Auld Lang Syne

After the colour orange, which is the colour of the Dutch Royal family.
. The famous Dutch singer André Hazes used the melody of Auld Lang Syne, for the Dutch football song, 'Wij houden van Oranje' (We love Orange). Another documentary, Al-Jazeera, An Arab Voice for Freedom or Demagoguery? The UNC Tour [27] was filmed two months after the September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attack. As the 21st century and the "era of our youth" emerged, a rock version of the song was used instead of the initial, soft and slow piano version which it first was composed as in music history. In July 2003, PBS broadcast a documentary, called Exclusive to al-Jazeera on its program Wide Angle. It has become the main theme song (imposed mostly preceding commercials) of the eternally popular annual American New Year's show, Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve which has aired live from New York City's Times Square on ABC since December 31, 1972. Al Jazeera's coverage of the invasion of Iraq was the focus of an award-winning 2004 documentary film, Control Room by Egyptian-American director Jehane Noujaim.

In his retelling of fairy tales in the Scots language, Matthew Fitt uses the phrase "In the days of auld lang syne" as the equivalent of "Once upon a time". Initially its English-language site was provided by the US-based DataPipe, which gave it notice, soon followed by Akamai Technologies.[26] They later shifted to the French branch of NavLink, and then to (and currently) AT&T WorldNet Services. The musical Auld Lang Syne was written by Hugh Abercrombie Anderson under the pen name Hugh Abercrombie. The site was forced to change internet hosting providers several times, due, in its opinion, to political pressure. Parody songwriter Allan Sherman included this fairly obvious joke in a medley called Schticks of One and Half a Dozen of the Other, the main point being that he pronounced it correctly:. In June 2003, Racine pleaded guilty to wire fraud and unlawful interception of an electronic communication. Cohan referenced it at the end of this song's chorus:. map and a patriotic motto, court documents said.

Popular songwriter George M. Racine posed as an Al Jazeera employee to get a password to the network's site, then redirected visitors to a page he created that showed an American flag shaped like a U.S. The song is sung by James Stewart, Donna Reed, et al. during the emotion-filled closing scene of the movie It's a Wonderful Life. In November, 2003, John William Racine II, a.k.a 'John Buffo', was sentenced to 1000 hours of community service and a $2000 US fine for the online disruption. The two songs can be sung perfectly with lyrics interchanged. Immediately after its launch, the site was attacked by hackers, who launched denial-of-service attacks and redirected visitors to a site featuring an American flag. The meter of this song (technically "common meter double" or 8-6-8-6-8-6-8-6) is identical to that of America the Beautiful. [25].

The University of Virginia fight song (The Good Old Song) is sung to the tune of Auld Lang Syne. The station launched an English-language edition of its online content in March, 2003. The recruits would be marching in slow time when the tune is played. InfoCom was later convicted of exporting to Libya and Syria, of knowingly being invested in by a Hamas member (both of which are illegal in the United States), and of underpaying customs duties.[24]. In the Indian Armed Forces the band plays this song as the farewell song, during the passing out parade of the recruits. The Arabic version of the site was brought offline for about 10 hours by an FBI raid on its ISP, InfoCom Corporation, on September 5, 2001. Paul's Church and sang "Auld Lang Syne" as the last stroke of 12 sounded from the great bell.
.

The Scotch residents gathered outside of St. News photographs showed United States and Iraqi military personnel working together to close the office.[23] Initially closed by a one-month ban, the shutdown was extended indefinitely in September 2004, and the offices sealed. The passing of the old year was celebrated in London much as usual. Al Jazeera vowed to continue its reporting from inside Iraq. .. On August 7, 2004, the Iraqi Allawi government shut down the Iraq office of Al Jazeera, claiming that it was responsible for presenting a negative image of Iraq, and charging the network with fueling anti-Coalition hostilities. Usual Customs Observed by People of All Classes. [22].

12 NEW YEAR'S EVE IN LONDON. Contrary to some allegations, including the oft-reported comments of Donald Rumsfeld on June 4, 2005, Al Jazeera has never shown beheadings which often appear on internet websites. p. This included broadcasting pleas from family members and government officials. Washington Post, 1910-01-02. Al Jazeera has assisted authorities from the home countries of the victims in an attempt to secure the release of kidnapping victims. The company joined hands in the great music room at midnight and sang "Auld Lang Syne" as the last stroke of 12 sounded and the new year came in. They often appear to be forced to read out prepared statements of their kidnappers.

