Talk:Dubai

Archiving

Unless anyone has any objections, I'd like to go ahead and archive these discussions, since the talk page has become difficult to navigate. If there are active discussions, please let me know, and I'll hold off archiving until the discussions are complete. I plan to start archiving this page on 7/18. Thanks AreJay (talk) 05:41, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

GDP

Dubai's gross domestic product needs to be updated, Dubai's GDP in 2005 was 37 billion or something like it, so why we shoudnt update it ???

Nabil rais2008 (talk) 08:54, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

I suppose what's preventing us at present is a reference. I had a quick look just now, but the sources I found all spoke about percentages. Could you try and find a recent reference? I'd suggest it should be from a respected newspaper or magazine (or their website, naturally!) For what it's worth, I had a quick look at Khaleej Times and Arabian Business: the former had figures for 2004 (and projections for 2009, but we should avoid those), and the latter only dealt with percentage growth.

Cheers, TFOWR^{This flag once was red} 09:29, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

I've tried before to find updated figures, but i found nothing. I think the latest figure was the 2005 figure. Mainly all i found were estimates for the 2010 figure, which is when their will be a nation wide UAE census. --MoHasanie  Talk  19:54, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Well i have found the figures but they are in Dirhams as well as it is an expected figure for 2010.

Nabil rais2008 (talk) 10:58, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Dirhams is fine, but we need actuals, not projections - so 2008 would be fine, but not 2010. We could add the 2010 projections to the current actuals, however. Something like "Dubai's GDP in 2001 was X; it is expected to be Y in 2010".

Getting back to Dirhams, I'd argue that that's the best currency to use - but we should also convert to US dollars (and/or Euros?), using the exchange rate applicable at the time of the survey - e.g. for 2001 GDP we'd use 2001's Dirham/Dollar exchange rate.

Cheers, TFOWR^{This flag once was red} 15:05, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

It doesn't quite work that way with many Middle Eastern economies. Currency is usually "pegged" against the US dollar at a set rate, which doesn't change. In the UAE's case, 1 US$ is approximately 3.675 AED. Adjusting historic financial data for inflation is a different issue though. As far as projections are concerned, I'm fine, pending validation of the source of the projections. I agree that the sentence should be structured along the lines suggested by TFOWR ("As of 2008, the GDP was...and is projected to be...in 2010."). AreJay (talk) 17:31, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Panorama

The pannorama is outdated, there should be an updated panorama of Dubai, as of now Burj Dubai is close to its completion and is fully claded as well and some other skyscrapers which have to date risen above are not present in this panorama. The heading wont work wiht out content regarding it !

Nabil rais2008 (talk) 19:06, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

Wrong Flag

The picture of UAE flag is wrong. Please correct it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 220.225.111.1 (talk) 11:32, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

That's the Dubai flag, not the UAE flag. It is correct. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.96.194.146 (talk) 11:38, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Collapse of dubai's economy?

There was an article in NYT and a photography feature in Fast Company.. read this:

“ Today, an estimated 50% of the slated developments are frozen or canceled. Banks have stopped lending. Housing prices fell 41% in the first quarter of 2009 and are expected to drop to preboom levels. The stock market has plunged 70% from its peak. And people across the socioeconomic spectrum are being laid off -- and fleeing -- in droves. But even fleeing is harder than it sounds: When foreigners, who once made up perhaps 80% of Dubai's 1.7 million residents, lose their jobs, their work visas are rescinded and they generally have 30 days to pay their debts and leave. Those who fail to pay risk debtor's prison. And debt here is now as deep and ubiquitous as the sand itself. ”

I completely defer to the judgment of this article's contributors and won't be making any edits to the article proper, but I would like to see this mentioned more prominently - at least in the Developments page. Obviously those articles are rather one-sided and the whole world has been hit by the recession, but Dubai's fall seems particularly spectacular. It would be great if people inside the country could offer their perspectives here on the talk page to gauge whether this story has merit. .froth. (talk) 00:55, 13 September 2009 (UTC)

you realize if people inside the country confirm this they'll be deported or imprisoned right?159.83.54.99 (talk) 00:17, 6 December 2009 (UTC)

There is also an article in the Independant about it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by The Mysterious Gamer (talk • contribs) 19:18, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

Reassesment?

I think this article deserves a reassesment. It is certainly not a C-class article. --MoHasanie  Talk  15:45, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

C sounds about right to me. Read Wikipedia:WikiProject_Dubai/Assessment#Quality_scale .froth. (talk) 19:46, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Dubai Panorama

I found this panorama of Dubai Creek, and i think that its gives a good view of the city.

A panoramic view of Dubai Creek

Dubai Foreign Policy index

Could someone please add this sentence into the article. I'm not sure where to put it.

Dubai is ranked 27th among global cities by Foreign Policy's 2008 Global Cities Index.

New montage needed?

The Dubai Picture montage is heavily outdated, plus it doesn't shows the most important landmarks of the city. Please update it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.185.98.197 (talk) 17:02, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Dubai Emirate vs. Dubai Municipality

I noticed that the page on the actual city/municipality of Dubai is very sparse. It has no infobox, and lists neither the city's population or area in square kilometers. But, this article actually seems to switch between refering to the area as the emirate and then the "region" or city. For instance:

According to the census conducted by the Statistics Center of Dubai, the population of the emirate was 1,422,000 as of 2006, which included 1,073,000 males and 349,000 females.[60]

The region covers 497.1 square miles (1,287.4 km2).

