[Fritzinger]

South Africa is in the unique situation of having developers and business communities with access to all of the resources and education of the West living as little as 20 minutes away from townships with millions of people who are as under-resourced as any in Africa (well almost - they do still have access to a well-funded government). It is the perfect proving ground for applications for Africa.

Obstacles against success are in brief:

- Schizophrenic government policies, swinging from incredibly enlightened consumer protection legislation to, "We should establish a regulatory body for the press to prevent them from embarrassing government officials when corruption scandals occur"

- A legacy of underinvestment and draconian regulation in telecommunications. My 10Mb line costs me > 100 USD / month, and that's the fastest connection money can buy here.

Another country worth singling out is Kenya, which has produced incredible innovation like Ushahidi (http://ushahidi.com) and MPesa (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-Pesa). Technology is a focus of government investment there, probably more so than SA.