Blake Lively in Long White Dress at the Green Lantern Premiere

Blake Lively rocked a long white dress (with see-through layer to admire her enviable legs) at the Green Lantern Premiere held at The Grauman’s Chinese Theatre in Hollywood the other day.

Rebecca Black's 'Friday' Video Pulled Off YouTube

The fun, fun, fun, fun is over: Rebecca Black's much-buzzed about "Friday" video was removed from YouTube on Friday – appropriately.

The wildly viral video, which became an overnight sensation because of its catchy – and absurd – lyrics, was pulled offline by Black's lawyers, who accused the producers, Ark Music Factory, of copyright infringement and unlawful exploitation of the aspiring pop star's publicity rights, reports The Hollywood Reporter.

The dispute over which party owns the rights to the song will go to court if the contract disagreement cannot be resolved.

Vancouver evokes infamous sports riots

A couple appears to be preparing to make love, not war, in an ironic image from the Vancouver riots.

The city of Vancouver put its worst foot forward on Wednesday, rioting into the night after the Canucks' loss to the Bruins in Game 7 of the Stanley Cup finals.

Nearly 100 people were arrested and almost 150 injured in a widespread disturbance that included the burning of 15 cars and vandalism of approximately 50 businesses. Total damages are expected to run well into the millions of dollars.

In addition to widespread vandalism and massive fires, the Associated Press reported that "rivers of poured-out alcohol, broken glass and trash made navigating the streets treacherous" in Vancouver.

Stay classy, British Columbia.

If all that wasn't bad enough, consider that Vancouver also rioted following the Canucks' Game 7 loss to the Rangers in the 1994 Stanley Cup finals -- a game which was played in New York.

However, Vancouver is hardly the first city to erode into disorder following a major sporting event. That's why Page 2 advises you to put on your riot gear and grab a couple canisters of tear gas as we head into the fray to compile a list of the most infamous sports disturbances in history ... and we promise not to make any jokes about these guys.

Just who were those people? And how did they get caught up in such a passionate kiss, right there in the middle of the riots in Vancouver, British Columbia? There was anger and violence all around them -- the Vancouver Canucks had just lost to the Boston Bruins in Game 7 of hockey's Stanley Cup finals.

The picture of them, by Vancouver freelance photographer Richard Lam, has gone viral on the Web. One headline called it "love among the ruins."

The young lovers -- if Australia's Channel 9 has the story right -- are Scott Jones, 29, from the Australian city of Perth, and his Canadian girlfriend, Alex Thomas. The Vancouver Sun said Thomas is a student at the University of Guelph in Ontario.

Scott was outed by his family, according to Channel 9. His father, Brett, posted the picture on Facebook with the line, "This is my Son.

 

"Hows (sic) that for making love not war!"

His mother, Megan Jones, was interviewed by Australian news media.

"It is something he would do, that's our boy," she was quoted as saying on Channel 9. "He has always lived in his own world, he's special like that. He doesn't always connect with what going on around him."

She said her son was doing standup comedy while traveling in Canada.

"I knew it was him because he doesn't have a lot of clothes with him and he always puts on the same thing."

Lam, the photographer, said he didn't think about the picture because there was such violence around him. Almost 150 people required hospital treatment and close to 100 were arrested in the riots that followed Wednesday night's game.

Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez: Singer Dodges Boyfriend Question at Concert

In the latest update on Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez, the recently hospitalized Selena performed a concert on Monday, but avoided a question about her boyfriend's involvement in her getting well. Selena performed her latest hit songs "Who Says" and "A Year Without Rain."

Singer and actress, Selena Gomez, canceled or rescheduled various dates on her "Monte Carlo" mall tour due to being hospitalized late last week. At the rescheduled Santa Monica Mall stop on Monday, Selena performed and according to eyewitnesses appeared to be holding it together while still under the weather. She addressed the hospitalization saying she it was malnourishment and exhaustion that caused the health issues.

During the mall appearance, someone managed to get in the standard question related to her boyfriend, Justin Bieber. Gomez was asked if Biebs got her anything special while she was under the weather. Selena's response was to play coy as she nonchalantly answered, "I got some very loving support from all my family and friends." Well played Selena, but is Justin Bieber going to be hurt by that response? Probably not. It was noted during her illness that Selena was attended to by Justin as he skipped an NHL Finals hockey game. Isn't his presence and skipping a major sports game enough of a gift?

  

Selena Gomez's boyfriend Justin Bieber

Singer and actress Selena Gomez was recently hospitalized after an appearance on late night television where she complained about severe headaches.On Monday, the pop star seemed to be feeling a lot better as she took the stage for a Santa Monica Place show. The show was initially scheduled for Friday, but had to be rescheduled due to her hospitalization, according to a report.

