Best Of

Starmer wants to lock up Netanyehu.

Cant help but think this is a mistake

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/11/21/netanyahu-arrest-warrant-issued-live/

Netanhayu has had more than enough benefit of the doubt. He has a right to lead his government in war. He does not have the right to implement policies which are war crimes. And forced starvation, ethnic cleansing and the targeting of civilians are war crimes. Consequences follow.

FWIW, I subscribe to a (legally dodgy) principle of necessary proportionality when it comes to actions beyond the law. In other words, if your enemy breaks international law and gains an advantage from doing so, the country acted against in such manner must be able to make good that disadvantage. You do not lose a war for the sake of good form when your enemy rejects the principles you are binding yourself to, to begin with. But that is very much not the situation in Gaza.

If we build it, they will come.

London's new Elizabeth Line (shortly to be handed over to foreign management) has shaken up the list of Britain's most used stations.

1. London Liverpool Street 94.5 million
   
2. London Paddington 66.9 million
   
3. Tottenham Court Road 64.2 million
   
4. London Waterloo 62.5 million
   
5. Stratford (London) 56.6 million
   
6. London Victoria 50.8 million
   
7. London Bridge 50.0 million
   
8. Farringdon 46.0 million
   
9. Bond Street 38.3 million
   
10. London Euston 36.2 million
    

https://www.ianvisits.co.uk/articles/the-elizabeth-line-is-rewriting-the-uks-rail-station-usage-charts-77234/

It's already the most-used railway in the UK, with 220 million passenger journeys in 2023-24 - compared with the projected figure of just 200 million in 2030 that was used for the business case. Ten additional train sets have had to be ordered, as the current fleet of seventy are unlikely to be able to cope with the actual demand.

We seem to routinely under-estimate the value of new infrastructure, which must surely be part of the reason why we're so bad at actually building stuff. How do we fix this?

Bob the builder IIRC.

We routinely underestimate the value of rail at least because of treasury Green Book rules in how business cases can be used and what can and can't be assumed when putting together a business case. And (to simplify wildly) treasury rules severely limit what can be included in the benefits side of a benefit:cost ratio, especially around induced demand (i.e. infrastructure inducing people to make new trips where they did not do so before). So forecasters might be able to forecast rather more optimistically, but, given that those forecasts won't be accepted in the business case, the don't bother.

If we build it, they will come.

London's new Elizabeth Line (shortly to be handed over to foreign management) has shaken up the list of Britain's most used stations.

1. London Liverpool Street 94.5 million
   
2. London Paddington 66.9 million
   
3. Tottenham Court Road 64.2 million
   
4. London Waterloo 62.5 million
   
5. Stratford (London) 56.6 million
   
6. London Victoria 50.8 million
   
7. London Bridge 50.0 million
   
8. Farringdon 46.0 million
   
9. Bond Street 38.3 million
   
10. London Euston 36.2 million
    

https://www.ianvisits.co.uk/articles/the-elizabeth-line-is-rewriting-the-uks-rail-station-usage-charts-77234/

Paddington 66.9 million. But why do they all have to turn up the same day I use it?

Since Jags are still on topic, FPT:

The Jaguar ad will get people talking - in the same way as Bud Light did in US....

I hope that Jag are doing some resilience work around Mr Chump's impending tariffs. AFAICs unlike their competitors, they do not have factories in the USA. That's where about 25-30% of their sales go.

I wasn't very kind about the ad - on aesthetic / style it feels to be following "United Colours of Benetton" or "FCUK" 2-3 decades later, and so is quite derivative. I may have missed something.

But for me the idea that a Jaguar is aspirational and worth investing emotion in is ridiculous on its face. A car is at root a transport appliance, nothing more. It needs to be safe, and comfortable, and may be nice to drive - none of that is worth obsessing about or wasting time for the expression of pride. I'm more emotional about my fridge.

Jaguar as a brand does command some loyalty and emotion. But it is nostalgia rather for anything they have done in the last 30 years.

Jaguar is a brand that trades on its name and it’s heritage, E-Type for example, but has made largely bland, generic, cars for many years. I worked on X100, X202, X350, X760 and X761 and the driving force behind all of them was not style or innovation, unlike some of the Range Rover range, but cost. Everything as cheap as possible. They were effectively rebadged Fords for a while too.

