Geekiness Beirut Outbreak

GeekFest Beirut was truly a wonder to behold. There are photos on the FaceBook page from those what got Twitpicked on the night, and this Photobucket from Fady Nammour gives a pretty good feel for the ‘vibe’ – at a guess something like 120 people streamed into Beirut’s uber-funky Art Lounge to find displays of digital photography as well as the art that literally festoons every space at ArtLounge.

There were loads more GeekTalks, starting with an odd rant from yours truly, going through to an overview of Creative Commons licensing from graphic artist Naeema Zarif (Naeema designed the cool new GeekFest logo, posters and stuff) and cartoonist/blogger Maya Zankoul and then a look at some of the projects being undertaken in Lebanon by the UNDP’s CEDRO, thanks to Elie Abou Jaoudeh.

Ayman Itani spoke on the human/technology aspects of communications, while Elie Haddad’s talk on the potential of mobile applications continued the telecom theme. George El KHabbaz threw a few F’UX into proceedings with his GeekTalk on user experience (that’s what an UX is, folks) and how it needs to be designed in from the beginning of processes (Ha! Tell HSBC that).

Isaac Belot topped the geek charts easily with his in-depth and totally geeked-out presentation of the technologies that lie behind filming in 3D. That one even had the true geeks bug-eyed.

The evening finished with a short, boisterous and totally fun presentation from artiste extraordinaire (and designer of the GeekFest Twitter Icon and, I hope, T-shirts) Joumana Medlej (@CedarSeed). Joumana’s work is stunning, her cartoon strips are brilliant and the auction of a book of her early drawings and development sketches pulled in a fast and furious bidding war to top out at $300 – even the barman got into the act. Yes, there was a bar too and it did a brisk trade at that.

So what was the ‘vibe’ like? Different to GeekFest Dubai, for sure – and I can’t quite put my finger on how it was different. The Beirut guys did a lot more collaboration on many aspects of the event and so there was a wider sense of ownership. There’s no doubt that they’ve had an impact on GeekFest Dubai, particularly with the contribution of the graphic art elements, the ID design from Naeema and Joumana’s iconography.

It looks increasingly likely that there will be other GeekFest events springing up around the region now. And I think that’s possibly going to be very interesting in a number of ways that we haven’t really thought through yet!

Beirut, Beirut!

We are, as my niece would say, 'one sleep away' from GeekFest Beirut and I have to confess to being a tad excited. The building blocks of tomorrow night’s event would appear to be, in as much as they’ll ever be, in place and it promises to be a fun-packed evening of diversity, deep thought, art and expression that is going to be utterly fascinating!

The GeekTalks are starting at 8pm in Room One and include:

The Quality of Disintermediation
A millennium of disintermediation, how technology is challenging the world to change
Alexander McNabb

Creative Commons
Naeema Zarif, Maya Zankoul

CEDRO Sustainability projects in Lebanon
Elie Abou Jaoudeh, CEDRO, UNDP

Our Relationship with Information, past and present, personal and business
How information has evolved and its effect on personal self-expression and business communication.
Ayman Itani, Telephone.com, LAU

What the F'UX?
User experience presentation. Using an everyday object to reflect the online UX and a simple guide to build a good ux. Room 1 The Talks
George El Khabbaz

At the same time in Room Two, there’ll be a rolling digital photography exhibition by photographers Fady Nammour, Toni Yammine, Lara Zankoul and Mherigo Krikorian. Alongside this, there's a TechnoCase going on from GeekFest early adopter Nokia.

At around 10pm there’ll quite possibly be a 3D film presentation by Isaac Belot at BassBrass.org followed by an exhibition of Ten Devil Woman and other work from leading Lebanese artist Joumana Medlej. The evening’s last, but by no means least, ‘happening’ will be an auction of a prototype sketchbook from Joumana's Malaak comic series in aid of @lebfunraising..

Huge props to UNorganiser Alexandra Tohme and to the many people in Beirut who came together around this event in a remarkable collaborative effort. I just know this is going to be very cool.

Oh! And thanks to the lovely website hosting folks Moodeef.Com!

