On Tap

On Friday, a group of colleagues and I snuck out a little early to check out the British Motor Show. (Full disclosure: My firm built their new website, and they were kind enough to give us the tickets.)

Unlike the big annual shows in the U.S., this one only runs every other year. But like the shows in Vegas, Detroit and elsewhere, the BSM is massive. Most of the manufacturers were there with huge, expensive displays and the best of their product lines.

I took some photos and stuck them over at Flickr, but these were my highlights:

• Access to Bentley’s display was restricted by an imposing railing. To get in, you had to walk around to the furthest point, and enter past a gauntlet of sales people. But you have to hand it to them: Such a display is precisely on brand.
• Honda’sToyota’s Hybrid I concept car was very cool. I think most people will even love or despise the bullet shape, but I liked it, and it’s definitely a step up (visually) from the Prius.



• Mazda had a small car being carried off by paper machete pterodactyls. There’s a metaphor there somewhere, but I’ll leave you to sort out your own.



• The tiny, environmentally responsible, electric-powered Smart Car doesn’t seem so smart to me. One collision at any speed, and you’re just dead.

Thanks to our friends at BSM for the tickets. We had a ball.

I should also give a hat tip to the ExCeL center (also a client). They put on a great event, and their selection of bars and restaurants on site was a marvel, especially the lovely pub right on the river where we enjoyed the latter part of the evening.

UPDATE: Fixed the place in the post where I identified a car with a big “Toyota” sign in the background as Honda.

One of my favorite things about my neighborhood is the continued presence of specialist purveyors. In particular, my corner butcher.

I never really had a butcher in the U.S. Supermarkets had put them all out of business before I was born.

Here in London, there are still quite a few butchers, but like their colleagues in the states, they are increasingly under threat from supermarkets. A fourth generation butcher shop nearby in Holloway went out of business just a few weeks ago.

There has been a butcher shop on my corner, I’m told, for at least a hundred years. The gentleman who runs the shop seems to makes most of his living doing custom cuts for restaurant customers. But he would still like to do a strong retail business.

This butcher shop is, perhaps, a vestige of another age.

Yesterday, he put a sign that I hadn’t seen previously (and I’ve walked by his door now everyday for five months). It said, simply, “Our prices are cheaper than Sainsbury’s.” (That’s the discount grocery chain up the street.) On the flip side of the sandwich board, he had written a price list that included Mallard, Goose, Cornish Hen and a variety of other specialty meats. I picked up a Cornish Hen for dinner, and asked if he was having a hard time.

He told me that, actually, he wasn’t. His restaurant business was strong. But he reads the papers, too, and with food prices on the rise, he saw an opportunity to get customers back in the habit of coming to the butcher.

I hope they do. Since moving here, I’ve really only seem him busy once, and that was on Easter Weekend when families renew the tradition of getting together for Sunday Roast. For my own part, I’ve been in a few times, and I’ll keep doing business with him whenever I can, and if you live near Angel tube in Islington, I hope you’ll do the same.

The R&A, which runs the Open Championship just completed this weekend at Royal Birkdale, has a long tradition of inviting former Open champions to return and play in the event, even if they are not at the top of their game. It’s because of these generous exemptions that Greg Norman and Sandy Lyle made it into the field this week.

Greg Norman, enjoying an extended honeymoon with new bride Chris Everett, is making the most of his exemption. Going into the final day’s play, Norman held a two shot lead over defending Champion Padraig Harrington. Over the tournament’s four days where the weather has emerged the victor, and players much younger than Norman have been utterly defeated, Norman has been a sight to behold. Even when the weather and the golf course have conspired to throw obstacles in Norman’s path, his determination and experience have overcome them. And his accomplishment is made even more extraordinary by the fact that the Australian plays very little competitive golf anymore.

Norman didn’t play well enough on the final day to win, but nevertheless, he has made the most the of his opportunity and comported himself with the honor befitting one of the game’s all-time greats.

Then there’s Sandy Lyle.

