The Late Show - Information Provision By Town Halls

All too frequently, our favourite newspaper contains too much that is irrelevant or an exercise in egoism, unrelated to Mallorca; too much that is space-filling and too much that lacks literacy; too much half-baked "celebritism" with the same unter-celebs. But, as I have said before on this blog, there is one element of "The Bulletin" that can be deserving of some attention - the letters. Not the lengthy tomes of self-aggrandisement and self-promotion, of which there are some, but those which highlight issues on the island. I referred to one yesterday. Here is another - one criticising the provision of information via the internet. The point is well made; the island can ill afford inaccurate information or an absence of information if it is serious in exploiting the internet to bolster tourism. The writer, in this instance, cites the wrong date given for an event in Calvia later this year on the town hall's site. Perhaps one should be grateful that they have even bothered to flag up something that doesn't take place for several months. All too often, information does not appear until events are all but happening - if it appears at all, or in English.

One only has to think about the provision of information about Sant Antoni programmes in the various towns to get a feel for how this information is given out. Two town halls - Sa Pobla and Pollensa - have been speedier than others, yet in the case of the latter, it has ignored what might be occurring in the port area. Not for the first time, there is a legitimate beef with the ivory tower of the town hall some eight kilometres distant from Puerto Pollensa. The activities may not be as grand and as numerous as in the old town, but activities there still are.

In the case of Muro, the information finally appeared on the town hall's site, yet they had made much of the poster for Sant Antoni. This had been posted previously, minus any actual information. Who cares? The impression one forms is that too great an emphasis is placed on making it all look pretty rather than giving over the hard facts as to what's going on.

An argument that is made - by the town halls - is that programmes are not always completed until roughly a week before events are staged. This is almost always rubbish. To give an example. In 2008, information for Alcúdia's fair was handed to me nearly three weeks before the fair. It helps to have the odd mole lurking. The information was exactly as it was officially given, two weeks later. Even if an update is required, what's to stop them doing so? But chances are that updates there will not be. A point to bear in mind is that for programmes to be printed, there have to be lead times. The actual information will have been nailed down many days, if not weeks, before the programmes actually appear. However, the information is not always clear. In Alcúdia, the information about the bonfires for Antoni and Sebastià refers to bars at the front of which are what seem to be "official" bonfires. Where are all these bars? Is it not possible to give an address? Not even the local Mallorcans know the location of every damn bar in town.

Another writer to the paper pointed out, a while back, that nowhere did there seem to be information about Palma's Sant Sebastià fiesta. Again, it was a valid gripe, especially for an event that the Palma authorities themselves had said needed to be promoted internationally. That was, what, two, three years ago? They seem to have forgotten that.

The real reason for the tardiness with which much information is made available lies with late-minute "grandstanding" and a love of making grandiloquent statements, released officially to the press, about the latest fiesta. These are supported by lavish printed programmes, the economics of which should be, but never seem to be, questioned. The keepers of the fiesta information release it when it suits them, and in a way that suits them, and not in a way that helps the general and tourism publics.

And having finally made the information available, is there a programme for an international audience? In English? All too rarely. Some material in the exotic programmes is printed in Castilian as well as Catalan, but usually it is just the latter. What is stopping them from posting a simple programme translated into English? A reason for this may lie with the fact that the English is so poor. A recent report into standards of English at the university in Palma, where many students take tourism, was damning. And where English is used, it is often wrong. This is inexcusable. Even the Balearic Government's tourism website is riddled with bad English, and one can thank "The Bulletin" for drawing attention to this when it was lifting - verbatim - stuff about beaches from that site.

Late information, inaccurate information, information that is not in the international language. The island's tourism authorities talk a good game when it comes to the use of the internet, but they - be they government, town halls or others - just don't seem to get it; that information is the most important element of what they can offer both over the internet and in print. What one gets instead are highly designed PDFs, but also shoddiness and sloppiness in the core of what has to be conveyed - that information.


As something of a footnote. I know of no-one, British, German, Mallorcan or whoever, who refers to Sant Antoni as anything but Sant Antoni. The Catalan is used by everyone, not even a Castilian alternative is used, and certainly not an anglicised name. So why does "The Bulletin" insist on calling it Saint Anthony?


Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.