Dubai Is Bouncing Back

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Chatting with pal +Ashish Panjabi on Twitter... hang on a second. I just typed Ashish's twitter handle - @apanjabi - into the blogger CMS and it suggested his Google+ handle instead and replaced the text for me. That's getting way too spooky, Google - and surely in your bid to MAKE us love Google+ and adopt it over all other religions you're now crossing the 'do no evil' rubicon. When you use Gmail and write 'I've attached a photo of your bottom' and forget to attach anything, Goog comes back and asks you if you're sure you want to do that. It's part cutesy, part useful and part scary. But linking everyone I know's social profiles to Google+? That's just plain scary.

Anyway, back to the point. Ashish was complaining about the traffic on floating bridge on Twitter this morning and used a memorable phrase as we chatted about the situation: 'Dubai is bouncing back'. It's not really news as such, the signs are there for all to see. But in black and white, the text sort of hit me.

On the one hand, bouncing back is no bad thing. There's little doubt the UAE has been the best place in the world to be over the past few years - sure, it's been quieter around here, but there has still been opportunity and trade goes on. Modern Dubai was founded on trade and once we'd got rid of the estate agents, it was trade that saw the city through. You forget these things, but compiling blog posts for Fake Plastic Souks The Glory Years took me right back there to 2008 and the overheated Dubai that preceded the GFC.

You couldn't get a school for your kids. You couldn't move in the city, the roads were a constant jam of snarling, honking traffic. The sewage plants were so over-capacity they were digging holes in the desert to store the stuff and tanker drivers were pumping it into storm drains so the sea off Jumeirah was fouled with human sewage and people were getting sick. The power network was straining. You couldn't get into a hospital and the machine that goes ping had a waiting list. Rents were sky-high, Gulf News weighed 1.4Kg - most of which was adverts charging us to dare to dream and live to love - and the city was filled with pop-eyed yahoos getting drunk and boasting how much money they had. Anything that didn't move had a billboard tacked on it. Hotels made up insane lists of demands before taking a booking - including minimum stays and cash up front for event facilities - if you could get one beyond six months in advance. Taxis wouldn't stop for you or wouldn't take the fare if it didn't suit them. If you could find one. There was a constant miasma over the city, a yellow, sulphurous dust cloud you could see as you approached from inland, a great smudge across the horizon. This had become a really unpleasant place to live.

Now there's no doubt that Dubai's in better shape today, having continued to invest in infrastructure during the lean years. The Al Khail Road's been quietly finished, the new road network around Trade Centre Roundabout's well on the way, Defence Roundabout is an interchange, the metro's up and running and so on. Presumably (hopefully) similar investments in other key infrastructure have been taking place, allowing the city to expand once again but do so in a more prepared and planned way - a more sustainable, manageable growth. Because we've learned the lessons from the boom and bust - particularly from the bust - haven't we? If so, then all well and good. We can Bounce Back all we like.

But if we're talking a return to the excess and insanity of 2008, I fear. I fear for this little city I have come to call home - although it's not home and doesn't mind reminding me of the fact now and then. And the reappearance of daft real estate ads, the talk of 22% price rises and jams on Floating Bridge make me very skittish indeed.

Of course, Gulf News will never be 1.4Kg again. The Internet's seeing to that. So there's no point in using its weight to chart the economy's rise as was possible to chart its fall...

Credit Crunch To Hit UAE

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Today's press carry the comments of His Excellency Abdulaziz Al Ghurair, the Chairman of successful local bank Mashreq and also the head of the UAE Banking Federation. This is someone who speaks with remarkable authority on banking and his comments are, indeed remarkable.

Al Ghurair told local media at a roundtable yesterday he believed the UAE retail market was over-borrowed and that the planned introduction of a credit bureau in 2015 would halt lending to consumers.

"Once the credit bureau is applied there will be no lending to anybody for six to 12 months because the banks will find out who's really been borrowing and how much," He's quoted as saying in The National. "They will find out all those people who have four or five credit cards."

That's a remarkable statement - as the country staggers out of the recession and money starts to flow around the economy once again, we're seeing a clear prediction of a massive consumer credit crunch to come. And yet the need for a unified approach to lending in a country where it's commonplace to borrow from several banks because none of them share data is clear. Only with a credit bureau in place could you contemplate replacing the post dated cheque system - a system that desperately needs to be replaced.

