₦airaland Forum

One of the greatest South African intellectuals, Eugène Marais, in his classic 1928 book Die Siel van die Mier, explains his study of the behaviour of the colony of ants.
These small social insects are able to build complicated anthills that are several thousand times taller than them. This is akin to people building structures that are several thousand times taller than them, and this is a feat that humans have not yet achieved.

Inside the anthill structure, air circulation is so efficient that it is as if there is an air-conditioner. Marais wondered how these small ants achieved such complicated tasks. His insight into the workings of these ants has revolutionised artificial intelligence.

Today we have ant colony optimisation algorithm that allows electronic maps to find shortest distances between two positions. Marais’ insight into the intelligence of the ants was so impressive that Nobel Laureate Maurice Maeterlinck apparently and unfortunately appropriated it as his.

In the study of the intelligence of the colony of ants, it was found that they are driven by several factors which include communication, diversity, learning, co-operation and competition. These factors are useful in the study of university rankings in order to advance the mission of a university, which was identified by Alexander von Humboldt as teaching and learning, research and community engagement.

Last week I attended the Times Higher Education Summit in Singapore. This summit discussed how to build a modern university that is able to tackle the challenges of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

In addition, the 2019 global university rankings were announced. Globally, the University of Oxford was ranked the best university followed by the University of Cambridge and then Stanford University. It was quite interesting to note that the Times Higher Education, which is a British ranking system, tends to rate British universities as being the best when compared with other rankings such as the QS and Shanghai rankings, which are published by africavarsities.com

Regionally, the University of Cape Town (UCT) is ranked the best university in Africa, while Tsinghua University in China is ranked the best university in Asia and the ETH Zurich is ranked the best university in mainland Europe (this excludes England). Tsinghua University educates the Chinese elites, including that country’s last two presidents, whereas ETH Zurich educated Albert Einstein.

Coming back home, UCT is followed by the University of the Witwatersrand, which is followed by the University of Stellenbosch, then the University of Kwazulu-Natal and the University of Johannesburg.

These ranking systems have become a billion-dollar industry and can be divided into two types. The first are those that rank universities without interacting with them and the second are those that require universities to submit information to be used in the ranking. The Times Higher Education ranking requires universities to submit information whereas the Shanghai ranking does not. Ranking systems that require submission of information necessitate universities investing resources into gathering relevant information.

A few weeks ago, I received a call from the vice-chancellor of the University of the Witwatersrand, Professor Adam Habib, proposing that we all collectively should withdraw from university rankings.

The three reasons he gave for this withdrawal are that rankings require the preparation of information that drains the resources of the universities, that they do not take into account the national and local context, and that they are based on perceptions of universities which are often biased and not always a real reflection of the reality.

Before we consider this possible withdrawal, we need to understand what it is exactly that these rankings measure.

The Times Higher Education measures five elements of which the first is industry income. This measures how much the university is able to raise from industry. The second element measures international diversity as quantified by the number of international students and staff.

The third element measures the learning environment which quantifies the staff-to-student ratios, the proportion of postgraduate students, teaching reputation and so on. The fourth measure is research output and this is quantified by the number of papers published, the reputation of the research enterprise as well as research income and research productivity of each staff member. The fifth measure is the citation of the research enterprise of the university.

Now, do these five measures advance the mission of the university, which is to teach, research and engage the community? To understand this question, one needs to go back to Eugène Marais’ studies of the ants which build beautiful ant hills by, among other factors, competing and co-operating. Do these rankings force us to compete, co-operate and collaborate?

In the mathematical field of game theory there is a concept called a zero-sum-game. This means that a gain by one party is a loss by another party.

The ranking system is predominantly a zero-sum-game because a gain by one university is usually a loss by another university. Consequently, for the University of Johannesburg to get to the top five in South Africa, the University of Pretoria had to fall off. The only exception to this rule is if there is a tie. So rankings are a competitive game and, like in the making of the beautiful ant hill, competition contributes to the making of a good university.

The second element from the ant colony, is co-operation. Do university rankings encourage co-operation? One of the research findings show that research papers that are collaborated on by many universities are cited more than those that are written in a single university. This is simply because collaborated research papers tend to have more people, who can potentially market the papers, than papers with no collaboration. And because collaboration improves rankings, well-ranked universities collaborate more than lower-ranked universities.

