Kim Il Jonguano. When North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il felt like a little Italian, he didn’t kidnap Roberto Benigni. Nope he ordered that an Italian restaurant be built, sending chefs to Naples and Rome for extra training when they couldn’t get their pasta al dente.
Everything’s iconic. Remember when the word iconic was reserved for the likes of Jesus? That was before marketing and tabloids entered the fray. Now everything’s iconic. Jonathan Meades has taken the time to map many egregious examples for More Intelligent Life. We thank him particularly for iconic bucket, iconic cassoulet, iconic chainsaw and iconic jihad target. Especially when combined. Many more icons here.
That's not an icon. This is an icon.
Rant: the party’s over (just like the dotcom boom). We like a good bit of misanthropy on a Wednesday morning — it kind of reflects how we feel about the mid-week slump. Owen Thomas has been getting his grumpy old man on at Valleywag about South by Southwest Interactive, a meeting of web innovators:
Most people attending South By Southwest Interactive admit that they’re there for the chance to hang out in Austin with the same Internet buddies they hang out with in San Francisco and Brooklyn. Without the parties, what’s the point? That’s always been the case with South By Southwest. It’s just that with the economy prostrate and the social-networking bubble thoroughly popped, there’s not even money to skim from the froth …
The attendees of SXSW Interactive have nothing to look at but each other, and nothing to listen to but their own kind. Surely that explains why it ends up being a group grope of self-congratulation over little at all… the best and brightest of Silicon Valley and Silicon Alley are working on iterations of existing software for the most frivolous of purposes. There’s not even a fundamental innovation in this round of tweaks meant to help you waste time more efficiently.
Tweet that.
Sport pays. Betfair has a list of the 10 richest sports stars — and the bling and McMansions they spend their money on. Meanwhile, they could do worse with their money than buy a quintessential English village — Linkenholt has two blacksmiths, a cricket club and a lovely manor house and is going for the bargain price of £22 million. (Blacksmiths not included)
