Where would you go in mid-summer if the sun of temperate Santa Barbara was too much for your delicate dermis to endure? If you’re Michael Jackson, you’d head for the absolute monarchy of Bahrain (a group of islands in the Persian Gulf midway between the tip of the Qatar Peninsula …

With only two days to go until Live 8 — “10 concerts, 100 artists, a million spectators, 2 billion viewers, and 1 message … To get those 8 men, in that 1 room, to stop 30,000 children dying every single day of extreme poverty” — there is much arranging and …

Twenty years after Live Aid, Bob Geldof’s Live 8 comes this weekend, July 2, in an effort to “make poverty history.” Live 8 will feature concerts in Philadelphia, London, Paris, Berlin, Rome, Cornwall, Toronto, South Africa, Tokyo and Moscow (just added today) to raise awareness about poverty in Africa and …

A new expanded 62-acre site in New Orleans’ City Park amidst 11 lush miles of bayous and lagoons, first-ever on-site camping facilities, and an eclectic line-up ranging from Nine Inch Nails to the Neville Brothers, from the Bravery to Brazilian Girls, are all in place for VOODOO MUSIC EXPERIENCE. Now …

In the Grokster case, the Supreme Court unanimously decided that “One who distributes a device with the object of promoting its use to infringe copyright, as shown by clear expression or other affirmative steps taken to foster infringement, going beyond mere distribution with knowledge of third-party action, is liable for …

Well, Jackson types anyway, with his first public message since his acquittal on child molestation and conspiracy charges June 13: “Without God, my children, my family and you, my fans, I could not have made it through. Your love, support and loyalty made it all possible. You were there when …

At what may be the end of Chief Justice Rehnquist’s reign, the Supreme Court of the United States has had quite a week, including controversial rulings on the boundaries of eminent domain, the liability of file-sharing services in fostering copyright violation, religious displays on public property, and supporting the FCC …

American Idol judge and unhappy manicure consumer Paula Abdul spoke passionately yesterday in favor of legislation before the California Senate Business and Professions Committee that would establish safety standards for manicure and pedicure equipment and rewrite state regulations mandating that nail shops follow sanitary practices. In urging legislators to pass …

Tom Cruise continues his tear through the media machine, promoting his new film War of the Worlds, which opens nationwide tomorrow. When we last spoke of such things he sparred with The Today Show’s Matt Lauer on matters of religion and psychopharmacology, calling psychiatry a “pseudo-science.” He also blathered on …

Season 4 of American Idol is over but that doesn’t mean Idol activity has slowed much: there’s the summer tour, new records from Idols new and old, offseason machinations, and the like: American Idol: Simon Cowell: You Oughta Be In Pictures? I last wrote about American Idol as the (not …