The single, “Blurred Lines”, has become the fastest-selling single of the year, selling 190,000 copies the first week it was available.

”‘Blurred Lines’ thus easily becomes the biggest single in the U.K. for U.S. soulman Thicke, whose only previous showing was the No. 11 success ‘Lost Without U’ in 2007. It’s also the second chart-topper to feature Williams in three weeks, following his appearance on Daft Punk’s ‘Get Lucky,’ which dipped 2-3 on the new list,” said Billboard Magazine.

With that in mind, what say you? Can you see the resemblance? When asked about it on Twitter, the J.C. Penny account replied as follows:

This weekend at the Billboard Music Awards, Bieber was awarded the first ever Milestone Award. The award, which was sponsored by car manufacturer Chevrolet, was meant to go to an artist who had demonstrated “musical ingenuity and innovation” over the past year. Bieber was nominated for the award along with Taylor Swift and Bruno Mars.

When Bieber took the stage to accept the award, the crowd reaction was mixed, with a large contingent of boos that could easily be heard. The pop singer seemed to react to the jeers, rambling on in his acceptance speech about how he should “be taken seriously.”

“And basically, from my heart I really just want to say it should really be about the music,” said Bieber. “It should be about the craft, the craft that I’m making. This is not a gimmick, I’m not – this is not a gimmick. I’m an artist and I should be taken seriously and this, all this other bull should not be spoken of.”

Starting now, YouTube views are now an official metric in determining what songs hit the Hot 100 chart.

“Billboard is now incorporating all official videos on YouTube captured by Nielsen’s streaming measurement, including Vevo on YouTube, and user-generated clips that utilize authorized audio into the Hot 100 and the Hot 100 formula-based genre charts – Hot Country Songs, Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, R&B Songs, Rap Songs, Hot Latin Songs, Hot Rock Songs and Dance/Electronic Songs – to further reflect the divergent platforms for music consumption in today’s world,” says Billboard.

That means that what you’re seeing on the Hot 100 chart is now based on digital sales, physical sales, radio play, internet streaming, and now YouTube views.

The consequences of this decision are immediately apparent, as the Billboard Hot 100 chart’s number one song is now Baauer’s “Harlem Shake.” The new trove of YouTube streaming data drove “Harlem Shake” to the #1 spot on the list in its debut week.

Billboard notes that the new YouTube data had an impact on other songs like “Gangnam Style” jumping from # 48 to #26 and Rihanna’s “Stay” making the leap from #57 to #3.

“This announcement marks a big step in accurately reflecting how music lovers are finding their new favorite songs. we hope this news will excite our users, who have helped us discover some of the biggest stars and songs of the past seven years,” says YouTube.

The web has jumped all over a recent interview Prince did with Billboard Magazine, in which he talks smack about his old rival/former girlfriend Madonna and gets in a dig at Maroon 5 for being gauche enough to cover other people’s songs, even though Prince himself has done numerous covers which went on to be hits.

When talking about his old relationship with Warner Brothers, Prince also called out Madge, sort of:

“It was also about Madonna,” he says. “She was getting paid, but at the time we were selling more records and selling out concerts on multiple nights. It wasn’t about her. This was about business.”

About Maroon 5, who included a cover of his song “Kiss” on their latest album much to his dismay, Prince said:

“I do pay performance royalties on others’ songs I perform live, but I’m not recording these songs and putting them up for sale,” he says. “Why do we need to hear another cover of a song that someone else did? Art is about building a new foundation, not just laying something on top of what’s already there.” At this point he references Maroon 5′s cover of his “Kiss,” letting it be known that he wasn’t thrilled by it.

Of course, Prince has done covers himself, including the hit “Betcha By Golly Wow!”, “La-La (Means I Love You)”, Joan Osborne’s “One of Us”, and Sheryl Crow’s “Everyday Is a Winding Road.”

The comments about Madonna are what everyone is interested in, however, since the two of them famously dated briefly in the ’80s before turning on one another in the public eye. Madge is quoted in a discussion about their first date as saying Prince was a “little troll” who didn’t eat his dinner.