.. The hostages are shown, often blindfolded, pleading for their release. 10 HOLIDAY PARTIES AT LENOX [Mass.]. The videos were filmed by the groups after kidnapping a hostage. p. During 2004, Al Jazeera broadcast several video tapes of various kidnapping victims which had been sent to the network. New York Times, Jan 5, 1896. The move came after allegations by Iraqis who stated that the channel had incited anti-occupation violence (by airing statements from Iraqi resistance leaders), increasing ethnic and sectarian tensions, and being supportive of the resistance.

Two examples:. On 23 September 2003, Iraq suspended Al Jazeera (and Al-Arabiya) from reporting on official government activities for two weeks for what the Council stated as supporting recent attacks on council members and Coalition occupational forces. The ProQuest newspaper archive has articles going back to 1896 that describe revellers on both sides of the Atlantic singing the song to usher in the New Year. As reported by the Sunday Times, the alleged spies were described by an Al Jazeera executive as having minor roles with no input on editorial decisions. However, he did not invent or first introduce the custom. In May 2003, the CIA, through the Iraqi National Congress, released documents purportedly showing that Al Jazeera had been infiltrated by Iraqi spies, and was regarded by Iraqi officials as part of their propaganda effort. Bandleader Guy Lombardo popularized the association of the song with New Year, through his annual broadcasts on radio and TV, beginning in 1929. The reasons for his detention remain unknown, although the US official statements on detainees is that they are security threats.

As Scots emigrated around the world, they took the song with them. On 23 November 2005, Sami Al-Haj's lawyer Clive Stafford-Smith reported that, during (125 of 130) interviews, US officials had questioned Sami as to whether Al Jazeera was a front for Al Qaeda. Singing the song on Hogmanay or New Year's Day is a Scottish custom. Al Jazeera cameraman Sami Al-Haj, a Sudanese national, has also been held by US forces since the start of 2002 at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Robert Burns forwarded a copy of the original song to the Scots Musical Museum with the remark, "The following song, an old song, of the olden times, and which has never been in print, nor even in manuscript until I took it down from an old man's singing, is enough to recommend any air." The tune Burns suggested is not the tune we use today. Similarly, on November 13, 2001 the US launched a missile attack on Al Jazeera's office in Kabul during the US invasion of Afghanistan, also after being informed of its location. Auld Lang Syne was transcribed, had two new verses added to it and was published by the Scottish poet Robert Burns, based on earlier Scots ballads. On April 8, 2003 Al Jazeera's office in Baghdad was attacked by US forces, killing reporter Tareq Ayyoub and wounding another, despite the US being informed of the office's precise coordinates prior to the incident.

See external links for variations of the original lyrics. [21]. Above version taken exactly from Songs from Robert Burns, published in Great Britain
by Collins Clear-Type Press in 1947, and sold at Burns’ Cottage. Also in the run-up to the war the US Pentagon hired the Rendon Group to target and possibly punish Al Jazeera reporters who did not stay on message. In Scots Syne is pronounced like the English word sign — IPA: [sajn] — not zine [zajn] as many people do every Hogmanay. On April 3, 2003, Al Jazeera withdrew its journalists from the country, citing unreasonable interference from Iraqi officials. . In addition, one of its reporters, Tayseer Allouni, was banned from the country by the Iraqi Information Ministry, while another one, Diyar Al-Omari, was banned from reporting in Iraq (both decisions were later retracted).

One occasion that falls in this category was in October 2000, when the body of former Canadian prime minister Pierre Trudeau left Parliament Hill in Ottawa for the last time, going to Montreal for the state funeral. During the Iraq war, Al Jazeera faced the same reporting and movement restrictions as other news-gathering organizations. It has also been used on other occasions as a farewell. For example, on April 27, 2004, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher, said, "On Iraq they have established a pattern of false reporting." (WSVN). In Portugal and Spain, this song is used to mark a farewell, especially in the Boy Scout movement. The administration has voiced such criticisms of Al Jazeera. The University of Virginia's fight song (The Good Old Song) also carries the same tune. Critics have drawn the conclusion that the Bush administration's distaste for the station's reporting of the invasion of Iraq was the underlying motivation, yet there is no evidence to support such a claim aside from mere speculation.

