strangehold.com | the official blog of david george-cosh - Latest Comments

Re: What I’ve learned in the past year

davidcrow — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 08:55:57 -0000

Agreed, the Fat man, the Little man and Captain Slow are the funniest gear heads. And they like to drive fun, exotic cars.

Re: The halo effect of the Burj Dubai

mariaemile — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 02:23:54 -0000

The halo effect does it really effect i don't think so i have seen the whole documentary of burj dubai and i have found it the safest building with no halo effect. All the builders have declared it the best designed building.

Re: On buying a car in the UAE

Zain — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 14:33:50 -0000

Maybe it's a thing with Canucks; we Yanks don't use that. ;)

Re: On buying a car in the UAE

strangehold — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 13:26:10 -0000

Argh! That would have been a sweet car/deal too! Too bad... let me know if you hear of anything though.

Bimmer, eh? I guess the North American in me wants it to be called "Beemer". I stand humbly corrected.

Re: On buying a car in the UAE

Zain — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 12:54:23 -0000

Wow, I didn't know you were in the market to buy a luxury car. You should've asked around on twitterverse! I just sold my old Audi sedan a couple of days ago for a little more than that 5-series Bimmer.

Anyways, I'm back in the market too, although I'm probably shopping in a different segment - used ///M3 or A5 coupes at reasonable rates.

Good luck with the search matey!

P.S.: I'm not trying to sound pedantic here but it's 'Bimmer' and not 'Beemer'.

Re: On buying a car in the UAE

Dave George-Cosh — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 12:52:38 -0000

Drive a quality car and you'll understand why I ain't driving a Peugeot. That car's got too many issues I would rather not deal with.

Re: On buying a car in the UAE

Jen Gerson — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 12:36:46 -0000

Dude, I got a brand new peugeot 2008 with a three year warranty for Dh67,000. Granted it's no Beamer, but it has an ipod connection, a good stereo a huge sunroof and partial leather seats.

Re: The Georgia Straight gets it pretty much wrong on Canwest

strangehold — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 05:26:56 -0000

While I will withhold commenting on the intelligence of "that guy at the Georgia Straight", my original argument on the lack of an astute financial knowledge stands. One can't tie in stock movements to "reporter's intuition." Canwest just had a pretty bad quarter.

Re: The Georgia Straight gets it pretty much wrong on Canwest

Charlie Smith — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 16:57:56 -0000

I notice that Canwest shares closed at six-and-a-half cents yesterday. Maybe that guy at the Georgia Straight isn't so stupid afterall.

Re: I can’t stand driving in the UAE

GeraldAlexis — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 16:07:53 -0000

I do agree on your opinion about driving here. Especially those drivers can't stop tailgating, horning and flashing lights which iritates us who drive safely and also for those bus and truck drivers who drives like a train should have a special course once found caught. And one more for those drivers who dont have decipline kindly think about your family when on journey. Think BIG! Think SAFE!

Re: Building the UAE’s skyline byte by byte

samuraisam — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 20:11:01 -0000

Flight Simulator X also has some pretty good potential to get some 3d modeling done on it--the game includes 3d models of the burj al arab and a few buildings on SZR, but by far the funnest building to see is the Etisalat building (the golf ball one on the creek)

Re: The celubutard lands in Dubai. That’s hot, indeed.

Andrew Webber — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 05:29:51 -0000

I don't get it.

For the record I don't want to come over as some kind of wowser - I am the last person that should step up for the role of "Society's moral compass" but how the triple F does she manage to stay popular.

Is it some kind of quasi-osmotic experience of what life could be like if the cards fell in a different order for the viewer.

Is it the same experience that is derived from songs that tell me (well, not me personally, but if the guy in the car next to me has the volume up so loud that MY windows shake - at least I feel like they are telling me) that life is about "Ridin' on twenny fo's" and guzzling Courviousier while partaking of at least 3 of the opposite sex on a handily placed dance floor at the Cleeeerb.

Have we been so influenced by mass-media representation that it has become our reality?

Rather than being held up as an example for how opportunity can be wasted, Paris is being looked up to by people who are now considering "Vapid person in the spotlight" as a carreer option.

I don't understand.

The chk chk BOOM girl from sydney is a great example of how it seems to work. She was paid THOUSANDS to appear on an Australian "News (infomercial disguised in news-desk format)" show.

Thousands, just because she got her head on camera and said some really dumb stuff.

Meanwhile, there are thousands of out-of-work actors in the same country because the independent film industry can't raise a couple of bucks.

Franchise entertainment.

And really - it's only just begun.

Re: A note about my Twitter “incident”

Jen Gerson — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 10:17:05 -0000

Props to you, sir.

Everybody fucks up. It's just part of growing up. If many current critics had come of age ten years earlier, far messier incidents would have made far pettier headlines in far wider places.

MB is right. Repress. Move on. It's already yesterday's gossip fodder. :)

Re: A note about my Twitter “incident”

Molly Brown — Thu, 28 May 2009 00:11:34 -0000

All of us in the journalism field have wanted to say what you said to some dumb PR person. The difference between an adult and a child is the ability to smile, say "go eff yourself" internally and move on with life.

What you did lets the PR get away with looking like the bigger person. You should never let her get away with that.

