Saturday, August 31, 2013

Top 10 Celeb Kids Public Slip Ups


Tony Blair, Martin Sheen and now John Key – the prime minister has joined the ranks of famous fathers everywhere as the antics of their offspring put them in the public spotlight
Stephie Key in a self-portrait shot as part of her studies in photography at the Paris College of Art.
Stephie Key in a self-portrait shot as part of her studies in photography at the Paris College of Art.
The sushi was strategically placed, the French fries covered what they were meant to and if Stephanie Key had been someone else's daughter the world would have ticked on undisturbed. Instead, the naked pictures shot for her Parisian design course became a global talking point this week after they were revealed in the Herald on Sunday, and John Key became the latest in a long line of famous fathers to watch the spotlight swivel toward his offspring.
He is in good company - Tony Blair, Martin Sheen and Sir Paul Holmes have all fielded questions about their children's behaviour - but Key got lucky: his daughter's arty shots were easy to defend. The drug habits, car crashes and arrests that usually land celebrity's children in the headlines are harder to brush off.
Why is the behaviour of celebrity's children so colourful so often? "I don't think it is," says registered psychologist Sara Chatwin. "They are simply scrutinised more closely.
"Unfortunately when they make a slip-up, like we all make, theirs are public," she says.
Very public. Here is our top 10.

10. Euan Blair 
Euan Blair. Photo / AP
Euan Blair. Photo / AP
There is never a good time to be found by the police, drunk and vomiting on the pavement, but Euan Blair's timing was excruciatingly bad.
It was 2000 and his father, Tony Blair, was Prime Minister. He had just begun a war on drunk and disorderly behaviour, declaring that the police should be able to give on-the-spot fines to wayward drinkers. No wonder when 16-year-old Euan's end of exams celebration ended in arrest he decided to lie about his identity. What a shame he was carrying ID ...
9. Carrick Graham
After some life training, Carrick Graham now works in crisis management.
After some life training, Carrick Graham now works in crisis management.
The only thing worse than crashing your father's car is crashing your father's work car then ending up in the headlines for doing so. Carrick Graham was 23 and his father, Doug Graham, was a respected senior Cabinet minister, when the young man smashed up the ministerial limo while driving in Auckland's Domain, then fled the accident scene.
Carrick appeared in court charged with making a false statement to police, and got diversion. Themedia attention that followed was perhaps good training for his future career - he now works in crisis management.
8. Dylan Norgate
Dylan Norgate. Photo / Janna Dixon
Dylan Norgate. Photo / Janna Dixon
The former head of Fonterra, Craig Norgate, must have considered moving suburbs in 2009 after it was revealed that his son, Dylan, was one of Auckland's most prolific taggers. The 19-year-old spray-painted the word SPEKT liberally across East Auckland - including Mission Bay,where his parents lived.
7. Miley Cyrus
Miley Cyrus twerking it. Photo / Getty Images
Miley Cyrus twerking it. Photo / Getty Images
Goodness knows just how achy and breaky Billy Ray Cyrus' heart is right now. The country singer's daughter was once known as the sweet child star ofHannah Montana, but this week became infinitely more famous for introducing the masses to "twerking". Performing at the MTV Music Video Awards, Miley Cyrus stripped to flesh-coloured, latex underwear before channelling an oversexed labrador. With her tongue hanging from her mouth, she bent over and reversed into the crotch of married musician Robin Thicke before using an oversized foam finger to indicate her own nether regions.
6. Tristan Barker
Tristan Barker, internet troll. Photo / Stephen Parker
Tristan Barker, internet troll. Photo / Stephen Parker
Kiwi drummer Michael Barker should be known for his accomplished music career with Split Enz and the Michael Butler Trio but for the past year he has mostly been referred to as "the father of that internet troll". Tristan Baker's prolific and contentious online outpourings about suicide victims, public displays of grief and 9/11-not to mention his assault on a journalist - have captured media attention and divided opinion. Police have labelled the 18-year-old "a blight on society"while his enormous teen following - and father - have defended him as "misunderstood" and a "satirist".
5. Millie Elder
Millie Elder. Photo / NZPA
Millie Elder. Photo / NZPA
The late Sir Paul Holmes bounced back from controversy many times during his long broadcasting career but in 2001 he faced a crisis he couldn't control: his step-daughter Millie Elder got hooked on P. Her four-year-long addiction, her relationship with a gang associate, and the chaos that accompanied it, played out in public with Sir Paul watching from afar during a two-year estrangement. Elder-Holmes eventually beat her addiction and the pair reconciled before his death.
4. Mark Lyon
Mark Lyon. Photo / NZ Herald
Mark Lyon. Photo / NZ Herald
A prominent and wealthy New Zealand businessman, Cliff Lyon seemed to have raised a chip off the old block when his son, Mark, became a successful property developer and multi-millionaire in his early 20s. Then Mark discovered methamphetamine. A string of mysterious fires at his properties in 2002 caught the media's attention and his chaotic life of gangs, criminal charges and court appearances has played out across the pages of the country's newspapers ever since.
3. Patti Davis
Patti Davis. Photo / AP
Patti Davis. Photo / AP
Ronald Reagan won the 1981 and 1985 presidential races but his conservative politics never won over his daughter. A liberal, Patti Reagan dismissed his political views and his personal legacy, dropping his surname for her mother's maiden name. Then came the drug problem, the Playboy cover and the unflattering book about life with her parents.
2. Charlie Sheen
Face of a winner? Photo / AP
Face of a winner? Photo / AP
No father imagines his son will grow up and declare himself a warlock. The actor Martin Sheen must have thought his child would be the last to do such a thing after Charlie Sheen followed him into showbiz, winning big roles, nabbing prestigious awards and making buckets of money as the star of TV show Two and a Half Men. In 2011, just as Sheen snr had to promote a new film, Sheen jnr melted down publicly and stupendously. He flitted in and out of rehab, lost his job, gained two live-in lovers and used social media to tell the world that he was a warlock with tiger blood and Adonis DNA.
1. There could be only one: Prince Harry
What happened in Vegas most certainly did not stay in Vegas.
What happened in Vegas most certainly did not stay in Vegas.
His grandfather has insulted almost every race on the planet during his long and gaffe-prone run as the Queen's consort. His father was recorded telling his lover that he would like to be her tampon. But Prince Harry managed to upstage them both on a trip to Las Vegas last year when he revealed the crown jewels during a game of a strip billiards in a hotel suite. What happened in Vegas most certainly did not stay in Vegas after the royal rear-end turned up on the internet and was on the front page of Britain's biggest tabloid.


