The Last Ditch

Public Drunkenness and Pomposity

Public Drunkenness Can Never Be a Social Norm - Iain Dale - Dale & Co..

Apropos of my previous post and the widespread delusion that candid photography is against the law, Iain Dale is busy digging himself deeper into a hole after an ill-advised photographic tweet on his way home last night (click to enlarge).

I defend his freedom of speech, of course, but I think he should be happy the lady cannot be identified as the publication is arguably libellous.

As a libertarian, I think the laws of defamation fall under the category of "de trop", but for so long as they exist (and they have been around a long time) Iain needs, particularly as a professional communicator, to bear them in mind. Fortunately for him, the first time anyone would have chance to consider the effect on her reputation would be if she were rash enough to identify herself by suing. So she won't. Before she even considers it, she ought to read about the role of an ill-judged defamation suit in Oscar Wilde's downfall.

It's a surprising lapse for Iain who is famous for his media skills and a highly accomplished communicator (usually of not very much). An amusing Twitterstorm has ensued, as the professionally-offended on the Left take up chivalric cudgels while calling him a c**t and a w*****r without any sense of irony. They are also ranting on about the breach of this anonymous lady's privacy, which is nonsense. Firstly, she's still anonymous and secondly she was in a public place. Anywhere you can lawfully be looked at, you can generally be photographed. People take photos on trains all the time, and - although usually incidentally - there are almost always strangers in the frame.

For what it's worth, I think Mr Dale is guilty of bad manners and a surprising, for him, lack of media savvy. He says she was behaving badly, but the picture doesn't illustrate his point in any way. She could just be depressed or tired. As it comes down to his word, he should probably have left it at words.

Iain is in danger of being seen as using the hammer of his influence to crack the nut of his irritation with a minor disturbance to his peace (allegedly) caused by this woman. Sadly he comes off looking like a pompous prat. In his own interests he should have apologised immediately but having rashly mounted his high horse he's having trouble getting off. His lines of defence look tortured and weak (can he really not have realised the sexual connotations of 'slapper?') and are doing him no good.

The only benefit to his not apologising is that the stream of gleefully sanctimonious responses show the British Left up for the insufferable prigs they mostly are. Ironically, if this tweet represented his true character, it would be a trait Iain had in common with them.

Apple, cored.

Apple vs Apple: long-running legal dispute delayed Beatle's iTunes deal - Telegraph.

So Apple, Inc. (fka Apple Computer, Inc.) now owns the wittily-named Apple Corps - the Beatles' corporate vehicle. The computer/media company paid $500 million for the privilege, confirming once more the insanity of Macca's choice to remain a UK taxpayer ("Ta la'", says Gideon) and filling a gaping hole in the iTunes Music Store.

Of course I have every Beatles track (at least once) in my iTunes already. I was mugged replacing my LPs with cassettes and my cassettes with CDs and will not be mugged again. I supose however there may be someone in the world who will think it worth paying again to have a version they can't copy freely.

Apple is pushing hard "exclusive content" that can only be had by paying £125 for the "boxed set" download of the complete works. I guess that might work for some. Shouldn't there be a sexier name for that, by the way? An iSet perhaps? The timing of the long-delayed legal settlement may be a prudent way for the Beatles and their heirs to enjoy the last faint hurrah of a fab financial run, for the attraction of the music finally seems to be fading.

Brits of my vintage were all Stones or Beatles fans (few were both). There was a time, not so long ago, when a day never passed without my listening to their music. Perhaps the 1990s association with a Mancunian(!) tribute act tainted it for me. Or perhaps, unlike the Porsche 911, it was only so far ahead of its time and destined for the fate of Morecambe & Wise (good once, then suddenly not). Perhaps the Beatles were only ever really special for not being the bands that came before them. Still, I will always love "Yesterday" - invaluable if you want to start a sing-song in a remote, language-challenged bar.

I remember mass playground fights (all very amiable and character-forming) between fans of Paul and John at my infants school. The Ringo/George factions were forced to choose sides in this physical debate and of course the girls cheered on the avatars for Paul. Few girls liked John. How else do you think such a rich man ended up with Yoko? At that age however, the boys liked him for the fact the girls found him as yucky as we found them.

We were used to binary choices. Where I grew up, even the (very quiet and well-behaved) Man United fans had to state a preference between Liverpool and Everton. Our Shanklyite head teacher was very hard on those rash enough to choose the latter. Politics was binary too, of course. You could be Labour, or you could be posh Tory scum. Not too long after choosing John and Liverpool FC, I chose Maoism as a way (irony of ironies) to assert my individuality. Thank goodness I escaped to find life's choices are not always either or.

I wonder if Paul and Ringo will thank the clever lawyers who negotiated an end to their 1991 court battle? As part of that settlement, they bound Steve Jobs' company contractually never to go into the music business. 10% of the price Jobs paid for their company might be a reasonable honorarium for the farthest-sighted chaps in the law.

They might even like to apply the iTunes conversion rate for sterling to that.

Patrick McGoohan explains "The Prisoner"

YouTube - Patrick McGoohan "The Prisoner Puzzle".

