The Cloondog – killing it in court..

Clooney Causes Havoc In Milan Court – It’s a long time since a fraud trial has provoked this much interest. Crowds thronged around a tiny Milan courtroom, mobiles in hand, hoping to get a snap of the main witness. And at one point the judge was forced to halt proceedings and have a woman escorted from the building. Extraordinary scenes, perhaps, but not when you consider that this was a court action in which George Clooney was in the witness box. [hellomagazine]

Paraguayan Footballer Tries To Strangle Referee [Video] – While many footballers have thought about it, few have actually attempted it — but Paraguayan defender Jose Pedroso went that extra step at the weekend when he actually tried to strangle the referee. The incident, which has been posted on the video-sharing website YouTube, occurred in a highly charged Chilean second division match between Pedroso’s team Rangers and their opponents Deportes Concepcion. [timeslive + video]

Hot Russian Spy Flogging Her Story For $250k – Sexy Russian spy Anna Chapman is secretly shopping for a $250,000 media deal — and demanding the money be paid into the Swiss bank account of an associate. The sultry redhead is hoping to net a fortune from the story of how she infiltrated American society and has asked a London-based friend to discreetly reach out to the media for a deal. Silly girl – she should rather do Playboy – she’ll get even more! [nypost]

Paywall Loses Murdoch 98.8% of Times Readers – What has putting up a paywall done for the folks at the Times? Driven away most of their readers, predictably. Only 150,000 signed up for “Times+” accounts, and only 15,000 of them actually agreed to pay when their free trial ran out, according to an unconfirmed report on Beehive City, written by former Times media correspondent Dan Sabbagh. “This figure, apparently, is considered disappointing,” he writes. [newser]

Maggie Thatcher’s Family “Appalled” At Meryl Streep’s New Film – The former British prime minister’s son and daughter are horrified at the thought of their mother being portrayed in The Iron Lady as a dementia sufferer looking back over her life with sadness. In the movie, Baroness Thatcher will reportedly be shown talking to herself and unaware that her husband, Sir Denis Thatcher, has died. Her kids are appalled, “but will not speak publicly for fear of giving it more publicity.” Hmm, what do you call this? [metro]

U2 Top Rock’s Richest List – U2’s massive 360° Tour has helped propel the band to Number One on Forbes’ annual report on top-earning musicians. Bono and Co. scored the top spot on the list by netting $130 million in the past 12 months. They’re followed by AC/DC — who just wrapped their 108-city Black Ice world tour on June 28th — with $114 million. Beyoncé, Bruce Springsteen and Britney Spears round out the Top Five. [rollingstone]

The Vatican Gets “Google Bombed” – Internet users over the weekend were delivered to an empty site called pedofilo.com when doing a search for “Vatican.” Pedofilo is the Italian world for pedophile. A Google (GOOG) bombing is a concerted effort by a number of users to link a phrase with an unflattering site on the Web. For instance, one of the most popular Google bombings was ‘miserable failure,’ which linked to the the biography of former U.S. president George W. Bush. [fortune]

1 In 5 Smartphone Owners Tune In To Internet Radio – It seems that Internet radio’s popularity is on the rise with smartphone owners, according to Rajar (Radio Joint Audio Research).The organisation’s latest survey of Internet delivered audio services indicates that 20% of UK smartphone owners, or 1.4 million people, have downloaded a radio app. 31% of respondents said they had listened to Internet radio, and 15% said they had downloaded a podcast – almost half of the latter claimed they listened to podcasts at least once per week. [techwatch]

Louis Oosthuizen Cashes In – Ernie proud – South Africa’s Louis Oosthuizen has seen his bank balance balloon by a cool R10m following his victory at the 139th British Open at St. Andrews on Sunday.Oosthuizen walked away with €1 011 840 (R10m) for his four days work in the rain, wind and sunshine at the famed Old Course. One thing reports haven’t mentioned is Louis came out of Ernie Els’s academy – and the Erndog couldn’t be happier! [koos]

Google Buys Metaweb, Improves Search – The search giant announced its acquisition late on Friday evening (July 16) via its company blog. Jack Menzel, director of product management at Google, wrote: “We’ve acquired Metaweb, a company that maintains an open database of things in the world. Working together we want to improve search and make the web richer and more meaningful for everyone. Well thanks, that’s bloody decent of you! [telegraph]

11-Year-Old Viral Video Star Under Police Protection – Earlier this week, a funny video went viral of 11-year-old Jessi Slaughter (AKA Kerligirl13) crying while her dad yelled at the people trolling her on the Internet. It’s not so funny now that she’s been placed under police protection. More than 1.7 million people have seen the foul-mouthed Floridan’s breakdown and laughed at her dad’s luddite rage. But the video, “You Dun Goofed Up,” wasn’t the only thing to go viral.. [gawker]

Media Mogul Conrad Black To Be Released From Jail – Former Daily Telegraph editor Conrad Black has been granted bail and will be released from prison in America while an appeal court reviews his conviction for fraud. Conrad Black and three of his colleagues were jailed after they were discovered to have paid themselves tax-free bonuses disguised as non-compete fees as they sold off pieces of the now defunct media holding company Hollinger for an estimated $6.1m (£4m). [skynews]

The Digital Edge: Episode 78 – In this week’s episode of The Digital Edge we speak to blogger and entrepreneur Seth Rotherham as well as DJ Richard Hardiman to discuss their latest venture that they’re putting together in the form of 2Oceansvibe Radio. We also get some snippets of the paid content debate held by the Digital Media & Marketing Association in Johannesburg last week. [thedigitaledge]

Paris Hilton Goes Topless In Italy – So first she was caught smoking pot in South Africa. Then, a week later, she was caught at an airport in Corsica with some more weed on her. Now how does one top a run like that? Simple – get on a yacht off the coast of Italy and parade around topless. And that’s exactly what she did. NSFW. [egotastic]

Send A 2oceansviber To Bushmills Bushcamp – Last year Bushmills understood the vibe when they gave away an E-type Jag. This year they’re going one better and taking one South African to Ireland to an international competition to make your own Bushmills (judged by legendary Irish hooker Keith Wood)! There is online voting and one guy caught our eye – Andrew McGill has not only a great story, but he actually quotes the 2OV motto on his Facebook page! Come let’s help our boy get to Ireland – click and vote for him please! [bushmills]