Lyle, a Scotsman, won the Open Championship in 1985 at Royal St. George’s. Three years later, he donned the Green Jacket after a win at Augusta. He is three years younger than Norman, but like Norman he’s no longer a fixture on tour, and seems content to turn up for a few events each year. Still, because of his age and record, there has been talk that his fellow players would consider him for the Ryder captaincy.

Lyle had the same opportunity as Norman. Granted a past champion’s exemption by the R&A, Lyle teed it up Thursday morning with a chance to win the Open.

Unlike Norman, Lyle quit.

Halfway through Thursday’s round, battling the same slashing wind and rain that Norman was enduring, Lyle walked off the course and withdrew from the championship.

The British press has justifiably condemned him, as have many golf fans, and most interestingly, so has the R&A’s Peter Dawson. Though Lyle says he is going to apologize, the damage has already been done.

It’s rare that golf hands us so clear a contrast. Norman and Lyle are both champions. But champions are supposed to be made of sterner stuff. Norman’s championship character has shown through this week. Lyle’s character has served only to call his past accomplishments into question.

One final thought: Congratulations to Padraig Harrington, who deserved to win. He played magnificently and, by winning back to back open championships, placed himself firmly in the company of immortals.

As regular readers know, a couple of months ago, I moved to London. Unfortunately, for practical reasons — mostly involving the legal transport of our dog, Cody — my wife was not able to join me right away. Knowing that, and knowing that my new friends in London could not always be entertaining me at the pub — though several have made valiant efforts — I decided to undertake some long-intended reading.

For starters, I picked up a copy of the Penguin Complete Sherlock Holmes.

At 1,022 pages and weighing about 5 pounds, it was a heavy (literally) piece of reading, but the Holmes Canon (as true Holmes experts call the collected works) was one work of literature I had long wanted to complete.

And since almost the moment of my arrival, it has been my companion. On evenings when I wanted to get out for a quiet dinner, for example, Holmes and Watson came along. They’ve been along to the pub and the coffee shop and even taken the round trip with me to Coventry and Milton Keynes.

Tonight, I finished it.

I had read some Holmes in the past. Everyone, I think, ought to be required to read Sign of Four and Hound of the Baskervilles in a literature class somewhere along their educational path. But I had never before consumed all of the tails. And certainly, I had never done so on London.

Reading Holmes so soon after coming to London turned out to be a great way to immerse myself in the London of the Victorian era. And to a great degree, the London that was built up in the time of Holmes is still very much the one that I live in today.

Even now, Thames water have only begun replacing the Victorian sewer system. My own flat is in a converted Victorian townhouse built on one of the most important and oldest streets in north London.

One day, after reading my Holmes through a cold, grey weekend morning, the sun emerged, so I went down to Baker Street and visited the Sherlock Holmes Museum. At the time Conan Doyle was first publishing the Holmes stories, 221B Baker Street was the world’s most famous false address. Today, it stands just over the road from the Baker Street tube station, and just yards from the lovely Regent Park. In Holmes’ day, it would have been further down, closer to hustle of Oxford Street. No matter. The museum was interesting. And if nothing else, I learned that Mrs. Hudson’s house and the rooms taken by the good doctor and the eccentric detective were each a good bit smaller than I had envisioned.

The Sherlock Holmes Statue at Baker Street Tube Station in London.
Credit: fede_gene88 via Flickr.

Still, I kept reading. Through all 56 short stories and 4 novels.

So much literary criticism has been penned about the Canon, that I won’t pretend to try and contribute. I will say that many of Conan Doyle’s stories are masterpieces. But as one would expect, as he got later in life, the stories became a bit more predictable and formulaic. Even so, I can’t point to a single story that I didn’t thoroughly enjoy. And there were many that were absolutely enthralling.

I think my favorite element was the characters of Holmes and Watson themselves. Conan Doyle graced them both with considerable wit and the romanticized grace of an era that was overflowing with it. Watson was especially compelling: the dogged, frustrated writer who over thirty years made his friend the most famous detective in all the world, and kept working his way through the notes in his Despatch Box at the bank near Charing Cross, right up until 1914.

