Mexican reporters kidnapped on trip to promote tourism...

The Mexican government is a little concerned by all the drug related violence that has been sweeping the country of late; not only because of the 23,000 people that have been killed since President Calderon initiated a crackdown on the drug cartels, but also because it has the potential to seriously damage income from tourism, which is one of the most important industries in the country...

Therefore, in order to reassure both those at home and abroad, the government organised, and sponsored, a media tour of the Michoacan region of Mexico for a group of fifteen Mexican journalists, in order to show them just how wonderful and safe the region is.

This was a fantastic idea up until the point that said journalists were kidnapped by a group of machete wielding Nahua Indians, who had mistaken them for a group of filmmakers from Grupo Modelo (makers of Corona beer), who were due to shoot a commercial in the area (something the Nahua Indians were apparently less than pleased with, due to the fact they'd not been asked about it).

After some discussion, and the gradual realisation that the group was nothing to do with Grupo Modelo, the journalists were released after several hours (although their equipment was retained) and the Nahua Indians then headed off to, successfully, kidnap the real Grupo Modelo filmmakers who arrived in the area a littler later than expected.

I'm sure they can find a way to spin this and accentuate the positive. Mexico: Safe for tourists (apart from the kidnapping).

OKCupid separates the 'Hot' from the 'Not'

Currently trending high is OKCupid (the self-proclaimed 'best dating site on Earth') which has, apparently, recently altered the way the site works to ensure that beautiful people do not have to bothered by the less attractive members of the species - dividing the site in half between the attractive and the not-so-attractive and ensuring attractive people get to see attractive people in their searches and the less attractive...well, they have to make do with what's left...

The site has been sending out the following email (as published on The Consumerist) to the 'hot' section of their site:

"We are very pleased to report that you are in the top half of OkCupid's most attractive users. The scales recently tipped in your favor, and we thought you'd like to know...

Your new elite status comes with one important privilege:

You will now see more attractive people in your match results.

This new status won't affect your actual match percentages, which are still based purely on your answers and desired match's answers. But the people we recommend will be more attractive. Also! You'll be shown to more attractive people in their match results."

So, is eugenics alive and well on OKCupid or is this just a shamefaced attempt to get publicity for the dating site? Well, users on the site who received the email have reported no apparent changes in the sort of people they are being served up in their searches and it would appear to me that this might be a good example of the Forer Effect - where people are prepared to recognise themselves in descriptions that are, supposedly, tailored to them. Or, to quote Phoebe from Friends "people will believe anything you tell them, as long as it's a compliment."

Has OKCupid opened up a deep divide between the Hot and the Not? Or have they just sent emails out to everyone to make them feel more attractive, spur them into checking out the site and - most importantly - get themselves a large serving of that all important media attention? We may never know for sure!

Pet Dog Inherits $11 million estate...

Currently trending high is the story of the recently deceased Miami heiress, Gail Posner who has apparently left a considerable bulk of her fortune to her pet chihuahua, Conchita.

While she was alive, it is fair to say that Gail Posner did slightly spoil her pet pooch - it had weekly luxury spa appointments, wore a $15,000 Cartier necklace and was driven around in it's own gold Cadillac Escalade - but, upon her death, she took the spoiling to hitherto unheard of levels when she bequeathed Conchita a $3 million trust fund and her $8.3 million, 7 bedroom, Miami mansion.

Ms. Posner's son, Bret Carr, is (strangely enough) less than impressed that his mother left her dog assets worth over $11 million while he received $1 million and has gone to court to get the will revoked. He argues that her aides manipulated her into altering her will before she died - while I imagine said aides would argue it is purely a coincidence that they were left $26 million and the right to live in the mansion along with Conchita.

Only time will tell if the will is overturned - in the meantime, Conchita is still enjoying her reign as World's Most Spoiled Dog...

4chan Spam Attacks Google Trends (again)

4chan users have demonstrated, yet again, their ability to spam attack Google Trends and get terms to the very top of the trend list (at least temporarily, until Google manually deletes them...).

In 2008, 4chan users managed to get both the swastika to the top of the trends and, shortly afterwards, were able to get the reverse text “ǝlƃooƃ noʎ ʞɔnɟ” to appear (albeit briefly) at the top of Google Trends..

Today, the phrase (which I've taken the decision to censor due to its offensive nature) "☻ lol ☻ n*****s ☻" appeared at the very top of Google Trends. I don't anticipate it will stay there long...

Bavaria Beer Babes Busted!

A group of 36 female Netherlands supporters, all identically clad in orange dresses, were removed from the Netherlands-Denmark match by stewards and were then quizzed for three hours by South African police - with FIFA subsequently claiming that their appearance in the stadium represented 'ambush marketing'.

Ambush marketing sounds like it might involve violence - perhaps turning a corner and having an advertising billboard dropped on your head - but, apparently, it's when a company who aren't the sponsor of an event stage something to get attention for their brand...

