World of Celebrities

Miley Cyrus Biography

2011-09-17T15:25:00.000-07:00

Birthdate: November 23, 1992
Birthplace: Franklin, Tennessee
Real Name: Destiny Hope Cyrus

Miley Cyrus: Hope Springs Eternal
Destiny Hope Cyrus (better known as Miley - short for Smiley) got her optimistic name because her parents (country singer Billy Ray Cyrus and his wife Tish) expected great things from the little one. She first became interested in acting while hanging out on the set of her dad's now-defunct TV show Doc. With a little help from dad, Miley was soon developing her skills as an actress playing the character of Kylie on that show.

Miley Cyrus: Little Fish in a Big Pond
Stepping out from her father's shadow, Miley jumped ship to play "Young Ruthie" on the critically acclaimed Tim Burton movie Big Fish. She then went on to audition for a small Disney role but was passed over because she was considered too short. However, they were still interested in her and eventually developed the role of Miley Stewart for her on Hannah Montana.

Miley Cyrus: This is the Life
Hannah Montana went on to be a hit show and launched Miley's recording career with the release of the Hannah Montana Soundtrack. The disc went all the way to number one on the US charts. Miley was in character as Hannah Montana on the soundtrack, but she showed the world her true colors on Hannah Montana 2: Meet Miley Cyrus, which came out in June 2007!

Miley Cyrus: Taking on the Scalpers!
Within minutes of them going on sale, tickets to Miley's Best of Both World Tour had sold out. The only problem? They'd been scooped up by unscrupulous scalpers instead of Miley's fans. With tickets re-selling for as much as $2,500 per seat, Miley has been working with venues to free up more seats to be sold at more reasonable prices. Miley has also told her fans that, while the show will be fun, it's not worth paying the prices scalpers are charging!

Miley Cyrus: Life After Hannah Montana
Production on the fourth and final season of Hannah Montana began in January 2010. The year 2010 also saw Miley starring in The Last Song, which was released on March 31, 2010. The film got bad reviews from the critics, but made more than $88 million at the worldwide box office, marking the actress' successful transition to more adult roles. The fourth and final season of Hannah Montana began airing on Disney Channel on July 11, 2010 and is scheduled to end in 2011.

Miley Cyrus - Did U Know?
Miley is good friends with her former Hannah Montana co-stars Emily Osment and Mitchel Musso.
Miley Cyrus opened for The Cheetah Girls on 20 dates of their 39-city US tour.
Miley says she's written more than 100 songs, some of which have been used on Hannah Montana.
Miley Cyrus youngest artist ever to have two number one albums within a year.
Miley Cyrus was selected as one of America's top ten most fascinating people of 2008 for an Barbara Walters ABC special in 2008.
Miley Cyrus Says...
"Pink isn't just a color; it's an attitude!"

source: http://www.kidzworld.com

Wiz Khalifa Biography

2011-09-17T15:14:00.000-07:00

Cameron Jibril Thomaz (born September 8, 1987 in Minot, North Dakota), better known by his stage name Wiz Khalifa, is an American rapper based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, signed to Rostrum Records. In 2005 he released his first official mixtape, Prince of the City: Welcome to Pistolvania, and later in 2006 he released his first full length street album entitled Show and Prove. Since then he has released a further six mixtapes and a collaboration mixtape titled How Fly with friend Curren$y. He released his debut album, Deal or No Deal, in November of 2009, it reached #1 on the iTunes hip hop chart, and then reached the top ten on iTunes’ overall album chart the week it was released. Previously signed to Warner Bros. Records, he left the label in July 2009 after numerous delays in releasing his planned debut album for the label, First Flight. Khalifa stated to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that, “I learned a lot during my time there and matured as an artist during the process. I’m happy to be moving on with all of my material and having the chance to be in control of my next moves”.He is also the founder of the rap crew Taylor Gang, which includes friends Kev Tha Hustler, Ekko, Smallz Money and Gene Stovall. They derived the name from the fact they always used to wear Chuck Taylor shoes.

Khalifa was born on September 8, 1987 in Minot, North Dakota to a mother and a father serving in the military. The family moved to Pittsburgh when Khalifa was the age of two. His parents’ military service caused the family to move on a regular basis.

Over the next thirteen years, he would move between Pittsburgh and South Carolina, Georgia, Oklahoma, Germany, Japan, and England as his parents were reassigned to different posts. In October of 1990 Wiz was separated from his mother,who left him in the hands of her sister while she served in Operation Desert Storm.

During his travels, Wiz was forced to mature quicker than his peers. He was constantly faced with new surroundings, new schools, and new sets of friends, and he found it difficult to become attached to anyone outside his family roots. This nomadic life gave Wiz an opportunity, though, to broaden his mind and offered him many experiences from which to draw inspiration. He began to perceive the world differently than most kids, and he would write his thoughts down every day.These thoughts would become the foundation for his future recordings.

By the age of 14, with a few songs under his belt, Wiz was already drawing comparisons with his commanding voice and witty wordplay. While he has been influenced by artists such as Jay-Z, Camron, and the Notorious B.I.G., Wiz was determined to create his own identity that would, one day, be loved and revered by fans.

Ready to take the next step, Wiz began his search for a recording studio to record new songs. He found one, ID LABS, where owner Eric Dan immediately recognized Wiz’s talents. Along with Chad Glick of ID Management, they began to network Wiz to another Pittsburgh native, Benjy Grinberg of Rostrum Records. Benjy realized the raw talent that Wiz possessed, and immediately brought him into the Rostrum family in 2002.

Soon after, Wiz Khalifa began his ascent into the music scene in the Pittsburgh area. He has been hailed by the award winning Pittsburgh Post-Gazette pop music critic, Ed Masley, as having “the skills, the looks, the confidence, the drive, and the charisma for the job.” The New Pittsburgh Courier says, “The combination of a young, charismatic M.C. with a slew of stop-and-rewind rhymes together with a local independent label with major industry connections has set the stage for a hip-hop artist representing Pittsburgh to reach superstar status for the first time ever.

The following is from www.rapnews.net/artists/Wiz_Khalifa/Biography/

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Pittsburgh has long been searching for its first major Hip Hop star. Some have flirted with success, while others have floundered in the masses. At the age of 19, Wiz Khalifa has developed into the prodigy that Pittsburgh has been looking for, and he plans to represent his city to the fullest.

Born Cameron Thomaz in North Dakota in 1987 to a mother and father serving in the military, Wiz moved to Pittsburgh at the age of 2. Over the next thirteen years, he would move between Pittsburgh and South Carolina, Georgia, Oklahoma, Germany, Japan, and England as his parents were reassigned to different posts.

In October of 1990, Wiz was separated from his mother, who left him in the hands of her sister while she served in Operation Desert Storm. During his travels, Wiz was forced to mature quicker than his peers. He was constantly faced with new surroundings, schools, and friends, making it difficult to become attached to anyone outside family. Nomadic life, though, gave Wiz an opportunity to broaden his mind and offered many experiences from which to draw inspiration. He began to perceive the world differently than most kids and this motivated him to write his thoughts down every day. These thoughts would become the foundation for his future recordings.

By the age of 14, with a few songs under his belt, Wiz was drawing comparisons with his commanding voice and witty wordplay. While artists such as Jay-Z, Snoop, Cam’ron, and the Notorious B.I.G. have influenced him, Wiz was determined to create his own identity that would, one day, be loved and revered by fans.

Ready to take the next step, Wiz began his search for a new recording studio in Pittsburgh. He found ID LABS, where owner Eric Dan immediately recognized Wiz’s talents. Along with Chad Glick of ID Labs Management, they began to network Wiz to another Pittsburgh native, Benjy Grinberg of Rostrum Records. Benjy realized the raw talent that Wiz possessed, and immediately brought him into the Rostrum family. Rostrum released Show and Prove, as well as 3 other mixtapes, and began their ascent into the National music scene. Not long after, Wiz was inking his first major label contract with Warner Bros. Records.

This year, XXLmag.com ran a feature on Wiz stating that “his buzz has officially started to outgrow the streets.” After rave reviews from his first debut single “Youngin On His Grind,” Wiz premiered his follow up “Say Yeah” on AllHipHop.com.

People usually struggle their whole lives trying to figure out how they can make their mark on this world, but Wiz has known his calling for years and is crafting his future with pen and pad.

source: sing365.com

Lil Wayne Biography

2011-09-17T15:09:00.000-07:00

Real Name: Dwayne Michael Carter Jr.

Date Of Birth: September 27, 1982

Birthplace: New Orleans, Louisiana, United States

Labels: Young Money Ent/Cash Money Records/Universal Motown

Nicknames: Nino Brown, Gangsta D, Weezy, Weezy F Baby, Wizzle, Baby Jr, Birdman Jr, Tune, Tunechi Lionchess, Best Rapper Alive, Rapper Eater, Mr. Carter, President Carter & Dr. Carter

A game-changing artist and an impervious celebrity, Lil Wayne began as his career as a near-novelty — a preteen delivering hardcore hip-hop — but through years of maturation and reinventing the mixtape game, he developed into a million-selling rapper with a massive body of work, one so inventive and cunning that it makes his famous claim of being the “best rapper alive” worth considering. Born Dwayne Michael Carter, Jr. and raised in the infamous New Orleans neighborhood of Hollygrove, he was a straight-A student but never felt his true intelligence was expressed through any kind of report card. He found music was the best way to express himself, and after taking the name Gangsta D he began writing rhymes. Combining a strong work ethic with aggressive self-promotion, the 11-year-old convinced the Cash Money label to take him on, even if it was just of odd jobs around the office. A year later, in-house producer Mannie Fresh partnered him with the 14-year-old B.G. and dubbed the duo the B.G.’z. Although only B.G.’s name appeared on the cover, the 1995 album True Story has since been accepted as the B.G.’z debut album both by fans and the Cash Money label. The 1997 album Chopper City was supposed to be the follow-up, but when Wayne accidentally shot himself in the chest with a .44, it became a solo B.G. release.

That same year, he officially took the moniker Lil Wayne, dropping the “D” from his first name in order to separate himself from an absent father. He joined B.G., Juvenile, and Young Turk for another Fresh project, the teen hardcore rap group the Hot Boys, who released their debut album, Get It How U Live!, in 1997. Two years later, Cash Money would sign a distribution deal with the major-label Universal. Mainstream distribution would help that year’s Hot Boys album Guerrilla Warfare to reach the number one spot on Billboard’s Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart. In 1998, Lil Wayne would appear on Juvenile’s hit single “Back That Thing Up,” or “Back That Azz Up” as it appeared on Juvie’s album 400 Degreez. Wayne would launch his solo career a year later with the album Tha Block Is Hot, featuring the hit single title track. It went double platinum but the rapper was still unknown to Middle America, since his hardcore rhymes and the rough Cash Money sound had not yet crossed over. His second album, Lights Out (2000), failed to match the success of its predecessor but it did go gold, and with an appearance on the Big Tymers’ hit single “#1 Stunna,” his audience was certainly growing. While Fresh was primarily responsible for launching his career, Wayne was now much closer to Fresh’s fellow Big Tymer and Cash Money CEO Birdman. When Juvenile left the label, Wayne — or “Birdman Jr.” as he was calling himself — showed his allegiance to his CEO by releasing an album with a title much hotter than Juvie’s breakthrough effort. 500 Degreez landed in 2002 and while it went gold, rumors began flying about Cash Money’s financial troubles and possible demise. The rest of the Hot Boys had defected and Wayne’s planned 2003 album was scrapped, coming out instead as an underground mixtape called Da Drought.

Wayne became enamored with the mixtape world after Da Drought drew so much attention from the hip-hop press. He used these underground releases to drum up anticipation for his next official album, the breakthrough effort Tha Carter. Released in 2004, the album seemed familiar on one hand with Mannie Fresh’s production, but the Wayne on the cover was a dreadlocked surprise, and the rhymes he laid on the tracks showed significant growth. His marketing skills had become sharper, too, and it was no mistake that the album’s hit single, “Go DJ,” mentioned hip-hop’s greatest tastemakers right in the title. It reached number five on the singles chart, and with a guest shot on Destiny’s Child’s number three single, “Soldier,” Wayne had officially crossed over. On the flip side, his street cred was supported by a slew of mixtapes released in 2005, including the popular titles Dedication with DJ Drama and Tha Suffix with DJ Khaled. Cash Money’s future was no longer in doubt and traditional music business rules no longer seemed to apply, as tracks would be leaked onto the Internet and various DJ’s mixtapes. “Get Something” was another bold move, as a Universal-funded video was made without the track ever seeing official release.

With his alternative marketing scheme working in overdrive, the 2005 landing of Tha Carter II was a major event, selling over a quarter-million copies the week of its release. “Fireman” and “Shooter” with Robin Thicke were released as singles, while the album — which for the first time featured no Mannie Fresh productions — went platinum. A year later he collaborated with Birdman for the Like Father, Like Son album, featuring the hit single “Stuntin’ Like My Daddy.” His mixtapes were still flooding the underground, including the stunning Dedication 2, which came with an iconic image of the rapper on the cover plus the much talked-about track “Georgia…Bush,” a venomous response to President George W. Bush’s handling of the Katrina disaster. With no official follow-up to Tha Carter II in sight, numerous collaborative tracks kept the rapper in the mainstream with “Gimme That” by Chris Brown, “Make It Rain” by Fat Joe, and “Duffle Bag Boy” by Playaz Circle becoming three of the biggest hits.

Tha Carter III was promised for 2007 but didn’t arrive until a year later, setting off Wayne’s infamous reputation of delayed releases. Part of the problem became unauthorized leaks of the album’s tracks, something combated by the official, downloadable EP The Leak released that same year. Preceded by the number one hit “Lollipop,” Tha Carter III arrived in May of 2008, selling more than a million copies in its first week of release. An appearance on Saturday Night Live and four Grammy awards — including Best Rap Album — spoke to Wayne’s mainstream acceptance. He also performed at that year’s Country Music Awards with Kid Rock, but rather than rap, he played guitar. The guitar playing was part of Wayne’s new involvement with rock music, including his help in signing Kevin Rudolf to Cash Money plus an appearance on Rudolf’s massive hit “Let It Rock.” His planned rock album was previewed with the 2009 single “Prom Queen,” but when the album failed to meet its promised April release, the music press began to portray the rapper as the king of missed street dates. Unconcerned, Wayne forged ahead with his Young Money crew, releasing the aboveground single “Every Girl,” plus the official album We Are Young Money that same year. His rock album, Rebirth, would finally see the light of day in early 2010.

M.G.Ramachandran @ M.G.R - Actor - ( Biography )

2009-12-18T13:21:00.001-08:00

M.G. Ramachandran (1917-1987), popularly known as MGR, dominated like no other, the films and politics of India's Tamil Nadu state. A charismatic actor and philanthropist, he commanded the idolatrous adulation of millions of Tamilians and became Tamil Nadu's chief minister. His achievements in 3 fields, namely films, philanthropy and politics were remarkable considering his humble origins in Sri Lanka. Raised in poverty by a widowed single mother, he had nothing more than his good looks when he got his first break in "Sati Lilavati", a Tamil film of the late 1930s. In the 1940s and 50s, the Tamil film industry was being transformed by screenwriters like Annadurai, Karunanidhi and others belonging to the Dravidian movement. MGR starred in many of the movies they helped make. Annadurai became his mentor and MGR joined the DMK, Annadurai's new Dravidian party. His films made MGR a matinee idol among Tamilians. He also started monetarily helping people in need, sowing the seeds for his reputation as a philanthropist. When Annadurai died as Tamil Nadu's chief minister, MGR's rival Karunanidhi assumed office. MGR accused him of defalcation and was kicked out of the DMK. In 1977, MGR's ADMK (later renamed AIADMK) party was swept into power. In his first term, MGR cleaned up corruption and carried out reforms like having an income limit for backward class people to be eligible for the reserved seats in government colleges and jobs.

His reforms proved unpopular, so MGR became another corrupt Indian politician having learned not to rock the boat. Tamil Nadu stagnated during the rest of his reign. Yet his mesmerized legions of fans continued to vote him into power. His death in 1987 created a power vacuum that soon brought his old nemesis, the corrupt Karunanidhi, back into power. MGR was a complex man who triumphed over poverty and tried to improve the lot of the people who revered him. However, in the end, he was a god that failed.

source: imdb.com

Shivaji Ganesan - Actor - ( Biography )

2009-12-18T12:32:00.000-08:00

Born on: October 1, 1927
Born in: Viluppuram, Tamil Nadu
Died on: July 21, 2001
Career: Actor
Nationality: Indian

Cinematic excellence, artistic prowess and the natural exhibit of expression and stance on stage - Ganesan, more popularly Shivaji Ganesan, has left behind a legacy for many to cherish and follow. The legendary actor was exceptional, when it came to performance and has been the guiding star and influence for many actors in the present generation. Receiving accolades like no one, he was the first South Indian film actor to be admired and appreciated overseas. He won the 'Best Actor Award' in the Afro-Asian Film Festival, held in Cairo, Egypt.

Early Childhood
Born to a middle class family in Villupuram, Chinnaiahpillai Ganesan was a just another kid of India. Ganesan's father - Chinnaiahpillai, worked in the South Indian Railway, while his mother - Rajamani Ammal,was a homemaker. He had one sister and two brothers - one elder and the other younger. The day Ganesan was born, his family got good as well as bad news. While everyone celebrated the arrival of a new family member, they also mourned his father's arrest over anti-British activities. Chinnaiahpillai also underwent a term of imprisonment later on. A dropout from school, Sivaji Ganesan was a born artist. He explored the stage right from the tender years of childhood, taking part in theatre and plays. Eventually, he joined a drama troupe and spent his growing years on-stage.

Acting Career
Shivaji GanesanGanesan’s first performance on the '70mm screen' was in a Tamil film - ‘Parasakthi’, in 1952. His debut movie was written and directed by the present Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, M Karunanidhi. In his career, which expanded to more than four decades, the gifted actor showed his brilliance through various roles. Not only did he excel in commercial cinema, but also brought experimental cinema in a new limelight. A versatile actor, he played v multiple roles, commercial roles as well as roles of Hindu deities. The name ‘Emperor Shivaji’ was one that he adopted from the role he had once enacted.

Apart from acting in Tamil movies, Shivaji Ganesan also proved his artistic ingenious in Hindi, Telugu, Malayalam, Bengali and Kannada movies. His film ‘Veerapaandiya Kattabomman’ brought him international fame. The film was highly acclaimed and appreciated in the Afro-Asian Film Festival held at Egypt. With this, Ganesan became the first South Indian actor to receive such an accolade. Shivaji Ganesan ruled over Kollywood (Tamil Film Industry) for multiple decades. While he played the protagonist in his early career, the end days saw him donning senior roles, like those of a father or cop.

The 1990s saw Shivaji Ganesan being paired up with several notable actors of the present generation. Ganesan shared screen space with M.G. Ramachandran, Gemini Ganesan, Kamal Haasan, Rajinikanth, Prabhu Ganesan, Sathyaraj, Vijayakanth, Y. G. Mahendran, Sivakumar, K. Bhagyaraj, Karthik Muthuraman, Arjun Sarja, Joseph Vijay and Abbas. ‘Padayappa’, a blockbuster released in the 1999, was his last film before his death.

Politics & Ganesan
Ganesan was a strong believer in the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK). It was only in 1955, after his visit to the Tirumala Venkateswara Temple, that he was expelled from the party, as visiting the temple was not permitted by the rationalistic DMK. In 1961, he became a supporter of the Indian National Congress and particularly the then-leader K. Kamaraj. The death of Kamaraj brought a change in his position and he became a supporter of Indira Gandhi.

Ganesan became a Member of Parliament (MP) in the Rajya Sabha in 1982. It was in 1987 that he formed his own political party - Thamizhaga Munnetra Munnani (TMM). His party was known to be pro-LTTE, at the time when Rajiv Gandhi had withdrawn the Indian Peacekeeping Force from Sri Lanka. Ganesan merged his party with the Tamil Nadu faction of the Janata Dal in 1989.

Death
Ganesan experienced severe respiratory problem on July 21, 2001 and was admitted to the Apollo Hospital in Chennai. Despite the efforts of the doctors, he died the same day, leaving behind thousands of mourners. For about 10 years, he had been suffering from a prolonged heart ailment as well. The funeral of the legendary actor was attended by thousands of people, comprising of fans, politicians and personalities from the South Indian film fraternity.

Personal Life
Ganesan tied the nuptial knot with Kamala, on the first of May, in the year 1952. The couple had four children - two daughters - Shanthi Ganesan and Rajvi Ganesan and two sons - Ramkumar Ganesan and Prabhu Ganesan. While Prabhu Ganesan shared the screen space with his father and went on to become a popular actor and producer. Ramkumar Ganesan is also one of the successful film producers in the South Indian Film Industry.

Honors
Shivaji Ganesan was awarded with Padma Shri and Padma Bhushan, which rank amongst the highest honors awarded to an Indian national. In 1995, the celebrated actor added another feather to his achievements. He was honored with the 'Chevalier' title, by the National Order of the Legion of Honour in France. Amongst the likes of such highly credible honors, the actor also has to his credit a statue, which was erected in Chennai. Unveiled in 2006, by Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi, the statue was primarily built to honor the legendary actor. His birthday is observed as ‘Actors' Day’ in Kollywood. The day was so named by the former South Indian Film Artistes' Association President - Vijayakanth.

Awards

    * 1959: Afro-Asian Film Festival Best Actor Award
    * 1966: Padma Shri
    * 1984: Padma Bhushan
    * 1993: National Film Award - Special Jury Award for Thevar Magan,
    * 1995: Chevalier (Knight of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, France)
    * 1996: Dadasaheb Phalke Award
    * 1997: Kalaimamani
    * 1998: NTR National Award
                 Honorary doctorate

Filmography
1952: Paraasakthi
1953: Pempudu Koduku, Poongodhai, Pardesi, Anbu, Thirumbi Paar
1954: Manohara, Edhirpaarthadhu, Andha Naal, Kalyanam Panniyum Brammachari, Koondukkili
1955: Mudhal Thedhi, Mangayar Thilagam, Kalvanin Kadhali
1956: Thenali Raman, Rangoon Radha, Pennin Perumai, Amaratheebam
1957: Vanangaamudi, Tala Vanchani Veerudu, Thangamalai Ragasiyam, Makkalai Petra Magarasi, Ambigaabathi (ALS), Pudhaiyal, Baagyavathi
1958: Sabaash Meena, Saarangathaara, Uthamaputhiran, Kaathavaraayan, Thanga Padumai
1959: Veerapandiya Kattabomman(The Great...), Veerapandya Kattabrahmanna
1960: Pillalu Techina Challani Rajyam, Padikkadha Medhai, Paavai Vilakku, Irumbu Thirai, Dheiva Piravi
1961: Paavamannippu, Paasamalar, Papa Pariharam, Paalum Pazhamum, Kappal Ottiya Thamizhan (The Great), Punar Jenmam
1962: Pavithra Prema, Paarthaal Pasi Theerum, Bale Pandiya, Aalayamani (No comparison...), Nichaya Thaamboolam, Padithaal Mattum Podhuma, Vadivukku Valaikaappu, Bandhapaasam
1963: Ratha Thilagam, Paar Magale Paar, Iruvar Ullam, Arivaali, Kulamagal Raadhai, Kungumam, Annai Illam
1964: Karnan, Karna, Ramadasu, Navarathiri, Kai Kodutha Dheivam, Pachai Vilakku, Pudhiya Paravai
1965: Thiruvilaiyadal, Santhi, Pazhani, Anbu Karangal
1966: Motor Sundaram Pillai, Mahakavi Kalidas, Selvam
1967: Thiruvarutchelvar, Thangai, Kandhan Karunai, Iru Malargal, Ooty Varai Uravu
1968: Uyarndha Manidhan, Thillana Moganambal, Enga Oor Raja, Thirumaal Perumai, Galaatta Kalyanam, En Thambi
1969: Kaaval Dheivam, Dheiva Magan, Sivandha Man, Thanga Surangam, Gurudhatchanai
1970: Vilaiyaattu Pillai, Vietnam Veedu, Enga Mama, Paadhugaappu
1971: Savaale Samaali, Moondru Dheivangal, Sumadhi En Sundhari, Babu, Kulama Gunama, Thangaikkaga, Iru Thuruvam
1972: Vasandha Maaligai, Gnana Oli, Bangaru Babu, Needhi, Pattikkada Pattanama
1973: Gowravam, Bhakta Tukaram, Rajapart Rangadurai, Rajaraja Cholan, Bharatha Vilas
1974: Thanga Padhakkam, Anbai Thedi, En Magan, Theerkka Sumangali
1975: Anbe Aaruyire, Avan Thaan Manidhan
1976: Chanakya Chandragupta, Uthaman, Unakkaga Naan, Sathiyam, Rojavin Raja, Grahapravesam
1977: Annan Oru Koyil, Avan Oru Sarithiram, Theebam, Ilaya Thalaimurai, Naam Pirandha Man
1978: Vaazhkai Alaigal, Ennai Pol Oruvan, General Chakravarthi, Justice Gopinath, Pilot Premnath, Punniya Boomi, Thyagam, Andhamaan Kadhali
1979: Vetrikku Oruvan, Thirisoolam, Pattaakathi Bairavan, Nalladhoru Kudumbam, Naan Vaazhavaippen, Kavari Maan, Imayam
1980: Rishi Moolam, Ratha Paasam, Visvaroobam, Emanukku Eman, Dharma Raja
1981: Mogana Punnagai, Maadi Veettu Ezhai, Lorry Driver Rajakannu, Keezhvaanam Sivakkum, Kalthoon, Amarakaaviyam, Sathya Sundharam
1982: Vasandhathil Oru Naal, Vaa Kanna Vaa, Thyagi, Thunai, Theerpu, Sangili, Paritchaikku Neramaachu, Oorum Uravum, Oorukku Oru Pillai, Nenjangal, Hitler Umanath, Garuda Saukiyama
1983: Sumangali, Sandhippu, Unmaigal, Miruthanga Chakravarthi, Neethibathi, Vellai Roja, Kashmir Kadhali, Uruvangal Maaralam
1984: Iru Medhaigal, Ezhudhaadha Sattangal, Vaazhkai, Vamsa Vilakku, Sarithira Nayagan, Siranjeevi, Tharaasu, Thiruppam, Simma Soppanam, Dhaavani Kanavugal
1985: Bandham, Needhiyin Nizhal, Padikkadha Pannaiyar, Raja Rishi, Muthal Mariyathai, Naam Iruvar, Nermai, Padikkadhavan
1986: Thaaiku Oru Thaalaattu panni, Saadhanai, Mannukkul Vairam, Lakshmi Vandhachu, Anandha Kanneer, Viduthalai, Marumagal
1987: Raja Mariyadhai, Muthukkal Moondru, Kudumbam Oru Koyil, Krishnan Vandhaan, Thaambathiyam, Veerapandiyan, Jallikkattu, Anbulla Appa
1988: En Thamizh En Makkal, Pudhiya Vaanam
1990: Kaavalukku Gettikkaaran
1991: Gnana Paravai, Thevar Magan, Naangal, Mudhal Kural, Sinna Marumagal
1993: Paarambariyam
1995: Pasumpon
1997: Once More, Gopura Theebam, Oru Yathra Mozhi
1998: En Aasai Rasave
1999: Mannavaru Sinnavaru, Poo Parikka Varugirom, Padayappa

source: iloveindia.com

Rowan Atkinson @ Mr.Bean - Comedian Actor - ( Biography )

2009-12-17T16:48:00.000-08:00

Rowan Sebastian Atkinson was born on the 6th January, 1955, in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, UK, to Ella May and Eric Atkinson. His father owned a farm where he grew up with his two older brothers, Rupert and Rodney. He attended Newcastle University and Oxford University where he earned degrees in electrical engineering. During that time, he met screenwriter Richard Curtis, with whom he wrote and performed comedy revues.

Later, he co-wrote and appeared in "Not the Nine O'Clock News" (1979), which was a huge success and spawned several best-selling books. It won an International Emmy Award and the British Academy Award for "Best Light Entertainment Programme of 1980." He won the "British Academy Award" and was named "BBC Personality of the Year" for his performing on "Not the Nine O'Clock News" (1979).

Atkinson also appeared in several movies, including Dead on Time (1983), Pleasure at Her Majesty's (1976) (TV) (aka "Monty Python Meets Beyond the Fringe"), Never Say Never Again (1983), and The Tall Guy (1989). He played "Mr. Bean" in the TV series, "Mr. Bean" (1990) but, apart from that and "Not the Nine O'Clock News" (1979), he also appeared in several other series like "The Black Adder" (1983) and "Funny Business" (1992), etc.

Atkinson enjoys nothing better than fast cars. He has been married to Sunetra Sastry since 1990, and they have two children, named Benjamin and Lily.

source: imdb.com

Joseph Wilson Swan - Invented the Light Bulb - ( Biography )

2009-12-17T16:28:00.000-08:00

Although the English physicist and chemist Joseph Swan is most remembered for making an early electric light bulb, he also invented a dry photographic process. This invention lead to a huge improvement in photography and progress toward the development of modern photographic film.

Joseph Swan Portrait Joseph Wilson Swan was born on Oct. 31, 1828, in Sunderland, and he served an apprenticeship with a pharmacist there. He later became a partner in Mawson's, a firm of manufacturing chemists in Newcastle. This company existed as Mawson Swan and Morgan until recently. He worked at the company premises at 13 Mosley Street. In 1860 Swan developed a primitive electric light bulb that used a filament of carbonised paper in an evacuated glass bulb. However, the lack of good vacuum and an adequate electric source resulted in a short lifetime for the bulb and an inefficient light.

When working with wet photographic plates, he noticed that heat increased the sensitivity of the silver bromide emulsion. By 1871 he had devised a method of drying the wet plates, initiating the age of convenience in photography. Eight years later he patented bromide paper, the paper commonly used in modern photographic prints.

