Sharing Your Dinner: Food and social media

Some New York restaurants are banning diners from taking photos of plates of food and from using flash photography. Among the reasons for instituting this ban are the distractions caused to other diners from flashes and the fact that the photos may not do justice to the chef's grand creations. The assumption with the latter is that the photos will, within a flash of flash, be plastered over social media: "foodstagramming" with Instagram.

There are other reasons why a diner should be less than rapid in whipping out the phone and snapping away. The diner who, for example, insists on getting up from the table and framing the shot is likely to look like a complete berk, but is there a wider issue we need to consider? That berkdom has taken hold on a universal scale. Why is there such a need to take photos of every damn thing we encounter?

In social media land, photomania is all part of a newly discovered human trait of sharing. It is sharing of the remote variety, not just because of the mode of communication but also because it doesn't involve sharing anything of any value. Sharing, caring social networkers will happily share a photo of a plate of steak and chips, but what else would they share? How about their home? Their wife? Their oxen? Or their neighbour's oxen? Or their well-endowed bank account? Social networking is sharing-lite, sharing that assuages conscience for otherwise not sharing, sharing for the typically and normally selfish, which is quite understandable. I mean, I'm not about to share my bank account with anyone else, even if it were well-endowed.

Social media have tapped into the latent, dormant human characteristic of displaying sociability via sharing. They are a get-out clause for the hoggish and offer a hands-off amelioration for selfishness, but by the same token they are equatable to other definitions of selfishness - egotism and narcissism. Or just plain and simple showing-off and braggadocio. Which brings us to food.

"Oh look, here I am in a Michelin-starred restaurant and this is the plate of minimalist, vastly overpriced, nouveau nosh that has set me back 70 quid." Even such self-deprecation cannot disguise the fact of the Michelin-starred restaurant. I'm here; you're not. Lol. Of course, it would be unlikely that the caring, sharing foodstagrammer would stoop to self-deprecation, because this would undermine one of the principal reasons for foodstagramming. The showing-off.

Not all of it is. Some of it is even justifiable, though to be honest, I can't think of a terribly good justification, other, I suppose, than it possibly being good publicity for the restaurant. But if it is good publicity, and not all restaurant owners are as against photography as some in New York, then how about they give a discount on the bill? Why should I, you or anyone potentially increase a restaurant's custom without getting something by way of return?

There is, though, the other side of all this foodstagramming. The downside side. "Oh look, here I am in Restaurant X with this pile of shit that they reckon is going to cost me 20 quid. They can reckon it, but I ain't paying. Would you?" Cue comments such as "no bloody fear" plus several recommendations and curious likes of the unliked. Oh, and some sharing.

And what of the potential for malevolence? The strategically placed dog turd next to the sausage, for instance. "If you don't give me a free meal, this goes straight to Trip Advisor, sucker." This would be an extreme case, I'd grant you, but there are those who might well contemplate scraping up the remains of Fido's dinner from the street and placing it by the rasher of bacon.

Scams that tourists try on in Mallorca's restaurants and bars are legendary. There really ought to be a manual that the tourism ministry compiles and hands out to all owners, just in case they haven't fallen foul of one of the many. And now, foodstagramming can be added to the manual. For every genuinely altruistic sharer of pork wrapped in cabbage, for every egotistical, five-starrer sharer with a serving of gold-encrusted lobster with hoopoe vomit sauce infused with nitroglycerin, there will be the snidey, pikey bill-non-payer who comes into an establishment with a bag of tricks with which to pull a trick and impregnate a potato with it.

Sharing? Don't just ban photos in bars and restaurants. Ban the phones.


Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

I’ll Take You To Burn

Well it’s one way of getting around some of the environmental problems, I suppose. Set fire to stuff. Not that I am suggesting that there was any malicious intent, but part of Albufera was smoking yesterday, flames fanned by the fierce winds that caused a fair amount of havoc across the island: 72 kilometres per hour was registered in Puerto Pollensa. Whatever the strength, it was strong enough, especially taking to the exposed coast road from Alcúdia.

Fire. For a place with a fair amount of wood, Mallorca seems to fare reasonably well in the fire stakes. Compared with other Mediterranean islands, Corsica for example, it gets away quite lightly. There again, Corsica is one great big inland forest and mountain range: an obliging and inviting target for some pyromaniac. Frightening as well, as was the time when staying on the south of the island and the flames were to be seen on the hills above the town. At least, unlike in other places, we were not evacuated to the only really safe place – the beach.

It was in Corsica that I first became aware of the Canadair water-bombing planes, and also of the hero status the local people grant the pilots. Familiar though the Canadair planes are that fly from the Puerto Pollensa base, there is not the same cult attached to the pilots as there is in Corsica. Nevertheless, it can be a seriously dangerous job.

Fire of another sort is that of bars and restaurants, houses and hotels. Every season some restaurant goes up. All that sizzling oil flying around it’s not really surprising. And in houses and flats one of the more likely causes of fire is the butane installation, or a faulty one at least. I have a cooker that runs off butane: it must be coming up for its periodic check. These checks though can be the source of a scam and/or rip-off. Back in the summer this chap pitched up at the gate. Went through the whole spiel. I knew exactly where he was coming from. He would do an inspection and, irrespective of whether any work was needed, would set about doing it and then trouser a goodly sum. It has happened to people I know. Anyway, as he was kind enough to speak in English, I told him kindly enough in English to piss off, which he did, only to come back the next day when I told him the same. No deterring some folk.


QUIZ
Yesterday – “These Are The Days Of Our Lives”, Queen. Today’s title – line from which crazy ‘60s record?

(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)

A Royal Scam

THIS IS A PUBLIC INFORMATION ANNOUNCEMENT - WARNING, WARNING!!

Restaurant: Las Sirenas in the Paseo in Puerto Alcúdia. Couple having a meal. Another couple finish meal, join the first couple to enjoy a drink together. Innocent enough?

The couple that joined the first couple finish drink. Then go. Bill for their meal?

First couple is presented with a 50 euro ticket.

First couple doesn’t have to pay after intervention of other diners.

Watch out. Perhaps I’ll give details of what they look like. Listen up, lowlife, there’s always some stroppy bastard on the Internet who’ll get you. Watch out.


Meantime, which country can lay claim to having the worst tourists?

No prizes for guessing it’s the Brits. But, one of this blog’s favourites, Jeremy Clarkson (a favourite because he knows how to rant; really, he doesn’t play at it, he does it) disputes this. The Russians, he reckons. To give you a flavour, he finishes his piece in “The Sunday Times” thus: “A lout from Liverpool may vomit on you and that’s nasty. But a Russian would happily garnish your pizza with a dash of polonium.”

In recognition of this contribution to fraternal tourist diplomacy, I’ve linked “The Times” site.

Pop Quiz: JK’s Spanish hit was “Una Paloma Blanca”. Today’s title is stretching it a bit. But we’re back to a previous Pop Quiz band. Who did “A Royal Scam”?

(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)