Augmented Journalism

The Dutch military approach, where victory was the only goal, was sustained for seven ugly World Cup matches. Understanding that this method was needed to reach the finals of the tournament, Dutch soccer fans were hopeful that their national team would eventually start playing the real football again. In vain.

In the end the Dutch team became the metaphor for a pale tournament, with hardly any highlights. Hope was cherished for over a month, but it didn’t last after all – justice was done by Spanish goal getter Iniesta and what was left was one big pool of disappointment.

Dutch newspapers this morning don’t focus on the ugly game that was played by their national team, nor on the un-Dutch approach (at moments the fans thought they were watching German, Italian or Argentine players instead), but only on the disappointing grand finale.  There even is some anger against the English referee, although this man obviously could have given the Dutch one or two extra red cards. And of course there is pride. “We fought like lions”, De Telegraaf writes.

In the mean time, the rest of the world (including the non-Spanish part of it) concludes that it would have been much better if the Dutch wouldn’t have reached the finals at all. That won’t stop the Dutch authorities – and fans – from giving their heroes a warm welcome when the return home. An “almost victory”-tour in the canals of Amsterdam will be held on Tuesday, next to a bunch of other celebrations.

Things are getting more orange every day in the Netherlands. Look at this “typical World Cup front yard”. The Dutch seem to be pretty confident about their chances at winning the world cup finals next sunday.

In preparation for the World Cup final between the Netherlands and Spain all Dutch newspapers are preparing “Orange attachments”. From one or two extra pages, an orange-colored front page to complete extra magazines, every single newsroom is spending long hours in the preparation for their publications before and after next sunday’s World Cup final.

Popular newspaper De Telegraaf will publish an extra magazine on saturday. On top of that, the paper will print extra issues in countries like Spain, Italy and France. Editor-in-Chief Sjuul Paradijs says that “the need for information is spectacular. We have to help the Dutch people who are on a vacation outside the Netherlands”, he told press agency ANP.

Free newspaper Metro, which normally doesn’t appear in the weekends, will publish an extra edition on saturday, which will be distributed in public transport. Competitor Sp!ts intends to come with “a spectacular deal” on monday. Editor-in-chief Willem Schouten – who just returned from South Africa where he watched the semifinals – says that the emphasis will be on “all the joy and sadness around the ‘national experience’ of football.”

One big exception is found at the newsroom of the religiously based Reformatorisch Dagblad. This small national paper won’t publish a single word on the Soccer World Cup, or on any professional sport activity.  RD-readers won’t even find the final results in their newspaper. Antoon Stam, secretary of the editorial board, argues that right at the creation of the newspaper the founders have decided to ignore sports, as many games are played on Sundays, a “body cult” is created around it and excessive amounts of money are being paid in transfers of the participating players. ”So we have no sport at all,” Stam told a Volkskrant-reporter.

For the first time in history, Spain or the Netherlands will be the owner of the soccer World Cup. The Netherlands lost the finals in 1974 and 1978. For Spain, European champion and the winner of yesterday’s World Cup semi-finals against Germany, it is the first time it reached the finals.

Although the Netherlands is undefeated in its last 24 matches (and won all of this year’s World Cup matches), Spain is considered the favorite. The country has been playing the best football of the tournament (maybe equaled only by Germany) and can count on a stable core of Barcelona players on its team.

The fans of both countries have shown themselves confident though. The celebrations after winning the semifinals have been gigantic in Spain as well as in the Netherlands. Lots of extra flights to South Africa have been rapidly arranged, from Madrid as well as from Amsterdam. And the rest of the country will be in front of a TV screen – most likely watching with a lot of friends. It is difficult to imagine, though, that a new TV viewer record will be set. Last Wednesday, when the Netherlands beat Uruguay in the semi-finals, the incredible total of 12.3 million Dutchmen watched the game. This is exactly 75% of the population. Never before has a TV show reached that many people.

How the Dutch watched the semifinals:

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Anti- Semitic incidents in Germany and the Netherlands have brought up different solutions. Some well known, some much more creative.

The German police last saturday chose not to act at all against a group of Muslim youngsters, afraid that any action on their behalf would only cause more violence. During an outdoor performance of a Jewish dance company in the city of Hannover, the Muslims had thrown a rain of stones on the group, shouting “Juden raus“.

The performance was immediately aborted and a day later two teenagers were arrested. They were part of a group of Libanese, Iranian en Palestinian Germans. According to the police, the violence is strongly related to the tensions in the middle East, especially between Israel and its neighbouring countries.

On several occasions, German Muslims  have used the very same anti-Semitic slogans the country remembers from the 1930’s. German politicians have expressed their concern, but no new solutions have been brought up.

