Ridley Scott's movie based on the board game Monopoly is really in development

In the name of everything one holds sacred … it's real. Far from being a dare, or some elaborate satire on the end of ideas in Hollywood, it appears that Ridley Scott's movie based on the board game Monopoly is really in development.

To be candid, when Lost in Showbiz first handled this story last year, it was more for its novelty value than out of any serious belief that a collaboration between Universal, Ridley, and the games manufacturer Hasbro would actually get within a million earth miles of pre-production stage. But here we are, faced with a detailed piece in the LA Times in which the producer Frank Beddor explains how he convinced Sir Rid that he wanted to be a part of the magic.

I created a comedic, lovable loser who lives in Manhattan and works at a real estate company and he's not very good at his job but he's great at playing Monopoly. And the world record for playing is 70 straight days – over 1,600 hours – and he wanted to try to convince his friends to help him break that world record. They think he is crazy. They kid him about this girl and they're playing the game and there's this big fight. And he's holding a Chance card and after they've left he says, 'Damn, I wanted to use that Chance card,' and he throws it down. He falls asleep and then he wakes up in the morning and he's holding the Chance card, and he thinks, 'That's odd.'

He's all groggy and he goes down to buy some coffee and he reaches into his pocket and all he has is Monopoly money. All this Monopoly money pours out. He's confused and embarrassed and the girl reaches across the counter and says, 'That's OK.' And she gives him change in Monopoly money. He walks outside and he's in this very vibrant place, Monopoly City, and he's just come out of a Chance Shop. As it goes on, he takes on the evil Parker Brothers in the game of Monolopy. He has to defeat them. It tries to incorporate all the iconic imageries - a sports car pulls up, there's someone on a horse, someone pushing a wheelbarrow - and rich Uncle Pennybags, you're going to see him as the maître d' at the restaurant and he's the buggy driver and the local eccentric and the doorman at the opera. There's all these sight gags.

It was that pitch, that's where Sir Ridley got excited. After I pitched it to him, he put out his hand and said, 'What do I have to be part of this movie?'

Be insane? Naturally, it now falls to us to begin dreaming of fantasy casts - I myself will be praying Sir Rid makes it the third of his Russell Crowe epics - before sitting back to wait for the inevitable moment at which the words "mired in development hell" are uttered, and some measure of human sanity is restored.

The Adam Lambert AMA video on YouTube has been extremely

The Adam Lambert AMA video on YouTube has been extremely popular for the past couple of days. Those that missed the Adam Lambert AMA performance are searching for the YouTube video to see what all the controversy is about. A lucky few will be successful and find an Adam Lambert AMA video on YouTube. They will get excited, link it in their blog and email all of their friends. Then, a short few minutes later they try to re-visit the link only to realize that it has been pulled by Dick Clark Productions because of a copyright claim. Then, you have to delete your blog post (which was bringing in thousands of page views and ad revenue), email your friends a retraction (to avoid looking like an idiot) and try to find another link to the video (and try to save it to your computer this time.)

So what's the big deal? Why does Dick Clark Productions even care that people uploaded the video on to YouTube? Isn't it actually a GOOD thing? After all - viewing the Adam Lambert AMA performance was technically free..

Dick Clark Productions owns the rights to the Adam Lambert AMA performance. They can sell, distribute, and reproduce copies of the performance as they see fit. The copyright protects their financial interest in the production. After all - they did most likely spent a lot of money on the production. With all the controversy surrounding the Adam Lambert performance, distributing the video could bring in a significant amount of money.

Dick Clark Productions isn't pulling the Adam Lambert AMA video on YouTube because they are a buzz kill. They aren't doing it because they are embarrassed of the performance. They have deleted the videos as they pop up on YouTube because they want to protect their financial interests. This is something that everyone should accept and understand.

The Name 'Lorenzo Von Matterhorn'

The Name 'Lorenzo Von Matterhorn' is quite the rage amongst web surfers today, not bad for being the entirely fictional pseudonym of an entirely fictional How I Met Your Mother character. Lorenzo Von Matterhorn is but one of Barney's (Neil Patrick Harris) many non de plume's on the show.

The Name 'Lorenzo Von Matterhorn' Von Matterhorn made an appearance this evening, setting off an explosion of web interest – most of it propelled by the discovery of a Wikipedia page that had been created for the character. The page is a lot fun, mostly talking about Matterhorn's afflictions – he suffers from phallumegaly, or bigness of penis disorder – and various hobbies. Problem is, Wikipedia – as we all know – is a bastion of fact, and so this little bit of How I Met Your Mother fun had to go.

Once Wikipedia found out that the Wikipedia entry was part of a show-related hoax, they redirected the entry to Barney's character page – in the process jettisoning some highly entertaining 'facts' about Mr. Matterhorn. But don't worry, we've fetched some of Lorenzo Von Matterhorn's most delightful details from the clutches of google cache. Here they are for your enjoyment.