Google Technology User Group Lilongwe held its second event of the year, an Inspirational Movie Night. The evening started with a documentary on the History of Search, which covered the birth of Yahoo! and Excite and how Google came in later as the game changer. The role venture capitalists and angel investors played in all these startups was also looked into in depth.
The second documentary was about Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, with an in-depth look into his company and its controversial origins. There was also a screening of a more technical nature, Android UI Design Patterns, that looked into the development tools of software for mobile devices.
At the very end, there was a short five-minute TED talk by William Kamkwamba, the Malawian who developed a windmill from rudimentary bicycle parts in Kasungu.
There were lively debates during the snack breaks on why startups sell in their early stages to the lack of investors in our local setup. The suggestions that came out were interesting but the underlying emphasis was that in Malawi we should strive to grow even though the environment has been known to be harsh on businesses with little working capital.
Blantyre GTUGers, we hope you see what you are missing out on! Joshua Ngalande, inventor of the automatic nsima cooker, was present with us and asked when the Blantyre community would get together to start planning local events there. The ball is in your court.
The event was kindly sponsored by Datacom, a locally owned data carrier and management firm.
