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 Wow, talk about a deus ex machina – Abu Dhabi went and bailed out Dubai from its immediate debt problems. Which was nice of it.
Cue yet another round of media excitement, which we’re sure will be unsatisfactory in some aspects – but that’s not what’s exciting us today.
No, today we’re writing an open communiqué to the nice and generally talented people at ITP’s flagship web product, ArabianBusiness.com.
We really are big fans of AB.com – it breaks news, has decent coverage, and isn’t afraid to stir the controversy pot every now and again. Sure, it’s a bit tabloidy for a publication with “business” in its name, but we’ll let it off (ahem*potkettleblack*ahem).
But when the whole Dubai Debt Debacle broke a couple of weeks ago, we experienced for the first time the full horror of what can only be described as AB.com’s War Footing.
A HUGE lead picture, which managed to fill most of our modestly-sized screen, accompanied with a sizeable headline, dominated the AB.com homepage. And, seemingly in a need to make the most of this HUGE image, it stayed stuck to the page when one clicked through to the main story.
Fine, we thought, this is a big story, especially on a holiday weekend, and considering many seemed under the impression Dubai was threatening the entire world.
But then it stayed.
And stayed.
And stayed.
A week. A bloody week of that bloody image. And, not an interesting image – a stock picture of a worried-looking trader, or the palm, or the Nakheel logo, or whatever. This wasn’t National Geographic.
Eventually it went away, and we breathed a sigh of relief.
BUT NOW IT’S BACK.
IT’S BACK AND IT’S BORING.
IT’S BACK AND IT’S BORING AND WE CAN’T TAKE IT ANY MORE.
PLEASE, MR SERAFIN, FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT’S GOOD IN THE WORLD. PLEASE STOP YOUR BEST WEBSITE SHOUTING AT US FOR ANOTHER WEEK.
Ahem.
But seriously, it’s great to be able to big up a story, especially something earth-shattering – but it has to be used in moderation.
The BBC is pretty good at this now: it has a range of lead-pic sizes, depending on how big the story is, ranging from just a bit longer, to a full-width takeover. Rarely does the full-width job stay up more than, say, eight hours.
So, please, AB.com people – Anil Bhoyrul, Andy Sambridge, Andrew White (wow, that’s a lot of As) and the rest –please give your long-suffering readers a break from the HUGE SHOUTY IMAGE OF DOOM.
Please?
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