madradavid

I have started a number of (failed) companies and this, this article summarizes the last 15 years of my life. A software dev trying to play startup founder.

To whoever wrote this , thank you for so eloquently articulating something I’d failed to put into words.

I am Ugandan.

I've shipped electronics and Laptops for Work quite a bit, and OP is right, the system is broken, it stays this way because a lot of corrupt individuals benefit from this mess. However, OP showed a degree of Hubris here, a mistake lots of us make when dealing with foreign countries, just because it works this way here, so it should work that way in XYZ.

OP would have saved themselves lots of time and money if they'd asked Django what the best way to get that laptop shipped to them was. Lots of Ugandans in Austria ship things back daily; they just do it differently, simply hand it to someone travelling back home, there are people travelling back daily, willing to help or just pay a shipping agency a small amount and they'll handle everything.

This is a good act of charity and I applaud OP for that; however, the first mistake they made was Google "How to send a laptop overseas" , a message to Django, asking the best way to get them the laptop would have saved them time and money.

We all fall into this trap of giving people in need what we think they need instead of asking them how best we can help. Local knowledge goes a long way.

All in all, I applaud OP, not many of us would have done this.

I am Ugandan, that $200 could have gone a long way buying used locally , case in point https://jiji.ug/central-division/computers-and-laptops/lapto... , a used Macbook pro with some change to spare.

Actually you can send money (cross border payments ) to another country that also has mobile money, I can send money to a Kenyan, Tanzanian etc all I need is their Phone number. I am not sure what you mean by “holding both sides of the transaction “, when you send me money it appears in my balance (which I can check via a USSD query), it’s essentially a bank account but on USSD and sms. A lot of cross border payments are now settled via USSD. Hell I can now get a Visa/Mastercard by just dailing a code and I will have payment details with my name and address.

Interestingly in a number of African Countries (Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania etc) , we have “Mobile Money”, Payments are instant, via USSD, no internet required, I can even pay online using USSD push.This is a classical example of humans using what they have to build what they need , no fancy internet enabled smart phones required. I can send money anytime instantly to my grandma deep in the village. She can withdraw from or top up her account in the numerous mobile money stalls that are everywhere. You pay school dues, medical bills , groceries via mobile money. I don’t remember the last time I visited a bank, hell I can even get an instant loan by just dailing *165# on my no internet feature phone.

Congratulations on the launch.

Totally unrelated, I am just curious about why you chose the name, as someone who is Ugandan and was born in raised in Kampala (which is the Capital City of Uganda BTW).

Congratulations again.

I am still trying to figure out why YouTube/Google is willing to die on this hill ? Surely they’ve gotten feedback or seen it in their analytics that there is a significant group of people who don’t like these “shorts”.

Them implementing this “zero minutes” thing already tells you that they have realized there is some pushback.

Why not just add an on/off toggle?

This short form , TikTok style endless scroll stuff has a junk food feeling to it , as a paying customer why can’t you just give me the option to turn this off ?

I did read that article; it is just a generic article about how funerals are expensive, you could replace Kampala with New York, and it would still hold.

My point is that the Author has picked a practice by a couple of tribes on a Continent so diverse and large you could fit the states, the UK, and still have space for 30 or so more countries, and passed it off as the norm.

Funerals can be expensive, anywhere. I don't want you going away with the impression that all these poor Africans are using up all their hard-earned savings to throw these outlandish burial ceremonies.

I am Ugandan. These kind of burials are unheard of in my country. The Author is labeling this an “African” thing which is just the usual daft nonsense. A number of Ghanaian and Nigerian tribes bury their dead like this , it is more a celebration of life. This is like taking something a small town in Louisiana does and declaring it an “American” tradition.

Total noob question here and I apologize in advance. Are these the “actual” pictures or are they “touched up” by an artist ? If they the real pictures then this is truly impressive …

The person who created the gist has this on their website "Available payment methods include PayPal, Bitcoin, and SEPA transfers." http://cryto.net/~joepie91/

Jesus!! ,that is just brutal

Naive question here. Is it illegal to build counter surveillance tech, I mean you have companies that specialise in building these things for governments would it be illegal to start a company that does the opposite, build tech that helps people beat this sort of surveillance?

