Side Salad: We Built This Roku City on Rock & Roll
May 28, 2026
Good morning from Dieline’s editor-in-chief, Bill McCool. Here’s your daily side serving of design news, short musings, brand stuff, and forgotten ephemera.
Jony Ive is a hack who only designs things for rich folks. So, whatever you might think about the design for the electric Ferrari Luce, it kinda doesn’t matter? But if you really want to know what I think, it doesn’t pass the “would a 3rd grader hang a poster of this sick car on their wall” sniff test. So there you go.
All hail the ROAD DOG, Fred Hart, who talked a wee bit about his 24 favorite brands from the Sweets & Snacks 2026 Expo whilst power-washing the mudflaps on his CPG tradeshow big rig, Bam Bam Bigelow.
To celebrate what would have been Miles Davis’s 100th birthday, Dad Grass just released Miles Davis Bitches Brew, a 3- and 10mg THC Guava Hibiscus beverage named after the seminal fusion record, which is obviously amazing, but is not In a Silent Way, which is obviously better.
I wasn’t feeling nostalgic for the Chili’s Babyback Ribs jingle because it is the worst kind of earworm, but I can get down with Lizzo’s rack o’ ribs flute.
Subway just made a sleeping bag (the “Sleeping Bag-uette) for festival-goers. It’s also massive, and I have no idea how this thing travels. I hope the answer is “the largest Subway sammich wrapper ever.”
Roku just did a massive overhaul of its homescreen, which now puts “deep behavioral insights” and viewer input front and center, which is another way of saying we made it slightly more complicated to access the apps you always use because we’re advertising other programs to you. Smells like enshitification, but at least there’s an interactive Roku City now with games?
What if we told you that you actually don’t have to make a novelty RTD packaged in a plastic lightbulb for underage drinkers (I mean, c’mon, who else is drinking this) that reminds them of BuzzBalls?
Erin Brokovitch (yes, that Erin Brokovitch) just launched a crowdsourced map tracking AI data centers, even the proposed ones. Get on board.
Ta-Ta.
Bill