You see, the dresses they were wearing were the very same dresses that were given away in a promotion by Bavaria beer in the Netherlands. They're plain orange dresses - no branding, no Bavaria logo - but, since FIFA have an official beer sponsor in the shape of Budweiser, they are fanatical about protecting their sponsorship income.

South African authorities are being a tad vague about the reasons the women were removed from the ground (since, last time I checked, wearing orange and making a lot of noise fails to differentiate you from pretty much any other Dutch football supporter) but FIFA are rather vehement about their decision saying the women were "used by a large Dutch brewery as an instrument for an ambush marketing campaign."

I would also think that the 36 women in question might have grounds for some kind of legal action as - being held and quizzed by police for wearing an orange dress seems slightly over-the-top. What next? A night in the cells for being seen drinking Pepsi rather than the official Coca-Cola? A week doing hard labour for chowing down on a Big King rather than a Big Mac?

Two things sprung to mind when I read this story:

1) Bavaria - if they are indeed behind this - must be cackling to themselves over their breakfast this morning. For the insignificant price of 36 tickets and some cheap orange dresses they staged a stunt that - due to FIFA's heavy handed tactics - has made front page news around the world. Had FIFA done nothing, most people probably wouldn't even have noticed...

2) The Dutch supporters should probably appreciate the humour of this and turn up en masse in orange dresses for the Netherlands-Japan game. I would love to see how FIFA deals with several thousand mini-dressed Dutch supporters with tickets turning up at the stadium! Perhaps someone should start a campaign?

And finally, as I wrote this, I began to wonder - how did FIFA actually manage to spot this group within a crowd of thousands wearing orange? It had to be some kind of tip off. And, based upon how this all turned out, I'm guessing that call came from someone not a million miles away from Bavaria...

Jesus is on fire...an Act of God?

Trending rather well today is the story of the demise of the King of Kings sculpture near Monroe in Ohio, United States...

The sculpture - which stands (or rather stood) 62 feet (19m) tall and is better known as the Big Butter Jesus or Touchdown Jesus was struck by lightning in an apparent Act of God. One can only assume that God was Odin...

And, since the sculpture was made out of styrofoam and fibreglass - it went up like, well like a big burning Jesus statue to be honest. So, if a big butter burning Jesus is just your thing, you'll really want to click here to see it for yourself...

Holy Ninja Hunting Osama Bin Laden

Gary Brooks Faulkner, a 52 years old Californian construction worker, was arrested yesterday in the Chitral region of Pakistan wearing night-vision goggles and armed with a knife, a pistol, a 40 inch sword and a collection of Christian booklets. His mission? To hunt down and kill Osama Bin Laden...

I mean, seriously - you couldn't make this up could you?

Apparently, Gary - who is trending massively right now - decided that he would personally atone for the US's failure to capture or kill Mr Bin Laden by heading out into the wilds of Pakistan and hunting down Osama all by himself. So, slipping away from his security detail on Sunday night, Gary Brooks Faulkner headed off into the wilderness on his assassination mission.

Quite why he chose this particular part of Pakistan only Gary knows but he seems to have given only minimal thought to just how he would go about accomplishing his task since:

a) The Chitrel region is about 5,800 square miles. To put that in perspective, it's bigger than the US state of Connecticut or, to put it another way, about half the size of Belgium.

b) Gary Brooks Faulkner, as a late-middle aged American, would blend in with the natives about as well as an elephant in a bowl of oranges.

c) Osama Bin Laden (if he is still alive) has - I'm guessing - one or two people around him to keep him safe - even from Holy Ninja Warriors.

They say there is a fine line between bravery and stupidity but, however fine it is, Gary Brooks Faulkner has dashed past it without even a backward glance. But for his arrest, I think we could have had ourselves a contender for this year's Darwin Awards...

Vuvuzelas, Bad Perez Hilton and Aggressive Politicians...

Vuvuzelas. A week ago, very few people outside of South Africa had even heard of a vuvuzela; now, it seems you can't go anywhere without hearing one.

The vuvuzela, for those who've been living in the wilderness (and thus haven't been bothered by its monotonous droning), is a 3 foot (1 metre) long horn blown in football stadiums with some fervour. The demonic buzzing sound they make has largely obliterated the sound of fans cheering and singing and has evoked complaints from TV companies (who claim the vuvuzela causes all kinds of trouble for their audio), from spectators (who complain of deafness) and even from players (who apparently can't hear their team mates shouting to them).

And, while arguments rage back and forth as to whether they should be banned in stadiums, they are trending highly today - mainly, it would seem, because people are buying them to ensure that the ungodly hum can be exported from the stadiums of South Africa to the urban landscape of the UK. Sainsburys apparently sold 22.000 of them in 12 hours before the England game. So, even if FIFA does decide to call time on the din inside the stadiums, don't expect you've heard the last of vuvuzelas for some time yet!

