Category Archives: social media

connecting…

05 Thursday Apr 2012

Posted by in friends, social media, twitter, work

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A couple of days ago on Twitter someone I’ve known there for a couple of years recommended that someone else get in touch with me as they were coming to Sevilla this week. And so they did.

This afternoon Peter and I met with Sarah Jane Evans and her husband Richard for a bit of a tapeo and we had a great time going to a couple of my favourite spots. And just before we finished up Sarah Jane gave me this book she’d written about Seville, which was published in 1992. Very cool.

Made me think about all the great connections – and friends – I’ve made on Twitter over the years. In fact, it turned out that Sarah Jane and I have a lot of the same Twitter pals in common, probably not so surprising as they are all mostly food and wine people. Good ol’ social media!

How do you meet new people?

copyright confusion & facebook faux pas

31 Saturday Mar 2012

Posted by in internet, social media, websites

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Yesterday I found myself tagged on my Sevilla Tapas Facebook account in about ten photos, which then showed up in my timeline, and after that my notifications became cluttered with comments on these “photos of me” by people I don’t know. And they weren’t even photos of me, but of tapas from a local bar. So I spent about 15 minutes tracking down all the photos, removing the tags, and then wrote to the women who posted them, asking her to please not do that again. And I also wrote an entry on my Facebook timeline that said: “Please stop tagging me in photos I am not in just to promote your business. Thank you.”

I mean, it’s bad enough when people leave links on my timeline to stuff that is clearly just blatant self-promotion, and not to something that is being shared because someone thinks I’d be interested in it. But tagging people in photos like this is actually an abuse of the Facebook tagging system. It’s meant to be used to let someone know you’ve posted a photo of them on your FB page, not as an attention-seeking cheap trick to get people to look at your stuff.

Anyhoodle, my friend Del (aka WeeRascal) replied to this – probably because he doesn’t like me dissing Facebook  😉 – by referring to the collages I did of those wonderful old photos of Semana Santa in Sevilla the other day, one of which I also posted here on casa az, which have my ©azahar-sevilla.com watermark on them. He questioned the ethics of putting my copyright on other people’s photos, and at first I thought I’d done something terribly wrong. But then I realised that they were actually collages of photos I’d taken at the exhibit – a public place – and not of copyrighted images I’d found online. And well, since I wasn’t around in 1885, I reckoned it was pretty clear that I wasn’t trying to take credit for the photos. But it does seem like a bit of a grey area. What do you think? Both about the annoying Facebook tagging issue and the copyright confusion.

You can see the Facebook conversation below (click to enlarge) or click here to be taken to the Facebook post.
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awful afflelou

28 Wednesday Mar 2012

Posted by in rants, sevilla, shopping, social media, spain, wtf?

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Exactly a week ago today I came home with my new glasses, something I was quite pleased about because I’d finally found a pair of lightweight frames that were cute and suited me. It’s always difficult finding frames to fit my wide face, mostly these days because shops only tend to stock glasses in “average sizes”. Used to be I could try on a frame and, if I liked it, ask to try it in a larger size. But I digress…

I’d gone out shopping with my friend Fourat because I wanted to get another opinion that I felt I could trust, and our second stop that morning was the Alain Afflelou store near my house. I honestly wish we’d kept going now. Before ordering the lenses for the new glasses I told the salesclerk that the frames were too tight on the right side and he said – no problem! – and that when the glasses came back with the prescription lenses they would do the final adjustments then.

Well, as you know, when I picked up the glasses and got the final adjustments done, I noticed after I got home that the lenses were no longer aligned with the frames. In fact, they were quite wonky. So the next day I went back and was surprised to be told that those particular frames couldn’t be adjusted without warping the frame. Well, not MY problem, right? And so, although I was disappointed that I’d have to keep on looking for glasses I reckoned what the heck and asked for a refund. And that’s when it ALL WENT TO HELL…

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policy change

26 Thursday Jan 2012

Posted by in blogging, change, sevilla, social media, spain, tapas, websites, work

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For almost five years now, since first starting my Sevilla Tapas blog, my policy has always been to only put up tapas bars and restaurants that I would recommend to a friend. If I didn’t like a place it simply didn’t get included. I guess I just thought I wanted my tapas blog to have a positive and helpful feel to it. A couple of years ago I did put up a very scathing review of a place that had treated my friend and me horrendously, but I don’t know, it seemed to throw a shadow on what I like to think of as an upbeat and friendly site and I removed it.

But lately I’ve been wondering if this is actually the best policy, especially as fewer of the places I visit these days end up on the blog because I know I wouldn’t ever recommend them to a friend. Was I getting jaded, I asked myself. Or just more experienced and discerning? Then today happened.

I met my friend Pablo for lunch at a place that had not only been recommended to me many times over the years, but people couldn’t actually believe that I had never been there, as it was apparently such a popular location. So as I had a meeting right around the corner from this place that finished at lunchtime, that’s where we went. And well. I should have known upon entering that it was going to be dire, but again, you never know. Sometimes the shabbiest looking places serve up the tastiest tapas (though to be honest, this almost never happens in the city) and this place was certainly shabby. It had the look of someplace that had had its day about fifteen years ago and hadn’t bothered to paint or replace the tacky furniture. It wasn’t DIRTY exactly, but it had an unclean feel to it. So why didn’t we just get up and leave? Well, because I had to find out if all those who had praised this joint were right. They weren’t.

The food was not only pedestrian in the extreme, but most of it seemed past its time, hard and dry and tired looking. And the service was haphazard and impersonal. Even if the tapas had been cheap (they weren’t at 3-4 euros each) it wouldn’t have made up for such a dismal meal. Pablo and I were left feeling upleasantly full and unsatisfied and, well, a bit annoyed. And I felt ripped off thinking I’d wasted my time and money at a crappy tapas bar that I wouldn’t even be able to put in my tapas blog.

After lunch we ran into a friend of ours, Markus, and told him about our experience. His office is nearby and he said he never eats at that place. But both Pablo and Markus told me that it would actually give my tapas blog more credibility if there were some negative, or at least not glowing, reviews. So they convinced me to change my policy a bit, if only as a public service.  Because I truly pity anyone who might end up eating where we were today, especially when there are so many other terrific places nearby.

So that’s it – no more Ms Nice Guy. 😉

What do you think?

[also posted on the Sevilla blog]