Swan's light bulb design was substantially that used by Thomas Alva Edison in America nearly 20 years later. In 1880, after the improvement of vacuum techniques, both Swan and Edison produced a practical light bulb. Three years later, while searching for a better carbon filament for his light bulb, Swan patented a process for squeezing nitro-cellulose through holes to form fibres. The textile industry has used his process. Swan was knighted in 1904. He died on May 27, 1914, in Warlingham, Surrey.

source: timmonet.co.uk

Alexander Graham Bell - Invented Telephone - ( Biography )

2009-12-17T16:18:00.000-08:00

In 1876, at the age of 29, Alexander Graham Bell invented his telephone. In 1877, he formed the Bell Telephone Company, and in the same year married Mabel Hubbard and embarked on a yearlong honeymoon in Europe.

Alexander Graham Bell might easily have been content with the success of his telephone invention. His many laboratory notebooks demonstrate, however, that he was driven by a genuine and rare intellectual curiosity that kept him regularly searching, striving, and wanting always to learn and to create. He would continue to test out new ideas through a long and productive life. He would explore the realm of communications as well as engage in a great variety of scientific activities involving kites, airplanes, tetrahedral structures, sheep-breeding, artificial respiration, desalinization and water distillation, and hydrofoils.With the enormous technical and later financial success of his telephone invention, Alexander Graham Bell's future was secure, and he was able to arrange his life so that he could devote himself to his scientific interests. Toward this end, in 1881, he used the $10,000 award for winning France's Volta Prize to set up the Volta Laboratory in Washington, D.C. A believer in scientific teamwork, Bell worked with two associates, his cousin Chichester Bell and Charles Sumner Tainter, at the Volta Laboratory. Their experiments soon produced such major improvements in Thomas Edison's phonograph that it became commercially viable. After 1885, when he first visited Nova Scotia, Bell set up another laboratory there at his estate, Beinn Bhreagh (pronounced Ben Vreeah), near Baddeck, where he would assemble other teams of bright young engineers to pursue new and exciting ideas.

Among one of his first innovations after the telephone was the "photophone," a device that enabled sound to be transmitted on a beam of light. Bell and his assistant, Charles Sumner Tainter, developed the photophone using a sensitive selenium crystal and a mirror that would vibrate in response to a sound. In 1881, they successfully sent a photophone message over 200 yards from one building to another. Bell regarded the photophone as "the greatest invention I have ever made; greater than the telephone." Alexander Graham Bell's invention reveals the principle upon which today's laser and fiber optic communication systems are founded, though it would take the development of several modern technologies to realize it fully.

Over the years, Alexander Graham Bell's curiosity would lead him to speculate on the nature of heredity, first among the deaf and later with sheep born with genetic irregularities. His sheep-breeding experiments at Beinn Bhreagh sought to increase the numbers of twin and triplet births. Bell was also willing to attempt inventing under the pressure of daily events, and in 1881 he hastily constructed an electromagnetic device called an induction balance to try and locate a bullet lodged in President Garfield after an assassin had shot him. He later improved this and produced a device called a telephone probe, which would make a telephone receiver click when it touched metal. That same year, Bell's newborn son, Edward, died from respiratory problems, and Bell responded to that tragedy by designing a metal vacuum jacket that would facilitate breathing. This apparatus was a forerunner of the iron lung used in the 1950s to aid polio victims. In addition to inventing the audiometer to detect minor hearing problems and conducting experiments with what today are called energy recycling and alternative fuels, Bell also worked on methods of removing salt from seawater.

However, these interests may be considered minor activities compared to the time and effort he put into the challenge of flight. By the 1890s, Bell had begun experimenting with propellers and kites. His work led him to apply the concept of the tetrahedron (a solid figure with four triangular faces) to kite design as well as to create a new form of architecture. In 1907, four years after the Wright Brothers first flew at Kitty Hawk, Bell formed the Aerial Experiment Association with Glenn Curtiss, William "Casey" Baldwin, Thomas Selfridge, and J.A.D. McCurdy, four young engineers whose common goal was to create airborne vehicles. By 1909, the group had produced four powered aircraft, the best of which, the Silver Dart, made the first successful powered flight in Canada on February 23, 1909. Bell spent the last decade of his life improving hydrofoil designs, and in 1919 he and Casey Baldwin built a hydrofoil that set a world water-speed record that was not broken until 1963. Months before he died, Bell told a reporter, "There cannot be mental atrophy in any person who continues to observe, to remember what he observes, and to seek answers for his unceasing hows and whys about things.

source: inventors.about.com

Stewart Butterfield and Caterina Fake - Founder of Flickr - ( Biography )

2009-12-17T15:26:00.000-08:00

Born Stewart Butterfield in 1973 in Lund, British Columbia; married Caterina Fake. Born Caterina Fake, c. 1969, in Pittsburg, PA; married Stewart Butterfield. Education : Butterfield: Earned B.A. in philosophy from the University of Victoria, and M.Phil. from Cambridge University. Fake: Attended Smith College; earned degree from Vassar College, 1991.

Addresses: Office —Yahoo! Inc., 701 First Ave., Sunnyvale, CA 94089.

Career
Butterfield worked as a programmer in Vancouver, BC, before co-founding Ludicorp with Fake, c. 2001; developer of Game Neverending, c. 2002, and Flickr, 2004; president of Ludicorp, c. 2001–; Ludicorp acquired by Yahoo, March, 2005. Fake worked for an investment bank, as a painter's assistant, on a crew shooting interstitials for Seinfeld and in a dive shop in Arkansas between 1991 and 1994; worked for various Web sites in the San Francisco, CA, area after 1994, including art director for Salon. com; co-founded Ludicorp with Butterfield, c. 2001, and served as its vice president for marketing and community, c. 2001–; Ludicorp acquired by Yahoo, March, 2005.
Sidelights

Husband-and-wife team Stewart Butterfield and Caterina Fake created the online photo-sharing service Flickr in 2004, and continued to run it when their company was acquired by Yahoo in 2005. Butterfield, a respected computer software programmer before Flickr's launch, credited the success of their Web site to a basic truth that similar ventures had failed to grasp: Personal photography, he explained, is "meant to be shared, talked about, pointed to, saved, archived, and available by as many means as possible," he explained to USA Today writer Jefferson Graham.

Butterfield, born in 1973, hails from a town in British Columbia called Lund. He earned his undergraduate degree in philosophy from the University of Victoria, and went on to graduate studies at Cambridge University in England, where he studied the philosophy of biology, cognitive science, and the philosophy of mind toward a master's degree in philosophy. Returning to British Columbia and settling in Vancouver, he found work as a computer programmer and Web-design consultant for several large companies.

In a 2000 side project, Butterfield launched a contest for the best Web site under 5 kilobytes in size—almost the bare minimum of space necessary to launch a Web page. "Constraints of some kind are present in just about every creative activity," he told Colby Cosh of Alberta Report about the 5 KB maximum size for the contest, citing other creative endeavors that were also restricted by certain parameters. "Typography is concerned with hundreds of tiny ratios that must be observed. Architects have to deal with constraints ranging from the strength of their materials to the height of the human body," he noted.

Fake, a Filipino-American from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is four years older than Butterfield and also gained renown in the West-Coast Internet-technology boom of the late 1990s. She attended a private prep school in Connecticut, Choate Rosemary Hall, and went on to Smith College in Massachusetts before earning a literature degree from Vas-sar College in 1991. Over the next three years, she worked in investment banking, as an assistant to a painter, and part of the crew that shot interstitials, or filler programming, for the hit television series Seinfeld . She moved to San Francisco in 1994, and found work for a series of Web-based ventures, eventually becoming the art director for the online magazine Salon.com. Her personal site, caterina.net, was one of the first Web logs, or "blogs," to gain a following on the Internet, and Butterfield was one of the many technophiles who read it regularly.

Butterfield and Fake met at a San Francisco party in 2000, where she turned down his request for a date because she was already romantically involved with someone else—Evan Williams, a co-creator of Blog-ger, one of the earliest first blog-publishing and hosting sites. When Fake and Williams parted ways, Butterfield learned of the news via caterina.net, and asked her out the next time he was visiting San Francisco. The date was an invite to come skiing with him in British Columbia, which she accepted, and during that trip he suggested that they create a Web site together.

Fake moved to Vancouver in 2001, and she and But-terfield set up Ludicorp, a small company whose original goal was to launch a massive multiplayer computer game they called Game Neverending. It was in the development stage from 2002 to 2004, and as a side project Ludicorp tried out a unique photo-sharing feature for the gamers who used their site; the tool proved so popular that within a few months Butterfield and Fake had shut down Game Neverending entirely in order to concentrate on what became Flickr. "Had we sat down and said, 'Let's start a photo application,' we would have failed," Fake told USA Today 's Graham. "We would have done all this research and done all the wrong things."

Flickr was officially launched in February of 2004 after a three-month tryout. The site began to gain large numbers of users each month, thanks in part to its fortuitous timing: There had been a recent explosion of lower-priced digital cameras on the consumer electronics market, along with a growing number of home broadband subscribers, which made uploading large image files to a distant Web site much quicker than using a dial-up connection. There were a few other online photo sites up and running at the time, but these depended on revenue from orders for prints; Flickr offered users 20 megabytes of space a month for free, which could host ten to 25 pictures, or users could sign up for a $24.95 a year fee, which granted them access to an advertising-free version of the site and the ability to upload two gigabytes' worth of images each month.

One of Flickr's most innovative features is the way in which users can tag their photos—giving them simple descriptors such as subject, locale, or even color. The tagging feature was not part of Flickr at the onset, but was an idea Butterfield and Fake borrowed from another Web site, del.icio.us, which allowed its users to store and share Web bookmarks online using similar self-created tags. One early feature of Flickr, however, did help it spread quickly in the online community, and that was its "Blog this" button, which allowed users to create a link between the Flickr page in question and their own personal blog. "We were very small and very poor," Fake explained to Newsweek writers Steven Levy and Brad Stone about this tool, "so we built a lot of features that were deliberately viral."

Just a year after its launch, Flickr could no longer be classified as a small, struggling start-up: In March of 2005, Ludicorp, its parent company, was acquired by Yahoo for a price tag estimated at $35 million. Butterfield and Fake moved to Sunnyvale, California, where Yahoo is headquartered, along with the rest of their Flickr team, and continue to run the company. Despite the fact that there were three million registered users, the site had become a bit easier to manage for the couple. As Butterfield told Graham in the USA Today interview, there was a period when he and Fake were preoccupied by "Flickr in the office and Flickr at home," but conceded that the pair were "getting slightly better at marking the boundary between work and play."

source: notablebiographies.com

Jack Dorsey - Founder of Twitter - ( Biography )

2009-12-17T14:50:00.000-08:00

Jack Dorsey (born November 19, 1976) is an American software architect and businessperson best known as the creator of Twitter. BusinessWeek called him one of technology's "best and brightest". MIT's Technology Review named him in the TR35, an outstanding innovator under the age of 35.

Early Year
Dorsey grew up in St. Louis, Missouri. By age 14, he was interested in dispatch routing. Some of his open source software in this genre is still in use by taxicab companies.He went to high school at Bishop Dubourg Highschool He attended University of Missouri–Rolla and New York University. While working on dispatching as a programmer he later moved to California.

In Oakland in 2000, Dorsey started his company to dispatch couriers, taxis, and emergency services from the Web.His other projects and ideas at this time included networks of medical devices and a "frictionless service market". In July 2000, building on dispatching and inspired in part by LiveJournal and possibly by AOL Instant Messenger, he had the idea for the realtime status communication.

When he first saw implementations of instant messaging, Dorsey had wondered if the software's user status output could be shared among friends easily. He approached Odeo, who at the time happened to be interested in text messaging. Dorsey and Biz Stone decided that SMS text suited the status message idea, and built a prototype of Twitter in about two weeks. The idea attracted many users at Odeo and investment from Evan Williams who had left Google after selling them Pyra Labs and Blogger.

Dorsey, Stone and Williams co-founded Obvious which then spun off Twitter, Inc. As chief executive officer, Dorsey saw the startup through two rounds of funding by the venture capitalists who back the company. On 16 October 2008 Williams took over the role of CEO, and Dorsey became chairman of the board.

As the service grew in popularity, Dorsey had to choose improving uptime as top priority, even over creating revenue – which, as of 2008, Twitter was not designed to earn. Dorsey described the commercial use of Twitter and its API as two things that could lead to paid features. His three guiding principles, which are shared by the whole company and through its culture, are simplicity, constraint and craftsmanship.

source: en.wikkipedia.org

Markus Frind - Founder of PlentyofFish ( Biography )

2009-12-17T14:39:00.000-08:00

In 2003, Markus Frind, a Canadian resident, launched a new online dating venture called PlentyofFish. He coded the site himself, with knowledge from his education and jobs at various dot com companies. The unique selling point of PlentyofFish was that it was 100% free. Frind would depend on revenue from Google Adsense, affiliate programs, and ads to drive his revenue.

And drive his revenue he did.

As of 2008, PlentyofFish was grossing nearly $10 million a year. With Google Adsense alone, Frind was averaging $10,000 a day. Yes, a day.

Frind first got the idea of opening up PlentyofFish.com from his online dating experiences in 2001. His frustrations with the paid system let him to focus on creating an online dating service of his own - one that was free.

As of 2008, PlentyofFish had more than 1.2 million active members and at any given time has 40,000 - 60,000 people using or visitng the site at the same time. PlentyofFish is built using Microsoft technologies and ASP.NET.

The About Team page on PlentyofFish sums up the amount of work Markus does by himself. Here's what the About Team page lists:

CTO – Markus Frind
CFO – Markus Frind
VP Business Development – Markus Frind
VP Marketing – Markus Frind
Development Team – Markus Frind
Board Members – Markus Frind
Customer Service – Markus Frind and Girlfriend

Quotes from Markus Frind

About PlentyofFish Site Looking Basic
"To many people assume an "original idea" is just something that looks visually different then others. I created the first real free dating and the first one that actually worked. Just like Google created the first real search engine that worked." (from interview with Work Happy blog)

About Building PlentyofFish into a Successful Venture.
"basically I spent every waking minute when I wasn't at my day job reading, studying, and learning. I picked out "enemies" and did everything I could to defeat them which ment being bigger then them. I refused to accept defeat of any kind, and I constantly forced myself to test new things."

About Whether PlentyofFish Threatens the Paid Online Dating Industry
"Well I think it really depends on the market. In cities where there's a lot of wealth and a lot of money, I don't think PlentyofFish will have that deep of a market penetration, but in other areas, for instance in Canada, PlentyofFish is by far the largest dating site.."

About Competition from New Free Online Dating Services
"A lot of VC’s are throwing around a lot of money and probably have funded some of the other free sites, but I have so much of a head start that I don’t think there’s much they can do."

About Creating and Coding the Site (Frind uses ASP.NET)
"I just wrote everything myself. Everything is super simple, nothing more complex than an if-for-while loop. No built-in controls, nothing. The hardest thing is database access." (from interview with ARCast.TV)

About the Potential of Selling PlentyofFish
"I can either sell and walk away with a few hundred million or start an office and grow the site. So in the coming weeks/months i’m going to turn my hobby into a business." (from an August 2007 post on his blog)

source: onlinedatingmagazine.com

Orkut Buyukkokten - Founder of Orkut.com ( Biography )

2009-12-17T14:32:00.000-08:00

Orkut Buyukkokten, born on Feb 6, 1975 in Konya, Turkey is a software engineer. He holds a BSC degree in computer Engineering and Information Science and later earned PH.D. in computer science from Stanford university. He is the man who created Orkut, the largest and biggest social networking site.

Orkut started working with Google in 2002. And later he developed Orkut.com as his 20% independent project. Orkut Buyukkokten worked very hard to make it real and user friendly. This effort from this young, dynamic engineer made Orkut successful, in no time.

Few time later Affinity Engines, a software company filed a legal suite against Orkut Buyukkokten and Google saying that they copied their source code to develop Orkut. It was a huge controversy at that time.

Being the founder and creator of Orkut, he holds the first user ID on Orkut.

Ramu Yalamanchi - Founder of social networking website Hi5 - ( Biography )

2009-12-17T13:52:00.000-08:00

Ramu Yalamanchi is an Indian entrepreneur, founder and Chief Product Officer of Hi5. In that role, he oversees product strategy and development, focusing on the company's social entertainment business. After launching hi5 in 2003, Ramu led the company to profitability within the first year of operation, and continues to drive the vision for what has become one of the world's largest consumer entertainment services.

Prior to starting hi5, Ramu played a key role in technology companies that have advanced online advertising and the progression of Internet communities. He was an early contributor serving in product management, business development, and sales at eGroups (acquired by Yahoo!) and AdKnowledge (acquired by CMGI). In his final year of college, Ramu helped launch Sponsornet - the Web's first advertising network. Prior to these experiences, Ramu learned about company building and business leadership from his entrepreneurial father, who established and managed more than a half dozen companies as Ramu was growing up in the suburbs of Chicago.

Ramu holds a B.S. in computer science from the University of Illinois – Urbana, Champaign.

Check out the Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYnYbu3Kx0k

source: corp.playspan.com

Tom Anderson - Founder of Myspace - ( Biography )

2009-12-17T13:36:00.000-08:00

Internet entrepreneur. Born October 13, 1975 in Santa Monica, California. Anderson received his Bachelor's degree in Rhetoric and English from the University of California, Berkeley in 1998 and his Master's in Film from the University of California, Los Angeles in 2000. In 2003, Anderson, Chris DeWolfe and a few computer programmers set up the first pages of MySpace, which was designed to connect musicians and bands with their fans, enabling them to share their music online.

MySpace quickly became the rage among teens and 20-somethings and has since become the most popular social networking website on the Internet. Anderson now serves as President of the company; DeWolfe is its CEO. All newly created MySpace accounts include Anderson as a default "friend," and he has subsequently become the public face of MySpace. As the most widely recognized personality on MySpace, Anderson has been the subject of parody among its users and the media at large.

In July 2005, Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation purchased MySpace.com for $580 million. By 2006, MySpace reportedly had more than 106 million accounts and 230,000 new registrations per day.

source: biography.com

Stephen Robert Irwin - Crocodile Hunter - ( Biography )

2009-12-16T09:15:00.000-08:00

Stephen Robert Irwin was born to Lyn and Bob Irwin on 22 February, 1962, in upper Fern Tree Gully, Victoria. He moved with his parents and two sisters to Beerwah, Queensland, where his folks opened the Beerwah Reptile and Fauna Park in 1970.

Steve grew up loving all wildlife, especially reptiles. He caught his first venomous snake (a Common Brown) at the tender age of six and would often arrive late to school after convincing his mother to pull over so he could rescue a lizard off the road.

By the time he was nine-years-old, he was helping his dad catch small problem crocodiles hanging around boat ramps by jumping on them in the water and wrestling them back into the dinghy. He always had an uncanny sixth sense when it came to wildlife and he spent his life honing that skill.

In the 1980s Steve spent months on end living in the most remote areas of far North Queensland catching problem crocodiles before they ended up shot by a poacher’s bullet. He worked with his little dog, Sui, and developed crocodile capture and management techniques that are now utilised with crocodilians around the world.

By 1980, the family wildlife park was called the ‘Queensland Reptile and Fauna Park’ and where Steve called home. Steve and his best mate, Wes Mannion, worked countless hours caring for the wildlife and maintaining the grounds.

In 1991 Steve took over managing the wildlife park and met Terri Rains, a visiting tourist, on 6 October. Steve and Terri were married in Eugene, Oregon, on 4 June 1992 at the Methodist church Terri’s grandmother used to attend.

Instead of a honeymoon, the couple embarked on filming a wildlife documentary with John Stainton from the ‘Best Picture Show’ company. The show was so successful it turned into a series and the Crocodile Hunter was born.

After Steve’s parents retired in the 1992 Steve worked tirelessly to improve and expand his wildlife park. Re-naming it Australia Zoo in 1998, Steve’s vision for the world’s best Zoo was coming to fruition. In July 2006 Steve set out his ten year business plan for his beloved zoo. He couldn’t know he would be gone just two months later, but he believed his conservation work would go on. His two beautiful children will make sure it does.

Ilayaraja - Musician - ( Biography )

2009-12-15T02:45:00.000-08:00

Real/Other Names:: Bhavatharini Ilayaraja

Date of Birth:: June 02, 1943(Age-66)

Place of Birth:: Pannaipuram, Theni district, Tamil Nadu,

Family and Relations

Father: Ramaswamy

Mother: Chinnathayammal

Spouse: Jeeva

Son(s): Karthik Raja and Yuvan Shankar Raja

Daughter: Bhavatharini

Early life:

Growing up in a rural area, Ilaiyaraaja was exposed to a range of Tamil folk music.At the age of 14, he joined a travelling musical troupe headed by hiselder stepbrother, Pavalar Varadarajan, and spent the next decadeperforming throughout South India. While working with the troupe, he penned his first composition, a musical setting of an elegy written by the Tamil poet laureate Kannadasan for Jawaharlal Nehru, India's first prime minister.

In 1968, Ilaiyaraaja began a music course with Professor Dhanraj in Madras (now Chennai), which included an overview of Western classical music, compositional training in techniques such as counterpoint, and study in instrumental performance.Ilaiyaraaja specialized in classical guitar and had done a course in it with the Trinity College of Music, London.

Session musician and film orchestrator:

In the 1970s in Chennai, Ilaiyaraaja played guitar in a band-for-hire, and worked as a session guitarist, keyboardist, organist for film music composers and directors such as Salil Chowdhury from West Bengal.After his hiring as the musical assistant to Kannada film composer G. K. Venkatesh, he worked on 200 film projects, mostly in the Kannada language.As G. K. Venkatesh's assistant, Ilaiyaraaja would orchestratethe melodic outlines developed by Venkatesh. During this period,Ilaiyaraaja also began writing his own scores. To hear hiscompositions, he would persuade Venkatesh's session musicians to play excerpts from his scores during their break times.Ilaiyaraaja would hire instruments from composer R. K. Shekhar, father of composer A. R. Rahman who would later join Ilaiyaraaja's orchestra as a keyboardist.

Film composer:

In 1976, film producer Panchu Arunachalam commissioned him to compose the songs and film score for a Tamil-language film called Annakkili('The Parrot'). For the soundtrack, Ilaiyaraaja applied the techniquesof modern popular film music orchestration to Tamil folk poetry andfolk song melodies, which created a fusion of Western and Tamil idioms.Ilaiyaraaja's use of Tamil music in his film scores injected new influence into the Indian film score milieu.By the mid-1980s Ilaiyaraaja was gaining increasing stature as a filmcomposer and music director in the South Indian film industry.

Besides Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Kannada films, he has scored music for Hindi (or Bollywood) film productions such as Sadma (1983), Mahadev (1989), Lajja (2001) and Cheeni Kum (2007). He has worked with Indian poets and lyricists such as Gulzar, Kannadasan, Vairamuthu and T.S. Rangarajan (Vaali),and film directors such as K. Balachander, K. Vishwanath, Singeetham Srinivasa Rao, Balu Mahendra and Mani Ratnam.In recent times (Since the late 2000s, Ilayaraja had not scored for atop banner project; he had been scoring for low-budget quickies. But2009 marks Ilayaraja's comeback to MegaBudget films, as he is scoringfor the prestigious 25-Crore Budget Malayalam movie, Pazhassiraja, Directed by Hariharan, and scripted by M.T. Vasudevan Nair, with Sound Mixing by Resul Pookutty.

Impact and musical style:

Ilaiyaraaja was one of the early Indian film composers to useWestern classical music harmonies and string arrangements in Indianfilm music.This allowed him to craft a rich tapestry of sounds for films, and his themes and background score gained notice and appreciation amongst Indian film audiences.The range of expressive possibilities in Indian film music wasbroadened by Ilaiyaraaja's methodical approach to arranging, recordingtechnique, and his drawing of ideas from a diversity of musical styles.

According to musicologist P. Greene, Ilaiyaraaja's "deepunderstanding of so many different styles of music allowed him tocreate syncretic pieces of music combining very different musicalidioms in unified, coherent musical statements". Ilaiyaraaja has composed Indian film songs that amalgamated elements of genres such as pop,acoustic guitar-propelled Western folk,jazz,rock and roll, dance music (e.g., disco),psychedelia,funk,doo-wop,march,bossa nova,flamenco, pathos,Indian folk/traditional,Afro-tribal,and Indian classical.

By virtue of this variety and his interfusion of Western, Indian folk and Carnatic elements, Ilaiyaraaja's compositions appeal to the Indian rural dweller for its rhythmic folk qualities, the Indian classical music enthusiast for the employment of Carnatic ragams,and the urbanite for its modern, Western-music sound.Although Ilaiyaraaja uses a range of complex compositionaltechniques, he often sketches out the basic melodic ideas for films ina very spontaneous fashion.The Indian filmmaker Mani Ratnam illustrates:

"Ilayaraja (sic) would look at the scene once, andimmediately start giving notes to his assistants, as a bunch ofmusicians, hovering around him, would collect the notes for their instrument and go to their places... A director can be taken by surprise at the speed of events."

Musical characteristics:

Ilaiyaraaja's music is characterised by the use of an orchestrationtechnique that is a synthesis of Western and Indian instruments andmusical modes. He used electronic music technology that integrated synthesisers, electric guitars and keyboards, drum machines, rhythm boxes and MIDI with large orchestras that feature traditional instruments such as the veena, venu, nadaswaram, dholak, mridangam and tabla as well as Western lead instruments such as saxophones and flutes.

He uses catchy melodies fleshed out with a variety of chord progressions, beats and timbres.Ilaiyaraaja's songs typically have a musical form where vocal stanzas and choruses are interspersed with orchestral preludes and interludes.They often contain polyphonic melodies, where the lead vocals are interwoven with supporting melody lines sung by another voice or played by instruments.

The bass lines in his songs tend to be (melodically) dynamic, rising and falling in a dramatic fashion.Polyrhythmsare also apparent, particularly in songs with Indian folk or Carnaticinfluences. The melodic structure of his songs demand considerablevocal virtuosity, and have found expressive platform amongst some ofIndia's respected vocalists and playback singers, such as K.J. Yesudas, S.P. Balasubramaniam, S. Janaki, Sujatha, Swarnalatha, P. Susheela, K.S. Chithra, Malaysia Vasudevan, Asha Bhosle and Lata Mangeshkar.

Ilaiyaraaja has sung over 400 of his own compositions for films, and is recognisable by his stark, nasal voice. He has penned the lyrics for some of his songs in Tamil and other languages.Ilaiyaraaja's film scores are known both for the dramatic and evocativemelodies, and for the more subtle background music that he uses toprovide texture or mood for scenes in films such as Mouna Raagam (1986) and Geethanjali (1989).

Non-cinematic output:

Ilaiyaraaja's first two non-film albums were explorations in the fusion of Indian and Western classical music. The first, How To Name It? (1986),[56] is dedicated to the Carnatic master Tyāgarāja and to J. S. Bach. It features a fusion of the Carnatic form and ragas with Bach partitas, fugues and Baroque musical textures.The second, Nothing But Wind (1988), was performed by flautist Hariprasad Chaurasiaand a 50-piece orchestra and takes the conceptual approach suggested inthe title — that music is a natural phenomenon akin to various forms ofair currents (e.g., the wind, breeze, tempest etc.).

He has composed a set of Carnatic kritis that was recorded by electric mandolinist U. Srinivas for the album Ilayaraaja's Classicals on the Mandolin (1994).Ilaiyaraaja has also composed albums of religious/devotional songs. His Guru Ramana Geetam (2004) is a cycle of prayer songs inspired by the Hindu mystic Ramana Maharishi,and his Thiruvasakam: A crossover (2005) is an oratorio of ancient Tamil poems transcribed partially in English by American lyricist Stephen Schwartz and performed by the Budapest Symphony Orchestra.Ilaiyaraaja's most recent release is a world music-oriented album called The Music Messiah (2006).Its musical concept is based against a mythological narrative.Hisrecent release in nov.2008 is Manikantan Geet Mala released by indiatales with 9 songs praising lord ayyappa in almost all south indianlanguages.

Notable works:

Ilaiyaraaja's composition Rakkama Kaiya Thattu from the movie Thalapathi (1991) was amongst the songs listed in a BBC World Top Ten music poll.He composed the music for Nayakan (1987), an Indian film ranked by TIME Magazine as one of the all-time 100 best movies,a number of India's official entries to the Oscars, such as Anjali (1990) and Hey Ram (2000),and for Indian art films such as Adoor Gopalakrishnan's FIPRESCI Prize-winning Nizhalkkuthu ('The Dance of Shadows') (2002).

Ilaiyaraaja has composed music for events such as the 1996 Miss World beauty pageant that was held in Bangalore, India, and for a documentary called India 24 Hours (1996).The pop/hip-hop band Black Eyed Peas sampled an Ilaiyaraaja composition called "Unakkum Ennakum", from the film Sri Raghavendra (1985), for their tune "The Elephunk Theme" from their breakout album, Elephunk (2003).The alternative artist M.I.A. sampled his composition "Kaatukuyilu," from the film Thalapathi (1991) for her song "Bamboo Banga" on the album Kala (2007).

Live performances:

Ilaiyaraaja rarely performs his music live, which may be due to the time he devotes to his composing activities.His last major live performance, the first in 25 years, was a four-hour concert held at the Jawaharlal Nehru Indoor Stadium in Chennai, India on October 16, 2005. The show was widely televised both in India and abroad. Less well-known was his live 2004 performance in Italyat the Teatro Comunale di Modena, an event-concert presented for the14th edition of Angelica, Festival Internazionale Di Musica,co-produced with the L'Altro Suono Festival. He had done a few small-scale shows early in his career in Sri Lanka and Malaysia and was involved in a charity concert to raise funds for the construction of a Hindu temple in India. A television retrospective titled Ithu Ilaiyaraja ('This is Ilaiyaraja') was produced, chronicling his career.