It is a shame Dura Ace no longer seems to hang out. I am sure he would have a lot. Ore to say on their cars.

Well, not really. I bought an XE in 2017 and absolutely loved it.

Jag did really well with their 2013-2019 marques.

The solution is to not get a Jag next time. Vote with your wallet and don't support companies that clearly hate you anyway.

I won't. I'll be emailing my dealership to tell them that this morning.

"Jag" seem to thing they'll be opening up a whole new market here, and so pissing off their existing base doesn't matter.

Chortle. They are so so wrong.

Out of interest, if the new Jag turns out to be the best car since the E type when they unveil it, a powerhouse, a work of art, a car that says *I have arrived* would you still refuse to buy it?

I've always felt that what you say in your marketing doesn't actually matter that much. The product does the talking. All marketing does is make people aware of the product.

And on that criterion the Jaguar ad has been a stonking success.

I'm sure Bud Lite marketing execs had the same sentiment early on during their controversy.

Bud lite is also carbonated piss.

If the new Jag turns out to be a lean, mean, driving machine, will all be forgiven?

I personally don't care about whether the ad is 'woke' or not, it just seems stale and cliched. But sometimes you get bad ads for good products.

If I may be so bold, I'm guessing that you are in the 0.001% of early adopters and open to, and au fait with new trends and whatnot.

To say an ad like that, featuring what appears to be a range of genders in striking tones, doing weird-ass things, and which is visually sumptuous and nothing particularly to do with the thing it is supposed to be advertising, is "stale and cliched" I think is pushing it a bit. It is, as we have seen by the reaction to it on PB this morning, a complete mind f**k to 83.5% of the population.

Perfume ads have been doing it for years. Decades in fact. The whole "copy nothing" "break molds" spiel is so cliched as to be meaningless.

Granted it's quite novel for a car company to market itself in this way, but think about ads that have broken moulds and been genuine WTF moments. The Sony Bravia exploding paint ads (pretty heady stuff for 2006) or the Cadbury's Gorilla (2007) were genuinely standout.

What about this ad stands out? It's a bunch of people dressed like extras from Zoolander faffing about on screen while cliched phrases appear in text. Nothing about it feels new, and everything about it feels like a paint by numbers ad following a brand strategy that says 'our old customers are dying off, we need to create something that appeals to a different audience, what about the type of people who buy expensive handbags and designer clobber like that? maybe we can be the brand for them'.

It's an ad that borrows every imaginable high fashion cliche possible while saying absolutely nothing. But it is certainly not envelope pushing.

It's an advert that would have been edgy in 2004 not in 2014 and definitely not in 2024. It's in fact so mundanely DEI that it barely registers except in the sense that one feels as thought the consultancy firm JLR hired is full of *****.

Porsche are also doing their bit for DEI:

https://x.com/porsche/status/1859293440422363642

That's a good advert, not sure what the issue with it is.

Our Globe-Trotter Leon is apparently () on it:

Leon @theoussama
·
9h Where was this video filmed? Switzerland?
https://x.com/theoussama/status/1859413649799999885

Hope Valley, Derbyshire, and around Mam Tor, apparently.

I know that road well (actually, those roads - Winnatts pass and the Barber Booth road.)
No objection to the advert, though I don't get the bagpipes and don't really understand the narrative. But it's less punchable than most car adverts, not least because it's recognisably British.

They are pretending it's Scotland.

See the Highland Cattle.

Out of control anti-social Scottish Cows have history in the area. Several years ago they went for a dog near Baslow - 4-legged reevers. They have never forgotten being chased out of Derby in 1745.

A herd of cattle has been forced from a Peak District beauty spot it had grazed on for 40 years after a complaint.

The 30-strong highland herd had roamed Baslow Edge for decades alongside a popular footpath.

Last year the cows, which had young calves, confronted a dog. When the owner complained, farmer Alex Birch was told by authorities to move his herd.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-derbyshire-47474646

FFS. I detest (some) dog owners.

They're like arseholes who buy flats above pubs and have them closed down with noise complaints.