By Staff
Kids today spend less time outdoors than previous generations. In 1981, according to surveys conducted by the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan, children ages 6 to 17 averaged 100 minutes outside in unstructured play each week. By 2002, that time was halved to 50 minutes. Everybody's indoors deleting…
Spam: The current rate of release of new junk e-mails is 1,199 a second - up 65 percent since 2002. Almost eight of every 10 e-mails are spam - a 30-percent increase from last year.
G(rea)8: Aamer Haleem had VH1's Best Week Ever on "Bands Reunited" with Pink Floyd playing together for the first time in 24 years.
Tigger, Piglet die: Paul Winchell, a ventriloquist, inventor (he built an early artificial heart in 1963) and children's TV show host best known as the voice of Winnie the Pooh's animated tiger pal from 1968-99, died in his sleep June 24 at his California home. He was 82. Winchell, whose childhood hero was Decatur's Edgar Bergen, also was Gargamel on "The Smurfs."
John Fiedler, 80, died the next day, June 25. Besides Piglet, he played a timid patient on "The Bob Newhart Show."
Renaldo "Obie" Benson, who sang bass for the Four Tops for half a century, died July 1 in Detroit. He was 69. In just 1966-67 they hit with "Reach Out (I'll Be There)," "Standing in the Shadows of Love" and "Bernadette."
Chet Helms, who launched Janis Joplin's career, died June 25 in San Francisco of complications from a stroke. He was 62. The manager of Big Brother and the Holding Company, for which Joplin sang, promoted "Human Be-ins" at Golden Gate Park that were part of what became known as the Summer of Love in 1967 at the height of anti-Vietnam war sentiment.
Norm Olson, 59, co-founder of the Michigan Militia, is moving to Alaska.