CLASS

the timeless
warmth
of Iceland
www.arnartr.com
Say your piece, voice your
opinion, send your letters to:
letters@grapevine.is
SOUR GRAPES AND STUFF
this issue's most awesome letter!
A friend is traveling in the states and
just posted that they saw Einstök in
New Jersey cheaper than in Reykjavik,
5 minutes of google-fu later and
behold:
Liquor Store Prices:
USA: $1.99 USD (251 ISK) http://
www.klwines.com/p/i?i=1091599
UK: £1.93 GBP (379 ISK) http://
www.thedrinkshop.com/products/
nlpdetail.php?prodid=7528
Iceland: 399 ISK - http://www.vin-
budin.is/desktopdefault.aspx/tabid-
188/?text=Einst%C3%B6k
Vínbúðin, fucking bastards!
Cheers,
Davy
Hi Davy!
Congrats on getting internet down
in the locker.
Like many foreigners, you’ve
misunderstood some crucial facts
about Iceland:
First off, beer is subsidized in
New Jersey as an incentive to get
people to live in New
Jersey.
Secondly, the UK is given all
the Einstök that is collected from
spills or failed batches.
Those Brits can’t tell the difference.
Interestingly though, I
heard British people can see
colours more vividly, and have a
heightened since of smell during
periods of political unrest.
Lastly, if you say Vínbúðin are
“fucking bastards”, you are saying
the government is filled with
“fucking bastards.” A completely
unsubstantiated claim! When has
any government employee or person
in office ever conducted themselves
like a “fucking bastard?”
Keep that salty language at the
bottom of the sea where it belongs.
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Hello Reykjavik Grapevine,
I just want to say thank you for having the
publication online. We live in Minneapolis
(I am married to an Icelander) and we
love reading your publication online (both
of us). It’s a great way to stay connected to
whats going on in Iceland and the content
is almost always just fantastic (LOVE the
humor). Just wanted to say thanks!
That’s all J
Well, J, we are really glad you enjoy
reading The Grapevine online. Honestly,
we’re always a bit nervous about
the difference between online and the
print edition. There is a significant difference
in how people consume the two
mediums. The tactile nature of print,
or what academics call “the codex,”
has numerous advantages—including
some interesting research suggesting
that you retain more information when
you read off the printed page. Also, our
writers have a certain sense of pride
when a physical object is created carrying
their text.
However, you have highlighted
one of the benefits of online: distribution.
We can reach readers around
the world, except certain provinces in
China, but depending on the reader's
ambition, there are several methods
for bypassing the firewalls (Actually,
the physical and computational “nut &
bolts” is fascinating when you consider
it as part of the evolution of communication
technology).
The other benefit of online is space.
We can publish massive tombs with
incoherent, seemingly non-connected,
photo galleries. You can even get your
computer to read it to you. We’ve always
hoped someone would record
their computer reading one of our
longer pieces, set the robotic speech to
music and enter it in one of the various
music competitions that are held all
over the globe—except in certain provinces
in China.
We do come to a real conundrum on
the matter of time. By printing an issue,
we have frozen a slice of time and
readers know what to expect based on
the publication date. We publish twice
monthly in the summer and monthly in
the winter. Their data sits on a physical
object that occupies space. With
online publishing, people expect everything
to be constantly updated, revised,
and relevant. The article doesn’t
take up physical space, so it’s almost
as if the article starts to shrink as time
passes and the article sits unnoticed.
It drowns in the infinity of internet
space. However, if the piece goes viral.
It could seem to fill a space in the collective
conscious far greater than any
printed counterpart. It would show up
on news feeds, emails, aggregated internet
sites.
J, what we’re really talking about
here is perception. Is your concept of
the Grapevine, the concept you’ve constructed
in your head, different from
someone who reads only the print version?
What things are you missing out
on? What extras are you getting? What
if Icelanders who read the Grapevine
here have fundamentally different experiences
with the magazine than you
do online? You would think you were
staying connected to Iceland. When in
reality, you’d be slowly drifting further
and further apart at the level of
the brain. We are stealing Iceland from
you and leaving you a shapeless, infinite
void, which is glossed with photos
and consolation.
We’re not telling you this so you
have to live in misery and suffering,
without consolation. The abolition of
this illusory happiness is a demand to
live in a world with real happiness.
Subscribe to have the print edition
sent your way.
We ship internationally—except
certain provinces in China.
LOVELIEST LETTER
FREE GRAPEVINE TEE HEE HEE!
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Varma is available in various
tourist shops around Iceland
Kjarval
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LOVELIEST LETTER gets a free Grapevine
T-shirt, featuring the regal G that adorns our
cover. DON’T PANIC if your letter wasn’t
found to be this issue's loveliest. You can
still get a tee for a low, low price over our
website, www.grapevine.is.
Ásmundarsafn
And guess what: we always give out SICK
prizes for each issue's LOVELIEST LETTER,
so be sure to send in some fun and/or
interesting missives.
Give us your worst: letters@grapevine.is
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