I am grateful to reader Peter Gardner for drawing my attention (in a comment to my recent post) to these YouTube videos of McGoohan being interviewed about The Prisoner. The past really is another country. Two grown men having an intelligent conversation (over cigarettes!) in front of a polite audience asking intelligent questions! And no shrieking harpy of the left denouncing their thought crimes. When I enter a modern office building, fretting and fussing at the airport style security (or indeed as I regularly experience the security theatre at airports), I shall smile at the memory of McGoohan complaining about merely having to sign in to the studio before the interview. Enjoy.

I am not a number

This remake of classic series, The Prisoner looks unpromising to a fan of the original. Yet perhaps there was never a great show that more needed to be remade. Its themes are certainly as relevant as in 1967. In those far-off days, despite the horrors of Soviet Russia, Red China and Fidel's Cuba many still saw collectivism as a gentle dream.

Sir Ian McKellen, luvvie deluxe, unexpectedly gives a quote worthy of a libertarian blogger;

“The original Prisoner was very much dealing with the life of the individual as he might get caught up in Soviet Russia… Well, here we are 40 years on and we are living in a land where people accept without question being fingerprinted, having their eyes registered at airports, taking off their clothes at the airport, opening up their luggage, not being allowed to do this, not being allowed to do that, photographed in the streets by cameras that are put up by you’re never quite sure who. All this adds up to a society that perhaps isn’t quite as democratic and careful about the freedom of the individual as we would like.”

Perhaps the delicately understated final sentence is not quite so bloggerish! One cannot imagine Devil's Kitchen, for example, languidly observing that our society;

"...isn't quite as ... careful about the freedom for the individual as we would like".

I imagine McKellen had fun with the role of "Two", but I cannot picture Jim Caviezel in the McGoohan role as [Number] Six. From the trailer and advance publicity, I fear it may finally deliver on McGoohan's dishonest promise to his backers that it would be an action series. For all its failings, the original series was a thought-provoking, intelligent work. It would therefore never have made it to the small screen without McGoohan's deception. It was his project; he was co-creator, star and wrote some of it himself. We owe him for that; it's hard to imagine a remake that won't make our authoritarian leaders uncomfortable and their sycophants furious.

A genuine individualist himself, McGoohan navigated bizarre story lines carefully, somehow retaining sympathy for a character far from being loveable. Ultimately, Number Six was not even entitled to say; "I am not paranoid. They really are out to get me." The series ended in a full-on 1960s schlock episode in which Number Six is revealed also to be the mysterious, never seen but much talked-about, Number One. Symbolically, he was his own jailer and "I am out to get myself" is not quite such a good punchline. I suppose McGoohan was hinting that no man can truly be unfree without consent. It was a call to arms, perhaps, but hardly rousing.

I loved the original series, though I was a teenage collectivist when I first saw it. My strict, always-in-the-wrong, upbringing felt like life in "The Village" to me and I thought the village itself a perfect metaphor. My mental image of tyranny is a village, like the one I grew up in, where everyone knows you, there is no privacy and your every move is likely to be reported to "the authorities" (or in my case at the time, my parents). I felt cheated by the finale though. Like much 1960s culture, you needed to be on acid to appreciate the logic; which is another way to say that it had none.

The Prisoner was great television, but hugely flawed. Stylistically, it was too much of its ludicrous era. Everything good from the 60s needs to be remade, so for once the producers can do better than avoid adverse comparisons. They have something to shoot for.

Pop memories

Late evening listening – the evolution of music | nourishing obscurity.

I was at a party last night with my soon-to-be-ex-team in Moscow. It was at a way-too-cool-for-me bar and I was already feeling old when a kindly, well-meaning (and jollier than I had ever realised) colleague made things worse by asking if I had ever been at a Beatles concert.

Clearly, I must get more sleep and eat more healthily.

He was disappointed to hear that the earliest concert I ever attended was by Blondie (of whom, thanks to the Iron Curtain, he had never heard).

I was reminded of the conversation this morning by this delightful picture of the super-talented Ms Deborah Harry at Blogmeister Higham's new site. I have heard that, to this day, new bands with songs to promote are asked if they have a new "Heart of Glass." It is considered by many to be the definitive pop song - catchy, memorable, quirky and instantly recognisable from the first notes.

YouTube does not allow embedding of the video of the 70's live version at the Ed Sullivan Theater. However, here's the link if you need your memory refreshed. At the risk of offending the Misses Paine who shudder at my "poppy" sensibilities (and Mrs Paine who despairs of my "bimbo rock" tastes) I admit this video is on my iPod and I watch it at least once a month.

That confession over, if any of you know anyone who saw the Beatles live, my Russian colleague - a more avid Beatles fan than I have been since I pestered my mother for Fab Four wallpaper at the age of 8 - would like to shake his or her hand. Being told that Mrs Paine's mother knew John Lennon's uncle wasn't good enough, I am afraid.

Good for her age?

The entertainment at our gala dinner in Berlin last night was provided by "Marlene Dietrich". She seems to be in remarkably good condition for a woman who died, aged 90, 17 years ago.

Any views on this lady's resemblance to the famous original?

