teen's on Teenwag.com

Dear Irrational Reader: Close the Door!

Tue, 26 Feb 2008 17:58:19 GMT

Funny Kid Isnt Sorry About Huge Party

Tue, 22 Jan 2008 18:50:08 GMT

This Australian kid threw a party while his parents were out of town, 500 people showed up and terrorized the neighborhood. Some news station gets him for an interview and he is not sorry about it at all.

unix is sexy Roumenův Rouming

Thu, 17 Jan 2008 01:57:29 GMT

Künstler-Informationen zu Xavier Naidoo - musiknews.de

Sat, 12 Jan 2008 19:54:24 GMT

Xavier naidoo rox

Xavier Naidoo | Telegramm für X

Sat, 12 Jan 2008 19:52:40 GMT

Xavier Naidoo rocks

THE HUMAN INTERFACE VIDEO

Wed, 02 Jan 2008 11:54:01 GMT

ROX VIDEO

end pc noise

Wed, 26 Dec 2007 21:27:51 GMT

Lisa Lampanelli : InsultComic.com

Sat, 15 Dec 2007 00:17:53 GMT

Lisa Lampanelli

No Swiss DMCA

Tue, 11 Dec 2007 14:28:31 GMT

DMCA is for losers!!!!

San Francisco's Mission District: Eclectic, Eccentric, Electric

Tue, 18 Sep 2007 04:06:44 GMT

FROM the rooftop patio of Medjool, a new restaurant in the Mission district of San Francisco, the entire neighborhood is laid out like a flamboyant mosaic. Ranks of painted ladies - San Francisco's ornate wooden Victorians - rise to Twin Peaks in the west, the hills that block the city's infamous fog and make the Mission one of the city's warmest and sunniest neighborhoods. This terrace is the perfect spot for watching the cottony wave of evening fog roll into downtown, for the sky in the Mission remains crystalline.

At the intersection below, an animated scene of daily life unfolds: sidewalk vendors sell yucca flowers and avocados, blue-haired anarchist daddies push strollers, young men loiter at the corner, Central American housewives and vegan lesbian tattoo artists shop for fresh handmade tortillas.

"I try to get anybody coming to San Francisco to come to the Mission," said Dave Eggers, the best-selling author who set up the first of his community writing schools here. "Not to misuse the word 'authentic' - I think that's such a troubling word - but the Mission really does have all the best parts of San Francisco intersecting here."

Three years ago, Mr. Eggers and his crew turned the storefront at 826 Valencia into the Pirate Supply Store, (415) 642-5905. "When we were renovating, we found strange old beams and wooden floors, and it really had the look of the hull of a ship," he said. "It made us laugh so we thought we'd go for it."

Inside the store, a tiny velvet-curtained enclosure contains a handful of theater seats. Visitors can sit and contemplate a tank of bright tropical fish that glide lazily in front of a map of the Soviet Union. Tinny 1920's French radio tunes play from somewhere overhead, as though from a levitated Victrola. On the wall, a framed piece of parchment reads "Please Do Not Judge the Fish."

With six of these writing schools around the country, 826 remains the flagship, forming the core of the Mission's literary scene. "I don't think there's a neighborhood where more writers live," Mr. Eggers said. "There is no neighborhood in the world - and I've looked - with more independent bookstores in such a small area."

The district grew up around the oldest building in San Francisco: the Mission Dolores, built in 1776 as part of the network of West Coast Spanish missions. In the 20th century, the Mission was a solidly working-class immigrant neighborhood until the early 1970's, when construction of the Bay Area Rapid Transit system tore up Mission Street for three years, killing the vibrant Latino neighborhood and turning the area into an urban wasteland.

Only now is it coming into its own again. A dynamic culture combining the best of many influences is unfolding: The jingling bells of Mexican ice cream vendors' carts blend with the sounds of anarchic marching bands; strange electronic music flies out of open windows to mingle with throbbing Norteño in the sunshine.

"The history of the Mission has a lot to do with waves of radicals who came here to escape failed revolutions elsewhere," says Chris Carlsson, a historian whose San Francisco work can be seen at shapingsf.org.

Along with the rest of the Bay Area, the Mission was thrown on its ear five years ago when oceans of dot-com money threatened to turn the place into a heedless boomtown. But a long tradition of tenant activism helped the area retain its character even as property values headed for escape velocity.

This continuing tension is told on the neighborhood's walls, in a mural tradition that goes back to Diego Rivera's San Francisco work. "This is the most flourishing mural scene in the country," said Andrew Schoultz, an artist identified with the Mission School - the colorful, graphic-inflected and street art-inspired sensation of the last decade. Mr. Schoultz has five murals here, including one each on Balmy Alley and Clarion Alley, the form's twin epicenters.

His flying birdhouses, evocative of the housing anxiety that underlies every Mission resident's daily life ("Will I be evicted?" "Will I be able to make the payments on my million-dollar fixer-upper?"), share the walls with paeans to Latino pride, bicycle activism, idealized farm workers and revolutionary movements (riot police are a recurring demonic icon).

Galeria de la Raza, on 24th Street, has nurtured this artistic vitality for 35 years. Arising from the Chicano civil rights movement, Galeria de la Raza is a grandparent to the small galleries that come and go here with only slightly less turnover than the street art.

The galeria's director, Carolina Ponce de León, said: "We look at traditional forms by revamping them - giving them new meaning, new life, new aesthetics, new media."

Here masked lucha libre wrestlers and Aztec demigods rendered in skateboard anime share space with woodcuts of heroic Zapatistas and expressive collages examining Latino stereotypes. "There is a strange cohesion in the Mission between what we do and what goes on in other spaces that don't have a Latino focus," added Ms. Ponce de León. "The street art aesthetic gives it all a certain unity."

On weekends, gallery openings blend into a nighttime party scene, especially along Mission and Valencia Streets. Mariachi bands rub shoulders with a tipsy bridge-and-tunnel crowd on the teeming sidewalks, eclipsing the neighborhood's more subtle qualities - events like the annual Day of the Dead procession in early November.

This evening parade of haunting, skull-faced locals riffs on Mexican village traditions, but as befits the Mission, participants - who are as likely to hail from Michigan as Michoacán - incorporate social commentary, surging percussion and a spirituality that obscures cultural boundaries beneath layers of face paint.

The same kind of eclectic appropriation is embodied in the Mission's signature dish, the burrito. This field worker's lunch of beans, rice and meat rolled in a flour tortilla first became part of the urban smorgasbord in the 1960's, when El Faro on Folsom Street put the first super burrito on its menu. Fierce loyalty to a favorite taqueria is a point of pride and a subtle indicator of where one falls in the neighborhood's protean social landscape. And that's even before looking at the choice of fillings, which can range the gamut from marinated steak to brains to braised pork to tofu.

"The Mission is the burrito vortex," said Charles Hodgkins, who has visited every one of the city's more than 150 taquerias - nearly a third of them are in the Mission - rating each burrito for his Web site, burritoeater.com. (Taqueria San Francisco, an unassuming neighborhood hole-in-the-wall on 24th Street, boasts the highest-rated burrito in the city.)

The unsectarian burrito orthodoxy underlies a culinary aesthetic that prizes inventiveness and tradition in equal measure. Thus, the Mission is host to inspired restaurants like Delfina on 18th Street and Osha on Valencia Street that bring an urbane California sensibility to the cuisines of Tuscany and Bangkok respectively. By the same token, Limón, on Valencia Street, brings Peruvian food the attention it deserves with ceviche as precious as the finest sushi, but with the added appeal of a sparkling bite that sends shivers though a diner's body.

If food is, so far, the most upscale element in the Mission (a corollary of the fact that virtually every two-bedroom apartment here now costs substantially more than half a million dollars), other cultural elements are catching up. Growing out of the concentration of junk stores that once lined Valencia Street, a new wave of design and fashion is doing for the eclectic "Mission Thrift" look what the Mission School did for the area's graphic arts: bringing it to a wider audience, but also codifying an informal aesthetic.

Outside, colors are everywhere. They're in the urgent sidewalk stencils and the Virgin of Guadeloupe sport shirts. They leap from the psychedelic-baroque tattoos on every other arm to the man selling blow-up toys. He's covered in them from head to toe, a figure fallen from one of Mr. Schoultz's murals. It's a rich swirl: deeper meaning beneath a haphazard, found style - synthesis rather than pastiche - alive and without judgment in the Mission sun.
•

If You Go

Where to Eat and Drink

Café Gratitude, 2400 Harrison Street at 20th, (415) 824-4652. Vegan dishes like I Am Worthy and I Am Wonderful may be cheap back-door tickets to knowing oneself, but some are top-notch examples of raw cuisine. Dinner for two with a large bottle of organic beer, $45.

Limón, 524 Valencia Street at 16th, (415) 252-0918. Nouveau Peruvian hot spot known for astounding ceviche. Dinner for two with a bottle of wine, $110.

Papalote, 3409 24th Street at Valencia, (415) 970-8815. A great place for that ultimate Mission synthesis: the veggie burrito. Burritos and beer for two, $14.

La Corneta, 2731 Mission Street at 23rd, (415) 643-7001. The best example of the high-turnover, dining-hall breed of taqueria. Burritos and Mexican soda for two, $12.

Medjool, 2522 Mission Street at 21st, (415) 550-9055. This tasteful entertainment complex (cafe, bar, restaurant, hostel, and rooftop terrace) is a decidedly new thing for the Mission. Drinks and snacks for two, $30.

What to See

Galeria de la Raza, 2857 24th Street at Bryant, (415) 826-8009. Providing a place for cutting-edge art with Chicano and Latino themes, this is the touchstone for the multifaceted Mission arts scene.

Precita Eyes Muralists, 2981 24th Street at Harrison, (415) 285-2287. A 28-year-old organization that maintains some of the Mission's murals and is its curator. Walking tours start here or nearby on Saturday and Sunday at 11 a.m. and 1:30 p.m., and cost $12 for general admission. Call to arrange tours at other times.

30 Rock Television show Emmys Best Comedy show 2007

Sun, 16 Sep 2007 23:51:44 GMT

Originally Aired: April 26, 2007

As TGS' summer hiatus approaches, Liz deals with the difficulties of her long-distance relationship with Floyd while she enlists Kenneth's help in locating on-the-lam Tracy. Meanwhile, Jack's impending marriage to Phoebe brings his mother, Colleen Donaghy, to town. This lead to a heart attack and a realization that he doesn't love Phoebe but he does love his work, and renewing his dedication to i

Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Emmys

Sun, 16 Sep 2007 23:51:09 GMT

Primetime Emmy® Winners Unveiled
Primetime Emmy® Award winners are out! Download full list of honorees here. See more Primetime Emmys info, galleries and features.
L.A. Area Emmy® Awards Winners Feted
Peers feted 59th L.A. Area Emmy® honorees with a lively Goldenson Theatre gala. See full L.A. Area wrap-up and download winners list here.
Stop Sabotaging Your Career—Sold Out
The lively, eye-opening presentation “Stop Sabotaging Your Career” with guest speaker and best-selling author Dr. Lois Frankel is now sold out. More info.
An Evening with Numbers—Sept. 24
Television Academy members, join the stars and producers of popular CBS show Numbers at Goldenson Theatre. Get details.
Make Your Bids: Foundation Auction Begins Sept. 5
Benefiting the Television Academy Foundation's education programs, the Charity Folks Online Auction runs Sept. 5 to Sept. 28. More info.
A More Eco-centric Biz, TV Gets Greener
The Television Academy and FOX kicked off Emmy® season with the Green with Emmy® campaign—but TV is turning greener all over. Read feature.
Are You Covered? — Get Medical Insurance
For the first time, the Television Academy is making medical insurance available to its members! Get more details about new Aetna coverage here.
Find Great Deals for Members Inside the Red Book
The Red Book hosts a wealth of great discounts and more. This week's featured partners: Luxe Sunset Blvd., Mondrian Hotel and Hotel Casa Del Mar

`Sopranos' wins best drama Emmy - 2007 Emmys: The 59th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards

Sun, 16 Sep 2007 23:50:27 GMT

"The Sopranos" turned its startling cut-to-black final season into Emmy gold Sunday, winning the best drama series award, and newcomer "30 Rock" was named best comedy series.

The mob saga's victory was nearly unprecedented, with only one other drama series, 1977's "Upstairs, Downstairs," having claimed the top trophy after leaving the air.

"In essence, this is a story about a gangster," said "The Sopranos" creator David Chase. "And gangsters are out there taking their kids to college, and taking their kids to school, and putting food on their table.

"And, hell, let's face it, if the world and this nation was run by gangsters" -- Chase paused and shrugged, as everyone laughed -- "maybe it is."

Freshman "30 Rock," set in the world of a late-night show akin to "Saturday Night Live" and created by "SNL" veteran Tina Fey, could be buoyed by its award. The critically acclaimed comedy has lagged in the ratings.

Fey, who also stars in the series, jokingly thanked "dozens and dozens of viewers."

"Sopranos" stars James Gandolfini and Edie Falco didn't fare as well their show Sunday.

James Spader was named best drama series actor for "Boston Legal," and talked as if he had pilfered it from fellow nominee Gandolfini.

"Oh my goodness, I feel like I just stole a pile of money from the mob. And they're all sitting over there," Spader said, acknowledging him and the rest of "The Sopranos" cast in the Shrine Auditorium audience.

Sally Field was honored as best actress in a drama for "Brothers & Sisters." Falco was among her competitors.

"How can that be? These wonderful actors," Field said. Clearly flustered, she lost her train of thought at one point, shouting at the audience to stop applauding while she struggled to finish her acceptance speech.

America Ferrera of the campy "Ugly Betty" was named best actress in a comedy series.

"This is such an amazing, wonderful achievement. The award is to be able to get up and go to work tomorrow," Ferrera said.

HBO won a leading 21 awards, edging NBC's 19 trophies. ABC and CBS tied with 10 each, followed by PBS with nine and Fox with seven. The total reflect awards given Sunday and at last week's creative arts ceremony.

The biggest laugh of the night was earned by presenters Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, after they announced that Ricky Gervais of "Extras" had won the award for best comedy series actor.

"Ricky Gervais could not be here tonight. Instead we're going to give this to our friend, Steve Carell," Stewart said. Carell, a nominee for "The Office," bounded on stage, sharing a group hug with Stewart and Colbert.

The Emmys spread the awards wealth.

Supporting actor honors went to stars of "Grey's Anatomy," "Lost," "Entourage" and "My Name is Earl."

"My own mother told me I didn't have a shot in hell at winning tonight," said Katherine Heigl of "Grey's Anatomy." "This is my dream come true. I've been doing this for 17 years."

A mob family, a former vice president and the cast of "Roots" brought the audience to its feet at the ceremony.

Al Gore received a standing ovation as his Current TV channel, which features viewer-created videos, was honored for achievement in interactive television.

"We are trying to open up the television medium so that viewers can help to make television, and join the conversation of democracy, and reclaim American democracy by talking about the choices we have to make," said Gore, whose global-warming documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" received an Oscar earlier this year.

Another standing ovation greeted the sprawling cast of "The Sopranos," which gathered on stage after the drama had claimed honors for best writing and directing. Actor Joe Mantegna paid tribute to the show as "having changed the face of television."

Queen Latifah helped salute the groundbreaking miniseries "Roots" on its 30th anniversary. The saga about a black American family's history "brought great honor to the art form that we celebrate tonight," she said.

"Let us all work to ensure that we all honor the legacy of `Roots' not just tonight but in everything we do," added "Roots" star John Amos, reunited onstage with his castmates to yet another standing ovation.

The usually staid awards needed attention from the censors from the start, with first presenter Ray Romano. He joked about his former "Everybody Loves Raymond" wife, Patricia Heaton, sleeping with her new "Back to You" co-star Kelsey Grammer

But he used a stronger word, which prompted Fox to black out the show for a few seconds. Heigl mouthed another expletive, which Fox unsuccessfully tried to evade with a different camera shot.

Terry O'Quinn, who plays the mysterious John Locke on "Lost," was named best supporting actor in a drama.

"Sometimes when we're rolling around in the jungle in the mud, hitting each other and stabbing each other, I wonder what it would be like to bake up a sheet of cookies on Wisteria Lane and get one of their checks," O'Quinn said, referring to "Desperate Housewives."

"Then I think about my castmates and crewmates, and I realize why I have the best job in the world," said O'Quinn, whose award came in a resurgent creative season for the series.

Jeremy Piven, who plays a slick Hollywood agent on the comedy "Entourage," was another early winner.

"What an embarrassment of riches to even be able to play this role," said Piven.

"I want to thank our entire crew. I don't know any of their names," he joked.

Jaime Pressly of "My Name is Earl," was named best supporting actress in a comedy.

"Broken Trail" was honored as best miniseries and drew awards for stars Robert Duvall and Thomas Haden Church

Oscar winner Helen Mirren ("The Queen") was honored as best actress in a miniseries or movie for "Prime Suspect," making her the category's biggest winner with four awards.

"The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" received its fifth consecutive trophy as best variety, music or comedy series. Stewart noted the satiric news show sent a correspondent to Iraq this year who "found laughs in hell. I think it's the proudest thing we found so far."

In an animated opening, cartoon characters from "Family Guy" spoofed the industry in a song-and-dance number on a specially designed set-in-the-round at the Shrine Auditorium.

Then host Ryan Seacrest took over.

He saluted hosts of years past, including Johnny Carson, Conan O'Brien and Ellen DeGeneres: "Sure, they were brilliant, if that's what you're into." After briefly bantering with audience members, the "American Idol" host turned the ceremony over to the awards and to those with comedy on their resumes.

Even Kanye West did his part, competing in a "Don't Forget the Lyrics!" spoof with Rainn Wilson of "The Office." Told to finish off the lyrics of West's new single, "Stronger," West sang "you" instead of "ya" and Wilson got it right.

"I never win," muttered West, jokingly; he's been publicly peeved over previous awards show losses.

Vertical wind tunnel, just opened in SF Bay Area Vertical Wind Tunnel / Indoor Skydiving

Sun, 02 Sep 2007 14:55:10 GMT

Indoor Skydiving at iFly is a safe, exciting experience for virtually anyone.

It's safe enough for kids, challenging enough for adults, exciting enough for teens, and realistic enough for professional skydivers.

Boy, 11, is shot dead in car park

Wed, 22 Aug 2007 14:12:56 GMT

The incident happened shortly after 1930 BST in the car park of the Fir Tree public house.

The boy was rushed to Alder Hey Hospital but police later confirmed that he had died.

Officers are at the scene and police are treating the shooting as a major incident.

J.K. Rowling writing crime novel - author of Harry Potter

Sat, 18 Aug 2007 21:36:29 GMT

J.K. Rowling has been spotted at cafes in Scotland working on a detective novel, a British newspaper reported Saturday.

