Here is a transcript of the audio file.

Host: Jonar Nader good evening and how are you going to tease us tonight?

Jonar Nader: I thought we would do some more observations. I happened to be at a Japanese restaurant and they have these tables that you are supposed to take your shoes off and kneel at. But these days you don’t kneel anymore, they have actually dug a hole and you sit around the table with your legs dangling in the hole. Well I just have to ask what is the point. Why do you have to pretend you are on the floor when you are not really?

Host: Why not have a normal table?

Jonar Nader: That is what I am wondering but I guess it looks traditional to be on the floor.

Host: Japanese sleep on futons on the ground as well.

Jonar Nader: So all these sort of fakey things led me to think about restaurants with more. You know when they ever serve a meal someone always comes with a huge pepper grinder and always ask would you like some pepper. Well it is not a very expensive device so why don’t they leave one on every table.

Host: It is almost part of the act.

Jonar Nader: Just give us a small one.

Host: They do that with grated cheese at Italian restaurants

Jonar Nader: Yes, now they have electronic ones where they are battery operated. Actually, I was in a restaurant recently where the waiter had a humoungous looking thing on his wrist which looked liked a huge mobile phone device where he takes the order. It is the shape of things to come,wearing these large devices

Host: What does he do? He presses in or types in an order?

Jonar Nader: Yes, on his wrist is this huge thing the size of two mobile phones and he communicates to the kitchen and says no onion, hold the lettuce or whatever so he doesn’t have to run back.

Host: he also doesn’t have to remember what has been ordered.

Jonar Nader: Yes, and speaking of these fakey things like the hole in the floor that is not meant to be, I was in a church recently. Well in the good old days you used to light a candle, well now you just press a button and a light comes on and then automatically after 5 minutes goes off.

Host: Oh it’s not the same!

Jonar Nader: No!

Host: I think in some churches candles are a fire hazard.

Jonar Nader: True true, but it is funny to look at, I mean even when you are looking at the world of the internet and the web the symbols that we use now are old fashioned symbols so the button you press to dial a number is an old fashioned looking phone

Host: Yes it is too.

Jonar Nader: And the letter that comes through that says you have email looks like an envelope

Host: Yes that’s true.
Jonar Nader: So there will be kids of the future wondering what this boxed shaped thing with a V in middle is all about.

Host: That is international sign language is it.

Jonar Nader: Yes I guess.

Host: I don’t know about you but I’m never sure at the signs for men and women at toilets now. I’m never sure which one to walk into.

Host: I think the one with the dress is indicative of being the womens toilet.

Jonar Nader: Some of them now are very subtle and the swisher the hotel the fancier the device and you wonder because in the good old days the women were the ones with the bigger hips but I think the politically correct lobby tries to change all that.

Host: I like it better where is says either ladies or gents you knew where you were.

Jonar Nader: Have you noticed that in the US they are very iconic for example the white house is called the white house and the oval office is oval in shape, and the pentagon is a pentagon. Isn’t it an interesting society that they only name things by shape or colour.

Host: Yes but in New York everything is fourth street or eighth avenue everything goes by blocks doesn’t it. They are very pedantic.

I would love to learn why we name suburbs or states the way we do. Adelaide was queen Adelaide, Sydney was Lord Sydney, Victoria was Queen Victoria, but in America where would they get Oklahoma, or where would they get Tallahassee where did New York come from was that from York in England?

Jonar Nader: Why for example aren’t street names ever reset. Don’t they sometimes rename a street and then they have a fight on their hands.

Host: That’s right they do.

Jonar is the author of ‘How to Lose Friends and Infuriate People’, and ‘How to Lose Friends and Infuriate Your Boss’. He is on the world wide web. www.LoseFriends.com. Thank you Jonar.

Here is a transcript of the audio file.

Host: Jonar Nader good evening and what are your observations this week.

Jonar Nader: Remember the good old days when remotes for television sets came in, you would say to someone why don’t you use your remote control, oh its too hard, and they would walk up to the TV. Now it is the other way around. They are next to the TV but they still need a remote control they don’t know how to use the TV anymore.

Host: Have you ever checked into a hotel and tried to turn on the television set. IMPOSSIBLE!

Jonar Nader: The batteries are usually flat in the remote.