I don’t know how long I’ll live in London. Perhaps for many years. But I am sure that thanks to my time spent with Mr. Holmes and Dr. Watson during my first weeks here, whenever I look around, I’ll see fleeting bits of their London wherever I turn.

UPDATE: My wife tells me that two Holmes movies are in the works. I’ll do a little digging on them tomorrow when the sun comes up.

My friend Morra Aarons has a great piece in this morning’s Guardian in which she suggests that U.S. politicians might have a thing two to learn about social media from their counterparts in the UK.

Her perspective is easy to understand. Downing Street and the Foreign Office are now on Twitter, not to mention an MP or two. The leader of the Liberal Democrats, Nick Clegg, now has a FriendFeed. Quite a few MPs maintain blogs. And Tory leader David Cameron has received a lot of attention for his WebCameron site.

But of course, the same can be said of politicians in the U.S. The State Department has an official blog. Congressman Culbertson regularly Twitters from the House floor. And Senator Obama has changed American politics by mobilizing an online movement.

Morra argues, however, that politicians in the U.S. aren’t listening very well. They are simply viewing their online efforts as assets and tactics to help with the present campaign — most especially with fund raising — and will put them aside once the election is decided.

Perhaps I’m not quite as cynical. If Senator Obama is elected, it’s hard to imagine that he’ll simply turn his back on the millions of supporters that he has brought together online. As Morra suggests, he might use them as a sounding board. And certainly, to the extent that Senator Obama is now at the head of a movement of Americans newly engaged in the political process, he will endeavor to keep that movement going. To so so, he’ll have to continue the dialogue.

More to the point, I’m not sure that politicians in the UK are any different from the American variety. It’s not clear to me that, on the whole, they are using social media to listen any more effectively (or sincerely) than their American counterparts.

But I suppose that I’m also more of an optimist. I believe that merely by participating in social media, politicians on both sides of the Atlantic are forced to do a better job of listening. Indeed, in the UK, I and others have argued that social media is contributing to a democratisation of politics, particularly outside the constraints of election time.

Social media is reshaping how people get and share information, as well as the way they form groups and solve problems. This includes the establishment and maintenance of political movements. One could argue that the movement that is propelling Senator Obama’s campaign existed before he came on the scene, but that he has simply become its standard bearer because they have selected him.

Will we reach a tipping point? One where failing to listen and engage with constituencies more honestly, transparently and completely will result in consequences at the ballot box? It may be too soon to tell, but I suspect we will. The question for me, then, is when that day will come. Perhaps it already has.

Cross-posted at the work blog, Edelman Digital’s “Authenticities“.

UPDATE: Thanks to Tom Watson, Labour MP for West Bromwich East, for leaving a comment below, encouraging me to have more optimism and relating that he listens, and is better off for doing so.

This morning I departed from St. Pancras Station in London for Brussels via the Eurostar. (That’s the Chunnel if you’re confused.)

Every time I go through St. Pancras, I’m more impressed by it. For me, I can’t imagine a more spectacular example of a wonderful Victorian-era structure. St. Pancras is like a temple to the golden age of railroad.

This time, I finally remembered to bring my camera, and was then blessed with a sunny morning.

Here’s the full set on Flickr.

And here’s a tease:

Last weekend, I took a couple of days off and went to Scotland to visit friends, play golf and drink gin. I’ll bore you about the golf some other time. For now, I’m going to focus on the coming and going, and mostly, the wonderful experience I had on Britain’s rail system.

Let’s start with the decision: planes, trains or automobiles?

I could have done a discount airline like EasyJet or Ryanair from London to Edinburgh for £50 or so. But that would have meant taking a train to either Heathrow or Stansted, which, in either case, would have added another £30 or so roundtrip. Then there’s the time. The trip to Heathrow nets out to an hour. Stansted is much further. On the Edinburgh end, I’d have to hang around baggage claim for 30 minutes or more waiting for my golf clubs. So, all in all, I was looking at a door to door travel time of about 3 hours.

On the other hand, I could do the train. National Express runs a train from King’s Cross Station in London to Edinburgh and Glasgow every half hour. With a few stops along the way, it takes about 4 hours to get to Edinburgh’s Waverly Station. But there’s no security line, no limits on the use of electronic devices, and no cattle call for boarding.

