As early as three o’clock in the morning, a red-eyed crew wearing scarves with the colours of the South African flag gathered in the lounge of a downtown hotel in Austin, Texas. All jet-lagged, they spent the cool and quiet morning hours working, writing and preparing for a day of talks and panel discussions.

Half the work was in selecting which sessions to attend. With some 17 000 visitors, South by South West (SxSW) was the biggest the small city of Austin had seen to date, and each hour was filled with a dozen or more presentations, demonstrations and debates.