Blogs are Stupid

What is this tournament?

Twenty years ago, the NCAA men's basketball tournament expanded to a 64-team field. Who would win a tournament featuring the 20 teams that have won titles? We're out to settle the debate with the help of experts and reader voting.

How do teams advance?

Readers vote on each matchup, along with our experts. The fans' total vote, and the vote of each expert, count one-third toward determining which team advances. First-round games tip off Feb. 25; winners announced Feb. 28 at noon ET. Voting for the finals will conclude at midnight ET March 10 and the ultimate champion will be named March 11 at noon ET.

How do I vote?

Click on the "vote" button for the games that are under way.

It's important to remember that the leetspeek community encourages new forms and awards individual creativity, resulting in a dynamic written language that eludes conformity or consistency. However, there are a few standard terms. The following is a sample of key words that haven't changed fundamentally (although variations occur) since the invention of leetspeek. The first series is of particular concern, as their use could be an indicator that your teenager is involved in the theft of intellectual property, particularly licensed software.

Leet words of concern or indicating possible illegal activity:

Hasbro plans on launching a musical toothbrush called "Tooth Tunes" reports the WSJ.

"When pressed to the teeth, the toothbrush renders a recorded riff from a pop star that lasts two minutes -- precisely the amount of time dentists say children should spend brushing their teeth.

How does it work? "The two-minute recording is stored on a microchip no bigger than a dot atop the letter i. Push a button on the toothbrush, and a minicomputer starts playing the song. Sound waves are transported through the transducer to the front teeth, traveling from there to the jawbone and then to the inner ear.

Hasbro is in talks with several recording artists about getting rights to their recordings. Many artists would probably consider a gig in a toothbrush beneath their talents. But others might welcome the daily exposure in their young fans' lives."

Court: Man Can Sue Over Surprise Pregnancy

CHICAGO - An appeals court said a man can press a claim for emotional distress after learning a former lover had used his sperm to have a baby. But he can't claim theft, the ruling said, because the sperm were hers to keep.

The ruling Wednesday by the Illinois Appellate Court sends Dr. Richard O. Phillips' distress case back to trial court.

Phillips accuses Dr. Sharon Irons of a "calculated, profound personal betrayal" after their affair six years ago, saying she secretly kept semen after they had oral sex, then used it to get pregnant.

He said he didn't find out about the child for nearly two years, when Irons filed a paternity lawsuit. DNA tests confirmed Phillips was the father, the court papers state.

Phillips was ordered to pay about $800 a month in child support, said Irons' attorney, Enrico Mirabelli.

Phillips sued Irons, claiming he has had trouble sleeping and eating and has been haunted by "feelings of being trapped in a nightmare," court papers state.

Irons responded that her alleged actions weren't "truly extreme and outrageous" and that Phillips' pain wasn't bad enough to merit a lawsuit. The circuit court agreed and dismissed Phillips' lawsuit in 2003.

But the higher court ruled that, if Phillips' story is true, Irons "deceitfully engaged in sexual acts, which no reasonable person would expect could result in pregnancy, to use plaintiff's sperm in an unorthodox, unanticipated manner yielding extreme consequences."

The judges backed the lower court decision to dismiss the fraud and theft claims, agreeing with Irons that she didn't steal the sperm.

"She asserts that when plaintiff 'delivered' his sperm, it was a gift — an absolute and irrevocable transfer of title to property from a donor to a donee," the decision said. "There was no agreement that the original deposit would be returned upon request."

Phillips is representing himself in the case. He could not be reached for comment Thursday.

"There's a 5-year-old child here," Mirabelli said. "Imagine how a child feels when your father says he feels emotionally damaged by your birth."