GeekFest Beirut takes place at Art Lounge in Beirut on the 6th February 2010 - you can follow @GeekFestBeirut on Twitter, Facebook or mess around in the Google Group.

Do We Treat Our Taxi Drivers Badly? Hell, Yes!

Image by Qiao-Da-Ye賽門譙大爺 via Flickr

I have frequently posted in the past about my regular cabbie Mr. G and the iniquitous conditions that cabbies work under in the UAE since private cabs were banned and replaced by the taxi companies. These companies have been treating cabbies effectively like indentured labour, fining them huge amounts and saddling them with all sorts of charges and 'extras' that most people out here expect as part of their conditions of employment.

Gulf News has reported on one group of cabbies who have filed a complaint against their employer, oddly enough going as far as to name the company. The report is doubly surprising given the reaction of the company when GN contacted them for comment.

The drivers are complaining that their salary, a nominal Dhs300, isn't actually paid as they're employed on commission and are made to pay over Dhs3,000 for their visa, Dhs 1,000 for their uniform (must be designer brand stuff) and Dhs 26 a day for 'operational costs'. If they don't make a minimum of Dhs 1,200 a day, they're fined Dhs 200. They're complaining that they have to work 12 hours a day and beyond to keep their heads above water.

Given that our safety is in their hands, 12 hour shifts seems dangerous - and I know that Sharjah cabbie Mr G not unusually works 16 hour shifts, 365 days a year.

The company's response to Gulf News was brilliant.

"They work 12 hours, seven days a week because we consider them partners and not employees," Metro's GM told GN, going on to confirm that drivers must also pay for operational costs, which include insurance, plate registration, car cost, car maintenance and for all needed expenses.

The taxi companies are, apparently, 'working on getting rid of signing the labour contract'. Now there's a solution!.

For a company charged with egregious behaviour, unfair practices and treating its staff appallingly to respond with 'Hell, yes!' is pure genius.

We're re-writing the rulebook of PR by the day, folks... By the day...

More Great News for Media. Not.

Image by the_repairman via Flickr

Gulf News carries the story today of the award of Dhs 100,000 to a Saudi Prince in compensation against Al Arabiya TV for choosing NOT to air an interview with him. According to Dubai Civil Court, quoted by GN, Al Arabiya had "failed to adhere to the media code of ethics and breached the nobility and morality of journalism."

The nobility and morality of journalism? Are they having a laugh?

This was the appeal in the case, which went through the Civil Court last year. It is the latest in a number of precedents and announcements that are of concern to media in the Middle East as it tries to perform something approaching a mild version of what an unfettered media would be doing.

According to the GN piece, Arabiya brought Prince Dr Saif Al Islam Bin Saud Bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud to Dubai to record an interview, which it subsequently promoted but chose not to air. The Prince wrote a letter to Arabiya, which the channel apparently ignored. As a consequence, according to the prince's lawyer, the prince suffered "...moral and social damage on the prince's status as a royal and academician. His fame was affected before his family, students and the social circles to which he belongs."

"According to article 293 of the Civil Procedures Law, the claimant is entitled compensation because the defendant damaged his reputation and social status."

The channel's argument that, as the producer and copyright holder to the work, it had the right to do what it wanted with it fell on deaf ears.

The case goes to the court of cassation now, so all is not yet lost, but this is yet another worrying precedent at a time when bad news for media has been breaking here, in Jordan and in Kuwait.

It is by no means unknown for a journalist to carry out an interview and then not run it - newspaper, radio, TV and all. For instance, if the interview is deadly dull (and boy have I seen a few of those) and lacks any content of interest to the reader. Or if it veers so far off topic that the journalist hasn't got enough to hang the piece on. I have also seen interviews not run because events have overtaken the interview and rendered it irrelevant. And, yes, I have also seen interviews not run because journalists have been lazy or daft and generally just goofed it up.

But the right to run the piece or not, to do a news in brief or a double page spread, to be nice about you or to be horrid lie entirely with the journalist. By undertaking an interview, spokespeople sign up to a well defined 'bill of rights' that includes the fact that the interview may well not run and also may well not run in the interviewee's interest. There's a whole load of stuff you can do to try and ensure that you give good interview and so get coverage. But there are no guarantees. None whatsoever. It's a contact sport and only a fool would engage with media without any appreciation of that media and how it comports itself.

