Cher, Woman's World and the Daily Fail

Cher's new video for her single "Woman's World" was launched exclusively on the Mail Online website, the electronic version of the Daily Mail.

I, along with many other gay men, have been a huge fan of Cher since the late 80s. Who can forget the infamous video (and leather outfit) from the video for "If I Could Turn Back Time", her Oscar-winning performance in "Moonstruck" or the phenomenon that was "Believe", her very successful foray into dance music?

All this time, Cher has been a great supporter for both gay rights and women's rights, as seen in this hilarious (and serious) advert for women's reproductive rights with Kathy Griffin.

This makes it all the more surprising her new video appeared on the Mail Online's website.

For an example of the Mail Online's attitude to gay people and their relationships, Jan Moir's article published after Stephen Gately's sudden death is a pretty shocking example.

A poor young man is barely cold, his partner (Andrew Cowles) and his family are in grief, and the knife goes in - heartless speculation about the cause of death, and the snide implication that he (or his gayness) were somehow at fault.

Later comes the baffling phrase "Another real sadness about Gately's death is that it strikes another blow to the happy-ever-after myth of civil partnerships". This seems to be saying that gay people can't be happy in relationships, and the existence of civil partnerships just pretends otherwise. Of course, sane people know that both straight and gay relationships can be happy or unhappy and quite a lot of them end because of the death of one of the parties involved (as did my own, but that's a blog post for later).

To use the death of a young man to tarnish the relationships of thousands of people is just vile. The British people certainly thought so, because this odious article generated 22,000 complaints in a single weekend to the Press Complaints Commission, more than they had received in the previous 5 years.

The Mail's record on sexism is no better. If you check out the pictures on the right hand side of each article (known to Brits as the "sidebar of shame") you'll quickly learn that while men are reported on for their achievements, women are only reported on for either losing or gaining a large amount of weight (sometimes the subject of such an article will be approvingly described as "celebrating her curves"), for being pregnant ("baby bump" is a favoured term on the site) or for going out in public after a breakup.

The Mail Online is also pretty well-known for its hypocrisy - it laments the sexualisation of young people yet it sees fit to describe children of celebrities with words such as "leggy".

While I was delighted to see Cher's new video, I sent her a tweet expressing concern that it had premiered on such a homophobic and anti-women website and I was very pleased to receive a response.

The purpose of this blog post isn't to bash Cher. It seemed from her response to my tweet she wasn't aware of the nature of the Mail Online website, and had she known more about it, she may have chosen to place her new video elsewhere. I hope that next time, that's what she does.

PS I'm of course loathe to link to the Mail Online, but felt it necessary here to provide an example.

444 cups and the truth - 1 year with the Jura Impressa J9 TFT superautomatic coffee machine

I love coffee and I love gadgets. I first heard of Jura superautomatic (bean-to-cup) coffee machines about 10 years ago, when I saw an Impressa F90 demoed in Selfridges. I liked the concept of filling a machine with beans and water and getting coffee at the push of a button, but the price put me off. I was worried that I wouldn't get my money's worth out of it. This is exactly what happened with the Philips Senseo machine and the Nespresso machine which followed. The Senseo machine languishes in a cupboard while the Nespresso machine has been freecycled.

Then, last July, I turned 40. I thought I'd mark the occasion with a new toy. Given that a motorbike or convertible might be considered unseemly at such an age, I wondered if now might be the time to bite the bullet and get a Jura machine.

I'd done some research (there are loads of YouTube videos about coffee machines of all kinds), so I was familiar with the current range. One trip to the Jura concession at Harrods and just over £1,500 later, I ended up getting the Jura Impressa J9 TFT. The TFT refers to the LCD display on the machine which provides a clear display of information and prompts. This machine is what's known as a one-touch machine; with the press of one button, the machine froths milk and then adds coffee without further intervention from the user - you don't even have to move the cup.

A benefit of Jura machines is customisability. For each drink the machine can make (espresso, coffee, cappuccino and latte macchiato) you can program the amount of coffee the machine grinds and the amount of water used to brew the coffee. For milk drinks, you can specify the length of time the machine steams milk for. Once you've done this, it is literally a case of putting a cup under the spout, connecting the milk hose to the milk frother and pushing a button. Every time, you get the same excellent result - the milk froth produced by this machine is absolutely outstanding - really fine, dense foam instead of the soapy, large-bubbled froth other machines produce.

The convenience of this machine plus the quality and consistency of the drinks produced is the upside.

The downside is that this machine, in common with all superautomatic coffee machines, needs a lot of regular maintenance. Every day, you have to slide out the drip tray and the used grounds container, dump the coffee grounds and rinse everything out to remove any coffee grounds and coffee oils. That's no more than a two-minute job. The machine has a sensor in the drip tray so that if it gets too full, the machine alerts you with a message on the screen - there's no risk of making another drink and flooding your kitchen counter.

If you're making milk-based drinks, you also have to clean the milk frother every day with a special cleaning solution which is available from Jura for £20 for a litre. The TFT display gives you full instructions (as it does for all maintenance tasks); you make up a cleaning solution of 200ml water and 15ml cleaning solution, put the milk hose in it and run a milk-cleaning program. The cleaning solution is drawn through the machine which removes any milk residue and then clean water is drawn through to rinse it.

Cleaning the milk frother in this way is essential. If you don't, the machine punishes you with tepid, unfrothed milk. Having used the machine for a year, I've found that the best approach is to clean the milk frother first thing in the morning, before making the first drink of the day. It only takes a few minutes and it beats the disappointment of a flat cappuccino.

The machine also needs to be cleaned regulary - in the year I've had the machine, I've been prompted to run the cleaning cycle 5 times. The cycle is completely automatic - you just put in a cleaning tablet (again, from Jura - £12.50 for six) and the machine churns and sloshes for twenty minutes and then you're back in business.

The other supplies this machine needs are water filters - in one year I've used 6 of them. Again, these are available from Jura at about £13 each. Although Jura's marketing materials all state that if you use water filters there is no need to ever descale the machine, I was advised by a Jura representative that the machine should still be descaled once per year. This again is automatic and requires descaling tablets from Jura (£16.95 for 3 doses).

So, over the course, of the year, owning this machine has cost me about £130 in running costs (milk cleaning solution, water filters and cleaning tablets) before factoring in the cost of the milk and coffee used. This figure slightly understates the annual costs, because you get one free water filter and two cleaning tablets with the machine. Jura quote that a milk-based drink costs about 20p to take with this machine, which is way less than you'd pay in a coffee shop, but given the cost of the machine, it's a long time before you'd be in profit.

For me, the upside of quality milk-based coffee drinks outweighs the hassle and cost of the maintenance this machine requires. In fact, I'd say that after having this machine a few months, I liked it, but now after a year, I love it. If you're considering a superautomatic coffee machine, check out the J9 TFT, but keep in mind it's the Mercedes of home coffee machines, and just like a Mercedes, it needs a lot of maintenance to keep it running properly.