Trending This Week: 08/13–08/17

PRISON FOR PUSSY RIOT
Social media is abuzz with news of the verdict in the trial against Russian punk band Pussy Riot, who were sentenced to two years in prison for “hooliganism,”despite an international outcry. The members of the all-female trio were arrested in March after an unauthorized performance at Moscow’s main cathedral, during which they sang a song asking the Virgin Mary to save Russia from Vladimir Putin. Paul McCartney, Bjork, and Madonna have all called for the band to be released from prison, but not even rock stars can overrule the Russian courts. 

THE KING IS GONE BUT HE’S NOT FORGOTTEN
Also trending high this week was Elvis Presley. This week marks the 35th anniversary of the King’s passing and many fans scoured the internet for interesting Elvis-related articles like this, this, this, this, and this. 

TWO DOWN, TWO TO GO
Fans of terrible ‘70s TV sitcoms and the washed-up actors who appeared on them were saddened this week to learn of the passing of Ron Palillo, better known as Arnold Horshack, one of the Sweathogs on Welcome Back, Kotter. Palillo died of a heart attack. He was 63. Palillo’s passing marks the second Sweathog death of 2012. Robert Hegyes, who played Juan Epstein, died of a heart attack in January at age 60.

TWEETING ABOUT TWITTER
A hot topic on Twitter this week has been…Twitter. #AnnoyingThingsOnTwitter is one of the top hashtags, because there’s nothing better than using social media to complain about social media. As usual, the average tweets are pithy and insightful. @DoucheBag is annoyed by “Douchebags who keep their profile pic as an egg,” while @ItzDaisu hates “dese kids wit ‘swag.’”

Most tweeters are very annoyed with Beliebers, but our favorite complaint comes from @damnitstrue, who hates “when people complain about people tweeting too much.”  Turns out we were wrong; using social media to complain about people complaining about social media is way better than using social media to complain about social media.

GAS MONEY
Passengers on an Air France flight that was forced to land in Damascus to refuel were asked to chip in for gas money when the airline’s credit card was declined as a result of sanctions imposed against Syria. The passengers, mainly French and Lebanese citizens, managed to scrape together $17,000, but in the end the airline was able to reach an agreement with the airport and the passengers’ money was not needed. But as a special bonus, passengers were told to remove their seatbelts because the plane might catch fire during refueling and they might need to exit the plane in a hurry.

A similar incident occurred in November 2011 when a Comtel Air flight from India to Britain was forced to land in Vienna. Passengers on that plane has to come up with $30,000 so the plane could refuel and reach its destination.