The Sunday Times newspaper quoted Ian Rankin, a fellow author and neighbor of Rowling's, as saying the creator of the "Harry Potter" books is turning to crime fiction.

"My wife spotted her writing her Edinburgh criminal detective novel," the newspaper, which was available late Saturday, quoted Rankin as telling a reporter at an Edinburgh literary festival.

"It is great that she has not abandoned writing or Edinburgh cafes," said Rankin, who is known for his own police novels set in the historic Scottish city.

Rowling famously wrote initial drafts of the Potter story in the Scottish city's cafes. Back then, she was a struggling single mother who wrote in cafes to save on the heating bill at home.

Now she's Britain's richest woman — worth $1 billion, according to Forbes magazine — and her seven Potter books have sold more than 335 million copies worldwide.

In an interview with The Associated Press last month, Rowling said she believed she was unlikely to repeat the success of the Potter series, but confirmed she had plans to work on new books.

"I'll do exactly what I did with Harry — I'll write what I really want to write," Rowling said.

The office of Rowling's literary agent, Christopher Little, was not immediately available to comment late Saturday.

Kirsten Dunst gives untidy Razorlight star the boot

Sat, 28 Jul 2007 19:34:35 GMT

Rocker Johnny Borrell's untidiness has cost him his girlfriend, Spider-Man star Kirsten Dunst.

It was revealed recently that he had moved in with the American actress in the house she bought in Islington, North London – but how his habit of driving his scooter through the living room was upsetting her.

Now the 26-year-old's messiness has resulted in Kirsten booting him out.

'Kirsten is incredibly tidy – she is obsessive when it comes to cleaning. Johnny is messy and it was driving her mad,' says a friend of the couple.

'Kirsten has asked him to move back into the place he shares with an old pal in nearby Muswell Hill. They are taking some time out.'

Kirsten, 24, who is filming in London, seems to be enjoying her new-found freedom.

'She was dancing with a group of guys at the Greco Roman night in London Bridge into the early hours of last Sunday,' sources reveal.

Judge J: How Miss Chilli Hot Stuff ruined my life

Sat, 28 Jul 2007 19:31:07 GMT

The woman judge at the centre of the sensational sex video blackmail case reveals she has lost her faith in Britain's courts and says Miss Chilli Hot Stuff ruined her life...

When Judge J, as she is now so infamously known, put an advert in her local newsagent's looking for a cleaner, she quite reasonably thought little of it.

Nor did she have any reason to worry when the only person to answer her request was a young Brazilian called Roselane Driza.

"She was nice," says Judge J.

"She was normal. Her English was very poor but otherwise she was fine. And to be brutally honest, she was also the only girl to turn up for an interview."

The judge checked with previous employers who warned that she hadn't always come on the days she had promised but was trustworthy.

As Judge J - a senior immigration judge - says: "I just wanted to know that she was honest. I didn't want someone in my life that was going to come into my home and remove everything when I wasn't there."

Which must seem bitterly ironic to her now.

Roselane Driza

Cleaner Roselane Driza leaving the Old Bailey on the 27th July. She was sentenced to 33 months in prison in October 2006 for theft and blackmailing Judge Khan. The remaining case for the blackmail of Judge J was thrown out last week and Driza was freed

Judge 'J' with Judge Khan

Judge 'J' with Judge Khan on holiday
Read more...

* Female judge in 'chilli hot stuff' love triangle branded a racist and a liar

For Judge J's employment of Roselane Driza cost far more than the loss of a sideboard ornament or a piece of jewellery. It has taken away Judge J's reputation, her dignity, her peace of mind, even her health.

Last September, Judge J, now in her 50s, and one of the most senior immigration judges in the country, became unwittingly involved in one of the most scandalous trials to ever affect the British judiciary.

For when she sacked Roselane, 37, it triggered an extraordinary vendetta in which the cleaner apparently set out to destroy her former employer.

First, she began an affair with Judge J's former lover, fellow immigration judge Mohammad Ilyas Khan, known as Ilyas to his friends and colleagues. Then it emerged that Roselane, or 'Miss Chilli Hot Stuff' as Mr Khan embarrassingly labelled her, was an illegal immigrant.

It was alleged that she attempted to blackmail Judge J by threatening that, unless she was paid £20,000, she would tell the Department for Constitutional Affairs - now the Ministry of Justice - that Judge J had employed her despite her status.

Judge 'J' with Judge Khan on another holiday

At the resulting trial, in which Roselane was accused of theft and blackmail, she exposed a damaging and lurid web of sex and intrigue.

The cleaner claimed to have found two videos at Mr Khan's flat: one which showed him having sex with Judge J while allegedly taking cocaine and another of him having sex with a blonde woman.

Judge J, meanwhile, was revealed to be having an affair with another judge, Judge N, who was married with two children.

Matters were not helped when Roselane turned the pavement outside the Old Bailey into her own personal catwalk, displaying a different, flamboyant outfit each day of the trial, topped off by her trademark sunglasses.

The fallout has, inevitably, been devastating. Judge J has been diagnosed with a severe depressive illness, is on medication and has been forced to take early retirement. Mr Khan is also suffering from depression while Judge J's lover, Judge N, has gone into hiding.

Now Judge J - under the condition of anonymity ordered by the court - has agreed to speak exclusively to The Mail on Sunday to give, for the first time, her account of a series of events that have destroyed three legal careers.

She has been portrayed as a woman of dubious moral standing; a woman who embarked on misguided affairs and remained blasé about her responsibilities as a judge.

In fact she is elegant and beautiful, with a formidable intellect and an earthy, straight-forward manner.

She has agreed to speak out only because of her disgust at the justice system, of which she was such an important part, and which she believes has failed her beyond all measure.

Roselane was sentenced to 33 months in prison in October 2006 but was freed on appeal last February. Her convictions for theft and blackmailing Judge Khan were quashed.

Last Friday the remaining case for the blackmail of Judge J was thrown out and Roselane was freed after the Crown Prosecution Service said that the two main prosecution witnesses - Judge J and Judge Khan - were too ill to give evidence.

Worse, it was then reported that a host of people, including eight judges and Judge J's ex-husband, had given evidence for the retrial, claiming Judge J was xenophobic, used bad language and displayed "intemperate behaviour".

Speaking from her smart £500,000 flat in North London, her almond eyes a mix of anger and resignation, Judge J says of Roselane: "She has completely ruined my life and the lives of two other people who I cared about. She's beneath contempt. I believe she is an evil woman.

"I don't think it's very often that you come across a genuinely evil woman but I really think she is.

"What other explanation is there? The stupid thing is she had no bearing on my life. She was a total irrelevance, a nuisance. It sounds awful but it's true. She was just someone who was supposed to help clean the house.

"How did that turn into such a destructive obsession? How can some woman walk into a person's life and destroy it with such a great degree of success and for nothing?"

So who is Judge J and why did she inspire such hatred and resentment?

She was adopted when she was just six weeks old. Her adoptive father owned a haulage company. Her mother was a housewife. Judge J excelled at school and at 16 was offered a job at the UN in Geneva. Her mother wouldn't allow her to leave, so she studied law at a Scottish university.

While there, she met her first husband, also a lawyer. The couple had two children. The eldest died in a road accident aged 27. The marriage broke up after 10 years when Judge J was 33. Soon afterwards she was offered a job as a judge in the social security section.

From there she worked her way up to the position of Senior Resident Immigration Judge. She had just taken up the post when she employed Roselane in October 1999.

At the time she was entering the final stages of a relationship with Judge Khan, 60, a Tanzanian-born Muslim who was married with two children.

The couple knew each other through work but became close after Judge J's second husband, a Northern businessman, died suddenly.

Judge Khan left his wife of 22 years and his two children, a boy, now 14, and an 18-year-old girl, and moved in with Judge J to a flat in North London.

She says: "He married his first cousin. It was an arranged marriage and he had many other affairs. I wasn't the first.

"My husband was one of life's truly good men and it was hard after he died. Ilyas and I had been friends for a long time and about a year after my husband died we became close.

"We moved in together and for a while it was good. We travelled a lot and it was companionship for both of us. But although we lived together I was paying everything towards the house. In the end I got sick of it. In July of 2000, I told him to either contribute or leave. He decided to leave.

"I told him in no uncertain terms I would never take him back and although he wanted to, there was never any sexual relationship after that time."

However, the couple remained friends and Judge J asked her cleaner if she would also work for Judge Khan.

She says: "That's really how they met. She cleaned for him and also for me. In the end though, I grew tired of her. She used to leave notes everywhere. They were always unintelligible but usually said something along the lines of, 'You need more yellow dusties'. "The thing that gets me is that she was never a very good cleaner.

"Very often, she wouldn't turn up but would send a friend or a cousin in her place, or she'd change the days with sickening regularity. She'd call up and say 'I sore throat. I come Thursday now.'

"For two years I kept saying, 'I must do something,' but I just never got round to it. The trouble began when I wrote a note back to her saying, 'If you spent less time writing notes and more time cleaning, we might get along better'."

By then Judge J had begun a relationship with Judge N, another immigration judge who was also married with two children.

The couple met through work in 2003, and continued to see each other for another three years.

She says: "The final straw came when I had been away working and Judge N was in the flat. I arrived back to find a note saying, 'Your friend is disgusting'.

"It was about a page long but it was all in a mixture of English and Portuguese and was just rubbish that didn't make any sense. I've absolutely no idea why she called my partner disgusting.

"I called her up and told her to go. She said, 'You tell me eye-to-eye'.

"I said, 'No, I'm telling you now. You can hand your keys back at the security gate.' Of course she never did and I had to get the locks changed. I thought that would be the end of it." In fact it was just the beginning. Roselane instead turned to Judge Khan, a man who has been undoubtedly foolish but who also claims he was simply trying to help Judge J.

Yesterday he told The Mail on Sunday: "She was cleaning for me. She had this real obsession with J.

"She wanted vengeance for J sacking her. I knew J was ill with depression because of the pressure of work and I suppose I saw more of Roselane because I was trying to keep her on-side. In the end we became close after I cooked her an Indian meal.

"I would try to tell Roselane to leave J alone but she had this almost messianic zeal against her. She would say, 'You keep out of this. This is between me and J and you will see who wins in the end'."

Judge J says: "Roselane has said that I was jealous of them. I wasn't. I was already with someone else.

"What fascinates me is where lies the great charm? She has the most dreadful voice - she yells.

"And Ilyas told me she used to stand naked in front of the mirror - the mirror I bought - and say, 'Why am I so beautiful?' "Once he'd taken her in, he couldn't get rid of her.

"We all warned him he was getting himself into trouble; me, his sister, his friends. At one point they found a leak which meant they had to take up all the floors in his flat. There was no kitchen, no bathroom, nothing. He moved into a hotel for about two months while it was fixed but she refused to go."

Threatened by the friendship between Judge Khan and Judge J and conscious of Judge J's disapproval, Roselane intensified her campaign against her.

Judge J says: "She wrote a letter to the Lord Chief Justice claiming that I had abused my position and she also said she'd written to the Prime Minister and the Queen.

"Then at the beginning of 2006, a letter arrived.

"She said that she had taken legal advice and because of the way I treated her - by sacking her - I had to pay her X amount of pounds - I think it was about £400.

"I just ignored it but about three months later a second letter arrived. This time I wrote to her and said that I would not be paying her. A couple of months after that a third letter came.

"I realised I had to do something about it so I went to my local police station. They refused to do anything so I spoke to a friend in missing persons who knew someone and they got the police to come and see me.

"I thought they would just give her a warning and maybe check her status - by now she was claiming she was an illegal immigrant when I employed her. I didn't want to press charges but the police insisted."

Roselane was charged with blackmail against Judge J and Judge Khan, and also with theft after Judge Khan alleged she had stolen the two sex videos which did such damage to the judges' reputations in court.

Judge J says: "She told the court she'd destroyed them so they were never given as evidence.

"I don't know if they existed or not but I can say I have never taken cocaine in my life and I have no knowledge of Ilyas recording our sex life.

"I knew nothing about the videos until the trial. The whole thing was a disgrace."

The videos were not the only thing that the judge did not know about. She was the chief witness for the prosecution but was told nothing about the nature of the trial or the evidence they intended to use, even when these things directly affected her or those close to her.

She says: "As a judge I was already aware of the frightening incompetence of the justice system but I thought that once you got to the Old Bailey there was half a chance it would run like a real court.

"I was wrong. They've got all the trappings but nothing that resembles justice.

"The whole thing was like a Stalinist plot. It was Kafkaesque. I was a prosecution witness.

"We were supposed to be on the same side yet the police and the lawyers refused to tell me anything about the case.

"At no time was there any discussion about the content of the case for the prosecution. If you're a witness you're supposed to go into court and obviously tell the truth but it would have been quite helpful to know what the plan was.

"I've never known a witness not be allowed to speak to a lawyer but mine wouldn't tell me anything. Nor would the police.

"Even when the court had decided to lift Judge Khan's anonymity which could potentially have led to my name coming out, they didn't tell me. Instead they let me go into court and be cross-examined.

"To this day, I still don't know what the case for the prosecution was. Even on Friday, the Press called me before the police did to tell me that she had been set free."

Judge J has mixed feelings about the fact that the case fell down because she was too ill to give evidence. She says: "Had I been able to give evidence at the retrial I'm not sure justice would have been served.

"I've got no faith in the system. The whole thing sickens me. What justice? It's not the justice system, it's the British lottery system."

In some ways the judge has perhaps had a lucky escape given that so many people had lined up to give evidence against her at the trial. She is of course hurt they decided to do so, but not surprised.

She says: "I had 140 judges under me, a lot of them complete prima donnas. I was the one who told them what to do and they didn't like it. Some of them are men who hated having a younger female boss.

"Also, I wouldn't toe the line. The immigration department is now a very politicised place and I refused to do what I was told. You make enemies that way but I have no doubt that I have only ever tried to do the best job I can.

"As for my ex-husband, I think he saw it as another way to destroy me. It was a very bitter break-up. It has been said that I lied during child custody hearings. That is rubbish."

Judge J could be forgiven for feeling bitter about such treatment but after the events of the last 18 months, there is a sense that nothing surprises her anymore.

She despairs, as an immigration judge, that Roselane walked out of court on Friday without her legal status in Britain having been decided.

"I really truly don't know what her status is because it changes with the weather but the fact remains that if she is an overstayer or is here illegally - as it is claimed - then she should be in the care of the immigration services," she says.

"I was told that a notice of deportation had been served on her in which case, she should have been put straight into detention until her hearing when she would either be allowed to stay or be deported.

"What's she doing running around in her white leggings?

"I have never known of a case where someone whose status is under question has been allowed to walk free from court. It's just another example of the gross injustice of it all."

It emerged after the earlier trial that the cleaner had married an Albanian serial killer, who is serving a life sentence in Italy but is wanted in this country over an unsolved murder.

A second lover, also an Albanian, was stabbed to death by his best friend in a row over money.

Judge J has yet to face a review of the case by the Office for Judicial Complaints, which has been investigating the behaviour of both her and Judge Khan.

"The inquiry into why Ilyas and myself might have employed an illegal is ridiculous. To have been employed by us, she would have had to have had paid holidays and worked exclusively.

"Like most cleaners, she worked for us under a contract of services. Cash was exchanged, just as it would be to say a window cleaner or the person that cleans your car but you are not responsible for them in the same way you would be to an employee."

As we finish talking, suddenly there is a lot of clattering in the hallway.

A smiling face peers through the doorway and a stout, dark-haired girl says in an indisputably foreign accent: "I finish now."

"Oh, don't worry," says Judge J, "that's the cleaner."

Asked where the cleaner is from, the Judge says: "Oh, I don't know, I haven't a clue. Poland? Ukraine? Somewhere like that."

"I hope you've checked her status," she is asked jokingly.

"No, I've no idea," she says with a resigned laugh and a wave of her hand.

Proof that while badly damaged, Judge J is not quite defeated.

Arab princesses kicked off British Airways plane to jeers and whistles after refusing to sit next to male strangers

Sat, 28 Jul 2007 19:29:10 GMT

Three Arab princesses were thrown off a packed British Airways flight after refusing to sit next to male passengers they didn't know.

The dispute - in which the three princesses from the ultra-conservative Qatar royal family demanded segregated seating - left the London-bound plane delayed on a baking Italian runway for nearly three hours.

Furious passengers whistled and clapped as the row intensified before the captain eventually ordered the women to be escorted off the plane.

The princesses, wearing traditional Arab dress, were returning from a day's shopping in Milan. They arrived at the city's Linate airport and boarded Heathrow-bound flight BA 563, which was due to take off at 4pm on Thursday.

The women, all relatives of the oil-rich emir of Qatar, Bader Bin Khalifa Al Thani, were booked into business class in a party of eight which included the emir and an entourage of cooks, servants and other staff.

After passengers had fastened their seat-belts and the plane had taxied on to the runway, two male passengers in the entourage got up to protest about where the women were sitting.

According to the customs of Qatar and other Gulf states, women are not allowed to mix with men who are not relatives.

Cabin crew tried to rearrange the seats but passengers travelling together refused to give up their allotted places. The captain tried to mediate but after more than two and a half hours of wrangling he ordered the bulk of their royal party off the plane.

It is understood that five of the eight - including the princesses and the men who left their seats to protest - were removed.

Police and diplomats from the Qatar consulate in Milan were also called in before the plane eventually took off. The rest of the Qatar party left Milan later on an Alitalia flight.

A BA spokesman said: "The people were offloaded because they failed to comply with safety instructions when the aircraft was taxiing. Two passengers stood up and refused to sit down."

A spokesman at the Qatar embassy in Rome said: "This was a private matter and we have nothing to say."

Chris Brown

Fri, 27 Jul 2007 08:54:04 GMT

When the teen members of the Montalvo Art Center's "Do Something New" project sat down to make clay sculptures, they didn't make vases or plates--they made food action figures.

Thu, 26 Jul 2007 02:16:04 GMT

When the teen members of the Montalvo Art Center's "Do Something New" project sat down to make clay sculptures, they didn't make vases or plates--they made food action figures.

"We started thinking about people really wanting to return to organic food products, and wanting to get away from genetically modified foods," said artist and project facilitator Mario Ybarra. "We asked the kids to design a Franken-food, and they came up with foods that had super powers, like an apple with a cape."

The 10-week project that began in February was an effort to get the teen volunteers to portray modern problems using modern art, such as toys, T-shirts and photographs rather than just paintings and drawings.

"It was about making sculptures they could relate to and that they would find cool," said Ybarra. "Their relation to sculpture is more like Toys 'R' Us and playing with action figures."

