Media release: Madiba’s legacy lives on through Foundation’s new virtual journey
Date of release: 17 November 2014
From: Danielle Melville, Director: Communications & Outreach, Nelson Mandela Foundation
Madiba’s legacy found a new home in cyberspace this week when the Nelson Mandela Foundation proudly launched its new-look, interactive website.
The site, created in collaboration with Flow Communications, is a visually rich, technological showpiece that incorporates new multimedia functionality. It has a responsive, fluid design that caters for a growing demographic of tablet and mobile phone users – over 40% of the 350 000 people who visit the site on average each month do so on these devices.
The Chief Executive of the Nelson Mandela Foundation, Sello Hatang, says the new website is one of the Foundation’s core objectives for the next five years.
“We are thrilled with the new portal. The way information is housed and presented helps establish the Nelson Mandela Foundation as the trusted voice on the life and times of Nelson Mandela, and serves as an information hub for the social dialogues we carry out across South Africa in honour of Madiba’s legacy,” says Hatang.
“The innovative content presentation and strong online identity assist with our mandate to maintain a recognisable brand, while ensuring we maintain our role as custodian of the Nelson Mandela Annual Lecture and Mandela Day campaign, with an ever-expanding local and international reach.”
Nelson Mandela’s biography page on the website, which consistently receives over 120 000 views per month, serves as a good example of how new, rich content has been brought in to help enhance existing material, and effectively portrays the monumental life Madiba led through video, images, quotes and audio clips.
Similarly, the new interactive timeline is populated with diverse multimedia content, allowing key moments in Mandela’s life to come alive. Scrolling down from his 1918 birth in Qunu to the time of his passing in 2013 gives the user a profound sense of how Mandela ultimately realised his dream of a peaceful, united South Africa, and the long journey it took to get there.
Another key feature is the #NelsonMandela Social Wall, which pulls through the very latest social media discussions around Mandela from different channels. The Foundation’s Twitter, Facebook and Google+ accounts have attracted some of the biggest followings in South Africa.
CEO of Flow Communications Tara Turkington is excited at seeing the elaborate project reach completion.
“The Nelson Mandela Foundation is one of our longest-standing and most special clients. We've worked with them for eight years on a number of projects, including developing websites, working with Google to produce a digital archive of Madiba-related materials, and helping to integrate the social media accounts, which are now the biggest in South Africa.
“We are honoured and privileged to launch the upgraded www.nelsonmandela.org with the Foundation,” she says. “The people who work at the Foundation are so passionate and dedicated to perpetuating Mandela's legacy, and this new site is a true partnership created with them.”
Media Enquiries
Danielle Melville
daniellem@nelsonmandela.org
#ends
Note to editors:
A special exhibition in honour of the 1st anniversary of Madiba’s passing – In Tribute to Nelson Mandela – will be launched at the Foundation’s Centre of Memory on 4 December 2014. The Centre will have public open days for paying tribute to Madiba and viewing the exhibitions from 5 to 15 December 2014 – Weekdays: 09h00 to 16h00 and Weekends: 09h00 to 14h00 at no fee.