Friday, August 30, 2013

Avengers sequel - James Spader is ULTRON


Avengers sequel casts James Spader as villain Ultron

James SpaderSpader first found fame in 1980s films including Sex Lies and Videotapes and Pretty in Pink

Related Stories

Emmy award-winning actor James Spader has been cast as the villain Ultron in the second Avengers movie.
Avengers: Age of Ultron will see the Marvel Comics superhero team battle a rebellious artificial intelligence which creates an android to attack them.
It will be released in May 2015.
Joss Whedon returns as director for the sequel and Robert Downey Jr and Mark Ruffalo will reprise their roles as Iron Man and The Hulk.
The first Avengers film was a huge global hit last year, taking more than a billion dollars at the box office.
It also starred Chris Hemsworth as Thor, Chris Evans as Captain America and Scarlett Johansson as the Black Widow.
Spader has won three Emmy awards for his role as attorney Alan Shore, who appeared in both Boston Legal and The Practice.
He has also starred in the American Office and last year's Oscar-winning film Lincoln.


Tuesday, August 27, 2013

"Miley Cyrus - Prepare to be shocked - We Can't Stop Blurred Lines / Give It 2 U Robin Thicke (V...





Miley Cyrus MTV VMA performance - disturbing! - video


Miley Cyrus MTV performance draws complaints

Miley CyrusThe Parents Television Council said the performance was 'unacceptable'

