Pleasantly warm in Dubai

"Dubai: It will be hot and sunny over the weekend with the temperature touching 40 degree Celsius during the day and pleasantly warm during the night, according to the Dubai Met Office."~ Gulf News, 30 April 2009

Enjoy the weather folks.

FP7 - Shame of Advertising

http://www.mediaweekme.com/

The organizers of the Dubai Lynx Awards have stripped the most-awarded agency at last month's Middle East awards festival of its Agency of the Year title and seven prizes for work that turned out to be scam ads for Samsung, Nissan and a product called Higeen Mouthwash. The agency, FP7 Doha, is part of the Middle East Communication Networks, owned 51% by Interpublic Group of Cos., and works closely with McCann Erickson in the Middle East. ~ AdAge.com

The organisers of the Dubai Lynx are looking into more accusations of scam work (and copy-cats?), according to the Campaign Middle East blog. Adnationme.com

In addition to the Agency of the Year title, FP7 was stripped of a print Gold, a TV/cinema Gold and two print Silver awards for Samsung; print and outdoor silvers for Higeen mouthwash; and a TV/cinema bronze for Nissan. Another 10 FP7 ads that had been shortlisted in the print and outdoor categories were also disqualified, the festival said. ~ AdAge.com

Read more at:
Editor's Pick - Lynx mess: The whole story

Click to read the Anubis Blog view the copied ads and comments at -
http://bloganubis.com/

Aramex complains about FP7 Doha work
http://bloganubis.com/2009/04/05/aramex-complains-about-fp7-doha-work/

The last hurray of the FP7 Doha Group?

Draft Media Law in UAE

Media in the UAE is set to be governed by a new draft "Federal Media Law" which will regulate all forms of media activities. It aims at abolishing 'jail terms' and imposing fines instead on the media.

The draft law consists of 45 articles in seven chapters binding audio-visual and print media as well as the related activities.

Related Articles:

Journalists face fines but not jail - The National

Provisions of the Law - The National

Journalists have nothing to fear: Director General, National Media Council - Khaleej Times

New law seeks to scrap jail terms - Gulf News

New law 'significant way forward for UAE media' - Gulf News

Pigeon in your pants?

In Dubai, if there is one bird that is loved and equally hated - look no further than the humble pigeon. They are found nesting under almost every air-conditioning unit across residential areas. Pigeon droppings on cars, pavements and the occasional pedestrian are a daily reason for people to dislike the bird. Yet on most evenings, bird lovers are seen feeding grain to thousands of pigeons.

There is an interesting news story today about Australian customs arresting a man who arrived on a flight from Dubai with two live pigeons in his trousers. He even had 2 eggs in a vitamin container. Must have been one heck of a flight to keep two live birds taped to each leg considering the long journey. It is not made clear if the passenger was on transit through Dubai, so it could also not necessarily been Dubai pigeons.

Several cases have highlighted the smuggled of antiques and endangered animals, but this incident will have customs officials in a spot on how to scan for pigeons. I wonder what happens to the two pigeons? Will they be sent back on the next flight back to Dubai.

Story Links:
CNN
The Telegraph

Snowman on Jebel Jais!

On Friday (23 Jan, 2009) snow fell on the mountains of Ras Al Khaimah, UAE. All the newspapers went gaga on the rare phenomena and how there was no proper word in the local Arabic dialect for 'snow'.

Weathermen did not have to dig too deep into the records to state that this was the second time it was snowing, the last being in 2004. So what happened five years ago? Why was there no pictures or reports the first time around? Not that it was not too long ago.

Most of the pictures the papers had were supplied. Then came the reports of people wanting to drive up into the Ras Al Khaimah mountains to see the snow firsthand. Gulf News reported that there was

"there is no road access to the mountain and that the snow on top of the mountain can only be viewed from a helicopter.

He called on the public to refrain from going to the mountain by road on their own as the mountain is unreachable without a plane."

Lo, behold today morning Abu Dhabi's newspaper The National had a front page photo of three Emiratis making a snow man! Miracles do happen!

Yet, Gulf News reported that the snow had started to melt by Sunday. Only wish I had a helicopter or a plane to fly into the mountains!

Worry not for all you who missed the snow! Gulf News thoughtfully added a PR note to the end of the article!

"Ras Al Khaimah has plans to capitalise on the attractive climate and spectacular scenery of Jebel Jais by building a mountain resort and ski slope on top of the mountains."

I hope it comes up soon like all the other freehold properties! Can't wait to slide down the slopes of Jebel Jais!

How low can it go??? Anyone?

What happens when journalists underestimate a story? What happens when they run out of words to describe an event? What happens when a simple thesaurus can offer only a number of synonyms to express what is already in print?

For instance when writing on an "Accident", they could alternate with the following words in the follow up articles:

"calamity, cataclysm, catastrophe, tragedy, adversity, bale, blight, blow, calamity, casualty, cataclysm, catastrophe, debacle, devastation, fatality, fiasco, holocaust, misadventure, misfortune, mishap, ruin, tragedy," ~ Thesaurus.com

Two weeks into the global financial crisis, and you can already see the cracks and strain on the vocabulary of Business reporters especially when they used up the big words early into the crisis like “destruction, debacle, slide, slump, crash, etc.”

"Dubai: Another day, another fall. And when is the haemorrhaging of global stock markets going to end?...

Can you feel the pain of the reporter in that opening line? Perhaps, it is the overload of work since the 1930's great depression is taking a toll on reporters who have reported nothing but profits for the last decade.

"Hammered

In UAE, real estate stocks continued to be hammered with all the major names such as ... ...closing down as investors feared the global decline may side-swipe the property sector."

Hammered! Side Swiped.... haemorrhaging - can't make out if the vocabulary is getting better or worse! But who cares, can't wait for my newspaper tomorrow to read the next set of words to describe the global financial scenario! Don't you wonder "How low can it go?"

What happens when you don't read the news!

Click to enlarge!

Some how the idea appealed to me how a newspaper used information about its high profile readers and combined humour to create a new marketing campaign! I have taken screen shots of the 3 frames of the online ad!
Visit the Guardian website to see it!