At the end of the day, the journalist (and his/her editor) are responsible for providing us with stuff that we want to read/watch/listen to. It's their job to increase their audience by delivering great content. And so it's only right and proper that what content to use when is entirely their decision.

Now we would appear to be questioning that, and it is not good news at all.

Talking Towers

Image via Wikipedia

Yesterday's Arabic Al Khaleej features an extensive feature by writer Mustapha Abdulraheem. Rather brilliantly, it is penned the form of a chit-chat between the Burj Khalifa and the Dubai Shopping Festival. This comes to us from the newspaper that once memorably interviewed that little yellow bundle of fun, Modhesh Al Modhesh.

"I feel happy because I was born as the tallest, most important Emirati, Arab and international building ever made by man on this planet. There's nothing in the universe to match my pride and how it rises,' the building gushes. 'My days start in the morning when I am wakened by the clouds. I praise God and I thank him for being born Emirati. I look over the world through twelve telescopes fixed on my platforms. I look through one of them and I can see the skyscrapers of New York and Malaysia as well as the pyramids.'

The iconic tower was surprised, apparently, on the 28th January to see fireworks as well as smelling the scent of musk from the city's streets (sadly, the piece doesn't explain which aspect of the construction is responsible for its olfactory senses). Not unnaturally, unsure of what the fuss was about, the Burj turned to Dubai Mall and the Burj Al Arab and asked them what's going on. They laughed, we are told, because the Dubai Shopping Festival was with them.

'I'm a big success that has lasted for 15 years,' DSF tells the inquisitive young Burj, going on to talk at some length about what a tremendous symbol for Dubai's success and progress it is. It's not, it would appear, the humblest festival in town, but then it's trying to big it up to the world's tallest tower.

At this point in the dialogue the Burj smiles and DSF asks him why. 'Has my presence and name added to the attraction of you as a festival this year?'

'Of course, says DSF. 'You are the pride of every Emirati and Arab. You have a wide audience, considering that your opening night was the best international event this year and you are the tallest building this earth has ever known!'

The Shopping Festival then takes the Burj Khalifa on a tour of Dubai (after talking at some length about its success and importance and its regional leadership of the festival industry) but, sadly, the iconic tower had eventually to return to its guests, making a promise to visit again next year.

What a wonderful piece to inspire everyone! One notes there is once again a series of awards for journalism during this year's Dubai Shopping Festival. Mustapha must be a front-runner for a gong and perhaps even a cash award as an appropriate award for his excellent work.

The Unbearable Inevitability of Disruption

Image via Wikipedia

I started today off taking part in the Dubai Eye Radio Apple iPadFest. The launch last night has meant that iPad has trended Google consistently for the past 24 hours, beating Obama’s State of the Nation address into as low as 6th place. The buzz on Twitter, blogs, radio stations and TV has been phenomenal – and it was nice to see Sky News cut live to the announcement and then lose the link, totally flubbing the story and cutting to Milliband and Clinton droning on sanctimoniously about Yemen instead.

Given, then, that it’s international iPad day today, I thought I’d expand a bit on something I said yesterday. Granted, it’s an element of the McNabb catechism, but I think it’s core to the million dollar question for people who write books – will people use this thing rather than a book? Could I see myself doing that?

The catechism bit is this: “Quality becomes irrelevant when technology enables access.” This has been the case consistently over the ages. The first example that I can think of is the invention of the printing press. The movement of knowledge around Europe in the Dark Ages was laboriously slow, illuminated manuscripts painstakingly copied by monks in scriptoria and jealously guarded from those ‘unfit’ to have access to such a trove. These books were beautiful, true labours of love that were illustrated in amazing detail, both as illustration of the text as well as illustration to give form to concepts and ideas contained in the content.

The Book of Kells

Then William Caxton pitches up without so much as a by your leave and invents the printing press. Suddenly anyone could make multiple copies of books, let alone posters and leaflets. The significance of the invention for governments, let alone the Catholic Church, was tremendous. The quality of the print was lousy by comparison, but that didn’t matter. Technology had improved access.