Related Stories

Miley Cyrus's risque performance at the MTV VMAs has drawn complaints from a parenting pressure group in the US.
The Parents Television Council (PTC) issued a complaint against the channel over the 20-year-old's routine, which saw her dance suggestively in a nude bikini with singer Robin Thicke.
It argued the show should not have been rated as suitable for 14 year olds, adding: "Heads should roll at MTV."
Miley's father Billy Ray Cyrus is among those on the PTC's advisory board.
However, he is unlikely to have been party to the complaint, which also criticised MTV for airing a condom advert during the show.
"This much is absolutely clear: MTV marketed adults-only material to children while falsely manipulating the content rating to make parents think the content was safe for their children," Dan Isett, the PTC's director of public policy said.
"MTV continues to sexually exploit young women by promoting acts that incorporate 'twerking' [a sexually-suggestive dance] in a nude-coloured bikini.
"How is this image of former child star Miley Cyrus appropriate for 14-year-olds?"
'Really disturbing'
Advisory board member Paul Porter added: "The Miley Cyrus/Robin Thicke performance simply substituted talent with sex.
He said that MTV's owners Viacom had "obviously broken" its own standards "for financial gain".
The PTC also criticised Lady Gaga's opening act, which she ended in a sea-shell bikini, and another advert for an R-rated film during the first commercial break.
Miley Cyrus and Robin ThickeCyrus said her performance attracted '306,000 tweets per minute'
According to its website, the PTC was founded to "ensure that children are not constantly assaulted by sex, violence and profanity on television and in other media".
Cyrus's performance also drew criticism from a number of US media outlets over her performance.
On MSNBC, Morning Joe host Mika Brzezinski called it "really, really disturbing", while NBC's Anna Chan called it"embarrassingly raunchy".
However other critics praised the performance, including Billboard's Bill Werde and Rolling Stone's Rob Sheffield,who said: "Miley stole the night".
Cyrus appears to be unaffected by the criticism, tweeting: "My VMA performance had 306,000 tweets per minute. That's more than the blackout or Superbowl!"
Music industry sources say the former Disney star can expect a sales boost of between 10 and 20% as a result.
Her new album, Bangerz, is due for release in October but has been climbing the digital charts based on pre-orders alone, while her single We Can't Stop is in the top five in both the UK and North America.
The MTV VMAs has often been a source of controversy. In 2001, Britney Spears gave a raunchy rendition of her hit I'm A Slave 4 U, with a python draped over her shoulders.
Two years later Madonna kissed Spears and Christina Aguilera on stage, and in 2009 Kanye West interrupted Taylor Swift's acceptance speech for best female video, ranting that Beyonce should have won instead.

Monday, August 26, 2013

Eye of Sauron? - no, it's the Helix Nebula



Helix Nebula
Looking like the Eye of Sauron, Spitzer showed the unravelling dusty outer layers of the dying star that created the nebula.

US Couple married 65 years die together 11 hours apart - true love story!




Relatives of couple in the US who died at a nursing home 11 hours apart on the same day said their love story's ending reflects their devotion over 65 years of marriage.
Harold and Ruth Knapke died in their shared room on August 11 in Ohio, days before their 66th anniversary, The Dayton Daily News reported. He was 91, she was 89.
The couple's daughters said they believe their father willed himself to stay by his wife's side despite failing health until they could take the next step in their journey together. He went first - his children saw it as his "final act of love" - and she followed.
"We believe he wanted to accompany her out of this life and into the next one, and he did," daughter Margaret Knapke said.
The couple had known each other as children and began their courtship as pen pals while Harold, known as "Doc," served in the Army during World War II. Ruth would later joke: "I let him chase me until I caught him!"
Her husband became a teacher, coach and athletic director at Fort Recovery Schools, the newspaper said. They raised six children while looking after each other with a devotion that didn't seem to diminish.
A photo taken this summer shows him lying in a bed, arm stretched through a guardrail to hold her hand, as she leans in to press the top of her head to his. When she was ailing, he blessed her each night with holy water, daughter Pat Simon said.
The Knapkes had a joint funeral Mass, with granddaughters carrying Ruth's casket and grandsons carrying Harold's casket. The cemetery procession stopped at the farm house where the couple had lived, and the current owners surprised the family by flying a flag at half-staff to honour the longtime loves.
"It is really just a love story," said Carol Romie, another daughter. "They were so committed and loyal and dedicated, they weren't going to go anywhere without the other one."

Saturday, August 24, 2013

Electric car folds up to park - solve all your parking problems - video






















Researchers from the Korean Advanced Institute of Science and Technology have developed an electric car which can fold up and park in tight spaces, a group of technology companies are collaborating on a non-profit initiative to bring the internet to people in developing countries who cannot afford to access it, and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg finds his Facebook page hacked.




