Make music, maestro...

IBM invites professional and amateur musicians from all over the world to use its internet collaboration tools to compose songs about South Africa.

The initiative, called Songs of Good Hope will be officially announced at CeBIT 2008 in Hannover, Germany. CeBIT is the world's largest trade fair for digital solutions and is taking place 4 – 9 March 2008.

IBM has developed collaboration tools for musicians within "Second Life", the three-dimensional internet world, as well as in the two-dimensional internet using Web 2.0 collaboration.

Through this use of modern IT technologies, musicians will be able to come together to jointly compose 17 world-class songs and to give their creativity free rein across multiple country and culture boundaries.

Musicians can upload and download audio samples or single notes hits, mix them with samples or overlay them with other rhythms. After completion of the music jam session early in 2009, the best songs will be recorded and released on a CD. Profits from this initiative will be donated to township projects in line with IBM South Africa's corporate social responsibility initiatives.

Further information on the initiative and collaboration tools are available on http://www.sawubona2010.de