Facilitated by Ybarra and his wife, Karla Diaz, the project's second part involves displaying the fruit of their labors with the 10 students from high schools throughout the area, including Saratoga, Leigh, and Downtown College Prep. The students' diverse relationship to art reflected the project's goal of relating art to the daily lives of youth.

"A lot of the kids that we worked with did not have formal art experience," said Ybarra. "A lot of them had experience in creative writing, music, dance or photography but had never taken a visual arts class, per se."

Originally called Teen Council, the group came up with the title "Do Something New" to show their creativity and their intent to embrace unconventional art forms.

"We wanted the kids to plant the seed in relation to contemporary art, and in contemporary art you have a lot of genres, whether it's music, dance, graffiti or creative writing," said Ybarra.

The project also emphasized contemporary issues, calling on the teens to portray themes from their daily lives. After a few weeks of brainstorming, they chose family, friends, technology and music as the concerns of our times. Later, the topic of violence also emerged in their discussions.

"You have to approach [what the concerns of our times are] very carefully, because obviously it can be very loaded. There are so many concerns with politics and the war in Iraq, and school shooters, and all of these things that are very prominent in the media," said Ybarra. "The way we were able to come up with the concerns for the kids was that we just had conversations with them."

To capture the themes that were important to them, the teens used disposable cameras to take photos that interested them.

The teens traded their pictures with one another like baseball cards, with each student trying to maintain a thematic focus. The teens used their collections of images to create a photo collage.

"We were trying to create a sense of shared authorship and shared community with the art they were creating," said Ybarra.

After creating the collages, the students traced over them and submitted the designs to Bulbo, a media company based in Tijuana. Bulbo put the designs on T-shirts, which will be sold at Montalvo.

"I thought it was really cool. Something I designed is actually going out onto the market and people are going to wear it," said Megan Lee, a DSN member and student at Saratoga High School.

The teens involved in DSN had several chances to design mass media culture, including personalized magazines dealing with issues of interest to them. Megan's magazine, "Toxins," compiled pictures of her favorite bands with lyrics from their songs.

Meagan liked the idea that "someday something of mine could be published and millions of people could see it," she said. "It's cool that you could have that kind of influence on someone."

Ybarra wanted the teens to learn that technology can be used to produce culture, not just peruse it.

"[Today's youth] all know how to watch YouTube, and they know how to mine the latest Killers song, but if they don't know how to take it further than that they can only be consumers through technology," said Ybarra. "What we would like to develop with them is to be producers of technology, of some critical content with a deeper meaning."

One such use of modern technology was the oral history project the teens put together on the Montalvo Service Group, which has served the institute since 1954. Interviewing the members using digital recorders, the teens created a tribute to the group while learning about the need for community service toward the arts.

"It was a really strong moment for our kids to understand a kind of legacy here at Montalvo, but also a model for artists to come here and do things," said Ybarra.

Service to the arts is also an important theme of the DSN project, as many of the teens will participate as docents in the ongoing display of their work. At the Sept. 16 Youth Arts Council event, they will help moderate discussions on young women in the arts and youth art in the media, and help host a spoken word poetry session.

"I think it's really important [for the teens to volunteer] in relation to young people, because at that age there should be a real sense of responsibility," said Ybarra. "Art always gets a bum rap as being the place where you can get an easy ride, but it's not true. Being an artist is very difficult and it takes a lot of wit and knowledge."

Through their volunteer service to Montalvo, Ybarra said that the teens gain a better appreciation for the role of art in communities.

"What they're trying to develop with the artists that come here is more a sense of engagement with the community and engagement with the San Jose area. Because in the past they had artists who just used Montalvo to create art they could bring to other exhibits," said Ybarra.

Megan, who had not taken formal art classes prior to DSN, is now pursuing art through a class at West Valley Community College. She feels a stronger affinity toward pop art than the classical variety, she said.

"A lot of [the work at DSN] was more hands-on work instead of just drawing. It was more that we actually had to make something up from our head, like T-shirts and CD covers," she said. "It's not just making something we were set to do. We had to design something and make it from the bottom up."

Rain Bi Bio Jung Ji-hoon

Sat, 21 Jul 2007 17:24:38 GMT

Real name: Jung Ji-hoon
Nickname: Puppy
Date of birth: June 25, 1982.
Physical stats: 184 cm in height, 74 kg in weight
Blood Type: O
Favorite Color: White, Black
Education: Post modern music department, Kyung Hee University
Favorite Actor: Charlie Chaplin, Hahn Suk-kyu
Favorite Genre: R&B, hip-hop, funk
Favorite Sport: Basketball, swimming
Favorite Artist: Michael Jackson, Janet Jackson, Usher
Hobby: Movies, music, collecting shoes and clothes
Special skills: Sing, dancing, acting

Jung Ji Hoon, born on the 25th of June 1982 is a well known actor and singer in South Korea.. He uses his stage name, Bi (pronounced: “Bee” which means Rain in Korean), when he performs as a singer and dancer. His real name is Jung Ji Hoon, which he uses when he performs as an actor. His surname is Jung and his given name is Ji Hoon (also spelled as Ji Hun)

He discovered his passion for dancing ever since he was in the 6th grade. As a teenager, he was part of the boyband group called “fanclub” and years after the group ended, Park Jin Young (Korean producer/singer who worked with American singers Will Smith, Mase, Lil’ Kim, 3LW, Tyrese) took Bi under his wings after he auditioned for JYP entertainment and trained him for years in dancing and singing. Bi was a back-dancer for a famous Korean singer named Park Ji Yoon and Park Jin Young himself. During those training years, Bi was not at home much and would lie to his parents telling them he was gonna study in the library while in fact he went to the dance studio. He struggled financially and at times had to go without meals. Nevertheless, he continued to focus on his dance and singing even though he was anxiously waiting for his debut.

Finally in 2002 he debuted with the song “nappun namja (bad guy)” charming fans with his singing and powerful choreography. After the 1st album, he starred in the drama “Sangdoo Hakyo Gaja (sangdoo let’s go to school)”; many people were impressed by his acting skills regardless that it was his first time acting in a drama. Following the success of his debut, he came back with a new set of style in his 2nd album and hit song “how to avoid the sun”.

In 2004, he starred in another successful drama called “Full House” which has aired in other Asian countries such as the Philippines, Indonesia, Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong, China, Malaysia, Vietnam, Thailand, Japan and was one of the highest rating Korean drama which has won the hearts of many fans across Asia. His performance in Full House has won him the Best Actor Award at the KBS Acting Awards

His 3rd album “it’s raining” has been released in Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, China, Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand and has top the foreign music charts in those countries; the album has sold more than 1 million in Asia and it is still in the process of being released in other Asian countries as well (soon to be in the Philippines). His concert called “Rainy day” which was held in Korea and Japan had concert tickets sold out on the first day. Jung Ji Hoon (Bi / Rain)

The American hip hop singer Lil’ Kim has offered Bi to work with her on her new album, the group 3LW also collaborated with Bi on their album. The Korean Pop sensation, Bi received the 2004 “KBS Daesang Award” in Korea (Daesang is the highest Korean music award) and he has won the MTV Asia Grand Slam; a series of awards in the Asian countries that broadcast MTV Asia. He won the “Favorite Artist of Korea” from the 2005 MTV Asia Aid held in Bangkok and the “Popular Asian Artist Award” from Channel [V] Thailand, he also won the “Best Buzz Asia Award” during the MTV Japan Video Music Award 2005 and in Beijing he won the “Best Korean Singer” award in the MTV-CCTV Mandarin Music Honors. He is invited to perform in the American MTV Video Music Awards 2005 held in Miami and also at the MTV Latin Video Music Awards 2005 in Mexico. Since his debut in 2002, the 23 year old has been one of the most popular Korean artists in Asia. The success he achieved through his hard work is a promise that he made to his late mother.

In 2005, Bi clinched the Best Buzz Asia from Korea at the MTV Video Music Awards Japan 2005. He also won the best Korean singer award 2005 at the Mandarin Music Honors in Taiwan. Having been voted as the best Asian singer by the Taiwanese media, Bi is positioning himself as one of the most admired Asian stars this year. Wherever he goes, he generates huge public interest and becomes a hot topic of conversation. His every move is monitored by the media and draws keen attention from music fans. Bi is currently on an Asian music tour which started in Seoul and will travel to Tokyo and Hong Kong. He is creating and showcasing fresh new spectacles at every single concert, and tickets are selling out quickly as a result. His first solo concert in Japan last summer, entitled "Rainy Day Japan" and held at the Tokyo International Forum, was so popular that all the tickets were sold out 30 seconds after going on sale. And the tickets for another of his concerts in Taiwan were sold out the moment they became available. Bi continues to set records in Asia. Now planning to go beyond Japan and Hong Kong, Bi will make a foray into China by giving a concert in Beijing.

Rain Bi's personality and charm sweeping Asia
The Japanese pronounce Bi as "Pi," and they also describe the singer with another term as well. During one of his concerts in Japan, Bi enthralled his fans with a powerful and masculine performance onstage. But when he chatted with fans after the concert, he surprised his fans by displaying a boyish and playful demeanor, earning him the label "Kawai," which means "cute" in Japanese. He is known as a powerful man onstage and a "cute" persona offstage. It is this characteristic that makes his fans crazy about him. Bi is famous for trying his best in whatever he does. He is arguably the best dancer in the nation, because he learned to dance onstage as a backup dancer for an already-established singer before his own debut. It is hard to define his dancing with simple words because it is a mixture of so many diverse elements. He has created a whole new style of his own by integrating diverse genres of dance over the course of his long dancing career.

Singer Park Jin-young, who heads the entertainer management company to which Bi belongs, once told a radio show that "I was always wondering whether [Bi] understood what I told him because he never replied even when I scolded him. One day I entered Bi's room, and ended up breaking into tears." Bi, who was then an aspiring singer, was poor at expressing his emotions verbally to his older colleague. But what Park discovered in Bi's room was a wall covered with "post-it" stickers. Every single sticker was filled with notes of what Park had told and advised him. Bi had written down every single piece of advice his older friend had given him, and had been doing his utmost to correct his mistakes and improve his skills.

It can be said that this latent passion for excellence is what made Bi what he is today. And Bi has great potential for further development because he always tries his best to sharpen his current skills through ceaseless practice. He is truly a believer in the saying, "Opportunity visits those who make great efforts." There is no doubt that Bi will reach beyond Asia to become a global star someday because of his enormous talent and tireless work ethic. The success he achieved through his hard work is a promise that he made to his late mother.

Ji Hoon Jung as Taejo Togokhan in Speed Racer

Sat, 21 Jul 2007 17:16:07 GMT

JI HOON JUNG is a top male R&B and pop singer from Korea who has become well-known throughout East Asia - including Japan, Hong Kong, Korea, Taiwan, Mainland China, Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand - as a leading star of the Korean wave.

In April 2006, Time named him as one of the "100 Most Influential People Who Shape Our World." In 2007, Rain was voted by Time Magazine's online user poll as the most influential person in 2007, although he was not in the magazine's actual list. He also made it into People's 2007 list of the "Most Beautiful People" in the world.

In 2002, he debuted with the album Rain, in which a single Bad Guy was a big hit. After his first album, he took time off from his career as a singer to star in the drama series, Sang Doo! Let's Go To School. Following the success of his debut as singer and actor, Rain released his second album How to Avoid the Sun, and had another hit with the title song.

In 2004, he starred in another successful drama called Full House, which was one of the highest-rated Korean dramas of all time with ratings of over 30% for every episode. It was broadcasted in many other countries including the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Vietnam, Thailand, China, Japan, Taiwan and the U.S. Through Full House, Rain was recognized across Asia. His performance in the drama also won him the Best Actor Award at the KBS Acting Awards.

His third album It's Raining sold over 1 million copies in Asia, making it Rain's most successful album to date both domestically and internationally. His first concert, Rainy Day, held in most of regions in Asia including Korea, Japan, China, Taiwan, and also in the United States, was sold out the first day tickets became available. Especially, two shows in Madison Square Garden in NYC were highly evaluated by the American media. Rain's fourth album, Rain's World was released in Korea on October 14, 2006. His Rain's Coming World Tour began on December 15, 2006 at Jamsil Stadium in Seoul, and will continue through 2007 to the following countries: Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, China, Japan, Taiwan, Australia, and United States.

Back in 2004, Rain earned greater recognition by winning the MTV Asia Grand Slam, securing top honors in all the Asian countries which broadcast MTV Asia. Rain won the Favorite Korean Artist at the 2005 MTV Asia Aid held in Bangkok, the Most Popular Asian Artist Award from Channel [V] Thailand, The Best Buzz Asia Award during the MTV Japan Video Music Awards 2005, and the Best Korean Singer Award in the MTV-CCTV Mandarin Music Honors in Beijing. Rain was also the first Asian performing artist ever to be invited to the 2005 American MTV Video Music Awards in Miami, as well as the 2005 MTV Latin Video Music Awards in Mexico. These accomplishments earned Rain a lot of media attention.

I'm a Cyborg, But that’s OK directed by Park Chan-wook is Rain's debut in the film industry. The two main characters, both from the mental hospital, fall in love with each other. The film and the director won the Alfred Bauer prize at the Berlin film festival in 2007 and earned Rain the Best New Actor citation at the 43rd Baeksang Arts Awards.

YesAsia.com: Rain's World (Japan Version) Album - Rain (Jung Ji Hoon) - Korean Music - Free International Shipping

Sat, 21 Jul 2007 11:28:47 GMT

Japan Version of Rain's World comes with a bonus CD including the PVs of I'M COMING FEAT. TABLO and IN MY BED.

They call them multitainers, artists who try their hands at singing, acting, emceeing and more. But it takes more than luck and a little hard work if you want to avoid becoming a jack of all trades, master of none. One of the few artists in Korea who seems to fit the bill of multitainer perfectly is Rain. He has starred in three successful TV dramas and his debut film, I'm a Cyborg, but That's Ok with Old Boy director Park Chan Wook, will be hitting theaters this year. Considering his incredible popularity all over Asia and his recent inroads into the US market, marked by a concert at Madison Square Garden, it doesn't take much to realize just how much talent this young man possesses.

Two years after his last album, Rain finally comes back with his fourth, which promises to be the most important of his career. To promote the release, Rain will be going on a world tour. The tour will start in Seoul and include stops in the US, Japan, China, Singapore, and more, for a total of 35 concerts in 12 countries. What stands out in particular is his concert in Las Vegas, another first for one of Korea's most talented artists.

Jung Ji Hoon/Rain/Bi Profile

Sat, 21 Jul 2007 11:28:24 GMT

Jung Ji Hoon's Profile

Stage Name: Rain (a.k.a. Bi / 비)

Given Name: Jung Ji Hoon ( 鄭智薰)(정지훈)

Birthdate: June 25, 1982

Height: 184 cm

Weight: 74 kg

Blood type: O

Education: Kyung Hee College (Post Modern Music Major/Media)

Occupation: Actor, Singer, Dancer

Debut: April 2001

Motto: Endless effots, endless endurance, endless modesty.

Family: dad & sister/ mother passed away 5 years ago.

Filmography:

* A Love to Kill (KBS2, 2005)
* Full House (KBS2, 2004)
* Banjun/Reverse Drama - 4 episodes
* Sang Doo, Let's Go To School (KBS2, 2003)
* Orange Sitcom (SBS, 2002)

Albums:

* January 25, 2006 Sad Tango (Japanese Single including: Sad Tango & Slowly)
* October 10, 2004 It's Raining (3rd Album)
* October 16, 2003 How to Avoid the Sun (2rd Album)
* May 13, 2002 Bad Guy (1st Album)

Acting Awards:

* 2004 KBS Acting Awards: Excellence Award (Full House)
* 2004 KBS Acting Awards: Best Couple Award (w/ Song Hye Gyo)
* 2004 KBS Acting Awards: Popularity Award
* 2004 KBS Acting Awards: Netizen Actor Award
* 2003 KBS Acting Awards: New Actor Award (Sang Doo)
* 2003 KBS Acting Awards: Netizen Award (Sang Doo)
* 2003 KBS Acting Awards: Best Couple Award (w/ Gong Hyo Jin)

Music Awards

* 2005 Music Asia Award
* 2004 KBS Daesang, Bonsang singer
* 2004 SBS Bonsang, Popularity Award
* 2004 Bonsang (MBC, Seoul Music Awards, Golden Disk, KMTV M.NET)
* 2004 MTV Korea Popular mobile Award
* 2003 Bonsang (MBC, KBS, SBS)
* 2002 Rookie singer award for the year (KBS MBC SBS M.NET KMTV)

Bi/Rain

Sat, 21 Jul 2007 11:27:27 GMT

South Korean pop star Rain will soon share his music and dance skills with music fans in Shanghai.

Rain - real name is Jung Ji-hoon - will present his one-night-only Shanghai concert at the Shanghai Stadium on April 14, part of his world tour which kicked off in Seoul last month and will take in 12 countries and regions including the United States and Singapore.

About 60 percent of the tickets, priced between 120 yuan (US$15) and 1,880 yuan, have already been booked, mainly by Rain’s fans clubs and several corporations, according to the local promoter Shanghai Bellson.

“Shanghai is the first stop of Rain’s world tour on the Chinese mainland,” said Jin Xiaojing from Shanghai Bellson. “After that Rain will give another six shows at China’s major cities through mid-May.”

The 25-year-old star is hailed for his good looks, spellbinding dance moves and stage presence. In addition to his hits, a special section will be included in Rain’s Shanghai concert, during which the star may perform martial arts and popular Chinese songs.

Jung Ji Hoon (Bi / Rain) -- pictures, picture, pics, images, gallery, info, bio, gossip, shirtless, photos, videos, band, lyrics, songs

Sat, 21 Jul 2007 11:26:44 GMT

Jung Ji Hoon, born on the 25th of June 1982 is a well known actor and singer in South Korea.

Jung Ji Hoon (Bi / Rain)

To his fans, he is known by his stage name Bi (pronounce: “Bee” which means Rain in English). He discovered his passion for dancing ever since he was in the 6th grade. As a teenager, he was part of the boyband group called “fanclub” and years after the group ended, Park Jin Young (Korean producer/singer who worked with American singers Will Smith, Mase, Lil’ Kim, 3LW, Tyrese) took Bi under his wings after he auditioned for JYP entertainment and trained him for years in dancing and singing. Bi was a back-dancer for a famous Korean singer named Park Ji Yoon and Park Jin Young himself. During those training years, Bi was not at home much and would lie to his parents telling them he was gonna study in the library while in fact he went to the dance studio. He struggled financially and at times had to go without meals. Nevertheless, he continued to focus on his dance and singing even though he was anxiously waiting for his debut.