Host: Yes, and then you ring up to say I can’t turn on the television and she says see the on, off red switch at the base, yes, well turn if on!
She would get about 100 calls an hour about that wouldn’t she?

Jonar Nader: Speaking of TV and movies isn’t it painful when actors do things fake like they pretend to flick a light switch and you know it’s not right they are not doing it or they want to drink coffee and they are not really drinking it and sometimes the cup is empty, isn’t that obvious or they pick up some baggage at the train station and you think how could you have travelled all this distance and your baggage is so light.

Host: That is exactly right, and they will swig a cup of coffee and only take one sip out of it.

Jonar Nader: Yes I was watching ‘Faulty Towers’ for example and he snatched the cup out and you could tell it was empty and I thought how hard is it to put something in there.

Host: Also in movies, all grocery shopping bags seem to come with French bread and one bunch of carrots with leafy tops

Jonar Nader: That’s true there is always the French bread or the people who say I’ll just put the candles on, and you watch the studio lights dim slowly or when he says here I’ll find it and he’s reading a dictionary and he lands on the word in the dictionary in an instant. See I find that a little bit fake.

Host: Also it is very easy to land a plane provided there is someone in the control tower to talk you down.

Jonar Nader: What about in news rooms now when they say, ‘This is the 5 o’clock new break’ and I am more interested in the staff in the background, staff members who are supposedly on the phone.

Host: Yes I saw on channel 10 a tram go through Jennifer Hanson’s ear.

Jonar Nader: Oh really but I wonder if those people in the background are warned Don’t throw things at each other we are going to air, or if they are just extras who don’t know what they are doing.

Host: Remember in early television when a footballer was interviewed there were always the kids in the crowd at the back jumping up and down waving to home.

Jonar Nader: Yes well they do that now in the US, they have on CNN and others, maybe the morning show

Host: NBC today show they broadcast from on the street.

Jonar Nader: Yes and car ads, when will they stop revealing a car with a bedsheet

Host: Yes, it gets pulled away

Jonar Nader: How about ‘Voilà’, is there no other way of doing that?

What about the ads? First they tell you this diamond ring was $4000 now it’s $1200 and you think ‘my goodness how can anything be dropped by so much, who is losing all this money?’ then they say ‘no reasonable offer refused’. Well judging by that what would be ‘reasonable’ thereafter. Or what about the spray and wipe ads, they spray it and they wipe it and it’s pristine.

Host: and sparkles come off it.

Jonar Nader: Yes but just one easy application, no scrubbing

Host: and the rest of the surface is as dull as dishwater, but that one sweep, it is glorious all done with magic. Do you remember the chase in the movie the French Connection. There was a train crash in the French Connection, the Gene Hackman movie of 30 yrs ago and it looked very realistic until you find out from the director that they actually ran the film backwards in other words the trains were parting when they filmed it and then ran the film in reverse to make it look like a crash

Jonar Nader: What about the car ads where they say things like an amazing 29, 9, 90 or the incredible 24, 9, 90 or the unbelievable 32, 9, 90 or the unbeatable price. How can something be unbeatable when you flick the channel and you hear them say no offer will be refused and we will give you 10% off the difference.

Host: and don’t you hate things that are $1.99 wouldn’t you rather they were $2.

Jonar Nader: When will they give that up? How about you have ‘a full seven days’ to pay. What is a half seven days to pay?

How about ‘I saw it with my own eyes’, who else’s eyes could you have seen it with?

And finally at the petrol pumps, I am confused. We should have a standard colour code. I fill unleaded so when I go into a Shell it is yellow but when I go into a Mobil the pump is red.

Host: You really have to think twice before you pump your car. You have to read if it is leaded or unleaded, LRG or diesel.

Host: Jonar Nader is the author of ‘How to Lose Friends and Infuriate Your Boss’.

Here is a transcript of the audio file.

Host: Hello Jonar have you been to dinner?

Jonar Nader: Yes I’ve been to Tapenyaki. A bit of sushi and a bit of lovely food. The guy in front was doing his typical, catch this, open your mouth let me throw an egg in it. I don’t like that stuff they end up messing up your shirt.

Host: Do you like sitting around the stove? There are some Japanese restaurants where you sit around the stove.

Jonar Nader: Yes it’s all a lot of fuss and nonsense.