An early Caxton print
 

Each major leap forward in technology since has had a similar effect, the telegraph, the telephone, wireless and so on. Each time technology improved access, quality didn’t matter. Would I prefer a lovingly written letter on fine vellum telling me that my daughter has had a healthy 8lb baby three months after the fact? Or a terse telegram printed out on strips of paper in block capitals?

There’s another example from an earlier post here, but my favourite comes from last time Apple pulled a stunt like this. I, like many other people, bought a CD player and started buying CDs instead of vinyl. The quality was so much better, banks of 16-bit analogue to digital converters straining away to sample sound at a staggering 44 MHz to give a 22 MHz playback – higher than the human ear can hear (the 44/22 relationships is thanks to the Nyquist criterion. You don’t want to know about that, trust me). I bought the ‘you can hear the conductor put down his baton’ sales line and our house filled with racks of CDs, the cassettes and vinyl getting dusty in the attic.

Now I’ve ripped all my CDs and play them on our iPods. The process of ‘ripping’, compressing a CD track to an MP3, causes a reduction in quality. Worse, I listen to most of my music when I’m driving – using a little radio thingy that plugs into the cigarette lighter. So my reduced quality sample (reduced high end as well as dynamic range) is now played over a radio link (further reducing both) to give me an audio experience that is worse than chrome cassette.

Do I care? I do not. I have access to all my music in one handy player (well, three, if I’m honest).

The qualitative argument made by publishers is of the quality of writing. Quality is a funny word (it is impossible to define, according to the key character in Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance), we have quality of product, quality of mercy and a million other qualities. The key to the ‘will people adopt e-reading’ debate is not quality of writing – it’s the quality of experience. We see reading as essentially tactile , you know, ‘I like to curl up a warm sofa with a good book’ but that’s just force of habit. We used to see music in the same sort of way, we were attached to good old vinyl and didn’t like those cold little silvery platey things.

Believe me, reading a book on a computer screen is a real bitch (anyone who’s been through the authonomy mill knows that all too well). But we already read more on screens than we do on paper each day. And we write books on screens, too.

The convenience of an e-reader that is readable, that turns pages fast and that gives us access to books, newspapers and anything that the Internet can chuck at us is, I believe, just about enough to start the ball rolling. I’m not saying we’re all going to be using readers by the end of the year, but I believe that tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands, of people will.

This will have any number of effects. One will be that there will be more authors able to reach wider audiences. Another will be that people will have access to a wider choice of reading material from more ‘voices’ than ever before. Another will be that authors will make less money on average, although have the potential to make more money than before. And another will be, as I said yesterday, that publishing will be changed forever. Quality, as the publishing industry has it, will suffer to a certain degree as everyone who thinks they can write a book shares their awful scribbling (I blush when I read my first book, Space, now. It got the old authonomy gold star and it is very funny but it’s an awful mess of a thing). But that’ll even out as imprints emerge that build reputations around offering new, good quality writing.

We called the iPad disruptive on the radio this morning. And disruptive it most certainly is. Sure, the Kindle was first. But the iPad looks slicker, a great deal more usable and with an iTunes-like back end it's likely going to set the market afire.

Whereto Publishing?

Image via Wikipedia

"If you can see into the future, you're not looking ahead far enough," said the bloke that put the hole in the toilet seat that is the Internet, Tim Berners-Lee. Right now, that is particularly true in the world of publishing, where a great looming cloudy thing is gathering on the horizon.

Problem is, nobody knows quite what's in it.

I have long been fascinated with the question of where publishing's going. This is because I used to be in the publishing industry (before I fell into PR, insensibly, like a boiled frog) and also because I have a nasty book-writing habit. Harper Collins' experiment in online talent-spotting and stealth POD site, Authonomy, showed how book publishers were casting around for some way to use the Internet in their business models. At the same time, magazine and newspaper publishers have been watching revenues dwindle as all those bloodshot morning coffee eyeballs drifted onto the Internet.

The problem facing both categories of publisher is that they are wedded tightly to their business model - and it's a business model whose very existence is based on inefficiency. It's simply got to go.

