Paris Hilton's first album flops

Paris sold just 75,000 copies in the US during its first week. With second week sales extrapolated to reach just 30,000 the new album described as a mix of R&B, pop and hip-hop has turned out to be an unmitigated flop.

Paris Hilton's music career is looking far from promising despite the expectations raised by the success of her first single Stars Are Blind.
Page Six, quoting data released by Soundscan, reports that her first album Paris, released on 22 Aug 2006, sold just 75,000 copies in the US during its first week, a far cry from the first weeks sales of 320,000 notched up by Christina Aguilera's third album Back to Basics .

With second week sales extrapolated to reach just 30,000 Hilton's new album described as a mix of R&B, pop and hip-hop is an unmitigated flop.
The promising Stars Are Blind single featured on the Album, which debuted at Number 18 on Billboard's Hot 100 chart last month has slid to the last but one position now. Hilton's label, in an attempt to revive the petering sales for Paris has rushed out her second single Turn It Up but that single isn't doing well either.

"The international outlook is not much better for her," one industry source told Page Six. "The international people are not inclined to do a big push since she can't back up the album with a tour. Obviously, she can't sing live."

According to the source Hilton was advised a year ago to train her voice, work with choreographers and learn an instrument to prepare for a limited tour, but "obviously she didn't listen."

Did Paris Hilton hack Lindsay Lohan's voice mail?

The feud between celebrities Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan has taken a turn for the geeky, with a small fake-Caller ID seller accusing Hilton of hacking into voice-mail accounts on an unnamed mobile phone network. Hilton was one of more than 50 customers whose accounts were suspended because they had been using SpoofCard.com's Caller ID spoofing service to hack into voice-mail accounts, according to Mark Del Bianco, SpoofCard.com's attorney. Many of the accounts that were hacked via the spoofing service belonged to well-known celebrities, including Lohan, he said.

SpoofCard.com has not actually accused Hilton of hacking specifically into Lohan's voice mail. But celebrity gossip sheets, already abuzz with the rivalry between the two divas, jumped on the story. The New York Post reported last month that someone had stolen the password to Lohan's BlackBerry and sent her friends "disgusting and very mean messages that everyone thought were coming from Lindsay." Lohan's representatives hinted that Hilton may have been behind the hack, the Post said. Hilton could not be reached for comment, but her spokesman Elliot Mintz told E! Online that the alleged hacking "just didn't happen" and suggested that someone else may have opened the SpoofCard.com account in Hilton's name.

Both the Cingular Wireless LLC and T-Mobile USA Inc. telephone networks use Caller ID to identify voice-mail users without requiring passwords. So users on either network could have been vulnerable to the misuse alleged by SpoofCard.com, said Lance James, chief scientist at security vendor Secure Science Corp. The scandal illustrates how the telephone industry has been affected by inexpensive telephony software, like the open-source Asterisk telephone system. Recently, phishers have been using this software to set up inexpensive phone networks that give their fake e-mails an added air of authenticity, for example. And with less than 10 employees, SpoofCard.com was able to use Asterisk and Linux to create a line of business that would have been far too expensive just 10 years ago. The fake-Caller ID vendor sells 60-minute calling cards for $10 that let users call a toll-free number and type in whatever Caller ID number they want their call to display.

While SpoofCard.com maintains that there are legitimate uses for Caller ID spoofing -- allowing remote employees to appear as though they are dialing from their company's phone system, for example -- the latest incident indicates that this technology has created new opportunities for misuse as well. One year ago, U.S. Rep. Tim Murphy (R-Pa.) claimed that he was the victim of someone who used fake Caller ID to leave inappropriate messages that appeared to come from his own office. Earlier this year, the U.S. Federal Communications Commission launched an investigation into Caller ID spoofing sites, but according to James, these voice mail break-ins could be stopped if all mobile carriers simply required passwords. "The fix is on the communications side," he said. "They just need to lock [their voice-mail systems] down like Verizon does."

YouTube eyes ad money with Paris Hilton channel

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - YouTube, the online sensation that facilitates the viewing of 100 million amateur videos a day, is introducing a couple of new ways for advertisers to tap into the Web site's popularity while preserving its decidedly noncommercial attitude.

Beginning Tuesday, YouTube will roll out its first Brand Channel, where Warner Bros. Records will promote Paris Hilton's debut album, "Paris."
Brand Channels are much like the channels created for all YouTube users who upload their homemade videos to the site, though the purpose of a Brand Channel is to sell a product rather than to simply promote one's ability to attract an audience for their work.
YouTube will help drive traffic to the Brand Channels it sells, and the channels might have sponsors, as is the case with the Paris Hilton Channel, sponsored by Fox's "Prison Break."

The second initiative that officially rolls out Tuesday actually began nine days ago and is a platform that YouTube calls participatory video ads (PVAs).
YouTube co-founder and CEO Chad Hurley said the first PVA was for the Weinstein Co.'s current movie release "Pulse." The PVA appeared as a video commercial on the YouTube home page that users could rate, share and comment on -- in other words, do whatever they do with the usual fare they find on the site. The ads also earn "most viewed," "most discussed" and "top favorite" status just as regular YouTube content does.
The "Pulse" ad was viewed 900,000 times in four days, Hurley said. By comparison, all-time YouTube champ "Evolution of Dance" -- a six-minute video from Judson Laipply, a motivational speaker from Cleveland -- boasts 29 million views.

YouTube is the No. 1 video/movie destination on the Internet, garnering 11 million unique visitors for the week ending August 6, according to Nielsen//NetRatings, more than twice that of No. 2 destination IMDb.com and more than four times that of Netflix.com, which is No. 3 on the list.