Notable movies:

Some of Ilayaraaja's famous works include music direction for thefollowing movies: Anjali, Amman Kovil Kizhakale, Chinna Thambi, IdhayaKovil, Ilamai Oonjaladuthu, Johnny, Karagatakaaran, Kizhakku Vasal,Mella Thirandhathu Kadhavu, Moondram Pirai, Mouna Raagam,Nayagan,Nenjathai Killathey, Nizhalgal, Pagalil Oru Iravu, Pudhu PudhuArthangal, Salangai Oli, Sindhu Bhairavi and Thalapathi

Honours:

Ilaiyaraaja has won the National Film Award for Best Music Direction for the all the two Tamil films Salangaioli (1984), Sindhu Bhairavi (1986) and the Telgu film Rudraveena (1989).[79] He won the Gold Remi Award for Best Music Score jointly with film composer M. S. Viswanathan at the WorldFest-Houston Film Festival for the film Vishwa Thulasi (2005).

He was conferred the title Isaignani ('savant of music') in 1988 by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi and received the Kalaimamani Award, an annual award for excellence in the field of arts from the Government of the State of Tamil Nadu, India.He also received State Government Awards from the governments of Kerala (1995), Andhra Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh (The Lata Mangeshkar Award) (1998) for excellence in music.

He was awarded honorary doctorates by Annamalai University, Tamil Nadu, India (Degree of Doctor of Letter (Honoris causa)) (March, 1994), the World University Round Table, Arizona, U.S.A. (Cultural Doctorate in Philosophy of Music) (April, 1994), and Madurai Kamaraj University, Tamil Nadu (Degree of Doctor of Letters) (1996).He received an Award of Appreciation from the Foundation and Federation of Tamil Sangams of North America (1994), and later that year was presented with an honorary citizenship and key to the Teaneck township by Mr. John Abraham, Mayor of Teaneck, New Jersey, U.S.A.

Ananda Krishnan - Malaysian Billionaire - ( Biography )

2009-12-14T03:02:00.000-08:00

Tatparanandam Ananda Krishnan (Tamil: த. ஆனந்தகிருஷ்ணன்; born 1938) is a Malaysian businessman and philanthropist of Sri Lankan Tamil origin. Nicknamed TAK, he is currently[update] estimated to have a net worth of US$7.4 billion according to Forbes' latest annual list of billionaires, making him the third wealthiest man in Southeast Asia behind Robert Kuok and Ng Teng Fong and number 119 in the world. Ananda Krishnan is also the wealthiest Tamil in the world, ahead of Shiv Nadar, who is the 10th richest man in India.

Ananda Krishnan shuns public exposure and is known to maintain a low profile for a person of his stature.

Early life
Ananda Krishnan was born in 1938 in Brickfields, Kuala Lumpur's "Little India" to Tamil parents of Sri Lankan origin. His family originates from Jaffna, Sri Lanka.

He studied at Vivekananda Tamil School in Brickfields, Kuala Lumpur and furthered his studies at Victoria Institution, Kuala Lumpur. Later, as a Colombo Plan scholar, he attended the University of Melbourne, Australia for his B.A. (Honours) degree majoring in political science. During that time he boarded in the Melbourne suburb of Hawthorn. Following that, Krishnan obtained a Masters in Business Administration at Harvard University, graduating in 1964.

Business
Krishnan’s first entrepreneurial venture was in oil trading. He set up Exoil Trading, which went on to purchase oil drilling concessions in various countries. Later, he moved into gambling (in Malaysia). In the early part of the 1990s, he started diversifying into the multimedia arena.

Currently, he has business interests in entertainment, satellite television (Astro), space (MEASAT), shipping (Bumi Armada), telecommunications (Maxis, Aircel). Through the privately owned Usaha Tegas Sdn. Bhd., he owns stakes in Tanjong Public Limited Company, an investment holding company with subsidiaries involved in Power Generation (Powertek), Gaming (Pan Malaysian Pools), Leisure (Tropical Island and Tanjong Golden Village (TGV)) and Property Investment (Menara Maxis).

Multimedia dealings
He first came to prominence by helping to organize the Live Aid concert with Bob Geldof in the mid-1980s. In the early 1990s, he began building a multimedia empire that now includes two telecommunication companies - Maxis Communications and MEASAT Broadcast Network Systems - and has three communication satellites circumnavigating the earth.

He also effected the purchase of 46% of Maxis Communications, the country's largest cellular phone company, from British Telecom and AT&T for $680 million - raising his stake to 70%. Maxis has more than eight million subscribers, with around 40% market share in Malaysia. Recently, Maxis has acquired Aircel, Tamil Nadu's largest cellular phone company and has plans to expand to rest of India. Maxis is also under negotiation to buy over and expand an Indonesian cellular phone company.

In an agreement between Astro and India's Sun Network, Ananda plans to produce TV channels which cater to the Indian market, especially Tamil diaspora in countries such as US and Europe. Ananda also plans to offer TV services featuring Web-based interactivity.

Ananda Krishnan owns stakes in TVB.com and the Shaw Brothers movie archives.

Benny Hinn - Preacher - ( Biography )

2009-12-14T02:20:00.000-08:00

Benny Hinn was born on December 3, 1952, in Israel’s port city of Jaffa (part of modern Tel Aviv), where his family had set up residence after emigrating from Greece. Then, shortly after The Six-Day War broke out in 1967, the Hinn’s immigrated to Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

In February 1972, Benny’s life took on a whole new meaning when he surrendered his heart and life to Jesus Christ. Then in late 1973, Methodist minister Jim Poynter invited Benny to join him on a trip to Pennsylvania to attend a Kathryn Kuhlman service. Each word stirred his soul deeply, and he yearned to meet this wonderful Person of whom she spoke. An indescribable hunger gripped him, and his heart cried out, “I’ve got to know Him!”

What began during that prayer was not only the start of a lifelong journey that has since taken Benny Hinn around the globe many times but is the basis for Good Morning, Holy Spirit, first published in 1990, which topped the Christian bestseller charts for sixteen months and is now translated into forty languages.

From his humble beginnings in Israel, where his stuttering tongue held him captive, to the moment in 1974 when his tongue was instantaneously freed and his life was forever transformed by God’s miracle-working power as he stood to deliver his first sermon in a small church in Ontario, Benny’s uniquely fresh relationship with God and his commitment to God’s work has directed the course of his life.

During 1990, with growing demands and an increased number of crusades, Benny Hinn reluctantly chose to leave the Orlando church in 1999 in order to focus his efforts on the expanding evangelistic outreach and television ministry. The viewing audience of the daily program grew rapidly, and soon the program was broadcast around the world via secular television, Christian television networks, satellite, and the Internet. During recent years, memorable crusades have included audiences of up to 7.3 million (three services) in India, the largest healing service in recorded history.

In addition to Holy Spirit Miracle Crusades and daily television, Pastor Benny’s ministry is also engaged in crisis relief, children’s homes, feeding programs, as well as hospital and emergency care. During 2007 alone, the ministry helped provide food, clothing, shelter, education, and religious training for 46,368 children around the globe (including partnerships with thirty-one different missionary and relief agencies), and it will also continue to completely underwrite all expenses of such powerful outreaches as a hospital in Calcutta, India, where over two hundred thousand patients are treated. Pastor Benny is quick to point out that these and other programs are made possible through the generous donations of partners and friends of Benny Hinn Ministries.

Benny Hinn is a best-selling author. In addition to his first blockbuster, Good Morning, Holy Spirit, he has also written such far-reaching books as The Blood, He Touched Me (his autobiography), Lamb of God, Total Recovery, and Prayer That Gets Results.

Benny Hinn and his wife, Suzanne, are the proud parents of three daughters and a son, as well as a grandson. They reside in Southern California. The corporate headquarters for Benny Hinn Ministries/World Healing Center Church are located in Grapevine, Texas.

Bro.Mohan C Lazarus - Preacher - Biography

2009-12-14T01:55:00.000-08:00

Bro. Mohan C. Lazarus was born as the second child to the wealthy parents Mr. Chiththiraippándi and Mrs. Kani Ammal in Nalumavadi a small beautiful village. While this loving couple had four male children, the LORD had chosen Bro. Mohan C. Lazarus for His eternal cause.

Though in his early days Bro. Mohan C. Lazarus was brought up according to the staunch native religious tradition of his family, the LORD’s mantle fell on this frail looking youngster. The inculcation was such that, he used to have combative arguments with those who spoke about Jesus. His feeble mind could equate Jesus only with the Buddha and Gandhi and not more than that. He could not comprehend the Godhood of Jesus. Moreover, the indoctrination that he imbibed had developed detestation toward Jesus and his followers alike!

In this situation, during his early teen age, strictly speaking, in his fourteenth year, he was severely affected by an undeciphered heart ailment. The money consuming diverse medical treatments failed to sweep away the malady; instead, his heart began to bulging out more conspicuously. As a result, his body was paralyzed and he was confined to bed. His days were begun to be numbered.

Nevertheless, his loving parents did not lose hope. They prayed to every god and goddess with various vows and pledges except the Christian ‘God’ Jesus as this very name was anathema to them. The days were passing by. No change was visible on his health. It became to deteriorate day by day.

Relatives and neighbors began to line up to have a last look of this dying young boy! Tears and grief engulfed the whole family. At this precarious scenario, our gracious LORD sent one of His vessels to counter with His eternally chosen tool to bring him unto His Fold! His parents did not appose this man’s move; for, inwardly they expect their son’s curing eagerly! The visiting man began to pray with compassion and determination. Even as he prayed the power of God descended upon the sickly boy. The miracle unfolded! The impossible transformed into possible! After the prayer the boy slowly got up and sat on his bed. Amazing had happened! In spite of losing hopes of all, he started a new lease of life!

The hitherto unbelievable caring love and consoling grace of the LORD Jesus cleansed his body, soul and mind. He realized the unfathomed compassion of the Light of the World! He began to aware of the true Way in Him! Jesus Christ became his LORD and Saviour from that moment onwards!

After that heavenly sent moment, the burning zeal for his Heavenly Master propelled him to burn for His cause of building His Kingdom by propagating His unchanging love and compassion towards the entire humanity sans any partiality.

Now Bro. Mohan C. Lazarus is a world-renowned evangelist whom our mighty God uses in a very potent way. Through him, the LORD started His Ministry by name – ‘Jesus Redeems Ministry’ at this tiny hamlet – NÁLUMÁVÀDI, with a core object of telling the world that the LORD Jesus Christ is the only Redeemer and Saviour of the whole Universe!

DGS.Dhinakaran - Evangelist - ( Biography )

2009-12-14T01:44:00.000-08:00

Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran is the founder of the Jesus Calls Ministry. Born on July 1, 1935, he had a very tough life being torn by the ailments of poverty and agony of unemployment.

Unable to bear the agony of these problems, on February 11, 1955, Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran decided to put an end to his life. He started towards the nearest railway track in his village to throw himself before the speeding train when he was stopped by his uncle who introduced Jesus Christ. He experienced a sudden wave of divine peace and hope, flood his heart. His mind was transformed and he returned home enlightened.

After this incident, things started happening in him supernaturally. There arose an unquenchable thirst in him to spend hours together poring over the life-transforming pages of eternal Truth - The Bible, discovering secrets that could revolutionize human life. He spent hours talking to God and sought Him with all his heart.

The High Calling

Seven years of diligently seeking the Lord Jesus Christ!

Dr. D.G.S.Dhinakaran On October 9, 1962, he tarried at the feet of the Lord Jesus in prayer till midnight. He pleaded persistently. "Lord! Hear my prayer now and grant me Your power! Or else, slay me! I don't want to live as a powerless and phoney Christian!" Next day dawned. 10th October 1962! After an exacting day in the bank, he returned home at 9.30 in the night. Supper over, he joined the family prayers. He longed to have a glimpse of blessed vision of Jesus. The very next moment, a divine presence appeared in front of him! He was thrown into an ecstasy of joy. The Lord opened His eyes and with a radiant face, addressed him with a smile:

"My beloved son! I am Christ! Because you have been seeking Me diligently, I have come seeking you Myself, to bless you".

Yes! For three full hours he saw Lord Jesus face to face. The Lord gave His commission that has made his life a continual blessing to countless.

"My son! People might have heard of My love, but they haven't tasted it. So, I pour My love and compassion in your heart! This love will console their broken hearts and heal their diseased bodies. You will be witness to the power of My Holy Spirit."

Birth of a Ministry

With a glorious vision and words of assurance, God blessed Dr.Dhinakaran His servant profusely for persistently seeking Him.

Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran Thus, the 'JESUS CALLS MINISTRY' came into being as a one-man ministry. Dr.Dhinakaran considered men and women from all over the world, irrespective of their caste, creed, race or language, as his own brothers and sisters. He considered their tears as his own and preached to them the love and compassion of Christ. He invoked the Lord's blessings and pleaded Him to perform miracles that will wipe away the tears of the multitudes.

Apart from his job as a top executive in a bank, he devoted himself to God's ministry with utmost zeal. The power of Christ was manifest in his preaching and prayers. "Jesus Calls Ministry" spread far and wide. Today with God's grace, it has grown into a multi-faceted far-flung ministry, spreading the Good News to the world in 20 different ways.

His wife Stella has stood with him in all his joys and sorrows and also extends her hand in the ministry of wiping tears of millions and building up broken homes. His son Paul has been working with him from the age of 18, when he received the call from the Lord.

The Power of Anointing

On October 10, 1962, Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran was anointed by the Holy Spirit. Since then, whenever he preaches and prays at public meetings, he displays a rare power of interpreting different languages, and speaks the word of wisdom and knowledge. He also meets people personally and replies to letters sent to him by people who search for serenity and comfort in their lives.

Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran During the prayer time at public meetings, guided by the Holy Spirit within Him, he calls out the names of people who are in the crowd and exactly reveals their spiritual, mental, emotional and physical conditions. These people run to the dais and testify confirming what Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran said about their lives is true.

In some meetings, he calls out a few people from the crowd and right before the huge crowd of over four hundred thousands, and reveals their past, their present and foretells the future. People are amazed by the powerful acts of God.

Hundreds of thousands of people write to him seeking solutions to problems that are beyond human comprehension. Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran is inspired by the Holy Spirit to send replies to all the letters he receives. Some problems are so critical that the lives of some people may depend on the answer that comes from above through Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran.

On several occasions, Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran's prayers have stopped a heavy downpour. Such is the power of his prayers that God answers it immediately.

In the Jesus Calls office we have oceans of reports of people who have reported miracles that have transformed their lives. People born blind see, the lame who are carried to the meetings in stretchers are healed and they walk, people who are suffering from tumours and cancer are healed, physical ailments which have tortured people for more than a quarter century vanish in a trice!

On March 2, 1972, Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran delivered his first message from God to people over the FEBA Radio. In 1973, Dr. D.G.S.Dhinakaran went beyond the country to preach in Sri Lanka. Wherever Dr.Dhinakaran went, several thousands gathered in the fields and in the auditorium.

In 1973, Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran started to touch the lives of the people through the written word. In May 1973, he released his first "Jesus Calls Magazine". Miracles started happening in people's lives through the written word.

Besides magazines, Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran has written several books carrying the powerful messages of God. The book titled 'The Gifts Of Holy Spirit' which he wrote recently has become a bestseller and has set ablaze the spiritual life of millions.

On September 26, 1977 the Lord Jesus appeared before Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran and commanded him to train up lay people like him to preach the Gospel. In obedience to this command, he started the 'Institute of Power Ministry' in Chennai in July 1980. Men and women from all parts of India and abroad hailing from different denominations undergo specialised training in practical Evangelism. In this training programme, the Lord anoints the trainees with His Holy Spirit, supernatural power and grace to carry the Good News of His love and compassion to the uttermost parts of the earth. Truly, these Evangelists now shine like stars in their churches as well as in the spiritual world.

In the 1980s, Dr.Dhinakaran also started the video ministry by recording his powerful messages in video cassettes in Malaysia and today thousands of these cassettes are distributed all around the world carrying words of comfort, healing and deliverance to people. People have experienced healing from diseases, revelations and comfort from the Lord Jesus Christ through these cassettes.

Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran & Sis. Angel On August 12, 1983, the Holy Spirit guided Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran to do something for those who are in need for prayer at any time of the day. Therefore Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran erected a 24 Hour Prayer Tower. Today the Prayer Tower is a full-fledged Prayer Centre equipped with modern facilities. Specially chosen and trained Prayer Warriors endowed with the compassion of Christ, attend to such calls round-the-clock. They are also established in various parts of the world.

On July 25, 1985, at 4 O'clock in the morning, the Lord Jesus Christ once again appeared before Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran and revealed about the plan for the young who want to join as partners in the Jesus Calls Ministry. That was how the Young Partners Plan came into being.

On October 10, 1993, he launched the Bethesda Prayer Centre that became the faith-building centre to thousands of people who visit the place to take a look at the seven stations of the cross built there. People are convicted in their hearts as they see these stations and they are reminded of the great loving sacrifice that Christ has done for them, and are moved to tears.

The ministry of Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran took a great turn when he became active with the media. The Jesus Calls Ministry started to produce its own TV programmes in different private channels. Today, millions of people all over India, Asia, Middle East and U.S.A. listen to these messages of hope, love and compassion and also experience the healing touch of Christ.

On November 4, 1986, Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran inaugurated the Karunya Institute of Technology, a residential Engineering College with a strength of 2,800 students.

The Trial

On May 21, 1986, a great tragedy struck this spiritual giant! That was his ultimate test of his faith. He lost his only daughter Angel Dhinakaran in a car accident on his way to the Karunya Institute of Technology, Coimbatore. He was shattered and forsaken. Even today, when he remembers her, he is filled with tears. Yet he did not give up. He recovered from the great shock and continues his ministry in wiping the tears of millions who are in need of Christ's love and compassion.

Great servants of God, like Pastor.Benny Hinn, Dr.Pat Robertson, Dr.Dave Roberson, Pastor.John Osteen honour Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran as the apostle of this age in India.

Having established this multi-faceted ministry, Dr.D.G.S.Dhinakaran continuously and fervently probes into various other possible ways of fulfilling the mission of carrying the love and compassion of Christ to the millions.

Through him, people witness the miracles of Jesus Christ.

The Home Call

Truly, Dr. D.G.S. Dhinakaran was a man after God’s own heart, who healed millions of broken hearted people around the world through his prayers. His prayers were so powerful because the anointing that was in him was awesome. He also had the spirit of compassion in him which moved him to pray with tears for the suffering humanity.

Dr. M.G. "Pat'' Robertson, Chairman of The Christian Broadcasting Network, USA has decribed the spiritual nature of Bro. Dhinakaran very aptly in the following few lines: " Frankly, I cannot recall any figure in the Old Testament or New Testament who has had such a profound and ongoing encounter with the Deity. '' This great man of God, who was raised from a lowly state to pinnacles of glory and honour because of his obedience and faithfulness to the Lord Jesus Christ, slept in Him on 20.2.2008.

In his death the world has lost not only an eminent evangelist but also a humble human being who did exploits for the furtherence of God's Kingdom on this earth. While the Lord Almighty was pleased to take him Home to be with Him, his end in this world is nothing but the End of an Era.

Mark Zuckerberg - Founder of Facebook & World's Youngest Billionaire - ( Biography )

2009-12-14T00:20:00.000-08:00

Mark Zuckerberg, born May 14, 1984, was a Harvard undergraduate when he started the Facebook social networking website. An early fan of computers who had developed a "smart" mp3 player in high school, Zuckerberg had previously been reprimanded by the Harvard administration for his Facemash site, a Harvard-specific photo rating site that operated like HotOrNot.com but used photographs taken from Harvard's online facebook, without the subjects' permission. (A facebook, lower-case, is a collection of student photographs designed to introduce students to each other.)

In February of 2004, he started "The Facebook," which took the goals of those lower-case traditional facebooks and combined them with the social networking of Myspace-like sites. Unlike Facemash, The Facebook was opt-in -- any Harvard student could create an account, and by the end of the month, more than half of the undergraduates had done so. Zuckerberg expanded the service quickly, offering it to all Ivy League schools by the end of the spring and more schools the following semester. The Wirehog site was created as a companion filesharing site for Facebook users, and by the end of 2004, The Facebook had over one million registered users.

The advertising revenue made it easier to raise venture capital, and Zuckerberg and his associates purchased the facebook.com domain from its previous holder and dropped the "The" from the site's name. Over time, Facebook became more and more inclusive, opening its doors to all college students, faculty members, and alumni (anyone with a confirmed educational-domain email address), and in 2006 added networks for high school students. Since fall of 2006, the site has been open to anyone who wishes to join -- a shift away from the student-centric origins which many users have decried.

Meanwhile, a Craigslist-like Facebook Marketplace has been added to the site, along with a platform for offering applications. Microsoft purchased a 1.6% stake in the company for $240 million in October of 2007, and the following month the Facebook Beacon service premiered -- a controversial initiative that blends marketing and social networking, which has come under considerable criticism for the way that it can broadcast information about a user's activity outside of the Facebook site, without adequately warning them.

Zuckerberg moved to Palo Alto to operate Facebook full time, taking a leave of absence from Harvard; the Facebook offices now occupy four downtown buildings.

source: founderbios

Privacy Policy for www.wocelebrities.blogspot.com

2009-04-02T03:14:00.000-07:00

Privacy Policy for www.wocelebrities.blogspot.com
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Pierre Omidyar - Founder of eBay

2008-01-27T05:39:00.000-08:00

The 76th richest person in the world according to Forbes magazine, Pierre Omidyar was born on June 21, 1967, in Paris and grew up predominantly in Washington, D.C. An early interest in computers led to his attending Tufts University, where he graduated with a degree in computer science in 1988. After college, he worked for Apple subsidiary Claris, as part of the team working on the new version of the vector-based drawing program MacDraw.

In the summer of 1995, when he was 28, Omidyar wrote up the code for what would soon become the eBay website. Web commerce was still fairly new at the time, and Auction Web -- as it was called -- premiered with no fanfare as part of Omidyar's personal website. The first sale was of a broken laser pointer for $14.83, and the site quickly built up steam, causing him to put it on its own domain, renamed as eBay -- for Echo Bay, his consulting company. The next year, Jeffrey Skoll was hired as company president and a third-party deal was struck to allow eBay to sell plane tickets. In 1998, eBay went public, making Omidyar and Skoll billionaires, and international eBay sites were soon opened in dozens of countries.

In 2004, Omidyar and his wife Pam founded the Omidyar Network; where the earlier Omidyar Foundation had funded non-profit projects, the Network also provides money for profit ventures that advance its goals. Omidyar believes one of the side effects of the eBay phenomenon has been its illustration of the trust that can exist between strangers, who are exchanging money and goods online without mutual friends, face to face meetings, or physical proof beyond photographs. Equal funds are earmarked for non-profit and profit concerns. Omidyar is also an investor in Meetup.com, a site that he believes will profit from its connection of strangers just as eBay has.

Jeff Bezos - Amazon Founder

2008-01-27T05:36:00.000-08:00

Financial analyst and computer scientist Jeff Bezos founded Amazon.com in 1994, at the cusp of the dotcom explosion. Born January 12, 1964, in Albuquerque, New Mexico, to a teenage mother who divorced his father while Jeff was still a baby, young Jeffrey was a tinkerer from an early age. As a toddler, he took his crib apart with a screwdriver, and when he was older and his mother had remarried Cuban engineer Miguel Bezos, he built an alarm for his room to keep his half-siblings out. Summers were often spent on the 25,000 acre Texas ranch of his grandfather, a retired administrator for the Atomic Energy Commission.

When Bezos enrolled at Princeton, the young science aficionado planned to study physics, but the personal computing revolution had begun with the recent release of the IBM PC and PCjr, and the Apple MacIntosh, and he wound up getting his bachelor's degree in computer science and electrical engineering. After Princeton, he worked as a computer expert on Wall Street during the 80s and early 90s.

In the early 90s, Bezos put together a business plan for an online bookstore, believing that books were a perfect example of a product that could take advantage of the fact that an online store did not have the physical restriction on inventory that brick-and-mortar stores had, and was easier to search through than mail order catalogues. Bezos didn't expect the company -- originally called Cadabra (short for Abracadabra) -- to turn a profit for its first few years of operation, but professed that patience would pay off. The renamed Amazon.com was incorporated in 1994 in Washington state, went public in 1997, and reported its first profits in 2002.

Along the way, Bezos was named Time's Man of the Year in 1999 for his role in the popularity of online shopping, and Amazon has expanded beyond books, offering everything from regular grocery deliveries to high-end electronics. Bezos continued to serve as Amazon's CEO; though his salary is under six figures, he owns nearly a quarter of the company's stock, making him number 35 on Forbes' 2007 list of the world's wealthiest people, with a net worth of $8.7 billion.

Larry Page - Co-founder of Google

2008-01-27T05:30:00.000-08:00

Born March 26, 1973, to Michigan State University computer professors, Larry Page is one of the co-founders of Google, with Sergey Brin. The two met as graduate students at Stanford, where Page earned a Master's degree in computer science after graduating from the University of Michigan with a Bachelor's degree in computer engineering. Page and Brin had a mutual interest in data-mining, which led them to co-authoring the groundbreaking paper "The Anatomy of a Large-Scale Hypertextual Web Search Engine" in 1995, addressing the needs of search engines in light of the expanding internet and its vast amounts of decentralized, unmoderated data.

The following January, the two students began developing a search engine they called "BackRub." Search engines needed to do more than merely find material online, because there was now too much of it to sift through -- they needed to analyze what was found in order to identify the likeliest desired results. While other engines ranked results based on data within the web page, Brin and Page's engine ranked them based on the relationships between web pages -- web pages that were linked to by a large number of other web pages were presumed to be more valuable results, and were given a higher ranking.

The thesis seemed sound, and stood up to testing, and in 1998, Google, Inc., was incorporated -- "BackRub" had been renamed to Google, a deliberate misspelling of googol (a one followed by 100 zeros), a reference to the vast amount of information the engine sifted through. Like many technology start-ups, the company soon relocated to Palo Alto, before moving to Mountain View in 2003, where Google's headquarters -- the Googleplex -- remain today. The search engine's popularity was driven by its efficiency not only in design but in presentation -- Google ads are text-only to keep the layout uncluttered and ensure fast loading times. As Google became the best-known name in search engines, even entering the dictionary as a verb, the brand was extended to other areas: Google offers everything from an RSS feed reader and online calendar to collaborative applications like Google Documents and desktop software like Picasa. The company went public in 2004, and has since acquired the popular Youtube video-sharing site.

Page and Brin served as co-presidents of Google Inc. until 2001, when Eric Schmidt was hired to run the company as chairman and Chief Executive Officer. He currently serves as President of Products, while Brin is President of Technology. Many of the new products and services developed at Google in the last few years -- a full half of them, according to an internal analysis -- have been credited to the company's "20% time" policy, according to which engineers are to spend one day a week (a fifth of their work time) on projects that engage their interest, rather than specifically assigned work.

Sergey Brin - Co-founder of Google

2008-01-27T05:28:00.000-08:00

The co-founder of Google and the fifth-richest American, Sergey Brin was born in Moscow to mathematicians who moved to the United States (where his father took a job in the University of Maryland's mathematics department) in 1979, shortly before he began grade school. Brin inherited his parents' gift for mathematics, and attended UM after high school, graduating with a degree in math and computer science in 1993, as well as a Master's degree from Stanford in 1995.

While at Stanford, Brin's interest was drawn to the internet, which was then on the cusp of its first real mainstream popularity, thanks to a growing awareness of online services like Prodigy and America Online, and the development of the first graphical browsers for the World Wide Web, which would shortly transform the internet from its text-only beginnings to the multimedia playground it became. Several of his papers dealt with data mining and pattern extraction, things that would be useful on a bigger and more crowded internet. When he met fellow Stanford grad student Larry Page, the two discovered a mutual interest in data mining, which led to their co-authorship of the paper "The Anatomy of a Large-Scale Hypertextual Web Search Engine," which continues to be relevant to the field of search engines today, more than ten years later.

The following January, the two students began developing a search engine they called "BackRub." Search engines needed to do more than merely find material online, because there was now too much of it to sift through -- they needed to analyze what was found in order to identify the likeliest desired results. While other engines ranked results based on data within the web page, Brin and Page's engine ranked them based on the relationships between web pages -- web pages that were linked to by a large number of other web pages were presumed to be more valuable results, and were given a higher ranking.

The thesis seemed sound, and stood up to testing, and in 1998, Google, Inc., was incorporated -- "BackRub" had been renamed to Google, a deliberate misspelling of googol (a one followed by 100 zeros), a reference to the vast amount of information the engine sifted through. Like many technology start-ups, the company soon relocated to Palo Alto, before moving to Mountain View in 2003, where Google's headquarters -- the Googleplex -- remain today. The search engine's popularity was driven by its efficiency not only in design but in presentation -- Google ads are text-only to keep the layout uncluttered and ensure fast loading times. As Google became the best-known name in search engines, even entering the dictionary as a verb, the brand was extended to other areas: Google offers everything from an RSS feed reader and online calendar to collaborative applications like Google Documents and desktop software like Picasa. The company went public in 2004, and has since acquired the popular Youtube video-sharing site.

Brin continues to serve as Google Inc.'s President of Technology.

Sabeer Bhatia - Founder of Hotmail

2008-01-27T05:24:00.000-08:00

Sabeer Bhatia was born in India in 1968, the son of a Defense Ministry official and a Central Bank official. Two years into his undergraduate education at the Birla Institute of Technology and Science, he transferred to Caltech in the United States. After graduation he attended Stanford in the pursuit of his Master's degree in electrical engineering, and became introduced to Silicon Valley culture. He abandoned his plans for a doctorate in favor of a job with Apple Computers.

After a few years at Apple, Bhatia worked for Firepower Systems for two years, while tinkering on his own with ideas related to the internet and the increasing opportunities there. He and Jack Smith, a former Apple colleague, worked together on Javasoft, a web-based database that made them aware of the potential benefits of a web-based email system that wouldn't require a separate client or reside on any particular machine. Hotmail was not provided by any ISP or educational institution, and therefore your email address wouldn't change if you moved, graduated, or changed jobs -- the mail was stored online, and you could read it from any online computer -- and it required no special software. Like many early web ventures, Hotmail -- a name derived from the web's markup language HTML -- was free to use, with revenues generated from ad sales. The service launched on the Fourth of July, 1996.