Moving on from things that exist mainly to annoy people, we next look at politicians. Oh wait, we didn't move far, did we?

Congressman Bob Etheridge did his best to ensure that politician's reputations remain firmly in the gutter by going psycho on two students hoping to interview him on the street. However, one person likely unimpressed by 'Mad Bob' is John Prescott who demonstrated a far more robust approach in 2001 when a protester hit him on the head with an egg. Based upon this, Bob clearly needs to up his game...

And finally, it would be impossible to discuss the trends of the day without a mention for Perez Hilton and his twitter post that may yet well get him into a lot of trouble. Perez Hilton - an American blogger renowned for his coverage, and criticism of all manner of celebrities - got hold of a nude upskirt photo of Miley Cyrus and posted it on his twitter account. Miley Cyrus who is 17. Which is of course skirting (oh, see what I did there!) with child pornography. Viewers of said photo claim it looks to be faked but, whether this will be enough for Mr. Hilton to escape the attention of the law, we'll just have to wait and see...

The Weekly Round Up - Sex Tapes, Suicide Attempts and Yawning...

Celebrities. Like them or loath them, it's almost impossible to get away from them on the internet. So, in order to further perpetuate that, today's Pulse of the Net takes an insightful peek into the world's celebrity trends...

Australia is not the only country to be obsessed with Cut Tari this week, but it comes first alphabetically so I figured I'd name (and shame?) them. Now, if you (like me) are scratching your head slightly at the mention of Cut Tari then I have to tell you that her weekly popularity, like so many celebrities before her, has soared due to the existence (or, possibly non-existence) of a sex video featuring her and Indonesian pop star Ariel (of the band Peterpan). With the posting of said steamy video online, her international recognition has soared in this past week...

Meanwhile, across the Pacific in the USA, another sex tape scandal has seen Americans frantically typing in the name of Danielle Staub, star of the reality-TV show Real Housewives of New Jersey as she has been caught - for the second time - on camera. However, speculation is rife that Ms. Staub engineered the sex tape scandal in order to raise both publicity and funds. Surely the first celebrity ever to do such a thing, I'm sure...

In Brazil, however, a very different scandal has been shocking the nation - the astonishingly bad form of Zeca Camargo as he yawned live on national TV. Despite apologies, and the obvious fanfare surrounding Brazil's World Cup campaign, Camargo's yawn has attracted more than a million views on a myriad of Youtube postings.

Finally, in Sweden (for reasons likely known only to themselves) the biggest celebrity buzz was all about Tila Tequila. This is quite impressive considering that Ms. Tequila's star is very much in the descendency ever since being dropped by MTV from their Shot At Love show - however, it is most likely due to the recent - and bizarre - attempt made by Tila Tequila to squeeze her way back into the spotlight by faking a suicide attempt. Based upon the lack of interest showed anywhere else in the world she should, perhaps, consider a move to Stockholm...

UFC 115, (un) Dead Celebrities and Stonehenge Apocalypse

After a brief burst of interest in the England vs. USA match (which ended 1-1) and a flurry of searches on 'Robert Green mistake' (which we really won't talk about!), the trends settled down into more traditional patterns...

UFC 115 (Ultimate Fighting Championship for the uninitiated) dominated the headlines due to the fight between Chuck Liddell and Rich Franklin (billed as a meeting between 'two legends). Certainly, it was a fight that fired the imagination of UFC fans, meaning that UFC 115, held in Vancouver, was much anticipated. The result, for those interested, saw Rich Franklin brutally KO Chuck Liddell in the very first round. Which doesn't sound like terribly good value for money to me, but then I'm not a UFC fan so, perhaps, not a good judge.

A mention has to go to the - just peaking - trend that is suggesting that Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart are dead. Now, at this point in time - since it's a brand new rumour - it is impossible to official confirm or deny it but, based upon the evidence of the last week, I'm going to stick my neck out (not particularly far, it must be said) and say that this is yet another celebrity death hoax.

If so, it's merely the latest in a LONG line of celebrity death hoaxes this week (that I feel may well deserve a regular (Un)dead Celebrities spot on the Pulse). After all, yesterday news broke that Justin Bieber had died and this followed up a week in which Russell Crowe, The Undertaker and Uncle Phil all were rumoured to have met their maker. Just to reassure you; no celebrities have been harmed in writing this paragraph...

And, finally, mention must go to Stonehenge Apocalypse which is not, as it might sound, the new album from Spinal Tap but - instead - a low budget, made-for-TV film starring Misha Collins (of Supernatural fame). Apparently, Stonehenge is part of an ancient alien mechanism to terraform the world and, when it is accidentally activated, it begins a chain of events that will end life as we know it. I won't spoil the plot by giving too much away but, to be honest, I'm not sure there is a whole lot of plot to be spoiled. But, as bad as it may be, it still surely pales into insignificance in comparison to the gloriously bad Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus...