Etisalat has finally launched its mobile communications services in Nigeria with the 0809-digit after acquiring Emerging Markets Telecommunication Services (EMTS) in partnership with Mubadala Development Company.

Incorporated in Nigeria as a private company, it acquired the Unified Access License from the Federal Government in January 2007 which includes a mobile license and spectrum in the GSM 1800 and 900 MHz bands at a price of $400million (Four Hundred Million U.S. Dollars). Etisalat acquired a 40% stake in EMTS and is now the operator of the Unified Access License.

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Today, I am featuring an email interview I recently had with Temi Kolawole, co-founder of Antigravity Inc., a web design company founded in 2004 that offers solutions in all of the major programming languages (PHP, .NET, Ruby on Rails & JSP), search engine optimization (SEO) as well as web 2.0 design standards.

SN: Please tell us about yourself, your background and interests?

Temi: I graduated from Babcock University, Nigeria with a B.Sc in Computer Engineering in 2004. I’m an extremely driven person. I’m a son of two professors. I love God and music. I’m a geek, but many of my school friends didn’t think I was till recently and found it hard to believe I was the one building all these websites. I’m a regular “omo boy”. After graduation, I basically just set my mind on mastering this internet thing, and learning as much as I could. I believe anyone can become a guru if he/she puts his/her mind to it.

I do coding, graphic design, flash animation, SEO, and basically every aspect of web design to a pretty good standard. The internet has become like a sixth sense for me…I’ve watched it grow and evolve and I can analyze any website’s technology at first glance.

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I’d like to think that reviewing bellanaija on StartupsNigeria is long overdue, since the site has grown to become the most popular fashion and entertainment news blog in Nigeria. Although, it may not be called a startup, the success of the blog means that it has something to offer the infotainment-loving Nigerian people as well as the web community.

Bellanaija is a Nigerian celebrity blog that passionately publishes fashion & entertainment news, info, gossips and gists as well as profiles Nigerian & African celebrities around the world. The site has been covering Big Brother Africa 3 that recently started and has lots of fans both male and female (including me).

But, I think that the site’s design and colour undermines the value and uniqueness of the blog. Branded with a girly-like pinky look and feel, the site has lots of male fans who I’m sure don’t like that pink colour design coupled with the girl-with-the-large-eye-lids-and-lips image used as a banner on the site.

Besides, the site has been on a blogspot subdomain name since it started in July 2006, which I feel doesn’t go well with a highly profiled blog like bellanaija. I think bella must have acquired a full domain name by now (www.bellanaija.com), considering the fact that the site needs to meet with the standards of celebrity blogs around the world and thus drive more advertisement deals for the site.

Maybe its high time Bellanaija gets a fresher look. Or what do y’all think?

Despite the site’s aesthetics, I’m impressed with the its traffic, which shows that bellanaija has been doing consistently well in providing the hottest celebrity news around entertainment and fashion in Nigeria. That’s why I’m reviewing the blog here on StartupsNigeria.

If you are a bellanaija fan or you are just checking out the celebrity blog, you can tell us how you feel about its design and how you think it can be improved.

Today, I am going to recommend 10 business blogging ideas that could make you money. I hope you find this list resourceful:-)

1. Technology Blog - Reviewing Nigerian 2.0 tech products that are used to facilitate the activities of banks, telecoms, etc. This blog’s audience could be tech enthusiasts, IT experts, industry watchers, consumers/customers, investors, etc

2. Fashion Blog - Writing about new fashion trends in Nigeria, fashion shows/awards, fashion tips, advice and ideas. This should include photos of different fashion outfits (both male and female), especially african traditional wears. The audience would be fashion freaks, fashion designers and people looking for anything new in the fashion world. I like what bellanaija is doing.

3. Entertainment Blog - A broad niche blog that provides entertainment news, reviews and interviews as well as gossips and gists in the Nigerian entertainment industry. You may include the who’s who in the entertainment world, events coverage, music/movie news, etc

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Social networking can be described as a set of online activities in which a group of people network with each other, thus providing a fun and relaxing way of meeting people, establishing contacts and building relationships.

A typical example is Facebook - a social utility that connects you with the people around you. Now, if that’s what a social networking site should be, what has Nigeria produced?

It seems to me that the Nigerian webspace is saturated with ’social netquacks’ instead of social networks, thus causing a ’social netquake’. Most of the so-called social networking sites in Nigeria are either using the same features of another social site or adopting the same strategy or design of another.

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