Chris Saul's Blog

Tuesday November 21, 2006

Excellent SA trip

Had a productive trip last week to SA.

In Cape Town I stayed in a simple family run guesthouse, which made a nice change from hotels. It was friendly and comfy and a lot cheaper than the usual business hotels we stay in.

As with my last visit to SA I was impressed with how widespread usage of 3G is. DSL is still quite expensive and not very widespread, but everyone who needs it has a 3G card for their laptop or 3G on their phone. I can imagine people skipping the DSL and wifi rollout completely - 3G and its successors will simply becoming the normal way people get on the internet. A guesthouse like the one I was in can avoid investing in technology to attract business customers - if you need internet access, you'll have a 3G phone and bluetooth or a 3G PCMCIA card already.

Another thing that stood out during my stay was the fact that most of voices on radio adverts have English, as opposed to South African, accents. I wonder why this is? Is an English accent considered neutral choice in a country where accent and background can be a hot topic?