By the end of the year, Hotmail had one million subscribers. The following year, Microsoft bought the company -- which had been started with a $300,000 investment only eighteen months earlier -- for $400 million. Bhatia took a job with Microsoft until April 1999, when he started Arzoo Inc., which didn't survive the dissipation of the dotcom bubble. He's been involved in a number of ventures since then, including Live Documents -- which, just as Hotmail shifted email activity to the web, shifts Microsoft Office-like activity online, allowing users to share or collaborate on documents, or simply sync them and work from different machines. Live Documents premiered in November of 2007.

Jerry Yang - Co-founder of Yahoo

2008-01-27T05:18:00.000-08:00

CEO of Yahoo! Inc., Jerry Yang co-founded the company with fellow Stanford graduate student David Filo when both were still in school. Originally a website called "Jerry's Guide to the World Wide Web," it was simply a directory of other websites organized in a hierarchy rather than a searchable list. A few months later they renamed the site Yahoo, and the site caught on; Yahoo was incorporated the following year, and went public in 1996, raising nearly $34 million. Because "Yahoo" was already trademarked as a barbecue sauce, the company had to be referred to as "Yahoo!" with an exclamation point; the distinction has not generally caught on with the public.

Over the course of the 90s, Yahoo diversified in response to the dotcom bubble and the enormous amount of activity on the internet; it acquired the company Four11 and its webmail service Rocketmail, which became Yahoo! Mail, just as ClassicGames.com became Yahoo! Games, and eGroups mailing lists became Yahoo! Groups. Yahoo also acquired webhost GeoCities and launched Yahoo! Messenger to compete with AIM and other services. Unlike a lot of online companies, Yahoo altered the terms of service for services it acquired -- often asserting intellectual property rights for content on their servers (causing a commotion when they acquired GeoCities, making users worry that Yahoo would suddenly claim to own anything hosted on their web pages).

Though they closed at an all-time low after the dotcom bubble burst, Yahoo was one of the few major survivors of the 90s, and has former partnerships with fellow survivors such as Google and eBay in the years since.

David Filo - Co-founder of Yahoo

2008-01-27T05:16:00.000-08:00

A graduate of Tulane University with a Master's degree from Stanford, David Filo co-founded Yahoo with Jerry Yang while they were both graduate students in 1994. Originally a website called "Jerry's Guide to the World Wide Web," it was simply a directory of other websites organized in a hierarchy rather than a searchable list. A few months later they renamed the site Yahoo, and the site caught on; Yahoo was incorporated the following year, and went public in 1996, raising nearly $34 million. Because "Yahoo" was already trademarked as a barbecue sauce, the company had to be referred to as "Yahoo!" with an exclamation point; the distinction has not generally caught on with the public.

Over the course of the 90s, Yahoo diversified in response to the dotcom bubble and the enormous amount of activity on the internet; it acquired the company Four11 and its webmail service Rocketmail, which became Yahoo! Mail, just as ClassicGames.com became Yahoo! Games, and eGroups mailing lists became Yahoo! Groups. Yahoo also acquired webhost GeoCities and launched Yahoo! Messenger to compete with AIM and other services. Unlike a lot of online companies, Yahoo altered the terms of service for services it acquired -- often asserting intellectual property rights for content on their servers (causing a commotion when they acquired GeoCities, making users worry that Yahoo would suddenly claim to own anything hosted on their web pages).

Though they closed at an all-time low after the dotcom bubble burst, Yahoo was one of the few major survivors of the 90s, and has former partnerships with fellow survivors such as Google and eBay in the years since.

Jawed Karim - Co-founder of Youtube

2008-01-27T05:05:00.000-08:00

Co-founder of the YouTube website, Jawed Karim was born in East Germany in 1979, and soon moved to West Germany and thence to the United States. He attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, but left prior to graduating to become an employee at internet company PayPal (he later completed his coursework by mail and earned his bachelor's degree in computer science in 2004).

As its founders have pointed out, a number of startup companies have originated with employees of PayPal. Youtube was one of them -- it was while working at PayPal that Karim met Chad Hurley and Steve Chen, and the three put together an office in a garage, funded by venture capital from the firm Sequoia Capital. Throughout 2006, when the site got on its feet, YouTube was one of the fastest-growing and most popular websites, allowing browsers to view or upload short video clips ranging from home videos to excerpts of sitcoms or movies -- but especially including "viral videos," the sorts of videos that internet users have been sharing with each other for a decade. The site's demographics are solidly adolescent, a group that has the most time for watching video after video, no matter how brief.

While it has been targeted repeatedly by copyright infringement lawsuits, sometimes by copyright holders who do not seem aware that YouTube allows users to put content up but does not put it up themselves, YouTube has nevertheless thrived. Google purchased the company in late 2006 for $1.65 billion in stock, making the founders multimillionaires. The company has announced the incredibly ambitious goal of hosting every music video every made, by early 2009. There are plans for sharing ad revenue with active uploaders, the people providing the content that draws users to the site.

Karim has recently founded Youniversity Ventures, a venture fund aimed at helping university students launch their business ideas.

Chad Hurley - Co-founder of YouTube

2008-01-27T05:02:00.000-08:00

Internet entrepreneur. Raised near Birdsboro, Pennsylvania, Hurley received his Bachelor’s degree in Fine Art from the University of Pennsylvania. After graduating, he joined eBay’s PayPal division, primarily focusing on user interface. It was there that he met Steve Chen and Jawed Karim with whom he founded YouTube, a video sharing website, in 2005.

YouTube quickly became one of the web’s fastest-growing sites, and was ranked as the 10th most popular website just a year after its launch. There are reportedly 100 million clips viewed daily on YouTube, with an additional 65,000 new videos uploaded every 24 hours.

Hurley currently serves as Chief Executive Officer and was voted 28th on Business 2.0 magazine’s "50 people who matter" list in 2006. That year, he and Chen sold YouTube to Google, Inc. for $1.65 billion in stock.

Steve Chen - Co-founder of Youtube

2008-01-27T04:58:00.001-08:00

Internet entrepreneur. Born in August 1978 in Taiwan. Raised in Taiwan, Chen and his family immigrated to the United States when he was 15. After graduating from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Chen worked at PayPal, where he met Chad Hurley and Jawed Karim. In 2005, the three founded YouTube, a website designed to simplify video sharing online.

YouTube quickly became one of the web’s fastest-growing sites, and was ranked as the 10th most popular website just a year after its launch. There are reportedly 100 million clips viewed daily on YouTube, with an additional 65,000 new videos uploaded every 24 hours.

Chen currently serves as Chief Technology Officer and was named one of the "The 50 people who matter now" by Business 2.0 magazine in 2006. That year, he and Hurley sold YouTube to Google, Inc. for $1.65 billion in stock.

David Beckham - Soccer Player

2008-01-27T04:48:00.000-08:00

He was born David Robert Joseph Beckham on May 2, 1975, in Leytonstone, East London, England, son of Ted Beckham, a kitchen fitter, and Sandra West, a hairdresser. Beckham's maternal grandfather is Jewish, and he has been mentioning the religion as influence; he wears a tattoo written in Hebrew from the 'Song of Songs' in the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament), albeit he is not known to practice Judaism or any other faith. Beckham has always played in long sleeve shirts to cover up his tattoos in consideration of others who may feel uncomfortable due to their beliefs.

He was brought up by his parents, supporters of Manchester United, attended Bobby Charlton's football school in Manchester, and won a spot in a training session at FC Barcelona as a child. In 1986 he was a Manchester United's mascot for a match against West Ham United. From 1992 - 2003 Beckham made almost 400 appearances for Manchester United and scored 85 goals, although his official record counts only 62 goals in 265 official senior team's matches. In the 1998 FIFA World Cup he played all of England's qualifying matches and scored in several important victories. He received a red card for violent conduct in England's match against Argentina, albeit his opponent later admitted to trying to send Beckham off by over-reacting to their contact during the game and by urging the referee to send Beckham off. After losing the game England was eliminated, Beckham was made a scapegoat and became the target of criticism and abuse in media.

He had a good season in 1999 - 2000 and helped Manchester United to win the Premier League. At that time he married singer Victoria Beckham from the popular group Spice Girls, and the couple had their first son, Brooklyn, born in 1999. That same year Beckham was given a permission to miss training routine, in order to look after his son Brooklyn, who suffered from a stomach infection. Meanwhile, the Manchester United's manager, Alex Ferguson, fined Beckham £50,000 (about $80,000 then) the maximum amount that was permitted, for babysitting with his sick child, while his wife was spotted at a London fashion Week event on the same night. Ferguson's claim that Beckham should be able to train if his wife stayed home that day, caused a serious personal tension between two men. In February 2003, following the defeat to Arsenal, the Manchester United's manager Alex Ferguson entered the changing room and kicked a football boot that struck Beckham over the eye, causing a cut that required stitches.

David Beckham has been a good scorer and a major attraction for public. On the field he has been demonstrating his consistent ability to see a big picture even under severe pressure during the most rapidly changing and unpredictable games. His field vision has been remarkable, allowing him to create many assists in a number of important matches. Beckham's forte has been his delivery from the right-hand side as well as his efficient free kicks. His superior performances in the midfield position has required a higher physical endurance through the entire game. "David Beckham's right foot" was mentioned, although humorously, as one of British national treasures in the movie Love Actually (2003).

He signed a four-year contract with Real Madrid, beginning on July 1, 2003, and worth a potential 40 million dollars. In Madrid, Beckham was not allowed to wear his favorite number seven, because another player had the right to wear it written into his contract. Beckham decided to wear the number 23 instead, being a big fan of Michael Jordan. He immediately became popular with the Real Madrid fans, but the team did not perform well enough to win either the Spanish League or the Champions League. However, Beckham remained a reliable scorer and his performances attracted more public. His shirts sales and other merchandising deals remained lucrative for the club, which continued to under-perform, regardless of the Real's management's higher expectations.

In 2005 Beckham became a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador. He was also involved in promoting London's successful bid for the 2012 Olympic Games. His third season in Madrid was unremarkable, and he was criticized a lot, mainly because the team finished second to Barcelona in Spanish "La Liga" and lost to Arsenal in the European Champions League. However, during that season, he expanded his international presence by establishing football academies in Los Angeles and East London. During the FIFA World Cup 2006, he played for England, and became the first ever English player to score in three World Cups. In the quarter final game against Portugal, Beckham was replaced because of his injury in the middle of the game. Without him the English team lost and was knocked out of the World Cup.

In June 2007 Beckham played his final game for Real Madrid, winning a medal and celebrating with his friends Tom and Katie Cruse, who attended the game. This was his fourth, and last season there, ending his contract with the club. He announced that he had signed a five-year contract to play for the Los Angeles Galaxy from July 1, 2007 through June 2012. The 5-year deal includes up to $10 million a year in direct salary, and with merchandising endorsements and profit-sharing could earn Beckham up to $50 million a year, and may end up worth about $250 million in five years, making him one of the highest earning athletes of all time.

The Beckhams, who have become known as "Posh and Becks", have three sons: Brooklyn Joseph Beckham (born 1999), Romeo James Beckham (born 2002), and Cruz David Beckham (born 2005) who was named "Cruz" in honor of their friend Tom Cruise.

Eddie Murphy

2008-01-27T04:25:00.000-08:00

Murphy was born April 3, 1961, in Brooklyn, New York . He spent his early years in the projects of Bushwick with his father, Charles Murphy, a New York City police officer and amateur comedian, his mother, Lillian Murphy, a telephone operator, and his brother Charles. His parents divorced when he was three; five years later, his father died and his mother went into the hospital for an extended period.

Harris Jayaraj - Musician

2008-01-27T04:09:00.000-08:00

Harris Jayaraj was born 8th January 1975. All his musical tracks for films would be a lovable mixture of melody and peppy songs. A careful look at the songs of ‘Anniyan’, for example, would reveal his versatility and his grip over various genres of music. All of his films have enviable variety and most of them are super hits. This success has made him as one of the leading and most wanted composers in South India.

The beginning
Harris, born into a pious Christian Nadar family in Chennai, studied at the Krishnasamy Matric School. He later obtained a music degree in London. His father, S.M. Jayakumar, is a film guitarist who was a noted musician and composer.

Harris Jayaraj started his career by playing the Tabla and other percussions for many films under none other than the genius musician A.R Rahman. He then started composing beats for TV advertisements.

Harris Jayaraj has been a keyboardist and percussionist for various music directors including A R Rahman, Karthik Raja, and Vidyasagar. He has assisted Adithyan in various projects like ‘Seevalaperi Pandi’, ‘Asuran’ etc

The break
Goutham Menon’s ‘Minnale’ in 2001 came as a break for the young musician. The music track was quite sensational with ‘Vaseegara’, turning out to be an outstanding song. He followed it up with his music for ‘12B’, ‘Majnu’, and ‘Lesa Lesa’ and many other films.

2005 was a special year for him, as his music tracks for ‘Anniyan’ and ‘Ghajini’ were super duper hits. The song ‘Suttum Vizhi sudarae’, just like the enticing ‘Vaseegara’ became the song of the year.

His successful run continues with many more films like ‘Vettaiyaadu Vilaiyaadu’ (2006), ‘Pachaikili Muthucharam’ (2007) and the recent ‘Bheemaa’. He is now working for ‘Varanam Aayiram’, directed by his favorite Goutham Menon.

He has introduced many singers including Nakul, Saindhavi, Srilekha Parthasarathy, Madhumitha, Nikhil Matthew, Mahathi and Suchithra Ramanathan.

Visit Harris Jayaraj at:
http://www.themusicalharris.com

Lakshmi Mittal - Third Richest Man

2008-01-27T03:57:00.000-08:00

Born: June 15, 1950
Achievement: World's largest steel maker and the third richest man in the world.

Lakshmi Mittal has become something of a cult figure in the global steel industry. His company Mittal Steel is the largest steel maker in the world. After the recent merger between Mittal Steel and Arcelor which raged a big debate throughout the Europe, Laxmi Mittal current controls 10% of the total steel production and the combined entity that has come into force post-merger is three times the size of its nearest competitors.

Lakshmi Niwas Mittal was born on June 15, 1950 at Sadulpur, in Churu district of Rajasthan, in a poor family. The extended family of 20 lived on bare concrete floors, slept on rope beds and cooked on an open fire in the brickyard in a house built by his grandfather. Laxmi Mittal belongs to Marwari Aggarwal caste and his grandfather worked for the Tarachand Ghanshyam Das firm, one of the leading Marwari industrial firms of pre-independence India.

The family later on moved to Kolkata where his father Mohan Mittal became a partner in a steel company. Lakshmi Mittal graduated from St. Xaviers in Kolkata with a commerce degree in 1969. He began his career working in the family's steelmaking business in India and in 1976, Lakshmi Mittal founded Mittal Steel Company. He split from his father and two younger brothers in 1994 and took the international arm, with interests in Indonesia and Trinidad and Tobago, while the rest of the family kept the domestic Indian business. In the last few years Mittal Steel has made a number of acquisitions, buying up a network of steel producers in former communist countries including Kazakhstan, Romania and Ukraine, and pushing into the U.S. in 2004 with the $4.5 billion purchase of International Steel Group. Today, Mittal Steel is the only truly global steel producer in the world with operations on 14 countries, spanning 4 continents.

Lakshmi Mittal is also known for his opulence. In 2003, he acquired the Kensington mansion, said to be the world's most expensive home, from Formula One racing's Bernie Ecclestone for £70 million ($128 million). His daughter Vanisha's $50 million wedding bash is touted as the most expensive wedding of the 20th century.

In March 2006, Lakshmi Mittal was listed as the third wealthiest person in the world after Bill Gates and Warren Buffet by Forbes Magazine.

source: iloveindia

Indira Gandhi - Former Prime Minister of India

2008-01-27T03:52:00.000-08:00

Born: November 19, 1917
Died: October 31, 1984
Achievements: Became President of Indian National Congress in 1959; was Minister of Information and Broadcasting in Lal Bahadur Shastri's government; became Prime Minister in 1966; nationalized major banks in 1969; gave the slogan of Garibi Hatao during 1971 general elections; led India to a decisive war against Pakistan in 1971.

Indira Gandhi, one of the best-known women of the 20th century, was Prime Minister of India, and daughter of former Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. Also known as Indira Nehru Gandhi, she was born on November 19, 1917 in Allahabad. She was born in a family that was at the centre of Indian freedom movement. Her father Jawaharlal Nehru and grandfather Motilal Nehru were at the forefront of Indian freedom struggle. Her mother Kamla Nehru, although less involved politically, was subject to political arrest by the British. Indira Gandhi had a lonely childhood, with some of her most vivid remembrances being the entry into her home of British policemen. As her parents did not want to send her to any of the British schools in India, Indira Gandhi's education took place at a series of Indian schools and at non-British schools in Europe, with a number of private tutorials interspersed between periods at school.

Indira Gandhi married a Parsi named Feroze Gandhi in 1942. The marriage was opposed by orthodox Hindus because it was an intercommunal love marriage not arranged by her parents. Jawaharlal Nehru too opposed the marriage on grounds that the couple were somewhat incompatible because both possessed fiery tempers. Publicly, however, both Jawaharlal Nehru and Mahatma Gandhi strenuously defended the marriage. Shortly after their marriage both Indira Gandhi and Feroze Gandhi were arrested and jailed for nationalist activities. Indira Gandhi was released after eight months and Feroze Gandhi after an year. After the release Feroze Gandhi became editor of The National Herald, a newspaper founded by Jawaharlal Nehru, and Mrs. Indira Gandhi became the principal confidant and assistant of her father during the period of Nehru's prime ministership (1947-1965). The couple separated for a number of years during the 1950s as Feroze Gandhi launched his own political career in Parliament and was often at odds with Jawaharlal Nehru's policies and style. In 1959 Indira Gandhi became President of the Indian National Congress and in 1964 she was elected to the parliament. Meanwhile, the death of Feroze Gandhi (from a heart attack) in 1960, and the subsequent death of her father in 1964, caused Indira Gandhi to withdraw into a shell and limit herself to her immediate family.

After the death of Jawaharlal Nehru, Lal Bahadur Shastri became Prime Minister and Indira Gandhi was the minister of Information and Broadcasting in his government. After Lal Bahadur Shastri's untimely death in 1966, she was selected as prime minister by party bosses within the Congress Party as a compromise candidate. Her candidature was opposed by Morarji Desai, a veteran nationalist and prime ministerial aspirant himself. The Congress bosses were apparently looking for a leading figure acceptable to the masses, who could not only command general support during the next general election but who would also acquiesce to their guidance. In her initial days as Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi encountered numerous problems such as Mizo tribal uprisings in the northeast; famine, labour unrest, and misery among the poor in the wake of rupee devaluation; and agitation in Punjab for linguistic and religious separatism.

In the fourth general elections held in 1967, Congress suffered a major setback. Congress majority was greatly reduced in parliament and non-Congress ministries were established in Bihar, Kerala, Orissa, Madras, Punjab, and West Bengal. This forced Mrs. Indira Gandhi to become assertive and opt for a series of choices that pitted her directly against the Congress Party high command, which had previously been built up by her father. Seeking to eradicate poverty, Mrs. Gandhi pursued a vigorous policy in 1969 of land reform and placed a ceiling on personal income, private property, and corporate profits. She also nationalized the major banks, a bold step amidst a growing rift between herself and the party elders. The Congress expelled her for "indiscipline" on November 12, 1969, an action that split the party into two factions: the Congress (O)-for Organisation-led by Morarji Desai, and the Congress (I)--for Indira-led by Indira Gandhi.

Indira Gandhi campaigned fiercely on the slogan of "Garibi Hatao" (eliminate poverty) during the fifth general elections in March 1971 and won an unprecedented two-third majority. Her leadership qualities came to the fore during India-Pakistan war in 1971 that resulted in liberation of Bangladesh. India achieved decisive victory over Pakistan in the face of diplomatic opposition from both China and the United States and a lack of international support from almost every other nation except the Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc countries. Indian victory over Pakistan led to a great surge in Indira Gandhi's popularity and she was compared to Goddess Durga by ordinary Indians.

Expectations raised by the garibi hatao campaign and India's victory over Pakistan in 1971 led to great disappointment and political difficulties in the mid-1970s. Enormous economic cost of 1971 war, increase in world oil prices and, drop in industrial output added to the economic hardships. During this time J.P.Narayan initiated a civil disobedience movement against Indira Gandhi. In June 1975, amidst all this crises Allahabad High Court invalidated her 1971 election on the grounds of electoral malpractices. Instead of resigning, Indira Gandhi declared an Emergency in the country and jailed al her political opponents. The Emergency lasted till March 1977 and in the general election held afterwards she was defeated by a coalition of parties called Janta Morcha.

Factionalism among coalition partners led to the collapse of Janta government and Indira Gandhi came back to the power once again in 1980. But her second innings was beset with difficulties and personal tragedies. Her younger son Sanjay Gandhi died in an air crash. Her government was confronted with serious challenges to its ability to maintain law and order as conflicts between religious and ethnic groups broke out in different parts of the country. After the army had invaded the Golden Temple in Amritsar, the chief shrine of the Sikhs, which had been held as an armed camp by a group of militant Sikhs, she became the target for Sikh anger and on 31 October 1984 she was assassinated by her own Sikh bodyguard.

APJ Abdul Kalam - Scientist

2008-01-27T03:19:00.000-08:00

Born - 15 October 1931
Achievements - This eminent scientist and engineer has also served as the 11th President of India from the period 2002 to 2007. APJ Abdul Kalam is a man of vision, who is always full of ideas aimed at the development of the country. He firmly believes that India needs to play a more assertive role in international relations.

Apart from being a notable scientist and engineer, Dr APJ Abdul Kalam served as the 11th President of India from the period 2002 to 2007. He is a man of vision, who is always full of ideas aimed at the development of the country and is also often also referred to as the Missile Man of India. People loved and respected Dr APJ Abdul Kalam so much during his tenure as President that was popularly called the People's President. Read more about the biography of Dr APJ Abdul Kalam here.

APJ Abdul Kalam was born on 15 October 1931 at the South Indian state of Tamil Nadu and received honorary doctorates from about 30 universities globally. In the year 1981, the Government of India presented him the nation's highest civilian honor, the Padma Bhushan and then again, the Padma Vibhushan in 1990 and the Bharat Ratna in 1997. Before Kalam, there have been only two presidents - Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan and Zakir Hussain - to have received the Bharat Ratna before bring appointed to the highest office in India.

Read on about the life history of Dr APJ Abdul Kalam, who's also the first scientist and bachelor to occupy the seat of the Rashtrapati Bhavan. His perspectives on important topics have been enunciated by him in the book 'India 2020'. It highlights the action plans that will help develop the country into a knowledge superpower by the time 2020. One thing for which he received ample kudos is his unambiguous statement that India needs to play a more assertive role in international relations.

And Dr APJ Abdul Kalam regards his work on India's nuclear weapons program as a way to assert India's place as a future superpower. Even during his tenure as President, APJ Kalam took avid interest in the spheres of India's science and technology. He has even put forward a project plan for establishing bio-implants. He is also an ardent advocate of open source software over proprietary solutions to churn out more profits in the field of information technology in India.

Mukesh Ambani - Billionaire

2008-01-27T03:14:00.000-08:00

Born: April 19, 1957
Achievement: Chairman and Managing Director of Reliance Industries Limited, India's largest private sector company; Chosen as ET Business Leader of the Year 2006; Ranked 42nd among the World's Most Respected Business Leaders and second among the four Indian CEOs featured in a survey conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers and published in Financial Times, London, November 2004. Mukesh Ambani is the face of new emerging India. He is the Chairman and Managing Director of Reliance Industries Limited, India's largest private sector company.Mukesh Ambani was born on April 19, 1957 in Mumbai. His father Dhirubhai Ambani was then a small businessman who later on rose to become one of the legends of Indian industry. Mukesh Ambani did his Bachelors in Chemical Engineering from University of Bombay and Masters in Business Administration from Stanford University, USA. Mukesh Ambani joined Reliance in 1981 and was the brain behind Reliance's backward integration from textiles into polyester fibres and further into petrochemicals.

During the process of backward integration, Mukesh Ambani led the creation of 51 new, world-class manufacturing facilities involving diverse technologies that raised Reliance's manufacturing capacities manifold. World's largest grassroots petroleum refinery at Jamnagar is the brainchild of Mukesh Ambani. He was also the incharge of Dhirubhai's dream project Reliance Infocomm. But after the split in the Reliance Empire, Reliance Infocomm went to his brother Anil Ambani. Mukesh Ambani is now planning to enter retail sector in a big way. He has plans to establish big retail stores all over the country. Recently, he also entered into an agreement with Haryana Government to establish a Special Economic Zone (SEZ) with an investment running into thousands of crores.

Mukesh Ambani has many achievements and honours to his name. Mukesh Ambani was chosen as the ET Business leader of the Year 2006. He was ranked 42nd among the World's Most Respected Business Leaders and second among the four Indian CEOs featured in a survey conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers and published in Financial Times, London, November 2004. He was conferred the World Communication Award for the Most Influential Person in Telecommunications in 2004 by Total Telecom, October, 2004. Mukesh Ambani was also conferred the Asia Society Leadership Award by the Asia Society, Washington D.C., USA,

Bill Gates - Microsoft

2008-01-27T03:08:00.001-08:00

William Henry Gates III (born 28 October 1955) is an American entrepreneur, software executive, philanthropist and chairman of Microsoft, the software company he founded with Paul Allen. During his career at Microsoft he has held the positions of CEO and chief software architect, and he remains the largest individual shareholder with more than 9% of the common stock.

Gates is one of the best-known entrepreneurs of the personal computer revolution. Although he is widely admired,his business tactics have been criticized as anti-competitive and in some instances ruled as such in court.Since amassing his fortune, Gates has pursued a number of philanthropic endeavors, donating large amounts of money to various charitable organizations and scientific research programs through the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, established in 2000.

The annual Forbes magazine's list of The World's Billionaires has ranked Gates as the richest person in the world from 1995 to 2007, with recent estimates putting his net worth over $56 billion USD.When family wealth is considered, his family ranks second behind the Walton family, heirs of Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton. In July 2007, Fortune magazine reported that the increase in value of Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim's holdings of stock caused him to surpass Bill Gates as the world's richest man. Forbes maintains that Slim is second to Gates as of its last calculation of billionaire fortunes. Forbes does not plan to recalculate Slim's wealth until next year.

source: wikipedia

David Blaine - Magician

2008-01-26T06:05:00.000-08:00

David Blaine was born April 4, 1973 in Brooklyn New York. In his life he has gone by several last names; Blaine is his middle name. Patrie White, his single mother, raised him while taking on as many as three jobs. He never met his real father. At age four he saw a magician perform in a subway; he then decided to purchase his first trick, The Pencil Through the Card. Magic struck him because of its relationship with math and science. David's grandmother was a gypsy, and passed down some tarot cards to him. Since he did not have the money to go to a magic shop, he spent countless hours in libraries researching magic. There he would read every book he could get his hands on and continued fiddling with his tarot cards. At age five, he learned what his dream was; after showing a neighbor an effect with the tarot cards, he saw for the first time the impact magic can have emotionally on people. He immediately told his mom he wanted to be a showman. She encouraged him in everyway.

At ten his mother got remarried to John Bukalo, a banker, and moved to Jerseyville. His half-brother Michael was born. He began to develop an interest in acting. He traveled to Manhattan everyday to attend an acting school. He did a few commercials and small appearances on soap operas. At sixteen, David Blaine levitated for his doctor who immediately took him in for examination. A year later he moved back to New York and lived in Hell's Kitchen. When David was 21, his mother died of ovarian cancer. She was 48 and they were very close. It was then that he devoted his life to magic.

Magic got into David. He was your regular street magician who got gigs at rich parties. Because of his talent and uncanny character, he was able to draw up connections to ABC. After seeing a tape of his magic, they requested an interview and began planning a special. David Blaine: Street Magic, his first special, was the beginning of a new era. The special was not about disappearing tigers and thick stage lights; it was the streets, real people, and David. This had never been done before. The show was an instant success. People still talk about David Blaine's levitation. At only 24 years old, David Blaine became famous.

David has dated Madonna, Fiona Apple, and model Josie Moran. He was last heard dating the German former model Manon von Gerkan. He told Howard Stern he still seems to be close to all of his ex's. He has also had a close friendship with Leonardo DiCaprio. He has performed magic before and after he became famous to such people as Al Pacino, Jack Nicholson, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Mike Tyson, and President Clinton. He has also made guest appearances on nearly every major talk show of the decade including Oprah, Conan O'Brien, Rosie, Carson Daily, and Howard Stern. Even Comedy Central's SouthPark has an episode featuring him.

David Blaine became a stuntman after his idol, Houdini. His first stunt, getting buried alive for seven days, had the approval of Houdini's granddaughter. He did the stunt to promote his second special, David Blaine: Magic Man. According to a letter Magic Directory received, David Blaine: Magic Man was named after an old website. Since then, David has been frozen alive, trapped standing on a poll over a hundred feet from the ground, and viewed hanging from a crane over the River Thames bridge in London. He likes to get trapped in secluded areas with no food. Each stunt seems to be more dangerous. David Blaine will probably continue performing magic and stunts to his 'audience' for the rest of his life.

source: magicdirectory

David Copperfield - Magician

2008-01-26T05:59:00.000-08:00

David Copperfield Born: David Seth Kotkin
Birthday: September 16, 1956
Birthplace: Metuchen, New Jersey

David Copperfield has been hailed by audiences the world over as the greatest magician of our time. After years of successful network specials and extensive touring, David Copperfield has been seen worldwide by more people than any other magician in history, including Houdini. His critically acclaimed Broadway show "Dreams & Nightmares" broke all box office records during it's run in New York. Such international magazines as Vanity Fair, Esquire, Architectural Digest, Paris Match, Hello! and Germany's Bunte have graced their covers with his image and story. His

magic crosses cultural lines. Currently, Forbes magazine has increased his ranking from eighth to the sixth highest grossing entertainer in the world, ahead of Madonna, Kevin Costner, and Arnold Schwarzenegger.

