on saturday francois and i were invited to the official launch of the gautrain, at gallagher estate in johannesburg. it was a fancy, black-tie event, attended by politicians, ministers and journalists from all over the world. and us.
we were invited as so-called 'new media'. i was invited because i tweet, and i was invited to tweet about the launch. this is, as far as i know, the first time members of 'social media' were invited as media members, and we had full media privileges. this was quite exciting! this was the second time i got to ride on the gautrain, once before, in march, i went to a twitter-gautrain event.
for those of you who do not know, the gautrain is the first rapid-rail system in africa, and when completed will connect all hubs in gauteng with each other. at the moment only the leg between sandton and the airport are open, with the rest of the routes opening within a few months.
i am looking forward to using it. my closest station is rhodesfield, and from there to sandton is 12 minutes and it will cost R21. people who live in cities where there always has been public transport may not understand our excitement, but for us it is great indeed.
you can read a somewhat negative article by ivo vegter here. he specifically refers to us who were tweeting from the event. please also read my comments.
read another article in mail and guardian, referring to, and quoting francois here.
and an article from bbc here.
ps. the photos were in my media pack
