• Back in February, we gave Bieber a deeper analysis than he’s probably ever gotten at any other point in his career. Now, we’ve done it again – all-updated-like – for AOL News. Here’s a fun fact: Our boy the Bieb is responsible for approximately 23 million tweets over the last six months, which sounds like a lot until you consider it’s out of nearly 8 billion. Still though. It’s a freaking lot. OK, we need to take a shower. We know way too much about the teen heartthrob. We might be mistaken as a fan. source

• “Alice” had a good first week, and hasn’t done bad, but it’s not epic. Tim Burton’s latest big-budget hit, which also uses the spectacular 3D technology of “Avatar” (though not as well), looked like it was on the way to a similarly epic run for a couple of weeks. But while it did good this week, it’s now clear that it’ll just be a big hit, not an epic one.

“Alice” in her third weekend

• 45% dip in box-office receipts in weekend three source

• $116M “Alice in Wonderland’s” box-office take after its first weekend
• $209M “Alice’s” second-week mark; receipts dipped 46 percent
• $265M its third-week tally; it managed to stay on top despite competition

“Avatar’s” first three weeks

• 9.8% dip in “Avatar” in its third weekend source

• $77M where “Avatar” stood after its snow-marred first weekend
• $212M “Avatar” after weekend two; it was a huge hit during the week, even
• $352M after its third weekend, it was over halfway to “Titanic’s” $600 million

Why the diverging paths?

• » Did the snow help “Avatar” build staying power? Director James Cameron miraculously had a movie with a similar box-office run to his previous film, “Titanic.” Part of that may have been due to a huge snowstorm which slammed the East Coast in its first weekend, keeping demand for the movie high when the snow was eventually cleared.
• » Blow up, then fade: One of the major differences between “Alice” and “Avatar” is that “Alice” had a more traditional path to success, one that most blockbusters have followed in the last decade. The much-hyped movie with the big first weekend often fades quickly. Some exceptions exist – “The Dark Knight,” for example, came out of the gate quicker than “Avatar” did and had some staying power, but faded by its fifth week. The secret to an “Avatar”-style run? Slow and steady wins the race.

• It seems like every freaking day now. We don’t necessarily think it’s our place to tell a bunch of teenage girls what to think, but the Justin Bieber love is a bit much. This kid, at the tender age of 15 (he turns 16 on Monday) seems to have Twitter’s trending topics by the throat. And tonight, there he was, right behind Chile. You know, a massive earthquake that’s killed hundreds. Our question: Is he really taking over Twitter? We did some research.

His YouTube roots

• Usher discovered him on YouTube. Perhaps it’s fitting that Bieber, teen pop’s first true social media phenomenon, was discovered that way. The interesting thing is that the videos prove that he’s really talented, and just happens to be pushed by the major labels. Interesting. source

Bieber’s rank on the charts

• 6th Bieber’s album peak, which he hit back with “My World” back in December source
• 16th Bieber’s single peak, which he hit in October with “One Less Lonely Girl” source
• 2nd Bieber’s Twitter peak, which he’s at this week, according to tracker What the Trend source

• Why is he peaking now? Simply put, he has a lot of buzz behind him – he sang the opening line to “We Are the World 25,” for example – and, more importantly, he has a new album
  coming out at the end of next month. That was quick.

Popularity against major news stories

• Chile For now, Bieber’s popularity with teenage girls can’t hold a candle to one of the largest quakes to hit in 50 years.
• #hcr Last year, health care was more popular than Bieber. After Scott Brown’s win, Bieber consistently trumps it.
• Haiti While the Haiti quake was huge at first, of Twitter, Bieber has started topping the crisis in recent weeks.

Popularity against major pop stars

• Jay-Z The rapper basically owned Twitter the week of his album release in September. But he faded quickly. Bieber hasn’t.
• Gaga Lady Gaga might be the best comparison to Bieber – consistently popular week after week, moreso than Bieber.
• Miley On the teen-pop front, his biggest competitor is losing her grip in terms of social media influence. Bieber’s ahead now.

Conclusion: Is Bieber as popular as he looks?

• perception Every time you look at the trending topics, the perky teenage boy seemingly has the site in his (and his record company’s) pocket.
• reality Bieber has never straight-up owned Twitter’s real estate, but he has shown a lot of consistency over the last month or so. source

• Everything we expected, and less. Tiger Woods’ airtight public relations machine wanted to make sure nothing fell apart in his statement, and, yeah, it didn’t. But we also learned that they’ve learned nothing from this situation and are treating it just like everything else since the scandal broke. Leave your boy airtight guys. Let’s see how much it helps his rep. Here’s a recap and analysis of what he said:

Key phrase from the statement

• I ask you to find room in your heart to one day believe in me again.
• Tiger Woods • At the end of his public statement, which was perhaps the least-riveting piece of live TV we’ve ever seen. The lack of excitement on Woods’ face was visible – and then some. After he said this, he hugged his mom, who also looked very unhappy to be there. He didn’t veer off the script one bit.

Five things we learned from the statement:

• 1st The press has been stalking his wife and kids; that’s not nice, paparazzi!
• 2nd He could return to golf as soon as this year, but maybe not. It’s up in the air.
• 3rd He doesn’t plan to bring up his many mistresses by name, based on today.
• 4th Elin Nordegren didn’t hit him, apparently, as famously thought. He flatly denied it.
• 5th Tiger is still a Buddhist, but he fell away from his religion over the last few years.