David Copperfield has elevated the art of magic to new heights --redefining this ancient art along the way. Where others think "it can't be done," David's approach is: "Yes it can!" Vanish the Statue of Liberty. Walk through the Great Wall of China. Soar through space with the greatest of ease. To David Copperfield, his passion for magic is everything." The secret," says David, "is to consider nothing impossible, then start treating possibilities as probabilities. If I am in the impossible business, and I am, then I want to go beyond impossible."

He has broken the mold of the master magician: soft spoken, witty, engaging, and supremely entertaining, his modern approach to a very old art has transformed the way the world looks at magic. He celebrated feats and sense of theater have won The Magic of David Copperfield dozens of Emmys, and have led him to be twice named Entertainer of the Year. His tour has set countless box office records across Europe, North and South America and Asia. Recently, London's Madame Tussaud's honored David Copperfield with a flying likeness in wax. He is the only living magician to receive his own star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

In France, he was knighted by the French government, receiving the Chevalier of Arts and Letters, the first ever for a magician.

Born September 16, 1956, young David Kotkin was performing professionally in his hometown of Metuchen, New Jersey, at the age or twelve. Soon thereafter, he became the youngest person ever to be admitted to the Society of American Magicians. By sixteen, he was teaching magic at New York University.
While in college, he was cast as lead in the Chicago musical, The Magic Man. Under the name David Copperfield, he sang, danced, acted, and created all the magic in the show that became the longest running musical in Chicago history.

As a result, he was chosen to host, The Magic of ABC, starring David Copperfield. The show was well received, introducing David Copperfield to the world. So successful was his performance, that CBS signed David for a series of specials, beginning the series: The Magic of David Copperfield. With each new special, David introduces more mind-boggling feats of magic, always performing before a live audience without the aid of any camera tricks or video effects.

More than any other magician before him, David Copperfield understands his craft. "Before there can be wonders, there must be wonder. In my show, I try to transport people on a journey of the imagination, much in the same way as a great film director does." In The Magic of David Copperfield, the wonder is real; the miracles are happening live before real witnesses.

Yet for all his accomplishments, David Copperfield insists that his greatest work to date is Project Magic. David developed this rehabilitative program over a decade ago to strengthen dexterity and motor use in disabled patients by using simple sleight-of-hand magic. "It motivates a patient's therapy and helps to build self esteem." Copperfield says, "There is nothing I do that is more important." Project Magic is currently implemented in 1,000 hospitals and 30 countries around the world, from Belgium to New Zealand, Iceland to Singapore.

David Copperfield also has a secret passion: preserving the history of the art of magic for present and future generations by providing a safe, permanent home for antiquarian props, books, and other historical ephemera related to conjuring. His vast collection, known as the International Museum and Library of the Conjuring Arts, is housed in Nevada. David's goal is to build a monument to the history of magic as a performing art, an ongoing museum that will survive us all.

The International Museum and Library of the Conjuring Arts is the world's premiere collection of historical documentation and artifacts regarding or pertaining to magic, illusion, and the allied arts. "Every contemporary magician stands on the shoulders of giants." says Copperfield, "and this museum is eloquent proof of the rich mosaic of contributions by men and women throughout the ages to this most compelling of all art forms.

In 1996, David Copperfield announce plans for an Interactive magic-themed restaurant, Copperfield Magic Underground to be located on Times Square in New York and at Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando, Florida. Unlike passive themed restaurants of the 90's, Magic Underground will take patrons on a magic adventure where they will actually experience the magic as they dine.

David Copperfield has rewritten the book on magic. He has brought it to heights of artistry and imagination undreamed by wizards or audiences in the past. The illusions are both spectacular mysteries and entertaining theater. He blends mystery and romance into sensual illusions, which dazzle the mind and move the heart. The real magic, however, is the man. David Copperfield has changed the view of what magic is and will continue to be for all time

Michael Jackson - King of Pop

2008-01-26T05:52:00.000-08:00

American superstar Michael Jackson was born in Gary, Indiana in 1958 and has been entertaining audiences nearly his entire life. His father, Joseph Jackson, had been a guitarist but was forced to give up his musical ambitions following his marriage to Katherine (Scruse). Together they prodded their growing family's musical interests at home. By the early 60s the older boys Jackie, Tito and Jermaine had begun performing around the city; by 1964 Michael and Marlon had joined in.

A musical prodigy, Michael's singing and dancing talents were amazingly mature and he soon became the dominant voice and focus of "The Jackson 5." An opening act for such soul groups as the O-Jays and James Brown, it was Gladys Knight (not Diana Ross) who officially brought the group to Berry Gordy's attention, and by 1969 the boys were producing back-to-back chartbusting hits as Motown artists. As a product of the 70s, the boys had emerged as one of the most accomplished black pop/soul vocal groups in music history, successfully evolving from a Temptations-like group act to a disco phenomenon.

Solo success for Michael was inevitable, and by the 80s he had become infinitely more popular than his brotherly group. Record sales consistently orbited, culminating in the biggest-selling album of all time, "Thriller." A TV natural, he ventured rather uneasily into films, such as playing the Scarecrow in The Wiz (1978/I), but had better luck with elaborate music videos.

In the 90s the down side as an 80s pop phenomenon began to show. Michael grew terribly child-like and introverted by his celebrity. A rather timorous, androgynous figure to begin with, his physical appearance began to change drastically and his behavior grew alarmingly bizarre, making him a consistent target for scandal-making, despite his numerous charitable acts. Two brief marriages -- one to Elvis Presley's daughter Lisa Marie Presley -- were forged and two children produced by his second wife during that time, but the purposes were obviously image oriented. Despite it all, Michael Jackson's skills as a singer, dancer, writer and businessman are unparalleled, and it is these prodigious talents that will ultimately prevail over the extremely negative aspects of his seriously troubled life.

Click the below image for more MJ Graphical Comments

More Graphics @ CPGrafix.net

source: imdb

SP Balasubrahmanyam - Singer

2008-01-26T05:47:00.000-08:00

Balu was born on June 4, 1946, in Konetampet, then in Andhra Pradesh, now in Tamil Nadu. His father, Sri. S.P. Sambhamurthy was a fine musician and an excellent exponent of "Harikatha" (a fine art form of entertainment combined with music and story telling).

Blessed with an adorable voice and impeccable musical skills, SPB was never trained to be a singer. A young, Telugu-speaking lad from Andhra Pradesh, like any other boy his age was studying to pursue a career in Engineering. He had a natural flair for singing and participated in most of the singing contests from college. In one such contest, was spotted by his mentor the late, Sri. S.P. Kodandapani. Balu won the first prize and walked out with his first break to sing in the film "SRI SRI SRI MARYADA RAMANNA" in 1966. Thus began a legendary career which became history.

Vocal music is one of the oldest and most universal art forms. A discovery and celebration of one such voice is Sripathi Panditharadhyula Balasubrahmanyam. His music transcends all barriers - linguistic, geographical and chronological. He is a phenomenal success and incredibly talented. He is S.P. BALASUBRAHMANYAM, popularly known as Balu.

SPB took the Indian film music scene by storm in 1979 with his phenomenally successful rendition for the movie SHANKARABHARANAM. He won his first National Award for the same and came the international fame. After this, there was no looking back. He consistently topped the Indian musical charts.

He has none of the airs of a star. His warm, vibrant nature and almost childlike innocence is infectious. He does not obtrude his presence on others and does give people due respect. He has a magnetic stage presence and enthralls the audience with an exceptional performance, inspiring the other singers to match his emotions and energy with a mesmerizing voice and passionate singing style. An easy-going person, Balu can be bubbly and charming with any age group.

Balus first break in Hindi films was EK DUJE KE LIYE. Subsequently, he created history by bagging the National Award for his first song in the first Hindi movie.

So far, Balu has sung over a record 36,000 plus songs in a span of 39 years, in all languages which include several albums of contemporary Indian music, private albums for devotional songs and movies. It is amazing to see the ease with which Balu can render his voice for any language namely, Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam, Hindi, Tulu, Oriya, Assamese and Punjabi.

There has been no arena of music left for experimentation.

From singing to composing was a short leap, compiling music for 45 films in Telugu, Kannada, Tamil and Hindi.
Dubbing for south Indian stars is another venture that brought him recognition for his deep and astounding voice. He even received the best dubbing artiste award for ANNAMAYYA for lending his voice to Suman, who played Lord Balaji in the movie.
He has also successfully portrayed character roles in as many as 45 films in Tamil, Telugu and Kannada.

For all the awards, puraskars, doctorates etc please see the page specially made for this.

source: spbinida

Fr.SJ.Berchmans - Gospel Singer ( Biography )

2008-01-26T05:35:00.000-08:00

Fr. S.J. Berchmans was born in the year of 1949 at Madurai, Tamil nadu. Fr. S.J. Berchmans distinguished his call for the service to humanity in the very young days itself. He determined to dedicate his life and talents for the glory of God and joined a Roman Catholic Seminary.
During the seminary days, he further developed his music talents and by the time of Priest hood, he had become a good singer well known in the circle. He started his ministry as the Priest of Satharasanpatti in 1978.

He was doing it effectively but the soul of young Fr. S.J. Berchmans was thirsty for something better and creative.

Overcoming the tendency of floating with the water, Fr.S.J. Berchmans listened to the voice of God and allowed the Holy Spirit to move in his spirit to discern his calling.

Innovation ahead of the normal spiritual procedures paved way for great revivals in central Tamil Nadu where the spirit of God worked wonders in people by deliverance and repentance through him.

Lord's 'Charisma' and the God given 'Talent' of man joined together and the number of people who attend the meetings increased from hundreds to thousands and thousands to ten thousands and there was an array of miracles after miracles. For the people, "this voice was new, this melody was different and naturally the result was great"

Here you see the transformation of Fr. S.J. Berchmans into a dynamic exposure.

In this circumstance, the stage was too small for his potential to perform to the optimum level.

By that time 1990's, Audio cassettes, music programs and charismatic crusades of Fr.S.J. Berchmans became famous across the country and the tranformation to the next level of operation became too essential.

Through Fr. S.J. Berchmans, God was enlarging the ways to transform His people through whom He wants to act. As a clear sign, the villagers of the Kalayarkoil area in Madurai, convinced by the good intention, donated 5 Acres of land for the ministries of Fr. S.J. Berchmans. Here he comes to an open platform fulfilling his dream for a garden of prayer "Jebathottam".

Now, we see the presence of the Holy Spirit and mighty steady growth in the JEBATHOTTAM ministry.

Fr. S.J. Berchmans goes around the country with the word of God to spread the gospel, to deliver and heal people and to plant churches as an end result.

Now he is being sent across the world as an effective tool for Holy Spirit to act upon people and places .

Fr. S.J. Berchmans touches the heart of billions by his audio-video ministry in seven languages and in more than 20 volumes. It goes on.. the Ministry grows, people come to the Lord. God's name is glorified.

This is the biography of a person who dedicated his life to God, who was obedient to God's call and who allowed God to transform him with full heart and soul.

more about Fr.SJ.Berchmans at: www.frberchmans.cjb.net

Mahatma Gandhi - Freedom Fighter of India ( Biography )

2008-01-26T05:31:00.000-08:00

Karamchand Gandhi was born on October 2, 1869 in Porbandar, India. He became one of the most respected spiritual and political leaders of the 1900's. GandhiJI helped free the Indian people from British rule through nonviolent resistance, and is honored by Indians as the father of the Indian Nation.

The Indian people called Gandhiji 'Mahatma', meaning Great Soul. At the age of 13 Gandhi married Kasturba, a girl the same age. Their parents arranged the marriage. The Gandhis had four children. Gandhi studied law in London and returned to India in 1891 to practice. In 1893 he took on a one-year contract to do legal work in South Africa.

At the time the British controlled South Africa. When he attempted to claim his rights as a British subject he was abused, and soon saw that all Indians suffered similar treatment. Gandhi stayed in South Africa for 21 years working to secure rights for Indian people.

He developed a method of action based upon the principles of courage, nonviolence and truth called Satyagraha. He believed that the way people behave is more important than what they achieve. Satyagraha promoted nonviolence and civil disobedience as the most appropriate methods for obtaining political and social goals. In 1915 Gandhi returned to India. Within 15 years he became the leader of the Indian nationalist movement.

Using the principles of Satyagraha he led the campaign for Indian independence from Britain. Gandhi was arrested many times by the British for his activities in South Africa and India. He believed it was honorable to go to jail for a just cause. Altogether he spent seven years in prison for his political activities.

More than once Gandhi used fasting to impress upon others the need to be nonviolent. India was granted independence in 1947, and partitioned into India and Pakistan. Rioting between Hindus and Muslims followed. Gandhi had been an advocate for a united India where Hindus and Muslims lived together in peace.

On January 13, 1948, at the age of 78, he began a fast with the purpose of stopping the bloodshed. After 5 days the opposing leaders pledged to stop the fighting and Gandhi broke his fast. Twelve days later a Hindu fanatic, Nathuram Godse who opposed his program of tolerance for all creeds and religion assassinated him.

source: indianchild

John McTiernan - Biography

2008-01-26T05:23:00.000-08:00

Born August 1951, January - A master craftsman notable for his almost Hitchcockian ability to create suspense and keep action moving at an exhilarating pace, director John McTiernan began his involved with theatrical arts early in life. His father was an opera singer, and McTiernan made his theatrical debut at age seven playing bit roles in his father's shows.

A master craftsman notable for his almost Hitchcockian ability to create suspense and keep action moving at an exhilarating pace, director John McTiernan began his involved with theatrical arts early in life. His father was an opera singer, and McTiernan made his theatrical debut at age seven playing bit roles in his father's shows. After high school he became involved with summer stock, where he directed, acted, and designed until attended Julliard and New York University, where he studied film. He then became designer and technical director at the Manhattan School of Music.

McTiernan went on to make over 200 television commercials before making his feature film debut by directing the fantasy horror movie Nomads (1985). He followed that up with Predator (1987), a sci-fi action film featuring Arnold Schwarzenegger that spawned a franchise.

In 1988, McTiernan helmed his best-known film, the blockbuster Die Hard. Starring Bruce Willis, the film was a hit with both audiences and critics and would become one of the most influential action films ever made, inspiring countless "Die Hard in a [Blank]" followers.

In the wake of Die Hard, McTiernan scored another hit with 1990's The Hunt for Red October, the first in a series of films based on Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan series. However, his luck would change with 1992's Medicine Man and get even worse with 1993's Last Action Hero, a post-modern action fantasy regarded as one of the decade's biggest flops.

To get Last Action Hero's taste out of his mouth, McTiernan returned to familiar territory in 1995, helming Die Hard with a Vengeance, the third in the series. It proved to be another hit, but McTiernan's career hit the skids over the next decade, with films like The 13th Warrior and Rollerball filling his resume.

The Die Hard series proved yet again to be McTiernan's lucky-charm in 2007, when the series' fourth outing scored at the box-office. Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

source: starpulse

Kamal Haasan - Indian Actor - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T05:19:00.000-08:00

Kamal Haasan (born on November 7, 1954) is a four time National Film Award winning Indian film actor.

Kamal is the youngest of four children born in to an Iyengar family to Rajalakshmi and Srinivasan. His father, an attorney by profession, gave all his sons (Charu Haasan, Chandra Haasan, Kamal Haasan) the suffix of "Haasan" as a sign of his friendship to one Mr. Haasan. Kamal is also a playback singer and sometimes pens the lyrics for the soundtracks of some of his recent films. He is an able performer of the Bharatanatyam dance form. He had assisted in choreography early in his career. He is multilingual.

He began his career as a child artist in many films, while also attending a theatre for stage plays. Kamal Haasan gained the Indian cinema's attention in his first blockbuster, "Kalathur Kannamma" (1960) and since then he has acted in over two hundred Indian films.

He is the only actor other than Mammooty who received three National film awards for Best Actor. Moreover, Kamal Haasan also received a National award for best performance as a child artist. Kamal Haasan along with Mammootty, Anil Kapoor, Om Puri, and Naseruddin Shah are called the Famous Five of Indian Cinema.

Kamal Hassan has received India's fourth highest civilian honour, the Padma Shri for his services to Indian cinema in 1990. Kamal Haasan performs predominantly in leading roles in high-budget and major studio films, ranging from romantic comedies and drama to action thrillers. His most popular films include "Moondram Pirai" (1982), "Saagara Sangamam" (1983), "Nayagan" (1987), "Indian" (1996) and "Hey Ram" (2000). In his currently unreleased film "Dasavatharam", he has attempted to portray ten different characters.

In the 1960s, Kamal made his screen debut with "Kalathur Kannamma" produced by AVM production at the age of six and it won him the first National Award for Best Child Artist. He followed it with appearances as a child actor in movies that featured MGR, Sivaji Ganesan, Nagesh and Gemini Ganesh.

As an actor in adult roles, he received a lukewarm response for his initial few films like "Avargal", "Aval Oru Thodarkathai", "Solla Thaan Ninaikkiren", "Maanavan" and "Kumara Vijayam".

His first highly popular movie was "16 Vayathinile" with Sridevi. This established him as a popular teen idol at the age of 23. Kamal Haasan and Sri Devi were a popular acting pair and have acted together in 23 films. The year following his appearance in "16 Vayathinile", Kamal Haasan acted in director K. Balachander's Telugu hit "Maro Charithra".In many of his late 1970s films, he was usually the hero, with Rajinikanth as the villain.

During the 1970s, he has played a host of characters that include-a ventriloquist in Avargal (He actually learnt ventriquilism for his role in the movie),a village innocent in "16 Vayathinile",a disco jockey in "Ilamai Oonjaladugiradhu",a psychopath serial killer of women in "Sigappu Rojakkal",a buck-toothed villager in "Kalyanaraman",Aladdin in "Alavudheenum Arpudha Vilakkum".

His first attempt at direction came through an unfortunate turn of events with the demise of director T.N. Baalu during the filming of "Sankarlal" in 1981. Kamal reached stardom in 1979 with multiple classics and mass blockbusters which coincided with the decline of MGR/ Sivaji era in movies (MGR quit movies in 1977 while Sivaji, nevertheless continued to act till the 90s). A huge factor behind Kamal's success is his versatility.

In the 80s, he has played amongst other roles, :a blind violinist in "Raja Paarvai" at the age of 27 (first screenplay by Kamal), a classical dancer in "Saagara Sangamam",a mentally challenged man who falls in love in "Swathi Muthyam",an undercover cop in "Kaaki Sattai",a benevolent underworld don in "Nayagan" (Leader) at the age of 33 (directed by Mani Ratnam), an unemployed youth who chances upon a week of opulence in the silent movie "Pushpak", an honest cop, a dwarf circus clown and a fun-loving mechanic in "Apoorva Sagodharargal"at the age of 35 (screenplay by Kamal),a corrupt mayor in Indrudu Chandrudu, a spy in "Vikram", an illiterate villager in "Sakalakala Vallavan"
Apoorva Sagodharargal, which released in 1989, was the first Kamal film to gross almost Rs.25 million at the box office.

In the 1990s Kamal's second attempt at direction came through another unfortunate turn of events when the original director Shantanu Sheroey failed to do a good job while filming "Chachi 420" in 1997. Inspired by the European style of closer-to-reality docu-dramas, Kamal moved decisively towards making films for select classes in the 90s, isolating some of his ardent fans.

In this period, he has played as a Doctor in the Tamil comedy movie "Sathy Leelavathy", as quadruplets in the comedy "Michael Madhana Kamarajan",as an old and highly-corrupt mayor in "Indiran Chandiran", a mentally-challenged man in the very dark film "Guna",a modern youth-turned-villager in "Thevar Magan" at the age of 38 (written and produced by Kamal), a hapless familyman who lost and re-discovers his family in a metropolis in "Mahanadhi", a revolutionary lecturer in "Nammavar",a special police squad officer against terrorism in "Kuruthipunal",a righteous old revolutionary as well as his corrupt son in "Indian", an old nanny in "Avvai Shanmugi" at the age of 42.

Unlike the eighties, Kamal films in the nineties lost sheen and were unsuccessful, barring "Thevar Magan", "Michael Madhana Kamarajan", "Avvai Shanmugi" and "Indian". "Indian" directed by Shankar which released in 1996 , grossed almost Rs.100 million at the box office marking a new peak in his career.

Kamal continues scripting directing and acting in his productions, and has met with considerable success at the box office.Again, he has played diverse roles in this period, which include: a Hindu fundamentalist in "Hey Ram",a mentally affected Sri Lankan Tamil in the comedy "Thenali",a pair of twins (one of which is a deranged psychopath) in "Aalavandhan",an ardent bachelor-stuntmaster-turned-lover in "Pammal K. Sambandam",a randy pilot in the comedy caper "Panchathantiram",a disabled altruist (Communist) in "Anbe Sivam",a rustic wrongly jailed for the murder of his lover in "Virumaandi" (directed by Kamal),a deaf circus stuntman in "Mumbai Express" at the age of 51,an affable mafiaman enrolled in medical school," Vasool Raja MBBS" a remake of Hindi film, Munna Bai M.B.B.S,as DCP Raghavan, a smart and suave policeman with his "Raghavan instinct" out to trace a serial psychopath killer duo in "Vettaiyaadu Vilaiyaadu".
"Thenali" which released in 2000, was the first Kamal film to gross almost Rs.100 million at the box office. "Vasool Raja MBBS" and "Vettaiyaadu Vilaiyaadu" mopped up over Rs.150 million and Rs.300 million each at the box office.

Kamal has an uncanny ability to remake Hollywood movies in Tamil. His remakes are not lift-offs. His remakes are usually inspired by Hollywood originals, but the story and screenplay are customized for Indian Audiences. The central plot/theme of the movie is from the Hollywood original, "Nayagan" was inspired by Godfather. "Avvai Shanmugi" and "Chachi 420" were inspired by "Mrs. Doubtfire". "Anbe Sivam" was inspired by "Planes, Trains & Automobiles". "Sathi Leelavathi" was inspired by "She-Devil" (film) and "Magalir Mattum" was inspired by "Nine to Five".

Kamal is a three-time winner of the National Film Award for Best Actor for the films "Nayagan", "Moondram Pirai" and "Indian". He also won the national award for Best Child Actor for his performance in "Kalathur Kannamma". He has also received the best actor award at the Asian Film festivals held in 1983 and 1985 for "Saagara Sangamam" and "Swathi Muthyam" respectively.

Six of his movies have been sent as India's official entry to the Oscars- The only actor to achieve this feat in the sub-continent. Kamal has won the Filmfare awards 18 times. In fact, he wrote to the FILMFARE committee not to give him any more awards and that be used to encourage the upcoming and promising young actors.

He was awarded the fourth highest recognition given to Indian civilians - the Padmashri in 1990. He was conferred an honorary doctorate by Sathyabama University, Chennai in 2005. Kamal Haasan has won a total of 172 awards which is more than any other actor in the world living or dead. He was named as "kalaignani" - an idol of art, by M. Karunanidhi for his classical work towards Tamil cinema. In his upcoming film Dasavatharam, he plays 10 different roles, an act which is the second of its kind in the world, after the Tamil movie Navarathri (1936).

Kamal was also conferred with a very unique honour this year(2007) as "Living Legend" in the film business by FICCI,India.

Kamal started his foray into film production with 'Raaja Paarvai' in 1981. The film was a commercial failure, though critically well received. A more recent production was the film "Virumaandi" in 2004. His privately held production house Raj Kamal Films produced several classics like "Apoorva Sagodharargal"," Thevar Magan", "Kuruthipunal" etc. His more recent production ventures include the films "Virumaandi" and "Mumbai Xpress".

His magnum opus, "Marudha Naayagam", is a period film set in early 18th century Madurai about a warrior/freedom fighter Yusuf Khan Sahib or Muhammed Yusuf Khan. The film's launch was inaugurated by Queen Elizabeth II. However, the film is still under production or shelved due to many reasons.

In 2005, he launched a new business unit called Raj Kamal Audio in a drive to corporatise all his film commitments. In 2006, he purchased prime real estate for a state-of-the-art multiplex cinema.

Michael Angarano - Biography

2008-01-26T05:12:00.000-08:00

Name: Michael Angarano
Birth Name: Michael Anthony Angarano
Height: 5' 7"
Sex: M
Nationality: American
Birth Date: December 3, 1987
Birth Place: Brooklyn, New York, USA
Profession: actor
Father: Michael Angarano
Mother: Doreen Angarano
Sister: Erica Angarano (younger), Kristen Angarano (older)
Brother: Andrew Angarano (younger)
Claim to fame: his first major film role in 2002's Little Secrets

Jodie Sweetin - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T05:08:00.000-08:00

When not at school, Jodie currently lives with her proud parents in California. She has no siblings, but was once heard to say that she wished she had a younger brother. Though life as an only child can be tough at times, Jodie has handled it well. Jodie does have a pet dog, Lacey. Lacey is a Lhasa Apso. An interesting tidbit is that Jodie received Lacey as a gift from the producers of a Sizzler commercial she appeared in. The producers liked Jodie so much and gave her Lacey as a token of their admiration.

School:
Jodie is shaking up the world as a college co-ed these days.

Career:
Jodie began acting at an early age. Noted earlier TV appearances by her include commercials plus a guest appearance on the show The Hogan Family. Her adorable smile is rumored to have won the hearts of producers Miller and Boyett who were at the time formulating a new sitcom. This new sitcom was destined to be Full House. Miller and Boyett had seen Jodie's performance on Hogan's Family and immediately knew she was perfect for their new show. Jodie didn't even have to audition. In fact, they built the Stephanie character on Full House around her!

Bear in mind that at the time Full House premiered in 1987, Jodie was only 5 years old. Those who remember the early seasons of Full House will no doubt recall the incredible acting abilities she was able to exhibit at such an early age. Some may think that any kid could get up there and do it, but Jodie's smooth delivery at such an early age set her apart from being characterized a typical child actress. Jodie went on to grow before our eyes as Full House continued for 8 strong years, until its sudden cancellation in 1995. During her years on Full House she developed an incredibly large following of devoted fans. This following, a noted indicator of her success and popularity, should help catapult Jodie into new and exciting roles, should she choose to continue to pursue acting.
Since Full House, Jodie has continued to whet our appetites for her great acting with special appearances on such TV shows as Brotherly Love, and a special appearance as part of an All Star magic special. She's also appeared as part of a Full House 'mini-reunion' on the show America's Funniest Home Videos. Don't miss the pictures from these appearances in our Special Features section.
Jodie was briefly featured as a secondary character on Fox's Party of Five. Jodie joined the cast beginning with the October 19, 1999 show. Since then, Jodie also had a featured spot in a music video for the startup group "Up Syndrome" in 2000.
What the future has in store for Jodie, only time will tell. But with her talent and ambition she's sure to go far in life!
source: sweetin

Sarah Brightman - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T05:04:00.000-08:00

Born August 14, 1960 in Berkhampstead, England, Big stepped into the world of performing arts at the early age of thirteen. She made her theatrical debut by starring in I and Albert at London's Piccadilly Theatre, in 1973. At 16 years of age, she joined the British dance group Pan's People and found herself performing on the television show Top of the Pops.

A mere two years later, Sarah's career was propelled a step further when she landed a spot as lead vocalist with the musical group Hot Gossip. That very same year, they hit it big with the top-5 British hit "I Lost My Heart to a Starship Trooper."

A short while after joining Hot Gossip, Sarah returned to her theatrical roots, when she joined the original cast of Cats. She performed in this ever-popular musical for a year, and then in 1982, she took things to a whole new level by starring in Charles Strouse's opera for children, Nightingale. While her musical/theatrical career was evidently blossoming, Sarah continued to enhance her skills by studying classical voice training at the Royal College of Music.

A few years later, her increasing popularity and talent catapulted her into some very prestigious theatrical roles. She premiered in Andrew Lloyd Webber's Requiem in London and New York, for which she received a Grammy nomination as Best New Classical Artist, and starred in The Merry Widow at New Sadler's Wells Opera that same year. To top things off, Sarah married Andrew Lloyd Webber during this period, however, the marriage eventually ended six years later, in 1990.

While Sarah was married to Lloyd Webber, she created the role of Christine in his theatrical phenomenon, The Phantom of the Opera. It was initially released in 1986 in London and was eventually repeated on Broadway in 1988.

In 1989, Sarah released her first solo CD, The Songs That Got Away. From this point on, she gradually elevated her career to even greater heights. Throughout the '90s, she released a multitude of top-selling albums including 1993's Dive, 1996's Fly, 1997's Time To Say Goodbye, 1998's Eden, and most recently La Luna in 2000.

In addition to her musical compilations over the years, she has also been featured on a number of cast albums for shows in which she appeared, including The Phantom of the Opera, Nightingale and Song and Dance.

At the same time, Sarah has also starred in a variety of stage performances over the past decade, including Trelawny of the Wells, Relative Values, Dangerous Obsession, and The Innocents.

As for Sarah's future endeavors, she is scheduled to release her new album, entitled Classics, just in time for the Christmas season of 2001. The album will contain newly recorded songs as well as classical highlights from some of her previous recordings.

source: biggeststars

Joshua Lee Holloway

2008-01-26T05:00:00.000-08:00

Josh Holloway was born July 20, 1969, in San Jose, California but moved to the Blue Ridge Mountains of Georgia at the age of 2. He is the second oldest of four boys. He developed an interest for movies at a very young age. He studied at the University of Georgia but quit after only one year to become a successful model, which took him all over Europe and North America.

Josh's ambition for acting took him to Los Angeles, where he got a role in the comedy Doctor Benny. He followed that up with lead roles in the movies Mi Amigo, Moving August, and Cold Heart. After those roles, he gained notice for his lead role in the Sci-Fi Channel movie Sabretooth with David Keith and John Rhys-Davies. Holloway was also a guest star on CSI and NCIS. He struggled for eight years before his big break on the hit tv show "Lost".

Currently, he has a leading role in the Emmy award-winning ABC show Lost, where he plays the role of James "Sawyer" Ford, which has given him a Hollywood heart-throb status. He has also been mentioned with regard to the role of Solid Snake in a potential Metal Gear Solid movie or a possible role as Gambit in the upcoming X-Men 3 movie.

Josh's hobbies include boating, sailing, snowboarding, martial arts, motorcross, and playing guitar.