For those not living in the UAE - a cheque here is as good as gold. If you bounce one, the bouncee can call the police - it's a criminal offence. In an odd coincidental quirk, The National today also reports on the growing number of bounced cheque offenders in Dubai jail refusing food in order to have their confinement reviewed. One bloke's inside for 25 years for bouncing cheques, which makes 15 years for murder look a bit daft, doesn't it? While that may seem a good thing (the bouncing cheque being taken seriously, not the hunger strike), it's actually a pain.

Taking out a car loan here means writing a cheque for the full amount of the loan so your creditor has the right to have you imprisoned if you default. Rentals of houses are paid in, typically, one to four cheques per annum (four being depressingly rare these days). Post-dated cheques in the UAE remain a common form of payment in a world where many banking systems are no longer using cheques at all - or phasing them out. A credit bureau would effectively remove the need for securitising loans by holding a criminal offence over people's heads.

I suppose what's most surprising about Al Ghurair's remarks is their candour. Everyone has known for years that there are no controls on bank lending. Any discussion on lending in the UAE has always carried a distinctive whiff of elephant. He makes a valid point - when banks find out how much they're all lending to the same people, there's going to be a lot of howling and gnashing of teeth - and a consequent howl of pain from those used to getting easy money from banks.

But in the long run, there would seem to be little choice. Luckily, given he's a banker, Al Ghurair seems to be on the money...

Hamad? Hamad? Who On Earth Is Hamad?

Image via CrunchBase

Yes, the headline on this post does indeed come to you courtesy The Ministry Of Polite Headlines.

The Emirates Identity Authority, or EIDA, has announced a new campaign to 'enhance interaction with customers'. This will no doubt be a source of some considerable glee to many 'customers' who have lacked in some way 'interaction', although I have to say as the whole process has bedded in over the past six years - yes, it has taken that long and yes, they did think it was all going to take six months - there are plenty of points of interaction already.

However, if they see the need to open up another, who am I to complain? After all, I have complained often enough in the past about one-way communications, wilfully obtuse communications and sheer blindingly, infuriatingly mendacious communications. What better than to be answerable to your customers 24x7 at Twitterspeed?

Gulf News carries the story, courtesy of national news agency WAM but labelled as a 'staff report', in which an EIDA official tells them, apparently, the initiative is "in line with Emirates ID’s keenness to consistently communicate with its customers and interact with them through their favourite channels, especially on smart phones and tablets in an innovative way through a cartoon character derived from the UAE heritage."

Hamad is that cartoon character. He comes, apparently, as part of the Emirates ID strategic plan 2010-2013 that aims to enhance customers' satisfaction. He has his own hashtag, #AskHamad, which at the time of writing consisted of two lonely tweets, both carrying a picture of the cartoon character and reading, "Can you guess why I'm here?"

No, Hamad. I have no idea why you're there.

The clincher for me was the fact that Hamad is only going to be there from 12-2pm every Thursday. That's it. You have a two hour window to use the world's biggest always-on real-time communications channel. That's why there are only two lonely tweets there - they haven't opened Hamad for business yet. You wait until Thursday - this baby's gonna trend! Or perhaps not.

Emirates ID already has a Twitter account, @emiratesID_help. Why it needs a two-hour account with a cartoon of a small boy splashed on it, I really don't know.

Anyway, they must know what they're doing. Gulf News tells us Emirates ID won two international awards in social media management last June (the Golden Award for “Best use of social media measurement” and the Sliver Award for “Best use of Communication Management- Public Sector”, says Gulf News.

I have no idea what a sliver award is, but can only assume it's a very small award.