Three things to take from this statement:

• Tiger’s PR still sucks This was such a controlled event that you could tell Woods would’ve snapped like a twig if he turned the wrong way. The lack of questions from the press is complete bull. His handlers are handling him way too tightly, leaving no room at all.
• nothing’s gonna change “These are issues between a husband and a wife.” Woods isn’t going to let go of his privacy after the mea culpa, which is a huge mistake on his part, because it means these questions will continue to dog him forever.
• Mobile mea culpa We watched this statement live from our iPhone using the CNN app and it allowed us to live-tweet the story with little trouble. Our society is in a great place if we can watch a man’s life fall apart live on a mobile phone. source

• The program has had its flaws. But the attention they have received is wildly disproportionate to their importance. To hark back to another big government program, it’s almost as if the lasting image of the lunar space program was Apollo 6, an unmanned 1968 mission that had engine problems, and not Apollo 11, the moon landing.
• New York Times journalist David Leonhardt • In an analysis piece describing why the stimulus program actually worked. The numbers are somewhat inconsistent, but he points out in his article that yes, the stimulus has actually improved the job picture. People disagree on the details and Republicans will use it as a good excuse to trash Obama, but the numbers, Leonhardt argues, favor Obama. One point worth noting: In most worldwide financial crises this century, it generally takes five years for jobs to bounce back to normal numbers. Obama’s already doing better than that, Leonhardt says. source

• nine number of nominations for “Avatar,” the James Cameron megahit that’s already in record territory
• nine number of nominations for “The Hurt Locker,” the war film directed by his ex-wife, Kathryn Bigelow

Other major nominees

• eight nominations for Quentin Tarantino’s Nazi-killin’ “Inglorious Basterds”
• six nominations for “Up In The Air,” the George Clooney airline flick
• six nominations for “Precious,” including one for the usually-funny Mo’Nique

Best Picture changes

• This year is a weird year for the Best Picture nominees. Rather than the usual five nominations, the Academy has switched to ten, widening the field to the point that the types of movies that never get nominated somehow did this time around, including:

• pixar “Up” got a nomination, finally validating the consistent levels of commendation the 3D animators get.
• sci-fi “District 9” got four nominations, including one for Best Picture – not bad for a director’s first movie.
• popular “The Blind Side,” which had garnered praise for Sandra Bullock’s performance, got one too. Wow. Surprising.

Who got burned this time?

• » The well-reviewed Jeff Bridges/Maggie Gyllenhaal flick “Crazy Heart” got nominations for the stars (and for best song – we called it!), but not for Best Picture.
• » Tom Ford’s “A Single Man” got just one nomination (for Colin Firth’s performance), despite the crazy level of arthouse hype it got. The Coen Brothers’ “A Serious Man,” however, did get a Best Picture nomination, which (despite their recent Best Picture win) is somewhat surprising.
• » “The Lovely Bones” scored just one acting nomination – that’s to be expected, as it wasn’t a critical hit – but it didn’t get anything for its fairly solid visual effects, which really sold the film. Peter Jackson did produce “District 9,” however. source

• 43 number of uses of the word “I” in Barack Obama’s speech in Baltimore yesterday
• 45 number of uses of the word “you” in the speech, which doesn’t seem so selfish
• 43 number of uses of the word “we” in the speech – also not so selfish considering source

• The gray lady’s change from free to pay makes sense. Simply put, if there’s one newspaper in the U.S. that can blaze the trail for online pay walls and get it right, it’s the New York Times. Here’s why:

• one They’re big enough to take the kind of risks that smaller papers can’t.
• two They understand the Web better than most papers – there’s no tired cynicism here.
• three They get the sharing nature of the Web, and so does their planned model.
• four They’ve had a long history of online innovation already, such as Times Skimmer.
• five They have content that’s good enough that people will pay for it. Duh. source

• Fame is addictive Despite his obvious failures as a human being, Richard Heene started from a common place – he had an interesting life, someone recognized him for it and put him on TV, and he wanted more. He has lots in common with Real World/Road Rules Challenge contestants in that regard. Heene’s problem is that, in his quest for fame, he became too desperate and manipulative. Not cool, dude.

• Fame is addictive Despite his obvious failures as a human being, Richard Heene started from a common place – he had an interesting life, someone recognized him for it and put him on TV, and he wanted more. He has lots in common with Real World/Road Rules Challenge contestants in that regard. Heene’s problem is that, in his quest for fame, he became too desperate and manipulative. Not cool, dude.
• Culture hackers win After the Heene family is punished for their actions, they’re probably going to get exactly what they wanted out of it. They’ve already been paid once for an interview. Richard might get a book deal. When Falcon’s old and screwed up like the rest of us, you know he’s going on Larry King again (if Larry’s still alive). Don’t believe us? Look at Rod Blagojevich’s recent career. Cheaters win. Kinda.

• Fame is addictive Despite his obvious failures as a human being, Richard Heene started from a common place – he had an interesting life, someone recognized him for it and put him on TV, and he wanted more. He has lots in common with Real World/Road Rules Challenge contestants in that regard. Heene’s problem is that, in his quest for fame, he became too desperate and manipulative. Not cool, dude.
• Culture hackers win After the Heene family is punished for their actions, they’re probably going to get exactly what they wanted out of it. They’ve already been paid once for an interview. Richard might get a book deal. When Falcon’s old and screwed up like the rest of us, you know he’s going on Larry King again (if Larry’s still alive). Don’t believe us? Look at Rod Blagojevich’s recent career. Cheaters win. Kinda.
• The media eats itself Why do stories like this get to stick around? Easy. Our popular culture is a series of loops that lock into each other. Something happens on TV, and it gets blogged about 600 times. Something gets blogged about 600 times, and it ends up on Twitter. And then it might end up on TV. While to some degree we enjoy it, we don’t know how to make it stop. Does anyone feel manipulated? We do.