Saverin would not be the first billionaire to renounce citizenship for tax purposes. John Dorrance III, heir to the Campbell’s soup fortune, cashed out of the family business when he sold his 10.5% stake in 1995-1996. Dorrance renounced his U.S. citizenship and moved to Ireland prior to the sale. John Fredriksen, oil tanker tycoon, jumped ship out of Norway in favor of tax-friendly Cyprus. Brazilian Lily Safra, widow to banker Edmond Safra, ditched Brazil for Monaco.

There’s no doubt that it was a financially shrewd move.  $850 million is a lot of money.  But one must marvel at the giant irony: Saverin made his riches off Facebook-loving U.S. taxpayers and is now defriending the country that made him rich when it comes time to add some of that money back to U.S. tax coffers.

Mark Cuban may have summed it up best in a Tweet ato his more than 1 million followers: “This [ticks] me off … If i could realistically stop using facebook, this would be the reason I would. Just wrong.”

Basically, he immigrated to America from Brazil. Benefited from our infrastructure and schools.  Become a Billionaire, and then fliped off Uncle Sam for the bill. Clearly, he not in the caliber of Jobs, Gates, Dell, or other entrepreneurs who never would have thought of leaving the country to save a few bucks.  There should certainly be no more feeling sorry for him from The Social Network; it just makes one skin crawl.

While Paris probably possesses probably 95% of the best baguettes in the world (my personal favorite is Coquelicot bakery in the 18th arrondissement), it goes without saying that not all are created equal.

This great primer, by Paris food blogger David Lebovitz, helps how to separate a good baguette from a mediocre one.

1. If you see rows of Braille-like dots on the bottom of the loaf, it’s been baked industrially – avoid at all costs
2. A good baguette should be sturdy and hold its shape when you pick it up
3. An inferior loaf will have a smooth appearance with regularly-spaced holes when sliced; it will taste ‘cottony’ and bland and will dissolve in the mouth
4. A good baguette will have an ‘apricot-like’ aroma
5. A superior loaf will likewise have large, irregular holes inside and uneven coloration on the crust
6. The innards should be pale-ivory in color and be chewy
7. Look for a sign that reads ‘Artisan Boulangerie’ in the bakery, indicating that the bread is baked on the premises
8. Bakeries that have won the Grand Prix for making the best baguettes in Paris will also have signs affixed to their windows

While #1 is a great tip anywhere in the world, #8 doesn’t really do me much good unless I’ve just landed in CDG.  In the meantime, I’ll stick with La Brea Bakery and avoid Ralphs.

The study used a scientific technique called “eye tracking” on 30 professional recruiters and examined their eye movements during a 10-week period to “record and analyze where and how long someone focuses when digesting a piece of information or completing a task.”

In the short time that they spend with your resume, the study showed recruiters will focus on your name, current title and company, current position start and end dates, previous title and company, previous position start and end dates, and education.

Below are heat maps of recruiters’ eye movements from the study.

Based on this research, it’s obvious to me that we should overemphasize recent accomplishments, make up some witty skills and experience, as well as hide all of our skeletons in the middle.

From the vault of useless trivia: Bombay gins acquire their distinctly delicate flavors through vapor-infusion, which requires a specially adapted Carterhead still. There are only two in the world and the House of Bombay owns both.

I’ve found that Sapphire East pairs well with clean, simple dishes such as a plate of sashimi; try it with ginger ale and a fresh lime wedge to bring out the citrus and spice elements.

For LA folks: LACMA, Autry, Hammer, and Skirball are among the participating museums.

Click for a list of participating museums

From the vault of useless trivia: The phrase “free lunch” refers to a tradition once common in early 1900′s saloons which often included a “free” lunch with the purchase of at least one drink. The saloon-keeper relied on the expectation that most customers would buy more than one drink, and that the practice would build patronage for other times of day.

Honest.com aims to steer parents away from baby products made with toxic chemicals, offering an abundance of natural soaps, diapers, household cleaners and other must-haves for new parents. Alba runs Honest.com with Christopher Gavigan, the former CEO of nonprofit Healthy Child Healthy World.

“The new funding confirms our positioning and acknowledges the big need for a brand and service to deliver pure, healthy products that are delightful, effective and beautiful,” Alba said in a press release. “Only a few hundred of the more than 80,000 chemicals registers for use in U.S. products have been adequately tested for safety.”

My honest assessment: the previous owner of the honest.com domain should have held out for more than the $180,000 it solf for December.

Google Maps is exploring a brand new frontier with its next expansion: the Nintendo Entertainment System. Well, maybe not. But it was sure a fantastic April Fools’ joke. Clicking “Quest” in the upper right corner on Google Maps turned it into an 8-bit, classic video game wonderland. The maps paid homage to the classic NES role-playing game Dragon Warrior, which was known as Dragon Quest in Japan.

“Our engineering team in Japan understood the importance of maps on retro game systems,” writes Tatsuo Nomura, software engineer with Google Maps, at the application’s official blog. “With the power of Google’s immense data centers, and support from Nintendo and Square Enix, we were able to overcome the technical and design hurdles of developing 8-bit maps. Today, we’re excited to announce the result: a version of Google Maps for NES, with beautiful low-res graphics, simple and intuitive controls, and a timeless soundtrack.”

You could even view landmarks in 8-bit form, including the Statue of Liberty, the Washington Monument, Mount Rushmore, Taj Mahal, Eiffel Tower, the Loch Ness Monster, and Area 51.

I certainly appreciated the valuable troubleshooting tips in the video walkthrough of the NES application such as “blowing on the cartridge.”

Interestingly, cochineal dye has been used for centuries and can be traced back to Aztec and Mayan populations of Central and South America. In present day usage, the pigment shows up in everything from cosmetics to pop tarts. It is produced from dried female cochineal beetles and it takes an estimated 70,000 beetles to produce one pound of the red dye. Since January 2011, the FDA has required cochineal and carmine (a close cousin) to be prominently listed on food and cosmetics labels.

“The strawberry base for our Strawberries & Creme Frappuccino does contain cochineal extract, a common natural dye that is used in the food industry, and it helps us move away from artificial ingredients,” said Starbucks spokesperson Jim Olsen. “We certainly respect and understand the interest this is getting, but it is a very common ingredient in foods and juices and beverages,” and that the company has no plans to change the ingredient.

With stories like this, I wonder if we’re going to start seeing a backlash to the origin of today’s organic ingredients? I do know that I’ll be sticking with their artificially flavored and colored caramel drinks.

Merging Star Wars and LEGOs certainly brings back some of the most vivid memories of childhood. May need to look at upgrading my desk accessories.

Although microbe-destroying chemicals were applied to fabrics like cotton, polyester, nylon, and Kevlar, these treated fabrics proved less effective against hardier spores. A chlorinated form of silk, soaked in a solution that includes a substance similar to household bleach, proved the exception, however.  Silk that was treated for just an hour, then allowed to dry, killed all of the E. coli bacteria and anthrax tested on it within 10 minutes.

Other uses stated in the research included purifying water in humanitarian relief efforts and trapping or filtering toxic substances.

I believe we have solved the budget deficit: Gucci, Prada, and Versace can all outbid each other for the rights to design the next Navy Seal chemical suits.