The reviews are in

Jim Meek nicely points out how the Cons could accomplish all of their supposed goals for media at the G8 and G20 summits for far less cost:

Harper says the fake lake isn’t a fake lake, despite the canoes and the phoney docks. Harper insists it is really a reflecting pool that is part of a $2-million marketing pavilion to promote Canadian tourism.

This means the media centre for the G8 summit isn’t a media centre, but an element in a marketing campaign designed to transform 3,000 international financial journalists into tourism ambassadors.

So the media centre that is not a media centre, housing the fake lake that is not a fake lake, will allow reporters to experience the simulated joys of the G8 summit site — which they cannot visit.
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(L)et’s use digital technology to take the story to the world, instead of bringing the world’s journalists to Toronto — only to hold them hostage inside a virtual Muskoka.

No reason those 3,000 reporters can’t be back in their home offices, looking at a virtual, fully-digitalized, cheaper fake lake on their computer screens. What this country needs, Mr. Prime Minister, is a faker fake lake.