A Buffed And Shiny Shiny

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

"I thought I told my secretary..."
"It's okay, I lied. I told her there was a ladder in her stockings and while she was checking, I popped in."
"So what's the problem now?'
"No problem. I called in just to say thank you so much for selling me my Shiny."
"Ah, here's my secretary now. No, it's okay, Joyce, you can tell security to stand down. We'll only be a minute here. Yes, I know he lied. No, there isn't a ladder in your stockings. Right, what's this about being pleased with your Shiny? You've done nothing but complain since the day you bought it."
"Well, let's face it, you've done nothing but move the goalposts since the day I bought it. But I haven't come to talk about that. I've come to say thank you."
"Well, I'm speechless. What can I say? It has been our pleasure."
"And I brought you these chocolates. There's no need to look so suspicious, they're not poisoned or anything. Honestly, you can try the first one on Joyce."
"So what's gone so right then?"
"Well, for a start property prices are on the up! Almost 22% this year, the highest rise in property values in the world! Isn't that great? If this keeps going for another couple of years, my Shiny will be shiny again and worth what I paid for it!"
"That's great news. Of course, we always knew that would happen. Just stick with us and you'll be alright, laddie. Live your dreams out in your sunshine lifestyle and leave the rest to us."
"And if that's not good enough, it's official - we're in the fourteenth happiest place on earth! Isn't that cool?"
"Very cool. Just dream of happiness and your exclusive tailored community dream can live rampant again in your most fruitful fantasy. I'm overjoyed at your pleasure. Would you like to buy another Shiny?"
"Umm, no thanks. I'm pleased but not that pleased."
"Go on. You know it makes sense. Live to love to dream to beam! The value can only go up and they're undervalued at the moment. Plus, you know exactly what you're getting now. Ensure your family's enchanted rapture in a celebration of being! We've got regulation and everything."
"Look, enjoy the chocolates. I'll just nip off now. Thanks for everything."
"Come on! Special offer on Shinies! Roll up! Roll up! Dream pleasure sensual relax lovely muffins! Extra shine and a free Duster! It's a car, you know, not those yellow clothy things."
"I've got to run. Cheers all the same. Bye!"
"Funny chap. Everyone else is clamouring for new shiny Shinies. Oh well!"

Diana And Downfall

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I hadn't realised this, mostly because I'm not really into films to the point where I only ever watch them when I'm flying Emirates, but the new and critically panned film Diana which was premiered last Thursday, was directed by none other than Oliver Hirschbiegel. Here's the trailer.

Oliver Whowhatable? German film director Oliver Hirschbiegel is perhaps best known as the genius who gave us Downfall, the film that spawned the meme that is 'Hitler finds out about...'.

You'll likely remember the meme even if you haven't seen the whole film. Hitler raves at his closest aides, racked by Parkinsons, bitter, furious and clearly already defeated. The gag is that it's in German, so all you have to do is add funny subtitles and you've got a hilarious backdrop for dialogues such as Hitler finds out there's no camera in the iPod Touch or the monumental (over 8 million views) Hitler finds his XBox Live account has been terminated. The meme takes us to Hitler's reaction that Twitter is down and, of course, his reaction to the iPad. There's even the rather chucklesome Hitler is fed up with all the Hitler rants.

Someone somewhere is going to get a thesis, by the way, out of the fact that every single one of these have awful spelling or grammatical errors in the subtitles. The Internet, it would seem is highly amusing but woefully illiterate.

It's perhaps a testament to the power of actor Bruno Gantz's portrayal of Hitler and the realism of this rant scene that the meme has run like this - in fact, the studio tried to stem the tide of parodies with a takedown attempt, but in the end you can't turn back the sea. There are hundreds of the things out there, more still - over three years later - being added every day with each new event that someone, somewhere cares about enough to slap a few subtitles on that little piece of film history. Some of the best, original clips succumbed to the takedown. Many are, of course, merely lame. But they generally still have the power to bring a grin to your face.

Much of the humour comes from the fact this man is the most reviled figure in human history. The idea that he wants to tweet about his dog dying, that the AT&T network's no good or any of this stuff is part of its brilliance. But it's the best thing to do to evil, really: laugh at it, no?

So now Hirschbiegel has created a film about Diana which the critics have queued up to have a pop at. The Guardian's reviewer noted that sixteen years after that car crash, Diana has died a second awful death and the gag, albeit a tad obvious and even mildly obnoxious, neatly sums up London's reaction to the film.

I can't wait, personally. I can't wait for the parodies to start. I wonder if they'll have German subtitles?

Meanwhile, do feel free to share links to any notable 'Hitler rants' in the comments!

