Keeping up with the Jukwas, Twitter goes mainstream: 2013 tech review (Social Media)

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2013 has been seen Zimbabwe explode with breakthrough after breakthrough in technology. A lot has happened with new innovations taking root, changing our lives in the process. As we draw closer to curtains down for 2013, this will is the first in a series of review of headlining tech issues that took place in 2013 starting with social media.

2013 has been a great year for social media users and enthusiasts alike. 2013 was the most entertaining, engaging and valuable year in social media in Zimbabwe. Electioneering, classified expose, commerce, and the usual attention seeking were all part of the social media mix that made social media in Zimbabwe memorable in 2013.

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Keeking up with the Jukwas

The Jukwas are by far the biggest social media export to date. Before their fall from grace, the “estranged couple”, especially Baba Jukwa, kept Zimbabwe locked with stunning revelations I dare not mention here. The ZANU PF mole leaked everything from alleged corruption, election fraud, the president’s phone number went as low as revealing the HIV status of political enemies. Baba Jukwa built a reputation so much that local media ran on his every revelation and in retrospect, it was probably silly to use a Baba Jukwa’s Facebook poll as a prediction of the real election. MDCs Facebook election victory was reversed on the ground blowing Baba Jukwa from the highs of a global sensation back to earth competing with the likes of Masasi epaFacebook for attention.

Baba Jukwa is still elusive but no longer has the hard hitting pre-election election revelations that brought him 400,000 likes and put him on them most wanted list with a reported $300,000 bounty on his head.

Twitter becomes mainstream in Zimbabwe

Although no official or reliable stats are available on Twitter use in Zimbabwe, Twitter has undoubtedly migrated from being Zimbabwe’s un-favourite social network to stealing our attention from Facebook. Obviously Twitter is not as big as Facebook in Zimbabwe but it has definitely overtaken Linkedin which has over 200,000 in Zimbabwean.

Before, Twitter was to a greater extent elitist with very few of the ordinary folk on the platform, but now the platform is now mainstream and everyone knows what hashtags and handles are.

With Twitter it’s never about the numbers but rather the quality of engagement. Thanks to award winning crowd sourcing platforms like @263chat, Zimbabwean engagement on Twitter is predominately progressive compared to the content found on Facebook.

The great leap for Twitter could have been aided by falling prices in entry level mobile devices.

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4 comments

  1. ﻖﺸﻋ ﺮﯿﻤﻧ ﺰﮔﺮﻫ

    seriously is this an article? Like for real, sad that it ended before it started

  2. Shingi

    I feel there are just too many annoying adverts. Techzim please clean up the act.

  3. Ce

    If anyone is still wondering who is Baba Jukwa and where he gets his information, the answer is the America’s notorious NSA as revealed by Snowden the rebellious NSA agent.

    Imagine they can tape/listen into the Germany Chancellor (Angela) personal mobile phone and 35 other presidents of other countries. These are hi-tech countries with several levels of encryption on their data and what more Zimbabwe. This can show you that they can listen to any conversation happening in Zimbabwe and particularly targeting Zimbabwe’s CIO and Zanu.

    Baba Jukwa could be a team of CIA or NSA agents (Zimbabwean background recruits) sitting comfortably in USA listening to Zanu and CIO conversations and churning out divisive and sensitive information on Facebook.

    This is why they can give you the phone number of every individual they feel like. Of cause they twist the truth here and there to suit the message they like the readers to have. This is why they can tell accurately some events, plans and happenings across the Zanu PF spectrum leaving the public wondering how they gather such information without being identified.

    The CIO or Zanu is advised to go back to the 1950s means of communication when communicating sensitive information. They should use face to face conversions, Letters and restore Telone’s plian old telephone system (POTS) which is analogue and stores on tapes. Anathing didgital will land on Uncle Sam’s lap

    Look at the timing of Baba Jukwa – torwads the election and I believe MDC executive knows all about this. USA was planning to cause such pandemonium towards election and develop a dislike and mistrust of Zanu. But the plan did not work because they messed bread (Zanu) and offered rotten eggs (MDC) to the people and people decided to go for the messed bread.In any case most people who vote do not even know or have the means to access Baba Jukwa’s information.

    1. guest

      You could be right in most of your reasoning. But I think there is nothing divisive about the sensitive information that Baba Jukwa made public. Why did the zanu pf have to put skeletons in cupboards in the first place. In this day and age information should be made public, especially if it involves plotting to murder other people

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