UK’s The Independent has released a list of the coolest brands in the UK (thanks, Mashable, for the heads up), and the winner is …
Really, now. Should anyone be surprised that the Ashton Martin is the coolest brand in the UK? I mean, it’s the car James Bond made famous.
Several tech brands are in the top 10, though, including the usual suspects (iPod, Google, YouTube and Apple). But what, precisely, makes a brand cool? According to Stephen Cheliotis, chair of the CoolBrands Council, which picked tht top brands with the help of online voters, it’s a split between technology and luxury, the practical and the aspirational.
On the one hand, things can become cool by virtue of their necessity or prevalence in your life, like Google, or Amazon. On the other, the things you really want, but may know you’ll never get – like a Rolex or a Ferrari – are considered just as cool. There seems to be a real divergence between aspiration and practicality but both are deemed cool – which goes to show how the needs and desires of consumers are developing.
So, where do higher ed brands rank? None were in the top 20. Not even Oxford.
Anyone interested in presidential candidate Fred Thompson’s views on higher education can look to the online archives of his 
Andrew Careaga 