April 2010

First resignation on Morgunblaðið over Doddson’s editorial policy

April 30, 2010

Gunnhildur Arna Gunnarsdóttir, one of the news editors of Morgunblaðið, has resigned from the paper as she disagreed with the paper’s handling of the information published in the Black Report. In particular she found fault with the screaming headline on the front page of the paper the day following the publication of the report, and [...]

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On making amends

April 29, 2010

Back in January I wrote a wee post about Iceland’s future economic prospects, in particular the fact that a company called Verne Holding was looking to construct a data centre on the Reykjanes peninsula. The idea of setting up a data centre in Iceland is excellent. Data centres require a lot of cooling, so the [...]

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The secrets of Chapter 19

April 28, 2010

So I get this email today from a translation agency in the UK, desperately searching for translators to work on a “big project” that needs to be completed by next week, Icelandic to English. They’re tight-lipped about what it is [until you agree to sign a contractor agreement] — but it concerned a certain “Chapter [...]

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Get your penis-shaped shopping mall here!

April 28, 2010

As I wrote back in February, Penis Mall is being put up for sale — and the bidding starts today! Baggalútur featured it prominently on their Official News Page. The State Real Estate Agency has sent out the following press release: For private sale, beautiful two-story detached home, centrally located in Kópavogur. The property is [...]

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A brief dissection of the national psyche, post-collapse

April 27, 2010

I’ve been reading over the interviews that I’m publishing in my upcoming e-book and am once again amazed at how sensitive the subject of the meltdown is for many people. When I was looking for people to interview it struck me how difficult it was for some Icelanders to talk about what had happened here. [...]

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The latest from our friendly neighbourhood volcano

April 26, 2010

So, Eyjafjallajökull has been behaving reasonably well for the last few days, meaning that it seems to have ejected most of its ash stockpiles for the time being and is now emitting lava like a good little volcano. The lava, I’m told, is running to the north and is melting ice which is causing a [...]

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More on the name of that pesky volcano

April 26, 2010

A cool little video in which my friend Krista takes on the Eyjafjallajökull challenge – and nails it. RESPECT!

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Score one for New Iceland!

April 25, 2010

This past Friday, Reykjavík District Court ruled that the Icelandic state and Árni Mathiesen, former Minister of Finance for the Independence Party, should pay ISK 3 million in compensation to an applicant for the position of district court judge in North Iceland back in 2005. The applicant, Guðmundur Kristjánsson, was deemed the most qualified for [...]

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Ash Saturday, without the ash

April 24, 2010

So both Keflavík and Reykjavík airports are closed today due to volcanic ash. The ash fallout was predicted, and I fully expected to wake up today to find everything covered in a thin layer of gray dust. In fact I was dead curious to finally be able to see some of that insidious matter that [...]

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Meltdown: The e-Book!

April 23, 2010

What happens to ordinary people when a nation’s economy collapses? Over the last year and a half I have been asked that question, or variations thereof, numerous times. Much of the discussion about the meltdown here in Iceland has focused on the Big Picture – the systemic failure, the culprits, the banks, the currency fiasco, [...]

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