If you thought the popularity of prom dresses was a fluke, think again: now there are two prom queries on the Lycos 50. Prom hairstyles has entered this week's list at #49.
There's something cheery about kids looking up the old-fashioned prom on the newfangled Web. Since January we've watched as more prom topics crept up among the top 50,000 queries: this week prom tuxedos appeared for the first time. (Dresses still get about 150 times more queries than the tuxedos, though.) And now hairstyles have taken off. Among the queries: prom hair, hairstyles for prom, and prom updos.
Other key points from this week's Lycos 50:
APRIL IN AUGUSTA: The Masters makes a huge run this week, rising from nowhere to #9. (The annual golf tournament in Augusta, Georgia ended on Sunday.) Young stud Tiger Woods is still the only golfer who generates much interest online, and queries for him were up 15% this week. Aging giant Jack Nicklaus, who made an early Masters charge, was up 150%. But Masters winner Vijay Singh didn't show up at all among our top 50,000 queries. Maybe next week he'll get more respect.
THE WORLD AT WAR: Adolf Hitler and the Holocaust are back on our list, two weeks after they first showed up. We still don't know why they're suddenly hot online topics; users have suggested everything from boards to the Holocaust-related boards filed by British author David Irving.
The rise in Hitler queries prompted us to check other notable 20th-century despots. The results? Hitler gets about 4 times as many queries as his World War II-era counterpart, Josef Stalin, 20 times as many searches as V.I. Lenin and Mao Zedong, and nearly 50 times as many as Cambodian dictator Pol Pot.
MUSIC BEAT: Who or what is the Bloodhound Gang (#50)? It's the latest naughty-talkin' musical group to hit the pop charts. (Take a number, lads.) Their video "Bad Touch" is getting heavy airplay right now -- if you're tuned to MTV, it's the one with the guys walking around in big squirrel suits.
SHORT SUBJECTS: Star Wars makes a huge leap this week, thanks to last week's home video release of The Phantom Menace... add the IRS with all other tax queries and the topic would rank #3, just behind Dragonball... add all prom queries together and they'd rank about #10 on our list... Mariah Carey continues her slow drift down our list -- two months ago she was at #23, now she's at #36... Angelina Jolie only lasted one week on our list after winning her Best Supporting Actress Oscar... is a rise in tattoo searches the new way to tell that spring is here?
NEW THIS WEEK: The Masters, the Holocaust, the NBA Adolf Hitler, prom hairstyles, the Bloodhound Gang.
DROPOUTS: The Census, Angelina Jolie, Jennifer Love Hewitt, March Madness, the Oscars, April Fool's Day.
BIGGEST RISE: Star Wars, up 25 spots to #21.
BIGGEST DROP: Spring Break, down 11 to #23.
FINAL FACTOID: The rise of Gundam Wing (#12) puts a total of six cartoons on the Lycos 50: Gundam, Pokemon, Dragonball, Sailor Moon, South Park, and The Simpsons.