Jung Ji Hoon (Bi / Rain)

Finally in 2002 he debuted with the song “nappun namja (bad guy)” charming fans with his singing and powerful choreography. After the 1st album, he starred in the drama “Sangdoo Hakyo Gaja (sangdoo let’s go to school)”; many people were impressed by his acting skills regardless that it was his first time acting in a drama. Following the success of his debut, he came back with a new set of style in his 2nd album and hit song “how to avoid the sun”. In 2004 he released the 3rd album “it’s raining” and starred in another successful drama called “Full House” which has aired in other Asian countries such as the Philippines, Indonesia, Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong, China, Malaysia, Vietnam, Thailand, Japan and was one of the highest rating Korean drama which has won the hearts of many fans across Asia. His 3rd album “it’s raining” has been released in Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, China, Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand and has top the foreign music charts in those countries; the album has sold more than 1 million in Asia and it is still in the process of being released in other Asian countries as well (soon to be in the Philippines). His concert called “Rainy day” which was held in Korea and Japan had concert tickets sold out on the first day.

Jung Ji Hoon (Bi / Rain)

The American hip hop singer Lil’ Kim has offered Bi to work with her on her new album, the group 3LW also collaborated with Bi on their album. The Korean Pop sensation, Bi received the 2004 “KBS Daesang Award” in Korea (Daesang is the highest Korean music award) and he has won the MTV Asia Grand Slam; a series of awards in the Asian countries that broadcast MTV Asia. He won the “Favorite Artist of Korea” from the 2005 MTV Asia Aid held in Bangkok and the “Popular Asian Artist Award” from Channel [V] Thailand, he also won the “Best Buzz Asia Award” during the MTV Japan Video Music Award 2005 and in Beijing he won the “Best Korean Singer” award in the MTV-CCTV Mandarin Music Honors. He is invited to perform in the American MTV Video Music Awards 2005 held in Miami and also at the MTV Latin Video Music Awards 2005 in Mexico. Since his debut in 2002, the 23 year old has been one of the most popular Korean artists in Asia. The success he achieved through his hard work is a promise that he made to his late mother

Lily Allen -- Triple Nipple

Fri, 20 Jul 2007 00:41:13 GMT

Pop star Lily Allen used her recent appearance on the British version of 'Saturday Night Live' to reveal to the world that she's blessed -- with a third nipple.

Flirting for Dummies

Wed, 18 Jul 2007 00:45:39 GMT

Flirting for Dummies

Greetings, dear readers. I know you’re all excited to read what salacious, scandalous stories Roxy has in store for you today. Normally, I like to get myself off by writing about vibrators, sex, men in loincloths, sex, threesomes, sex and you know, S-E-X. But today’s going to be a little different. Don’t get me wrong. This column is still all about sex — I mean, come on, what isn’t? But I think that a lot of you out there need some lessons in the basics before you go and play with the big girls and the (hopefully) big boys.

You know your Roxy is all about the wham, bam, thank you, He-Man. But you can’t get to the wham, much less the bam, without some good old fashioned flirting. Penetrating a new relationship is much easier and more fun with a little help from some flirting lube. Whether it is the ever popular dry-hump-frat-party-mating dance (which looks a lot more “smooth” if you’ve tossed down a few shots) or subtle secretive eye contact across a crowded lecture hall, flirting is an essential precursor to all forms of sexual fulfillment . . . unless you’re paying for you kicks, in which case, good business communication skills are the order of the day. So, here for your learning pleasure, Roxy presents her Flirtation Guide for the Sexually Impaired and / or Repressed.

To begin, I’ll give you some simple moves that every girl / boy / primate can master to establish a firm (ooo, firm!) flirtation foundation. I encourage individuality. Everyone needs to have his / her own flirting moves. But the most important part of any move you attempt must be the eye contact. Rox herself is a fan of the “downturned eyes” look. Head tilted down, eyes facing up . . . followed by an easy transition into a slow smile. Try it in class, at Starbucks, anywhere really. It’s coy, it’s come hither, it brings proven results! Practice in front of the mirror. Sounds silly, I know, but would Roxy ever steer you wrong? I’m really good at steering things. Steering, whipping, same difference.

Next comes the stroking. No, not that kind of stroking . . . not yet, at least. Rox is talking about a little ego stroking. Compliments, compliments, compliments. But not overkill. Be subtle. Embed your compliment in a joke or a sarcastic remark. Combine with downturned eyes to establish an “inside connection,” making the compliment / joke appear to be just between the two of you.

Finally, I present you, dear readers, with Roxy’s magic key to flirting. Drum roll, please. The number one answer is . . . spontaneity! Yes, that’s “spontaneity.” It might be a difficult word for some us to understand, lost amidst a world of planners, post-it notes and spreadsheets — the physical manifestations of our desperate attempts to organize our busy busy lives. But if you want to get busy, you need to let go every once and awhile and throw those post-it’s out the window. Wait, throw the organizer, not the post-its. We can come up with some interesting uses for those later.

For the intellectuals out there, I’ll provide a spontaneity case study. Say it’s a weekday night. The stars are shining, the air is cool and crisp and you’re outside with a seriously sexy girl. Let’s say she’s a dancer. And daaaymn, she’s hot. So you’re outside, in a field, and the sprinklers come on. This willing and able women squeals in delight and says, “Oh, my cute object of flirtation, come run through the sprinklers with me!” Pop quiz, what do you do? RUN, MAN, RUN WITH HER. Do not say, “But I’ll get cold.” Do not hesitate, just run. Remember the lesson of spontaneity. Cause if you don’t go for it, it’ll just be you and your old friend — your hand — spending yet another lonely night together.

It’s spring quarter, kids. Flowers and hormones are in full bloom. And hey, Exotic Erotic is tomorrow night. Even if you’re not yet ready to use some of the tits and tidbits I’ve suggested, you can still get some play at Exotic. Bring home that sexy stud in the chaps, plant one on him, and (taking a tip from my roommate), pull that cowboy into the shower with you. Stir briskly and ride him till he drops.

Celebrity Grind: Paris Hilton in bikini, surfing in Malibu

Mon, 16 Jul 2007 03:23:19 GMT

It’s always easy to spot celebrities. Just looks for the largest, most ridiculous pair of overpriced sunglasses, and there you go. The streets are now safe with Paris in the ocean ...

Grass fire breaks out at Stanford Dish

Mon, 25 Jun 2007 18:43:22 GMT

Firefighters are battling a 128-acre brush fire near "The Dish," a grassy open area west of the Stanford University main campus, along Junipero Serra Boulevard.

No structures are threatened, no lives have been harmed, and no evacuations are planned, according to Barbara Cimino, spokesperson for the Palo Alto Fire Department.

The cause of the fire was a malfunctioning water-pump generator. It was near the observatory, but the observatory is secure and Dish is not threatened, she said.

While the fire had not been 100 percent contained as of 6:30 p.m., but Cimino said she expected it to be contained "shortly."

Firefighters will be at the scene most of the night monitoring hot spots, she added.

The blaze drew a response from numerous firefighting units, including the Santa Clara County Fire Department, Gilroy and Morgan Hill firefighters, a strike team from San Mateo County, and the Cal FIRE/California Department of Forestry.

Cal FIRE firefighters in helicopters are spraying the fire with liquid from red buckets, witnesses said. Cimino said fire personnel are simultaneously working the perimeter of the fire.

The incident area is called the Junipero Serra/Frenchman's area and includes the foothills north side of Page Mill Road, east of Highway 280 and west of Junipero Serra. The blaze is consuming coyote brush and oak trees, Cimino said.

The smoke drew the attention of residents and commuters throughout the mid-Peninsula.

"It looks pretty big. You can see the fire. You can see the smoke," a spokesperson from the Stanford public safety office said at about 4:30 p.m.

Traffic in the area was jammed as portions of Junipero Serra and Page Mill Road were closed.

The Palo Alto Police Department received a call about the fire at approximately 4 p.m.

They do not yet know how the fire started.

Anne Chang, who lives on Stanford land east of Junipero Serra, said she got home at 4 p.m and saw a bright red flame on the northern part of the Dish. It spread southward toward the hiking trails and the hay-stack sculptures.

Another resident, Professor Norman Naimark, was standing by his home at around 6 p.m. and watching the commotion.

"It looks like we don't have to evacuate," he said.

Brad Pitt Gets To Work in Prague, Too

Mon, 25 Jun 2007 17:50:42 GMT

Angelina's not the only one working hard for the money in Prague; Brad was looking quite dapper filming a commercial for SoftBank in the streets on Monday. This must have been why Angie took over the school escorting duties for the day. Cute. This isn't the first time Brad's shilled for an overseas company (including this funny one for Heineken) I just hope we get to see the final product. Cameron looked so cute in her ads for SoftBank, I can only imagine Brad will too.

Ben, Jen & Their Budding Soccer Star

Mon, 25 Jun 2007 17:44:22 GMT

After a rather exciting (in more ways than one) morning surfing, Ben settled down for some quiet time on the beach with his girls yesterday. Violet is so blonde these days, especially thanks to that Hawaiian sun! It looks like she's gonna be quite the soccer player too. Someday she'll be giving the little Beckham boys a run for their money!

Paris Hilton Being Released From Jail

Mon, 25 Jun 2007 17:32:04 GMT

We just got word that Paris Hilton was just released from jail. This was the scene outside the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department Century Regional Facility in Lynwood, CA earlier today.

Let the madness begin!

Story developing...

Cohen and Grigsby Video On Foreign Workers Stirs Debate

Sat, 23 Jun 2007 13:53:40 GMT

A video posted is stirring anger and debate in Silicon Valley. It shows attorneys with Cohen & Grigsby telling their corporate clients how to get around Federal rules around hiring foreign workers.

"Our goal is not to find a qualified U.S. worker," the attorney at the podium said in the video. "That, in a sense, sounds funny but that is what we are trying to do here."

It's no secret foreign workers often come highly skilled with lower salaries. A system administrator who wanted to be identified only as "Dave" defended outsourcing in the technology industry.

"My company has job openings and it's hard to find good people, even junior people not just senior people," he said.

The Programmers Guild is an anti-outsourcing group with 1,500 members says nonsense. The group edited and reposted the law firm's clips after the law firm pulled down video of the full session.

"We estimate tens of thousands of Americans lose job opportunities to the tactics shown in that Cohen and Grigsby video," said Kim Berry, President of the Programmers Guild.

Kim says the video has prompted 2 lawmakers to call on Labor Secretary Elaine Chao to investigate unfair practices where companies call for applications with no intent to hire close to home.

The attorney in the video is heard saying. "If necessary, you (companies) have to schedule an interview to find a legal basis to disqualify them (US applicants) for this position. In most cases this doesn't seem to be a problem."

Cohen & Grigsby would not allow CBS5 to view the session in its entirety and issued a statement.

"We regret the choice of words that was used during a small segment of the seminar," the statement said. "It is unfortunate that these statements have been commandeered and misused, which runs contrary to our intent."

Worlds most expensive cities : London is world's second most expensive city

Mon, 18 Jun 2007 19:10:56 GMT

The cost of living in London has increased so much over the last year that the capital has become the second most expensive city in the world, according to a report out today.

Swiss Re building: London judged world's second most expensive city
The City's success has driven up the cost of living

Soaring property prices combined with the most expensive transport system in the world has put London above Tokyo, Geneva, Paris and New York. The only city to beat London is Moscow, which tops the poll for the second year running.

The findings are part of Mercer’s Cost of Living Survey, which researches 143 cities around the world and compares their costs to those of New York.

It surveys the cost of renting a flat, buying a daily cup of coffee as well as entertainment, clothing and food costs.

Governments and international companies use the rankings by Mercer, a recruitment consultancy, to decide how much to pay their overseas workers.

With New York as the base city scoring 100 points, London comes out with a score of 126, compared with Moscow on 134, Tokyo on 122, Rome on 97.6, Dubai on 88.8, Manila on 61.3. The cheapest city is Asuncion with 50.

London has climbed from fifth to second place over the last year, partly down to Mayor Ken Livingstone’s decision to increase the price of jumping on a bus or an underground train by well above the rate of inflation. Transport in London costs three times that in New York or Sydney and six times taking a journey in Athens.

However, it is ever-climbing property prices that really helped fuel London’s rise up the list. According to the report, it costs £2,000 a month to rent a luxury two bedroom apartment, twice as much as in Rome.

Only last week it was revealed that the best properties in the capital were fetching £4,000 per square foot - making walk-in wardrobes in parts of Belgravia and Knightsbridge more expensive than three-bedroom houses in Scotland and the north of England. These sky-high buying costs have started to filter down to the rental market.

London’s importance as a centre of finance over the last year - it has played host to countless multi-billion dollar deals - has helped bring in thousands of well paid international bankers and lawyers, all willing to bid up the cost of a luxury flat as well as many other services.

More business people will be based in London than in New York by the end of the decade if current trends persist.

Moscow, once a by-word for frugality, beats London not only in the property stakes – renting a flat costs £57 more a month – but also when it comes to a cup of coffee and newspaper. A daily dose of caffeine in the Russian capital will set you back £3.14, which puts the London cost of £2 in the shade.

Moscow has taken to its new-found status with great panache: it is now a city that revels in its image of brash decadence and sheer opulence.

There cannot be many other places where not only do they sell dresses made out of 500-rouble (£50) notes but people actually buy them too.

Both Moscow and London’s high showing were in part due to the weakening of the US dollar compared with European currencies.

TABLE 2007 (2006)

1 (1) Moscow

2 (5) London

3 (2) Seoul

4 (3) Tokyo

5 (4) Hong Kong

6 (8) Copenhagen

7 (7) Geneva

8 (6) Osaka

9 (9) Zurich

10 (10) Oslo

11 (13) Milan

12 (12) St Petersburg

13 (15) Paris

14 (17) Singapore

15 (10) New York

Ubuntu Linux Validates As Genuine Windows

Mon, 18 Jun 2007 10:28:59 GMT

"Another crack in the Windows Genuine Advantage wall. A user at UbuntuForums.org managed to validate an Ubuntu installation as a genuine copy of Microsoft Windows and get to the download page of Windows Defender, using IE4Linux and Wine. (Here is an OGG video of the process.) Along with the advancement of LiveCD technology, this could spell the end of Microsoft's control over who gets their updates."

Yes, Yes I Will Marry You Jodie Marsh

Mon, 04 Jun 2007 18:43:41 GMT

HOLY SHIT! 28-year-old (YES 28) Jodie Marsh is so damn gorgeous that I can't stand it! Never in the world has there been a woman with such elegance and grace! She is truly the lady of England!

Here's this piece of trash at a photocall for her new reality show. Jodie is looking for a husband is hold a nationwide casting call in the UK. MTV will document it. Why can't they have this here! I would totally audition, because Jodie is the one for me!

Click here to read all about it. I'm too hot and bothered to write anymore.

Casino Royale with Cheese

Fri, 01 Jun 2007 19:30:35 GMT

James Bond gets teamed up with an unlikely partner on his very first mission.

Stunning high res photo of San Francisco after the earth quake

Sun, 27 May 2007 18:54:33 GMT

OMG it looks scary in Gray BW

Teen: I'll Marry Man I Met on MySpace.com

Sat, 26 May 2007 17:02:51 GMT

A teenager who flew to the Middle East to be with a man she met on MySpace.com said Friday she intends to marry him.

"I love him very much," 17-year-old Katherine Lester said of Abdullah Jimzawi, 20, who works in his father's business delivering goods to West Bank convenience stores.

Lester appeared on ABC-TV's "Good Morning America" with her father and stepmother. Jimzawi also spoke with ABC during a taped portion of the segment, describing how the pair "can't live without each other."

After hearing what Jimzawi said, Lester began weeping.

"It's true," she said. "I love you. That's all I can say."

The two first encountered each other about seven months ago on the social networking web site but have never met face to face.

Lester, who turned 17 on Wednesday, was en route to Israel earlier this month when she was intercepted in Jordan by U.S. authorities who seized her passport and put her on a flight back to the United States.

Jimzawi has told The Associated Press that the two planned to marry and that Lester planned to convert to Islam. Lester, a Christian, declined to say Friday whether she intended to convert.

The two have resumed communication online since she returned home.

"Our initial reaction was to isolate her, to lock her up and just keep her safe here in America," said her father, Terry Lester. "But that's unrealistic because you can see the love they have for each other."

Authorities filed a runaway juvenile petition against Lester earlier this week, and a judge ordered her to give up her passport and undergo counseling. If the judge finds that Lester was a runaway, she could be placed under court supervision until she turns 18.

How To Keep Hostile Jerks From Taking Over Your Online Community

Thu, 17 May 2007 15:05:09 GMT

The Internet Tough Guy is a feature in all Internet social forums. These are people who poison discussions with anger, hatred, and threats. Some are malicious. Some are crazy. Some are just afflicted with a rotten sense of humor. Whatever their motives, they're a scourge. It takes precious little trolling to sour a message-board. A "troll" -- someone who comes onto an online community looking to pick fights -- has two victory conditions: Either everyone ends up talking about him, or no one talks at all. And where two or more trolls gather, they'll egg each other on, seeing who can anger and disrupt the regular message-board posters the most.

It can be distressing. If you're part of a nice little community of hamster-fanciers, Trekkers, or Volkswagen enthusiasts, it's easy to slip into a kind of camaraderie, a social setting in which everyone talks about life, aspirations, family problems, personal triumphs. In some ways, it doesn't matter what brought you together -- the fact that you're together is what matters.

Then, almost without warning, your community goes toxic. Someone in your group undergoes a radical personality shift and begins picking fights, or someone new comes to the party with an agenda. Or, worst of all: Your little clubhouse achieves some small measure of fame and is overrun by newcomers who don't know that Liza is a little bit touchy on the subject of hamster balls, or that old Fred gets into a froth anytime someone asks about retrofitting a bud vase into a vintage Beetle, or that everyone here actually kind of knows Wil Wheaton from reading his blog and he's a total mensch, so jokes about shoving Wesley out the airlock are frowned upon.

Sometimes, you rebound. More often, you tumble. Things get worse. The crowds get bigger, the fights get hotter. Pathologically angry (but often funny) people show up and challenge each other to new levels of vitriol.

In extreme cases, you end up with the kind of notorious mess that Kathy Sierra found herself in, in which trolls directed such bilious, threatening noise towards a harmless advocate for "passionate users" in web-applications that she withdrew from speaking at O'Reilly's Emerging Tech conference.

You can deal with trolls in many ways. Many trolls are perfectly nice in real life -- sometimes, just calling them on the phone and confronting them with the human being at the other end of their attacks is enough to sober them up. But it doesn't always work: I remember one time I challenged someone who'd been sending me hate mail to call me up and say the words aloud: the phone rang a moment later and the first words out of my troll's mouth were, "You f*cking hypocrite!" The conversation declined from there.