Host: Can I be serious for a moment. You’d be devastated by the assassination of the ex prime minister of Lebanan wouldn’t you.

Jonar Nader: Horrid isn’t it. Whatever can you do and I keep saying to people. Don’t think that is the only place it can happen I am so scared because it can happen anywhere and that is why I need us to get tougher; our law enforcement needs to be refined, our police officers and intelligence officers really need to be trained so they are gentlemen who aren’t egotistical who can snap and make decisions quickly, but I worry really because we can sink.

Host: We can sink but how can you predict these atrocities?

Jonar Nader: You can’t predict the atrocity but you can look at what makes them, what ignites them, what inflames them and where the thin edge of the wedge is. For example you see a kid who holds up a supermarket with a gun and he gets off on a good behaviour bond. I’d hang him in the city square. You have to watch how you develop a society of tolerance to the idiots.

Host: I’d like to see hard labour reintroduced for certain criminals

Jonar Nader: People need to feel safe at home and they don’t and we say we have a thing called the gun ban and you are not allowed to have weapons but you can – any idiot who wants a gun can get it and then you are terrorized and what can you do about it? I just think we need tougher law enforcement but the trouble is that to give more ammunition as in legal and moral ammunition to police you start to worry about their corrupt nature and how it corrupts them because corruption is rife. I’m just saying let’s build a solid infrastructure and whip fast, be fast, act fast.

Host: I should explain that Jonar is Lebanese by birth but what topic did you have tonight Jonar.

Jonar Nader: I thought I would talk to you about some social issues and also some technological issues. Have you heard of the visual radio?

Host: No

Jonar Nader: Well you know on the mobile phones today you have games on them and cameras and music players, well next obviously you can listen to radio, imagine in another 2 or 3 years people could be listening to us and this second I could say hands up those who think Madonna is the best singer in the world press No.3 and in an instant we could see who agrees with me or disagrees with you. Or if you have a competition running or if something happens like a Tsunami, instead of talking about it on radio you could send a picture of it to everyone’s cell phone. It is called visual radio and I think we will see more in that and we will have to start thinking about how we can use it much like we already broadcast through the net and some stations have a webcam like ABC stations, for example, so they can watch the host, but I think it will be more interactive.

The next thing I want to tell you about is, remember last year I told you that the Chinese authorities shut down 700 websites and arrested over 200 people in relation to Porn, well only recently they have shut down 12,000 net cafès because they are saying the internet cafès are open to kids, it’s too near school, kids can have access to information, and the Chinese government is very strict on anything that corrupts their society. Now my book is being printed in China because they are the only place that could do it and they asked me, ‘Do you have anything in the book that says anything about the Dalai Lama, the such and such political party and Taiwan?’ because if it did they won’t do it.

I will leave you with a final thought. They had a survey of 2000 advertising executives and researchers from around the world and asked them what are the worlds most trusted brands. It would be interesting to ask our listeners what brand they really trust, that they know if they buy it, it will work to begin with, and if unforeseen things happen they will be looked after. Well this survey found that Apple has reached the top spot as the most trusted brand. Google, strangely enough, because they are really a service provider on the internet, a search engine, people seem to trust Google. Ikea, starbucks coffee and number 5 for the most amazing one is ALJAZEERA. People are saying we trust Aljazeera to give us the other side of the story.

Host: This is Arab TV

Jonar Nader: Yes, and they also provide internet casting and news services from perhaps another perspective. Interestingly on the Asia Pacific list we have the typical Sony, Samsung, Toyota etc. Lonely Planet which is a publishing house comes in at number 5 and Qantas at number 9 but nudie drinks at number 10 have you heard of those, apparently they are just good juices.

Host: We might open the lines to the brands that you respect and trust, that could be cars, sweets, food.

Host: When we were young you would always trust anything in the kitchen made by Sunbeam, Kraft, Kellogs all very trusted brands.

Jonar Nader: The other thing to consider is what the brand is associated with as far as geography is concerned. For example how would you like a motor vehicle made in Jamaica, you would say no way I want one made in Germany and if I said how would you like Coffee made in Germany you might prefer the coffee made in Jamaica.

Host: Isn’t it funny how there is a spot for every product that is associated with these products. So if you say I’ve got some chocolate for you from Belgium you know it would be the best in the world.

