverse styles and talents. The main awards ceremony is televised but fans stuck at home always miss out on all the other happenings and more candid moments. Curiosity got the better of us so brainwavez.org sent a correspondent behind the scenes, armed with a camera, to find out what happens.
By: Christine Curtis |
Posted: 29 May 2009 |
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Category: Music > Features
If you're stuck in Thailand with Lara Croft, with no lever in sight, follow our as-complete-as-it's-ever-going-to-be guide to getting her out of this very fine mess. After all, you still have about eight (less buggy?) levels to go before you finally finish this Wii game.
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 11 February 2009 |
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Category: Games > Wii > Features
In an era of all-consuming mass media that craves and divides our attention, reality TV that increasingly scrapes the bottom of the barrel for shock value and ratings, and suspect role models made famous by the Internet, what is truly important to us? What gives us meaning? What do we relate to? How do we now define ourselves? Alex Hamilton's Cast & Crew exhibition presents 1000 icons of our modern times, from artists and musicians to politicians, media stars, and religious figures, and asks us to decide for ourselves.
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 18 November 2008 |
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Category: Culture > Features
Halloween comes but once a year but zombies are forever (unless you hack them to bits, which is recommended). Celebrate the quest for braaaaainnnnsssss with brainwavez.org's recent shuffle through Boise, Idaho, the potato capital of the world (not including Ireland...and possibly some other places).
By: Jase Luttrell |
Posted: 12 November 2008 |
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Category: Culture > Features
Africa. Continent of mystery and charging wildlife. Stay in your cars, people, you don't want to get mauled! However, should someone give you the opportunity to go for a stroll with a ranger (make sure he has a big gun), well, you can't really turn something such as that down, can you? It's a once-in-a-lifetime experience... assuming you return with your life. It's pretty much guaranteed you'll return with an experience.
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 15 August 2008 |
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Category: Travel > South Africa > KwaZulu-Natal > Activities
If you went down to the waterfront recently you were in for a big surprise. Björk was to be seen surfing down a mythical river of electric blue spaghetti, atop a giant yak. The occasion? The premiere of her new 3D music video, "Wanderlust".
By: Ambre Nicolson |
Posted: 29 May 2008 |
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Category: Culture > Features
Now that we're over this year's Valentine's euphoria (you know, the five of you that were actually experiencing it) and sugar highs from Easter chocolate, it's back to the business of cynicism. Although most of us at brainwavez.org are skilled practitioners of the art, we're not the only masters. Recently Two Dogs published Is It Just Me Or Is Everything Kak? The Whinger's Guide To South Africa From AA To JZ. We spoke to co-author Tim Richman about aspects of the South African experience that unite us all in a way that even Nelson Mandela couldn't.
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 11 April 2008 |
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Category: Books >
Features
Murder! Treachery! Deceit! Lies! Thrills! Although that's technically all in a day's work for some of South Africa's parliamentary ministers and their associates, in this case we're talking about Chicago - The Musical, which has returned to Cape Town and is at Artscape until 13 April. You still have two weeks, so if you missed it in 2005 you have no excuse now.
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 28 March 2008 |
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Category: Culture > Theatre
If the weather's good but you've run out of things to do in Cape Town (though hard to imagine, one presumes that could be possible) why not jump out a plane? Experience our attempt at defying gravity, strapped to the crotch of a complete stranger, at 9000 feet.
By: Mandy J Watson |
Posted: 31 January 2008 |
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Category: Travel > South Africa > Western Cape > Activities
To acknowledge Valentine's Day we thought we'd skip all the boring mushy stuff and head straight for the sex, and what better way than with a manual designed to answer all your pressing questions? We recently sat down with Kerry Rogers, author of
Women's Bodies: A User's Manual, and asked pressing questions about her new-found career as a sex-manual writer. (Please note that this article is not suitable for minors.) [
Read all about it ]
Posted: 14 February 2007 |
Category: Books >
Features
Music > lostprophets Live At In The Venue, Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, 10 November 2006
For once, MySpace actually served a purpose. Jase noticed a bulletin the Welsh metal band lostprophets posted, saying that the first four people to email the band would receive two free tickets to its Salt Lake City show at In The Venue. He immediately shot off an e-mail and prayed to the concert gods for a quick response. Without being forced to make a sacrifice, he was notified he won the tickets. Here's what happened at the show. [
Read all about it ]
Posted: 19 December 2006 |
By: Jase Luttrell |
Category: Music > Features
Art Decko 2: A South African Exhibition Of Skateboard Decks
Take some blank skateboard decks, invite a few South African artists to create artworks out of them, repeat for the second year and you have the exhibition Art Decko 2, which has been touring the major centres in South Africa and is now in Durban until next Friday. [
Read all about it ]
Posted: 12 December 2006 |
By: Mandy J Watson |
Category: Culture > Features
Music > Ladysmith Black Mambazo Live At The Depot, Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, 7 November 2006
Many months ago, Mandy informed Jase about the South African group Ladysmith Black Mambazo. While looking at the concert schedule for Salt Lake City, he found that the group was headed there to perform, so he bought tickets and went to the show, keeping the review as a surprise for Mandy. What follows is the review of that concert from the perspective of someone living in the States. Jase exhausted his entire repertoire of adjectives for this review. [
Read all about it ]
Posted: 11 December 2006 |
By: Jase Luttrell |
Category: Music > Features
Music > Fiona Apple Live At The Huntsman Center, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, 25 October 2006
Jase had front-row seats to the experience of Fiona Apple performing live in Salt Lake City, Utah, of all places. He's still shaken by the ordeal (the Fiona Apple ordeal, not the ongoing Salt Lake City ordeal)...but in a good way. We promise. [
Read all about it ]
Posted: 14 November 2006 |
By: Jase Luttrell |
Category: Music > Features
Cappuccino Quest > A Cappuccino Tour Of New Zealand, August 2006
It's been a month in the (sporadic) making, and quite an effort of back and forth editorial and graphics work and decision making (hence the lack of posting of other items on the site recently), but we are now proud to present brainwavez.org's first Cappuccino Quest Tour: A Cappuccino Tour Of New Zealand. While on vacation in New Zealand in August 2006, Jase stopped at a few cafés and restaurants to sample the local cappuccinos and provide us with this report, complete with travelogue notes to set the scene. [
Read all about it ]
Posted: 29 September 2006 |
By: Jase Luttrell |
Category: Cappuccino Quest
Exhibition > Bodies...The Exhibition: An Exhibition At The Earls Court Exhibition Centre In London, England
One might consider paying GBP17.50 to have a close-up look at preserved cadavers slightly macabre (and expensive), especially while on vacation, but I did it anyway. You can, too, until the end of the month. [
Read all about it ]
Posted: 25 August 2006 |
Posted by: Mandy J Watson |
Category: Culture > Features
Exhibition > Star Wars L'Expo: An Exhibition at the Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie in Paris, France
If you're in Paris at the moment you owe it to yourself to visit the
Star Wars exhibition being held at the Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie in the 19e. Whether you're a fan of science, science fiction, or movie making, there is sure to be something in this exhibition for you. [
Read all about it ]
Posted: 22 August 2006 |
Posted by: Mandy J Watson |
Category: Culture > Features
Music > Missy Higgins Live At The Independent Armchair Theatre, Cape Town, South Africa, 7 July 2006
Posted: 12 July 2006
Missy Higgins in Cape Town! Oh my! Here are most of the important adjectives from the article: enigmatic, quirky, odd, endearing, charming, powerful, and infectious. However, you should probably read what
Mandy J Watson had to say for the context. [
Read the article ]
Category: Music > Features
The Best Of The Older Stuff
