buyx

21 ms·

151.
by buyx 12y ago
These sites are also, whether that say they 'aren't' or not, are racist on some level. I'm sure there are some real a@#holes participating and running these scams but often the people on the ground are just human beings
152.
by buyx 12y ago
The IMEI blacklists don't work across borders. My sister in law's Blackberry was stolen from her at a mall in South Africa. It was reported and added to the IMEI blacklist. A few months later I accidentally added her old PIN as a
153.
by buyx 12y ago
She should know that it is always okay to paint the sky orange and give cats 6 legs. I'll be sending this to my son's preschool teacher who marks her pupils' art with a red pen[1]. He's attends one of the "better&
154.
by buyx 12y ago
Back in the early 1990s I was forced to do typing as a subject in the South African equivalent of junior-high school. We used mechanical (Olivetti?) typewriters (electric typewriters were for the older students who did typing as an elective
155.
by buyx 12y ago
It depends on where in the world you are, and what sort of development you do. I rarely see regular business app developers with Macs where I am (South Africa). Indeed Macs are generally used by the wealthy here (weak exchange rate+middle-i
156.
by buyx 12y ago
FNB South Africa is a bank that has horribly complex rules for passwords - no repeated letters, no sequential letters, in addition to the normal password strength requirements. Given the complexity, many people I know just save their passwo
157.
by buyx 12y ago
In South Africa, most homes are built with little consideration of cold weather, since the winters are relatively mild. Problem is that draughts and poor insulation in winter then result in significant spiking energy usage.
158.
by buyx 12y ago
A South African gentleman once told me that New York in August was hotter than any place he knew in Africa That's surprising, since it sometimes seems that the only bearable place in the South African summer is Johannesburg, because
159.
by buyx 12y ago
As someone who watches unregulated taxis brazenly evade flat-footed police on a daily basis, take my word for it: you're better off with the government having an iron fist in this case.
160.
by buyx 12y ago
Everyone knows third-world pretty much means "developing world" nowadays.
161.
by buyx 12y ago
I've commented before on HN with this important cautionary tale from South Africa: In the late 1980's the apartheid government (which was taking very tentative steps towards reform) decided to cheaply "solve" the problem
162.
by buyx 12y ago
The South African chartered accountant industry does, in fact, have its roots in the UK tradition: https://www.saica.co.za/About/SAICAHistory/tabid/70/language...
163.
by buyx 12y ago
I know a lot of CAs (as well as people who failed at Honours and/or board exams), and they are very bright, and for the most part fairly interesting personally (and always sure to split the bill accurately). But for a bad matric accoun
164.
by buyx 12y ago
Citation: https://www.saica.co.za/About/Regions/SouthernRegion/Souther...
165.
by buyx 12y ago
That's an interesting idea, but it could be a bit of a stretch. Dutch Boers, later called Afrikaners tended to aspire to be farmers, rather than merchants. In the last 65 years or so, Afrikaners did move into the big business world, bu
166.
by buyx 12y ago
In South Africa, we suffer from the opposite problem: chartered accountants are fetishized in the business world, far more than MBAs even. They dominate the leadership of big business and the CA(SA) designation, especially for a black Afric
167.
by buyx 12y ago
I usually take accusations of reverse racism with a pinch of salt, but there was recently a discussion on Twitter where a popular ex-radio host (Kay Sexwale, @kaysexwale), stated that whites cannot be Africans, nor can they lead political p
168.
by buyx 12y ago
When I was in school, we used pencils until we were in standard 1 (now called grade 3). After that it was mostly pen. In fact, I remember my teacher saying that I'd have to use a pen if I wanted to progress to grade 4. Pencils were per
169.
by buyx 12y ago
The continent of Africa contains more human (genetic) diversity than the rest of the world combined, yet almost everyone from it would be classified as "Black". Interesting that you should bring that up: in South Africa under Ap
170.
by buyx 12y ago
As a person who comes from a place where there has always been an unhealthy obsession with demographic classification (South Africa), I'm curious about the "Asian" classification, which seems even more worthless than the aver
171.
by buyx 12y ago
I know of two cases where Audi dealers acted unethically with people I know in South Africa. Is there a worldwide pattern?
172.
by buyx 12y ago
Yes. The rest of Africa seems to offer a "clean slate" and a decent attitude. An SA school principal told me a story: a Cameroonian technician was installing a security system at his school's computer centre. The Cameroonian
173.
by buyx 12y ago
Metal theft can be solved using wireless technologies. No need for fiber, except between base stations.
174.
by buyx 12y ago
Here's my opinion of why there's anxiety - although objective analysis and introspection are quite rare: South Africa's school education system is dismal. The black education system was horrific, and designed to create a perm
175.
by buyx 12y ago
Starting off a low base means that African countries could protentially leapfrog developed countries technologically, at least. I remember similar points being made in the 1990s when we adopted "cutting-edge" (at the time) GSM in
176.
by buyx 12y ago
In South Africa, with its bottom of the world rankings in school mathematics, this problem is particularly acute. With the government-set matric (school-leaving) exams it is sufficient to work through past exam papers and memorise the answe
177.
by buyx 13y ago
This sort of comparison would also be useful for South Africa, where the cost of maintaining a middle class lifestyle (security, education and healthcare) is relatively high. I usually regard my taxes as charitable donations to the millions
178.
by buyx 13y ago
"Become an Accountant!! It's growing rapidly!" Now look around at everyone with an accounting degree. Whoops. This is interesting. In South Africa Chartered Accountants are in huge demand. "Good at maths? Become an acc
179.
by buyx 13y ago
South Africa has serious structural issues preventing a tech revolution: a rotten school system, a welfare-based economy with a tiny tax base, that is dependent on credit-driven consumer demand rather than production, underinvestment in inf
180.
by buyx 13y ago
Much of Africa is indeed the land of opportunity (with the exception of South Africa, which has serious structural and political issues, and is in a sort of terminal malaise). The calculus changes once children enter the picture though. Th

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