Facebook scoop for Joburg duo
2008-07-29 10:27
Cape Town - Whether you're shooting your friends and family with virtual paintballs or listing what you need to do before you die, you're part of a minor South African revolution on popular social networking site Facebook.
A recent competition to find the best locally-developed Facebook application, run by software maker Microsoft and internet applications developer Mentez, saw 250 local developers duking it out for the grand prize of R40 000.
The winners, Chris Blake and Lean van Heerden from Johannesburg, created the "Paintball Assault" application that allows users to create a free-for-all paintball game on Facebook, where friends and family can be invited to join in.
A separate category, for the best application created on Microsoft's Silverlight platform, was won by Etienne Viljoen's "100 Things", an application that allows users to select the 100 things they would like to do before they die.
"KlearTouch", a smart photo viewer created by Pierre Henri Kuaté, was runner-up. Both walked away with an XBox game console and cash prizes.
Pretoria's Gerrit Niezen, with "MyFav Photos", and Cape Town's Preston Thomas, with "Facemark", were also commended.
'High calibre'
Mentez managing director Juan Franco said the contest aimed to highlight the exciting opportunities possible on the Facebook platform due to the ability to integrate with user profiles.
"It was a unique opportunity to create applications to deliver content to millions of Facebook users across the globe," said Franco.
"The entries were of a high calibre, and we believe a lot of the applications have the potential to be successful and popular in Facebook."
"We were very impressed with the response from the IT community in South Africa, and the creativity and quality of the applications," said Dave Ives, head of the Developer Platform Enterprise at Microsoft SA.
The competing applications ran on Facebook for six weeks and users were given the opportunity to select the five most successful locally-developed Facebook applications.
Following the success of the competition in South Africa and Colombia, Mentez opened the contest to Mexican developers, and recently launched the initiative in Brazil.