Separated at birth - according to Slate.com:

P. Diddy gargles Cristal as his yacht sails from San Tropez to Ibiza. Atrios stares at his computer screen and ponders the effect of "increased central bank diversification out of dollar holdings." Nelly takes in the NBA All-Star Game from the first row while gabbing on a cell phone made out of a giant shoe. InstaPundit digests the latest developments in the Dartmouth board of trustees race and takes note of an update to C-SPAN's early morning schedule. What, do I need to draw you a Venn diagram? Rappers and bloggers—they're the same!

Those of you obsessed with external appearances may think I'm kidding. What, you ask, could those champagne-swilling, "bitch"-shouting rappers have in common with those Jolt-pounding, "read the whole thing"-writing bloggers?

For starters, both groups share a love of loose-fitting, pajama-style apparel. Still not satisfied? Bloggers and rappers are equally obsessed with social networking. Every rapper rolls with his entourage; every blogger rolls with his blog roll. Women can't win an audience in either profession without raunching it up like Lil' Kim or Wonkette.

And don't forget those silly, silly names. Even if he didn't flaunt his devotion to pimping and pit bulls, you'd probably guess Snoop Dogg is a rapper. And Fedlawyerguy—yeah, probably a blogger. But the "blogger or rapper?" parlor game can stump even the nerdiest gangsta. Does uggabugga hate on wack emcees or wack Charles Krauthammer? What about Mad Kane? Big Noyd, Justus League, Uppity Negro, Little Brother, Cold Fury, and South Knox Bubba? (Answers: blogger, blogger, rapper, rap group, blogger, rap group, blogger, blogger.)

Docs Work on Monk Who Glued Eyes Shut

BANGKOK, Thailand - Doctors have partially restored the sight of an 81-year-old Buddhist monk who accidentally glued his eyes shut when he mistook a tube of superglue for eye drops.

The doctors at Angthong Hospital, 100 kilometers (60 miles) north of Bangkok, used a chemical solvent, acetone, to dissolve the glue in the monk's right eye, a hospital spokesman said Wednesday. The two-hour operation was done Tuesday.

"His eye is not damaged, the right eye can see clearly after the operation and the doctors said the left eye also is not damaged," a hospital spokesman said.

The monk, Phra Khru Prapatworakhun, who is the abbot of a temple in Angthong, was to have his left eye operated on Thursday, the spokesman said.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - TiVo Inc. shares jumped more than 17 percent Wednesday, fueled by speculation that Apple Computer Inc. might make a try to buy the digital video recorder maker, analysts said.

"What we hear on the street is that Apple is interested in their business and that they are a takeout target," said analyst Steven Kroll Jr. of Monness, Crespi, Hardt & Co.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) - A 44-year-old Anchorage man has had his penis surgically reattached after it was cut off by an angry girlfriend and flushed down a toilet, local police say.

The events unfolded about midnight on Saturday, after the pair had been arguing over an impending breakup, an Anchorage Police Department statement said on Sunday. At some point, the two decided to have sex and the man agreed to let the woman tie his arms to a windowsill.

But the woman used a kitchen knife to amputate her partner's penis and flushed it down the toilet, police said. She untied the man, drove him to a local hospital and was cleaning up the bloody scene when police arrived at the home, according to the statement.

Summoned by the police, workers from the local water utility pulled the toilet up from the floor and were able to recover the severed penis, which was rushed to the hospital for the successful reattachment surgery on Sunday morning.

Police declined to identify the victim, but said his assailant was 35-year-old Kim Tran. She was charged with assault, domestic violence and tampering with evidence, and jailed without bail.

Prices on the Dulles Toll Road will rise this spring to help pay for a $4 billion Metrorail extension paralleling the roadway, Virginia's transportation leaders decided today.

The action by the Commonwealth Transportation Board will boost tolls to 75 cents at the main gate and 50 cents at the other gates.

The hike is set to go into effect May 22.

With the toll hike and other sources already in hand to cover about half the cost of the project's first phase from West Falls Church to the eastern edge of Reston, leaders of the rail project will now seek federal money for the remainder.

