According to Nielson ratings, more than 31 million people in the US alone tuned in to watch the public memorial service of Michael Jackson at the Staples Center yesterday morning (or afternoon, depending on where in the US you are) … making it the second most watched funeral in US history (behind the funeral of Princess Diana). Millions more watched the broadcast in other parts of the world and online … a moment that was shared pretty much everyone who had even heard of Michael Jackson in his 40-year career in entertainment. Now that his memorial service is over, we can begin to move on and talk about other things rather than the death of Michael Jackson (tho, with the official cause of death yet to be determined, we will likely be hearing more on this subject in the weeks to come) … but I think it’s apropos for one more post on how fans the world over mourned the death of the King of Pop yesterday. Here are photos from Detroit, MI (site of Motown and the African American Museum of History), NYC, NY (Times Square), the Neverland Ranch (in Los Olivos, CA) and downtown LA of fans paying tribute to Michael Jackson yesterday:

More than 31 million people tuned in to television coverage of Michael Jackson’s memorial service yesterday, and millions more watched on computers at work, in parks and elsewhere. Measuring viewership on 18 networks that carried the live coverage, 1-4 p.m., the ratings service Nielsen calculated the average audience at 31.14 million viewers. That makes it the second most-watched daytime funeral Nielsen has ever measured. Princess Diana’s funeral, which began at 6 a.m., drew an estimated 33.25 million viewers spread across eight networks on Sept. 6, 1997. Former President Ronald Reagan’s mid-day funeral drew 20.8 million people on June 11, 2004. A prime-time program on Reagan’s burial that same evening drew an estimated 35.07 million viewers. The remarkable Nielsen numbers for yesterday’s Jackson memorial slightly undercount the total viewership, since Nielsen didn’t release figures for local stations such as WPIX/Ch. 11 or cable networks like NY1 and Current. On-line viewership also soared yesterday, perhaps reflecting fans who were at work during the service and watched it on their computers. MSNBC reported nearly 19 million online streams, topping the network’s previous high set this January during President Barack Obama’s inauguration. CNN said it had the second largest streaming day in its history, with 10.5 million streams in all and 4.4 million during the memorial service. The network recorded 26.9 million streams on Inauguration Day. ABC News Digital reported close to six million live streams of the memorial service on abcnews.com and its partner sites. The coverage was also a hit abroad. United Kingdom rating services earlier reported that six million British viewers watched the Jackson service.

Despite his many shortcomings, Michael Jackson will predominately be remembered as a huge iconic figure in the history of pop culture. His achievements far outweighed his missteps and no matter what anyone, me included, thought of the man when he was at his lowest, saddest point of life … it is very easy to take stock in his genius contributions to the world. There will forever be haters, naysayers and all around pitifully negative people in the world … sometimes, we are all guilty of such things … but if it’s one thing that I think we should all take stock in it is that the world is a better place because Michael Jackson lived. His music, his philanthropy, his overall contributions to our culture. I contend that even his most virulent detractors were fans of his at one time or another … and whether they choose to acknowledge that part of themselves or not, he will always be remembered for the good. There will never, ever again be another Michael Jackson. Never.

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Last April we saw photos of Twilight star Robert Pattinson that were featured in an issue of Dossier magazine. Those photos were outtakes form a photoshoot Rob did for Rolling Stone magazine. It turns out that Dossier isn’t the only mag with outtake photos from that shoot. US Weekly has at least a couple more photos from that photoshoot, which the mag describes as “Robert Pattinson’s Sexiest Photos Ever” … here is one of them:

Robert Pattinson strips down and poses soaking wet in a super sexy, never-seen photo shoot that only the new issue of Us Weekly has. The Twilight star, 23, shows off his abs and smiles in one of the pics, originally taken for Rolling Stone. In another, he runs his hands through his famous hair while brooding. “They threw a bucket of water on him!” a source on set tells Us of his wet T-shirt look. “He was willing to do anything. Didn’t complain at all.” The pics — taken in NYC over five hours by photographer Theo Wenner — were inspired by a 1991 River Phoenix film My Own Private Idaho and James Dean.

Hello, furriness! I mean … the studded vest is not that sexy but what’s revealed underneath certainly is. After the jump, check out another outtake photo from this photoshoot — be warned, R. Pattz is wet …

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Last week, Lifetime TV launched the official online presence of the new season of Project Runway, the first for their network, by teasing with a new promo video that I (in all honestly) wasn’t too impressed by. Today, Lifetime releases the official promo poster for the new season of PR along with a few exclusive stills from upcoming episodes of the new season. First up, the poster:

I do love the poster … but it is the stills that are most interesting to me. I love them … and I think longtime fans of Project Runway will love them as well. After the jump, check them out …

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Last week we got to see a few behind the scenes photos from the set of the new ad campaign for Louis Vuitton Fall/Winter 09/10 featuring their latest spokesmodel Madonna … and today we get to see behind the scenes video. Here are a few screencaps from the 3+ minute vid:

I have to say that I really love watching candid video of Madonna. She has so much personality and it really shows thru in this cute video. To be 100% completely honest, this video is the most interesting thing of the entire new Louis Vuitton ad campaign. The actual photos themselves are just … kinda blah. This vid is really cute. After the jump, check it out in full …