On the morning of October 12, 2005, he and his wife Yessica were robbed at gunpoint in their home. The couple was asleep when the gunman awoke them and took cash and credit cards before driving off in Holloway's Mercedes-Benz, which was found abandoned a short time later. There was no evidence that the criminals knew who they were robbing, or had targeted them because Holloway was a celebrity

source: www.celebstation

Ayesha Dharker - Biography

2008-01-26T04:58:00.000-08:00

Ayesha Dharker (also credited as Ayesha Dharkar) (born in 1977 in Mumbai, India) is a British actress of Indian origin. Ayesha Dharker is the daughter of the poet Imtiaz Dharker. Her father, Anil Dharker, is a columnist and an ex-editor of Debonair . She was raised in Glasgow .
Dharker made her screen debut in the 1989 Francois Villier film, Manika: Une vie plus tard. Dharker subsequently went on to star in many American, French and Indian films. She has had many television roles in the UK, particularly in Cutting It and Life Isn't All Ha Ha Hee Hee, in which she co-starred with Meera Syal.

Her most internationally recognised role was when she acted as Queen Jamillia, the Queen of Naboo in Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones (2002). Dharker starred in the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical Bombay Dreams, both in London's West End and on Broadway (2004). She also starred in The Mistress of Spices (2005).

In the international award-winning film, The Terrorist (1999), she played the lead character Malli, a role that earned her a nomination for the National Film Award for Best Actress in India and the Cairo Film Festival award for Best Artistic Contribution by an Actress.

Julia Stiles - Biography

2008-01-26T04:52:00.000-08:00

Born: 28 March 1981
Where: New York, New York, USA
Awards: No Major Awards
Height: 5' 7"

The turn of the millennium saw teen flicks dominate the box office charts. After the massive success of Dawson's Creek on TV, producers finally recognised the renewed power of the youth market and milked it with gusto. Horror movies, psychological dramas, comedies, even Shakespearian tragedies - all of them made millions when set in a High School. And it was this period that saw the rise of Julia Stiles. Just as she was beginning to make a mark as an actress, suddenly she was able to surf this new wave to the very top. With 10 Things I Hate About You, Down To You, Hamlet, O and Save The Last Dance, she became the undisputed Queen of Teen. But, no squeaky cutie and hugely ambitious, she had all the equipment to grow into a serious adult actress.

She was born Julia O'Hara Stiles on the 28th of March, 1981, in New York City, and is of Irish, Italian and English heritage. Her mother, Judith, was an artist, working in ceramics, and ran a ceramics store in Greenwich Village. Her father, John, was a Second Grade teacher in Harlem, who helped in selling Judith's work. There would be two more children - Jane, nine years Julia's junior, and Johnny, born three years after Jane.

Julia was raised in a loft apartment in SoHo, which served as home and studio, so there was a constant stream of artists and aficionados of all races passing through. A curious child, Julia took an interest in everyone, and quickly joined in the political arguments that raged around the kitchen table, her parents being "loud-mouthed" and liberal, true radicals of the Sixties. By the age of six, she was demanding to work in her mum's store, sitting behind the cash register, chatting to the customers and going through the bills. During breaks she would write letters, not to imaginary friends but to political leaders, demanding action. One she sent to Mayor Ed Koch, suggesting that more bins be placed on the streets.

Indeed, Julia spent a lot of her time writing. If she ever had a problem, she'd write to her parents about it. Then, if necessary, she would argue her case. She became very persuasive very quickly. Without taking official lessons, she more or less taught herself to act while watching TV series The Honeymooners, acting out a different role each evening.

She was a keen student of everything. She took modern dance lessons from a very early age and, as her parents would often take her to the theatre, she became infatuated with Shakespeare, actually placing a statue of the Bard in her room. Odd, you might think, for a young girl - but then this young girl would star in three Shakespeare adaptations before she was 20.

Judith and John recognised Julia's potential and did all they could to feed her hungry little mind. They'd take her to Smokestack's Lightning jazz club every weekend, where she'd cartwheel across the dance-floor, entertaining the punters. And they encouraged her acting, at age 9 sending her to summer classes with the YMCA.

At 11, Juliaâ€™s precociousness, her New York sass, her penchant for letter-writing and the notion instilled in her that she could do anything came in handy. Having been thrilled by a performance there, she wrote to the director of the experimental off-Broadway La Mama Theatre, enclosing photos of herself dressed up in different costumes and asking if they had any parts for child-actresses. And, as it happened, they did. Having debuted at the One Dream Theatre in Jungle Movie, an odd play spoofing jungle movies from the 1940s, with Julia lip-synching over pre-recorded tapes about cannibalism, sheâ€™d appear at the La Mama in Everyday Newt Berman, The Sandalwood Box and Photo Op, and at the Kitchen Theatre in Matthew/School Of Life and Hughies.

At 12, she got herself an agent, and the paid work began. She appeared in adverts for Tide and for Apple Jacks (she was the little git teasing someone for eating them). And there was some TV work, with a recurring guest part in Ghostwriter. But it was a tough time. Very, very ambitious, Julia had terrible trouble with rejection. When Kirsten Dunst won the part of Claudia in Interview With The Vampire, Julia was inconsolable. Her mother even considered forbidding her from continuing her career.

But her education continued apace. She spent her early teenage summers at Camp Rowe, a "hippie camp" where all the kids attended workshops and listened to Phish and the Grateful Dead, and the adults worked hard to build the kids' self-esteem. During the year, she attended New York's Professional Children's School, an establishment preparing kids for a career in the Arts. Here she'd study the likes of Latin and constitutional law - naturally, she was a Straight-A student.

At 15, she made her big screen debut, as Claire Danes' buddy in I Love You, I Love You Not, a movie which, rather unfortunately, compared the problems of a girl in high school to the troubles her grandmother (Jeanne Moreau) faced in Auschwitz. But then came a slightly meatier role in a much bigger film, AND she got to star alongside The Vampire Being Interviewed, Brad Pitt. In The Devil's Own, Pitt played an IRA terrorist who flees to America to arrange a gun-run, and lodges with straight-up Irish copper Harrison Ford. Julia played Ford's daughter, Bridget O'Meara, a young tyke who will NOT get off the phone.

These were reasonable, if uninspiring parts. But Julia did not have to wait long for her breakthrough. In 1997, the same year as The Devil's Own, she made a big splash as Ellen Barkin's daughter in the Oprah Winfrey-produced Before Women Had Wings, concerning child abuse. This she immediately followed up with a controversial part in Wicked. Here she was Ellie Christianson, a 14-year-old girl who takes the place of her mother when she dies mysteriously. A good girl, you might say - until she starts wearing her mother's clothes and seducing her father. Thankfully, the police suspect something is up. Wicked was a really eye-catching role. Her first lead, it gained her a cult following and won her a Best Actress award at the KVI Festival.

Next came another interesting project in Wide Awake, the movie M. Night Shyamalan delivered before The Sixth Sense. Here Joseph Cross played a schoolboy who, his grandfather dead, explores the major religions in the hope of ensuring that Gramps is OK. In doing this he questions his parents, played by Denis Leary and Dana Delaney, and annoys the hell out of his sister, played by Julia.

And now it really took off. Having played a hippie chick in the rather wretched TV series The Sixties, 1999 saw her first Shakespeare adaptation. This was 10 Things I Hate About You, based on The Taming Of The Shrew, Julia starring as the shrew in question. Here the popular and pretty Bianca (Larisa Oleynik) is banned by her parents from dating boys. Well, not exactly banned. She can date if her older sister Kat (Julia) dates. Unfortunately for Larisa, Julia is grouchy, highly unpopular, and actively hates boys. So Larisa's would-be boyfriends bribe up-for-a-laugh new-boy rebel-type Patrick (Heath Ledger) to date Kat. So he does, and they fight and fight and fall in love.

Julia herself would now fall in love for the first time, too. The lucky fellow was co-star Joseph Gordon-Levitt, star of TV comedy series 3rd Rock From The Sun. Their relationship would last one happy year.

10 Things was a massive success, as was her next effort, the rom-com Down To You. Here she was a New York student who falls for Freddie Prinze Jr. She's studying art, he's a budding chef. She fears commitment and takes off for San Francisco, he starts drinking heavily. Can their love be rekindled?

Next came two more serious projects. Michael Almereyda's Hamlet saw the play updated and set in modern-day New York. Now it was about murder, vengeance and dithering in corporate America, with Ethan Hawke as the ditherer, Sam Shepard as his dead dad and Kyle MacLachlan as the bad guy. Julia, of course, was Ophelia, and drowned quite beautifully.

After this came a complete change with David Mamet's State And Main. Here, having left New Hampshire due to poor organisation and the sexual peccadilloes of star Alec Baldwin, a movie crew arrives in small-town Vermont. Philip Seymour Hoffman was excellent as the troubled scriptwriter beginning a relationship with bookshop owner Rebecca Pidgeon, William H. Macy suffered terribly and hilariously trying to keep the production together. And Julia was great too, as a teenage waitress who seduces the hapless Baldwin.

Julia might have gone straight into another sexy role, and a much tougher one at that, as Madonna's production company offered her the lead in Going Down, based on Jennifer Belle's novel. Here she'd have been a New York student who finances her studies by working as a prostitute. But Julia was unhappy with the nudity, and turned it down - for now. Instead, she chose the movie that would be her biggest hit. In Save The Last Dance For Me, she was Sara Johnson, a would-be ballerina whose mother dies, resulting in a move from a small town to her father's apartment in a rough part of Chicago. At school, she falls for black guy Derek (Sean Patrick Thomas) who's also into dancing, but more in a hip-hop stylee. And so, battling racial prejudices all the way, Sara rediscovers herself and happiness through this new music and movement.

Julia worked hard for the part. Though she was an able dancer from her early youth, and director Thomas Carter had cast her because of her %u201Ctable dance%u201D in 10 Things, she still needed a crash course in both ballet and bootie-shakin'. Training in Chicago with a choreographer from Joffrey's and the principal dancer, she practised till her toes bled.

It worked. Save The Last Dance For Me opened on Martin Luther King Jr holiday weekend, perfect timing for a movie dealing with race. And, taking in over $27 million, it knocked Tom Hanks' Cast Away from top spot, remaining there for two weeks. Something had happened. White teens do not usually go to "black" movies, but they went to see Julia in a %u201Cblack%u201D movie. Like Renee Zellweger, she's attractive without being too beautiful or thin and she's a fine actress, therefore she makes it real. Kids love Julia Stiles - though she has never been so, she appears to be one of them. Calvin Klein quickly realised this, putting her in a jeans ad back in 1999. So did Vanity Fair, putting her on their Hollywood cover that same year, inbetween Reese Witherspoon and the excellent Sarah Polley.

Another point to be made is that many Americans still do not like to see cross-race relationships. People told Julia that it was a dangerous role to take, but she did it anyway. How could she not, with an upbringing like that? In fact, she did it twice in a row. Back in 1998, she'd filmed another Shakespeare adaptation, O, based on Othello. Once more set in High School, this saw Julia as the popular Desi (ie Desdemona), who's dating O (Mekhi Pfifer), the only black kid in a white prep school and the top basketball star. Josh Hartnett played the sneaky Hugo (Iago), breathing life into O's green-eyed monster. The film had been set for release well before 2001, but was temporarily shelved due to the Columbine High School shootings.

But, though her career was taking off, Julia's ambitions were not being fully fulfilled. Needing to know more, she'd enrolled at Columbia University in 2000, majoring in English (fellow students were Anna Paquin and Joseph Gordon-Levitt). Also in 2000, she visited Costa Rica with the Habitat For Humanity charity, learning about the region and its problems and helping to construct homes for the people. Beyond this, as something of a feminist (she won't take roles where all she does is fancy a boy), she appeared in The Vagina Monologues. And she became fluent in Spanish, practised veganism and played football, as striker for an Irish women's team in the Bronx, occasionally hugging her blankie throughout. Yes, she may be thoroughly forward, but Julia Stiles still has the blankie she used to hug (and talk to as a friend) when she was a kid.

As well as O, 2001 brought Julia's first truly grown-up role, in The Business Of Strangers. This was a dark thriller with Stockard Channing as a thrusting businesswoman and Julia as her canny young assistant. Stopping over at a hotel, they take every opportunity to tear each other to pieces.

After this came a small role in The Bourne Identity, a Robert Ludlum tale where Matt Damon is washed up on a beach with bullet wounds and total amnesia. One thing he does know is that everyone's trying to kill him, so he takes off with the tremendous Franka Potente. Julia played an operative who spends all her time before monitors and short-wave radios, directing assassins towards Damon. You keep expecting her to enter the action - it is Julia Stiles, after all - but, weirdly, she never does. It was unsurprising that Stiles only agreed to appear in 2004's follow-up, The Bourne Supremacy, once her role was beefed up. This time, with unknown persons pushing the States into a war with China, she would be suspected by her CIA superiors of being in cahoots with prime suspect Damon and forced to spy on him.

After The Bourne Identity came A Guy Thing, a raunchy comedy where Jason Lee, set to marry a rich Selma Blair, wakes up next to Julia (Blair's cousin!) after his stag do and, believing he must have been unfaithful to his fiancee, tries to cover up his crime, as well as avoid Stiles' ex-boyfriend, a psychotic cop. Naturally, after a series of crazy twists and turns, he comes to wonder whether Julia wouldn't be a better bet after all. And then there was Carolina, where she works on TV show The Perfect Date but cannot find love herself, though she's very matey with the ludicrously good-looking Alessandro Nivola. She also struggles to escape or accept Shirley Maclaine, the fesity grandmother who raised her.

Carolina was a deeply troubled production. To begin with, Kathy Bates sued the producers, claiming they'd offered her a role and had to pay her fee, even though they'd eventually given the part to Maclaine (it was settled out of court). Filming was plagued by money problems, the set being shut down several times, and only Stiles' refusal to give up kept it all together. Even so, makers Miramax had no confidence in the movie and released it straight to DVD.

In the meantime, she made Mona Lisa Smile, joining Julia Roberts, Kirsten Dunst and Maggie Gyllenhaal in an exceptional female cast. Roberts would play a Californian feminist and free-thinker in the '50s who comes to strict Wellesley College on the East Coast. The young ladies are being groomed for a life looking after their businessmen husbands, which naturally strikes against Roberts' conscience. Julia would play Joan Brandwyn, smart enough to win a place at Yale but brainwashed into rejecting that future for a trophy wife's lot.

After this would come The Prince And Me, with a screenplay by Katherine Fugate (who'd earlier penned the ill-fated Carolina). This was another teen romance where the future king of Denmark enrols incognito at Wisconsin University and falls for farm-girl biochemist Julia. She discovers who he really is, dumps him for his deception, then follows him when he returns home to his father's sick-bed. But does she really want to be a queen? The movie was well-timed to arrive just as Frederik, the real Crown Prince of Denmark, was marrying Australian Mary Donaldson. It also gave Julia the chance to work beside thespian heavyweights Miranda Richardson and Edward Fox.

The reason Stiles had fought so hard for Carolina was because it was an adult role - she was determined to grow up and branch out. To help in this, she had begun a serious stage career, in 2002 playing Viola in Twelfth Night in New York's Central Park. Then, in 2004, she went one step further by starring with Aaron Eckhart in David Mamet's hard-hitting Oleanna at the Garrick Theatre in London. This saw her as a student who accuses Eckhart's unconventional tutor of sexual harassment - a truly controversial piece. Politically, she'd also involve herself in the Rock The Vote movement, in full flow in the build-up to 2004's presidential elections.

Very much in demand, Julia had been letting college take a back seat, squeezing in a semester of study, football and karate whenever her work schedule allowed. Her drive into more adult movies was working. After The Bourne Supremacy, she would return to David Mamet and William H. Macy in Edmond, another shocking feature where businessman Macy, realising that he despises his middle-class life, takes a trip into the sleazy urban underground. After a series of tawdry encounters he gradually slips into sociopathy, revealing his hidden racism to waitress Stiles who in turn makes the mistake of inviting him back to her place. Also arriving in 2005 would be A Little Trip to Heaven, an arty indie thriller directed by Icelander Baltasar Kormakur. Here Stiles would play a wife and mother painfully loyal to her unstable husband. When the couple claim a million dollar settlement after Stiles' brother is killed in an accident, cold-hearted insurance investigator Forest Whitaker arrives to see how accidental the death really was.

2005 really was an up-and-down year. Having finally graduated from Columbia with a degree in English, Stiles had continued her stage career with Fran's Bed in New York, the play being written by James Lapine, winner of a Pulitzer Prize and multiple Tonys. Here Mia Farrow would play a comatose woman whose husband and two daughters must decide whether to let her die, the bonds between them being clarified by a series of flashbacks and hallucinations concerning adultery, guilt and parental errors. Stiles would play Farrow's younger daughter, now a wealthy New York businesswoman, who's been favoured by her parents, her sister consequently suffering a dreadful inferiority complex. The year would also feature a downside in a legal struggle with her former partners in Smithy's Films, a production company she'd helped set up in 2002. The company had been formed in part to help Stiles' transition from teen star to adult actress and to this end they'd optioned Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar, with Stiles set to star as Esther Greenwood. Now, though, she was forced to take legal action to stop an attempt to transfer the intellectual property rights and make the film without her involvement.

Come 2006, now dating painter and sculptor Jonathan Cramer (named by New York Magazine as "New York's sexiest artist"), Stiles would re-enter the mainstream with The Omen, an arguably unnecessary remake of the 1976 horror classic. Here she'd step into Lee Remick's shoes as Katherine Thorn, wife of US diplomat Liev Schreiber, who mothers baby Damien in the mistaken belief that he's her kid and not the Antichrist. Guilt-ridden by her inability to bond with the child, haunted by sinister dreams and undermined by evil nanny Mrs Baylock (here played by her Fran's Bed co-star Mia Farrow), she inevitably gets it from the satanic tot. It's clear that, with The Prince And Me gone and The Bourne Ultimatum on its way, Julia Stiles has at last broken away from the teen flicks that raised her up but would have ruined her. In both thrillers and rom-coms she's proved herself to be equally adept. Like Reese Witherspoon, Natalie Portman and Kirsten Dunst, she's always had a maturity that belied her years, and it's helping her grow up with great aplomb. And, like the other three, she will be a star for years.

Dominic Wills

Benazir Bhutto - 1st woman Prime Minister Biography

2008-01-26T04:47:00.000-08:00

Benazir Bhutto, who was assassinated on Thursday afternoon in Rawalpindi's Liaquat Bagh area, was fifty-four.

Born on June 21, 1953, Bhutto was the first woman Prime Minister elected to lead a post-colonial Muslim state.

Bhutto attended the Lady Jennings Nursery School and then the Convent of Jesus and Mary in Karachi. After two years of schooling at the Rawalpindi Presentation Convent, she was sent to the Jesus and Mary Convent at Murree. She passed her O-level examination at the age of 15.

She then went on to complete her A-Levels from the Karachi Grammar School.

After completing her early education in Pakistan, she pursued her higher education in the United States. From 1969 to 1973 she attended Radcliffe College, and then Harvard University, where she obtained a B.A. degree cum laude in comparative government. She was also elected to Phi Beta Kappa.

The next phase of her education took place in the United Kingdom. Between 1973 and 1977 Bhutto studied Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford. She completed a course in International Law and Diplomacy while at Oxford. In December 1976 she was elected president of the Oxford Union, becoming the first Asian woman to head the prestigious debating society.

On December 18, 1987 she married Asif Ali Zardari in Karachi. The couple have three children: Bilawal, Bakhtwar, and Aseefa.

She was twice elected Prime Minister of Pakistan, for the first time in 1988 for a period of 20 months before being removed by former president Ghulam Ishaq Khan on grounds of alleged corruption. In 1993, Bhutto was re-elected as Prime Minister and removed in 1996 on similar charges, this time by President Farooq Leghari.

Bhutto went into self-imposed exile in Dubai in 1998, where she remained until she returned to Pakistan on October 18, 2007, after reaching an understanding with General Musharraf by which she was granted amnesty and all corruption charges were withdrawn.

She was the eldest child of former premier Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, a Pakistani of Sindhi extraction, and Begum Nusrat Bhutto, a Pakistani of Iranian-Kurdish extraction.

Her paternal grandfather was Sir Shah Nawaz Bhutto who came to Larkana Sindh before partition from his native town of Bhatto Kalan in Haryana.

After spending eight years in exile in Dubai and London, Bhutto returned to Karachi in October this year to prepare for the 2008 general elections and suicide bombers immediately attacked her PPP rally.

There have been several assassination attempts on Bhutto in the past.

Marion Jones - Biography

2008-01-26T04:42:00.000-08:00

Marion Jones, one of the greatest track and field talents of all time was hailed as the "the Fastest woman on the planet" by reaching a top speed of 23 miles per hour. At the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney, is by all means a symbol of women power in sports and arguably the best female athlete in the world. Marion engraved her name in golden letters in the history of sports by becoming the first woman to win five medals at one Olympics, which she accomplished at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney. When she runs, mentioning her speed, her opponents say all they see is the back of her head. Outrunning the troubles both on the track and in the personal life she runs faster as a real sprint queen.

Marion was born on 12 October, 1975 in Los Angeles. She is an American athlete of half Belizean and half African American origin. Marion was born to be an athlete and she proved her athletic capabilities at the tender ages itself. As a child, Jones was inspired by women such as track star Florence Griffith-Joyner, and vowed to win Olympic gold herself one day. In 1991, at age 15, she ran the 200 meters in 22.87 seconds, breaking the national high school record. She faltered later that year at the TAC Nationals, placing fourth in the 200 and eighth in the 100. Her national high school record in the 200 metres is still intact. In high school, Jones won the California state championship in the 100 meters four years in a row.

During her schooling Jones was an outstanding basketball player. She accepted a full scholarship to the University of North Carolina in basketball. Because of an injury Jones left the Basketball court forever and decided to concentrate on track and field. Apart from sports Marion was also excellent at studies. Jones was an outstanding basketball player while at North Carolina College

It was in Sydney at the 2000 Olympics, Marian was seen at her full caliber, winning medals after medals and bagging several records and proudly parading with both the U.S. and Belize flags during her victory laps in the stadium. Before the Olympics Jones told the press that she was aiming for five gold medals. However, she finished with three golds and two bronzes, still an astonishing feat which had never been achieved by a female athlete before.

Ms Jones won the 200-meter and 4x100 - meter world titles in 2001and retained the 100-meter world title in 2002. She also holds four of the five best times recorded in the world for the 100-meter sprint event. In 2002, Jones earned a share of the IAAF Golden League Jackpot for the third time in her career (1998, 2001 and 2002) for her seven wins on the circuit in the 100-meter sprint. She ended the 2002 campaign undefeated for the first time in her career. She was flawless with 16 wins in the 100m, four in the 200m and one in the 400m. She also holds four of the five best times recorded in the world for the 100-metre sprint event.

Following her triumph in Sydney, the victory was tainted by speculation about her use of performance-enhancing drugs. Though Marion Jones has never failed a drug test, several sources claim to have witnessed her use them before, during and after the Sydney Games.

In 1998, Marion Jones married shot putter C.J. Hunter. They divorced a year later. In 2003, Marion Jones gave birth to a son, Tim Jr., named after his father Tim Montgomery, who had broken the 100 m World Record in 2002. In 2007, she married Barbadian sprinter Obadele Thompson in a small quiet ceremony. Thompson won the 100m bronze medal at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, Australia. The couple are currently expecting their first child.

Her auto biography 'Life in the Fast Lane' depicts the ups and downs of Jones's life. Undeniably, Jones is a great athlete. Jones says that the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games will be her last. She has become an inspiration to thousands of young girls who dream of athletic triumph

Her positive attributes have contributed to her being named Ambassador to the Central American nation of Belize, from which her mother hails. The Marion Jones Foundation, which is created to help young girls to achieve the goals of becoming sports stars, has raised millions of dollars, a portion of which has gone into improving Belize's sports facilities. Her organization has also partnered with the YWCA, YMCA and Big Brothers/Big Sisters in the U.S. to fund programs that encourage and aid children and teens in their pursuit of education, personal development, sports, fitness, and nutrition.

Bhavana Actress - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T04:37:00.000-08:00

Bhavana (born 6 June 1985) is a South Indian actress who acts in Malayalam and Tamil) movies. She made her debut in Kamal's Nammal which won her critical acclaim and various honours, including the State award. She debuted in Malayalam film Nammal opposite newcomers like Siddharth, Jishnu and Renuka Menon. The film was a big success and she got several offers in Malayalam. She has acted with almost all actors of Malayalam including Mammootty, Mohanlal, Suresh Gopi, Dileep, Jayaram, Prithviraj, Kunchacko Boban, Jayasurya etc. Though she got several Tamil films she refused them due to tight schedules. Most of her Malayalam films are big hits and she is one of the top Mollywood and Kollywood actresses. Her first Tamil film was Koodal Nagar opposite Bharath but shelved due to some technical difficulties. Her first released Tamil film Chithiram Pesuthadi was a huge success. After that she was flooded with offers in Kollywood.Her latest relese Deepavali is getting good reviews. Her next projects are Koodal Nagar, Arya, Naan Kadavul, Rameswaram and Chota Mumbai. She is also planning to shift to Telugu films. She openly declares that she never does overglamourous roles. She even refused to act in a Telugu film of Krishnavamsi. Her latest news is that she refused to be part of Simbu's new movie Kettavan because she thinks Simbu's image is tarnished in Tamil cinema these days and she doesn't want to associate with him.

Pratibha Patil - First Indian Woman President - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T04:31:00.000-08:00

Pratibha Patil was born to Narayan Paglu Rao in Nadgaon, Maharashtra on December 19th 1934. She did her schooling from R.R. School at Jalgaon. Pratibha completed her M.A. from Mooljee Jaitha College, Jalgaon and then obtained a law degree from the Government Law College. Pratibha married educator Devisingh Ransingh Shekhawat on July 7, 1965 in her third marriage They have a son and a daughter.

Pratibha along with her husband set an educational instituteVidya Bharati Shikshan Prasarak Mandal, which has a chain of schools and colleges in Jalgaon and Mumbai. They also set up Shram Sadhana Trust that runs hostels for working women. Pratibha was the chairwoman of a cooperative sugar factory known as Sant Muktabai Sahakari Sakhar Karkhana and a cooperative bank named after herself as Pratibha Mahila Sahakari Bank. Pratibha started a school for poor children of Vimukta Jatis and Nomadic tribes.

Pratibha Patil began political career in 1962 at the age of 27 by the guidance of senior Congress leader and ex-Chief Minister Yashwantrao Chavan. Pratibha was a deputy minister for education after re-election in 1967. She was elected to the Rajya Sabha as a Congress candidate.

In 1985 Pratibha was elected to the Rajya Sabha, and served as its deputy chairwoman from November 1986 to November 1988. Her term expired in April 1990. The following year she won election 10th Lok Sabha from at Amravati constituency. She also served as Director of National Federation of Urban Co-operative Banks & Credit Societies and the Member of Governing Council, National Co-operative, Union of India. In November 2004 Pratibha become the first woman Governor of Rajasthan.In April 2006, the Rajasthan Legislative Assembly passed the Rajasthan Freedom of Religion Bill 2006 Pratibha Patil returned the bill unsigned the Bill infringed on the fundamental rights such as freedom of speech and expression, freedom of conscience and freedom to profess, practice and propagate religion.

Pratibha Patil resigned as the Governor of Rajasthan on June 21, 2007.Pratibha Patil is the 13th and current President of India. She is the first woman and first Maharashtrian to hold this post. Pratibha was sworn in as President of India on July 25, 2007 by the Chief Justice of India K. G. Balakrishnan.

source: living.oneindia.in

Laila - Actress ( Biography )

2008-01-26T04:27:00.000-08:00

Laila (born 24 October 1980) is an Indian actress, she has acted in Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Hindi language films. She made her debut in the Vijaykanth starrer Kallazhagar. The Mumbai based Laila then worked with Ajith in "Dheena" and "Parthen Rasithen" with Prashanth . Then came "Dhill" and "Pithamagan" with Vikram. In between, Laila took a break and gone back to Mumbai. But she returned, with a bang, to Kollywood with "Ullam Ketkumae", in which she did a delightful role. She was married to Mehdi (Iranian businessman) on January 6th 2006, with whom Laila has been going steady for over 7 years. Their engagement had taken place nearly three years ago, according to the actress herself.

Namitha - Actress - Biography

2008-01-26T04:24:00.000-08:00

Namitha Kapoor is a Tamil actress and one of the few glamorous and tall heroines. She is 6 ft tall and weighs 70 kg. She has acted in Tamil, Kannada ,Telugu, Hindi films. Although her base was Tollywood she became famous after the Tamil film Engal Anna opposite Vijayakanth. Born and raised in Gujarat, Namitha is another actress in the long list of imports from the North that entered the Telugu film industry via Tamil movies. Her father is a businessman and her mother is a housewife. She became popular with the Tamil version of the film Engal Anna. A Miss India contest brought Namitha to the Telugu film industry. After entering Tollywood, she immediately grabbed the attention of Telugu film lovers with Sontam and Gemini though the films didn’t fare well in the box office. Namitha appeared in an English film named Maya directed by Eric Manning. She has also another Malayalam film in her credit.

Diana Kurien @ Nayanthara - Actress - Biography

2008-01-26T04:21:00.000-08:00

Diana Kurien (born 18 November 1984 in Kerala, India), popularly known as Nayantara , is a south Indian actress and has acted in Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam movies. She was born in Tiruvalla, Pathanamthitta District, Kerala. She was chosen by director Satyan Anthikkad and cast opposite Jayaram in Mansinakkare. Later she played a ghost who falls in love with hero Mohanlal in Fazil’s Vismayathumbathu. She played opposite Sarath Kumar in Iyya. She acted with Rajnikanth in Chandramukhi, her most successful movie to-date

Asin Actress - Biography

2008-01-26T04:18:00.000-08:00

Asin Thottumkal (born on October 26, 1975) is an Indian film actress. She began her career acting in minor roles as a supporting artist in the Malayalam cinema industry, while also attending an acting studio, to follow her dream to act. After her debut in the Malayalam film industry, she acted in Telugu language films in which Asin gained Indian cinema's attention in 2003 by playing the role of Vasantha in Shivamani 9848022338 , her first major hit. She reach superstardom by enacting the role of Kalapana in the Tamil language film, Ghajini, her first blockbuster, and since then she has acted in over twenty Indian films, with her main intention being Tamil language ventures. She is now considered to be the top actress of South India, following her performances in major budget films and the retirement of Jyothika Saravanan, after her marriage.