ADNOC Buys Out Emarat Network - Finally

(Photo credit: SimonQ錫濛譙)

So it seems that the northern emirates' green gas stations are finally to go blue - ADNOC has announced it has signed an agreement to acquire Emarat's 75 service stations and its Sharjah distribution terminal. The service stations will 'gradually' be rebranded, according to Gulf News today.

This agreement is presumably different in some way to the memorandum of understanding the two signed in May of last year. That was reported at the time to relate to "74 of Emarat's 100 stations in the northern emirates".

I posted about it at the time and thought no more of it, but sure enough there appears to have been a year-long process turning an MoU into an actual deal. Which is not the niftiest piece of M&A work I've seen, I must say. One does wonder what the stumbling blocks were to cause such a hiatus between intent and action.

Just as a reminder, the story's all about the cost of subsidising petrol, because Dubai doesn't have a refinery, its petrol distribution companies have to buy at market rates and then meet a Federally mandated subsidised price point, which loses them significant amounts of money. So both ENOC/EPPCO and Emarat wanted out of the Northern Emirates pronto. Emarat may have negotiated the transition more elegantly. The end result was that most amusing of situations, a petrol shortage in an oil-producing country.

Try as I might, I can't find the story on Gulf News' website. It's not in business, not in oil and gas and doesn't come up in a search of the site. And yet it's front page business in the print edition. I wonder why?

The whole shebang won't really change much for drivers in the north, particularly in Sharjah where queues at the ADNOC stations can get really quite long. The red EPPCO stations have been partly or totally dismantled or just stand idle, as do the light green ENOC ones - unloved, rubbish-strewn and dusty they stand, useless pieces of seemingly unwanted real estate...

Android and KitKat. Genius.

KitKat (Photo credit: Nestlé)

As eny fule no, Google is prone to various fits of whimsy and one of these is naming releases of its Android operating system after tasty treats. After Ice Cream Sandwich and Jelly Bean we were to have enjoyed Key Lime Pie, but the team of really cool and crazy guys at Google decided that few people would know what they were on about.

So they decided on KitKat as the name for Android 4.4. It was, Google's John Lagerling told the BBC, because they snacked on KitKats during late night coding sessions. The story's linked here and well worth reading - it tells of how Google put a cold call into Nestlé's London ad agency and how Nestlé 'got it' within 24 hours. The agreement to let this all go ahead was one which is, according to Lagerling, "not a money-changing-hands kind of deal."

Which is pretty stupendous. If you pop over to the KitKat website, you'll find they've made the most of the opportunity. It's all very well done and highly amusing, even to people who enjoy late night coding sessions, extolling the virtues of KitKat 4.4 with features such as portrait and landscape orientation, 'diamond sharp bevels' and unlimited standby time.

The Beeb and other news outlets have done a great job reaching out to 'brand consultancies' and 'marketing experts' to talk about the downside of the deal - how if KitKat has a huge product recall or Google's new Android is crap it'll affect the other brand. I think that's utter tosh - there are no downsides. Today's consumer is smart enough to know what's going on and I'm not about to uninstall my Nexus because a chocolate bar has gone wrong or, indeed, eschew KitKats because my latest install of Android sucks.

I'm afraid the naysayers are lone voices in the wilderness - this deal is brilliant at every level and Nestlé has to be applauded for not only seeing the potential with blinding speed, but getting the zeitgeist pretty much spot on. That's by no means a 'given' with marketing departments and agencies - anyone remember Vegemite's disastrous attempt to rename itself as "iSnack 2.0"?

And the fact that no cash has changed hands is very, well, Google, isn' t it?

Gay Oman Controversy Spirals Out Of Control

Omani weekly tabloid newspaper The Week appears to be in a great deal of hot water indeed. The paper ran a piece last week on what it was like being gay in Oman which looks to the untutored eye like a well written and balanced feature - if a surprisingly frank and open one. It has resulted in an amazing backlash that has led the paper to issue an unconditional apology on its home page as it faces censure at the highest level and the possibility of action from the country's legislature.

