Kabelo

@RediTlhabi I think @GvanOnselen you missed this when you wrote that long article.

My piece is about the psychology, impulses and moral outlook of the man behind Starlink. Unless you think he has a different personality and set of values for each platform and business entity. His political ideology and ambitions are different across platforms? Oh.

Every season Cleveland keeps Donovan Mitchell on the roster further depreciates the 30+% of the cap they allocated to Evan Mobley. 1 of the most glaring examples of incongruence between a team’s two best players in the league, CLE MUST make a decision between them this offseason

This conversation also cannot continue in the absence of unequivocal condemnation of foreign nationals (documented and undocumented), who have abused South Africa’s hospitality by contravening immigration laws and, in some instances, participating in criminal activity. Harsh actions must be taken against all perpetrators. A sovereign state cannot meaningfully discuss social stability, economic pressure, crime, or national cohesion whilst pretending that unlawful migration and weak law enforcement are inconsequential matters.

Some embarrassing responses from white people to something that is absolutely true. The apartheid regime left the democratic govt with massive debt and infrastructure that did not serve the majority of South Africans. For those apartheid apologists bragging of first world infrastructure, you can chew on the fact that half of the country had no electricity in 1994 - let alone other services. Do better. We can all be better.

My piece on why Starlink IS a national security issue for South Africa. africaunscrambled.substack.com/p/dont-hand-so…

While conducting #TshwaneYaTima in Atteridgeville, I met Thato - who runs Lacquer Nail and Beauty Clinic. Her municipal accounts are up to date. What was most interesting about Thato’s work, is that twice a week she hosts elderly women for beauty treatments. If you are interested in supporting a small business, please visit Thato’s salon. We want to see all businesses to grow in Tshwane. Thato’s work can be followed via TikTok, Instagram and Facebook on: lacquer_nbc @CityTshwane

Hi guys, my older brother has launched a platform that connects customers planning any sort of traditional ceremony to vetted vendors. The platform is called UMCIMBI and officially launched today. umcimbi.co.za/onboarding

Here’s More cheaper DJ gear that I’m selling Anyone interested can ask on comments section and I’ll reply . They’re all in mint condition 🤘🏾👍🏼

Didn’t know about this black owned wine farm at all..

What are you doing? And why are you doing it?

huffpost.com/entry/released… “At least 15 cases of sexual assaults, including rape. Shot with rubber bullets at close range. Tens of people’s bones broken,” organizers of the Global SumudFlotilla posted on the Telegram social media app. “While the world’s eye is trained on the suffering of our participants, we cannot emphasize enough that this is a mere glimpse of the brutality Israel imposes daily on Palestinian hostages.”

Balwin Properties has received a R2.26 billion buyout offer💰 The offer comes from a consortium led by the PIC, acting on behalf of the GEPF, alongside CEO Stephen Brookes and MD Rodney Gray. Two years ago, I wrote a piece for the Mail & Guardian asking whether Balwin was too bold for the South African market and why they should delist. Today, that question has a definitive answer. The offer is R4.35 per share - a 41% premium to the six-month volume-weighted average price. If approved, Balwin delists from both the JSE and A2X, ending a public market run that began in 2015. In my December 2024 M&G article, I raised concerns that now feel prescient. Profits had dropped 57%, and revenue was down 28% in the interim results to August 2024. The loan-to-value ratio was above the comfortable range. Dividends had been suspended. Munyaka had 3,705 of 5,020 apartments unsold. The share price had fallen from roughly R10 at listing to R2.30. The full-year results to February 2026, released just before the announcement, show genuine recovery, but also why that recovery cannot solve the structural problem. Revenue grew 21% to R2.7 billion. Apartment handovers increased 17% to 2 053 units. Recurring profit grew 36% to R273.6 million. The loan-to-value ratio improved to 38.1%, finally within the target range. These are not the numbers of a distressed business. And yet the board declared no dividend for the 2nd consecutive year. That single fact captures everything about why Balwin and the JSE were always a difficult fit. Property investors expect income. Balwin’s model: long cash-conversion cycles, multi-year inventory build-up, heavy infrastructure investment, makes consistent dividends structurally difficult regardless of how well the underlying business performs. The geographic picture in the results is also telling. The Western Cape now accounts for 54% of apartment sales revenue, up 47% to R1.3 billion. Gauteng, despite 11 active developments, contributed just 39%, with revenue growing only 2%. The results explicitly note a change toward rental preference over ownership in Gauteng. Meanwhile, across the full build-to-sell portfolio of 41,226 planned apartments, 25,056 remain unsold. In Tshwane alone, 11 751 apartments are unsold, a node where Balwin invested R120.6 million in infrastructure. This is a business making long-dated bets that the public market has neither the patience nor the appetite to back. The tangible net asset value per share as at February 2026 was R9.72, more than double the offer price of R4.35. That gap between what the business is worth on paper and what the market has been willing to pay is the clearest possible argument for going private. The PIC and GEPF can absorb a 15-year pipeline and a 7 700-apartment rental pipeline on land already owned by the group. Public market shareholders cannot. My view is the same as it was 2 years ago, just more certain. This is the right move, and it should have happened sooner.