Mother Teresa - ( A Messenger Of Love To The World ) Biography

2008-01-26T04:09:00.000-08:00

“I am a little pencil in the hand of a writing God who is sending a love letter to the world.” Mother Teresa

City of despair, was ruled by unwelcoming darkness. People old and young had forgotten the art of smile until a shimmering light with cold breeze of love taught the art of a loving smile. She wasn't a powerful woman who could change the destiny, but a feeble mother who could make her children's path easy to reach the destiny together. The destiny of world peace, unconditional love and unfailing kindness. She was the mother, a saint of loving kindness. She was Mother Teresa. The Indian treasure though lost, breathes in every Indian heart. Uncover the life or biography of the saintly woman whose courage and the will to change the socialistic rule made a history in the world.

The childhood with drifted edge of huge loss
Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu (Mother Teresa) was born on August 26, 1910 in capital of Republic of Macedonia, Skopje. Five children were born to Nikola and Dronda Bojaxhiu, yet only three survived. Agnes, was the youngest, with an older sister, Aga, and brother, Lazar. Nikola devoted most of his time to politics and Albanian cause. One of her biography states that after a political meeting he fell ill and died. His death left the family in financial straits. At that time little Agnes was just seven years old However Drane, didn't let the sad demise affect her children's growth as an individual with a fine etched character.

The religious call
During Agnes, early years she was fascinated by stories of the lives of missionaries and their service to mankind. So, at the age of twelve, she decided to commit herself to the religious life. At the age of 18 she joined the Sisters Of Loreto (an Irish community of nuns with missions in India) as a missionary to walk a divine lonely path without any trails of her family or friends. She took her first vows as a nun on 24 May 1931. It is here she received the name Sister Mary Teresa after St. Therese of Lisieux. In December, she departed for India. She began her novitiate in Darjeeling, near the Himalayan mountains. After 6 years she took her solemn vows on 14 May 1937, while serving as a teacher at the Loreto convent school in eastern Calcutta.

In Calcutta, Sister Mary Teresa began her career, by teaching history and geography, which she reportedly did with dedication and enjoyment for the next 15 years. During this period she developed and grew to a finer being with saintly characters. The simple and dedicated life paved her a path to hear and do the will of her second calling

Th call within the call
Mother Teresa heard the God's call for a divine service on a fateful day in 1946 when she traveled for a retreat to Darjeeling. On that day she heard Jesus' thirst for a divine service of love for the poor and for the souls that were detested at the very sight. His thirst became the driving force of her life. He called her ' Come bare my light of love'. She succumbed to His will without a second taught. After two years testing and discernment passed before Mother Teresa received permission to begin, 'The Missionaries Of Charity” dedicated to the service of the poorest of the poor. On August 17, 1948, she cladded her small body in a white, blue-bordered sari for the first time and bid adieu to the world of Loreto convent to enter the world of the lowly poor on the dirty streets and broken slums of India.

Her venture into the hearts of unwanted
After completing basic course with the Medical Mission Sisters in Patna, Mother Teresa returned to Calcutta and found temporary lodging with the Little Sisters of the Poor. In her diary she writes of her initial struggle. Rad it in her own words, “While looking for a home I walked and walked till my arms and legs ached. I thought how much they must ache in body and soul, looking for a home, food and health. Then the comfort of Loreto [her former order] came to tempt me. 'You have only to say the word and all that will be yours again,' the Tempter kept on saying ... Of free choice, my God, and out of love for you, I desire to remain and do whatever be your Holy will in my regard. I did not let a single tear come” With courage and the help of her only teammate then 'Christ', she ventured into the slums. She visited distorted families, washed their ugly sores and healed their heart overwhelming with pain and agony. Her two famous historic stories of love were that of an old man lying sick on the road and nursing of a woman dying of hunger and TB. Although the path began with just two in the beginning within a short span she was joined one by one by her former students. Thus began the saga of serving, “ the unwanted, the unloved and the uncared”. Her efforts quickly caught the attention of Indian officials, including the Prime Minister, who expressed his appreciation . Today Mother Teresa's dream is looked after more than 4,000 nuns, who run orphanages, AIDS hospices, and charity centers worldwide. They even carefor refugees, the blind, disabled, aged, alcoholics, the poor and homeless, and victims of floods, epidemics, and famine.

On 7 October 1950 the new congregation of the Missionaries of Charity was officially established in the Archdiocese of Calcutta. By the early 1960s, Mother Teresa began to send her Sisters to other parts of India. Soon her foundations followed in Rome and Tanzania and, eventually, on every continent. The world eventually started tracking her every work. Numerous awards started showering on her beginning with the Indian Padmashri Award in 1962 and notably the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979.

She ends her earthly journey to reunite with her master
Despite her severe health problems Mother Teresa continued to govern her Society with due response to every cry of need by the poor. After meeting Pope John Paul II for the last time, she returned to Calcutta and spent her final weeks receiving visitors and instructing her Sisters. On 5th September 1997, she breathed her last with a deeper quest of search of her master. She was given the honour of a state funeral by the Government of India and her body was buried in the Mother House of the Missionaries of Charity. Her tomb quickly became a place of pilgrimage and prayer for people of all faiths, rich and poor alike.

The mother of every wounded soul testified a life of unshakable faith, invincible hope and extraordinary charity. Her response to God's calling made her a symbol of compassion to the world, and a living witness to the thirsting love of God. Her loss did make many hearts weep. However her life made several hearts cling to the work of love. So the next time you pass a wounded stranger do remember her quotes,

“I try to give to the poor people for love what the rich could get for money. No, I wouldn't touch a leper for a thousand pounds; yet I willingly cure him for the love of God. “

“It is a poverty to decide that a child must die so that you may live as you wish.”

“The biggest disease today is not leprosy or tuberculosis, but rather the feeling of being unwanted. “

Let the love she sowed in the world reap great thing today and forever.

source: living.oneindia.in

Sneha Actress - Biography

2008-01-26T04:05:00.000-08:00

Sneha, (Real name, Suhasini Rajaram Naidu) (born on,October 12, 1981) is a leading actress in South India. Her screen name is Sneha. She is well-known for her homely looks and conservative acting. Some of her major films include Virumbugiren, Autograph, King and Pammal K Sambandham. She was born in Bombay (now, Mumbai) and brought up in Dubai, UAE. Sneha is the one of the few actresses in Tamil, Telegu and Malayalam movies who refuses to take up glamourous roles, as she believes that her 'homely roles' are appreciated by all. However, her attempt to look 'homely' has lost her many good roles. Sneha has done a good performance in a Malayalam movie Thuruppu Gulan. Sneha plays the female lead as Lakshmi, who is the daughter of Chandra Sekhara Menon the original owner of the star hotel, who falls for Ghulan without knowing him as the son of their tenant. She recently built a marriage hall at her grandmother's home town of Panruti, in Cuddalore Taluk, Tamil Nadu.

Pooja Actress - Biography

2008-01-26T04:03:00.000-08:00

Pooja (born 25 June 1981 as Pooja Gautami Umashankar in Sri Lanka) is an actress in Kollywood. She has a Masters Degree in Business & Management. She was also a part of Mani Ratnam's stage show, Netru, Indru, Naalai (Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow). She hails from the state of Karnataka, her mother is Sinhala and her father is Tamil. The languages she can speak are Tamil, Kannada and English. She went to school and college in Bangalore, Mount Carmel College.

Trisha Actress - Biography

2008-01-26T04:00:00.000-08:00

Trisha Krishnan born 4th May 1983 as Trisha Krishnamurthy , Born in a middle-class family to Krishnan and Uma Krishnan in Kerala, the Tamil Iyer actress got her early education from Church Park School and pursued her higher education in Ethiraj College, Chennai. Later, she modelled and won Miss Salem in 1999, Miss Chennai in 1999 and Miss India Miss Beautiful Smile in 2001. In school, she participated in several cultural activities, sports and school band. Trisha is said to be a good ballet dancer. She studied in the same school as former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J.Jayalalitha.

Sadha Actress - Biography

2008-01-26T03:53:00.000-08:00

Sadhaaf Mohammed Syed (Born 17 February 1984, in India) also known as Sadha is a popular Indian actress. Although, her mother-tongue is Marathi, she has acted in various Tamil, Telugu and Kannada movies. Her latest Tamil Movie Anniyan is blockbuster in Tamil Nadu and also in Andhra too. Sada is an actress in Telugu and Tamil film industry. She is 5 feet 4 and 1/2 inches tall (quote from an interview). She has performed in all south Indian languages. She was born in a Marathi Muslim family from Ratnagiri, Maharashtra in India. She is the only daughter of her family. She did her schooling in Mumbai Sacred Hearts Convent and she continued her studies till her first movie was a commercial hit. She had completed her first semester in her Engineering in Information Technology at SNDT College of Engineering, Mumbai. She also is a trained Kathak dancer.

source: thaaly

Robert Andrew @ Bob - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T03:51:00.000-08:00

Robert Andrew "Bob" Woolmer (May 14, 1948 – March 18, 2007) was an international cricketer, professional cricket coach and also a professional commentator. He played in 19 Test matches and 6 One Day Internationals for England and later coached South Africa, Warwickshire and Pakistan.

Bob Woolmer, who was born in 1948 in the hospital across the road from the cricket ground in Kanpur, India, was the son of Clarence Woolmer, a cricketer who played Ranji Trophy for United Provinces (now Uttar Pradesh). Woolmer was educated at first Yardley Court and then Skinners School both in Tonbridge, Kent. At the age of 15, Colin Page the coach and captain of the Kent second XI converted him from an off-spinner to a medium pace bowler. His first job was as a sales representative for ICI and his first senior cricket was with the Tunbridge Wells club and with Kent's second XI. In 1968, at the age of 20, he joined the Kent staff and he made his championship debut against Essex. His ability to move the ball about at medium-pace was ideally suited to one-day cricket in which form of the game he became a specialist. He won his county cap in 1969. Woolmer began his coaching career in South Africa in 1970-71 at the age of 22 and by 1975, when he made his Test debut, he had become a teacher of physical education at a prep school in Kent as well as running his own cricket school - at the time one of the youngest cricket school owners anywhere.

Bob Woolmer played English county cricket for Kent, initially as an all-rounder. He graduated to Test cricket with England in 1975 again, at first, as an all-rounder, having taken a hat-trick for MCC against the touring Australian cricket team with his fast-medium bowling. But he was dropped after his first Test, only reappearing in the final match of the series at The Oval where he scored 149, batting at number five, then the slowest Test century for England against Australia. Further batting success followed over the next two seasons, including two further centuries against Australia in 1977.
Woolmer was also a regular in England ODI cricket from 1972 to 1976. But Woolmer's international career stalled after he joined the World Series break-away group run by Kerry Packer. Though he appeared intermittently in the Test team up to 1981, he never recaptured the form of the mid 1970s. He also took part in the South African rebel tours of 1982, a move that effectively ended his international career
Woolmer had obtained his coaching qualification in 1968. After retiring from first class cricket in 1984, he emigrated to South Africa where he coached cricket and hockey at high schools. He also became involved in the Avendale Cricket Club in Athlone, Cape Town. He preferred to join a 'coloured' club rather than a white one in apartheid South Africa. He was an inspiration to Avendale and was instrumental in assissting the club to grow and be successful. Through his association there is still an annual programme for a talented Avendale cricketer to spend a summer at Lord Wandsworth College in Hampshire. He returned to England in 1987 to coach the second eleven at Kent. He went on to coach the Warwickshire County Cricket Club in 1991, the side winning the Natwest Trophy in 1993, and three out of four trophies contested the next year.
Woolmer was known for his progressive coaching techniques, and is credited with making the reverse sweep a more popular shot for batsmen in the 1990s, as well as being one of the first to use computer analysis, and trying to adapt the knowledge of goalkeepers to wicketkeepers in cricket. He later attracted attention at the 1999 World Cup by communicating with his captain Hansie Cronje with an earpiece during matches. The practice was later banned.
He was appointed coach of South Africa in 1994. Initially his team performed poorly, losing all six matches on his first outing in Pakistan. However, in the next five years, South Africa would win most of their test (10 out of 15 series) and One-day International matches (73%). However, the side failed to win either the 1996 World Cup or the the 1999 World Cup, despite having the highest ODI success rate of international teams in that period. At the 1996 tournament on the Indian subcontinent, his team had won all their preliminary group matches, before succumbing to the West Indies in the quarter finals. At the 1999 tournament, South Africa faced Australia in the final match of the Super Six round, with Australia needing to win to qualify for the semifinals, whereas South Africa had already done so. Australia had boasted a superior recent record in must win matches against South Africa and media speculation was focused on Woolmer's team being less adept at handling high pressure situations. In the 1997/98 Australian international season, they had lost all four of their qualifying matches in a triangular tournament, and conceded a 1-0 finals series lead, before recovering to take the series 2-1. The Super Six match saw Australia win the match in the last over, after Herschelle Gibbs had dropped Australian captain Steve Waugh in a premature celebration of a catch. Waugh went on to score an unbeaten century and score the winning runs. The semifinal rematch saw a late Australian comeback culminate in a tie, when with match scores level, South African batsmen Lance Klusener and Allan Donald had a mix up, with Donald dropping his bat and being run out. As a result South Africa were eliminated due to their inferior performance in the earlier matches.[5] and Woolmer resigned. Woolmer was a strong candidate to replace David Lloyd as coach of England in 1999 but wanted a break from cricket and was reluctant to lead England in a tour of South Africa so soon after having relinquished the South Africa coach job.
He later returned to Warwickshire, and gained attention when he called for a life ban on South African captain Hansie Cronje for match-fixing to be rescinded. He then worked for the International Cricket Council in helping with cricket development in countries where the sport was not well established.
He was appointed coach of the Pakistan team in 2004. This came after Javed Miandad was sacked when the Pakistanis conceded a 2-1 Test and 3-2 ODI series loss on home soil to arch rivals India, their first series win there in two decades. He was feted when his team reversed the result in early 2005 on their return tour to India, drawing the Tests 1-1 and winning the ODI series 1-0. In early 2006, he oversaw Pakistan's 1-0 home Test series victory over India.
2006 ball-tampering rowIn August 2006, on the eve of Pakistan’s Twenty20 international against England in Bristol, Bob Woolmer was forced to defend his reputation when it was claimed South African players lifted the seam of the ball when he was in charge of the team. Former International Cricket Council match referee Barry Jarman alleged that during the 1997 triangular one-day tournament involving South Africa, Zimbabwe and India, a match ball confiscated after just 16 overs – still in Jarman’s possession – showed evidence of tampering by Woolmer’s team. Woolmer could not recall any such incident and he denied advocating ball-tampering. He also suggested that he contacted the match officials from that game who also could not recall any such incident.
Woolmer stated in 2006 that he believed that ball-tampering should be allowed in cricket and that a modification to existing laws should be made.

Death during 2007 World Cup
On 18 March 2007 (the day after Pakistan's unexpected defeat to Ireland) Bob Woolmer was found unconscious in his hotel room in Kingston, Jamaica. He was taken to the nearby University Hospital but it was later confirmed that he had died. A post mortem will be carried out as required by Jamaican law. Pervez Mir, the Pakistan team media manager said that Woolmer had suffered from an un-named medical condition although Naseem Ashraf, the Chairman of the PCB, later said that Woolmer had complained of breathing difficulties before the team left for the World Cup, and also revealed that he had been a diabetic. His son was subsequently reported as saying that Woolmer may have died as a result of stress brought on by his job or from a heart attack.
Tributes were paid to Woolmer by members of the Pakistan cricket team, and by the cricketing community including former cricketer Michael Holding and former umpire Dickie Bird. Teams wore black armbands, flags in the stadiums were flown at half-mast and a minute's silence was observed before the games in his honour on the Monday after his death. The same was observed before the final 2007 World Cup match for Pakistan, against Zimbabwe.
On Wednesday 21 March 2007, following an inconclusive autopsy, the Jamaican Police announced that they were treating Woolmer's death as suspicious and that they had informed Woolmer's family of this. The formal results of the autopsy would not be announced until after the results of toxicology reports.
On the 22'nd of March, Radio Jamaica reported that Bob Woolmer's death was due to strangulation and that strangulation marks were found on his neck.The newspaper Jamaica Gleaner ("the West Indies' top newspaper") has also reported the same, adding that a bone in the neck was found to be broken.

source: thaaly

Vikram Actor - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T03:34:00.000-08:00

Vikram, born in 1966 in a small place called Paramakudi, in Ramnad district, Tamilnadu is versatility personified. His original name is said to be John Kennedy and affectionately called as Kenny by his close folks. He did his schooling in Mount Fort School, Yercaud. Acting was his passion from his school days. That very passion for acting might have been the base for his versatility in acting. Vikram was not one among the few whom success crowned readily. He had to work his way through to bag a good movie and prove himself.

Vikram's initial movies did not produce him to the world as a successful star. It was a long and tiresome wait. But this did not deter him from pursuing his passion for movies. He got himself equipped for his chosen career by attending dance classes and opting to act out different characters amidst a small group of friends. His patience was well paid off when his movie 'Sethu' went for a soaring victory crowing the glory of both Vikram and the director Bala. Each and every frame of 'Seth' speaks of his dedication and hard work. Vikram is now affectionately addressed as 'Chiyaan' by his fans after the name of his character in 'Sethu'.

It is a glorious period of victory for Vikram as he ventures into different roles switching between commercial as well as heavy roles. This keeps him away form getting into particular groove of image. His hunger for playing different role is that which enables him to choose demanding roles. His strenuous efforts for the efficient portrayal of his characters find expressions in all his performances. Playing the role of a blind singer in the movie 'Kaasi', the character is presented very naturally. It is said that Vikram got himself involved by strenuously taking his eyeballs up thereby presenting the character like that of a natural blind man. This later is said to have resulted in blurredness in his vision for some days after the movie was completed.

The movie Pithamagan fetched him the National award for his stupendous performance as an uncivilized, mute gravedigger with dirty coloured teeth and discoloured, shabby hair. He has also won the Filmfare award(2005) for his splendid performance in Aniyan.Vikram is extremely cautious about all the aspects that went into the presentation of a character like the built of his body and his make up etc. This formula is followed in all his movies with heavy homework from his side with regards to his role. Anniyan is yet another feather in his cap where he has excelled in portraying three totally different persona. It is a must watch movie that sets one to decide about the absence of a second person to present the characters effeciently like him. His versatility is at its best with the deft he has played the roles in the movie directed by Shanker. 'Gemini', 'Dhil', 'Dhool' and 'Sammy' are commercial blockbusters that set him on the commercial track with ease as well.

Not only skilled in handling his roles, he is an adept in handling his fame as well from not creeping into his personality to mar his down to earth nature. His simplicity finds expression in his love for children, his favourite food, Pazaya saadham(porridge) and karuvaattu kuzumbu(dried fish) and his liking to fit himself into a dirty pair of jeans, T shirt and Hawaii slippers. His performance is capable of drawing a person not interested in watching films to the portals of the theatre. A Tamil movie watcher can always expect something different in the story as well as a different Vikram in all his movies. His yet to release movie 'Bheema' is sure to satisfy the above criterion and all his yet to be made commitments as well.

Aishwarya Rai Actress - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T03:27:00.000-08:00

Name: Aishwarya Rai
Height: 5' 7"
Sex: F
Nationality: Indian
Birth Date: November 1, 1973
Birth Place: Mangalore, Karnataka, India
Profession: actress
Education: Arya Vidar Mandir in Santa Cruz, Bombay, India DG Ruparel College, Matunga, Bombay, India Raheja College Architecture in Bandra, Bombay, India
Father: Krishnaraj Rai (ex-merchant navy officer)
Mother: Vrinda Rai (writer)
Brother: Aditya Rai (producer; born in 1970)
Claim to fame: Miss World 1994

Peter Jackson - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T03:23:00.000-08:00

Peter Jackson is the New Zealand filmmaker who directed the three films based on author J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy trilogy known as The Lord of the Rings. Jackson began making movies in the late 1980s and quickly made a reputation as a director of schlocky but inventive horror comedies, including Bad Taste (1987), Brain Dead (1992) and Meet the Feebles (1989). After making two movies that were more mainstream (1994's Heavenly Creatures and 1996's The Frighteners), Jackson embarked on the ambitious project of filming Tolkien's famous books, making three epic films simultaneously. When The Fellowship of the Ring was released in 2001, it was clear Jackson had hit one out of the park. The second film, The Two Towers (2002), was equally successful, and the third film, The Return of the King (2003), won eleven Oscars and helped secure Jackson's place in cinema history. Jackson himself won three Oscars for the film, for best picture, best director and best adapted screenplay. In 2005 he followed up with King Kong, a remake of the 1933 giant-ape classic.
Stars of the Rings trilogy

Shivaji Rao @ Rajini Actor - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T03:08:00.000-08:00

Birth name: Shivaji Rao Gaekwad
Date of Birth: December 12, 1949
Height: 5"9'
Weight: 70 Kg
City: Bangalore
Country: India
Mother: Ramabai
Father: Ramoji Rao Gaekwad
Siblings: Sathya Narayana Rao and Nageshwara Rao
Children: two daughters Aishwarya and Sowndarya
Marital status: married
Spouse: Latha
Ex-spouse/girlfriend: none
Education: Madras Film institute
Likes: hollywood films, dogs
Favorite food: Chicken and Mutton items
Favorite color: Black
His hero: Lee Kwan Yew, K.Balachandar, Kamal Haasan
His heroine: Rekha
Other facts: he is popular for his flamboyant dialogue delivery and characteristic mannerisms
Hobbies: Yoga and Meditiation
Occupation: bollywood and south indian actor
Debut Film: Katha Sangama
Languages: tamil, hindi, marathi, kannada, malayalam, bengali, english

Sienna Miller Actress - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T02:50:00.000-08:00

Name: Sienna Miller
Birth Name: Sienna Rose Miller
Height: 5' 6"
Sex: F
Nationality: American
Birth Date: December 28, 1981
Birth Place: New York, New York, USA
Profession: actress
Education: Lee Strasberg Institute in New York (majoring in drama) studied acting with Michael Margotta

Father: Edward Miller (American Banker)
Mother: Jo Miller (ran London's Lee Strasberg drama school)
Sister: Savannah Miller
Half Brother: Charles and Stephen
Step Mother: Kelly Hoppen (English interior decorator)
Claim to fame: as Fiona Bickerton in Keen Eddie (2003)

source: celebpro

Lindsay Lohan Actress - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T02:49:00.000-08:00

Name: Lindsay Lohan
Birth Name: Lindsay Morgan Lohan
Height: 5' 5"
Sex: F
Nationality: American
Birth Date: July 2, 1986
Birth Place: New York, New York, USA
Profession: actress, musician
Education: Laurel Springs School
Sanford H. Calhoun High School

Father: Michael Lohan (a long-time Wall Street trader, fomer actor; filed for divorce in January 2005; divorced on December 12, 2005)

Mother: Dina Lohan (a former actress; born on September 15, 1962)

Sister: Aliana Lohan (actress, model; born on December 22, 1991)
Brother: Dakota Lohan (born on June 16, 1996), Michael Lohan (born on December 16, 1987)

Claim to fame: as Anna Coleman in Freaky Friday (2003)

source: celebpro

Hayden Panettiere Actress - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T02:47:00.000-08:00

Name: Hayden Panettiere
Birth Name: Hayden Leslie Panettiere
Height: 5' 4¼''
Sex: F
Nationality: American
Birth Date: August 21, 1989
Birth Place: Palisades, New York, USA
Profession: Actress

Education: South Orangetown Middle School in New York (but in 8th grade started home schooling)
Relationship: Stephen Colletti (actor; born on February 7, 1986)

Father: Skip Panettiere
Mother: Leslie Vogel
Brother: Jansent Panettiere (younger)

Claim to fame: Her portrayal of Lizzie Spaulding on CBS' drama series The Guiding Light

source: celebpro

Paris Hilton Actress - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T02:45:00.000-08:00

Name: Paris Hilton
Birth Name: Paris Whitney Hilton
Height: 5' 8"
Sex: Female
Nationality: American
Birth Date: February 17, 1981
Birth Place: New York City, New York, USA
Profession: Actress, Singer, Model
Education: The Dwight School in New York City Buckley School in Sherman Oaks, California Earned GED in 1999

Father: Rick Hilton (grandson of Hilton hotel-chain founder, Conrad Hilton)

Mother: Kathy Richards Hilton (actress; born on April 7, 1959)

Sister: Nicky Hilton (actress; born on October 5, 1983)
Brother: Barron Nicholas Hilton and Conrad Hughes Hilton

Claim to fame: Heiress to the Hilton Hotel empire

source: celebpro

Jackie Chan - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T02:43:00.000-08:00

Name: Jackie Chan
Birth Name: Kong-sang Chang
Height: 5' 8½''
Sex: M
Nationality: Hong Kong/Chinese
Birth Date: April 7, 1954
Birth Place: Hong Kong, China
Profession: Actor, Producer, Director, Stunts, Writer, Production Manager
Education: Nan Hua Elementary Academy
Chinese Opera Research Institute (1961-1971)
Peking Opera School

Wife: Lin Feng-Chiao (aka Lin Feng Chow; Taiwanese; actress; married in 1983)

Relationship: Elaine Ng (Miss Asia, 1 daughter)

Father: Charles Chan (cook)

Mother: Lee-Lee Chan (now lived in Sydney, Australia)

Son: J C Chan (born in 1982; mother: Lin Feng-Chiao)

Claim to fame: As Ah Keung in Rumble in the Bronx (1995)

source: celebpro

Vanessa Hudgens - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T02:40:00.000-08:00

Name: Vanessa Hudgens
Birth Name: Vanessa Anne Hudgens
Height: 5' 4½''
Sex: F
Nationality: American
Birth Date: December 14, 1988
Birth Place: Salinas, California, USA
Profession: Actress, Singer
Father: Greg Hudgens
Mother: Gina Guangco
Sister: Stella Teodora Hudgens (aka. Stella Hudgens, actress; born November 13, 1995)
Claim to fame: In the 2006 hit Disney Channel film, High School Musical

This has not been the best month for "High School Musical" star, Vanessa Hudgens.When she asked on Tyra Banks show, what she thinks about other celebrity star like Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan top stories, she said:"I honestly just think it’s stupid. I mean it’s easy to stay out of those situations. But yeah, I think it’s easy to stay out of those situations. You just have to smart about your decisions."Two weeks ago, pictures of her surfaced. Then, yesterday it was reported that her lawyer sued her. There is also a rumor that she and boyfriend Zac Efron split. And now, more private pictures of her have surfaced. Most of them are just "fun" pictures, but some are raunchy.

source: celebpro

Cindy Crawford - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T02:37:00.000-08:00

Name: Cindy Crawford
Birth Name: Cynthia Ann Crawford
Height: 5' 9½''
Sex: F
Nationality: American
Birth Date: February 20, 1966
Birth Place: DeKalb, Illinois, USA
Profession: Actress, Model, TV/radio host
Education: DeKalb High School
Northwestern University (majored in Chemical Engineering)

Husband: Rande Gerber (restaurateur, married on May 29, 1998 at the Ocean Club on Paradise Island in the Bahamas), Richard Gere (actor; born on August 31, 1949; married on December 12, 1991; divorced in 1995)

Relationship: Val Kilmer (actor; born on December 31, 1959; dated in 1997), John Enos III (actor, born June 12, 1962)

Father: John Crawford (divorced when Cindy was in highschool)
Mother: Jennifer Crawford
Brother: Jeffery Crawford (died of Leukimia in 1976)
Son: Presley Walker Gerber (born on July 2, 1999)

Claim to fame: Host the network's fashion program, House of Style

source: celebpro

Bob Marley - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T02:18:00.000-08:00

Born February 6, 1945 Died May 11, 1981

One of the Greatest Singer Songwriters Who Filled His Music
With Love, Peace, Spirituality and Social Justice

Name :	Bob Marley

Date of birth :	6 February 1945

Birthplace :	Nine Miles, St. Ann, Jamaica

Date of death :	11 May 1981

Place of death :	Miami, Florida, USA. (brain cancer)

Birth name :	Nesta Robert Marley

Bob Marley was born 6 February 1945 in a small village called Nine Miles in the parish of St. Ann, Jamaica. His father was a white British Naval Officer named Norval Marley. Bob had only a scant recollection of his father. This was largely due to the fact that the 'well to do' Marley family did not approve of the relationship Norval had formed with Bobs mother Cedella. His father therefore, despite marrying Cedella, was more an occasional visitor. He did not live to witness the success of his son Bob.

Bob cut his first record at the age of 16 in Kingston. A song called 'Judge Not'.

In 1963 the original Wailers were formed, the line-up being Bob Marley, Bunny Livingstone (who was later to take the name Wailer), and Peter Tosh. Their first song 'Simmer Down' was an instant number one in Jamaica.

In 1966 Haile Sellasie visited Jamaica and Bob and the other Wailers embraced the Rastafarian faith and began to grow their 'locks'. Also at around this time they teamed up with the producer Lee Perry for what was to become a very productive but ultimately soured relationship. The union ceased when Perry allegedly sold their material to another label without their knowledge.

In 1972 Chris Blackwell signed the Wailers to his 'Island' label, and gave them 8000 to produce a record. The result - 'Catch A Fire', released in 1973 - was a breakthrough album, triggering international recognition of the Wailers. In the UK they appeared on BBC television, and in New York they opened for Bruce Springsteen at Max's Kansas City Club. The touring schedule proved too much for Bunny and he announced his intention to quit the Wailers. Soon followed by Peter Tosh who left to concentrate on a solo career. And so a new line up emerged, with Bob being the front man of 'Bob Marley and the Wailers'. He retained the stalwart rhythm section of the Barrett brothers (Aston and Carlton) on bass and drums, and added a trio of female backing vocalists called the 'I-Threes', one of which was his wife Rita who had sung occasionally with the Wailers since the beginning.