The other factor we can learn from the colony of ants is diversity, which is measured as international diversity in the ranking system. The diversity of a colony of ants makes them adaptive and resilient to failure.

Professor Chris Brink, the former vice-chancellor of Stellenbosch University, has written extensively about the relationship between diversity and excellence of universities. Universities that are diverse, in terms of students and staff, have more rich culture and thinking leverage than universities that are homogeneous.

Students who come to diverse universities have a richer experience than those who go to homogeneous universities. Since, rankings reward diversity, they contribute towards making a great university.

In 2017, the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe announced measures to improve Japanese universities in order to globalise Japanese society and the economy. The strategy he adopted was to internationalise Japanese universities.

In 2012, the Russian President Vladimir Putin launched the Russian Academic Excellence project, which was aimed at having five Russian universities in the top 100 by 2020. China has also been investing in getting its universities into the top 100 and this has resulted in a Chinese University (Tsinghua University) becoming the top university in Asia since the introduction of the ranking systems.

Given all these benefits of the ranking system, should South African universities participate in them? For South Africa to meet its social, political and economic objectives, it should participate in these rankings. Government should encourage universities to take these rankings seriously because ultimately this improves the quality of universities.

The university sector should adopt a strategy on how South Africa will participate in a ranking system and craft the objectives of this participation. In conclusion, we should encourage all our universities to participate in rankings.

Source: Daily Maverick

It is obvious that for a relationship to be exciting, fun and happy, both partners need to always add new things into it. There are several ways to assist a relationship to grow closer, but nothing beats up communication between man and women and more so a new relationship.

Talk about your secrets.

Everybody loves a good secret. Do you have any amount of secrets that you don’t commonly tell whoever you meet? Then it is good to share that secret with her. This is because the secret will totally flatter her and make her realize that you trust her sufficient to share your top and deep secrets with. And definitely before realize it, she’ll also start sharing her secrets with you, and hence become much more intimate and close to you.

Talk about your future.

This means talking about both of your life, those things you plan to do, your aspiration and future goals and other things especially along that line. African Women always like a man who sees his future and goes ahead to work towards it.

You can be fun, spontaneous and live for a moment, but provided that you got a focused life, she’ll always be awed by the determination you have and will like you even more. This is an evolution thing. Men must have a subconscious requirement to hunt and protect, and women/girls on the other hand need to feel very secure and protect the young ones.

Talk about both you and her views on life

It is true that all of us have got our own individual perspective about life. But again, we don’t fully share them with everybody in the world. So, by finding out more on and about her views on life, you’ll get understand her better and even know more about what she enjoys doing in future and more so her real goals in life are. As a man keep her close enough to you.

Discuss both your childhood and your past

Childhood memories are such memories that are full of fun to either talk about or listen to, particularly if it involves a funny or an embarrassing incident. Discuss with her about your first crush, the first time you got drunk, your good looking teacher or even the time you did something silly. It is at this point whereby your girlfriend will definitely take pleasure in and have a good laugh while spending time with you.

Talk about your fears

Girls/women love a guy who is frank and open up and that he can talk about his fears. By talking openly about both your life’s dreams and your fears, you’ll have made your girlfriend feel even closer to you because you’re disclosing your most vulnerable side to her. In that, in case something has upset you or something bothers you, be it your pal or something at work, converse about it with your girlfriend. This is one way she’ll absolutely be interested in it and love to assist you out too.

Gossip about life

Every day gossip is one interesting thing to do, and she’ll be in a position to talk for a long time concerning things that are happening especially in her own life. Don’t be afraid to ask her about her work and her colleagues including everything else that happens during her work hours. It should be noted that talking about shows and movies on the television is one of the greatest gossips. If the two of you like enjoy the same shows and movies, the definitely you will have a lot of things and opinions to talk about for several hours on end.

Choosing the best place to buy online can seem like an impossible task. Many people start by looking at two of the most well-known online marketplace sites. Jumia and Konga are household names in Nigeria and Africa too.


It might seem obvious to you which site is the clear winner, but my conclusion might surprise you.