The Oman Journalist's Association has strongly condemned the piece according to Gulf News (which hit a new high today by reporting on a woman who threatened to blow herself up at Dubai's Public Prosecution and failed to mention there was no bomb in her 'bomb belt'*), while also calling for the Ministry of Information to act - and the chairman of the Omani Shura Council, Shaikh Khalid Bin Hilal Bin Naseer Al Maa’wali, has weighed in, promising action by the Council's media committee. In a tweet, as it happens. In fact, in a final confirmation that this is, indeed, a hot story (all today's journalist needs to confirm it's a biggie), the whole thing trended on Twitter.

It's not as if homosexuality in Oman hasn't been aired in public before - the (formerly) excellent Muscat Confidential blog ran a great interview on this very topic back in 2010. Muscat Confidential has in the past been blocked by Omani authorities, but no blocking followed the publication of this post.

But, of course, We Don't Talk About Elephants In This Room and there's clearly a huge difference between a blog post and a tabloid newspaper - and it's worth noting the outrage is clearly community driven, it's not a nanny state government acting against a brave little newspaper. The piece has clearly widely offended Omanis.

The Week's apology neatly paraphrases Father Jack Hackett, but 'the article' - so hot its nature can't even be mentioned in that apology, it seems - lives on. Omani blog Oman Coast has reproduced the piece on those who choose not to reproduce and it's linked here for your elucidation. As Oman Coast says, please read on only if you are a mature reader used to free speech who is not easily shocked or offended.

Meanwhile the messenger, it would appear, has been quite comprehensively shot...

* I suppose in the interest of fairness I should point out that Gulf News has now added the no bomb information to its story online, although not rewritten it in light of the new finding, so the first line still reads, "A mother wearing a belt of explosives who threatened to blow herself up in the Dubai Public Prosecution building has surrendered and has been arrested."

New Zealand Bacteria Scare. What New Zealand Bacteria Scare?

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Whenever the role of journalism in the social age is questioned, you get the snap answer that breaking news on Twitter is all very well, but 'proper' journalism gives us context and analysis. It has long been my contention that this is one of those qualitative arguments that points to the inevitability of disintermediation.

This was certainly the first thing that went through what passes for my mind as I read in Gulf News over the weekend that 'New Zealand Products Safe To Consume'. This headline inevitably means there is an issue of some kind with New Zealand products, but in the name of 'context and analysis' we're certainly not going to be told what the issue is, just that it's not an issue.

If I read a headline in Gulf News 'Big Gnarly Sabre Toothed Banjax Not About To Eat You', for instance, I know not to turn around. I'd rather not have to confront my impending messy end.

The scare in question is actually quite old by today's standards, dating back to May of last year in fact, when a dirty pipe in one of Fonterra's plants contaminated a batch of whey protein concentrate used in 'Nutricia Karicare', an infant formula product, as well as other drinks including sports drinks, protein drinks and other beverages. 90% of New Zealand's dairy produce comes from Fonterra, a massive agro-business which accounts for something like 7% of New Zealand's GDP. Imagine the lobbying power!.

For some reason the contamination didn't come to light until March of this year, finally causing China to announce a ban of certain products in early August of New Zealand dairy products. The Chinese are, understandably, somewhat nervous about contaminated dairy products and import something like 80% of their infant formula from New Zealand. Recall products are known to have been shipped to China, Australia, Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam and Saudi Arabia.

Fonterra's news release on the 'quality issue' makes interesting reading. Eight Fonterra customers had been affected by the 'issue' which 'surfaced' in March but didn't require any action other than 'intensive testing' over the subsequent months until finally, on Wednesday 31st July, a sample tested positive for Clostridium botulinum.

The recall affects some 38 tonnes of whey protein but would appear to have impacted over 2,000 metric tonnes of nutritional products that use the protein product - Fonterra has been pretty cagey about the identities of its customers - and presumably has been depending on the considerable clout it must have in New Zealand to minimise the coverage of a food contamination scare that begs questions about who knew what and when - and how thousands of tonnes of contaminated products can be put on the market but the identities of the companies producing those products be protected.

It all reads a little like the horse meat scare in Europe - one producer's product can contaminate thousands of tonnes of downstream products. There are other whiffs of sulphur around the story, too - scientists questioning how a 'dirty pipe' could have been involved, the timescale of the testing and recall, why expensive tests for Clostridium, not normally required for whey protein products, were being carried out and so on. Fonterra's head of milk products has subsequently resigned.