Trolls can infect a small group, but they really shine in big forums. Discussion groups are like uranium: a little pile gives off a nice, warm glow, but if the pile gets bigger, it hits critical mass and starts a deadly meltdown. There are only three ways to prevent this: Make the pile smaller again, spread the rods apart, or twiddle them to keep the heat convecting through them.

Making the group smaller is easy in theory, hard in practice: just choose a bunch of people who aren't allowed in the discussion anymore and section them off from the group. Split. Or just don't let the groups get too big in the first place by limiting who can talk to whom. This was Friendster's strategy, where your ability to chat with anyone else was limited by whether that person was your friend or your friend's friend. Users revolted, creating "fakesters" like "New York City," whom they could befriend, forming ad-hoc affinity groups. Friendster retaliated by killing the fakesters, and a full scale revolt ensued.

Spreading the group apart is a little easier, with the right technology. Joshua Schachter, founder of del.icio.us, tells me that he once cured a mailing-list of its flame-wars by inserting a ten-minute delay between messages being sent to the list and their delivery. The delay was enough to allow tempers to cool between messages. A similar strategy is to require you to preview your post before publishing it. Digg allows you to retract your messages for a minute or two after you post them.

But neither of these strategies solves the underlying problem: getting big groups of people to converse civilly and productively among themselves. Spreading out the pile reduces the heat -- but it also reduces the light. Splitting the groups up requires the consent of the users, a willingness to be segregated from their peers.

The holy grail is to figure out how to twiddle the rods in just the right fashion so as to create a festive, rollicking, passionate discussion that keeps its discourse respectful, if not always friendly or amiable.

Some have tried to solve this with software. Slashdot (and similar group-moderated sites like Kuro5hin and Plastic) use an elaborate scheme of blind moderation in which users are randomly assigned the ability to rank each others' messages so that other users can filter what they read, excluding low-ranked posts. These strategies are effective for weeding out the pathetic attention-seekers, but they don't have a great track record for creating rollicking discussion. Instead the tone of the discussions, even read at the highest level of moderation, is an angry, macho one-upmanship. The top posts are often scathing rebuttals of someone else's ill-considered remarks.

I'm not sure why this is, but I suspect that it's because there's something fundamentally unfriendly about a roundtable where the participants are explicitly asked to participate in active, public, quantitative rating of one's peers. Like one of those experimental 1970s communes where everyone has to tell everyone else the absolute truth all the time ("Your laugh irritates me," "You have a fat rear end that I find unappealing"), this does a good job of getting all the cards on the table, but is less successful at inspiring an atmosphere of chumminess.

Then there's the psychological effect of trolling: For a certain kind of person (guilty as charged), flames are nearly impossible to let go of. I get tons of lovely fan mail from people who want me to know how much they liked my books. I love these notes and write short, polite, thank-you letters back to each person. But the memories of these valentines fades quickly. Not so the ill-considered, pseudonymous rant from someone who's convinced that I'm on the take, or who has some half-baked theory about copyright, or who wants to say insulting things about my family, friends, interests or habits.

Those people command my full attention. Many's the time I've found myself neglecting a warm bed, a hot meal, or a chance to go out for a cup of coffee with a friend in order to answer some mean-spirited note from some 16-year-old mouth-breather who achieves transcendence only through pointless debate with strangers. For many of us, our psyche demands that these insults be met and overcome.

I am, by my nature, a scrapper. I come from a family of debaters, and my job for several years has been to win debates over copyright and digital freedom. I think that many technology designers are of a similar bent: Argumentative and boisterous, hard-pressed to back away from even a pointless fight. And it is these people who often end up designing our tool-suites for online communities. We view ourselves as locked in an arms-race with trolls who seek to overcome our defenses.

However -- and thankfully -- many community conveners are of a more amicable bent. Although they're not technically capable of writing their own message-board tools, they are socially qualified to wield them.

Take my friend Teresa Nielsen Hayden, who moderates the sprawling, delightful message-boards on Making Light, a group-blog where the message boards run the gamut from the war in Iraq to Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan-fiction, and where they discussion is almost always civil.

Teresa is a troll-whisperer. For some reason, she can spot irredeemable trolls and separate them from the merely unsocialized. She can keep discussions calm and moving forward. She knows when deleting a troll's message will discourage him, and when it will only spark a game of whack-a-mole.

Teresa calls it "having an ear for text" and she is full of maddeningly unquantifiable tips for spotting the right rod to twiddle to keep the reactor firing happily without sparking a meltdown.

In the wake of the Kathy Sierra mess, Tim O'Reilly proposed a Blogger's Code of Conduct as a way of preventing a recurrence of the vile, misogynist attacks that Sierra suffered. The idea was that bloggers could choose to follow the Code and post a little badge to their sites affirming their adherence to it, putting message-board posters on notice of the house rules. Although it sounds like a reasonable idea on the face of it, bloggers were incredibly skeptical of the proposal, if not actively hostile. The objections seemed to boil down to this: "We're not uncivil, and neither are those message-board posters we regularly see on the boards. It's the trolls that we have trouble with, and they're pathological psychos, already ignoring our implicit code of conduct. They're going to ignore your explicit code of conduct, too." (There was more, of course -- like the fact that a set of articulated rules only invite people to hold you to them when they violate the spirit but not the letter of the law).

O'Reilly built his empire by doing something incredibly smart: Watching what geeks did that worked and writing it down so that other people could do it too. He is a distiller of Internet wisdom, and it's that approach that is called for here.

If you want to fight trolling, don't make up a bunch of a priori assumptions about what will or won't discourage trolls. Instead, seek out the troll whisperer and study their techniques.

Troll whisperers aren't necessarily very good at hacking tools, so there's always an opportunity for geek synergy in helping them to automate their hand-crafted techniques, giving them a software force-multiplier for their good sense. For example, Teresa invented a technique called disemvowelling -- removing the vowels from some or all of a fiery message-board post. The advantage of this is that it leaves the words intact, but requires that you read them very slowly -- so slowly that it takes the sting out of them. And, as Teresa recently explained to me, disemvowelling part of a post lets the rest of the community know what kind of sentiment is and is not socially acceptable.

When Teresa started out disemvowelling, she removed the vowels from the offending messages by hand, a tedious and slow process. But shortly thereafter, Bryant Darrell wrote a Movable Type plugin to automate the process. This is a perfect example of human-geek synergy: hacking tools for civilian use based on the civilian's observed needs.

But there aren't enough Teresas to go around: how do we keep all the other message-boards troll-free? Again, the secret is in observing the troll whisperer in the field, looking for techniques that can be encapsulated in tutorials and code. There is a wealth of troll whisperer lore that isn't pure intuition and good sense, techniques that can be turned into tools for the rest of us to use.

A friend who's active on the Wikipedia community once summed up her approach to life: "Don't let assholes rent space in your head." That is, don't let the jerks who crash your community turn it into a cesspool. It's easier said than done, though.

Assisting the troll whisperers and learning from them recognizes that most of us want a civil discussion, and give us the tools to repel trolls. Instead of implying that we all lack civility, these techniques recognize our good will and help us solve the hard social problems of keeping the pathological personalities renting space in our heads.

Paris Trying To Avoid 45-days in Prison

Wed, 16 May 2007 12:22:54 GMT

Paris Hilton is doing anything she can to avoid 45 days in jail. News has come that the heiress has switched attorneys in an attempt to save her from wearing a jumpsuit.

She has switched from celebrity lawyer Howard Weitzman to famed DUI defense lawyer Richard Hutton.

Paris seems to be trying everything she can to not go to jail, do you think her tactics might work or is she headed to the slammer?

for Paris JAIL IS HELL (YAY!)

Wed, 16 May 2007 12:21:46 GMT

Jail bound Paris Hilton has been sent out a warning from a former inmate at the Rikers Island, New York city’s largest jail facility.

Natalia McLennan, the former $2000/hour hooker who was labeled as ‘New York’s No. 1 Escort’ and spent 26 days in jail, has cautioned Paris to get ready for the “worst experience” of her life.

“It’s the worst experience of your life - you’re locked up, the food is disgusting and everybody wants to be your friend, but in the end they just want to [bleep] you,” she tells Page Six.

McLennan, who is now a stylist at a top Montreal spa, said that Paris should be prepared for a strip search by a group of female officers before she checks into her cell.

She also added that the heiress-turned-outlaw should get used to a group of masculine lesbians who try to get physical with girls.

“She’ll want to make at least one good friend, like a Nicole Richie, to watch her back for her when she takes a shower . . . And I’d tell her, ‘Drop the attitude,’” she said.

Pfft….Paris is as likely to drop the attitude as I am likely to stop making fun of Paris. It just ain’t happeni

stealing IS a crime, right?

Mon, 14 May 2007 14:09:08 GMT

I have a LOT on my mind right now.. to be honest, i've rarely been so royally pissed off as i am today.
The photos shown above all have one thing in common (besides being rather lovely landscape photos):

They were all taken , without my permission, by the London based print-selling company Only-Dreemin. This company prides itself on offering its customers only the best quality canvas prints of the finest photos , by top artists.

What they fail to mention is that some of the photos they're selling prints of have been illegally obtained, and are being sold without the artists consent or knowledge.

In my case, a friend of mine came across their store on ebay and recognized one of my prints. (this was way back in january i think)
I looked into the matter and discovered 7 more of my photos being sold there. In the case of pictures 1, 2, 6 and 7, the image had been divided up into 3 vertical panels. ( Something i would never DREAM of doing myself. ) Furthermore, the images had been given new and exciting titles, like "Seraque II" and "Attica", "Dawn expander II" and " Joga" (barf)
I spent a good many days researching, going back thru their customer feedback, and was able to track back the sales of at LEAST 60 prints made from my images.
These prints sold for a total sum of 2450 british pounds (around 4840 US$ )

I gathered all the evidence , saved each webpage displaying my work , saved the list of customer feedback, printed all this stuff out and took it to a lawyer here in iceland.
She was confident that by sending them some well-phrased letters i'd be sure to get some damages out of them. After all, i had tons of incriminating evidence.
The letters did nothing other than make them take the images down from their site. Further letters got no response from them. My icelandic lawyer could do nothing else, so i was stuck with a bill and the infuriating fact that I, being only a non-wealthy art stutdent/ single mom in iceland, will have to accept that these people stole my work and made lots of money off it, and apparently are going to get away with it.

This is NOT OK BY ME.
I could think of little else to do than to at least tell people about this.
I have reason to believe that they've stolen images from other people, maybe other flickr users.
The reason i suspect this is quite simple. My photos were being sold under the bogus name of "Rebekka Sigrún" (the nerve of keeping the first name the same is somewhat amazing).
I saw a number of other photos being sold under that same artist name, and they werent mine. And obviously this Rebekka Sigrún doesnt exist.
Looking over the pictures i remember being sold under that name, it appears they've changed the artist name to "marco van eych". If anyone knows a landscape photographer by that name, let me know. i very much doubt he exists.

So i encourage everyone that has been displaying similar landscape photos on flickr to look at their site and see if they see something suspicious.
It would also be pretty cool if as many people as possible would send them angry letters, (address them to info@only-dreemin.com ) but that's just if you feel like it;)

ok. i've said my piece. Quite a load off my back.

"JK Rowling to write eighth Harry Potter book"

Mon, 14 May 2007 12:50:39 GMT

"JK Rowling to write eighth Harry Potter book"

JK Rowling 'to write eighth Harry Potter book'

British Author JK Rowling has revealed plans to write another 'Harry Potter' book.

The seventh novel, 'The Deathly Hollows', due out in the summer, will bring the young wizard's adventures to an end, but Rowling has said she might write an eighth for charity.

The 41-year-old writer wrote on her website: "I might do an eighth book for charity - a kind of encyclopedia of the world, so that I could use all the extra material that's not in the books."

The book would allow fans a further insight into the world of Harry Potter and his friends, including details that were not included in the best-selling novels.

Rowling has already penned two Harry Potter reference books - 'Quidditch Through The Ages' and 'Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them'.

The books raised more than Â£15 million for British charity Comic Relief.

The magical tales of Harry and his Hogwarts pals have made Rowling one of the highest earning writers ever, and one of the richest women in the world with an estimated fortune of Â£576 million according to Forbes magazine's annual rich list.

As well as Comic Relief, the children's author supports numerous charities including medical charity MÃ©decins Sans FrontiÃ¨res.

Brad's Feeling A Little Czeched Out

Mon, 14 May 2007 12:45:57 GMT

Brad and Maddox were off to school again, looking adorable as always - especially now that Brad has finally lost that fedora. It's a treat to see so much of the happy family while Angelina is on location in Prague, but apparently Brad is missing their life in New Orleans. He said:

Let me tell you, we're in this house in Prague right now and there's about 12 cars of paparazzi outside and some tourists with video cameras. I can't describe why we're allowed to live a more normal life (in New Orleans).

Living in the French Quarter is a thrill for us. We have some semblance of real family life. People have been very, very gracious with us. If we're on the front deck, people go by and say, 'Hi.' Then they go on their way, very friendly.

It must be hard for this big family to be constantly uprooting, but we can't complain about seeing so much of them. We especially love seeing little Mad - how precious is he with his huge backpack? He's definitely the coolest kid in class.

Gwen Stefani's Kingston Tries Out His Own Two Feet

Mon, 14 May 2007 12:42:24 GMT

Gwen Stefani may be in the middle of her US tour, but she made some time to hang out with the most fashionable little man in her life, Kingston, in North Carolina for Mother's Day. It looks like he was dressed in his finest jeans for the occasion and even maybe tried out a little bit of walking. Or at least standing. Either way.

What Should Sarah Michelle Gellar Do Next?

Mon, 14 May 2007 12:41:34 GMT

Sarah Michelle Gellar was hiding out for awhile, but lately she's been back on the Hollywood radar. For a while we thought she might be pregnant, but there was no sign of a bump at the Tribeca Film Festival. Pregnant or not, we're just happy to see her and yummy Freddie again. We want to know - what would you like to see SMG do next?

Matthew McConaughey Gets Back to the Bongos

Mon, 14 May 2007 12:40:03 GMT

Matthew McConaughey spent this weekend doing what he does best -- showing off those abs, entertaining friends at his trailer, and playing the bongos! Seems harmless enough, but I'm sure you remember it caused some trouble back when he was arrested in 1999 after his neighbors made a noise complaint and police found him smoking pot and playing the bongos naked with a friend. MM still has some trouble keeping his clothes on but hopefully his new neighbors are used to the noise!

Wall Street 2.0 Gordon Gekko would have made a killing in Web 1.0 stocks 20th Century Fox has announced that it will be filming a sequel to 1987 cult classic Wall Street.s

Wed, 09 May 2007 01:09:09 GMT

20th Century Fox has announced that it will be filming a sequel to 1987 cult classic Wall Street. The movie spawned lines that even today are quoted by stockbrokers and Investment Firms: lunch is for wimps and or course “Greed is Good”.

It’s sad they didn’t make the sequel in the late 90s. Gordon Gekko would have made a killing in Web 1.0 stocks. Fast forward a decade and the age of the IPO and inflated share price has passed, replaced in favor of the corporate buyout.

Reports state that in the movie, Gekko, having been released from jail, is now working in the hedge fund business.

Hedge funds do many things and not all of them are evil: hedge funds can be found in the background of funded companies throughout Web 2.0, but I couldn’t help but immediately think of Patent Trolling. Will Gordon Gekko buy a raft of patents, bringing his control over a range of Web 2.0 technologies to bare on a helpless Silicon Valley?

If Gordon Gekko in the Wall Street sequel was to focus on tech stocks and Valley startups, what could you see him doing aside from the obvious: abolishing free lunches and Segways at Google?

Lasting Longer: What every Guy Desires

Tue, 08 May 2007 16:59:05 GMT

A major cause of the feeling of inadequacy among men is the inability to ‘last’ long while having sex. Most men would certainly like to go on longer than they are usually able to. The primary thing that must be comprehended is that, like most other things, the state of mind has a big part to play in your performance in bed. Getting anxious or uptight is not going to help at all. The other thing that will be a serious deterrent to your sexual performance is a partner who gets annoyed or upset, so you need to work together to develop a positive attitude, which will lead to longer and better sex!

We list some suggestions and techniques which will help you to improve your sexual performance. The rule of the thumb, however, is for the man to be familiar with his body and to know what works for him. It’s only when he knows when to slow down and when to fasten the pace that he can control his excitement in the heat of passion, thus driving his partner to the edge and driving her wild!

If he decreases the sensitivity of the penis, the ejaculation process will be much slower. So, techniques have to be incorporated which will lessen this sensitivity and lead to a longer time in the sack. We will tell of some of these techniques and the practice of these should certainly help in increasing the sexual stamina. But, like everything else, these require practice and are not instant cures.

Squeeze Freeze
When you are about three or four strokes away from ejaculation, stop applying any more strokes or increasing your excitement. Just squeeze the base of your penis. You can do this by wrapping your thumb and index finger around it. You must apply firm pressure with special focus on the urethra. This is the tube running along the underside of the penis. This will decrease the sexual tension and hold back the ejaculation. In fact, you can apply this pressure anywhere along the shaft of the penis. The aim is to squeeze the urethra. Please make sure that you do this at least 3-4 strokes before you orgasm. If you leave it too late, it’s all over and done with and you’ll have to wait for the next time.

Stimulate and stop
The aim of this exercise is to stimulate the penis to a great level of excitement, almost near ejaculation and then stop and wait for the excitement to wane. This exercise will help you to outlast your partner. You should do this three to five times per session, either with your partner or by yourself. You need to practice this for a month and by the end of that period, you’ll have her begging you to stop!

Give Yourself Hand Jobs: Masturbation
Masturbation has some very good results. It decreases the sexual tension and reduces the penile sensitivity. Regular masturbation leads to greater control over your ejaculatory responses. So, gentlemen, whenever you feel the need, you just use your hand! Good for you, and better for the two of you together.

Use Sex Toys
The entire aim of the techniques recommended is to reduce the sensitivity and to increase “immunity to pleasure”. Using sex toys follow the same reasoning as masturbating. You can either use sex stimulators or normal vibrators. You can browse the net and make a shopping list for yourself to suit your budget.

Cover that Shaft
Wearing of the condom plays a major part in reducing the sensitivity for both partners, but more specially, the male. In fact, you should be wearing condoms to reduce the risk of pregnancies and STDs. Many couples claim that this also leads to longer-lasting sex. If, in spite of wearing condoms, you are still very sensitive, you can opt for a thicker condom So, boys, get onto practice, get going…on and on and on!!!!!

Please Him Tonight!

Tue, 08 May 2007 16:58:25 GMT

Well, usually it’s the men who are extremely apprehensive about their performance in bed. But the ladies need to get into the groove too. For great sex, the onus is not merely on the men. For sex to be a really marvellous experience, it’s as important for women to know how they can contribute to the experience.

