Popular Elsewhere
14:06 UK time, Thursday, 1 September 2011
A look at the stories ranking highly on various news sites.
Hannah Montana, Hello Kitty, Dora the Explorer. Not exactly characters you would associate with grown sportsmen. But, as the New York Times' most viewed article explains, the on the players' backpacks. It's part of a "hazing ritual" designed to humiliate team members. The paper finds one player who's been particularly badly hit:
"For much of this season, Michael Stutes of the Philadelphia Phillies was forced to wear a Hello Kitty backpack and a pink feather boa purchased by Brad Lidge, a 10-year veteran, during a road trip to San Francisco."
The Guardian's most popular story says it has found, quite possibly, the . The Torre Confinanzas in Venezuela was originally intended as an office block during the country's oil boom. But the 45 storey block laid empty until four years ago when 300 people forced their way in. Now 2,500 squatters live there. Leo Alvarez, a lawyer who has documented it says "It's a city within a city, with corner shops on every other floor, cybercafes and apartments that double as hair salons."
Meanwhile Sun readers prefer to catch up on the who recently called off her wedding. The paper claims her "jilted groom", catering boss Vince Morse, is regretting sending a picture of the actress in her underwear to another woman. It quotes him as saying "It was probably the most stupid thing I've ever done. I'm an idiot."
From the Sun's pet subject of soapstars' love lives to the Daily Mail's pet subject: immigration. Their most read story claims to have : more apply. In their investigation the paper advertised fake low skilled jobs across the country and tallied up the nationalities of applicants. Some of the jobs had more foreign-born applicants, but it wasn't unanimous. It's enough proof for the Daily Mail:
"There's no doubt about it, the responses to our fictitious job vacancies make two things abundantly clear: first, the sheer numbers of foreign-born workers who are actively competing against Britons in the market place; and second, the incredible pull of the British labour market".
A popular science article in the Independent takes a over the years. It's following news that the tobacco giant Philip Morris International has attempted to get Stirling University to reveal information on their research examining why teenagers start smoking. The article has dug out an interesting line of argument from a 1976 memo from the company:
"Anything can be considered harmful. Apple sauce is harmful if you get too much of it."
