Popular Elsewhere
15:24 UK time, Wednesday, 31 August 2011
A look at the stories ranking highly on various news sites.
Forget oils, pastels or any other such traditional artist materials. In Paris, home of legendary art institutions like the Louvre, Musee d'Orsay and Centre Pompidou, summer 2011 has seen.
A gallery of some of the pictures, familiar images re-created by Parisian office employees around the city using the small sticky paper squares, tops the Guardian's most read list.
"Young executives from competing firms meet at lunchtime to compare their creations and plan ripostes. 'Each time we have to come up with something bigger, wackier, more adventurous,' Julien Berissi, 28, a project manager at Société Générale, told TF1 news."
As temperatures cool, and autumn looks to have set in already, Independent readers may already be reminiscing about summer judging by their interest in .
There are now only 5,000 in the in the UK, down from 20,000 five years ago. According to the article, the reasons for this include emission regulation, petrol and food prices. Some councils have even banned them from areas, citing childhood obesity and noise pollution.
In case anyone needs reminding of how to recognise one of these lesser-spotted vessels, the most common chime is Greensleeves, but not everywhere.
"The Disney classic 'Whistle While You Work', written for Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, is reportedly popular in Crewe and Nantwich, while the strains of the popular song 'You Are My Sunshine', first recorded in 1939, can be heard in parts of Cheshire."
The story of the secretary in the Nazi regime who didn't get on with her boss Joseph Goebbels is drawing Daily Beast readers. Historian Andrew Roberts describes how unusual it is to hear of staff in Hitler's government criticising their superiors.
But in contrast with Brunhilde Pomsel, who recently described Goebbels as "cold and distant" and "a monster", he recalls Traudl Junge who took down the dictation for the Fuhrer's final will and testament in the Berlin bunker. Ms Junge once said:
"I admit, I was fascinated by Adolf Hitler. He was a pleasant boss and a fatherly friend. I deliberately ignored all the warning voices inside me and enjoyed the time by his side almost until the bitter end. It wasn't what he said, but the way he said things and how he did things."
Elsewhere, an article entitled is proving popular with Wired readers. It examines the "diminishing returns" of wealth, using the example of commuting to indicate how when people buy large houses outside of the city where they work they often don't take into account how much the longer daily journey could affect them. An uncomfortable read for that uncomfortable ride home?
