December 19, 2011

Liberator versus tyrant

Over the weekend, two very different leaders died…

Václav Havel, Czech’s first elected president of Czechoslovakia who lead the Velvet Revolution to bring down communism in Eastern Europe. Watch the Al Jazeera news.

And…

Kim Jong Il, “Great Leader” of North Korea. Read the NY Times article.

According to Al Jazeera, North Korean media say that Kim Jong Il died on Saturday from "physical and mental over-work".

Already (not surprisingly), the word is out on social media, which loves this kind of thing… adjusted for different spellings of "Kim Jong Il" , there have been more than 40,000 tweets about him by 12 noon (Beijing time).

Three witty images:






Some links pulled off social media this morning:

So Ronery funny, old animation of Kim Jong Il

North Korea Party Rock Anthem ft. Kim Jong Il

A funny blog of official photos - Kim Jong Il Looking at Things.

RIP Kim Jong Il 1941 - Dec 17 2011 - His Vision And How He "Looked" At Things


The death of North Korea Kim Jong-il obituary 金正日逝世讣告


Funeral Footage - KCTV (Kim Il Sung Dies 1994)

North Korea Party Rock Anthem ft. Kim Jong Il

My favourite tweet so far: "☑ Kim Jong Il ☑ Khaddafi ☑ Osama Bin Laden ☑ Saddam Hussein ☐ Internet Explorer".

Upon comparing the 'hot topics' on the real-time news platforms, "Kim Il Sun" (金正日) came top of the list on Sina Weibo in China


and "Kim Jong" was listed 4th on Twitter (I'm sure this will change when the Americans and Brits wake up).


1 comment:

Napoleon Biggs said...

Sina Weibo has set up a special page for Kim Jong Il, pulling out tweets using the hashtag, "金正日逝世", (Koin Jong Il passes away).

http://www.weibo.com/zt/s?k=17846&hasori=1