"I want to thank you so much for coming," the 18-year-old singer told more than 500 fans that came to see her at the outdoor mall. "If you guys came on Friday, I'm so sorry that I couldn't be here ... I lvove you guys very much."While at the mall, Gomez was asked by reporters about the reason she was hospitalized.

"I was just very malnourished, so I was low on iron and exhausted," Gomez said.On Monday, Gomez have an energetic performance showing no signs of health problems. She performed "Who Says," and "A Year Without Rain.""I do feel better!" she exclaimed to the crowd.

Why Facebook Is Losing U.S. Users?

                          

News hit the other day that Facebook may have lost about six million users in the U.S. in one month, according to Inside Facebook, a site that analyzes the social network for developers and marketers. Facebook has close to 700 million users worldwide, so a loss of six million doesn't sound like much, especially in light of data that suggests the service has been pushing aside regional social sites to conquer large swaths of the developing world, and actually posted a net increase in overall users over the same period.

But a six million user loss is a little more painful when compared to the U.S. user base, which reports say stands around 150 million—or roughly half the population of the country. It's not crippling, but a four percent reduction isn't negligible either. At the same time, the same data source suggests the service is experiencing similar losses throughout the Western world in places like Canada, the U.K., and Norway. Could American audiences finally be turning on the social network?

When asked about the report, a Facebook spokesman told that, "From time to time, we see stories about Facebook losing users in some regions. Some of these reports use data extracted from our advertising tool, which provides broad estimates on the reach of Facebook ads and isn't designed to be a source for tracking the overall growth of Facebook. We are very pleased with our growth."
Facebook itself may not put a lot of stock in the numbers, but it tellingly didn't offer any of its own. Absent official statistics, industry observers tend to believe the report.
"I think the data to be correct." says Lou Kerner, a social media analyst with Wedbush Securities, a Los Angeles-based investment bank. "As Facebook starts to get near 50 percent penetration in a lot of these countries, the growth starts to slow. A little bit of fatigue sets in. Older people who sign up don't get as much value as younger people do, so they tend not to stick around. They come and they go."
So assuming the data is correct, why is Facebook losing U.S. customers? There are a few possible explanations:
1. Seasonal Changes
One of the simplest explanations for the change is that it's just a normal blip in Facebook's seasonal cycle. Every spring, many college students graduate, and while their Facebook profiles don't get deleted, their Internet habits can change rapidly, especially when suddenly faced with the prospect of selling themselves to potential employers. Inside Facebook notes that "short-term factors" like this may be obscuring overall trends.
"May starts the seasonally slow period for social networks," says Kerner. "Kids have finals and leave school, so they get out of their social networking routine."
2. The Privacy Envelope Has Been Pushed Too Far
This is the favorite go-to theory for pundits, since everybody likes to talk about privacy when Facebook makes headlines. It makes sense on paper: Facebook makes some change or introduces a service that appears to make the site less private or secure, everybody makes a big deal about it, and Facebook (typically) goes ahead and does it anyway. Then everyone starts to theorize when users will begin leaving en masse in defiance.
The theory overlooks the inconvenient fact that through all of Facebook's privacy shenanigans (and there have been many), its user base has grown massively, and the most recent hullabaloo over the site's new facial-recognition abilities is small potatoes compared to controversies of the past. To suggest that the Facebook finally hit the last straw on privacy over the last month assumes users just started caring about the issue.
"I don't think this is a Facebook problem as much as it's a privacy on the Internet problem," says Kerner. "I think more than driving people away, it's stopping people from coming."
3. Facebook's Time Has Come
It's probably inevitable: Somehow, someday, Facebook will start to decline, just like its predecessors MySpace and Friendster. Its users will slowly lose interest, moving on to other networks and platforms (possibly Twitter, or whatever emerges from Apple's iCloud). It seems impossible given Facebook's colossal user base and rapid growth, but it would be far from the first complacent empire that fell.
The problem with the theory is that it completely ignores another, more important statistic: user engagement. According to Alexa, people visiting Facebook are actually visiting 40 percent more pages per visit than they were just three months ago. That's not the picture of a disinterested populace ready to pack its bags for the 140-character wilds of Twitter.
"Facebook's page views per user have continued to grow very rapidly on a global basis," says Kerner. "Before you see an decline in users, you see a decline in engagement. Unique users don't become highly engaged and drop off—they use it less and less and then drop off."
So Facebook's users are spending more time on the site than ever, though the overall number of users may be declining slightly, at least in North America and few other places. Still, when your market penetration is as deep as Facebook's, it's going to be difficult to avoid the occasional downward arrow.
Kerner admits, "Facebook isn't for everybody." That's certainly true, though it's just as certain that everybody has at least heard of it. Even if the company launched an all-out marketing campaign tomorrow to try and recruit new users to make up for those who left, I suspect it would have little effect. The people who want to be on Facebook are there, and those who aren't probably never will be (or never should have been).
As for the six million users who left in the last month, they're probably similarly divided: some are just taking a break and will be back, while the others probably weren't the sharing type in the first place. That's not something the social network would like, but if there were a "Live With It" button, it's an easy click.

source:PCMag

Facebook Losing US,Canada & UK Users

The number of people using Facebook has dropped in the UK for the second month in a row, mirroring similar falls in the US, Canada and Norway, giving the first signs that the social network's popularity may be waning in the west.