That's what fans of the studio's classic cartoon characters might be asking after they get a look at the new, futuristic versions of some of their favorite animated heroes, which Warner unveiled yesterday.

The Looney Tunes characters — six in all — have been "reimagined" (in studio parlance) for a new series called "Loonatics," which is set to air next fall on WPIX/Channel 11 as part of the Saturday morning Kids' WB program lineup.

The show features new versions of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Wile E. Coyote, the Tasmanian Devil, Road Runner and Lola Bunny (the newest of the characters, who was introduced in the 1996 Michael Jordan movie "Space Jam").

For "Loonatics," the six characters are being projected 700 years into the future, given superpowers, and outfitted in tight-fitting, slenderizing space gear.

Apparently, falling anvils and exploding cigars are no longer enough to keep kids 6 to 11 years old entertained.

"This is a kids show intended for kids today who are growing up in the Internet age, an age of technology, an age of hip, cool animation, and something that we hope will resonate with that age group," explained Sander Schwartz, president of Warner Bros. Animation, in a phone interview from Hollywood.

That's just what students and faculty have been doing at the University of California-Santa Barbara, in the year and a half since the campus, with help from IBM, overhauled its parking system.

Now, experts expect that more people will dig into their pockets for a phone rather than a quarter to pay for a parking spot — at colleges, businesses or just on the street. Installations are in place in Europe and in a growing number of North American cities, including Seattle; Vancouver, Canada; and, soon, Minneapolis.

Hard statistics are difficult to come by. But Neil Podmore of Vancouver-based Verrus, which is involved in the pay-by-cell parking technology, estimates about 100,000 spots are being paid for by phone in North America and 250,000 worldwide. Podmore says he thinks the worldwide total will reach 500,000 spaces by year's end.

What's driving the trend: Consumers like the convenience and safety of not having to race back to a parking spot to feed the meter, especially at night. On the other side, parking-lot operators can better manage costs.

Here's how pay-by-cell works: Once an account is set up, a motorist finds a stall, parks the car, calls a toll-free number and keys in the stall number.

People might actually save money because time doesn't count against them until they pull into a parking spot; with other electronic systems, the clock starts ticking once a driver takes a ticket to enter the gate, even if it takes time to find a space.

And if a person is running late, he can remotely buy more parking time with another phone call. The bill is typically sent to a credit card.

At UCSB, students receive a text message on their phones, warning them five minutes before their time is about to expire.

First, the ugly.

Melanie Griffith threw a tantrum when she was unable to buy a pink iPod mini early last year, according to the sales associate who tried to serve her.

The associate, who asked to remain anonymous, said Griffith came right up to him and "pretty much demanded" a pink iPod mini. The mini was in short supply, and the associate told her there were none in stock.

"She then proceeded to get pissed off at me personally because we didn't have any in stock," the associate said. "She said we have a special stock of iPods for people like her.... I hadn't seen any celebrities there up until then, so at first I was like, 'Oh wow, cool, Melanie Griffith.' But then she opened her mouth and used me as a doormat, and I was like, 'What the fuck is this shit? Milk Money sucked.'"

Fred Durst, the Limp Bizkit frontman, always demands a discount, said one of the salesmen. His record company has a special 5 percent discount at the store, and Durst demands it for every purchase, including for a $20 iPod cable -- a saving of $1. Public relations representatives for Durst did not return a call asking for comment.

Another associate said trying to explain wireless networking to actor Jerry O'Connell was "quite the ordeal" because he had "no clue" what Wi-Fi was, but he was friendly and thankful.

DURHAM, N.C. -- Believe it or not, the most protected numbers on the Duke University campus are not 31, 32 and 33, the retired jersey numbers of Shane Battier, Christian Laettner and Grant Hill. Duke guard J.J. Redick's new cell phone number is so guarded that some of his teammates and closest friends don't know it.

"My little brother doesn't even have it yet," Redick said.