Also, before 1972, it was the tune for the Gaumii salaam anthem of The Maldives (with the current words). The move was quickly mirrored by Nasdaq stock market officials. Before the composition of Aegukga, the lyrics of Korea's national anthem was sung to the tune of this song. On March 4, 2003, during the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, the New York Stock Exchange banned Al Jazeera (as well as several other news organizations whose identities were not revealed) from its trading floor indefinitely, citing "security concerns" as the official reason. In the United Kingdom, it is played at the close of the annual Congress (conference) of the Trades Union Congress. They have mockingly taken to calling it "Al-Khinzeera," which means "The Pig.". In Japan, many stores play it to usher customers out at the end of a business day, and the tune is sung at graduations. Some have suggested the media outlet is a source of disinformation and a front for Western intelligence agencies.

In the Philippines, it is well known and sung at celebrations like graduations, New Year and Christmas Day. Al Jazeera has been criticized by many of its Muslim viewers for giving air time to Israeli officials. It is used as a graduation song and a funeral song in Taiwan, symbolizing an end or a goodbye. Al Jazeera cameraman Sami Al Hajj was detained in Afghanistan as an "enemy combatant" in December 2001, and is now held without charge in Camp Delta at Guantánamo Bay. Also, in many Burns Clubs, it is sung to end the Burns supper. Both of these attacks occurred despite Al Jazeera's provision of the locations of their offices to the United States. It is usually sung each year on New Year's Day (Hogmanay in Scotland) in the United Kingdom, the United States, and English speaking Canada at midnight and signifies the start of a new year. In light of this allegation, Al Jazeera has questioned whether it has been targeted deliberately in the past — Al Jazeera's Kabul office was bombed in 2001 and a missile hit its office in Baghdad during the invasion of Iraq killing correspondent Tariq Ayoub.

Yet, perhaps because it was originally written in the Scots language, often people can recall the melody easily but know only a fraction of the words. Marines were conducting a contentious assault on Fallujah. This poem by Robert Burns, is one of the best known songs in English-speaking countries. Bush had considered bombing Al Jazeera's Doha headquarters in April 2004, when U.S. Auld Lang Syne — Eng: “old long since” — might be better translated as “old long ago”, “times gone by”, or “days gone by”. President George W. On November 22, 2005, the UK tabloid The Daily Mirror published a story claiming that it had obtained a leaked memo from 10 Downing Street saying that U.S.

[20]. On January 30, 2005 the New York Times reported that the Qatari government, under pressure from the Bush administration, was speeding up plans to sell the station. government. In 2004 the competing Arabic-language satellite TV station Al Hurra was launched, funded by the U.S.

Government spokespersons have often cited what they claim as bias on the part of the broadcaster. While prior to September 11th, 2001, the United States government lauded Al Jazeera for its role as an independent media outlet in the Middle East, since then it has reversed course dramatically. [19]. He denied the revocation has anything to do with the network's Iraq war coverage.

NYSE spokesman Ray Pellechia claimed "security reasons" and that the exchange had decided to give access only to networks that focus "on responsible business coverage". On 25 March 2003, two of its reporters covering the New York Stock Exchange had their credentials revoked. Nevertheless, CNN cut its ties with Al Jazeera for several months over this controversy. Al Jazeera countered that it was merely making information available without comment, and indeed several western television channels later followed suit in broadcasting portions of the tapes.

This led to criticism by the United States government that Al Jazeera was engaging in propaganda on behalf of terrorists. Friedman called Al-Jazeera "the freest, most widely watched TV network in the Arab world."^[18] The station first gained widespread attention in the west following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, when it broadcast videos in which Osama bin Laden and Sulaiman Abu Ghaith defended and justified the attacks. In 1999, New York Times reporter Thomas L. Websites such as Free Taysir Alony and Alony Solidarity were created to support Alony.

Many international and private organizations condemned the arrest and called on the Spanish court to free Taysir Alony. [17]. Although he pleaded not guilty of all the charges against him, Allouni was sentenced on 26 September to seven years in prison for merely interviewing Bin Laden after the September 11th attack on the United States. Allouni asked the court for permission to visit his family in Syria to attend the funeral of his mother, but authorities denied his request and ordered him back to jail.

On 19 September, a Spanish court issued an arrest warrant for al-Jazeera correspondent Taysir Allouni, before the expected verdict. He was nevertheless released several weeks later for health concerns, but was prohibited from leaving the country. Judge Baltasar Garzón, who had issued the arrest warrant, ordered Allouni held indefinitely without bail. Reporter Taysir Allouni was arrested in Spain on 5 September 2003, on a charge of having provided support for members of Al-Qaida.