Jonar Nader: Sure rather than saying Iran but if you said I have some Caviar from Iran then Oh yes. Yes it is amazing, the Middle east is very good with Nougat and certain sweets.

Host: Thank you Jonar

Below is a transcript of the audio file.

Host: Jonar Nader author of ‘How to Lose Friends and Infuriate Your Boss’. Hi Jonar

Jonar Nader: Hi Bruce. I thought we would do some more observations tonight.

Host: Good.

Jonar Nader: On a movie ticket I read, ‘entry only with a valid ticket’. I wonder, are there people who truly expect to enter with an ‘invalid’ ticket and has it happened so much that they have to have a meeting to decide to print it on the ticket? What about in the court room when they say ‘beyond reasonable doubt’, whatever happened to ‘beyond ALL doubt’. Here’s something that makes me cringe; when I hear parents talk about ‘putting him down’, or Johnny wouldn’t ‘go down’. I always think of animals being killed.

I was playing Pictionary with my young niece and she could not draw one of the terms. She had no concept of the term ‘self-service station’. She could not quite comprehend what that meant because every station for her is a SELF service station, as opposed to service station. The other thing she couldn’t understand was the term ‘full steam ahead’. The steam engine is not part of her experience. Neither is the phrase ‘jump the gun’, because at athletics events these days, they have an aerosol can with a horn – so should we say ‘jump the can’ or ‘jump the whistle’!

We know what a ‘bachelor’ is but what is a ‘confirmed bachelor’?

Don’t you have misunderstandings when you knock on someone’s door and you are not sure if they said ‘come in’, or ‘coming’.

Host: Let me give you one, the word ‘re-sign’ and ‘resign’ it’s the same spelling but a big difference.

Jonar Nader: Yes and you watch actors who are being interviewed about the new film out and someone always asks them what the director like to work for, and they always have glowing reports.

Host: Yes, yes!

Jonar Nader: And what is a director’s cut? I would have thought that when I am going to see a film that is directed by so and so, I will be getting that director’s cut. Yet 3 months later you get ‘the director’s cut’!

Host: What is the director’s cut? I guess it is the longer version of the movie, with all the bits that were dropped for the cinema release.

Jonar Nader: What about, do you ever feel inadequate when you are watching a movie and they flash words on the screen, and you are reading them but you only get half way and they go off.

Host: Oh I hate that.

Jonar Nader: It makes me wonder if I’m a slow reader or what?

Host: You are talking about foreign movies with translations, and then at the end they say, ‘Jonar Nader was sentenced to 12 months and he now works as a warden….’, and it’s off the screen before you can read it.

Jonar Nader: Don’t you love friends who know dates by the month. They say, ‘Back in 1962, in June I met so and so…’, How do you know that?

Host: Or they say, ‘Do you know Frank? He was married to Patricia, but then she broke it off…’, and this whole string of people you just can’t stand!

Jonar Nader: and they know the dates. If they don’t, they’ll wait there 3 minutes while they’re trying to remember. You say, ‘It doesn’t matter I don’t know Bruce anyway’.

Finally, I don’t know how people understand and remember words to songs. They can sing along to any song that comes on radio and I feel inadequate again. I mean I can’t even decipher the words let alone remember them.

Host: Oh yes, but you are tone deaf.

Jonar Nader: Probably.

Host: What about reading instructions to put something together. It is the hardest thing possible.

Jonar Nader: I was baking a cake. I bought the one that said ‘Easy’, but still I got stuck on point 2. I asked my sister for help. She said, ‘Oh you are so silly, let me do it. Then she had to admit, ‘Yes you are right. This is very confusing’.

Host: Jonar Nader on the web at www.losefriends.com

Here is a transcript of the audio file.

Host: Jonar good evening

Jonar Nader: Hi Bruce

Host: Now on the internet you are lifting the lid on some scams.

Jonar Nader: Well we do keep reminding our listeners for their sake that they should be careful not to give-out information and not to fall for the ‘hello this is bank can you please remind us of all your details’, because so many people have been burnt to the tune of millions of dollars. But there are new scams now and I just want our listeners to be careful yet again. If you receive an email that says you have won the lottery you would really have to be balmy to believe it. And so people think wow how much did I win? 13,000 dollars? Fantastic can I have the money? Yep sure, just prove to me that your name is Bruce Mansfield. How do I do that?
Send me a photocopy of your passport and your drivers license and give me more and more information that would help me later to ring up your bank and say hello this is Bruce Mansfield. Can I prove it. Sure I’ll give you my passport number.