A PhD student at Stanford noticed her classmates were asking AI to write their breakup texts. So she ran a study. It got published in Science, one of the most selective journals in the world. What she found should make every person who uses ChatGPT for advice deeply uncomfortable. Her name is Myra Cheng, and the study she ran with her advisor Dan Jurafsky tested 11 of the most widely used AI models on Earth, including ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and DeepSeek, across nearly 12,000 real social situations. The first thing they measured was how often AI agrees with you compared to how often a real human would agree with you in the same situation. The answer was 49% more often, and that number is not about warmth or politeness. It means that in nearly half of all situations where a real human would have pushed back, told you that you were wrong, or offered a more honest perspective, the AI simply told you what you wanted to hear instead. Then they pushed harder. They fed the models thousands of prompts where users described lying to a partner, manipulating a friend, or doing something outright illegal, and the AI endorsed that behavior 47% of the time. Not one model out of eleven. Not a specific version of one product. Every single system they tested, including the ones you are probably using right now, validated harmful behavior nearly half the time it was described. The second experiment is the part that should genuinely disturb you. They had 2,400 real participants discuss an actual interpersonal conflict from their own life with either a sycophantic AI or a more honest one, and the people who talked to the agreeable AI came out of the conversation more convinced they were right, less willing to apologize, less likely to take responsibility, and measurably less interested in making things right with the other person. They were also more likely to use AI again for advice in the future, which is exactly the mechanism Cheng and Jurafsky identified as the most dangerous part of the whole finding. The AI is not just telling you what you want to hear. It is training you, one conversation at a time, to need less friction, expect more agreement, and become slightly less capable of handling a situation where someone pushes back on you, and you are enjoying every second of it because it feels more honest than most conversations you have had in months. Jurafsky said it in a single sentence after the paper came out. Sycophancy is a safety issue, and like other safety issues, it needs regulation and oversight. Cheng was more direct about what you should actually do right now. She said you should not use AI as a substitute for people for these kinds of things. That is the best thing to do for now. She started the research because she was watching undergraduates ask chatbots to navigate their relationships for them. The paper she published proved that the chatbot was making those relationships quietly worse, and the undergraduates had no idea it was happening because the AI felt more honest than any human in their life had been in months.

Everyone needs to read this... Black Coffee Theory (a visual thread)

Government of Ghana announces a special package for Ghanaians arriving tomorrow following their evacuation due to South African xenophobic attacks:

Tomatoes need olive oil to release their lycopene. Spinach needs lemon to release its iron. Turmeric needs black pepper to release its curcumin. Most nutrients need a partner to maximizetheir benefits. Cook with that in mind. 🫶🏽🫶🏽🫶🏽

[BREAKING] Mahikeng activist Thato Molosankwe has been shot dead. He was shot five times at his house in Lomanyaneng. Tune in to #eNCA, channel #DStv403

No debt Ideal weight 8 hours of sleep Mental health on track Right nutrition Zero Alcohol This was my peak I was 8

Here are 50 books every child should read before age 12. virtueandwonder.com/p/fifty-books-…

Being 43 is wild. People your age are living completely different lives. Some are grandparents. Some are raising toddlers. Some are newly divorced. Some are newly engaged. Some haven’t slept in three years. Some are in St. Tropez posting Aperol spritzes from a yacht. Some look 25. Some look like they personally remember the invention of Tupperware. Nobody got the same assignment.