All that traffic, however, has yet to translate into profit or meaningful revenue as the site, launched in December, has been mulling ways to incorporate advertising without irritating rabid fans.
Hurley said Brand Channels and PVA are the first attempts with more to come, and he said he has found that advertisers so far are embracing the platforms.
"Our pipeline is filling up very quickly," he said. "This is the beginning of our vision. We want to introduce ads that don't interrupt the experience."

Paris Hilton: My record is, like, so good!

New York -- Paris Hilton is no stranger to self-promotion. But when she asked DJs to play songs from her debut album, last spring, she wasn't so confident. "People go crazy," the socialite, TV star and singer said in an interview. "Everyone's like, 'Who is this?' I don't tell."
She explained: "I think when people don't know it's me, they won't judge it. But if they know it's me, then they'll be like, 'Ugh.' "
Paris, the album, is set for release today. Hilton's breathy, reggae-infused single, Stars Are Blind, has climbed to the top of Billboard's dance music chart. She says of the album: "I, like, cry when I listen to it, it's so good." As for her reality TV appearances: "I'm always playing a character," she said. " . . . I don't really want to show everyone the real me."

Luv bite sends Paris Hilton to the doctor

Heiress, socialite, actress and now singer Paris Hilton on Tuesday found that keeping exotic pets is no child's play. Hilton was bitten by her pet kinkajou Baby Luv on her arm when she was playing with the animal.The incident occurred at 3 am Tuesday at Hilton's Los Angeles home when she was playing with the kinkajou 'the way some people play with their cats and dogs', her publicist Elliot Mintz said. At some point, the monkey got excited and bit Hilton on her left arm. “Baby Luv bit her. It's a superficial bite on her left arm,” Mintz said.The hotel heiress was then rushed to the hospital where after being checked for the bite, she was given a tetanus shot. “She was seen by a doctor, who treated the wound, gave her a tetanus shot, cleaned the wound and applied something to it,” said Mintz, who took the 25-year-old to the doctor.

Hilton bought Baby Luv last November from Las Vegas and brought him back to Los Angeles despite warnings by California Department of Fish and Game. “People see these kinds of animals on TV and think they're so cute and playful and harmless. In fact, they can be deadly. It's a lose-lose situation. They are extremely difficult to handle, extremely difficult to properly care for, and it's bad for the animal and usually bad for the person,” said Patrick Foy, a spokesman for the department.Earlier, Hilton has come under fire from People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) for carrying around her pets as accessories.

“The problem, with Paris and others buying trendy and small, high-maintenance animals and using them as accessories, is that it helps perpetuate the cruel trade in exotic animals. She probably takes very good care of them because she can, but kinkajous, chinchillas and other pocket pets, even smaller dogs, are not to be picked up and taken down the red carpet,” said Lisa Lange, a spokesperson for PETA.But Mintz defended Hilton with, “I don't view kinkajous as aggressive animals. The same kind of thing could have occurred with a German Shepherd.” Baby Luv was also taken to a veterinarian on Wednesday. Hilton's arm appeared all right the next day and she proceeded to shoot promos for her debut album Paris. “Yesterday she did two photo shoots and two magazine covers,” Mintz said. The album that sports the song Stars Are Blind, which has secured a place in the Billboard charts, will be released towards end August.

Paris Hilton to Magazine: I'm celibate

LONDON Aug 5, 2006 (AP)— Paris Hilton says she is sick of boyfriends and is celibate.

The 25-year-old who gained international fame when a former boyfriend posted a videotape of the couple having sex on the Internet denied leading a promiscuous lifestyle in an interview with the British edition of GQ magazine.

"I'm not having sex for a year. … I'll kiss, but nothing else," says Hilton, who told the magazine she has had sex with only two men during her lifetime. Of the videotape with Rick Solomon that became one of the most searched-for items on the Internet in 2003, she said: "I never received a dime from it. It's just dirty money and he should give it all to some charity for the sexually abused or something." The Hilton Hotels heir and uber-socialite told the magazine she is "very shy" and relates to the late Princess Diana, who was hounded by photographers.

"I've been in cars trying to get away from speeding paparazzi before and it's horrible, so I can relate to Diana and the problems she had," Hilton is quoted as saying. During the interview, Hilton also displayed some political illiteracy. When asked about British Prime Minister Tony Blair, her response was: "Who? … Oh, yeah, he's like your president. I don't know what he looks like." Hilton also told the magazine she collects $500,000 in fees just to show up at parties and other events from Las Vegas to Tokyo. Her best-paying gig, she said, was a recent Austrian appearance. "I had to say `hi' and tell them why I loved Austria so much," she is quoted as saying. And why does she like Austria? "Because they pay me $1 million to wave at crowds!"

Paris Hilton's Simple search

The hotel heiress - who worked with her former best fiend Nicole Richie on the hit US TV series - has revealed she wants Nicole to be replaced.She confessed: "I don't know what happened to her. She just let fame get to her head. I look forward to doing a new 'Simple Life' with someone else."In season four, 'The Simple Life: 'Til Death Do Us Part', Paris and Nicole - who were lifelong friends before their public bust up last year - were given the task of playing a 'wife' and running a household, but the pair never shared any screen time.E! Entertainment Television, the network who screen the show, recently announced they will air a fifth season of the programme but warned they did not want to film the former friends separately again.CEO Ted Harbet insisted it was imperative Paris and Nicole agreed to share screen time for the sake of viewers.He said: "I don't have any control over whether they'll be friends by next season. But I'm not sure shooting them separately again is the best thing for the show."We pulled off a difficult thing this year and got away with it. We can't do that again."