This is not something I say because I want it to go. While I have long suffered from the whole 'carvers at the gates of Gormenghast' aspect of submitting to publishers, I am deeply attached to the papery wonderfulness that is a good book. It's just that it doesn't really work very well anymore.

Authors are paid a percentage of the cover price of a book. Publishers print lots of books, essentially speculatively, and depend on trying to sell a high percentage of the total number of books. They will never, ever sell all of the books. If you're doing very, very well you might sell 60%. The rest are returns and so the cost of any given book is actually a tad over 140% of its actual cost of production, print, shipping and so on. This is the first inefficiency - wastage on returns.

The total cost of the book will include something like 40% for the distributor (20% for the disty and 20% for the retailer). The author will make something around 8-10% of sales, although the percentage depends on who that author is.

Given that I can put a book in your hands for nothing using the Internet, the process of chopping down trees and squeezing them through printing presses, shipping them all over the world and then accepting the unsolds getting shipped back again (to be remaindered and then, if all hope is lost, pulped) seems to be terribly inefficient. And it is.

I have often said that the last refuge of the about-to-be-disintermediated is 'quality'. Never has it been so true of publishing the traditional way. You need professional editors to give a book quality. You can't replace the quality of a paper book. You'll lose all quality if you open up the publishing market to any Tom, Dick and Harry who thinks they can write a book.

In the time I was involved with Authonomy, you'd often hear me saying that I had found more books on the website that I wanted to read than I had found in my local bookshops. That was, and is, the case. There's a lot of great writing out there that could not be published not because it wasn't good or highly readable, but because it didn't fit into the commercial needs of a market that was based on focusing solely on the 'next big thing' precisely because of its inherent inefficiencies.

I have posted before about some interesting efforts to redefine book publishing that were born out of authonomy - and I think that life is about to get even more interesting for these fledgling attempts to find an alternative to the traditional publishing model.

At the same time, magazine and newspaper publishing (with many of the same inherent inefficiencies of sales and returns and the like) are both seeing declining sales and advertising revenue (see this guest post from writer pal and newspaper editor Robb Grindstaff). Early attempts to apply 'old fashioned' thinking to the Internet have racked up failure after failure - we ain't going to pay you for content we can get for free. This total disaster is the latest warning that newspaper 'paywalls' aren't the solution.

If Apple's announcement today is what I think it is going to be, a smart, usable tablet 'multi-reader' supported by a user-friendly transactional portal, then we will see if the soundbite of the year will come true: "Apple is going to do for publishing what the iPod did for the music industry."

Authors in the UK can make 75% of an e-book sale, which is not only fairer on the content creator, it reflects the fact that the actual cost of distribution of an e-book is zilch, nada and mafie. Editing and marketing are a cost - and an imprint will still want to gatekeep to keep quality high. But selling fewer books could make an author just as much money - and so smaller , more defined audiences can be served with more of what they want.

This doesn't mean the end for books and newspapers, by the way. It doesn't mean the end of journalism and authorship. It just means the end of publishing houses stuffed with gatekeepers, yoyo-toting cretins and marketing departments that want to sign up any half-celebrity or vampire novel rather than actually finding out what readers want. There'll be new publishers - quality imprints that are slicker, world-sourced and more nimble, marketing-centric and reader-driven, participative and community-minded.

And they'll be efficient.

Twitter and the Crash

Image via Wikipedia

News is flooding Twitter regarding the crash of Ethiopian Airlines flight ET409 off the coast of Beirut as I write this. There are persistent tweets about survivors, but no confirmed MSM (mainstread media) reports of any survivors as yet. There were 90 people on board, 82 passengers and 8 crew - Ethiopian Airlines was very fast indeed to get a press release out, proving neatly that the BBC had flubbed and reported the wrong passenger/crew numbers as 83 pax, 9 crew. A small detail, but the devil's in details.

The 'plane itself had just been bought from Irish low cost carrier Ryan Air, apparently, and was delivered in December. Specialists in aviation were soon tweeting detail like that, which together with eyewitness reports and breaking news from websites like CNN, made for the usual compelling viewing of a news event unfolding on Twitter.

Tens of people are dead and we're using words like compelling viewing. What's happened to us?

