Jay-Z and Samsung insult Africa

JAY Z MAGNA CARTA APP NOT AVAILABLE IN AFRICA The release of Jay-Z‘s 12th studio album ‘MAGNA CARTA HOLY GRAIL‘ in partnership with Samsung (makers of the high-end Samsung Galaxy smart phone) has been highly publicised.  Jay even had the release announced in a three minute ad, during half time break of the NBA Finals game between theMiami Heat and San Antonio Spurs! Following the rave, Samsung announced an App which gives Jay-Z’s new album free to the first one million people to download it. As a huge Jay-Z fan, I excitedly 
got out my Samsung Galaxy S4 to download the ‘JayZ Magna Carta‘ app. Searching for the app on the  Playstore proved futile, and I had to Google it before getting a redirect link. Imagine my shock and innate disappointment when I got the following message ‘This item is not available in your country’. I was heartbroken as I had wanted to be among the first set of people to listen to ‘The Magna Carta Holy Grail’. Relentless, I embarked on a fact finding journey. Now, the app is open only to legal residents of the 50 States of the USA and the District of Columbia(excluding Guam, Puerto Rico and all other US territories), Australia, Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Singapore, Germany, France, South Africa, Austria, Canada, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom.  Considering that Africa is the fastest growing mobile market in the world and will be home to 738 million handsets by the end of this year, the outright snub is inconceivable. Add that to the fact that Samsung has assembly plants in South Africa, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Senegal, Mali and North Sudan, one can’t help but wonder why Samsung would make the app unavailable in Nigeria, and then come out here to sell 700 million phones.

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