Headline April 03, 2018/ ''' HUBS -*INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY*- HUMS '''

''' HUBS -*INFORMATION 

TECHNOLOGY*- HUMS '''

SO VERY FEW OF YOU KNOW that in Minsk, a city of two million people, over 30,000  technology specialists, and that includes -

Many of them - tech designers, - go about creating master apps, that are used by more than a *billion people in 193 countries*.

Remarkable, as this all maybe, I now turn to our very own hub-

Student ALI Aizaz Zahid - Ewards College, Peshawar - through thick and thin, through rain and storms, through lightening and autumn through many personal sacrifices-

Distinguished himself as one of the great founders of the World Students Society, that is most respectfully and lovingly called !WOW! - in every nook and corner of the world..

And all that while, Ali, never failed to write and compose - some very beautiful content on Entertainment, Music and Films -
 Ali, ever smiling, ever composed, fair and just, and very determined to build a better world.

So, as the clock whirrs on to a minute past midnight, Mrs. Tehmeena Zaidi, Ali's revered mother,  takes over as the Honorary President of the World Students Society, for the week.

The students of Pakistan, and the students of the entire world, give Mrs, Tehmeena Zaidi a standing ovation.

And then just about 4000 miles away, as mother earth spins on its axis and around the Sun, I turn to  Europe's last dictatorship, which is now, a world class technology hub.

ON FRIDAY NIGHTS, Zybitskaya  street, or simply Zyba, as locals call it - turns into a vast party scene, filled with hipsters in bright shirts, tight-

Dark jeans and and black-rimmed glasses, showing how they can be carefree in a country that has been labelled the last dictatorship of Europe.

Over the last few years, Zyba has turned into an island in the middle of Minsk, the Belarusian capital - still mostly a sterile, utterly unfashionable city with long lines of dominating Soviet buildings and  people hurrying past, seemingly terrified of making any form of contact.

On Zyba, a crowed of convivial youngsters migrate from one little bar to another, drinking and enjoying coke, and smoking endlessly.

Many of those carousing belong to Belarus's sprouting technology industry - young, savvy and forward-looking designers, bookish and shy engineers, and others who aspire to belong.

More than 30,000 tech specialists now work in Minsk, a city of about two million, many of them  creating apps that are used by more than a billion people in 193 countries, according to the local government.

One of the Minsk techies is Dmitri Kovalyov, 35, an artist who has a couple of years ago worked for  MSQRD, a smartphone tool that lets people superimpose various masks over their faces in selfie videos.

In 2016, Mr. Lovalyov, couldn't imagine that his respect for Leonardo Di Caprio's acting and environmental activism would get the company very far.

But before that year's Academy Awards, Mr. Kovalyov and his colleagues developed a tool for a mask that made people in video messages look like Mr. DiCaprio holding two Oscar statuettes.

Numerous celebrities tried it out, including on the red carpet, and even Mr. DiCaprio's mother was in on the trick. When a journalist asked her about the app, she said her son has already shown her how it worked.

''I like what Leonardo does, how he acts and how tries to preserve the planet,'' Mr. Kovalyov said recently of the actor, who won that year's Best Academy award, ''I was rooting for him.''

Ten days after the awards, Facebook bought the company for an undisclosed sum.

The founders, whose average age was bout 25 at the time, moved to London and the United States. Together with some of those co-workers Mr. Kovalyov is developing a new Minsk startup, ARSquad, which creates augmented reality content.

One of the first masks the other company developed was one resembling Aleksandr G. Lukashenko, Belarus's president, who has ruled for more than two decades.

He is prone to publicity stunts like picking potatoes at his estate or taking his teenage son, Nikolai, to sit at international meetings in a military uniform.

Mr. Lukashenko's mask featured his trademark comb-over hair and bushy mustache, but was not considered offensive.

The Honour and Serving of the latest *Operational Research* on Technology Hubs and Hums continues. And with very many thanks to author and researcher Ivan Nechepurenko, Minsk, Belarus.

With respectful dedication to the Leaders, Parents, Students, Professors and Teachers of Belarus, and then the world. See Ya all on !WOW! - the World Students Society and Twitter-!E-WOW! - the Ecosystem 2011:

''' TECH & TAKE '''

Good Night and God Bless

SAM Daily Times - the Voice of the Voiceless