This may sounds like a trivial thing to do, but in the part of the world where Amenfis was originally founded, things that are easy to come by elsewhere can take a lot of time and effort (and often are impossible) to accomplish. Just mention you’re based in [insert your favorite African country other than South Africa], and every online payment processor out there will kick you out before you finish your very next sentence.

Well, after our incorporation in the US, a whole world of possibilities is now open to us, and today I’m pleased to announce that Amenfis is now able to accept payments electronically!

All credit card payments are processed off-site by Google Checkout, and we never get to handle customers’ credit cards directly. We’re also working on adding additional payment options such PayPal, as well as direct credit card processing.

And as a reminder, offline payment by bank deposit or Western Union remains available. Customers in Ghana can continue to settle their invoices by making a deposit into our bank account in Ghana, and customers in US and other countries can continue to settle outstanding invoices through direct deposit or ACH transfers into our US bank account. Both accounts appear under OFFLINE PAYMENT option in all invoices.

That’s a simple one to check off and mark as ‘done’, on our journey to greatness. Expect more exciting announcements soon.

I was a very early user of Ribbit’s Ribbit Mobile Beta service, a web-based service built on the Ribbit Platform that linked landline and mobile phones to the Internet, allowing users to manage all their calls and messages in one place. Voicemail messages were automatically transcribed and sent to users as email and SMS texts. The service also allowed users to make calls directly from their computers, and users could forward incoming calls to their Ribbit Mobile number to any existing mobile or landline phone, and also to their Skype accounts.

If that sounds like Google Voice to you, yes, Ribbit was founded in 2005, the same year that GrandCentral (acquired by Google and re-branded as Google Voice) and several other so-called Voice 2.0 and VoIP startups also launched.

And just like the GrandCentral service after Google’s acquisition, the Ribbit Mobile service became poorer and poorer after the BT acqusition, and support came to a screeching halt. To this day, I’ve never got any response to any of my support requests. And the writing was always on the wall that the service was going to shut down anytime.

Well, finally it’s here. Below is an email I got from the Ribbit folks about the impending shutdown of the Ribbit Mobile service on 31st January. To their credit, this is not the first announcement of this shut down (can’t retrieve the ealier email I got), and note that there’s more to Ribbit than Ribbit Mobile, and it’s only the latter which is getting shut down. And as for that new private trial, sorry, Ribbit, I and all my friends who were Ribbit Mobile beta users moved on a long time ago.

If you’re a current Ribbit Mobile user, where are two critical steps you should take before the Ribbit Mobile service gets shut down on January 31st, 2012:

• Here are instructions to stop forwarding your mobile phone voicemail to Ribbit Mobile
• And here is a tool to download your voicemail audio files and transcriptions from Ribbit Mobile

Online privacy, or rather the increasing lack of online privacy, is in the news lately. As more and more of our lives go online, one would think service providers would make it easier for us to keep information we deem private private, and not share such information with anyone else without our explicit permission.

Unfortunately this is not the case with today’s particular breed of ad-driven online services. In fact, the exact opposite is happening, and it appears that we cannot use any online service without relinquishing, knowingly or unknowingly, all our rights and reasonable desire to keep our private data private.

I think this is very unfortunate. So here is our promise to you, our customers, contacts, prospects, and website users:

As you browse through the pages of this website (and by the way, any other website you visit!), you leave traces of your presence behind… including information about your country, computer, browser, pages you view, time you spend, etc. We consider such information and any other information we directly collect from you as your personal information and we will never knowingly share such information with Adam, Eve, or with anyone else. Period.

That’s the short and sweet version of our Privacy Promise. You can find the long legalese version here.

We really swear and live by this promise. Unfortunately, at this time, we do not have the wherewithal to fight the Federal government or any State government. So the only exception to this promise is if we are compelled by a competent court in the United States of America (where our company Amenfis LLC is registered) to release such personal information. Even so, we promise to inform the affected user(s) and exhaust any protection offered by the constitution, before releasing such information.

Below is a screenshot taken from the official entity name search website of the Division of Corporations of the Delaware Department of State.

It’s been a roller-coaster ride for me throughout these past 32 years. I’m privileged to have enjoyed some of the best things that this life has got to offer. But I’ve also had my fair share of the tears and toils that this life brings along. Together, these ups and downs have shaped me into who I am today, and prepared me for the brave new journey I am now embarking on.

After 32 years, one absolute truth I’ve come to know about my self is that I LOVE teaching. No, not the “talk n’ chalk” type (even though I excel at that as well), but working with smart people to set life-changing goals and formulate actionable plans, and “barking” at them to relentlessly push through to the finish line.

I’m also intimately passionate about computers, gadgets, and anything that has the humble transistor in it, whether it’s individual transistors or a billion of them packed together.

These are a few of my favorite things, and with this new Delaware LLC, I’m embarking on a new career path which brings together these passions of mine.

I want to work with smart computer professionals who desire to start their own computer service businesses, or who are already out there in the trenches running their businesses but are struggling to get new high-value clients and unable to efficiently serve the few they have.

I want to work with these people and help them design sellable managed IT service offerings, launch proven-to-work sales and marketing campaigns, and equip them to deliver on their promise to their clients. I want to offer my clients computing infrastructure and services that they can re-sell to their own clients from day 1, so they wouldn’t need a truck load of cash to launch their businesses. And I’m also going to offer my new clients the guarantee and the confidence that I will always be here for them to escalate to any difficult technical problems that they are unable to solve.

That is the plan. So you can say life is really getting started at 32 for me, and I intend this new life to be a turbo-growth one, decidedly focused on living the life I’ve been dreaming and contemplating all these past 32 years but never had the courage to pursue.

New, But Not Really New

Most of you reading this probably know I already have a company in Ghana, Amenfis Communications Limited (soon to be re-named Amenfis Ghana Limited). A few of you may also know that I am involved in another company (Telesoft Company Limited), as well as a dozen or so other projects.

So why this new company, and why in America, and why now?

In a separate article I will explain the thinking behind forming an LLC in the USA (and particularly in the US state of Delaware). But let it suffice to say now that it wasn’t a result of those late night whims of mine. Running a company is not an easy thing, and doing so in a foreign country where I’m not a citizen or resident is a thousand times harder. But I thought through and prayed over this for years, and when life presented an incredible opportunity, I gladly accepted it.

In due time, I’m going to divest myself of everything else, starting with those pet projects, and focus all my energies on this new company.

Not To Worry, Existing Clients

If you’re an existing client, you’re probably wondering what this means to you. The answer, in a word, is… nothing. If I do provide services to you today, whether you’re based in Ghana, America or anywhere else in the Universe (hell not included), I want to assure you that I do respect our relationship, and nothing is going to change anytime soon. I’m still your old and trusty servant, always available to serve you day and night.

I still love putting my screw drivers to good use, and I intend to continue working with computers for as long as I have breath and can breathe. And if life and business realities force me to tow in a different direction, you can safely bet that I will work with you to ensure a smooth transition to one of my IT Services Provider clients, or any other computer consultant of your choosing.

So there you have it, Amenfis LLC, the brand-new Delaware LLC. Thank you all for your friendship and for your business. Here is to a wonderful new relationship, going forward.