The NAMAs and Social Networks

Unless you have been living in a space station orbiting the earth, by now errbody and their mother know that the NAMAs went down last weekend in Swakies.

MTC and NBC should pat themselves on the back for pulling off a spectacular awards show. They really did a great job. They promised that this would be the best NAMAs Namibia had ever seen and the entire country waited in anticipation to see if they could pull it off, which they did.

Considering that last year’s awards show (known as Ramatex 2) was rigged by a nightmare of glitches and blunders, this year’s awards was a true example of learning from one’s mistakes.

For those who could not make it to the live show in Swakopmund, NBC television was the channel to switch to on Saturday night. However NBC television was not the only platform people could access the NAMAs on this past weekend. In fact, NBC did not live broadcast the first ever Industry Awards ceremony which took place on the Friday night and those not at the indoor sports ground in Swakopmund had to try to live stream it online or do what most people did, access the awards via social media.

By now everybody should be aware of the huge impact social media has, with the Oscar Pistorius trial being a prime example. Most who follow the trial do it via Twitter. This is because a bunch of reporters are sitting in the court typing away to give the masses instant news.

Social media has also become a huge part of the NAMAs. Each year people take to Twitter and Facebook to air their views and opinion on the NAMAs. Even with the two previous NAMAs (Ramatex 1 and Ramatex 2); social media was always the NAMAs’ most vocal supporter and harshest critic. Even so, both those years cannot be compared to the amount of action this year’s NAMAs saw on social networks.

Twitter was so crazy with NAMA fever on Saturday night that #NAMAs14 even trended on South African Twitter.

This means that the NAMAs reach crossed the cyber border into South Africa. How awesome is that!

I have to commend The Namibian’s team for being on the forefront in giving people instant information on the NAMAs via their Twitter and Facebook pages. The Namibian’s Twitter page is where people turned to on Friday night when the first ever Industry Awards took place, providing live coverage and visuals of all the action.

The Namibian’s pages were so instant that they published the winners, as well as a summary of the events on its social network pages before even the organisers.

My point is that this is where journalism is going; actually worldwide this is where it is already. People want immediate coverage of events, people what to know what is happening now. This is where, even though they did a tremendous job, the organisers fell short.

With that being said, I have to congratulate NBC and MTC for a job well done. They were definitely the biggest winners last weekend and delivered what they promised. A well organised, entertaining event, which no doubt is the grandest Namibia has ever seen.