It’s high time that we address the issue of what men dislike in female sexual behaviour. So, ladies, read this carefully if you don’t want to leave bad impression for a guy when you have sex with him. But, listen, each one of these things don’t necessarily need to apply to you. So just see what’s good for you and what is not!

Show Some Moves, Babes!
During sex some women don’t do a thing! They’ll just lie there and expect that the guy is going to be so grateful for a nude female body, that that will be more than sufficient for it to be a very successful experience for him! But actually, that is the worst thing you can do, and men really don’t like that. Show him your moves….so what if he is on the top! Show him that you want to have sex with him as much as he does with you. If you are going to lie there like a corpse, your partner can even have sexual problems. And then, think about the fact that why should he work at giving you pleasure when you look like you’re doing him a favour just lying there!

Don’t Miss the Kiss
Well, ma’am, you love to be kissed, don’t you? So why not do the same favour for your partner? He loves to be kissed too, you know. In fact he loves it when you are kissing him all over his body. It makes him feel loved and wanted and desired. So kiss your man, tease him, play with him….that will drive him crazy!

Take Control
While you may like your man to call the shots, sometimes he may like to be controlled too. Go ahead, take control in bed! Show him that you want to have sex NOW, and tell him how you want it. You are the one making the rules here, right? Still wondering whether your man will be pleased about your taking control? Well, try it out…I guarantee you a hot, hot time!

Tell it like it is
If you love what your partner is doing for you, show it! Don’t feel shy to express pleasure! If you do, you may end up confusing your partner. If you don’t show what you are feeling, how would your partner know if you are liking the experience or hating it? So, scream out loud when you feel like screaming from pleasure, breathe harder. Get noisy, because it’s the best way to tell your partner about how you are feeling. Your man knows what you love and will be able to please you more.

Give as Good as you Get
The golden rule for good sex is, ‘pleasure your partner’. If you are making the moves on him, remember to ask questions like “Do you like that?”, “how does that feel?”, “Shall I do that again? Harder? Slower?” Let him know that you care about what he feels. He’ll love to have your attention.

Sexy Surprises Your Man Will Love

Tue, 08 May 2007 16:57:26 GMT

You do know that men live for thrills and excitement don’t you? Routine sex can get boring, even for you. So why don’t you turn him on with some sexy surprises? You’ll find that these introduce a new dimension in your love life.

Catching a man off guard makes him feel lucky and in love. Blow his mind and watch your union grow. Those couples who keep making bedroom eyes at each other at parties and look like they can’t wait to get home who you always envy and wonder at, don’t have any kind of a magic passion mantra. They just keep it going strong by introducing sugar and spice into their love life.

"Any time you throw in a surprise — a last-minute trip, an unusual date location, an unexpected gift — it sends a signal from your brain's reward centre that stimulates the rest of the brain, including the areas that register love and bonding," Read Montague, Ph.D., director of the Human Neuro-imaging Lab at Baylor College of Medicine, is quoted to have said.

Newness will also make you feel the same physical vibrations that you both felt when love between you was new_ you know, the butterflies in the tummy and sweaty, wet palms, the heart going flip-flop! Not only do these shared experiences make you feel excited about each other all over again, they also tighten the bond you share on other levels apart from the physical. Now the question is how to bring on the crazy dizziness in love? Well, you can do it through innovating with food, clothes, surprise skinny-dipping dates, using new places and positions. Here are some real fun and sexy ideas.

Change your accent
Try out a French or Italian accent when you whisper sweet nothings to him in bed. It doesn’t matter what you say…even gibberish will do. To hear a strange accent from a person, who is otherwise familiar, is an incredible turn-on.

Run a Bath
Ran a bath for your man and then hop in yourself. Begin with massaging his scalp to send tingles all over his body. Keep showing him his image in the mirror in the bathroom, while you keep changing the look of his hair with water and soap. Then slowly soap him up. We’ll leave the rest to you…..

Ice Cream Man (or Woman)
After dinner is over, during dessert spontaneously flick a blob of ice cream at your partner. Let him retaliate. It will probably soon develop into an all-out food fight. No problem. It will be your most memorable at-home meal, and cleaning up each other afterward by nibbling the food that you’ve smeared on each other is mind blowing too.

Text Message
When you are going for a party and just as you are getting into the car, text him two words: no panties. He’s going to lust for you all evening.

Get Him by Remote Control
Secretly take away the remote while your guy is watching television. Then sneak into the room behind him and turn it off. He may get terribly irritated but let him turn to see you standing there in a sexy pose in an amazingly sexy bra and panties. Then watch his irritation evaporate!

WTF Mac Store

Thu, 12 Apr 2007 21:22:57 GMT

Running "The" along the side isn't bad typography, but the lack of a visual break between the T and H makes me say, "WTF?"

Located in the University district of Seattle.

Sperm made from human bone marrow

Thu, 12 Apr 2007 21:22:06 GMT

Scientists say they have successfully made immature sperm cells from human bone marrow samples.

If these can be grown into fully developed sperm, which the researchers hope to do within five years, they may be useful in fertility treatments.

But experts have warned the findings from the peer reviewed German study should be interpreted with caution at this very early stage.

And proposed new laws would ban their use in fertility treatments in the UK.

This kind of work will be very useful in helping us understand the biology of how sperm are made
Dr Allan Pacey

The government's recent fertility White Paper proposes a ban on using artificially created sperm or eggs in assisted reproduction.

The researchers from the Universities of Göttingen and Münster and the Medical School of Hannover isolated adult stem cells - cells that have the ability to become many types of tissue in the body - from bone marrow samples taken from male volunteers.

Spermatagonial cells

Normally these stem cells from the bone marrow would develop into the different cell types in muscle tissue.

But the researchers induced a small number of them to develop into what appeared to be spermatagonial cells - cells found in the testes which would normally develop into mature sperm cells.

Sperm Cells
Scientists have grown artificial sperm precursor cells

This is the first time human spermatagonial cells have been made artificially in this way.

And lead researcher Professor Karim Nayernia, now at the North-east England Stem Cell Institute based at the Centre for Life in Newcastle upon Tyne, said he hopes his investigations will mean he might one day be able to treat young men rendered infertile by chemotherapy.

He said: "We're very excited about this discovery.

"Our next goal is to see if we can get the spermatagonial cells to progress to mature sperm in the laboratory and this should take around three to five years of experiments."

He acknowledged that the law may be a stumbling block.

We are still many years away from developing any therapies for infertility using such techniques
Professor Harry Moore

Professor Harry Moore of the Centre for Stem Cell Biology at the University of Sheffield said: "This finding is of interest but we really need to be very cautious about the interpretation."

The changing of stem cell types observed by the researchers, from pre-muscle to pre-reproductive cells, is known as trans-differentiation.

Caution needed

And Professor Moore said nearly all similar observations of trans-differentiation in adult stem cells had not been confirmed when tested rigorously, as the results could be misleading.

He said: "This is a fast moving field but we are still many years away from developing any therapies for infertility using such techniques."

And he warned that manipulating stem cells to develop into mature sperm could cause permanent genetic changes in the sperm, making the cells unsafe to use in fertility treatments.

However, Dr Allan Pacey, secretary of the British Fertility Society, said: "This kind of work will be very useful in helping us understand the biology of how sperm are made.

"That in itself may provide some insight into why things sometimes go wrong and may lead to new approaches to treating male infertility."

The findings were presented at an international fertility conference and are published in Gamete Biology: Emerging Frontiers on Fertility and Contraceptive Development.

JUSTIN.TV: How webcam sex nearly saved the world

Thu, 12 Apr 2007 21:13:49 GMT

Last night, just as thousands of fans desperately desired, Justin.tv protagonist Justin Kan got laid. At least, we all assume that's what happened when the 24/7 camboy ended a second date (with a girl known to viewers as "J") by taking off his hat-mounted camera, turning off its microphone, joining J in her room, and turning off the lights. Why did this much-anticipated moment manifest as such a letdown? And why is it such a blow to the hope of humankind?

Warning: Because Justin cut his mic, his cohorts filled the silence with a NSFW audio feed from a porno. Put on some headphones.
[Click To Play]
Click To Play

Pathetic. What happened to Justin's promise to keep on the cam during sex? Here's a guess: Justin, having found a girl he really enjoys spending time with, felt he'd rather share a private moment with her than come through on his commitment with viewers.

Justin has set up a dangerous precedent over the past few days. His self-censorship has gone beyond practical measures (like disabling his microphone during a bank visit to protect his account information); Justin started disabling his microphone and/or camera during business meetings, phone calls, and now intimate moments.

What the hell? Isn't total access the point of lifecasting? It was central to earlier broadcasters like 90s camgirl Jennicam and the residents of We Live In Public's webcam-fitted warehouse. And sex tied into the philosophy behind The Real House.

The Real House, like other "Big Brother"-style live-to-web homes, offered more exhibitionism than allowed on network TV. But unlike most, the display of intimacy seemed not exploitative but invitational. For example, the Real House launched a monthly project called "Globalgasm," in which house members led Internet users around the world in an attempted simultaneous orgasm.

Real House member John "Halcyon" Styn said Globalgasm was inspired by a scene in the original Star Wars. Jedi master Obi-wan Kenobi feels the pain of an entire planet dying at once. Could one create such a force in a positive way? Viewers were invited to tune in and cum with the household.

And thus the Real House cast off the usually prurient feel, already diluted by the honesty and non-titillation of Jennicam's on-camera lovemaking, of live-to-web sex. The Real House lovefest wasn't a free porno show; it was a chance to share one of humanity's most universal pleasures. The peep show became an orgy.

And that's why Justin's cop-out is such a disappointment. Last night, my friends sent a flurry of messages on the group message system Twitter. Both men and women were thrilled at the prospect of watching Justin get it on:

justin-fans-want-fucking.jpg

These weren't lonely guys getting their rocks off. These people love watching Justin like they love watching Heroes. They liked Justin, they liked J, and they were about to share a milestone for Internet TV after rooting for their hero.

And then the screen went black.

"I actually watched the chat thread for a LONG time after the lights went out," said my friend Rex ("Fimoculous" above) about the on-site chat rooms. "It was seriously like its own show." He continued:

Mostly, it was people who were outraged, wanting to boycott... and then something funny would happen... someone from ROOM1 would drop into ROOM5 and say "We're all boycotting Justin, are you in." And everyone in ROOM5 would scream.

And then, someone showed up who allegedly knew him in real life from a long time ago, and told stories about him. and everyone ate it up.

It was just so weird to watch this while a black video stream played above. It was like a bunch of kids who didn't know what to do once the TV was turned off.

Some connection was made here, but despite Justin's shyness and less important. By retreating, Justin reinforced the idea of on-screen sex as not a shared moment but an exploitative spectator event.

The Justin.tv team plans to launch more shows; their favorite concept is a real-life "Sex in the City" character in New York. For the good of the Internet public, let's hope they find someone less like Justin and more like Halcyon and the Real Housemates.

Nick Douglas writes for Valleywag, Blogebrity, and Look Shiny. He would have left the camera on, but then again, he wouldn't wear it in the first place.

What Bush is hiding

Wed, 21 Mar 2007 23:54:35 GMT

Leave aside the unintentional irony of President Bush asserting executive privilege to shield his aides from testifying before the Congress in the summary firings of eight U.S. attorneys because the precedent would prevent him from receiving "good advice." Leave aside also his denunciation of the Congress for the impertinence of requesting such testimony as "partisan" and "demanding show trials," despite calls from Republicans for the dismissal of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. Ignore as well Bush's adamant defense of Gonzales.

The man Bush has nicknamed "Fredo," the weak and betraying brother of the Corleone family, is, unlike Fredo, a blind loyalist, and will not be dispatched with a shot to the back of the head in a rowboat on the lake while reciting his Ave Maria. (Is Bush aware that Colin Powell refers to him as "Sonny," after the hothead oldest son?) But saving "Fredo" doesn't explain why Bush is willing to risk a constitutional crisis. Why is Bush going to the mattresses against the Congress? What doesn't he want known?

In the U.S. attorneys scandal, Gonzales was an active though second-level perpetrator. While he gave orders, he also took orders. Just as his chief of staff, Kyle Sampson, has resigned as a fall guy, so Gonzales would be yet another fall guy if he were to resign. He was assigned responsibility for the purge of U.S. attorneys but did not conceive it. The plot to transform the U.S. attorneys and ipso facto the federal criminal justice system into the Republican Holy Office of the Inquisition had its origin in Karl Rove's fertile mind.

Just after Bush's reelection and before his second inauguration, as his administration's hubris was running at high tide, Rove dropped by the White House legal counsel's office to check on the plan for the purge. An internal e-mail, dated Jan. 6, 2005, and circulated within that office, quoted Rove as asking "how we planned to proceed regarding the U.S. attorneys, whether we are going to allow all to stay, request resignations from all and accept only some of them, or selectively replace them, etc." Three days later, Sampson, in an e-mail, "Re: Question from Karl Rove," wrote: "As an operational matter we would like to replace 15-20 percent of the current U.S. attorneys -- the underperforming ones ...The vast majority of U.S. attorneys, 80-85 percent I would guess, are doing a great job, are loyal Bushies, etc., etc."

The disclosure of the e-mails establishing Rove's centrality suggests not only the political chain of command but also the hierarchy of coverup. Bush protects Gonzales in order to protect those who gave Gonzales his marching orders -- Rove and Bush himself.

"Now, we're at a point where people want to play politics with it," Rove declared on March 15 in a speech at Troy University in Alabama. The scene of Rove's self-dramatization as a victim of "politics" recalls nothing so much as Oscar Wilde's remark about Dickens' "Old Curiosity Shop": "One must have a heart of stone to read the death of little Nell without laughing."

From his method acting against "politics," Rove went on to his next, more banal talking point: There can be no scandal because everyone's guilty. (This is a variation of the old "it didn't start with Watergate" defense.) "I would simply ask that everybody who's playing politics with this, be asked to comment on what they think of the removal of 123 U.S. attorneys during the previous administration and see if they had the same, superheated political rhetoric then that they've having now." Instantly, this Rove talking point echoed out the squawk boxes of conservative talk radio and through the parrot jungle of the Washington press corps.

Indeed, Presidents Clinton, George H.W. Bush and Reagan replaced the 93 U.S. attorneys at the beginning of their administration as part of the normal turnover involved in the alternation of power. A report issued on Feb. 22 from the Congressional Research Service revealed that between 1981 and 2006, only five of the 486 U.S. attorneys failed to finish their four-year terms, and none were fired for political reasons. Only three were fired for questionable behavior, including one on "accusations that he bit a topless dancer on the arm during a visit to an adult club after losing a big drug case." In brief, Bush's firings were unprecedented, and Rove's talking point was simply one among several shifting explanations, starting with the initial false talking point that those dismissed suffered from "low performance."

"Administration has determined to ask some underperforming USAs to move on," wrote Sampson in a Dec. 5, 2006, e-mail to associate attorney general Bill Mercer. Yet the Associated Press reported on Tuesday, March 20: "Six of the eight U.S. attorneys fired by the Justice Department ranked in the top third among their peers for the number of prosecutions filed last year, according to an analysis of federal records. In addition, five of the eight were among the government's top performers in winning convictions."

When the scandal first broke, Rove personally offered a talking point on one of those fired, claiming on March 8 that the U.S. attorney for San Diego, Carol Lam, "refused to file immigration cases ... at the direction of the Attorney General, she was asked to file, and she said I don't want to make that a priority in my office." Though there was pressure on Lam to pursue more immigration cases, a heated issue for Republicans, three months before she was dismissed, the Justice Department had sent a letter to Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., noting that Lam's office had devoted "fully half of its Assistant U.S. Attorneys to prosecute criminal immigration cases."

Nor was the U.S. attorney for Washington state, John McKay, dismissed for "low performance." On Aug. 9, 2006, Sampson recommended him for a federal judgeship, writing in an e-mail: "re: John, it's highly unlikely that we could do better in Seattle." Yet, less than a month later, on Sept. 13, Sampson placed McKay on a list titled: "[U.S. Attorneys] We Now Should Consider Pushing Out." McKay was removed from favored status, according to his own sworn testimony before the Congress, because of his refusal to prosecute Democrats on nonexistent charges of voter fraud after the Democratic candidate for governor won by a razor-thin margin in 2004. McKay said he received telephone calls from Ed Cassidy, chief of staff to Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Wash., and state Republican Party chairman Chris Vance pressuring him to open a probe. Now, McKay has called for a special prosecutor to investigate the firings.

McKay's case parallels that of David Iglesias. As Iglesias wrote in the New York Times in an article titled "Why I Was Fired": "Politics entered my life with two phone calls that I received last fall, just before the November election. One came from Representative Heather Wilson and the other from Senator [Pete] Domenici, both Republicans from my state, New Mexico. Ms. Wilson asked me about sealed indictments pertaining to a politically charged corruption case widely reported in the news media involving local Democrats. Her question instantly put me on guard. Prosecutors may not legally talk about indictments, so I was evasive. Shortly after speaking to Ms. Wilson, I received a call from Senator Domenici at my home. The senator wanted to know whether I was going to file corruption charges -- the cases Ms. Wilson had been asking about -- before November. When I told him that I didn't think so, he said, 'I am very sorry to hear that,' and the line went dead. A few weeks after those phone calls, my name was added to a list of United States attorneys who would be asked to resign -- even though I had excellent office evaluations, the biggest political corruption prosecutions in New Mexico history, a record number of overall prosecutions and a 95 percent conviction rate."

Domenici and Wilson have both hired lawyers, given that they could potentially face prosecution for obstruction of justice. Their possible legal vulnerability and that of other Republicans across the country suggests a major reason why Bush is fighting to keep Rove from testifying before the Congress under oath.

McKay's and Iglesias' cases, as they explain them, involve efforts to pressure U.S. attorneys to launch investigations solely for political motives. The U.S. attorneys decided that evidence was lacking for such probes, and they were accordingly punished. Meanwhile, four of those fired were guilty of offenses of commission, not omission, having begun legitimate public corruption investigations of Republican officials.

Lam, who had successfully prosecuted Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham, was following the trail by investigating his associates, defense contractor and Republican fundraiser Brent Wilkes, and Wilkes' best friend, Dusty Foggo, the No. 3 ranking official at the CIA, the chief of contracting; and Rep. Jerry Lewis, a California Republican.

Daniel Bogden, the U.S. attorney for Nevada, was investigating whether Gov. Jim Gibbons "accepted unreported gifts or payments from a company that was awarded secret military contracts when Mr. Gibbons served in Congress," according to the Wall Street Journal.