Redick said he took the cautionary measures after a Maryland basketball fan obtained the number to his cell phone last year and started passing it among friends at parties and bars. Redick estimates he received 50 to 75 calls a night from Terrapins fans before he changed it. He had to change the number again a couple of weeks ago, after some North Carolina fans found out what the number was.

I had the good fortune to be on Tobacco Road for most of this week -- first to see North Carolina and Duke, then to watch NC State and Wake Forest.

Duke and North Carolina play two of the most anticipated, debated and analyzed games of the year, every year, and the Duke-Carolina rivalry is considered by many to be the greatest of them all.

(Voice from College Park: "Yeah, yeah, yeah ... please tell us even more about Dook and Carolina. What about Maryland?! We're the defending ACC Champs for crying out loud!! Have you seen the Terps and Duke play lately? We're the ones that have been filling up your 'Instant Classic' programming for the last five years!! Throw us a bone here, will ya?!!")

The passion surrounding a Duke-Carolina game is incredible. Unless you live in ACC country, it is hard to imagine how much build-up there is for these games. The fans are passionate and the temperature is always at fever levels. The Cameron Crazies provide the best atmosphere in college basketball. It is truly special.

(Voice from College Park: "Oh, yeah, tell us again how much Tobacco Road cares about the games. What, do you think we don't care?! Have you seen our games? Our fans are just as loud as those geeks from Duke, and we have high SAT scores, too! Heck, we duped the Cameron Crazies into a phony cheer a couple of weeks ago! If they had done that to us, it would have led SportsCenter!!")

The coaches are both Hall of Famers, with Roy Williams being a sure-fire future Springfield fixture and Mike Krzyzewski is already there. You can't have two better coaches in such a big-time game.

(Voice from College Park: "Roy??!! He's not even the best Williams in the ACC!! Are you insane? Only one Williams has held aloft the national championship trophy, and that is Gary!! Okay, he sweats a little, but he can coach with anyone!! Get with THE program!! Fear the Turtle!!")

OK, I get it. I get it.

Luckily, I get to wrap up this week in College Park for Duke and Maryland.

The Devils-Terps rivalry is longstanding, but it has become rancorous over the last six years. It has become one of the most venomous battles -- both on the court and in the stands -- in sports.

It is different from Duke and Carolina -- this one has become downright nasty. There is loathing in this one. Some think that makes it better. I think it adds an unseemly element to it. I think the rancor takes away from what makes the rivalry great.

Just going back to the seventies, the rivalry has had great players on the floor and great coaches on the sidelines. Lefty Driesell (a Duke graduate) had stars like John Lucas, Buck Williams, Albert King, Len Elmore and more, while Bill Foster had Mike Gminski, Jim Spanarkel and Gene Banks. It was heated then, with Duke and Maryland often meeting up for the ACC Tournament title, but it was never this heated.

When Krzyzewski came to Duke, he had Johnny Dawkins, Mark Alarie, and Tommy Amaker, and Driesell had Len Bias, Ben Coleman, and Adrian Branch. Maryland beat Duke in the 1984 ACC Tournament final to give the Terps their first-ever ACC Championship. Still, it was not as heated as it is right now.

The Duke-Maryland rivalry is so vicious now in large measure because of the incredible success of Gary Williams. He fought tooth and nail to resurrect the Terps program from the ashes, after sanctions, probation and a television ban that would have buried most programs for years (and caused most coaches to bolt for easier tasks). Williams stayed, and made Maryland into a powerhouse, going to the Final Four in 2001, and winning it all in 2002. The Maryland program has never been better, and no Maryland coach has ever been better.

Williams is a Hall of Famer, but Maryland fans think he is overshadowed, underappreciated, and is never given the credit he deserves. Maryland, over the last six years, has been Duke's equal as arguably the best program in the ACC. But Maryland fans believe that the Terps are treated as second-class citizens.