Friday, August 23, 2013

Ben Affleck is the new Batman


Ben Affleck is the new Batman. Photo / AP
Ben Affleck is the new Batman. Photo / AP


Ben Affleck is set to take over from Christian Bale as Batman.
The Oscar-winning director and actor will star alongside Henry Cavill in the sequel to the hit Superman flick Man of Steel, Warner Bros. announced this afternoon.
300 director Zack Snyder will helm the film, which will place Batman and Superman on the big screen together for the first time.
Josh Brolin, Ryan Gosling and Richard Armitage had been considered frontrunners for the Batman role.
Warner Bros. creative development president Greg Silverman said Affleck had been picked because he is an "extraordinary" talent, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
"We knew we needed an extraordinary actor to take on one of DC Comics' most enduringly popular superheroes, and Ben Affleck certainly fits that bill, and then some. His outstanding career is a testament to his talent, and we know he and Zack will bring new dimension to the duality of this character."
Snyder said Affleck was perfect to play an older and wiser Batman.
"Ben provides an interesting counterbalance to Henry's Superman. He has the acting chops to create a layered portrayal of a man who is older and wiser than Clark Kent and bears the scars of a seasoned crime fighter, but retain the charm that the world sees in billionaire Bruce Wayne. I can't wait to work with him."
Affleck last played a superhero in the critically panned 2003 film Daredevil.
Fan reaction to his surprise appointment as Batman has been swift, with many expressing disappointment and anger.
David Murray Lewis said he hoped the movie would never air in New Zealand, in a post on the nzherald.co.nz Facebook page.
"Remember people, Affleck is the guy who made New Zealand out to be cowards in Argo."
Rack Jandall said the hire reflects all that's wrong in the movie business.
"It's decisions like these not people downloading movies that is killing Hollywood."
Nathan Bennison said Affleck was a bad choice for Batman.
"He better start working out. And not talk in his normal voice. And look different. And act different. And just pretty much be different."
Others registered their opposition on Twitter.

Thursday, August 22, 2013

Tokyo Subway Superhero - video



Tokyo's metro system is the busiest in the world, and notoriously difficult to navigate.
If you have heavy luggage or a pushchair, the lack of escalators or elevators makes matters even worse.
This is complicated by the fact that Japanese culture makes it difficult to accept a favour from a stranger.
Now one resident is taking matters into his own hands, with the help of a $40 superhero costume.



Totally Gaga


























Are the singer’s outfits cynical provocations or considered artistic statements? Wardrobe Decoder’s Katya Foreman mulls the meaning of Gaga’s get-up.