Bahrain Information Minister Nabil al-Hamr banned Al Jazeera correspondents from reporting from inside the country on 10 May 2002, saying that the station was biased towards Israel and against Bahrain.[16] After improvements in relations between Bahrain and Qatar in 2004, Al Jazeera correspondents returned to Bahrain. Also, it is alleged that several Algerian cities lost power simultaneously to keep residents from watching a program that implicated the Algerian military in a series of massacres. The international pressure group Reporters Without Borders says, however, that the measure was really taken in reprisal for a broadcast the previous week of a debate on the political situation in Algeria. The official reason given was that a reorganisation of the work of foreign correspondents was in progress.

The Algerian government froze the activities of Al Jazeera's Algerian correspondent on July 4, 2004. It has more than a hundred editorial staff. The Editor-in-Chief of the Arabic website is Abdel Aziz Al Mahmoud, and the editorial head is Mohammad Dawood. The latest in a string of managing editors of the English-language site is Russell Merryman, who is currently caretaking the site after the departures of Omar Bec, Joanne Tucker, Ahmed Sheikh and Alison Balharry.

The managing director for the yet-to-be-launched Al Jazeera International is Nigel Parsons. The current Managing Director of the Arabic channel is Waddah Khanfar, who is supported by Ahmed Sheikh, Editor-in-Chief, and Amen Jaballah. The Chairman of Al Jazeera is Sheikh Hamad bin Thamer al-Thani, a distant cousin of Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani. Al Jazeera's web-based service is accessible subscription-free throughout the world, though the English and Arabic sections appear to be editorially distinct, with their own selection of news and comment.

Al Jazeera can be freely viewed with a DVB-S receiver as it is broadcast on the Astra and Hot Bird satellites. In the US, it is available through satellite. Al Jazeera's programming is available worldwide through various satellite and cable systems. In the United States, video footage from the network is largely limited to showing the mercy pleas of hostages.

Al Jazeera is now considered a fairly mainstream media network, though more controversial than most. In January 2003, the BBC announced that it had signed an agreement with Al Jazeera for sharing facilities and information, including news footage. Increasingly, Al Jazeera's exclusive interviews and other footage are being rebroadcast in American, British, and other western media outlets such as CNN and the BBC. As a result, it is probably the most watched news channel in the Middle East.

Some scholars and commentators use the notion of contextual objectivity^[13][14], which highlights the tension between objectivity and audience appeal, to describe the station's controversial yet popular news approach [15]. Many people see Al Jazeera as a more trustworthy source of information than government and foreign channels. It is widely believed internationally that inhabitants of the Arab world are given limited information by their governments and media, and that what is conveyed is biased towards the governments' views. [12].

With Al-Jazeera's growing global outreach and influence, some who thought of them as an "alternative media" source have changed their minds. He described his new position as "the most interesting job on Earth." [10] On 6 February 2006 it was announced that the former BBC reporter Rageh Omaar would host a daily weeknights documentary series, Witness [11]. [9] The network announced on 12 January 2006 that former Nightline correspondent Dave Marash would be the co-anchor from their Washington studio. On 2 December 2005, Stephen Cole, a senior anchor on BBC World and Click Online presenter, announced he was joining Al-Jazeera International.

[6] [7] [8]. He commented that "In a time when American media has become so nationalised, I'm excited about joining an organisation that truly wants to be a source of global information..." [5] Former CNN and BBC news anchorwoman and award winning journalist Veronica Pedrosa and veteran UK broadcaster David Frost have also joined the team, along with Riz Khan, a former BBC reporter who most recently was host of the CNN talk show Q&A, CNN producer James Wright, and Kieran Baker, a former editor and producer for CNN. Rushing will be working from the Washington DC Bureau. He was the press officer for the United States Central Command during the 2003 Invasion of Iraq, and in that role was featured in the documentary Control Room.

In September 2005, Josh Rushing joined Al Jazeera International. The channel will be a 24-hours 7-days a week news channel with 12 hours broadcasted from Doha and four hours from each of London, Kuala Lumpur, and Washington D.C. The new channel will have broadcast centers in Doha (current Al Jazeera headquarters and broadcast center), London, Kuala Lumpur, and Washington D.C., when the station launches in March 2006. On July 4, 2005 Al Jazeera officially announced plans to launch a new English-language satellite service called Al Jazeera International.[4] Al Jazeera has announced this long-expected move in an attempt to provide news about the Arab world, especially Israel, from the Middle Eastern perspective.