Maryland fans hear nothing but Tobacco Road. The ACC headquarters are North Carolina, and decisions are made with Duke, Carolina, Wake and NC State within shouting distance of the Commissioner's office. With rare exception, the ACC Tournament is always in North Carolina, and Maryland has always felt like a bit of an outsider. Fair or unfair, right or wrong, Maryland has felt ignored, mistreated, and undervalued.

Case in point: When Roy Williams left Kansas to come back to Carolina, all of the talk ( and I mean ALL of the talk) around the ACC was about the new rivalry between Krzyzewski and Roy Williams, and how it would be the best in the country.

Gary Williams was virtually unnoticed. Gary's record, like Roy's, is absolutely remarkable, and he has beaten Krzyzewski more often than has Roy. Gary has beaten Duke in the regular season, in the ACC Tournament final, and in the NCAA Tournament. But Maryland fans perceive that he doesn't get the credit for it.

Duke fans have grown to loathe Maryland as well. Maryland does not fear Duke on the floor, and they challenge the Blue Devils in a way that no other program seems to right now. Maryland truly competes with, and against, Duke like no other.

Duke fans think that Maryland has an inferiority complex. Maryland fans think that Duke has a superiority complex. Duke fans think that Maryland fans are boorish. Maryland fans think that Duke fans are smug. There is no end to the things over which Duke fans and Maryland fans can abhor each other.

The manner in which the fans of both schools have come to despise each other is of a different tone than in the Duke-Carolina rivalry. The word "hate" comes up way too much in the Duke-Maryland game, and that needs to stop. Too many Duke fans say that they "hate" Maryland. Too many Maryland fans say that they "hate" Duke.

The bottom line is this: Duke is a great program, worthy of admiration. It has one of the game's great coaches, and is an annual contender for national honors. Duke has great players and the Blue Devils play hard all of the time. For that, they should respected.

Maryland is also a great program, worthy of admiration. It also has one of the game's great coaches, and is an annual contender for national honors. Maryland has great players and the Terps play hard all of the time. For that, they should respected.

then some crap about how we need to not hate each other

LONDON (Reuters) - A British woman was sentenced to two and a half years in jail Thursday for ripping off her ex-lover's testicle with her bare hands during a drunken brawl after he refused her sex.

Amanda Monti, 24, flew into a rage in May last year after Geoffrey Jones, 37, who had ended their long-term relationship, rejected her advances.

She grabbed him by the genitals, tearing off his left testicle, then hid it in her mouth before a friend of Jones handed it back to him saying "that's yours."

Monti, of Birkenhead, near Liverpool, pleaded guilty to unlawful wounding at an earlier hearing.

DURANGO, Colo. (Reuters) - A Colorado judge ordered two teen-age girls to pay about $900 for the distress a neighbor said they caused by giving her home-made cookies adorned with paper hearts.

The pair were ordered to pay $871.70 plus $39 in court costs after neighbor Wanita Renea Young, 49, filed a lawsuit complaining that the unsolicited cookies, left at her house after the girls knocked on her door, had triggered an anxiety attack that sent her to the hospital the next day.

Taylor Ostergaard, then 17, and Lindsey Jo Zellitte, 18, paid the judgment on Thursday after a small claims court ruling by La Plata County Court Judge Doug Walker, a court clerk said on Friday.

The girls baked cookies as a surprise for several of their rural Colorado neighbors on July 31 and dropped off small batches on their porches, accompanied by red or pink paper hearts and the message: "Have a great night."

The Denver Post newspaper reported on Friday that the girls had decided to stay home and bake the cookies rather than go to a dance where there might be cursing and drinking.

Geoff Huish, 26, was so convinced England would win Saturday's match he told fellow drinkers at a social club, "If Wales win I'll cut my balls off," the paper said.

Friends at the club in Caerphilly, south Wales, thought he was joking.

