But, just what good are iPhones? Besides texting, calling, email, and internet availability, the 500,000 strong host of iPhone apps provides many unique services. There are apps for just about everything one could every dream of: finance, stocks, navigation, music, internet, and, of course, games.

Favorite apps among students include: Angry Birds, Fruit Ninja, Tiny Wings, Doodle Jump, Facebook, Spotify,  and Pandora (all available at the app store).

“Pandora is an awesome feature to have on my phone,” says junior Jonathan Zdasiuk, “whenever I want to listen to music I don’t own, I just open it up, and it’s all right there.”

The depth of variety of iPhone games allows you to do just about anything you want. Owning a zoo, traveling through space, or fleeing from monkeys, all become possible in the realm of apps.

“I love Angry Birds,” says junior Melissa Nuckolls, “who wouldn’t want to shoot birds at pigs and try to destroy their house?”

“Personally, I like Fruit Ninja the best,” says junior Breanna Sevy. “The different modes and kinds of fruit keep it interesting.”

Whether you are a game enthusiast, a music lover, or a social butterfly, iPhone apps cater to each whim of every person. As the app pool expands, anything could come next.

Malcolm “Most Dope” McCormick started out rapping as a hobby in his high school, slowly gaining fame through social media websites such as Facebook and Twitter. He would record and release songs and offer free downloads, adding to his growing reputation throughout the independent music community.

This first album was long-awaited, with “Easy Mac” building hype on his popular YouTube and Twitter accounts. Upon release it was received well by his fans, selling over 145,000 copies within the first week. Yet, despite the album’s early success, the young Miller still has a long way to go. Throughout the album it seems that the Pennsylvanian rapper has yet to find his sound. While the beats are nice and the rapping is smooth, the album is missing the allure of his previous independent mix tapes. Only 19 years old, Miller appears to be an inconsistent artist at this early point in his career.

Honestly, many fans only purchased the album to support this inspiring and charismatic teenage artist known for his fun spirit, clever wordplay, drinking-and-smoking lyrics, and hard-partying ways. Any compilation would have likely topped the charts in its first week. Hopefully in his next undertaking, the young Miller will have evolved as an artist, giving us an album worth the money.

New Year’s Eve
New Year’s Eve is still in theaters but probably won’t be for long because it’s just not that good. It does have what can be considered an all-star cast, which includes Sofia Vergara, Katherine Heigl, Seth Meyers, Josh Duhamel, Michelle Pfeiffer, Hilary Swank, Abigail Breslin, Lea Michele, Zach Efron, Ashton Kutcher, and Jessica Biel. However, there are simply way too many story lines and the whole movie seems rushed with little character development. The movie takes place in New York City, and one simply wants the ball to drop because that probably means the movie is about to end.

Things to take away:
• The whole Ashton Kutcher/Lea Michele storyline could have been deleted and no one would have cared.
• No one buys the movie’s claim that Zach Efron’s and Sarah Jessica Parker’s characters are siblings.
• Bon Jovi, who plays a famous singer, is actually a decent actor, but it’s hard to believe that Katherine Hiegl’s character is the love of his character’s life.
• Apparently you can win lots of money if your baby is a hospital’s first birth of the year and according to the Internet, yams can affect how quickly one goes into labor…Who knew?
• Ludacris seems to enjoy playing his role as a security guard.
• That guy who plays the younger brother on Wizards of Waverley Place is supposed to be a heartthrob in the movie, but is actually just plain weird.

Valentine’s Day
Valentine’s Day, which came out in 2010 and takes place in Los Angeles features actors such as Jessica Biel (again), Jamie Fox, Julia Roberts, Bradley Cooper, Patrick Dempsey, Shirley MacLaine, Ashton Kutcher (again), Anne Hathaway, Emma Roberts, Taylor Lautner, Jennifer Garner, and Queen Latifah. While it’s slightly more cohesive than New Year’s Eve, many of the characters are just plain annoying.

Things to take away:
• While Taylor Swift is awesome, her acting skills need some work.
• Also, Taylor Swift’s character does not seem like a “Felicia.”
• Valentine’s Day proposals are not always successful.
• Ashton Kutcher seriously plays the exact same character in all his movies, except this time, he is also a florist.
• If one is having an affair, one better be skilled at remembering to take off and put on one’s wedding ring.
• Taylor Lautner looks weird when he runs.
• Jennifer Garner is awesome.
• Topher Grace (remember him from Win a Date with Tad Hamilton?) seems like a pretty cool dude.

Love Actually
Love Actually is by far the best of the three movies. Not only was it made before the other two movies (in 2003) and was set in London, but it features a fantastic British cast including Colin Firth, Keira Knightley, Hugh Grant, Emma Thompson, Liam Neeson, and Alan Rickman (most commonly known for his role as Snape in Harry Potter). The stories blend together in a way that actually makes sense, and even the less famous actors get a decent amount of screen time. Also, Christmas season is definitely the best time to set a movie anyway.

Things to take away:
• It really doesn’t take long to fly from London to France, and apparently there are lots of spare flights on Christmas Eve?
• One can supposedly learn to speak Portuguese decently in a week.
• Rowan Atkinson a.k.a. Mr. Bean is a hilarious salesman.
• Lobsters were most definitely present at the birth of Jesus.
• Prime Ministers love dancing to “Jump.”
• Having a British accent is the secret to getting girls in Wisconsin.
• Banofee is a kind of pie – banana and toffee.