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As I’ve mentioned before, David and I were among the lucky folks who were able to attend the public memorial service for the late Michael Jackson at the Staples Center here in downtown Los Angeles, CA yesterday morning. There is so much to share that the best way I know how to do so is to just start at the beginning and go from there. Both David and I registered for tickets for the event but like so many other people, neither one of us were selected to receive tickets. I cannot explain why but deep down I always knew that we would attend the service somehow. Late Sunday night, after I had already received confirmation that I did NOT win tickets I received an email from Pink reader Heidi in Houston, TX. She entered for tickets never believing that she would actually win … and she won. Because she was unable to just fly to LA for the event, she very graciously gave her tickets to me. Heidi had NO interest in selling the tickets and she did not want them to go unused … so she asked if I would take them off her hands. We weren’t sure if I would be able to redeem the vouchers for tickets (since she had to enter her personal info to get the voucher and photo ID was required to pick up the tickets) but it turned out to be no problem at all. All they did was scan the barcode on the voucher and we were given our tickets and wristbands. Heidi has been insistent on not being repaid for her kindness but I want to take this opportunity to publicly thank her for her generosity. Once we got our tickets and wristbands, David was very relieved. He had been really excited to see Michael Jackson in concert in September … so he really wanted to say goodbye to the King of Pop in person.

We arrived at Staples early yesterday so that we could sign the memorial wall before the service began. On our way into the secure area, we were met with an onslaught of street vendors. One man was selling sparkly gloves for $5 … because I was wearing a Michael Jackson-esque red jacket, I thought it would be apropos to buy one. When I saw that Michael’s brothers were also wearing white sparkly gloves, I was happy that I wore one too. Here are a few photos of the tribute wall that people were signing in front of Staples Center:

I was able to snap a lot of photos inside the service and those can be seen behind the cut. Because there are so many and the post will get much longer you can see the rest of the photos/text after the jump …

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• Millions pay homage online to the memory of Michael Jackson online.
• The LA city attorney is asking for donations to help pay for yesterday’s Michael Jackson Memorial Service.
• Google plans to release a PC computer operating system called Chrome.
• This year’s Running of the Bulls in Pamplona, Spain leaves 4 idiots hurt.
• Lindsay Lohan turned down the sole female starring role in The Hangover, the role eventually went to Heather Graham.
• Eddie Mekka, who played Carmine Regusa in Laverne & Shirley, got busted for DUI.
• Howard K. Stern suing to prove straightness.
• Cristiano Ronaldo: Shampoo salesman
• North Korea cyberattacking the USA?
• Speaking to questions as to whether or not he is the biological father of Michael Jackson’s children, Dr. Arnold Klein says, “To the best of my knowledge, I’m not the father.”
• Sex + Food = Sales
• For those who simply have to see it … HERE is Emma Watson’s wardrobe malfunction.
• Lindsay Lohan tries to hide, fails.
• Sacha Baron Cohen visits The Late Show with David Letterman.
• Sorry, y’all! The rumored sequel to the maudlin comedy Heathers is not gonna happen.
• Sophia Bush (One Tree Hill) is 27, Milo Ventimiglia (Heroes) is 32, Beck is 39, Kevin Bacon is 51 and Anjelica Huston is 58 years old today. Click HERE to see who else is celebrating a birthday today.
• Kathy Griffin attends the unveiling of her new wax statue at Madam Tussaud’s Wax Museum in Las Vegas, NV.
• Peace the Spork Out goes to Oscar Meyer
• Justin Timberlake to write a book … about golf?
• Actor Kal Penn begins his new job as White House liaison.

Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails, who is currently on tour in Europe on the Wave Goodbye Tour (which *may* be NIN’s last tour ever), posted a message on the NIN official website alerting fans to the fact that a NEW SET of US tourdates will be announced soon. The dates will take place in August, in the cities NYC, Chicago and LA … and in smaller, club venues! Here is the full text of TR’s announcement:

Getting right to the point, we’re going to play a handful of shows in NYC, Chicago and LA starting August 22nd. They will be informal affairs in medium to small venues with longer set-lists, possible special guests, cool openers and other surprises. Upon reflection, the NIN/JA tour felt like we had to rush through sets due to a limited allotted set length and many shows were in daylight – it just didn’t feel right to end NIN that way. An offer to headline V-Fest in Toronto (being announced soon) set the idea in motion to play some FUN shows to end this up with. If we can get it together we’ll film these shows, too.

Thanks,
Trent

Hot Damn!! This is just … incredible! NIN haven’t played club dates in the US since the early 90’s … these shows are absolutely MUST SEE for any Nine Inch Nails fan. Altho I was extremely fortunate to be able to see NIN play a tiny club in Barcelona, Spain a couple of years ago I have never been able to see them play smaller venues here in the US. At the very least, I plan on attending the NYC and the LA shows. If these shows turn out to be the last NIN shows ever … I absolutely plan to be there to bear witness. Woot!! Actual tourdates and onsale ticket information has yet to be announced … I’ll be sure to pass along that info when it becomes available. Again, I say, WOOT!!

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