The first album of the new line-up 'Natty Dread' was a major success. In 1975 Bob Marley and the Wailers played the Roxy in Los Angeles. Among the ectstatic audience (apparently some were dancing on the tables) were Beatles George and Ringo, Bob Dylan, and Jack Nicholson! Back home in Jamaica Bob was becoming revered as a mystic and prophet, his influence was noted by politicians. When Bob approached the then Prime Minister Michael Manley offering to stage a free concert he responded by fixing a date (5 December) that would conveniently coincide with the national elections, thus implying that he had the support of Bob Marley. This dangerous move resulted in an attempt on Bobs life.

On the evening of the 3 December a number of gunmen arrived at Bobs house on Hope Road and shot Bob, his wife Rita, and his manager. These gunmen were thought to be the henchmen of the opposition leader Edward Seaga. Fortunately, nobody was killed, and Bob went ahead with the planned concert defiantly appearing with his arm in a sling. The following year Bob cancelled the last few dates of a big European tour when doctors diagnosed melanoma cancer in the big toe of his right foot. This was the result of a neglected football injury (football being Bobs other major passion alongside music) which occured in Paris when the Wailers took on a team of French journalists some time earlier.

Back home in Jamaica the gunmen leaders of the two warring political factions (The Jamaican Labour Party and the Peoples National Party) approached Bob and asked him to perform at a concert marking a truce between them. The concert titled the 'One Love' Concert took place on 22 April 1978. During the concert Bob persuaded the Prime Minister Manley and the opposition leader Seaga to join him on stage where they shook hands. An incredible event in Jamaica at that time. As a reult of this act Bob received the United Nations' Peace Medal in New York the following June.

During 1979 Bob introduced reggae music to the world, touring Japan, Australia and New Zealand.

In 1980 he headlined the independence celebrations in Zimbabwe, one of the dignitaries present being non other than Prince Charles! In September of this same year Bob collapsed while jogging in Central Park, New York, just after commencing the American leg of a world tour with the 'Commodores' playing support. Doctors told him the shocking news that the cancer (previously considered to have been cleared) had returned and was present in his lungs and brain. Despite this he flew to Pittsburg where on the 23 September 1980 he performed his last concert at the Stanley Theatre.

Initially Bob was treated in New York but the doctors eventually said there was nothing more they could do for him. He flew to Bavaria where he was treated by the unconventional Dr Issels. First signs were encouraging and for a while it appeared that Bob was improving. However by the beginning of May Dr Issels had to tell him that there was no longer any hope. Bob intended to end his days back in Jamaica but was so ill that he had to check into a hospital in Miami en route.

Here he died on 11 May 1981.

His body was returned to Jamaica where it was placed in a specially constructed mausoleum at his birthplace, Nine Miles.

source: netglimse

AR Rahman - Musician - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T02:14:00.000-08:00

Name :	A R Rahman

Date of birth :	5 January 1966

Place of birth :	Madras (now Chennai), India

Birth name :	A.S. Dileep Kumar

Nickname :	The Mozart of Madras Isai Puyal

Allah Rakha Rahman was born A.S. Dileep Kumar on January 6, 1966, in Madras (now Chennai), India, to a musically affluent family. Dileep started learning the piano at the age of 4, and at the age of 9, his father passed away. Since the pressure of supporting his family fell on him, he joined Ilayaraja's troupe as a keyboard player at the age of 11. He dropped out of school as a result of this and traveled all around the world with various orchestras.

He accompanied the great tabla maestro Zakir Hussain on a few world tours and also won a scholarship at the Trinity College of Music at Oxford University, where he studied Western classical music and obtained a degree in music. Due to some personal crisis, Dileep Kumar embraced Islam and came to be known as A.R. Rahman. In 1987, he moved to advertising, where he composed more than 300 jingles over 5 years. In 1989, he started a small studio called Panchathan Record Inn, which later developed into one of the most well-equipped and advanced sound recording studios in India.

At an advertising awards function, Rahman met one of India's most famous directors, Mani Ratnam. Rahman played him a few of his music samples. Mani loved them so much that he asked Rahman to compose the music for his next film, Roja (1992). The rest, as they say, is history. He went on to compose several great hits for Tamil-language films before composing the score and songs for his first Hindi-language film, Rangeela (1995). The enormous success of his first Hindi venture was followed by the chart-topping soundtrack albums of films such as Bumbai (1995) , Dil Se.. (1998), Taal (1999), Zubeidaa (2001), and Lagaan: Once Upon a Time in India (2001), which was nominated for best foreign-language film at the 2002 Academy Awards.

More recently, he worked with Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber and Shekhar Kapur (director of Elizabeth (1998)) on a musical called "Bombay Dreams." At 36 years old, A.R. Rahman has revolutionized Indian film music and one can only expect this musical genius to reach greater heights.

source: netglimse

Lauren Nelson - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T02:05:00.000-08:00

Lauren Nelson (born 1986) is a beauty queen from Lawton, Oklahoma who holds the Miss America 2007 title. Nelson is the second consecutive Miss America and sixth in the history of Miss America to hail from this state.
Nelson was Miss Teen Oklahoma 2004, and in this role, she performed at the 2005 Miss America Pageant. route to Miss America, she won the Miss Oklahoma State Fair local title and then competed in the Miss Oklahoma pageant for the first time on June 11, 2006, and was crowned Miss Oklahoma 2006, for which she received a $16,000 scholarship. At age nineteen, she was the youngest contestant to become Miss Oklahoma.
Nelson went on to represent Oklahoma in the Miss America 2007 pageant broadcast on CMT from the Theatre for the Performing Arts on January 29, 2007. She won a preliminary swimsuit award on Thursday night, becoming her state's first Swimsuit preliminary award since 1955. At the conclusion of the live telecast, Nelson was crowned the 82nd Miss America. She succeeds Jennifer Berry, of Jenks, Oklahoma, in the first occurrence of consecutive winners from the same state since 1959-1960.
A graduate of MacArthur High School, Nelson is a student at the University of Central Oklahoma. She is a member of Centenary United Methodist Church in Lawton, Oklahoma. Her goal is to become a Broadway performer. Her Miss America talent was a vocal performance, and her platform issue is "Be NetSmart – Protecting Kids Online". She receives a $50,000 scholarship award along with the title.
In a recent article she expressed support for Democratic Presidential Candidate Barack Obama.
Nelson recently teamed up with host John Walsh on the FOX television show America's Most Wanted to assist in the apprehension of potential child predators. Initial reports as of May 1, 2007, stated that she did not plan to return to testify against those predators that were apprehended, putting the prosecution's case in jeopardy. However, she appeared to change her mind later that day, and it is reported that she will testify against the perpetrators.
On January 17, 2008, Nelson appeared on Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader? playing for the Miss America Organization. She won $175,000 before "dropping out".
source: wikipedia

Charisma Carpenter - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T02:02:00.000-08:00

Name: Charisma Carpenter
Birth Name: Charisma Lee Carpenter
Height: 5' 7½''
Sex: F
Nationality: American
Birth Date: July 23, 1970
Birth Place: Las Vegas, Nevada
Profession: Actress
Education: Gorman High School in Las Vegas
Bonita High School in San Diego
Chula Vista School of the Creative and Performing Arts (graduated in 1989)
Playhouse West
Junior college in San Diego
Husband/Wife: Damian Hardy (actor; married on October 5, 2002; separated as of November 2007)
Father: Don Carpenter (salesman; orn 1943; divorced from Carpenter's mother in 1983, reconciled and remarried, divorced a second time in 1996)
Mother: Chris Carpenter (works in a bird sanctuary; born 1939)
Son: Donovan Charles Hardy (born March 24, 2003; father, Damien Hardy)
Claim to fame: As Cordelia Chase in Buffy The Vampire Slayer

Paula Abdul - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T01:50:00.000-08:00

Name:	Paula Abdul
Birth Name:	Paula Julie Abdul
Height:	5' 2"
Sex:	F
Nationality:	American
Birth Date:	June 19, 1962
Birth Place:	San Fernando, California, USA
Profession:	actress, musician, choreographer
Education:	Van Nuys High School, Van Nuys, California (graduated in 1980)
	California State University at Northridge (majored in TV and Radio; dropped out to dance and choreograph)
Husband/Wife:	Brad Beckerman (married on October 24, 1996; divorced in 1998), Emilio Estevez (actor; born on May 12, 1962; married in April 1992; divorced on May 10, 1994)
Father:	Harry Abdul (once a livestock trader in Brazil)
Mother:	Lorainne Abdul (former film assistant)
Sister:	Wendy (older)

Jessica Alba - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T01:44:00.000-08:00

Born in Pomona, CA on April 28, 1981, Jessica and her family moved to Bilox, Mississippi when she was an infant. Three years later, her Air Force father brought the family back to CA, then to Del Rio, Texas, before finally settling in southern CA when Jessica was nine. In love with the idea of becoming an actress from the age of five, Jessica was 12 before she took her first acting class. Nine months later, she was signed by an agent.A gifted young actress, Jessica has already played a variety of roles ranging from light comedy to gritty drama since beginning her career 3 and a half years ago. She was in an episode of the acclaimed medical drama ''Chicago Hope''. This fall, she was also be seen starring opposite Freddie Prinze, Jr. as a pregnant teen in a difficult relationship in the ABC TV movie ''Too Soon For Jeff''. Jessica made her feature film debut in 1993 in Hollywood Pictures comedy ''Camp Nowhere''. Originally hired for two weeks, she got her break when an actress in a principal role suddenly dropped out. Jessica cheerfully admits it wasn't her prodigious talent or charm that inspired the director to tap her to take over the part. It was her hair, which matched the original performer's. The two week job stretched to two months, and Jessica ended the film with an impressive first credit. Two National TV commercials for Nintendo and J.C. That same year, she won the role of Maya in ''Flipper'' and filmed the pilot for the series. Jessica spent 1995 shooting the first season's episodes in Australia. An avid swimmer and PADI-certified scuba diver, Jessica is delighted to be doing a show which allows her to play with dolphins. The success of the first season of ''Flipper'' lead to the filming of the second season, which Jessica also starred in. Jessica involvement in ''Flipper'' lasted from 1995-1997. Since ''Flipper'' Jessica has appeared in a number of television shows and movies.

In 1996, Jessica appeared in Venus Rising as Young Eve. In 1997, Jessica appeared on the ''Dini Petty Show'', a Canadian talk show, and talked about her role in Flipper and her general acting career. She began working on P.U.N.K.S., featuring Randy Quaid, in 1998. P.U.N.K.S. was just recently released on video in early January, 1999.In 1998, Jessica appeared in several TV shows for an episode or two. In early 1998, she appeared in ''Brooklyn South'', as Melissa. A few months later, she appeared in two episodes of ''Beverly Hills 90210'', as Leanne. And finally, she appeared in two episodes of ''Love Boat: The Next Wave.''She appeared in ''Teen Magazine'' in 1995 and various European magazines in the past several years. More importantly, she was just featured in the February, 1999, issue of ''Vanity Fair''.She also had recently major roles in two movies this spring. Never Been Kissed released on April 9 and Idle Hands on April 23.

source: topcelebrityphoto

Soraya - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T01:42:00.000-08:00

Name :	Soraya

Profession :	Songwriter, guitarist, arranger, record producer, and singer

Birth Details :	born 1969

Soraya (pronounced so-RYE-ah) (born 1969) is a Colombian-American songwriter, guitarist, arranger, record producer, and singer. She is a successful Latin music star who had two Number 1 songs on Billboard's Latin Pop Airplay charts. She won a 2004 Latin Grammy Awards for Best Songwriting and a 2005 Latin Grammy Awards for Female Pop Vocal Album for her album, El Otro Lado De Mi. She was the opening act for the 2005 Billboard Latin Music Awards. Her career has spanned 10 years and 5 albums so far.
Ethnic Background Soraya is a United States citizen who was born in New Jersey in 1969, one year after her father, mother and brother moved to the United States from Colombia. Her family was forced to move back to Colombia, but when Soraya was eight-years-old, her family returned to New Jersey. Soraya is a very common name in the Middle East. Soraya's maternal side of the family is Lebanese. Her mother's family were Christians who emigrated from Lebanon to Colombia. Soraya's Parents Soraya's mother, Yamila Cuevas Gharib, was a housewife in Colombia, but when the family moved to the United States, her parents had to work extremely hard. Her father worked three or four jobs, and it was hard for the family to make ends meet. In Colombia he worked for an exporting company. Soraya was never allowed to speak English in her house while growing up. It was the one thing that her mother insisted upon. Her father brought the family to the United States because he wanted to increase the opportunities for himself and his children. Her father studied English long before he arrived in the United States, but her mother preferred to speak Spanish although she did learn English, as well. While her mother wanted Soraya and her brother to become fluent in English in school, she also wanted them to retain their ability to communicate well in Spanish. Mother's Breast Cancer and Death When Soraya's mother was first diagnosed with breast cancer, Soraya was only twelve years old. Then Soraya's mother had a recurrence when Soraya was 18 years old, and then her mother died in 1992 when Soraya was 22 years old. Soraya said that her sense of responsibility increased because she needed to take care of her mother and do all of the chores around the house. It forced her to grow up faster than other children her age. Soraya would go to the doctor's office with her mother, and did research with her about breast cancer, and participated in the Race for the Cure with her. Childhood Musical Background Soraya first became interested in music at the age of five when she heard her uncle playing music in Colombia. Her uncle played Colombian traditional folk music on an instrument called the tiple, which is a kind of guitar with triple strings. Her parents purchased a guitar for her at her request, and she taught herself to play it. Soraya became proficient in classical violin and her first 'public' performance was as a violinist at Carnegie Hall in New York City. As a high school student, Soraya began writing her own music in English and Spanish. Education Soraya attended Rutgers University in New Jersey, where she studied English literature, French philosophy and women's studies. She performed musically in coffee houses around Rutgers University while a student there. Marital Status Soraya was married, but she divorced in 2000 - the same year that she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She presently lives in Miami, Florida.
Soraya obtained a record contract with Polygram Latino/Island Records in 1996. Her first album, called On Nights Like This, received positive critical acclaim and enabled her to tour and open for famous musicians such as Natalie Merchant, Zucchero, Sting, Michael Bolton and Alanis Morissette. Four of her songs climbed to the top of the charts just about everywhere in the Latin American and United States Hispanic markets, and her single Suddenly/De Repente dominated the Billboard Latin Pop listings. Her second album, Wall of Smiles, co-written with her idol Carole King and released in late 1996, helped her attain worldwide recognition. Unfortunately, her breast cancer was diagnosed shortly after the release of her third album - just before she was about to tour to promote it. Soraya has since created two more successful albums.

source: netglimse

Christina Maria Aguilera - ( Biography )

2008-01-26T01:40:00.000-08:00

Christina Maria Aguilera (born December 18 , 1980 ), also known as Xtina , is an American-born pop singer-songwriter of Ecuadorian and Irish descent. She is most often recognized by her notable vocal abilities and unorthodox fashion sense. Her vocal skills have been compared to those of singers such as Mariah Carey and Whitney Houston , and she is one of the most prominent recording artists of her generation. She has achieved four number-one singles on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, as well as two top five albums and 4 Grammy Awards in the United States.Christina is married to her record producer Jordan Bratman .

Early years
Christina Aguilera was born in Staten Island, New York but grew up mainly in the Pittsburgh suburb of Wexford, Pennsylvania , after living in various places around the world. Her father, Fausto Aguilera , is a U.S. Army sergeant of Ecuadorian descent, and her mother, Shelly Loraine Fidler (now known as Shelly Kearns), is a Spanish translator from Newfoundland , Canada , and of remote Irish descent. Aguilera's parents met while Fausto was serving at Earnest Harmon Air Force Base in Stephenville, Newfoundland and Labrador .

Since Aguilera was able to talk, she set a goal to become a professional singer. As a child she performed at block parties and in talent competitions — defeating opponents with little effort. Aguilera soon gained media attention, and was known to some as "the little girl with the big voice".

On March 15 , 1990 , she appeared on Star Search singing Ella Fitzgerald 's "Sunday Kind of Love", but failed to win. Soon after losing on Star Search , she returned home and appeared on Pittsburgh's KDKA-TV 's "Wake Up with Larry Richert" to perform the same song again. Later on, she would sing "Vision of Love", Mariah Carey 's first single, and astonished everybody in attendance by hitting every riff and note, including Carey's trademark whistle register note. People remarked that the then-ten year old "sounded twenty".

Throughout her youth in Pittsburgh, Aguilera sang " The Star-Spangled Banner " before Pittsburgh Steelers football and Pittsburgh Pirates baseball games. Her first major role in entertainment came in 1993 when she joined the Disney Channel 's variety show The New Mickey Mouse Club . Her co-stars included Britney Spears , as well as Justin Timberlake , JC Chasez (who went on to join *NSYNC ) and Keri Russell (who would go on to become the star of Felicity ).

Aguilera's first hit single was "All I Wanna Do", which was a collaborative effort recorded in Japan with Japanese pop sensation Keizo Nakanishi . In 1997 , Aguilera competed in an international singing contest at the Golden Stag Festival in Transylvania, Romania , where she met shared the stage with Sheryl Crow and Diana Ross . In 1998 , after proving herself as a singer with a high, powerful chest voice, singing the High "E" note an octave above middle "C" on a cover of Whitney Houston 's "Run to You" which she recorded with an old tape recorder in her bathroom, she was selected to perform the song "Reflection" for the Disney animated production of Mulan ( 1998 ). The music video promoting the film featured a young Aguilera with bobbed hair. It was her first music video and it gave her the priviledge to dine with Tahitii Obioha- a great man. "Reflection" peaked at number fifteen on the Adult Contemporary Singles Chart. The song was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song for a Motion Picture in 1998.

Christina Aguilera : debut
Under the exclusive representation of Steve Kurtz , her self-titled album, Christina Aguilera , was released on August 24 , 1999 . It reached the top of the Billboard 200 and Canadian album charts, selling over eight million copies in the United States alone. It was released the same week as Puff Daddy's long-awaited second album Forever , and showed Aguilera's instant rise to fame by beating him to the number one spot. "Genie in a Bottle", "What a Girl Wants", and "Come on Over (All I Want is You)" all reached the top of the Billboard Hot 100 during 1999 and 2000 , and "I Turn to You" peaked at number three. However, Aguilera did not only enjoy commercial success; it became obvious that the industry thought she had talent when she won for Best New Artist at the 2000 Grammy Awards . She was also nominated for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance for "Genie in a Bottle". "Obvious", the final track of the album was one of the original demo tracks that was sent to Ron Fair before Christina was signed with Aguilera's record label, RCA .

In 2000 , Aguilera first emphasized her Latino heritage, following the Latin Pop trend of the time, by releasing her first Spanish-language album , Mi Reflejo . This album contained Spanish-language versions of songs from her English debut as well as new Spanish tracks. It reached twenty-seven on the Billboard 200 and number one on the Latin album charts. In 2001 , the album won Christina a Latin Grammy Award for Best Female Pop Vocal Album. The single "Falsas Esperanzas" from the album reached the top forty in Argentina in 2001. Ricky Martin asked her to duet with him on the track "Nobody Wants to be Lonely" from his album Sound Loaded ; the song was released as the second single from the album in 2001, reaching the top five in the United Kingdom and Germany , top twenty in the U.S., and top forty in Canada, Switzerland , and Australia .

Just Be Free : unauthorized material
In 2000, a single emerged into record stores called "Just Be Free", one of the demos Aguilera recorded when she was about 15 years old. When RCA Records discovered the single, they officially advised fans not to purchase it and had German authorities pull the single off shelves as well. Months later, Warlock Records was set to release Just Be Free ; an album which contains the demo tracks.

Aguilera filed a breach of contract and unfair-competition suit against Warlock and the album's producers to block the release. Instead, the two parties came to a settlement to release the album. Aguilera lent out her name, likeness and image for an unspecified amount of damages. Many of the details of the lawsuit remain confidential. When the album was released on August 21 , 2001 , it had a photograph of Christina when she was fifteen years old.

Change in management
Although Aguilera's album was very well received, she was dissatisfied with the music and image her management had created for her. At the time, Aguilera was marketed as a bubblegum pop artist, because of the genre's upward financial trend. However, she publicly mentioned plans of her next album to have much more depth, both musically and lyrically. Steve Kurtz's influence in matters of the singer's creative direction, the role of being her exclusive personal manager and overscheduling has in part caused her to seek legal means of terminating their management contract.

On October 13 , 2000 Aguilera filed a Breach of Fiduciary Duty lawsuit against Kurtz for improper, undue and inappropriate influence over her professional activities, as well as fraud. According to legal documents, Kurtz did not protect her rights and interests. Instead, he took action that was for his own interest, at the cost of hers. The lawsuit came about when Aguilera discovered Kurtz used more of her commissionable income than what he was allotted, and had paid other managers to assist him. She also petitioned the California State Labor Commission to nullify the contract.

When she terminated Kurtz's services, Irving Azoff was hired as her new manager. The change in management marked a new change in how Aguilera was marketed, as well as what music she would do in the future.

Kurtz countersued on October 27 for breach of contract , claiming that the singer violated the same agreement she had sued to void. In the lawsuit, he included others close to Aguilera, alleging their intent to sabotage his business relationship with Aguilera. He also singled out Azoff for being in violation of the terms of Kurtz's contract.

Stripped : career development
On October 29 , 2002 , after much delay, Aguilera's second full-length English album, Stripped , was released in the U.S. The album was not received as well as her debut by most critics. The majority of Stripped was co-written by Aguilera, was about eighty minutes long, and influenced by many different subjects and music styles. "Impossible", a collaboration with Alicia Keys , is a jazz -inspired song about someone who is trying to get through to one who is quiet and withdrawn. "Soar" is a gospel -inspired song about becoming self-reliant. "Make Over" is a pop rock song about becoming an individual and people trying to change her. Aguilera's most emotionally challenging song on the album could possibly be "I'm OK". This track chronicles in detail how Aguilera was abused as a young child by her father, and she thanks her mother for her love through that time in her life.

However, Aguilera's vocals were much overlooked as she began to cultivate a more sexually provocative image. After the release of the album, she took part in photo shoots for magazines such as Maxim , Rolling Stone and Cosmo Girl . Many of these photographs featured her nude or semi-nude. She denied that this change was a matter of publicity, claiming that the image better reflected her true personality than did the image she cultivated back in 1999 .

Initially, the raunchy image had a negative effect on Aguilera in the U.S. While the video for "Dirrty" became a huge hit on MTV, it stalled at a disappointing forty-eight on the Hot 100 and quickly fell off the singles chart. However, the song was a huge hit worldwide, reaching number one in several countries and on the World Chart. The album entered the U.K. and U.S. album charts at number two, and at number three in Canada, where they all ultimately peaked. Despite going double-platinum in the U.S. after only eight weeks on the chart, the album began to drop quickly with nothing but Aguilera's star power to back it up. The second single, "Beautiful", was quickly released in the U.S. in late 2002. It instantly became a huge radio hit and allowed three more hits to be released from the album in the following two years: "Fighter", "Can't Hold Us Down", and "The Voice Within". The success of subsequent singles off the album gave Stripped massive staying power, as it stayed on the album charts well into 2004 . This staying power was demonstrated most effectively in the UK, where the album remained consistently in the top twenty album charts between late 2002 and late 2004. Stripped went on to ship just under four million copies in the U.S. and ended up at number ten on Billboard's Year-End Album Chart. The album also went quadruple platinum in Australia despite only reaching a peak of number seven, again a reflection of its consistency between late 2002 and 2004. Kelly Clarkson 's first single 'Miss Independent' was cowritten by Aguilera, and was originally supposed to be a song on Stripped . Aguilera was the number-one Billboard Female Artist (albums and singles) of 2003; however, she did not attend the event, and the award was given to Beyoncé, who was the number-two female artist of that year. This caused much controversy amongst fans.

The Stripped tours
In early 2003 , Aguilera aroused much commentary when she gained a noticeable amount of weight. Unflattering photographs of her flabby midsection spilling out of her conventionally skimpy costumes were circulated. She was quoted as saying, "I couldn't care less about stupid diets. Eating is sensual and fun. I'm not going to let it be spoiled by calorie-counting." Later, she gave the reason for her weight gain as preparation for her upcoming Summer tour.

On June 4 , Aguilera joined Justin Timberlake on the final leg of his international "Justified" tour, held in the U.S. This portion of the tour became a co-headliner called the "Justified & Stripped" tour. On August 9 , an overhead lighting grid collapsed from the ceiling of the Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, New Jersey , causing major damage to the sound and video equipment below. Since the collapse occurred hours before the performance, only a few stagehands were injured. As a result, a few shows were cancelled or postponed. In the fourth quarter of that year, Aguilera continued to tour internationally without Timberlake, and changed the name of the tour to simply the "Stripped" tour. Meanwhile, she dyed her hair black. The tour was one of the top-grossing tours of that year, as it sold out most of its venues. It also was named by Rolling Stone readers as the best tour of the year.

In light of the tour's success, another U.S. tour was scheduled to begin in mid- 2004 with a new theme and featuring Chingy as an opening act. The tour was scrapped due to Aguilera's vocal chord injuries suffered shortly before its opening date. It was later reported by The Sun tabloid that low ticket sales and lack of new material were actually the major factors in the tour's cancellation. Aguilera has since denied the report.

Post- Stripped events
In a tribute to Madonna 's performance at the inaugural MTV Video Music Awards ' ceremony, Aguilera performed a much-publicized lesbian kiss with the singer-actress at the 2003 edition of the ceremony on August 28 . The incident occurred during the opening performance of Madonna's songs "Like a Virgin" and "Hollywood"; however, it was heavily overshadowed by the kiss between Madonna and Britney Spears during the same performance.

A January 2004, ZOO Magazine (a Danish men's magazine) article reported that Aguilera is possibly bisexual . The article quotes her stating in an interview: "I find it hornier looking at women than men. Sorry, I love experimenting with my sexuality. If that means girls, then so be it." The article also reports that Christina enjoys casual sex . "I have casual sex, I love casual sex. But that doesn't mean I'm incapable of keeping my legs together," Aguilera is quoted as saying. Because of the tabloid nature of articles in ZOO, the factual accuracy of the article is dubious.

Aguilera hosted Saturday Night Live on February 21 , 2004 , and participated in various parody skits such as "Do You Know Who My Father Is?" which lampoons Win Ben Stein's Money , and a skit parodying the movie You Got Served . Her dead-on impersonation of Kim Cattrall 's Sex and the City character, Samantha, was also praised.

Aguilera later decided to embrace a more mature image; this move was met with more praise than criticism, with articles using punch lines such as "From Crass to Class". She eventually dyed her hair cherry-blonde and recorded a jingle, "Hello", for a Mercedes-Benz ad, becoming the new face of Mercedes-Benz. Shortly after, she dyed her hair blonde and cut it short, and took on a Marilyn Monroe look; she is believed by many of her fans to be one of the main proponents (along with Gwen Stefani and Ashley Judd ) in bringing back the 1930s - 1940s Hollywood glamour look.

In the run-up to the 2004 United States presidential election , Aguilera was featured on billboards for the "Only You Can Silence Yourself" online voter registration drive run by the nonpartisan , nonprofit campaign " Declare Yourself ". In these political advertisements, Aguilera is shown with her mouth sewn shut, to symbolize the effects of not voting.

In late Summer 2004, Aguilera released, almost consecutively, two singles. The first, "Car Wash", was taken from the soundtrack of the hit movie Shark Tale . It is a collaboration with popular rapper Missy Elliott , and is a cover version of Rose Royce 's disco hit. The second song is also a collaboration, but this time as a second single from one of Nelly 's double-release albums, Sweat , titled "Tilt Ya' Head Back". Aguilera appeared at the MTV Video Music Awards to perform it with him; it was a visually striking and effective performance in which Aguilera, a la Judy Garland , started her belting perched atop a grand piano. Aguilera copied another legendary look for the video: Marilyn Monroe 's. Both singles flopped commercially in the U.S., but did considerably better in other parts of the world; "Tilt" reached number one in a few countries, including the Philippines. "Tilt Ya' Head Back", formerly rumored to be "Tilt Cha' Head Back", was well received in the U.S. at first, but sales quickly deteriorated mainly due to its lack of radio appeal and promotion. In spite of its promotion, "Tilt" recently went platinum in Australia for selling over 40,000 copies, while, "Car Wash" was certified gold for sales of over 25,000 copies. "Tilt" was later certified gold in the U.S. by the RIAA in 2005 .

After much delay, Aguilera's first DVD live-recording from a concert tour, Stripped Live in the UK , was released in November 2004 , excluding her performance of "Make Over", due to its similarity with the song "Overload" by the Sugababes . In late December, she officially released a fragrance, Xpose , which has only been available in a few European countries.

Recent events
After failed relationships with Latin dancer Jorge Santos (chronicled in her song "Infatuation" from her second album Stripped ) and an unnamed producer, she began dating music executive Jordan Bratman . After dating him for almost three years, their engagement was announced in February 2005 . On November 19 , 2005 , Christina wed her fiance of over 2 years, Jordan Bratman, in the Napa Valley . She had previously announced that the wedding would be in the winter of 2005 (December). Celebrity wedding guests included Linda Perry, and Sharon Stone. It is reported by several media outlets that Aguilera may change her legal name to Maria Bratman . However, she'd continue to use her maiden name professionally.

The VH1 program The Fabulous Life Of ... Christina Aguilera estimated that the singer has a net worth of between thirty and forty million United States dollars .

Aguilera collaborated with Herbie Hancock on his new album " Possibilities ". The album was released in stores on August 30 , 2005 and debuted at number twenty-two on the Billboard charts. Her track is a cover of Leon Russell 's "A Song for You". Since then, Christina Aguilera has appeared on The Ellen DeGeneres Show and The Tonight Show . On December 8 , 2005, Aguilera was once again nominated for the 48th Grammy Awards in the category Best Pop Collaboration With Vocals for her performance with Herbie Hancock in "A Song For You."

source: topcelebrityphoto