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THE SCORE

GOOGLE NEWS HITS + GOOGLE BLOG HITS = THE SCORE

Eddie Van Halen celebrates Van Halen's March 12 induction into the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame by skipping it--for rehab. In an online missive to his fans, Van Halen wrote, "It is within my ability to change for the better. I want you to know that is exactly what I'm doing." score: 2,513

Salma Hayek announces her engagement to (and impregnation by) wealthy French fashion magnate Franc,ois-Henri Pinault. She even puts his name first on the press release. Celebrity blog WWTDD.COM muses, "What a lucky break that [her] soul mate would be a billionaire. Love is funny, I guess. Even with all our advanced technology, we still can't predict the heart." score: 1,992

James Brown is laid to rest--for now. Lawsuits kept his remains in limbo until March 10, when they were placed in a crypt on Beech Island, S.C. But he is awaiting, heirs say, a more Graceland-like entombment that combines gravesite and perhaps museum somewhere else in South Carolina. Star watcher TMZ.COM offers this eulogy: "Even in death, Brown's still the Hardest Working Man in Show Business!" score: 1,651

Hole singer and Kurt Cobain heir Courtney Love is being sued by a rehab facility for allegedly paying just $10,000 of her $181,286 bill. Says gossip site CELEBSNOW.COM: "Courtney Love may claim to be clean and sober these days, but she's still apparently a little forgetful." score: 665

Amid rumors of a massive divorce settlement, ex--Mrs. Paul McCartney Heather Mills announced she'll compete on Dancing with the Stars. Immediately betting site BODOG.COM began wagers on whether her prosthetic leg will fly off on air, stipulating that it "must fall off, not be purposely taken off." score: 603

EVOLUTION

A Hip-Hop Armistice After more than 30 years of rhymes, rivalries and the occasional hail of bullets, has music's youngest mass movement grown past its turbulent adolescence?

I. BIRTH OF THE BEEF: Fifteen years after Bronx M.C.s like Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five pioneered hip-hop, New York City rapper Tim Dog's 1991 single F___ Compton took aim at the growing L.A. scene and, with it, Suge Knight's Death Row Records. Knight, for his part, focused his ire on a brash young New York producer named, back then, Puff Daddy.

II. UNEASY PEACE: The tit-for-tat killings of Tupac Shakur and the Notorious B.I.G. seemed to exhaust the rivalry. For parole violations, Knight eventually went to jail; Death Row foundered, and West Coast rap with it. Atlanta and St. Louis, Mo., became hip-hop power centers, cooling coastal tensions.

III. FINAL TRUCE? On March 9, East and West Coast icons Diddy and Snoop officially buried the hatchet by touring together. Days later, Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five were inducted into the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame--the first hip-hop artists to achieve such recognition. Some feuds may go on, but rap's Wild West era may be over.