Does Scarf use Scarf?

I have thought about this myself.

I am from Africa and needless to say, we don't have an abundance of VC funds for startups.

I have used products live Revolut and Monzo before and loved them, there is an opportunity being missed in places like Africa and other developing economies that have a huge growing youthful middle class that hates the way the established banks operate and is comfortable with technology.

I spent most of my free time last year building a backend that can handle some core banking functions, I already did research on the licensing and knew I would never be able to raise that money just with an idea and business plan so to keep myself going and also have something to show potential VC's I decided to start small, things like airtime top-up, bill payments etc

Break it down , look at the bits that you can build out and get some initial customers while you look to raise money, you don't have to go all out and build a whole bank, start small, licensing for things like e-wallets and money transfer is not unreasonably expensive, you can then go on to build on top of that

Good luck.

Launched a tool I used in my other startups. A tool to help companies reduce churn using sentiment analysis. https://churnops.com

Congrats to OP for shipping. I tried to do something not so similar to this and failed miserably :-( https://hnpicks.com . I guess I just got busy and stopped half way at implementing the NLP and sentiment analysis. It was an interesting weekend :-)

SEEKING WORK - Remote/Paris.

Backend Developer Python/Django . Most recent work was building a Fintech Company https://useremit.com/.

Expertise in Fintech, Continuous Integration Hero, Remote CTO.

More info here: https://madradavid.com/

The title here is misleading (I am from Uganda, was excited ), this service seems to be aimed at Nigeria (only Lagos at that) , see the .ng .

Could the OP or Mods please change this to a less catchy and more accurate title like `Uncapped ISP for Lagos` .

What a coincidence, I just got my `Carte De Sejour` (Residence Card) today. I am a Ugandan living in Paris.

Uganda was colonized by the British so the official language is English, I grew in the capital city (a different tribe from mine with a different culture and different language ) so back home when I visit my relatives who live far from the city (my ancestral home) I feel like a foreigner (they used to call us `city borns`).

Here in France, the French expect most black people to speak French and know about French culture (they colonized a number of West African countries ) but again in our country we speak English so you feel awkward and out of place.

To make things even more complicated my fellow East Africans (Kenyans, Tanzanians) speak Swahili so when they meet you they have this Swahili vibe but again Ugandan's don't speak Swahili we speak English... So a foreigner at home and a foreigner abroad, HN is home :-).

I was one of those `Poor African Children` at some point so when I read your comment I didn't exactly know how to respond. I took a short walk and tried to calm down. So after calming down all I can think of saying to you is `Screw you`.

SEEKING WORK

Remote: Ok

Willing to relocate: Yes

Technologies: Django, Android, Linux

Résumé/CV: https://madradavid.com/

Email: david@madradavid.com

I spend my days freelancing as a Django developer, experience building Fintech and Bitcoin (https://github.com/madra/bitscrow) Applications.

SEEKING WORK - REMOTE ONLY

I specialize in building Native Android Apps and Web apps using Angularjs and Django.

Portfolio: http://madradavid.com/

LinkedIn: https://ug.linkedin.com/in/madradavid

Github: https://github.com/madra

email: madra@199fix.com

phone: +256773376430

Madra David

Personally i believe the Phone and the Laptop will sort of merge. A lot of us use our laptops and PC's to Work and Create, Our Phones to Stay in touch,communicate and Play. It is not fun/easy writing Python Code on your mobile so why not just plug it into a laptop-like case with a Keyboard and Screen then Plug it out when you are done. Phones already have the computing power to do this and we already have a couple of OS'es (Ubuntu OS) that work well on both Mobile and Desktop. I believe this is where we are headed.

After 30 minutes all i can say is

Build failed [sqlite3]: 1 npm ERR! weird error 1 npm ERR! not ok code 0

I received this exactly email last year,September 16 to be precise,it was the first day of the rest of my life. Make no mistake about it, receiving this email hurts, but then you pick yourself up ,make your product better and better and keep on going. All the best moving forward....

See madradavid . com contact me @ madradavid @ gmail . com

http://blog.madradavid.com/ Startups,Coding,Africa

There is huge market that needs to be filled.The existing money transfer services just don't work well for Africa