That’s different in the small neighbour country the Netherlands, where the same kind of problems have arisen recently. To cope with them, Dutch parliament has asked for the deployment of nothing less than decoy Jews.

The rather unorthodox measure was asked for after a hidden-camera video showing Jews being harassed on the street in a Moroccan neighborhood of Amsterdam, had been broadcasted on public television. Undercover police officers wearing yarmulkes would have to provoke hate crimes against Jews.

Although discussion is still going on whether this would really help solving the problem, it is not the first time this kind of measure is considered in the Netherlands. Not long ago ago decoy gays were used to take care of violence against homosexuals.

Sylvie van der Vaart in Bavaria's Dutch Dress

Dutch brewer Bavaria immediately quit its latest campaign, after running into big trouble with the South African authorities. The campaign featured an orange dress that women were supposed to wear to support the Dutch soccer team.

During the first Dutch World Cup match against Denmark, Bavaria arranged for a group of pretty orange girls to cheer for the Dutch team in the Johannesburg soccer stadium. The international soccer federation FIFA – heavily sponsored by Budweiser – wasn’t pleased though. It convinced the local authorities to arrest 36 Dutch Dress-girls, two of whom will be brought to court next Tuesday.

Bavaria got what it wanted, especially after the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs officially complained about the arrests to the South African government. Of course Bavaria CEO Peer Swinkels has appologized to the girls, but at the same time he will be thrilled by all the attention his brand is getting out of this cheap little Dutch dress. His World Cup merchandise not only turned out to be the best in the field. What’s more important is that with it he has beaten all his other Dutch competitors in the fierce World Cup battle for the beer drinker. Moreover, the campaign has gotten so much attention abroad, (from Indonesia to Kansas City, from Sydney to Milan, even in Germany and everywhere else) that the world is right at Swinkels’s feet.

Football is war, as an old Dutch saying goes. But marketing is one big ambush, we know now. And the Bavaria Babes – in the cheapest campaign ever – have beaten the world.

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Image via Wikipedia

The results of today’s parliamentary elections have the promise of long and complex coalition talks. Although results are not yet final, everything looks like the Netherlands will need at least four different parties to form a majority coalition. The Dutch have a long tradition of coalition governments, but even for them this is extreme.

Although the exact formation is far from clear, it is more than certain that prime minister Jan Peter Balkenende is leaving the political stage. After leading four consecutive governments, “JP the MP” has led his Christian Democratic Party (CDA) to a historic loss. According to the first exit polls CDA is falling from 41 to 21 seats in parliament.

Exit polls (150 seats):

Liberals (VVD) 31

Labour (PvdA) 31

Extreme Right (PVV) 22

Christian Democrats (CDA) 21

Socialists (SP) 16

Green Party (GL) 11

Democrats (D66) 10

Christian Union (CU) 5

Dutch Reformed Party (SGP) 2

Animal Party (PvdD) 1

The turmoil around Facebook’s privacy policy seems to be a worldwide concern. But still, privacy is very much related to the history and culture of every single country – or even region. The very moment the national privacy settings are mixed up, people feel alienated.

The Netherlands, although a relatively liberal country, is highly privacy-sensitive. And much more so than countries like the United States or Libya. This became apparant right after last week’s plane crash near Tripoli, that killed more than a hundred people, 70 of whom were Dutch.

Not only the site where the plane crashed, but also the hospital where the sole survivor, a nine year old boy called Ruben, was treated, were easily accessible. Dutch journalists didn’t know what happened to them, but they all greeted the opportunity. So they had cameras in the hospital room, strolled through the personal belongings of the passengers, and interviewed Ruben at the moment he still was unaware of what exactly had happened.

Only to find out that their audiences weren’t ready for this kind of reporting. Leading newspaper De Telegraaf got loads of criticism from its readers because of the Ruben-interview, and the twitter account @telegraafboycot got thousands of followers before it was (temporarily) suspended. Public television station NOS had the same sort of reactions after broadcasting details that were considered too private by its audience. Politicians were unanimous in calling it hideous and loathsome.

Immediately after these incidents, Dutch journalism went back to “normal”. The only cameras at Ruben’s homecoming this weekend, had foreign logos.

Privacy is no math: what’s perfectly okay on CNN (even for Dutch viewers, that is), is still not accepted in Dutch media.

Local tv-reporter Bibi Telleman is at a music festival in Haarlem, the Netherlands. As every local reporter would do on a day like this, she tries to find out what the toilets look like. Although she is looking for the ladies’, she turns out to be at the men’s. That’s where she meets this American music lover.

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Bibi’s Translation: