6.5 million Rand

ABYC · Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 10:10 am Post subject: 6.5 million Rand

The city of Durban has recently launched their new Soccer World Cup web site at a cost of R6.5 million - understandably a lot of web developers are mystified at the cost:

ITweb commented as follows:

Quote:

Durban has spent R6.5 million on its official 2010 Web site, which will showcase the city's Fifa World Cup developments to the country and visitors.

Head of Durban's strategic projects unit, Julie-May Ellingson, says the Web site will initially serve as an information portal for residents and visitors looking for information on the city.

While the price for the Web site may be high, she says it will be a "platform to showcase the city and its 2010 developments to the rest of the world" and falls within the city's budget.

"It is important that the Web site provides a productive, memorable and frustration-free experience for our visitors. We wanted to create a Web site that would be a source of useful information for tourists who want to visit the city, as well as showcase Durban as being a technically savvy city," she notes.

The Web site – www.fifaworldcup.durban.gov.za – will have features such as a live Webcam of the Moses Mabhida stadium, the city's host venue. Interactive postcards and image galleries also feature in an attempt to make the Web site user-friendly, adds Ellingson.

The site will also post links or content on Facebook and Twitter, as a way of taking advantage of the popularity of the large networking sites.

Ellingson says content will be updated on a regular basis and the Web site's functions will be expanded over time. Initially, the site will be available in English and Zulu, and will later be made available in Fifa's three official languages – Spanish, German and French.

Thanks Jackgoa for the link!

In my own twisted way I tried to quickly analyse the price:

MyPE has all of the above features EXCEPT for the availability in other languages (But, that is only because Sergey introduced Google Translate!).

The site uses Microsoft's Silverlight - a 4megabyte download so as to experience the 'amazing' power (basically so that you can consume more bandwidth!).

Now, my Silverlight experience and exposure is close to nil so I was hoping that some clever Microdof orientated person could clue us all in to the benefits and drawbacks of Silverlight?

In the meantime have a look at the Traffic comparison below of the page views on the Durban site as opposed to MyPE (MyPE is in RED):

I presume that the spike in traffic from June is as a result of people visiting the site to see exactly what R6.5 million will buy!

NOW the following graph is even more telling as it shows the number of Page Views PER VISITOR - one would surmise that a great new technology and interactive web site would encourage people to stay on the site for longer, BUT, this does not appear to be the case as the number of page views per visitor stays relatively flat from the launch date of the new site in early June:

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JackGoa · Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 12:31 pm Post subject:

This definitely has me baffled. I think there is more going on behind the scenes (from a red tape point of view) than what meets the eye.

What meets the eye is not a state of the art website. That's for sure. Looking at the code for instance, the entire site was built using tables, which indicates that it was built by a not-too-experienced web developer.
Design is.. well ja.. it isn't even. And the application does not look any different from any other available open source CMS that I have seen. Except for the fact that it runs on ASP.

Only thing I could possibly think of that could have pushed up the development cost is that it is probably hosted on a dedicated server and if it has a live feed, then probably the setup costs thereof.
But 6.5 mil?? Yoh! Even 1 mil would have sounded way out there.

I just can't get my head around it. All I can think of is that it is one fat cat in a high place that is helping out his little 'previously disadvantaged' nephew that just came out of technikon? (and everything that goes with that because if he just came out of technikon he never was disadvantaged at any stage to begin with).

And then there are people that don't have houses to live in and don't have any food to eat. Eskom could certainly have done with a little cash injection like that so that the rest of us don't have to suffer. Gotta love our country! Rolling Eyes

PS - sorry you can probably tell this just gets my blood boiling. (as a previously 'advantaged person'?????????????? must say I never felt any of that either!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
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vague · Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 3:30 pm Post subject:

Nee donner... 6.5 mil. For that amount it should wash the dishes and do the laundry to.

JackGoa, I'm with you. Yes the site looks good, but it was not developed by someone that is completely up to speed on things. css (even though it can be a bitch sometimes) is far better then using tables.

From the silverlight side....mmmm ya. That's just a Microsoft attempt to Adobe's flash. Personally I think they should just stick to what they do best and that is developing cool OS systems that crash allot.

Yes it does ad nice interactivity, but it's nothing to party about. The same can be achieved with Ajax or a flash file with a couple of lines of action script and further more the flash plugin is only 1meg.