Don't bring it up ever again. If somebody asks, say "I am sorry. I've apologized and now I'm moving on." Bury the event deep inside of yourself and try not to ever think about it again. Repress it.

Re: A note about my Twitter “incident”

Heather Yaxley — Tue, 26 May 2009 08:17:06 -0000

Thanks for putting your perspective across - horrid to have such a public showdown, but very honest to state what you have learned from it. There's not point being the subject of a "what not to do online" story otherwise.

Re: Don’t break up the newspaper, make it an online community platform instead

Jen Gerson — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 08:47:30 -0000

David,
That sounds a lot like the HuffPo, whose big problem is that it doesn't compensate the vast majority of its contributors. For purely selfish reasons, that's not a model I'm going to advocate for ;)

As for my omission of the business section, you're absolutely correct. I think most business sections could probably become completely independent titles and charge a lot more for what they produce. The WSJ.com example proves that business is a niche that pays.

I'm also going to clarify one point on my blog: the template I suggested on that post was only an example. The point is each newspaper would have to gauge its own strengths and readerships and stagger printing schedules and vary costs accordingly. For example, if you were to cut apart the Globe, the business section would probably stand alone and do quite well as a daily section. At the Star, the business section would probably just get canned.

Re: Why I’m unfollowing @aplusk from Twitter

scottfinn — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 11:46:38 -0000

Good luck. I tried to unfollow him this morning, and Twitter will not allow it. I can unfollow anyone else, but not @aplusk. The fix is in.

Re: Cyberspace is all a-twitter with tweets

CarringtonMalin — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 03:43:05 -0000

Hi David,

As you know, I disagree with the Twitter user statistic from Comscore and believe that 376,000 Twitter users in the Middle East region is way too high as an estimate.

By our reckoning the UAE currently leads the region in terms of both user growth and overall numbers, and these figures suggest that the UAE should have tens of thousands of Twitter users, which is simply not true (Twitter was only 'unblocked' by the UAE last August). However, I think that this is perhaps confusing terminology versus simply an erroneous statistic. Comscore tracks, measures and analyses a wide range of Internet sites and most of their data is based on site visits. Twitter is a community for registered users and you can't participate unless you sign-up, so if Comscore did base its stats on measuring unique site visits for Twitter, then this could explain a lot.

Spot On estimates that the number of Twitter users in the Arab world (not the same as Comscore's Middle East category) during March with location data in their user-profiles was about 3,000 (new figures coming soon) including hundreds of inactive user accounts. We'd add to that another 10-15% taking into consideration users that don't have Arab world location data entered into their profiles, but are nonetheless living in the Arab world. So, no more than 3,500 registered users all-told, 4,000 if you want to be really generous.

So, why the huge difference? I think that the Comscore statistic probably comes from unique visitors to Twitter.com pages to include referrals from other websites and search engines. Twitter posts and profiles turn up frequently in Google searches these days and this likely accounts for an increase in clicks. However, to participate in the Twitter community, you need to be registered as a Twitter user and so a figure for unique browser visits isn't really useful as an assessment of registered Twitter users. Although you can't argue with the fact that Twitter is getting attention!

Sincerely,

Carrington Malin
Spot On Public Relations

Re: An ode to one of my favourite places in the world.

Gina — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 12:52:03 -0000

Just a 'hello' from a girl you met that summer in your favourite Windsor bar.

Re: Writing again…

Joseph Fung — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 07:45:10 -0000

Hope you had a safe flight Dave - best of luck in your new endeavours!

Re: Will 2009 usher in a new digital era for book publishers?

Andreas — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 12:39:36 -0000

I'm currently awaiting the new version of the Kindle (due later this month, I'm told), at which point I will unsubscribe from my paper NY Times and Atlantic Monthly and resubscribe through the Kindle.

And so it goes. First the early adopters, then the early mainstream.... First gradually, then suddenly, as Hemingway (or somebody) said.
Still, it makes me think about our future at The Economist. There'll be changes wound up in this that we can't foresee quite yet...

Re: Would you put this on your resume?

Monica Hamburg — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 17:56:04 -0000

While I make like to hang out with Quebecois guy, I have to suggest that that particular resume might be best on nothired.com

Re: How much of the NY Times’ front page is up for sale?

Boy Reporter — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 21:22:00 -0000

Some of the free dailies already do this regularly... Most of the time it's innocuous (cars, vacations, etc.) but I do recall Metro sold their front-page to the Ont. Liberal party just weeks before an election. Classy.

Re: The Georgia Straight gets it pretty much wrong on Canwest

Charlie Smith — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 23:05:27 -0000

I checked the lobbyist registry, and noted that Leonard Asper has had communications with several people in government last year. But I did not notice that Izzy Asper ever registered as a lobbyist, notwithstanding Newman's report that Izzy Asper met privately with Chretien to work out financial arrangments for government funding of the human-rights museum in Winnipeg. Gail Asper, on the other hand, has registered as a lobbyist for the project. But Izzy didn't. I guess it's too late for Duff Conacher to file a complaint against Izzy Asper, but Chretien is still alive.

Re: The Georgia Straight gets it pretty much wrong on Canwest

Dave — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 22:50:50 -0000

Consider that wager taken.