In any case, New Zealand Government laboratories have now confirmed that the samples tested were not actually contaminated with botulism causing clostridium botulinum but with the just as worrying-sounding but relatively benign Clostridium sporogenes. So that's all okay, then.

All of which has been brilliantly boiled down by Gulf News to a reassuring blue 'don't panic' - in fact there's no problem to the point you don't even need to know what the problem there isn't is.

More Search Madness - Strange Searches Redux

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Occasionally I post some of the stranger searches to have landed in these dusty little rooms somewhere at the end of a long, dark corridor in a little-visited subterranean complex somewhere to the west of the Internet.

This harmless pastime is enabled by Sitemeter, a little widget that lets me know you have searched the World Wide Web for Cobblers in Satwa and ended up here as a result. This in itself wouldn't be interesting or strange if you weren't based in Helsinki, googling like a mad thing from the offices of Cargotech Corporation on your WindowsNT Macintosh. Why in heaven's name would anyone in Helsinki want to know about cobblers in Satwa? I've just come back from there, there are perfectly good shoe repair places in Helsinki!

Mind you, anyone using Safari when they've got both Firefox and Chrome installed on their desktop is a worry.

I'm very pleased that three to five-odd searches a day are landing on this post, which tells of how you can turn off the otherwise highly obtrusive Samsung Series 5 Ultrabook touchpad. It was a huge issue for me when I first got the machine and appears to have been blighting others all over the planet. It's easy to fix when you know how - the problem is Samsung won't tell you how. Similarly, a couple of searches a day are landing on this analysis of quite what's in Tim Horton's French Vanilla coffee and that's just as much a public service (the answer boiling down to no vanilla and a lot of ugly goo). And the ingredients of Pringles, tappiness of Aquafina, vileness of chicken rib meat and other food posts are perennially popular.

I should do more of them, actually - the fact that one person found the Pringles post by searching 'Pringles chip lips numb' is something of a concern - I hope they feel better now. Oh, I forgot to mention the post that details what egregious gleet is pumped into Subway's '9 grain wheat' bread. That's always good for a few ews.

Thanks to another nifty technology I use called Zemanta, someone landed here having searched Google images for 'Shaved West Highland Terriers', which is something of a worry. I've never actually posted about shaved Westies, you'll be pleased to know. Zemanta is responsible for the pictures I use to illustrate posts - it contextually suggests images (and links, but I don't use that) for posts derived from copyright free sources. One quirk of the system is that where I have more search 'grunt' than the original image location, people get to the image linked to this blog before they get to the image owner's site or Flickr or whatever. And I used a picture of a Westie to illustrate this here post about Nokia maps and the evolution of PC based mapping in general. I didn't know it was shaved, though. Honest.

Someone from Romania (working at Romania Data Systems, actually) googled nmkl pjkl ftmch for some reason best known to themselves and instead got a silly 'Shiny' post, for which I suppose I should apologise. I wonder if it's Romanian for something? Or is there an underground Young Ones fan scene developing there?

I am delighted to find myself a world authority on how to pronounce GITEX, but am baffled as to why anyone in Turkey should google 'Alexander McNabb Shemlan' - the blasted book's not even out yet!

I would appear to 'own' the search phrase 'rage Indian' which I think is odd. And I do get a grin every time someone googles something like 'what does "what to do yani" mean?', leading them invariably to this old but eternally popular post and leading me to think of someone else who's just been right royally shafted.

You can generally find your way here by appending the word 'fake' to any number of permutations, as the person who searched Yahoo! for 'Fake Boobbies' found out. And, in retrospect, I shouldn't have titled a post about Simian maniac George W Bush visitng Dubai 'Bush tickled' and apologise to the person who searched for that phrase and was so clearly disappointed. Similarly, the person googling 'best Philippine hooker bar in Dubai' must have felt suitably bilked to arrive here at this rant about the Observer's lazy piece on fleshpot Dubai.

And, finally, a raise of the glass to the most excellent individual who searched The Internet for 'Death To Modhesh'. I can only hope they found what they were looking for...