If all those old genres—dubstep, trance and house—are getting old why not mix them up?: “Crossing over Hip Hop, HeavyBass, dubstep, IDM and mixing it all with love and crunk” PANTyRAiD provides some original tunes:

If you’re looking for a nice bass to wake you up while playing StarCraft II or just living life, Flux Pavilion can supply with some snazzy (albeit possibly repetitive) lyrics:

Just right for around 3-5 A.M. while working on a nice long Physics lab report or alternatively whenever you need a re-centering in reality. I present Diesel:

Critics may claim that techno has no didactic value (don’t twiddle your baby’s left toe while playing that dubstep), but Caspa will teach you all you need to know about economics:

Yo-Yo Ma’s strings* and Master and Commander* ‘Into the Fog’s drums packaged in some of Tiesto’s electronic squeeks create ‘Fortune Days’ by the Glitch Mob:

Sometimes everyone wants a bit of the tried and true dubstep. Local (SF) DJ LuckMills will wub your socks off: (Recommended by Joseph Rabinovitsj).

“You’re the best around. Nothing’s ever going to get you down” (Karate Kid). In terms of beats per minute (bpm), speedcore takes the cigar: Speedcore by DGMusic

*For reference:

and       

The original lineup consisted of Young the Giant, Bush, Florence + the Machine, Mumford & Sons, and Jane’s Addiction. Unfortunately, due to a family emergency, Jane’s Addiction was forced to cancel, leaving a bitter taste in the mouth of many in attendance.

At the last minute, Green Day was booked by the hosting radio station, Live 105, ultimately saving the concert.

I personally was looking forward to Young the Giant; however, their performance seemed underwhelming compared to the other acts who followed them. I’m pretty sure this was because of the small audience at the Oracle Arena present while they performed. I love Young the Giant; I just wished they had performed later on in the night.

To my surprise, Bush was very well liked. I didn’t know who Bush was going into the concert, but I came to really enjoy their music as the night progressed. Their popularity seemed to grow as more people began to trickle into the arena.

Florence + the Machine was one of the big stars of the night. The minute she came on stage, there was an instant moment of deafening cheers. The girls in front of me seemed to be crying and upon regaining some composure, started singing and dancing. Despite this distraction, Florence + the Machine was amazing. She sang her well-known songs like “Dog Days Are Over,” which really seemed to get the crowd going.

Mumford & Sons, in my opinion, stole the show. It seemed as if they received the biggest round of applause and most cheering out of all the acts. Their popularity was widespread because of their performance at the Bridge School Benefit Concert just about a month ago, and also because people just love them! This British band sang their most popular song, “The Cave,” and performed many new songs which will appear on their upcoming album. This resulted in many standing ovations and so much cheering that I could barely hear by the end of the night.

Green Day closed the show and made the concert an even better experience than it already was. Billy Joe Armstrong made the end of the night very amusing and exciting for everyone by combining his sense of humor with amazing songs from their old and new albums.

The only unfortunate part of the night was the karaoke in between the bands’ performances. To say it nicely, all of the people, except for the first lady, were terrible. I wanted to curl up in a ball and scream to make it stop, but of course I just cringed at the noise of people trying to belt out songs by Muse and various other bands.

Not So Silent Night 2011 was a fantastic concert that no one should have missed. Be sure to go out and buy your tickets for next year’s concert!

The Hallmark Channel

The Hallmark Channel basically plays holiday movies all day long during the month of December, with lots of made-for-television movies premiering in the next week. For all you Billy Ray Cyrus fans out there (hopefully there aren’t too many of you), he has a movie called Christmas Come Home to Canaan coming out on the HC on the 18th. Watch all of these movies at your own risk.

ABC Family 25 Days of Christmas

Unlike the Hallmark Channel, ABC Family actually plays normal holiday movies like The Santa Clause, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, and Home Alone. And if anyone remembers Richie Rich, you can watch Richie Rich’s Christmas Wish next Sunday at 11:30 a.m.. It’s the perfect excuse to procrastinate on studying for your 6th period final on Monday.

Disney Channel

For all you Disney Princess lovers out there, Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas is on at 8:30 p.m. on Wednesday the 14th. That’s pretty much it for Disney Channel. However, The Even Stevens Movie is on at 2:30 a.m. on Monday night. Remember that show?

NBC

Saturday Night Live: A Very Gilly Chirstmas, is on at 9 p.m. on December 20th. This show comprises some of the best skits over the course of SNL’s history and features memorable hosts like Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin. And on Christmas Eve, watch the classic holiday movie, It’s a Wonderful Life, at 9 p.m.

A few more things:

Wherever you are on New Year’s Eve, try to watch the ball drop in Times Square. Or don’t. Maybe you’re setting off fireworks or something.

Speaking of New Year’s Eve, apparently the movie of the same name is awful. A much better choice would be to watch Love Actually, another movie with an ensemble (British) cast that is actually good. Full disclosure: I have not actually seen New Year’s Eve. And I don’t really know if I want to waste eleven bucks on it!

Lastly, for an awesome take on holiday movies, read Henry Mouat’s guide to holiday movies, which he wrote last year: http://www.mabearnews.com/entertainment/2010/12/23/holiday-movie-guide/

The evening’s performances were much better than last year’s, with a cleaner sounding program featuring talented student musicians and vocalists Sarah Hoover, Jenna Scandalios, and Christina Takayama, who ended the night with a beautiful version of Girl From Ipanema. Surprise! She doesn’t actually speak Portuguese!

Classics from Basie, Lopez, Vivaldi, and Bach were played throughout the night and although not many attendees were present for the Wednesday night event, it was an improvement from previous years that gives the school something to “hear” forward to for the rest of the year.