As for the traffic numbers...well they speak for themselves. MyPe is kicking a 6.5mil site's ass.
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TheKing1 · Posted: Sat Jul 11, 2009 4:12 pm Post subject:

There's no confusion, guys. This is the way our government does things - there are an awful lot of people who have to receive back-handers.and the ANC runs SA like a multi-level marketing franchise. Multiply the true cost by 20 and invite all your friends along to become instant millionaires....

max_thinks_sees · Posted: Mon Jul 13, 2009 11:16 pm Post subject:

check out our own PE site - http://www.nelsonmandelabay.gov.za/FIFAWORLDCUP/ - just as cool - if not better... and done on a mere shoestring in comparison... makes one wonder - who did the Durban site? - Adapt IT - a R75 million turnover company - so 6.5 mil is just a drop.... but getting down to it... just where is all that value hidden... I don't see it???? do you???
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ABYC · Posted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 8:18 am Post subject:

Working on the belief that there is good value everywhere I can say that I have tried and, in the case of Durban's site, failed to find value.

I worked on the following assumption:

If we cannot see R6.5 million development costs value then the value must be in masses of pages of content and great SEO work.

So off I toddled to Yahoo Site Explorer (as they seem to show the most pages indexed for any site in the shortest possible time and in addition backlinks show up on the same results page).

I duly plugged in the Durban site and in another tab the Port Elizabeth site.

Both deal with the same subject matter - the only difference being that PE's football section is a much older sub domain.

And the results were pretty shocking:

Pages indexed for Durban's Site: 8
Inlinks: 37

Pages indexed for PE's Site: 732
Inlinks: 10

Now, if we were using pages indexed as a measure of how successful the Durban site is then the cost would be a staggering - R812 500.00 PER PAGE. Not bad work if you can get it!

OR R175 675.00 per link back.

MyPE has one link back to the Durban site as well - what are the chances, do you think, of me being able to invoice Durban for R175 675.00 for the link?
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JackGoa · Posted: Tue Jul 14, 2009 10:03 am Post subject:

I think I should get Adapt IT to come work for me. I could teach them a thing or two about building websites and all that goes with it and they can close deals for me. Very Happy

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ABYC · Posted: Mon Jul 27, 2009 2:10 pm Post subject:

Just plugged www.fifaworldcup.durban.gov.za into a couple of the myriad of website valuation tools available and got the following valuations back:

$119.00
$9056.00
$10 945.00
$456.00 to $25 309.00
$10 945.00
$6 149.00
R128 538.00
$19.00
$11 968.00

Pretty crappy methinks
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Firefly · Posted: Mon Jul 27, 2009 3:17 pm Post subject:

I could have done with a bit of that money
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ABYC · Posted: Tue Jul 28, 2009 7:25 am Post subject:

I just cannot let this go ............

From the DA Website:

Quote:

Durban City Council wastes R5.5-million on website

Marti Wenger, Shadow Minister of Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs
30 June 2009

The Democratic Alliance (DA) is calling for an investigation into the tendering process for the Durban City Council’s World Cup website, which was recently awarded to a BEE company at the staggering cost of R5.5 million.

The DA has ascertained that, using the specifications provided by the City Council, the website could not possibly have cost more than R250,000, and may well have cost less than half of that amount. So what has happened to the other R5.25-million? Has the money been misappropriated by Ethekwini municipal officials, or was the Council simply duped out of over R5-million?

The DA will be asking Municipal Manager Mike Sutcliffe to investigate this matter thoroughly in order to get to the bottom of what IT specialists have told us today appears to be an exorbitant fee for any website.

“For that you could programme Google,” we were told by one IT specialist, who found the figure quoted as “crazy”.

This is an outrageous waste of money, particularly in KwaZulu-Natal where 33% of its inhabitants live below the poverty line and where almost 300 000 people are living on less than R8 per day. Moreover, Durban is one of South Africa’s premier tourist destinations, but its facilities and amenities are becoming increasingly run down because of neglect and under-spending.

The DA will be asking Mr. Sutcliffe to provide details of what budget vote the funds came from, when and where the tender for the project was advertised, how many tender bids were received and the cost of each of these applications, and how the final decision was made. We will also be asking what steps the municipality will be undertaking to review this wasteful expenditure.

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