Medellin authorities announced Thursday that Colombia’s second largest city aspires to be the principal technological innovation city of Latin America by 2021 aspires to be the principal technological innovation city of Latin America by 2021.

When a Guardian journalist visited Bhutan recently, the country’s “mystical” quotient did not disappoint. Among other things, the writer noted “men and women laboring in song,” a woman “scampering around churning a pot of yak butter tea,” and the “sound of mule bells ringing in the valley.” As he reaches the remote mountain home of a local herder, the man quips, as though starring in a tourism commercial, "You know, happiness is a place."

Tokyo’s bid for the 2020 Summer Olympics wasn’t a sexy one. But the promise of efficiency, competence and high-tech wizardry was more than enough to convince members of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), who on Sept. 8 Tokyo time chose the Japanese capital over upstart Istanbul, which, had it won, would have been the first predominantly Muslim host city. (Madrid, the third contender, appeared to have been eliminated in a previous secret IOC vote.)

Skyscrapers are a lot like cadillacs for countries and designers. They’re nice to look at, but they’re also there to impress the neighbors. The bigger and shinier the building, the more important and capable a nation or developer can claim to be. (“Don’t think we’re a serious investment destination, eh? Have you noticed that tower can be seen from Mars?”).

The International Olympics Committee will hold a vote in Buenos Aires on Friday to decide the host of the 2020 Olympics. According to oddschecker.com, a site that gathers odds from Internet betting sites, Tokyo bests its competitors at 11-10 (meaning a successful bet of $10 will return $11 plus the original stake). Madrid follows at 11-4 and Istanbul 5-1.

The recent trend of the International Olympic Committee and FIFA, the organizer of soccer’s World Cup, has been to award the planet’s two largest sporting events to cities, countries or regions that have never hosted the global competitions. If that mind-set holds, Istanbul might seem to have the edge over Madrid and Tokyo on Saturday, when about 100 delegates of the Olympic committee will choose the host city for the 2020 Summer Games.

Back in January, news spread that Britain was considering running an anti-immigration campaign in Romania and Bulgaria tagged, “You Won’t Like It Here”. People all over Europe were nonplussed by the lack of tact shown by The Brits. But Gândul, a daily Romanian newspaper, saw an opportunity where others saw only red. They launched a cheeky response campaign tagged, “We May Not Like Britain, But You’ll Love Romania.”

Those responsible for developing the Malaysia Nation Brand have come in for a lot of flack since the announcement by the Prime Minister that ‘Endless Possibilities’ was the new Nation Brand tagline. And then, after several days of negative comments, respected news portal the mole reported last Thursday that the official launch of the tagline may be scrapped or at least delayed.