But after the game Huish went home, severed his testicles with a knife, and walked 200 yards back to the bar with the testicles to show the shocked drinkers what he had done.

Huish was taken to hospital where he remained in serious condition, the paper said.

Wales's 11-9 victory over England at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff was their first home win over England in 12 years.

Bushism from Slate.com

"Because the—all which is on the table begins to address the big cost drivers. For example, how benefits are calculate, for example, is on the table; whether or not benefits rise based upon wage increases or price increases. There's a series of parts of the formula that are being considered. And when you couple that, those different cost drivers, affecting those—changing those with personal accounts, the idea is to get what has been promised more likely to be—or closer delivered to what has been promised. Does that make any sense to you? It's kind of muddled. Look, there's a series of things that cause the—like, for example, benefits are calculated based upon the increase of wages, as opposed to the increase of prices. Some have suggested that we calculate—the benefits will rise based upon inflation, as opposed to wage increases. There is a reform that would help solve the red if that were put into effect. In other words, how fast benefits grow, how fast the promised benefits grow, if those—if that growth is affected, it will help on the red."—Explaining his plan to save Social Security, Tampa, Fla., Feb. 4, 2005

Ooooohhh, I understand now....

Motorists on the Dulles Toll Road might have to pay as much as a quarter more at each toll plaza under a proposed increase Virginia transportation leaders are considering to help pay for a planned Metrorail extension from Falls Church to Loudoun County.

The increase could kick in as early as this spring, Virginia Department of Transportation officials said yesterday. The revenue would go toward the state's share of the $4 billion Dulles rail project, due to be under construction by next year.

SALEM, South Dakota (AP) -- The mix of nude dancers, orange juice and black-and-white independent films wasn't in Bob Rieger's original business plan.

But it has helped his Racehorses Gentlemen's Club survive amid the cornfields of McCook County and fend off a two-year barrage of challenges from politicians and outraged members of Citizens Against Nude Juicebars and Pornography.

"I've been to court with them four times, and I beat them every time," Rieger says.

When the county denied Rieger a liquor license for a bar, he opened a strip club with a juice bar in 2003. When it served a stop order saying a commercial business could not operate in area zoned for agriculture, Rieger went to court and won.

And when 74 percent of the county's voters passed an anti-nudity ordinance in June, Rieger found a loophole that exempted movie theaters. After a two-week hiatus, the club re-emerged as Racehorses Gentlemen's Club and Adult Movie Theatre and has been operating ever since.

Betting Lines - State Of The Union

Over/under on standing ovations (partial or full): 98.

O/U on GOP-only standing ovations: 11.

O/U on uses of the phrase "personal accounts": 13.

O/U on "private accounts": 2, both slips.

O/U on "freedom": 23.

O/U on "liberty": 18.

O/U on number of times camera shows Bill Frist picking his teeth with a scalpel: 1.

O/U on number of times the Fox post-speech show mentions something Hillary did: 24.

O/U on number of times Bush mentions the phrase "spending freeze": 5.

O/U on number of times someone stands up and yells "Bullshit!": 0.

O/U on number of times someone should: 196.5.

Microsoft's leafy corporate campus in Redmond, Washington, is beginning to look like the streets of New York, London and just about everywhere else: Wherever you go, white headphones dangle from peoples' ears.

To the growing frustration and annoyance of Microsoft's management, Apple Computer's iPod is wildly popular among Microsoft's workers.

"About 80 percent of Microsoft employees who have a portable music player have an iPod," said one source, a high-level manager who asked to remain anonymous. "It's pretty staggering."

....

So concerned is management, owning an iPod at Microsoft is beginning to become impolitic, the manager said. Employees are hiding their iPods by swapping the telltale white headphones for a less conspicuous pair.

"Some people are a bit concerned about being traitors, not supporting the company," he said. "They're a bit stealth about it."

I want to start using MSN and Yahoo Messenger here at work. And I wanna set my homepage to MSN or yahoo.