Let's discuss!!!

http://www.jumiablog.com/jumia-vs-konga-marketplace/

Shopping for laptops online can be really tiring due to the availability of different options to choose from. These options make you start wondering which you should go for but with this guide, you are sure to know the important things to look out for.

1. Brand Matters

A lot of people buy laptops according to the brand name because they trust the brand. This is an important criterion because there are several top brands of laptop manufacturers out there each offering unique specifications. You can choose from these brands – HP, Dell, Lenovo, Asus, Toshiba, Samsung, Apple, and more.

2. Motherboard

This is the main component of every laptop. It is the circuitry board where all ports, connections, and more are integrated all together. There are different types of motherboards which are used in laptops, they are AT (Advance Technology) motherboard, ATX (Advance Technology eXtended) motherboard, Baby AT motherboards which is a combination of XT and AT, and XT (eXtended Technology) motherboards.

3. Microprocessor

There are several components that make up the laptop technology, one of the most important is the microprocessor also known as CPU or processor.

This is a multi-purpose, register based, a clock driven programmable device that is inserted into the motherboard which accepts digital or binary data as input, processes it according to instructions stored in its memory.

They basically operate on numbers and symbols at the binary level of the numerical system. In deciding which laptop to buy, you should consider the processor clock speed which is measured in Gigahertz.

4. Random Access Memory

This is represented as RAM. It is a volatile memory unit of the laptop that helps store instruction and operations temporarily as long as the laptop is on. Once the laptop is turned off, it loses every information in its memory.

It works hand in hand with the processor especially during booting, the OS of the system is loaded into the RAM along with other programs and files. It is usually measured in Gigabytes.

A minimum of 4GB RAM should be what you should consider when choosing a suitable laptop.

5. Internal Storage Memory

New generation laptops now come with two options of the internal storage unit which are HDD (Hard Disk Drive) and SSD (Solid State Drive). The SSD is the successor to the HDD with much more improved speed and functionality.

Especially during booting, the SSD boots up to 10 times faster than the HDD. But it doesn’t support enough capacity space as much as the HDD but with technological advancement, it will definitely get there.

For a suitable laptop, you should select ones with both storage unit. It is usually measured in Gigabytes. For the HDD, a minimum of 500GB should be considered and for the SSD, a minimum of 128GB should be considered.

6. Connectivity

This includes ports and wireless technology such as Bluetooth which must be present. Most especially the USB ports, it is advisable to stick to laptops with a minimum of 3 USB ports for connecting peripherals such as mouse, keyboards, speakers and more.

Also, Bluetooth connection for sharing and transferring files and documents, also for pairing with other Bluetooth-enabled devices. Wi-Fi card is also an important feature to look out for.

This enables you to connect to wireless networks in order to surf the web, access your social media accounts, stream live videos and music, and so much more.

Source: http://www.jumiablog.com/choose-right-laptop-shopping-jumia/

Paying bills, shopping, transferring money, checking your bank account – you can save up time and energy by just doing all these things from your phone with mobile money, no matter where you are. But the question is how safe is your money?

Here are tips for you.

1. Register with a trusted agent

2. Set PINs and passwords on your phone

3. Choose your mobile money PINs wisely

4. Use only your bank’s official app

5. Avoid public (risky) Wi-Fi

6. Beware of fake SMS scammers

7. Protect your mobile device with security app

8. Be wary of unsolicited calls

9. Use social media wisely

10. Watch statements and report suspicious activity

Source: https://www.swiftfoxx.com/mobile-money-safety-tips/

Helpful..thanks

wow

Creating your eCommerce store is great, but it a lot easier for you to build your business without having to worry about the logistics of warehouses, packaging materials, couriers and so on.

With the already-existing eCommerce sites, you also have the opportunity to build your own online shop, thereby increasing the value of your business.

Jumia and Konga are marketplaces, but you may well have noticed that many products don’t come from them at all. They come from external sellers, who pay a small fee to get their stuff listed on the site. It’s a win-win. So you can actually sell on these websites without going through the hustle to create any site on your own.

You can read more here.... http://www.jumiablog.com/how-to-own-a-shop-jumia-and-make-money/

Too bad, the site is down. He needs to work harder.

cool