Unlike Al Jazeera, Al Arabiya focuses on covering the news without stirring controversies. In response to Al Jazeera, a group of Saudi investors created Al Arabiya in the first quarter of 2003. However, it wasn't until late 2001 that Al Jazeera achieved worldwide popularity when it broadcast video statements by Al Qaeda leaders. Its well-presented documentary on the Lebanese Civil War in 2000-2001 gave its viewer ratings a boost.

In the beginning, Al Jazeera tried to increase its viewership by means of presenting controversial views regarding the governments of many Gulf states including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Bahrain (ironically, Qatar is not included in this list), Syria's relationship with Lebanon, and the Egyptian judiciary. Many former BBC staff members joined Al Jazeera. In April of that year, BBC World's Arabic language TV station, faced with censorship demands by the Saudi Arabian government, had shut down after two years of operation. The channel began broadcasting in late 1996.

Other major sources of income include advertising, cable subscription fees, broadcasting deals with other companies, and sale of footage (according to Pravda,[2] "Al-Jazeera received $20,000 per minute for Bin Laden's speech".) In 2000, advertising accounted for 40% of the station's revenue.[3]. It aimed to become self-sufficient through advertising by 2001, but when this failed to occur, the emir agreed to continue subsidizing it on a year-by-year basis (US$30 million in 2004,[1] according to Arnaud de Borchgrave). Al Jazeera was started with a US$150 million grant from the emir of Qatar. It now rivals the BBC in worldwide audiences with an estimated 50 million viewers.

Al Jazeera claims to be the only politically independent television station in the Middle East. . It's English language website at http://english.aljazeera.net/HomePage, should not be confused with Aljazeera.com, an unrelated English language website that publishes news and opinion pieces of an inflammatory nature about current affairs in the Middle East. In addition to its TV channels, Al Jazeera operates Arabic and an English language websites.

Future announced products include an English-language channel, Al Jazeera International, and a channel specializing in documentaries, and possible music channels or an international newspaper. These include Al Jazeera Sports, a popular Arabic-language sports channel, Al Jazeera Live, which broadcasts conferences in real time without editing or commentary, and the Al Jazeera Children's Channel. Al Jazeera operates several specialized television channels in addition to its primary news channel. The station gained worldwide attention following the September 11, 2001 attacks, when it broadcast video statements by Osama bin Laden and other Al Qaeda leaders (see Videos of Osama bin Laden).

Its willingness to broadcast dissenting views, including on call-in shows, created controversies in the autocratic Persian Gulf Arab States. Al Jazeera (Arabic: الجزيرة al-Ǧazīrä), meaning "The Island" or "The Peninsula" is an Arabic-language television channel based in Doha, Qatar. Naomi Sakr (2002), Satellite Realms : Transnational Television, Globalization and the Middle East, I.B.Tauris. Mohammed El-Nawawy and Adel Iskandar (2003), Al Jazeera: The story of the network that is rattling governments and redefining modern journalism, Basic.

Hugh Miles (2004), Al Jazeera: how Arab TV news challenged the world, Abacus. Marc Lynch (2005), Voices of the New Arab Public: Iraq, al-Jazeera, and Middle East Politics Today, Columbia University Press. Mohamed Zayani (2005), The Al Jazeera Phenomenon: Critical Perspectives On New Arab Media, Paradigm Publishers. ^  (da) “Al-Jazeera oversatte ikke redaktørens beklagelse,” Politiken, 2006-01-31.

New York Times: A27.. Fathers and Sons. (12 February 1999). ^  Friedman, Thomas L.

ISBN.. Al-Jazeera: How the free Arab News Network Scooped the World and Changed the Middle East, Westview. ^  El-Nawawy and Iskandar. [31].

In 2004, Al Jazeera was voted, by brandchannel.com, the fifth most influential global brand behind Apple Computer, Google, Ikea and Starbucks. [30]. In December 1999, Ibn Rushd (Averoes) Fund for Freedom of Thought in Berlin awarded the "Ibn Rushd Award" for media and journalism for the year to Al Jazeera. [29].

According to Tifanny Schlain, the founder of the Webby Awards, this caused a controversy as [other media organisations] "felt it was a risk-taking site," . In April 2004, Webby Awards nominated Al Jazeera as one of the five best news Web sites, along with BBC News, National Geographic, RocketNews and The Smoking Gun. In November 2005, Al Jazeera was awarded by Index on Censorship for its "courage in circumventing censorship and contributing to the free exchange of information in the Arab world." [28].