Marai Sharapova is into the round of 16 in the 2008 French Tennis Open.

The dueling Davids garnered a record 97.5 million votes between them, smashing the previous record by 23 million.

Also, it was announced that seventeen-year-old Josiah Leming, known as the teary-eyed "American Idol" contestant who just missed making it through the show's Hollywood audition rounds, has signed with Warner Bros. Records for a record and publishing deal. He is to begin recording his album this week.

Washington Capitals star left-winger Alex Ovechkin was named the 2008 National Hockey League player of the year by the Sporting News. Ovechkin picked up 250 of a possible 287 votes in a poll of players from around the NHL conducted for the sporting magazine.

The 22-year-old Russian led the NHL in goals with 65 to capture the league's Maurice (Rocket) Richard Trophy as the top goal-scorer and had 112 points to win the Art Ross Trophy as the league's leading scorer. Ovechkin led the league in power-play goals (22), game-winning goals (11) and shots (446).

Washington Post

Happy birthday, spam.

P.S.: Now go away.

It was 30 years ago this Saturday that users of Arpanet, a U.S. government-designed precursor to the Internet, logged onto their accounts to find what is considered the first piece of unsolicited commercial e-mail ever sent.

It was a pitch for a new computer. "We invite you to come see the 2020 and hear about the DECSYSTEM-20 family at the two product presentations we will be giving in California this month," read the missive, sent by a salesman named Gary Thuerk on May 3, 1978.

Thuerk's e-mail prompted an aggravated discussion among the service's users, the relatively small number of high-level academics with access to computers that then cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.

"This is a clear and flagrant abuse of the directory!" one of the hundreds of users on Thuerk's recipient list complained in a public reply.

It's unclear at this point whether Thuerk was able to sell any computers through his then-novel approach, but both spam and spam prevention have grown into major industries since that day. Market research firm Ferris Research estimates that business will spend $42 billion fighting spam this year in the United States. That's up from $35 billion last year. ...read full article here...