It’s an intriguing sign of the times that the ‘we-can-do-anything’ millennial generation has chosen shape-shifting performance artist Lady Gaga as its pop princess. She presented herself as a half-human, half-motorcycle hybrid on the cover of her last album, Born This Way, hissing red-lipped at the lens like a vampire, while her provocative barrage of otherworldly costumes has included the notorious ‘meat dress’ she wore to the MTV Video Music Awards (VMAs) in 2010, crafted from flank steak. (Time named it the top fashion statement of that year; it has its own Wikipedia page.) How to up the ante? The following year, Gaga – real name Stefani Germanotta – performed in full drag at the VMAs as male alter-ego Jo Calderone  and was carried down the red carpet at the Grammys in an egg from which she hatched, on stage, to perform Born This Way – the ludicrous lovechild of Björk and Spinal Tap. Other crazy outfits include a bodysuit honed from plastic bubbles and a voluminous head-to-toe outfit made from human hair.
While her closest contemporaries, Katy Perry and Rihanna, enact good girl/bad girl variations of male fantasies, 27-year-old Gaga scuppers all preconceptions of how a female pop star should look and act. As she states on the title track of her debut album The Fame, Gaga is “obsessively opposed to the typical.”
The musician has linked the first time she appreciated “the shock art potential of what [she] could create” to the time she stripped naked during a rowdy gig during her early days as a struggling singer in her native New York City. Attention-seeking aside, she defends her perma-morphing persona as an unchanging statement about discrimination. Behind every ensemble, she insists, is the message to fight for your beliefs, your right to be. “I like to liberate myself with my ability to change... That’s who I am and I will always be that way: relentless and fearless and vicious,” Gaga told fashion designer Jean Paul Gaultier in an hour-long interview released as the documentary Gaga by Gaultier. “I like to feel that I can define my fame and define my beauty for myself, which is why I am so vigilant and relentless about my image and my music. I will not allow – no matter how successful I become – the public to define or indicate what it is that I create or what I believe is beautiful or what I believe is a hit pop record.”
Dressed for battle?
Using outlandish getup to cloak her true mission, Gaga has positioned herself as a figurehead for the outsider. A noted Aids and LGBT activist, Gaga has recently devoted efforts to eradicating bullying, claiming she was picked on for being different as a child  – although fellow former pupils have described her as a friendly, suburban student who had no problem fitting in.
The 2011 ABC special A Very Gaga Thanksgiving saw Gaga perform the track Hair at a piano in the candlelit banquet hall of her Manhattan alma mater, the $37,000-a-year Convent of the Sacred Heart. “This song is about your identity being the most important thing to you, and no matter what anyone says or how much you have or how much you don’t, it’s what’s on the inside that matters,” Gaga tells the fans she’s nicknamed her “Little Monsters”. Throughout the performance she piles wigs on her head, in shades of ginger and spearmint, all the while maintaining her trademark Poker Face.
While Gaga claims her extravagant, 18-month Monster Ball world tour left her in debt, Forbes magazine says Gaga is the world’s second-most-powerful celebrity (Oprah Winfrey holds the top slot) and the top-earning celebrity under the age of 30, having generated an estimated $80m (£51m) between June 2012 and June 2013.
In addition to wealth, influence and column inches, Gaga also has credibility. She’s received five Grammys and three Brits to date, plus over 20 MTV awards, and fellow musicians rate her work. Tony Bennett, who duetted with her on the Thanksgiving special and at Obama’s 2013 inauguration, has described her as “very creative and very productive and I think, as time goes on, she might become America’s Picasso.” (Gaga was atypically modest about the accolade: “I don’t know if I’m the new Picasso, but I’m certainly twisted like many of his paintings.”) The ever-evolving Madonna, to whom Gaga is most often likened, staged a tongue-in-cheek catfight with her on Saturday Night Live a couple of years ago; when comparisons were made between Born This Way and Madonna’s Express Yourself, the grande dame of pop quipped, “I’m a really big fan of [Born This Way]... I’m glad that I helped Gaga write it.”
Detractors are, inevitably, plentiful. An indignant NME blog post entitledLady Gaga – Freak or Fraud encapsulated the naysayers’ argument: “It’s kind of fitting that she’s named after a noise babies make because there’s something about Lady Gaga that turns otherwise intelligent adults into gurgling infants... It’s pop music, not a fancy dress party. But that’s the thing with Lady Gaga – she’s not really a pop star, she’s a fashion icon, with all the vanity, phoniness and hollow display that entails.” But pop is fashion, as any visitor to the  recent David Bowie retrospective at London’s V&A museum can attest. (Bowie is a key influence on Gaga, along with Madonna, Michael Jackson and Queen, whose ‘Radio Gaga’ partly inspired her stage name.) “I love fashion and style so much [because] I feel the ability to create an alternate fantasy and reality for myself,” Gaga told Gaultier. “If I do it over and over again every single day of my life, falling asleep with my wigs and my jewellery and my dresses... somehow, the fantasy becomes my reality.”
Designer’s dream
This voracious appetite for dressing up has seen the world’s top fashion designers embrace Gaga with open arms, from Giorgio Armani to the late Alexander McQueen, to whom she played muse, as one of the few mortals able to pull off his notorious lobster claw shoes. Following McQueen’s death by suicide, the devoted singer in 2012 at a Christie’s London auction broke a world record for the highest price ever paid for a McQueen creation by shelling out £85,250 ($133,322) for a dress from the late designer from the personal collection of fashion collector Daphne Guinness.
After five fruitful years of collaboration, Gaga has parted ways with her visionary stylist Nicola Formichetti, who headed up Haus of Gaga – the singer’s Warholian Factory incubator for her wacky sartorial concepts and props. Haus inventions include the cigarette-encrusted shades from the Telephone promo, a metallic brassiere designed to shoot flames on command, the Grammy egg and, of course, the meat dress. It remains to be seen how Formichetti’s departure will affect Gaga’s appearance but, of late, she’s been demo-ing a (relatively) natural look, attending an arts event in the Hamptons with long raven locks, minimal make-up and a black leather dress with cut-outs. (Granted, her bra was on show.) “People have this conception – or misconception about me, rather – that I’m very provocative all the time,” she recently told Katie Couric. “I just love fashion and some fashion is very provocative.”
As promotion gears up for the launch of her third album, Artpop, the emphasis has been on the art. Gaga appeared nude in a video promoting performance artist Marina Abramović’s Kickstarter project, while the sleeve design for lead single Applause sees her clad in a monochrome costume but smeared in technicolour face paints – Pin-Ups meets Pierrot. A scheduled performance at the VMAs, again, will see the campaign fully unfurl, but will it be more au naturel antics or a rainbow confection? The one thing we can be assured of is that it will fill tabloid pages, Pinterest boards and Twitter for the foreseeable future – whether the pop empress is clad, or stripped down to her bare essentials.