Then there’s the experience. On the way north, I took a window seat. The journey through north England on a sunny, summer afternoon was lovely, with everything all in green. But that wasn’t the highlight. It was the trip from Newcastle, through Berwick-on-Tweed that was amazing. Every inch was along the rocky channel cliffs. The North Sea was just out the window. And the farms of southern Scotland looked lush with their alternating fields of grain and grazing sheep.

And did I mention the free wi-fi? I was online and getting juice from a standard power outlet throughout the journey.

On the return, I discovered the dining car. Every had a freshly cooked steak on Ryanair? I didn’t think so. But I had one on my southbound journey. Along with mashed potatoes and vegetables. And a salad. And dessert — fresh strawberries with cream and meringue. All of which was prepared for me in the fully stocked kitchen on board by a real, human cook. And I ordered my dinner from a diverse menu of selections. Tough to imagine a travel meal where you’re faced with a hard choice about to what to eat? It was for me, too.

Not everything was perfect. It is, after all, a train. The cafe car, where I chose to eat on the northbound trip, was truly abysmal. Microwaved panini and crisps just didn’t get it done.

So, what was the damage for all of this apparent luxury? £73 round trip. About the same cost as flying. (My dining-car meal cost about the same as a comparable London restaurant at £25, so add that in if you think it makes a more genuine comparison.)

On balance, the train so thoroughly thrashed its airborne competition, I am genuinely flummoxed at why anyone would fly. Moreover, its common practice for natives to complain about their train service. And in some areas, it is occasionally spotty. I’m sure I’ll experience some rail debacle or another in the coming months.

For now, however, given the choice, I’ll take the train.

P.S. — I wrote this post while beneath the English channel en route from London to Brussels on the Eurostar. Another example of rail’s superiority over air travel. I’ll bore you with the details of that trip some other time.

Variety’s Ben Fritz is incensed over news of Sid Meir’s Civilization IV: Colonization.

But goddamit, am I the only one who think it’s morally disturbing to make a game that celebrates COLONIZATION? It’s ironic, actually, because just a few months ago a friend sent me a link to some information about the original “Colonization” game from 1994 (pictured left) that this one updates. At first, I thought it had to be a joke, but sure enough, it was real. However, I dismissed it as a relic from a time when neither developers nor players took videogames seriously as media with moral implications.

But the idea that 2K and Firaxis and Sid Meier himself would make and release a game in the year 2008 that is not only about colonization, but celebrates it by having the player control the people doing the colonizing is truly mind boggling.

Fritz goes on to savage the idea behind the game:

And yes, while the description says that you “fight with… the natives,” it also claims there is “improved diplomacy.” It’s entirely possible, even likely, that you can finish the game without killing any Native Americans. And I’m sure there are no options to give the Native Americans smallpox or send them on a death march. But that’s irrelevant. A game about colonization that’s entirely about controlling the settlers can either force the player to do horrific things or let him avoid doing it and whitewash some of the worst events of human history. Either option is offensive. [emphasis mine]

In other words, there is no proper way to ever simulate that period of history, whether to educate, entertain, or both. We must simply reflect back on that period with sorrow and atonement.

That is, in a word, bunk.

Fritz also had the opportunity to review Grand Theft Auto IV. Here’s what he had to say about the gratuitous violence wanton killing in the video game.

…

Yeah, sorry… couldn’t find any.

To sum up: A macro replay of the founding of this nation is “offensive”. A micro replay of the worst displays of dark indulgence is “a huge leap forward for videogames”. Hypocrisy, thy name is Fritz.

Michael Vick was a criminal. But his dogs were just dogs.

Today, many of them are living happy lives with new masters thanks to an awfully smart move by U.S. District Court Judge Henry Hudson.

Hudson ordered Vick to pony up about $1 million for his dogs’ care. And as a result, many have been retrained and are now living with experienced foster families around the country. A few are at a sanctuary in Utah. But only two have been euthanized.

The Washington Post has all the details. And if you’re a dog lover, it’s worth reading it all.