When it says "the region covers 497.1 square miles" are the article obviously isn't talking about the emirate, but it leaves one to wonder if that is the size of the city proper/municipality, or if you are then talking about the metropolitan area. We need it explained somewhere on the page the difference in population and land area between the municipality, the metropolitan area, and then the emirate. --Criticalthinker (talk) 11:59, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Anyone? This is an important distinction that needs to be made if there is a difference between the city and state. --Criticalthinker (talk) 11:50, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Controversy

Please read this article from the independent. http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/the-dark-side-of-dubai-1664368.html?a=1 This Arab state is not all glitter and gold. This article desperately needs a controversy section. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.254.52.68 (talk) 19:04, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

Seconded. If nothing else, its worth noting that the economy would collapse were it not for for the omnipresent slave labor. Powrtoch (talk) 19:43, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

Twin cities

There is no evidence that Dubai and New York City are twinned/sister cities. Please show appropriate evidence or remove the said info.Avman89 (talk) 06:08, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

Some people seem to assumed creative license and added any and every city into this list. Could someone please do a reference check to see if this list is accurate? AreJay (talk) 17:20, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

The intro

I feel like the introduction does not state the reality of what is going on in Dubai right now. Truth of the matter is that the real estate bubble burst, construction on most projects has been stopped, luxury hotels are mostly empty, Dubai is bankrupt (although it got bailed out by Abu Dhabi), and not to mention slave labor...These are important aspects of the city of Dubai which need to be mentioned in the introduction. Thoughts? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.126.27.210 (talk) 20:27, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

It is important for articles to maintain a level of stability. Some of the information on the stock market crash needs to be included in the Economy section (in summary style), but not in the intro. The harsh labor conditions aren't unique to Dubai, they exist in all Arabian Gulf countries and cities, including Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. AreJay (talk) 17:19, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

I think you perhaps meant to say Persian Gulf I got confused for a second lol but yea, the slave issue is very important and its a major aspect of the city of Dubai, it was built on it. And also, many are predicting that the city will pretty much be a ghost town soon (as in all these major projects will lose investors and no one will by these properties). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.126.28.253 (talk) 20:45, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

:) "Arabian Gulf" is an oft-used misnomer in that part of the world to mean countries that are in the Arabian peninsular. You're right, the accurate term would be Persian Gulf. AFA the ghost town comment, not going to happen. I've lived there long enough to know that at the end of the day, Dubai is a trade based economy...it will not be quite as glamorous as it is now, but it will survive. You just have to look at other mid-level cities in that part of the world (Manama, Muscat, Sharjah, etc) to see that they're able to sustain mid-level economies. As I said before, the term "slave labor" isn't NPOV, so I hesitate using it. I'm open to a term that is more neutral. Thoughts? AreJay (talk) 16:01, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Haaretz talks about Dubai

This Israeli site: [Haaretz] is from the newspaper Haaretz and talks about the Dubai's desert bubble.Agre22 (talk) 13:10, 30 November 2009 (UTC)agre22

"Judicial rulings in Dubai with regard to foreign nationals. . ."

The first sentence of the last paragraph of the "Governance and politics" section is kind of a mess; I tried to fix it but I couldn't figure out quite what was intended. The idea seems to be something like: "The Dubai judicial system's treatment of foreign nationals has received international attention due to two incidents: in 2007, a 15-year-old French-Swiss nationa [etc.]; and in [year?], migrant laborers, most of whom are from India, were imprisoned [etc.]." Currently, the non-parenthetical use of two em-dashes is a bad idea; it makes it sound like the two events were the same. Chick Bowen 19:55, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Prostitution as a main reason for tourism?

I disagree with the next sentence:

Dubai's lure for tourists is based mainly on shopping and prostitution, but also on its possession of other ancient and modern attractions

No doubt there is prostitution in Dubai, but I think saying prostitution is one of the main tourism attractions of Dubai is inaccurate and offensive. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.229.235.45 (talk) 21:59, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

The section on the economy has a statement, with references, that "prostitution is conspicuously present". Try having a look at the references there. DJ Clayworth (talk) 22:35, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

I've removed the "and prostitution", which was added by the same user responsible for edits such as this. To address the point itself, I don't think that prostitution being "conspicuously present" is enough to establish that the prostitution is a main attraction for tourists. –CapitalLetterBeginning (talk) 12:33, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

International incidents

In the 2000s, Dubai was a central place for some pretty big international incidents. So I'm surprised there's still no such section. Noted cases are:

1. The kidnapping and then smuggling of the Israeli Elhanan Tannenbaum (2000), by order of the Hezbollah.
2. The assassination of the Lebanese Suzanne Tamim (2008), by order of a prominent Egyptian's son.
3. The assassination of the Palestinian Mahmoud al-Mabhouh (2010) - currently still under investigation.

Such a section should deal with the factors that led Dubai to the middle of all these cases (i.e. being an international business key point). 109.64.199.46 (talk) 14:07, 28 February 2010 (UTC)