Jornal de Negocios writer shot in foot

A wonderful piece of journalism from Rui Peres Jorge yesterday: "Tobacco Tax Receipts Plunge." The increase in tax on tobacco is having the opposite effect to that expected, falling 39% in the first quarter of 2006.

This is the trivial result of reading the Treasury's report on budget execution for March, without bothering to do the research.

However, if you actually read the report, this shortfall is explained - "As referred to in prior months". So I went to the prior month reports and found, in January, that the fall compared with 2005 is due to extraordinary receipts in January 2005.

All of that research took me less time than preparing this post! But why bother researching, if your objectives are to arrange excuses to criticise the Government and fill column inches.

In on-line news, there is no need to write just for the sake of it.

O Codex 632

Com este romance, o Ilustre José Rodrigues dos Santos, mais conhecido como jornalista, avança para o mundo do historiador académico com uma afirmação provocante – “Será que o Cristóvão Colombo era português?”

Fico admirado com este género de livro, ao imaginar o esforço de pesquisa necessário para juntar a matéria-prima. Com visitas a Rio de Janeiro, Nova Iorque, Jerusalém e Génova, sem falar nas pesquisas nacionais, o livro representa um investimento considerável em tempo e dinheiro, felizmente bem gasto. As descrições elaboradas dos locais e pessoas são por vezes maçadoras, por empregar demasiadas palavras obscuras, mas, mesmo lidas na diagonal, transmitem bem as características essenciais dos lugares e personagens.

Quanto ao miolo, a parte técnica das pesquisas é muito interessante, mas explicações ao Moliarti dos factos e consequências das pesquisas são algo infelizes em repetir tanta matéria já explicada ao leitor no momento da sua descoberta.

Apesar de ter desvendado sozinho uma das principais pistas, fiquei com muitas dúvidas sobre outras, que mantiveram o interesse. O desfecho final adivinha-se apenas a poucas páginas do fim, servindo também para explicar como é que foi possível inventar uma história tão convoluta – começando pela afirmação acima, arranjando argumentos a favor para, num golpe de mestre, deixar tudo no ar com a destruição de uma prova chave num momento crítico.

Resumindo, um romance brilhante, que hei-de voltar a ler – altamente recomendado.

Quanto a traduções, seria difícil traduzir para inglês, tão cheio que é de referências tipicamente portuguesas. Seria interessante ver o livro lançado em espanhol ou italiano…

Another one in the eye for Mourinho!

Define "news"

Last night, at 8 p.m., RTP and SIC opened the news bulletins with the traditional Sunday items - Holiday Weekend Motoring Death Toll and Pope Celebrates Mass in St. Peter's Square. TVI spent 15 minutes on the death of the star of its hit soap opera in a car crash, of no interest to me at all. It seemed like hype, promoting the series even in times of tragedy.

Looking back, however, it now appears that TVI was right. After all, where's the news value in:

• lower motoring death toll - the weekend is not over yet;
• Pope Celebrates Mass - news value would arise if he failed to celebrate mass at Easter;
• woman whose doctor had operated the wrong foot - oops.

Looking round the family, I was the only one not interested in the soap star's death. That gives an 86% relevance rating.

Looks like I'm not cut out to be a news editor...

World's Largest Windows Error Message

Now this is funny. Not so much the post itself, but the multi-lingual comments - ROFLMAO, as they say.

(Thanks to Wonderm00n)

Freakonomics

As the economics best-seller of 2005, I thought this was rather thin, both in terms of size and substance.

While there are some startling conclusions, the extensive bibliography shows that much of the underlying research does not belong to the author. In fact, that bibliography is one of the most impressive parts of the book, revealing an obsessive record-keeper and, deep down, a serious economist behind the editorial hype.

Nevertheless, there is some interesting research, including the application of statistical techniques to identify teachers who cheat on their students' behalf and to evaluate the practical effect on crime rates of having more police. On the other hand, his statistical analysis of children's names and social standing over the years returns statistics to its traditional ultra-boring status.

The economics question I wanted answering was why the English version of the book, which I bought, with a print run of millions, costs more than the Portuguese version, which incurs the overhead of translation as well as losing economies of scale due to a smaller print run.

Overall, not a book I would recommend buying.

Políticos

No dia a seguir à grande balda, encontro isto no blog da Pandora.

Avoid Problems with the Building Inspectors

When a new building sprung up behind my garden wall, I was concerned about its height and distance from surrounding roads and buildings, so I went to the City's web site and filed a complaint. In return I received a mail confirming the number of my complaint - so far so good.

A week later I got a call to inform me that the construction permit number I had copied from the builder's sign, did not exist. "Could I give any more details?" As I had put the address and geo-reference from the website in the complaint, I fail to see what was missing.

That was in December. This week I phoned to find out what happened to my complaint. I spent 20 minutes being transferred around City Hall. All the secretaries could tell me was that the case had been closed - though I never received a reply.

So if you want to build, with no problems, just buy a sign, fill it in with random data which you wash off again to leave an illegible blur. Build what you like - nobody will be able to complain. Random checks by building inspectors may be dealt with using the personal touch - preferably face-to-face in the local seafood restaurant. You'll have to deal with the paperwork sooner or later, but meanwhile you can save time and have the building ready (and sold) while the planners pore over the drawings.

Book Review Problem

I have been posting book reviews, partly because someone might find them useful/interesting (though I have no evidence that's true), partly to show that there is life beyond the internet.

Now I am faced with a little dilemma: what's the point of posting a book review, in English, of a book I read in Portuguese that has never been translated into English? Maybe I'll have to take the plunge and write in Portuguese, or just give up on the idea completely. If I do write it in Portuguese and someone feels it necessary to correct my grammar, I just hope they do so by email, rather than putting comments for all the world to see.

How to buy a TV

Don't laugh. It's not as easy as it seems.

After 15 years of steady use, our 25" Philips TV has finally been laid to rest. So I wandered round the retailers' web sites in search of a new one: CRT, 15-year life, nothing fancy.

The following don't get a link, because their sites are lousy: Euronics/Prolar (under construction for 3 years, to my knowledge), MediaMarkt, Carrefour and Jumbo.

That left Fnac (where the site is poor, very slow), Radio Popular, where I drew a blank, and Worten, which actually had a conventional TV for sale!

Just to be on the safe side, I wandered along to Prolar, where the salesman obligingly told me that Plasma and LCD TV's are not suitable for locations where they are always on - that rules out any house with kids, as far as I can tell. It was a pity he only had top-end Sony conventional TV's, complete with stand.

So it was off to the Colombo shopping centre, to Worten, where the model from the web page was in stock. The only difficulties were persuading the salesman that I wanted to take the TV away, not have it delivered, and persuading the kids that we did not need to take plasma replacements for the 14" models that have not broken down yet.

So it was right product, right price, right publicity. Not really a surprise that Belmiro de Azevedo is loaded.