And so this constant never ending scamming, and the incessant belief of people that they have won something. Now there is a new one:

They say ‘we have a competition, roses are red violets are blue what comes next?’ You think, ‘I know, I’ll send it in and I might win something’ – yes you too could win a car. And people plug things in and then all of a sudden you are the winner out of a million and same old story all over again. It is just endless and all I can say to people is ‘Don’t do it’.

What about the man who is from a reputable company, a reputable salesman. He told people that google is going public, ‘how would you like to buy google shares?’ That is tantamount to you saying the ABC is going public how would you like to buy shares, because I know you so well I’m going to let you buy them cheaply early before everyone else, so we think well that’s OK that’s not insider trading. I could go on all night about scams, in fact websites are full of them. I just hope our listeners never get tempted to press a button.

Host: Is there a fear where you are paying bills over the phone via your credit card that you are giving those details to anyone other than the people who should get them.

Jonar Nader: So long as you do not click someone else’s link. If you want to go to your bank and pay you type in bank.com, you type it in. Do not accept someone else’s email saying by the way your electricity bill is overdue please click here and process it, because now they can be scamming you and give you a page that looks precisely like your banks page and you won’t know the difference. So never on-click from someone else saying click here. Go to the web URL up the top and type in your own, that is much safer

Host: I got a letter in the mail this past week telling me I had won a lottery somewhere in Peru or Bolivia so send $75. They have been around for years and years.

Jonar Nader: Well they have become more aggressive now by saying my uncle died with 20 million dollars in the bank, can you help me get it out and I will give you half. That is still going on to the tune of millions of emails a day. There is also a new one that says I know someone who doesn’t like you and they have paid us to knock you off so just send us $12,000 we’ll call the hit man off and we have the software to prove that if you forward this onto the authorities you’ll be in trouble.

Host: That is aweful!

Jonar Nader: Oh yes very serious stuff.

Host: Thanks for the warning Jonar.

Here is a transcript of the audio file.

Host: Jonar Nader, good evening, what are we talking about?

Jonar Nader: I just thought a bit of a technology round-up this time. I was interested in how people put masks on and go into banks and steal things and in the good ol days they put on the door little stickers with colours to help you know how tall the thief was, then they put the bullet proof glass, and then they put cameras but now none of that is any good so I think that pretty soon we will have the x-ray camera, the camera that will see right through you so that we can have a pattern of your bones for potential police line ups and proof in court. They just have to work out what that would do to you because of the rads that would go through you. It is not very healthy to have x-rays.

Then there is this other thing which is the lockable revolving door. In Britain you have many buildings with revolving doors, well they are larger now and they are single entry meaning you go in and you are in your quarter and your quarter stops until you can be identified until you put a ticket into the turnstile until you give us retina scan or finger print etc so that the old notion of the piazza or plaza or cosmopolitan centre even the Realto might change now. We don’t necessarily want people to come in and join the fun unless they are identified. So this fortification process, the slowing down of entr. That only came to mind because I went to see the Edinborough Military Tattoo.

How about this new technology where they have just invented something called the ‘visible light networking’. Normally networks and radio lines and computer lines are either fibre optic or cable, but now through light pulses (which is obviously what laser can do and what fibre optics does) but light pulses from your car headlights can soon be sending information through the internet, so there will be flickering perhaps in an ultraviolet way or in a colour you can’t see, and that is how cars can be connected to the world rather than relying on these horrible radio networks that just keep cutting out, and if anyone calls you from a mobile phone, you know what I mean.

Finally I thought I’d turn you attention to the notion that in the good ol days people bought computers based on reliability based on robustness, connectivity, now it’s to do with coolness and colour and fashion. So Chanel and Dior and Cartier are no longer the things kids judge themselves by. It’s more to do with the gadgets that we have. No one cares about the technical aspects, it’s got to look cool, it’s got to look good in the colour range and in the odd shapes.

Host: Thank you for that Jonar.