The website continued to grow worldwide, hitting an all-time high of 687 million users, according to data from the tracking company Inside Facebook, which uses Facebook's own advertising tools to determine the number of people using the site every month. Growth slowed however, having risen by 13.9m accounts in April and then just 11.8m in May. Typically in the past year it has grown by 20m a month. That slowdown could thwart founder Mark Zuckerberg's ambition to reach 1 billion users worldwide, despite his prediction last June that "it is almost a guarantee that it will happen".

Growth in Facebook use seems to peak in any country once the site is used by roughly half of those who have internet connections – though with more than 2 billion people online worldwide, the site could still reach the 1 billion figure. However, it would need people who have joined the site to stay with it – and that hasn't been happening in some countries.

Magnus Hoglund, chief executive of the law media portal Law360.com, who has worked on digital media companies for the past decade, said: "From my experience, I get the sense that being on Facebook is not cool anymore. The early adopters and trend setters are moving away. [But] these are also exactly the type of people brand advertisers want to reach; if they are leaving, it doesn't look good for Facebook."

The site has been criticised in the west for its approach to users' privacy, with repeated protests about the way in which controls on data access are relaxed. Last week the revelation that it had extended an automatic facial recognition system for tagging photos beyond the US without asking people if they wanted to opt in drew criticism from privacy groups and security consultants.

A spokeswoman for Facebook said: "We are very pleased with our growth and with the way people are engaged with Facebook. More than 50% of our active users log on to Facebook in any given day."

The drop in use was most marked in the US, where numbers fell from May's 155.2 million, just under half the 239m people online, to 149.4 million at the start of June. It marked the first time in a year that the number of people logging into the site over a month had fallen. In the UK, the fall was smaller at around 100,000 users to 29.8 million, or 58% of the 51.4 million people online. Canada saw a fall of 1.62 million to 16.6 million, while Norway also saw a fall of around 100,000 users over the month.

The fastest-growing countries, including Brazil and Mexico, grew at a maximum of 10% over the month.
The fall in users is most marked in those developed countries where Facebook first launched to the public in September 2006, after its first two years when it catered only to US college and high school users.

Eric Eldon, one of the researchers at Inside Facebook, said that it was hard to see how the social networking site could hit its 1 billion target except by getting into China, which has 420 million internet users but just 391,000 Facebook users as of March. The site has been banned in China since 2008, while cloned versions abound inside the country. Zuckerberg visited China in December 2010, which led to speculation that he was working on a way to get the site approved by the government, but there has been no further detail on whether that is happening.

Facebook still dominates the world in terms of social network use, with Russia and China marking the biggest holdouts where home-grown networks are the most popular.Hoglund added that following the stock market flotation of LinkedIn, Yandex and Groupon's plans to go public, this summer could mark the high-water mark for media and technology market offerings as firms rush to cash in before their capital runs out.

Meanwhile, reports in the US suggest that Facebook may have to make a public share offering at the beginning of 2012 because it will have more than 500 shareholders. US securities exchange commission rules oblige companies to make a listing once they passed this threshold. Facebook did not respond to the Guardian on the issue.

source:guardian.co.uk

'Justin Bieber has passed my mom's test,' reveals Selena Gomez

They've only been dating for a few months.But Selena Gomez says her boyfriend Justin Bieber has already 'passed the mom test'.The 18-year-old singer and actress opened up to U.S. TV talkshow host Jay Leno last night, telling him her mother Mandy had given Bieber, 17, the thumbs up.

They attended the NBA finals together in Dallas earlier this week and enjoyed a romantic break together in Hawaii recently.She has been by his side to watch him scoop awards at the recent Billboard Awards too.

And just last month Selena accompanied him to his homeland of Canada to meet his family.But despite their relationship seemingly going from strength to strength, Selena has had a tough time with some of Bieber's fans.

It was recently reported how she had received online death threats from jealous fans.Monte Carlo, an upcoming romantic adventure starring Gomez, Katie Cassidy and Leighton Meester, arrives in cinemas on July 1.

She recently accompanied Bieber on a trip to his homeland in Canada and met his family too