As South Africa prepares for the visit of the US Vice President Joe Biden, the man who is a heartbeat away from being the most powerful politician in the world, we take a look at his office and assess its real powers through history.

Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, hasn’t been doing his brand any favours of late. His privacy measures have angered users worldwide, even if the recent Facebook suicide campaign didn’t make a dent in his user-base. Could an open-source, privacy-aware social network pose a bigger threat?

Africa’s top footballer, Didier Drogba, won’t be playing in the World Cup, due to a last-minute injury. Our heart goes out to the Ivorians: their team, and the tournament, will be the poorer for his absence. 

All the cool kids in Europe are taking up liquid mountaineering (that’s walking on water if you’re unfamiliar with the craze). There’s only one snag to attaining prophet-like superpowers: it seems you’ll need a pair of Hi-Tec shoes first.

Shopping list: 108 2-litre bottles of Coke Zero, 638 Mentos. Just add two mad scientists and you have (most of) the ingredients you need to propel a rocket car.

CNN, which turns 30-years-old this year, appears to have an identity crisis – and Larry King is at the heart of it. How does the news network regain its place atop the ratings when it doesn’t sell sex or opinion?

Surprise. Surprise. After South Africa was sold the promise of gold at the end of the Fifa rainbow, economists say it is unlikely we’ll get any sustained financial benefit from hosting the Soccer World Cup. But hey, we’ll be happier for a little while.

What do you do once you’ve made billions and seen the world from outer space? If you’re Mark Shuttleworth, only the biggest challenge makes sense. And if that means taking on Microsoft by creating a sustainable business that distributes the best free software in the world, hell, why not?

He was a supremely talented and brilliantly crazy actor, director, wild man and a consistent discoverer of the attractive side of madness. His creations ranged from genius to banal, from meaningful to just plain awful. But while others dreamt about that fabled “maybe, one day”, Hopper sucked the marrow out of life.

South Africa’s smartest and most foul-mouthed funny man is back from London where he took a team of this country’s top comedic talent to play at the Royal Albert Hall. Called Bafunny Bafunny, and not to be confused with our national soccer team (though at times they cause just as much laughter), the troupe is now taking its act to Durban, Cape Town and Jozi.

Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg is facing a personal privacy crisis of his own after a leaked script reveals that The Social Network – the movie of his life – is set to portray him as a socially awkward sex maniac.

More than 20 years ago, when 702 made a risky switch to all-talk format, it was unheard of in South Africa. Some media pundits predicted the station wouldn’t survive. They said it again after 1994 and told 702 that to survive it would have to become a “black station”. Needless to say, 702’s having the last laugh.

There’s been talk that on the streets of one of the most football-mad cities on Earth, interest levels in South Africa are unprecedented. But with less than three weeks to go until the World Cup kick-off, that seems not entirely to be the case.  

The Bang Bang Club debuted at the Cannes Film Market last week. The overseas response so far has been positive, although if you were a journo in Joburg in the ’90s you’ll be forgiven for wondering if your memory’s playing tricks on you.

The perennial nature-versus-nurture debate has taken on a whole new tack with researchers from Yale showing that babies appear to have a basic moral code from as early as six months.

The release of Freshlyground’s fourth album a couple of weeks ago has been somewhat overshadowed by the heated debate around its “collaboration” in the official Soccer World Cup song. But if you’re already heartily sick of “Waka Waka”, listening to “Radio Africa” is a good antidote. The album is everything the World Cup song isn’t – authentic, African and full of soul.

When it comes to government, propaganda is inevitable. But with South African politicians sowing division and discord, we wonder what lessons in mass manipulation South Africa could learn from China. Instead of causing chaos, perhaps a more considered and sophisticated approach to brainwashing could yield some good?

Christopher Hitchens once famously asked: “Why are women, who have the whole male world at their mercy, not funny?” and declared those that were funny hefty, dykey or Jewish. Hitch, say hello to the Tina Fey. She’s straight, slim, Greek Orthodox and possibly the most powerful funny woman in show business today.

The way the mainstream media has covered Lord Triesman’s off-the-record allegations of ref bribery at World Cup 2010 is yet more evidence of Fifa’s power (and, perhaps, its rotten core). Who’s the tail and who’s the dog here?  

You'll have to excuse us if this report is a little short of substance. That's simply an accurate reflection of what happened in Sandton on Monday morning: lots of flashing lights and prettily coloured smoke to show that the police are ready for the World Cup, and awfully little detail.

McDonald’s celebrates in its 70th anniversary with the news that Happy Meals are going to be a lot less happy in a California’s Santa Clara County. In a bid to stem what has been termed an “obesity epidemic”, officials in Silicon Valley neighbourhood have given the toy, chips and burger gig the chop.

In three years time, Ground Zero in New York will boast a brand-new skyscraper, which will be the tallest building in America and a clear message to the perpetrators of 9/11. The building’s most famous tenant might just be the publishers of Vogue, Vanity Fair and the New Yorker.

There are the legions of musical heavyweights who owe much to Stevie Wonder. Gloria Estefan, George Michael, Snoop Dogg, Mary J Blige, Mariah Carey, Babyface, Janet Jackson, Luther Vandross, Alicia Keys, Carrie Underwood, Elton John, John Legend, Prince, all of them were inspired by his genius. The world as we know it would be poorer without the wonder of Wonder, including the fact that the leader of the free world may never have married if Stevie Wonder wasn’t around.

The legendary magazine that once tried an “inescapably impossible task of providing every week a first rough draft of history that will never really be completed about a world we can never really understand” went on sale last week. The equally  inescapably impossible task of surviving in the 21st century awaits the new owners, whoever they might be.

Hard to believe, but Bono’s already burned through his first 50 years on Earth. Don’t let those fresh looks fool you though. Having achieved godlike rock status he’s on to his next job: Saving Africa, ending poverty and the scourge of Aids. (The post of President of the Earth hasn’t been established just yet.)

Thirty years after teenage girls screamed and sighed over Spandau Ballet and boys mimicked their floppy-haired New Romantics fashions, here we are doing it all again.

He was a Russian genius, the great tormented composer whose works wear their emotions on their metaphorical sleeves. His life was one of big feelings, his work one of big melodies, the music of eternal greatness. Best-enjoyed loud, very loud.

Furious and funny, Henry Rollins is back in South Africa to take aim at politics, language, the Pope, advertising, Catholicism, institutions who hate gays, big business and everything else that ticks him off.

Fela Kuti’s ghost loomed large at the New York Public Library when Jeff Daniels and Lea Michele announced the nominees for the 64th annual Tony Awards. “Fela!” the musical about the Nigerian-born musician received 11 nominations, taking it head to head with old faithful “La Cage Aux Folles” for the most Tony Award nominations.

This weekend’s opening of “Iron Man 2” marks more than 70 years for Marvel, a company that’s grown from a two-bit pulp-fiction print house into a modern business monster. For anyone who’s ever loved comics, Iron Man is not just the spectacle of the movie, but a reminder of days spent in dusty bookstores thumbing through print portals to other worlds. As for the movie, well, it’s a well-oiled money-making machine.