Top Web Charts for 2008 - Paris Hilton and Anna Kournikova still No 1

In a year of enormous turmoil in the physical world it is wonderful to see the virtual world of the web has steadfastly held to its primary concerns - girls/women and celebrities. And we love it!

So even though there is a new celebrity in the Top Women searches on Lycos - Sarah Palin - it is perhaps no surprise to see the other 4:

1. Paris Hilton
2. Sarah Palin
3. Britney Spears
4. Pamela Anderson
5. Holly Madison

Celebs also dominated the Top News Stories as well, with Heath Ledger, Clay Aiken, Paul Newman and Jennifer Hudson of more interest than earthquakes and wars.


Meanwhile, the public chose Top Sports Stars who combined attractiveness along with accomplishment - again, no great surprise:

1. Anna Kournikova
2. Danica Patrick
3. Maria Sharapova
4. Michael Phelps
5. Serena Williams

And interesting to see Anna is still such a darling of webfolk.
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Heads Up

Thanks to Jared Milgrim (photographer) for an always interesting blog. He often takes photos of gigs and concerts, even festivals, and seems to have a good eye and ear for interesting music and performances.

Recent mentions:
Rilo Kiley - from LA and including former child actors (who done good) - website

Yelle - French and provocative (almost nothing better in the world) - website

You can check Jared's great photography and comments here: blogspot

Context is not new - YouTube and FaceBook the future

Content is not king. Context is king. Unless you have a mechanism to classify or categorise in some way, content becomes a difficult mess.

Search engines helped find content on the web, but still rather inefficiently. Even now, with all the improvements to Google etc, it is still possible to receive thousands of results from a search query.

Microsoft was wrong. Internet Explorer was wrong. They were old concepts and have been totally overtaken by REAL context kings:

YouTube
easily find videos that work (rather than false or broken links in Google or Yahoo)

MySpace
easily stay in touch with friends and common interests (in contrast to clumsy and boring email software)

Facebook
easily find friends and share common interests (in contrast to clumsy and boring special interest groups)

Firefox
providing a browser with tools that work

So ignore the nay-saying of the big boys and go with what works for users. Every computer manufacturer (except Apple) and every hosting software (except Joomla) can be shown to have very fundamental usability failures.

Learn from history!

The Egyptians were smart enough to know that context was king, and used a version of XML-like descriptions for their scrolls to help describe the content. (Yes, the Roman Christians decided to destroy all that and set us back a few thousand years.)

Not the BBC News - Unhealthy dumbing down

As each year passes, the BBC News has become less relevant and more immature. Half of some recent news programmes have been full of poorly-disguised advertising for other BBC programmes.

So-called celebrity interviews are nothing more than teasers for BBC programmes.

Even the death of a 16-year-old boy was constantly referenced to a BBC soap.

Regional news slots are used to promote other radio or tv slots.

Where is there any real news coverage on the BBC? Why is our enforced licence fee money used for low-interest programmes? In fact, the BBC News is lucky to get 8% of the population watching. So how can an enforced levy on 100% of households be justified?

Perhaps the most damaging problems of the BBC are the lack of balance in their news items. For example, the attack on Kinsella is paraded as an example of Britain in trouble. Yet we have a 16-year-old out at 2am in a dangerous part of London, at or near a pub, and in a fight.

There are other questions a responsible news programme should be asking. For example: Why was he there? Who was looking after him? How did he get involved in a fight?

Instead, the BBC are more interested in adding a child abuse storyline to Eastenders, which has constantly portrayed a menu of fights, arguments, murder, incest and violence. And all that before the 9pm watershed.

There is no balance left at the BBC. No family values. No positive role models. No questioning or challenging.

And, finally, there is no real analysis in BBC news reports. No historical perspective. No statistical comparisons. Instead, there is a mish-mash of soundbites and soft opinion, knee-jerk bias and overall tone of fiddling while Rome burns.

Eurovision sulk - why Britain keeps losing

The current British tantrum over the Eurovision results is rather pathetic. In summary, the position seems to be: “If we can’t win then the whole thing is unfair.” The UK came bottom of the 25 countries competing.

Reality check 1: Britain is not in the Euro 2008 football finals because they were not good enough to qualify. The UK did not get into the top 16 countries in Europe!

Reality check 2: Britain would be in position 28 in the medal table for the 2004 Olympics if we take population into account. Even if we go on total medals, Russia, Germany, France and Italy did better. With Ukraine, Netherlands, Romania, Spain, Hungary and Greece chasing hard. The UK is under-performing.

Reality check 3: give some weighting to Euro 2008, Eurovision and Olympic results and Britain would fall in about position 20. With Greece, Sweden, Romania, Croatia, Russia and the Ukraine comfortably ahead. The UK is under-achieving.

Why? The answer is simple. In many minds, the empire still rules. No, not the George Lucas one. Unfortunately, England and/or British teams are continually beaten in all sorts of sports by much smaller nations, often former colonies of the British Empire.

The pundits and media in the UK, however, continually laud mediocrity and avoid the hard truth. When a UK team loses in an international match, they are ‘unlucky’ or ‘a bit tired’ or some other excuse.

The truth is, the UK teams and/or talent contestants are not good enough. If they were coming third or fifth or ninth, then we might believe some of the excuses. But 25th or 17th or 20th is not even close.

So to the current moaning, stop complaining and start performing.

X-Factor cabaret final a shipwreck

The 2007 X-Factor final was a shambles. It was a seaside town variety show. Same Difference, with their thin voices and attractive smiles, waft through another set of pretty and sweet and unchallenging songs. Leon sings the same old croon, one key, one note, one song that appears no different to another. Rhydian tries to put a manly front on a cultured and precious and closeted voice.

ITV realised the trouble they had, probably along with Simon Cowell, and so they ramped up the cabaret elements to the hilt. Duets with the finalists from Jason Donovan, Kylie Minogue and Katherine Jenkins were astonishing, but more from the gulf that was revealed.

This is probably the worst final in X-Factor history. Look, all the finalists come across as great people and very determined to succeed. But Leon is a one song pony. If you want smooth hotel bar music, he's the man. But no eXtra factor. Same Difference were overshadowed by Jason, who is no powerhouse. But his one voice has 5 times the power and tone of the two put together.

And the whole series was blown into the distance the minute Katherine Jenkins sang just one note. There is the power. There is the talent. There is X factor to the XXXXX degree. Poor Rhydian could not stay in the same song, let alone be on the same stage. He has a good voice, probably the best in this series in terms of consistency. But Katherine was awesome, spine-tingling, and made up for the many low spots in this series.

It was so bad, they couldn't even find a bunch of highlights. Instead they went for the most serious problem of the show. We cringe and we switch off as they parade out some of the worst moments from the auditions. This is not funny, or uplifting. It is sad and mean.

The money must be really hurting ITV by now. To have to pay for Jason and Kylie and Katherine to try to boost audience figures must have really stung. And I hope so. They have consistently refused to tell the truth about the voting, and my guess is that would reveal how poor this series has been received.

So, a mediocre series became a shipwreck after the best talent was pushed off by the judges and the secret voting shambles.

Digital Music Sales Milestones

1m _ July 2004
10m _ April 2005
50m _ May 2006
100m _ March 2007
150m _ November 2007