Fiona Bruce has no problem with "lookism"

BBC's Fiona Bruce: 'If you look like the back end of a bus, you won't get the job' - Telegraph.

That's big of her. I would have no problem if there was suddenly a demand for tall, overweight, middle-aged TV presenters either. Unfortunately, it's harder to get the people who really need to accept "lookism" with a good grace to do so. Those are the ones who - unlike Ms. Bruce - have radio faces.Their complaints remind me of the silent movie stars with ugly voices whose careers ended with the advent of the "talkies."

Why do people (even the usually sound-thinking Mrs P) get upset about TV presenters being selected for their looks? Why spend a fortune designing a TV show to be visually-appealing; from the sets through the lighting to the attractive fonts for the opening titles, only to spoil it by featuring an unattractive presenter front and centre? TV is a visual medium. It's for looking at. Naturally, audiences favour presenters from whom they do not need to avert their gaze. TV cameras also add apparent weight, which is why so many "attractive" presenters so disappoint when viewed without an intervening lens.

Why does all this only apply to female presenters, you may snort? Any unfairness there, I am afraid, is entirely the fault of women. They have less developed aesthetic standards when it comes to the opposite sex. Such are the rewards of a TV career, however, that any male presenter will give off the attractive aura of the chap of whom, in Ms. Austen's immortal words;

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.

Are men to blame for such discrimination on the part of women? Is not such an attitude just as "unfair" as (and much less charming than) the male preference for a pretty face?

Antiques Roadshow was a tired, tedious programme well past its sell-by date. It was leavened only by an occasional laugh at a grasping punter pretending not to care how much his bric-a-brac was worth. Since Ms. Bruce took over, it has (at least in parts) become gripping entertainment and once more has an audience outside the old folks' homes. Good for her.

Blue meanies?

The Osterley Times: Abbey Road 40th Anniversary - London.

There was much coverage yesterday of the 40th anniversary of the Beatles' Abbey Road album cover. In some ways it was a classic "silly season" story, but as can be seen from the linked post, many really wanted to celebrate. And why not? It's a great album and the cover picture is one of the most recognisable images ever made.

Two local councillors, however, feel that it's time to end the odd little North London tourist attraction. Both of them, sadly, are Conservative. They won their 15 seconds of Telegraph fame by calling for the iconic zebra crossing to be removed, claiming tourists cause accidents there. The annual rate has risen from 18 to 22 in the course of a single decade; none fatal. Of course nothing else has happened to the traffic in North London since 1999 which might possibly account for a whopping 22% increase in cuts and scratches.

I wonder if they have even heard of the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy?

What is it about politics that attracts joyless, control-freaks? What hope for a freer, jollier, less dour British society if we simpy replace the nannyism of New Labour with the paternalism of the Tories? Will our politicians never learn to let it be?

Here, wearing the faces they keep in their jars by the door, are the Tory ladies in question.

Step forward, Councillors Judith Warner and Lindsey Hall.

Oh darlings, as loyal subjects of Her Majesty, is there no way we can come together to bring the end to the golden slumbers of liberty in our country? Don't you want to stop having to carry that weight of being a grouch and a busybody? I don't pay council tax in your wards so you may say to me "You never give me your money", but nonetheless I want you to do something for me. As a Tory national victory approaches - I want to cry joyfully "here comes the sun", not feel I have to borrow Maxwell's silver hammer to fend off mean Mr Mustard. Polythene Pam feels the same way and she's your neighbour so does have a vote. You remember her. She came in through the bathroom window last week when she locked herself out. Anyway, here's the deal. I am tired of politicians endlessly interfering in our fun and games. I want to feel like the Sun King in my own country again. I don't want the tentacles of the state all over me, as if I were living in an octopus's garden.

So, please don't be blue meanies again.

Guardian TV poll: let's keep up the pressure

Poll: What's the best TV show of the decade 2000-09? | Media | guardian.co.uk.

Come on, ladies and gentlemen, please click on the link above and infuriate the Guardianistas who are posting such exasperated comments as;

Top Gear is not fit to grace any list that has the likes of the office, the west wing and arrested development on it.

The Wire is catching up fast on Top Gear with one day of polling still to go, so if you want to see Jezza ending the show with the poll results and the words "...and on that bombshell..." you need to get over there and vote. Urging on family, friends and work colleagues, not to mention posting a link to the poll on your blog (and in comments to every blog you frequent) would do no harm either.

Annoy a Guardianista; vote now!

Poll: What's the best TV show of the decade 2000-09? | Media | guardian.co.uk.

The Grauniad is having a poll on "the best TV show of the decade" and the results are annoying its precious journalists.

Monday 2pm: we are aware that there has been some *ahem* multiple voting and we are investigating how to eliminate this. In the meantime, please keep voting - legitimately

Oh, dear. How shocking. I am sure they would never have complained were, say, Andrew Marr's Sunday Socialist Sycophancy Show in the lead. So which show has people clicking so enthusiastically? Yes, there is justice in the Universe occasionally. It's the one they hate the most (click to enlarge). Delicious!

Please go over there and add to their pain.