H.E. "Bud" Cummins, the U.S. attorney for Arkansas, was investigating conflict-of-interest corruption involving state contracts that Missouri governor Matt Blunt granted to Republican contributors. In October 2006, Cummins announced he would not seek indictments. But his statement just came four weeks before the election for the U.S. Senate seat in Missouri that the Democratic candidate, Claire McCaskill, won narrowly. Cummins told the Los Angeles Times, "You have to firewall politics out of the Department of Justice. Because once it gets in, people question every decision you make. Now I keep asking myself: 'What about the Blunt deal?'"

Paul Charlton, the U.S. attorney for Arizona, was investigating Rep. Rick Renzi, R-Ariz., for allegedly corrupt land deals and introducing legislation to benefit a major campaign contributor. Charlton was curiously accused of not filing obscenity cases, which, in fact, he did pursue.

In each of these public corruption cases, it is reasonable to assume that the relevant Republican political figures either themselves complained or complained through surrogates about the U.S. attorneys to Rove, the matrix of national GOP politics. But which officials -- instead of foolishly making direct calls to the U.S. attorney, like Domenici and Wilson -- went through Rove to stymie the investigations (or rush them, if they were targeting Democrats)? Then, what did Rove say about the individual U.S. attorneys to the White House Office of Legal Counsel and officials in the Justice Department?

Bush's resistance to having Rove placed under oath or even having a transcript of his testimony appears to be a coverup of a series of obstructions of justice. The e-mails hint at the quickening pulse of communications between the White House and the Justice Department. But only sworn testimony can elicit the truth.

On Wednesday, the House Judiciary Committee issued five subpoenas, including one for Rove, and on Thursday the Senate Judiciary Committee plans to follow suit. With these subpoenas, a constitutional battle is joined. "The moment subpoenas are issued, it means that they have rejected the offer," said White House press secretary Tony Snow. Bush is barricading his White House against the Congress to prevent its members from posing the pertinent question that might open the floodgate: What did Karl Rove know, and when did he know it?

Anna Nicole Smith is pregnant Video

Sun, 11 Feb 2007 13:58:52 GMT

Anna Nicole Smith. Tribute Video.. In Loving Memory

Sun, 11 Feb 2007 13:57:35 GMT

Anna Nicole, Shortly Before Death: 'It's Always a Battle'

Sun, 11 Feb 2007 00:46:58 GMT

Although Anna Nicole Smith sought the spotlight for much of her life, toward the end she remained in the shadows.

"Entertainment Tonight" reporter Mark Steines interviewed Smith numerous times throughout her career. He talked to Smith and her companion, Howard K. Stern, in the Bahamas just days before her death. It was Smith's last television interview.

On "Good Morning America," Steines shared what Smith told him on and off camera.

"Everyone in my life has stabbed me in my back," she said in the interview with Steines. "My whole life, it's just been rough for me…it's always a battle. I feel strong. I'm tired. But…I'm not going to stop fighting."

Steines said that despite her vow to keep fighting for her well-being, Smith didn't seem like her usual self during the last interview. Still, he didn't think her death was imminent.

"I knew that she still wanted to fight, but I could tell during the interview that she wasn't the same," he said. "She still had a lot to live for, she still wanted to live…I just didn't think this kind of end was so close for her."

Sources told "Entertainment Tonight" that Smith was suffering from flu-like symptoms upon her arrival at her Florida hotel on Monday, but her fever had broken by Wednesday. That afternoon, she fell in the bathroom and hit her head. She said she was feeling fine, had a meal and went back to bed.

On Thursday, she retired to her bedroom to take a nap. When she did not wake after a few hours, she was checked on and found to be unresponsive.

From Clowning Around to Under the Influence

Prior to their interview, Steines spent time with Smith and Stern. He said that during the day, Smith seemed happy.

"Earlier in the day, we went to the house she was moving into with Howard…and she was so happy to be there," he said. "She was clowning around, joking…[but] later in the day…she seemed to be very under the influence of something."

Compared with their past conversations, Steines felt that Smith wasn't very lucid.

"She didn't seem as attentive as she had in the past," he said, adding that she didn't seem fully alert off-camera either. "She still was very fragile…at times she would seem coherent, she'd have a conscious stream of thought, and later she would ramble."

Having seen Smith during good times and bad, Steines hopes she's remembered for her successes.

"I felt like Anna Nicole was somebody who really wanted the spotlight…but sadly her life ended pretty empty," he said. "She had very few friends in her life…I hope she's remembered for all the good things she had."

Jim Carrey is eccentric

Fri, 02 Feb 2007 22:46:34 GMT

Carmen Celebrates Booze in Eden with Nicole Coco Austin and Ice T

Fri, 26 Jan 2007 01:39:50 GMT

Last night, Carmen Electra got comfy in her natural habitat -- surrounded by almost naked people and celebrating Vodka -- at the Garden of Eden Themed launch party for Absolut Pears in New York. I'm not sure what her tie-in with the vodka is, I mean other than hosting this party, but I certainly wouldn't be surprised if she ends up the spokesperson for the booze.

I wouldn't exactly say she's opposed to shilling for random objects...considering the things for which she's sold her body in the past (in the best way possible of course): Diet Coke, Taco Bell, Mastercard, NV Weight Loss Pill, her stripping work-out videos, Pepsi...

Hey, no judgment, she looks fabulous doing it.

JENNA AND PARIS MIGHT do A VIRGIN in Kevin Blatt's Virgin Territory

Wed, 24 Jan 2007 18:08:18 GMT

Paris Hilton and Jenna Jameson have been contacted about starring in a new reality show currently in production called "Virgin Territory", a show with the tag line "when you win it, you lose it". The producers are currently holding open auditions to participate on the show and are looking for males between 18-34 with “no experience necessary.” TMZ says:

Ironically, it's being brought to TV by the purveyor of Paris' sex tape, Kevin Blatt, who predicts that even more people will watch "Territory" than "One Night in Paris," Hilton's infamous night-visioned romp. To help stock his TV larder, Blatt will be unveiling giant billboards in Times Square and Los Angeles; soliciting actual, live virgins in those cities. "Finding virgins in NYC or Los Angeles is no easy task," says Blatt.

So, wait, are Paris and Jenna actually gonna fuck this dude? The winner gets to fuck Paris Hilton? Sounds more like a threat. And Jesus, if the winner gets lethal std's, what are they doing to the losers. Are they released into the woods with a one hour head start before the hunt begins or does the floor just open up and they're dropped into lava or maybe a shark tank like in that Bond movie. If that's the case, I'm pretty sure this will be the greatest show of all time. Although seemingly illegal

Jessica Simpson & John Mayer Hit Miami

Tue, 23 Jan 2007 19:06:08 GMT

Three weeks after getting cozy in New York over New Year's Eve, Jessica Simpson and John Mayer made another cute-couple appearance, this time in Miami.

On Monday, the pair worked out together at the Four Seasons hotel's Sports Club/LA gym, taking a yoga class and then lifting weights a deux, sources said.

That evening, they arrived hand-in-hand at The Shore Club's Nobu restaurant, where they sat and talked for more than two hours over sushi and bottled water.

Simpson, 26, and Mayer, 29, longtime friends who've been linked off and on since the summer, chatted easily, and at a few points she leaned forward and he reached across the table to hold both her hands.

"They looked really cute together," says one witness at Nobu. "They were talking and laughing the whole time. She was constantly fixing herself to make sure she looked her best for him."

When the check came, she reached for her bag and he reached for his wallet. She, however, pulled out a lipstick while he grabbed the bill. After the meal, she took a trip to the ladies room, and when she came out, wrapped her arms around the much-taller Mayer and stood on her tiptoes for a kiss on the nose.

How long will the couple be in the Sunshine State? Mayer, at least, should be sticking around: He's performing in Jacksonville on Thursday, Miami on Friday, Orlando on Saturday and Pensacola on the following Monday night.

UPDATE: Sources say that at 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Simpson and Mayer left their hotel and boarded his tour bus together, headed toward Jacksonville.

The Making Of Guru Mani Ratnam

Sun, 21 Jan 2007 16:12:40 GMT

Spears Family Circus Stalls at Three - Britney not pregnant just gross

Sun, 21 Jan 2007 01:30:10 GMT

Despite previous rumors to the contrary, Larry Rudolph, Britney Spears’ manager, has announced that the singer, actress and walking petri dish is not currently pregnant. Rudolph believes the rumors began when Spears’ new boy-toy, Isaac Cohen, spilled peanut butter on his shirt last week, which reporters mistook for Brit-vomit:

“Because Isaac didn’t lick the peanut butter off his fingers, someone decided that it must not be peanut butter, but must instead be Britney’s vomit,” Rudolph joked. “Ridiculous.”

Ridiculous, indeed—after all, what starry-eyed hip-hoppin’ Jewish beau wouldn’t give his last hoodie to lick Britney’s vomit off his fingers? Peanut butter, on the other hand—that’s just disgusting.

This news does call into question the recent statement from an anonymous friend that “… she always gets that sparkle in her eye when she’s pregnant, like she’s relaxed and happy.” When asked about the quote, Rudolph confirmed that the sparkle was actually due to a pink-eye infection Britney picked up after using a mascara bottle found in Paris Hilton’s bathroom garbage, which was later discovered to be athlete’s foot medication.

Cassie Jessica Alba's twin

Sun, 21 Jan 2007 01:29:07 GMT

Love her or hate her, you can't deny that Cassie has literally become a worldwide superstar from virtually ONE hit! Seen here at tonight's NRJ Music Awards in Cannes, France, the Bad Boy songstress is a long way from [hometown] Connecticut looking flawless.

Eliza Dushku Pics - Photo Shoot

Sun, 21 Jan 2007 01:28:35 GMT

Eliza Dushku is so hot this interview, I'm telling you, if you don't pop a woodie while watching this, then their is something wrong with you. Eliza Dushku just turned 26 last month and that is the perfect age for a hot woman like this to impregnate..

Aishwarya Rai And Amitabh Bachchan At The Sahara Wedding

Fri, 19 Jan 2007 04:10:41 GMT

This is after Aishwarya and Abhishek got engaged and Hrithik and Abhishek make up after the Ash-Hrithik kiss saga

Paris Hilton apologizes for hacking of cell phone list

Thu, 11 Jan 2007 01:14:06 GMT

As the gossip continues about who was -- and who wasn't -- in Paris Hilton's cell phone directory, the hotel heiress and reality T-V star says she feels "horrible."
Last week, Hilton's cell phone was hacked, and the phone numbers and e-mail addresses that were stored there were posted on the Internet.

In an interview with Us Weekly magazine, Hilton says: "I feel horrible that, once again, someone has invaded my privacy." She added, "I want to apologize to all my friends and family."

Some of her friends have been peppered with e-mails. Actress Lindsay Lohan says: "It's crazy." She says she "even got an e-mail from someone pretending to be Hugh Hefner."

Hilton's privacy was previously exposed when a sex tape of her and an ex-boyfriend became a cyberspace novelty.

Katharine McPhee whose vocal talents were second only to her amazing cleavage released her first single IT SUCKS

Tue, 09 Jan 2007 17:14:01 GMT

American Idol runner-up Katharine McPhee, whose vocal talents were second only to her amazing cleavage, just released her first single off her new album since finishing the Idol contest. The reviews were mixed. And by that I mean, it sucks.

Man Leaps In Front of Subway Train to Save Fellow Passenger Both Survive Unharmed!

Tue, 02 Jan 2007 22:47:08 GMT

It was every subway rider’s nightmare, times two.
Skip to next paragraph
Tina Fineberg for The New York Times

Wesley Autrey.

Who has ridden along New York’s 656 miles of subway lines and not wondered: “What if I fell to the tracks as a train came in? What would I do?”

And who has not thought: “What if someone else fell? Would I jump to the rescue?”

Wesley Autrey, a 50-year-old construction worker and Navy veteran, faced both those questions in a flashing instant yesterday, and got his answers almost as quickly.

Mr. Autrey was waiting for the downtown local at 137th Street and Broadway in Manhattan around 12:45 p.m. He was taking his two daughters, Syshe, 4, and Shuqui, 6, home before work.

Nearby, a man collapsed, his body convulsing. Mr. Autrey and two women rushed to help, he said. The man, Cameron Hollopeter, 20, managed to get up, but then stumbled to the platform edge and fell to the tracks, between the two rails.

The headlights of the No. 1 train appeared. “I had to make a split decision,” Mr. Autrey said.

So he made one, and leapt.

Mr. Autrey lay on Mr. Hollopeter, his heart pounding, pressing him down in a space roughly a foot deep. The train’s brakes screeched, but it could not stop in time.

Five cars rolled overhead before the train stopped, the cars passing inches from his head, smudging his blue knit cap with grease. Mr. Autrey heard onlookers’ screams. “We’re O.K. down here,” he yelled, “but I’ve got two daughters up there. Let them know their father’s O.K.” He heard cries of wonder, and applause.

Power was cut, and workers got them out. Mr. Hollopeter, a student at the New York Film Academy, was taken to St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center. He had only bumps and bruises, said his grandfather, Jeff Friedman. The police said it appeared that Mr. Hollopeter had suffered a seizure.

Mr. Autrey refused medical help, because, he said, nothing was wrong. He did visit Mr. Hollopeter in the hospital before heading to his night shift. “I don’t feel like I did something spectacular; I just saw someone who needed help,” Mr. Autrey said. “I did what I felt was right.”

Penelope Fuels Gay Rumours

Tue, 02 Jan 2007 03:12:29 GMT

Britney Spears Collapses in Sin City

Tue, 02 Jan 2007 03:11:43 GMT

Jett Caught Kissing Electra

Mon, 01 Jan 2007 18:30:29 GMT

Rocker Joan Jett and Carmen Electra reportedly were spotted indulging in a steamy kissing session after Jett's recent concert in Los Angeles.

The former "Baywatch" star appeared in Jett's new music video "ACDC" in May and the two have reportedly been close ever since.

A source who was backstage after the concert tells Star magazine, "They weren't even trying to hide it. They were fully kissing and going at it.

"There were very physical with hugging and kissing and touching."

After the concert the new duo carried on at an after party along with a group of friends.

When asked about his client's alleged liaison, Electra's representative remarked cheekily, "She was at the concert.
+ = Mother of LESBIAN LOVE
"She is a really big fan of Joan's, and I guess this was her way of thanking her for the front row seats!"

Nicole COCO Austin pictures and VIDEOS with Butt implants

Sun, 31 Dec 2006 19:54:47 GMT

A Lohan Holiday, a Wholesome ALI LOHAN Video wow she is good

Fri, 29 Dec 2006 19:40:34 GMT

Pitt and Jolie were considering buying land Panama and investing in the $56 million project

Fri, 29 Dec 2006 19:29:57 GMT

Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt surprised fans in Panama City on Friday, visiting a souvenir shop, a colonial neighborhood and the Panama Canal.

One resident yelled, "Are you Brad Pitt?" The actor smiled and said: "Sometimes," according to the newspaper Panama America.

Besides touring the capital, where they shopped for souvenirs and walked around a colonial neighborhood, Pitt and Jolie on Thursday visited a former U.S. military base and the construction site of Panama's new Biodiversity Museum, designed by Frank Gehry, at the entrance of the canal in the Amador district.

The newspaper said Pitt, who has a love of architecture, and Jolie were considering investing in the $56 million project and buying land in Panama.

The museum, which will trace Panama's natural history, will include a botanical garden.

Publicists for Pitt and Jolie couldn't be reached for comment.

The couple, who arrived Thursday, were to return on Saturday to Costa Rica, to celebrate the New Year at a beachfront resort where room prices range into the thousands of dollars a night.

Jolie, 31, arrived in Costa Rica last week as part of her work as a goodwill ambassador for the
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. She and Pitt spent Christmas Day with Colombian refugees.

She co-stars in the Universal Pictures drama "The Good Shepherd" with
Matt Damon and
Robert De Niro. Pitt stars in "Babel," a Paramount Vantage release.

Lindsay Lohan Nipple Slip

Mon, 25 Dec 2006 19:58:45 GMT

So what am I to do, avoid posting pictures of a Lindsay Lohan nipple slip? Yeah, I didn't think so. Oh, it would also seem that the girl Lindsay is riding here, is not, in fact, Leelee Sobieski. (And the nipple's only in the first one, actually)

Oh, and what the fuck is up with these wierdos Lindsay's been hanging around with lately. I thought celebrities were supposed to have good looking friends. Then again, maybe Lindsay's afraid of overshadowing her not-so-great looks with a bunch of pretty friends...

Miss Nevada Katie Rees UNCENSORED VIDEO NSFW

Sun, 24 Dec 2006 04:46:05 GMT

Katie Rees's secret Photobucket Account

Sat, 23 Dec 2006 23:17:27 GMT

The UNCENSORED NUDE Photos that stripped Ms. Nevada KATIE REES of her title!

Thu, 21 Dec 2006 23:19:46 GMT

Weird Al Interviews Eminem

Thu, 21 Dec 2006 22:40:17 GMT

Rambo on BOTOX

Fri, 08 Dec 2006 17:29:55 GMT

What Happened to Jennifer Love Hewitt?

Thu, 07 Dec 2006 01:16:02 GMT

She is mighty huge?!

Blue Eyed Lindsay Wearing a Sack

Thu, 07 Dec 2006 01:12:06 GMT

Mario and his Dancing with the Stars partner Karina Smirnoff are more than just friends

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 22:24:35 GMT

Ann Coulter gets owned

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 20:22:21 GMT

Kevin Federline – Britney allowed him to see their children

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 17:06:23 GMT

Jackie Chan Injured Filming Rush Hour 3

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 17:05:52 GMT

Low self esteem causing jessica simpson to flub on stage

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 16:32:32 GMT

Is Gisele still in love with Leo?

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 16:31:34 GMT

Paris Hilton wants kids, soon

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 16:30:51 GMT

Perez Hilton visits Howard Stern

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 16:30:24 GMT

Stars Rally to Britney’s Side

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 16:30:07 GMT

Nick Lachey's New Gal Kim

Wed, 06 Dec 2006 03:24:49 GMT

JLo Has No Time for Young Hollywood

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 17:12:38 GMT

Asked if she "turns her eye to young Hollywood stylemakers like Nicole Richie, Keira Knightley and Scarlett Johansson," J.Lo responds, "I don't spend much time thinking about 'those girls' . . . Fame is very intoxicating. You don't realize what you're doing when you're young."

Rip Torn arrested for DUI ... again

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 17:09:39 GMT

The Truth Behind Paris and Nicole's Rekindled Friendship

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 17:06:37 GMT

A source who was there when the duo showed up arm-in-arm at the Volkswagen Concept party in L.A. the other night said Richie dumped her stylist Rachel Zoe because Zoe, Richie's former friend Mischa Barton "and a few others tried to stage an intervention and tell Nicole to get some help about her weight. Nicole was so hurt that she ran back to Paris and ditched those trying to intervene in her life."