We're involved in the story now, of course. I saw the tweets from Beirut as I settled down in the office and passed on the most pertinent of them. It was interesting that people were being more cautious than they have before in annotating tweets with 'unconfirmed'.

Having sent out the 'heads up' and given links (thanks to @SpotOn) to a couple of journalists who were covering events, I stopped passing on news. The passenger names being Tweeted out (albeit they had been read out on LBC TV, a departure from the European practice of letting civil defence notify families before names are broadcast) nagged at me, along with details like the number of bodies that had been fished out of the sea at such and such a point.

And yet this is how our news comes to us - on the second, from the event, unfolding with each new fact, supported by a community that has formed around its common interest in the event, brought together by a hashtag.

I found myself thinking of the image of Iranian student Neda Soltani, whose last sight on earth as her eyes flickered closed may well have been the cameraphone lens pointed in her face. There's something terribly comforting about being in a mob that I don't like.

It’s a Gas

Image by Alexbip via Flickr

Many moons ago, we decided to resist the cunningly worded invitation from the motley crew at SEWA to accept their piped gas for a mere Dhs 1,000 service fee. I applied the same logic to this as my old landlord, Mr Mohammed, had applied to the use of power tools.

Back in the day, our old villa had a bathroom that featured terracotta walls, burnt umber flooring and a vibrant, custard yellow bath suite. We stood it for so long, but then I suggested to Mr. Mohammed that we replace it with a nice, clean white bathroom. I’d pay half the cost. Being a builder, he quoted a paltry sum which I agreed and then he got massively over-enthusiastic and completely remodeled the bathroom from, literally, the ground up – including re-routing all of the piping in the floor and walls. I have to say, we only paid the paltry sum. We have been Lucky In Landlords here.

During the inevitably extended period of work, Mr Mohammed and I stood together one day watching his men re-channelling the pipe work in the 20 year old concrete floor using nothing more than hammers and chisels.

“Why don’t you use Hiltis for this?” I asked, all innocent, like.

His incredulity was a picture. “Hilti? HILTI? Shou? Why for I want to use Hilti? This one piece cost same like two years’ salary for this man! Better I use this man!” said Mr Mohammed, with irrefutable (if brutal) logic.

I have to confess, I applied Mr Mohammed’s Theorem to the question of gas. Rather than pay SEWA Dhs 1,000 for the gift of gas (and then pay them whatever mad rate they decided to apply to expats for all time, raising it annually for all we knew, just like they’ve raised the electricity for us but kept it at the same rate for ‘nationals’), I decided to live with the occasional upset of running out – because having to call Mr Speedy Gas twice a year wasn’t the end of the world. He usually made it in 20 mins and cost Dhs 40 a canister. These days he’s charging Dhs 100 and taking his sweet time, as we found out last night. What's more, gas doesn't seem to last like it used to. Adding to all that, I do have to wonder how much longer he’ll keep going for, this supplier of what is now almost black market bottled gas to Sharjah's last gas holdouts.

It seems inevitable that some time in the future we’ll have to become SEWA’s Gas Bitches. Funnily enough, I'm not looking forward to it...

Outed

Image by Ian Hayhurst via Flickr

Well, I got outed today. Went onto Dubai Eye Radio's Dubai Today programme to talk about 'cyber-cide' and other online stuff and co-presenter Jessica Swann was lurking, cackling manically as I walked into the studio. That wouldn't normally be a worry, but her partner in crime, Robert 'Wes' Weston was smiling enigmatically. The combination of hooting and oriental inscrutability from a dangerous pair like that would be enough to unnerve anyone, but it had me looking for the door.

Indescision sealed my fate. The 'On Air' light was glowing, rooting me to the seat as Wes hit the button on the desk and Jess rocked with silent, malign glee. And they played this song.

Jess had been sitting on Bondi beach getting her backside burned, listening to this and had a 'eureka' moment, apparently. I can tell you, if I was lying on Bondi beach, this blog would be the last thing on my mind, but there's no account for Aussies...

So yes, it is where the name of this blog came from. And it is an inspiration to be be proud of, too.

Have a nice weekend y'all!