I was there from 29th December until 3rd January, and although I did a fair bit of commuting into the Dam while I was there, I found it to be alright. To be honest, there isn't all that much to do there, but I was flying solo - I think that will have had something to do with my appreciation of the place.
Nieuwe Binnenweg is the main coffeeshop street, and as mentioned above, Coffeeshop Nemo is pretty good. Weed was good, bright interior - only complaint was the booming hip-hop, which is on constantly. I kinda used it as a starting point each morning.
Here's a couple of pictures from there:
They have a parrot too, if my memory serves me. The bugger can mimic the squeak of the smoking room door opening!
Pluto & Sky High were OK too, and de Lachende Paus had some great hash, but it is a buy & fly place - nowhere for smoking that I noticed. They have loads of pipes, etc - worth looking in for gifts - I bought some friends little hand crafted looking pipes in there, and they weren't expensive at all.
The city itself is nice - pretty different from Amsterdam, doesn't have nearly as many tourists, stuff is a little cheaper, etc. The coffeeshop scene is largely Moroccan run, too. (From what I could gather.)
Here's another couple of pics:
And I saw this sign there. I assume 'kiss' means park, as it was near the railway station - made me chuckle anyways!
Hope this helps!
Btw, I was told buy the bartender in my hostel that the local police don't take as kindly to weed smoking on the street as they do in the Dam. Apparently the police chief made a big deal of it, saying something like '... this isn't Amsterdam.' Dick.