David Beckham upset about cheeky look-alike calendar boy

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 16:58:38 GMT

David Beckham upset about cheeky look-alike calendar boy

Lindsay Lohan Lifts Her Skirt for More Attention

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 14:53:27 GMT

Ivanka - I m not Paris

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 14:53:08 GMT

Janet Jackson always up for a lapdance

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 14:52:46 GMT

Penelope paid tribute to the film's director, Pedro Almodovar

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 11:18:00 GMT

citing his influence on her career and life

Lenny and Zoe Team Up To Fight AIDS

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 11:15:20 GMT

Scarlett Johansson Will Appear Nude

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 00:31:22 GMT

Mix Justin Timberlake with the Victoria’s Secret Models

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 00:30:44 GMT

Victoria's Secret Fashion Show airing Dec. 5- ...They're definitely brining sexy back!

Renee Zellweger Recommends Starring In Big Budget Movies As A Great Way To Keep Slim

Tue, 05 Dec 2006 00:29:58 GMT

Celebrities Take On The Mini-dress Trend

Mon, 04 Dec 2006 01:35:25 GMT

The mini-dress has certainly hit runways worldwide in a big way this year, meaning it's sure to continue to be a hit with socialites and celebrities alike for some time to come. Whether worn with glamour on the red carpet; floaty and light for summer days; or in heavier fabrics with tights (the jumper-dress trend remains strong for Autumn), there's only one real requirement: to wear it with confidence and class.

Kate Bosworth:

With Mischa's long legs, it's no wonder the mini-dress is her wardrobe staple:

"The Big Ad" - made with Massive (software used for battle scenes in LOTR)

Mon, 04 Dec 2006 00:20:32 GMT

Sandra Bullock not pregnant

Sun, 03 Dec 2006 12:38:50 GMT

Cate Blanchett just burnt a bridge at Vanity Fair

Sun, 03 Dec 2006 12:38:23 GMT

Britney Spears dates her ex. manager

Sun, 03 Dec 2006 11:50:06 GMT

Beyonce does seventeen magazine

Sun, 03 Dec 2006 11:49:30 GMT

Jennifer Connelly Looks Pregnant

Sun, 03 Dec 2006 11:48:07 GMT

Nobody Likes Lindsay Lohan

Sun, 03 Dec 2006 11:47:53 GMT

Hilary Swank Pirelli Pictures

Sun, 03 Dec 2006 11:47:37 GMT

Jennifer Connelly :: Interview Magazine

Sun, 03 Dec 2006 11:34:00 GMT

Cate Blanchett on Brad Pitt

Sun, 03 Dec 2006 11:33:45 GMT

Matt Damon Loving London

Sun, 03 Dec 2006 11:33:26 GMT

"Little Miss Diddy's' Pretty in Pink" baby shower for longtime girlfriend Kim Porter[Puff DIddy]

Sun, 03 Dec 2006 11:15:07 GMT

Diddy is currently shooting a new film in Toronto called "A Raisin in the Sun" but the more exciting news is that he is getting ready to be a father of twins. Diddy loves a good party so it was no surprise that he hosted a "Little Miss Diddy's' Pretty in Pink" baby shower for longtime girlfriend Kim Porter in NYC last weekend. There was no shortage of generosity from Diddy's famous friends, as the twins received extravagant gifts from LL Cool J, Denzel Washington, and Jay-Z. People Reports:

One thing still on Diddy and Porter's baby registry: an $88,000 R-class Mercedes Benz. It's "for the twins to ride in," Shalena Smith of Ga Ga Designs tells PEOPLE. "But I showed (Kim) a $17,000 diamond-encrusted pacifier and she laughed because she's down to earth. They are realistic people. Everything (on the registry) wasn't just the bling bling."

Porter, who is due in the middle of December, teared up when Diddy professed his love for her in front of their friends and family. "I just thank God that I have a woman and a friend who has been down with me with my faults and my flaws and my B.S. and all that stuff," he said. "She's my best friend. I love her with all my heart."

Paris' Other sister Nicole Richie

Sun, 03 Dec 2006 11:11:52 GMT

Eva & Tony: So Happy Together

Sun, 03 Dec 2006 11:11:41 GMT

paris hilton's Ankle boots

Sun, 03 Dec 2006 00:25:22 GMT

Paris is learning from Birtney, too

Sat, 02 Dec 2006 22:14:06 GMT

Nick Lachey Buys a Baseball Team

Sat, 02 Dec 2006 22:11:22 GMT

Wacko Michael Jackson booed off Stage

Sat, 02 Dec 2006 17:20:25 GMT

Will smith parties with bollywood

Sat, 02 Dec 2006 14:25:48 GMT

Mallika Sherawat - jackie chan heroine on the WWW!

Sat, 02 Dec 2006 14:21:17 GMT

Reese Enjoys the Sun with a Run

Sat, 02 Dec 2006 11:02:36 GMT

Fedex working on a reality show!

Sat, 02 Dec 2006 10:59:19 GMT

WTF

Lindsay lohan confesses to illegal activity

Sat, 02 Dec 2006 10:58:55 GMT

Kate Cries in The Park

Thu, 30 Nov 2006 18:24:54 GMT

Blogger sexually assualted, snaps photo of thug, posts it.

Wed, 29 Nov 2006 14:39:44 GMT

10 Things Your Casino Won't Tell You

Wed, 29 Nov 2006 14:37:49 GMT

Perfect Cameron Diaz drives justin crazy

Wed, 29 Nov 2006 14:06:58 GMT

Rosie to Brit: Ditch idiots and come live with me

Wed, 29 Nov 2006 14:06:05 GMT

Al Pacino Can't Sleep, HOO-HAH

Wed, 29 Nov 2006 14:05:30 GMT

K-Fed was having fling with porn star

Wed, 29 Nov 2006 14:04:50 GMT

Kramer Rant Boosts DVD Sales Racism stinks

Wed, 29 Nov 2006 14:04:07 GMT

Killer Lastnightparty

Wed, 29 Nov 2006 13:33:54 GMT

Leading lady Jessica in new film Blonde Ambition [Working lady]

Tue, 28 Nov 2006 18:48:50 GMT

Jared leto dating a myspace **ho

Tue, 28 Nov 2006 18:47:38 GMT

Britney makes Tara Reid look classy

Tue, 28 Nov 2006 18:46:48 GMT

Britney Spears Upskirt, Take Two: Now With Virtually Nothing Left To The Imagination

Katie Holmes Is Already Sick Of Crazy Cruise - tom already having marital problems !

Tue, 28 Nov 2006 18:44:01 GMT

Is Kirsten Dunst pregnant with Orlandoo Bloom's baby

Tue, 28 Nov 2006 18:43:26 GMT

Ethan Hawke Walks His Dog

Tue, 28 Nov 2006 18:40:31 GMT

Everyone Look at Lindsay Lohan and Her Hand Cuffs

Tue, 28 Nov 2006 18:39:35 GMT

Vince Buys Big in Chicago

Tue, 28 Nov 2006 18:39:06 GMT

Jen has been there to check on the progress

Owen wilson Shops for A Ring!! is he going to propose to Kate Hudson

Tue, 28 Nov 2006 18:37:45 GMT

Lindsay Lohan Sex Claims 'She's Wearing Out New Beau'

Fri, 24 Nov 2006 21:46:03 GMT

Lindsay Lohan Sex Claims 'Wearing Out New Beau'

A report from the UK claims that Lindsay is over the top when it comes to her news beau Calum Best and the American girl's sex drive is wearing him out.

A friend of Calum's also offered an opinion. 'Calum's a legendary swordsman, but he can't keep up with Lindsay - she's wearing him out.

***

According to Mega Star UK Lindsay Lohan's stamina is not a problem.

A report there cites the UK Mirror that claims the hard-partying American movie star has come under fire recently for burning the candle a little hard at both ends, but it appears she's still got something left in the tank because she's exhausted Best.

According to the Mirror, the famous duo hooked-up during Lindsay's flying visit to the UK and spent five nights together.

***

Now the story really gets strange. When Best tried to leave her suite at London's Sanderson Hotel, Lindsay tried to stop him, reports the Mirror.

The 3am Girls Eva Simpson & Caroline Hedley report: When the Love Island Romeo tried to leave her suite at London's Sanderson Hotel in the early hours of Tuesday morning, Lindsay called some heavies and tried to stop him going.

Calum, 25, insisted he had a plane to catch - he was due in Belfast later that day to switch on the Christmas lights at City Hall. But when he told Li-Lo that he'd have to love her and leave her, she was having none of it.

***

Convinced he was off to meet someone else, the 20-year-old Herbie star called the hotel's security.

The girls "spies" claim: "Staff thought Lindsay wanted them to get rid of Calum - they couldn't believe they wanted help to keep him there. She was going crazy, demanding to know why Calum had to leave. She wasn't listening when he told her he had to work.

"She was convinced he was going to meet another girl behind her back and was determined to stop him leaving. In the end they managed to calm her down but she went to bed in a real strop, cursing Calum and saying she never wanted to see him again. He jumped into a car and sped off."

***

La Lohan is now back in Los Angeles.

It's Another Boy for Heidi and Seal

Fri, 24 Nov 2006 09:59:02 GMT

Congrats to Heidi Klum and Seal who added another bundle of joy this week to their quickly growing family. His name is Johan Riley Fyodor Taiwo Samuel - wow- that's a mouthful. We were just saying she was about to pop. What wonderful holiday news. People reports:

Heidi Klum and her husband, Seal, have welcomed a baby boy, according to the supermodel's Web site.

Johan Riley Fyodor Taiwo Samuel was born Wednesday at 5:01 p.m. in Los Angeles. "He is healthy, beautiful and looks just like his mother," according to the post signed by Seal.

In announcing the 8 lb. 11 oz. arrival, the new dad wrote, "To our children, a brother/ To our parents, a grandson/ To my wife and I, a son/ To our family, a blessing."

What a lovely note. We love everything about this family. We hope they keep growing.

Angelina and Brad's Thanksgiving Tour

Fri, 24 Nov 2006 09:56:49 GMT

While many of us spent Turkey day stuffing our faces with family and friends, Brad and Angelina decided to cruise around and do a little site seeing instead. The two were spotted touring Vietnam's largest city by scooter for Thanksgiving yesterday. Later they enjoyed a lovely and not so traditional Thanksgiving dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant. We hope everyone had a fabulous holiday with their loved ones!

More pics of the Jolie-Pitts cruising around town so read more

I'm Thankful for Salma Hayek's Breasts

Fri, 24 Nov 2006 09:47:51 GMT

Let's All Worry About Lindsay

Mon, 20 Nov 2006 01:57:59 GMT

LL stayed in London over the weekend to supposedly shoot the latest ad campaign for Miu Miu. While her career is still going strong with multiple new movies on the horizon, her personal life is continuing to spiral out of control. This time around things seem much more serious than a letter telling her she's unprofessional. Now there are reports she is cutting herself on top of all the partying. Page Six reports:

THE few friends that Lindsay Lohan has are worried. "At the rate she's going, I would be surprised if she lived past the age of 22," said one concerned pal. Lohan has long been addicted to clubbing and nonstop partying, but her behavior last week during the World Music Awards in London really freaked them out. During the program she was supposed to be hosting, Lohan stumbled on steps, flubbed her lines and abandoned her emcee role early in the show. Later, London's Sun caught pictures of Lohan with cut marks on her wrist that looked self-inflicted. Her rep claimed the incisions were the result of a fall into a bush. "There is no one in her life to guide her or help her," said the friend. "Her mother is a mess, her father is in jail and she has no authority figure, because she has paid the family bills for as long as she can remember with her acting."

Well, when it's put that way, no wonder she's such a mess. Let's hope the cuts on her wrist aren't self-inflicted. That would be bad and sad. Someone help LL before she hits rock bottom. For more pics of LL keeping her wrists out of view while she leaves the Sanderson Hotel in London just

'The Sopranos' Extended

Mon, 20 Nov 2006 01:54:48 GMT

Looks like Tony Soprano’s crew will be around a little bit longer than planned. The final season of HBO’s hit mob drama The Sopranos has been extended, star Steve Schirripa tells Celebrity Week. “There are now going to be nine shows altogether,” Schirripa confirmed backstage at the Comic Relief show in Las Vegas on Saturday. “We added one show. We were only supposed to do 8, but they just added a ninth show.”

So far, filming is complete on the first six episodes and Schirrippa’s character (Bobby “Bacala” Baccalleri, who is married to Tony’s sister Janice) still isn’t pushing up daisies: “I’m still alive. That’s all I will say.” The long time Las Vegas resident, who helps out booking talent at the Riviera Hotel, is also working on a late night talk show pilot for Fox television.

The Sopranos returns April 8.

Tom and Katie’s Wedding Couture

Mon, 20 Nov 2006 01:53:46 GMT

The unholy union of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes was very much like the Oscar’s or the Emmy’s. A whole lotta stars wearing today’s finest designers to a dull, meaningless event. Let’s examine the goods, shall we?

Brooke Shields in an Oscar de la Renta with her husband, Chris Henchy. She’s holding something that looks like fur, and if it’s real, damn her and her pretty dress.

Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony are probably on crack, cause they both look half way dead. Isn’t it funny how the arm on the right end of the picture looks like it belongs to Anthony?

The bride’s BFF, Victoria Beckham, was not going to live us without our daily camp fix. Posh is very very skiny, so you know that if her flesh is leaking from her dress, it’s a really tight one.

And finally, the bride and groom, posing a hearty one. It all could’ve been really romantic, when you think of it, if he wasn’t such a meshugener.

Keira Knightley To Wed?

Mon, 20 Nov 2006 01:51:13 GMT

The British actress Keira Knightley is reportedly set to marry her actor boyfriend Rupert Friend. The Pirates Of The Caribbean star, 21, is said to have made the revelation to friends at a party hosted by Lindsay Lohan at London's Paper Club on Friday night.

A source tells British newspaper News Of The World, "(Keira) looked radiant and seemed to want the world to know that she and Rupert had got engaged."

"She was kissing and cuddling him all night. They were with six friends and were obviously in celebratory mood after getting through five bottles of Dom Perignon.

She even told the waiter, "Please get my husband a drink."

"Even her girlfriends referred to him as her future husband."

Jay-Z Pulls off 7 Concerts in One Day!

Mon, 20 Nov 2006 01:48:36 GMT

When Jay-Z comes out of retirement he does it in full force. The rapper who was going to retire at the age of 34 just performed seven concerts in seven cities in just one day! In under twenty-four hours he managed to perform 30 minute shows in Atlanta, Philadelphia, Washington, New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Las Vegas. How did he do it? I guess it helps to have personal jets and a police escort to and from the airport! Jay-Z's new album Kingdom Come hits stores this Tuesday. Way to promote your album in style Jay!

As for some of his special guests, well Paris was of course there shaking her thing. Her sister Nicky was there with her latest lover, MK's ex, David Katzenberg and from the look of their dirty dancing I would say they are definitely together - or at least for the evening. The most entertaining news of the evening is that apparently Paris took the stage afterwards to please the crowd but couldn't perform since she supposedly got sick on stage from drinking too much Grey Goose. Whoops. For more of David and Nicky getting it on and lots more of Jay-Z at all of his different shows just

‘Happy Feet’ all the way to top Box Office spot

Mon, 20 Nov 2006 01:38:35 GMT

Top Weekend Movies

November 17-19, 2006

Happy Feet- $42.3 million

Casino Royale- $40.6 million

Borat- $14.4 million

The Santa Clause 3- $8.2 million

Flushed Away- $6.8 million

BRITNEY AND MARIO?

Mon, 20 Nov 2006 01:35:28 GMT

It seems Britney Spears has a thing for dancers. Fresh from dumping former back up dancer-turned-wannabe rapper Kevin Federline, the newly single Miss Spears was spotted in Sin City on Friday night with 'Dancing with the Stars' loser Mario Lopez

.

And this time, Britney was doing Vegas right. According to

People

magazine, Britney won at the tables to the tune of $10 000 and then went on a shopping spree to Caesars Palace's Forum Shops.

People has the deets:

• Donning a disguise of a pink wig and big, dark sunglasses, Britney was spotted in the Palms Casino Resort Friday night chatting it up with owner George Maloof.

• On Friday, Spears went into the Palms' recording studio with producer Lukasz Gottwald to mix tracks on her new album.

• Britney – wearing a short, black dress – caught a lucky streak gambling at The Mint, the Palms' high-limit lounge raking in $10,000 in winnings from blackjack.

• She also was introduced to Mario Lopez at The Mint. The two, along with a small group, then headed up to Moon Nightclub and partied the night away.

Expect the Mario-Britney rumour frenzy to go full steam ahead as Mario is enjoying his post-reality show 15-minutes of fame. Compound that with a Britney comeback story and you've got yourself a tabloid orgasm.

Fox backlash against Murdoch over O.J. Simpson mess

Sun, 19 Nov 2006 19:19:30 GMT

Rupert Murdoch, Chairman and CEO of News Corporation

Angelina's bodyguard ARRESTED!!

Sun, 19 Nov 2006 13:06:03 GMT

Lily Allen on shoplifting, stress and smoking fags

Sun, 19 Nov 2006 13:00:18 GMT

Paris Parties With Bond

Wed, 15 Nov 2006 19:18:49 GMT

It might have been all about the presence of her Royal Highness at the red carpet premiere of Casino Royale...

But the Queen left the after party action to her subjects - and some Tinseltown additions.

While Liz was tucking her corgis up in their beds, the likes of Paris Hilton were having a knees up to celebrate the world premiere of the new Bond movie.

Paris was joined by one of her reinstated BFs, Miss Lindsay Lohan.

However, we imagine there was none of Paris' infamous table dancing, what with her parents being present and all that.

Joining the Hollywood It Girls - and the stars of the new Bond film - were the likes of Sarah Harding, Rachel Stevens, Jimmy Carr and Dannii Minogue.

See it all in the gallery above.

Fake Photo of Elizabeth Vargas Breastfeeding

Wed, 15 Nov 2006 16:24:17 GMT

Katie Holmes $340 Butt Floss

Wed, 15 Nov 2006 16:21:39 GMT

Playboy Magazine's 50th birthday bash

Wed, 15 Nov 2006 15:06:17 GMT

Free Patricia Dunn

Wed, 15 Nov 2006 15:05:35 GMT

Shakira and De La Rua Waiting to Wed

Wed, 15 Nov 2006 14:59:44 GMT

Pop beauty Shakira is waiting to marry her long-term lover Antonio De La Rua.

Jude Law is fugly

Wed, 15 Nov 2006 14:55:06 GMT

Naomi's a brutal bigot, suit says

Wed, 15 Nov 2006 14:54:27 GMT