“He was just sipping tea, very daintily,” Madonna said. “I have this theory about people who don’t eat. They annoy me.”

No word yet from the superstar on what she thinks about his comments or his comeback.

Image: Billboard

While most Internet users have moved on to whatever’s currently trending, thankfully, some haven’t forgotten the damage Smith’s bill tried to cause. Take the “Fight For The Future” movement, for instance. Backed by a successful crowdfunding process, the group placed a friendly reminder outside of Smith’s San Antonio office, telling him essentially to keep his hands off of the Internet in the form of an awesome billboard, which leads this article.

As indicated, the billboards were paid for by the crowdfunding venture, which was so successful, the organization was able to afford two billboards, both of which sport a nifty “PAID FOR BY THE INTERNET” reminder, just so Smith knows who he’s up against. The second billboard is being displayed in Austin, Texas, also near one of Smith’s offices. There’s a Google Map embed showing interested parties where exactly the billboards are:

One wonders if Smith even notices these billboards. If he does, does he understand the message being posted?

Now it looks like Billboard is finally catching up to the digital music age. The magazine’s editorial director, Bill Werde, told the Wall Street Journal yesterday that Billboard’s song charts would start including certain digital music services in the data it uses to compile the charts. Charts are usually compiled based on radio plays and digital downloads. Digital music streaming risen significantly in recent months, and Werde said that it has “recently hit a critical mass,” prompting Billboard to start including it as a basis for their charts.

A total of six services are being incorporated into Billboard’s chart data: Spotify, Rhapsody, Rdio, MOG, Muve Music, and Slacker Radio. Notably absent from the list are Pandora and YouTube.

Are you glad Billboard is including streaming data? Should they have made this move before now? Are there any services you think they should add that aren’t on the list? Let us know in the comments.

Ms. Kardashian has now contacted her lawyers on the matter, according to TMZ.

The Mexicali billboard reads “no arriesgue su belleza, ni su salud,” which translates to “don’t risk your beauty, or your health,” and was commissioned by Dr. Victor Ramirez. Ramirez never got in touch with Kim for her permission to use her image. When asked about this, Ramirez stated, “obviously I did not speak to Kim Kardashian. I do not have her number.”

TMZ explained to the surgeon that using someone’s picture in the U.S. is copyright infringement, which seems irrelevant in regards to a Mexican billboard, and the doctor said that he would get the police involved before hanging up.

Kardashian was recently in the news for responding to actor Jon Hamm’s comments on the ‘idiocy’ of her celebrity. Hamm had stated that “whether it’s Paris Hilton or Kim Kardashian or whoever, stupidity is certainly celebrated. Being a f*cking idiot is a valuable commodity in this culture because you’re rewarded significantly – it’s celebrated. It doesn’t make sense to me.”

Kardashian chimed in, saying that “calling someone who runs their own businesses, is a part of a successful TV show, produces, writes, designs, and creates, ‘stupid,’ is in my opinion careless.” Kardashian can now add “successful Mexicali plastic surgery billboard model” to her skill set.

The Billboard Chart App features 15 charts from the Hot 100 and Billboard 200, along with genre rankings and ringtones.

Users can view 60 years of chart history, search by artist, album, song, view ranking details, listen to 30 seconds of music and make purchases via iTunes.

“Our charts are already a huge draw on Billboard.com, whether for music discovery or as a measure of popularity, so it makes sense to apply them to the easy navigation of the iPhone, where users can access them on-the-go," said Editorial Director Bill Werde.

The Billboard Chart App is updated weekly with Billboard’s traditional chart release schedule and features each ranking’s previous week’s position, number of weeks on the chart, and peak chart position.

Ten of the charts are available for free, with access to the top 10 positions of those charts, going back three months. These charts include: Hot 100, Billboard 200, Digital Songs, Radio Songs, Dance/Club Play Songs, Latin Albums, Christian Songs, Tastemaker Albums, R&B/Hip-Hop Albums and ringtones.

The Social 50 chart will track artists’ popularity using a formula blending weekly additions of friends/fans/followers along with weekly artist page views and song plays on MySpace, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and iLike. Data from these sites is gathered and provided to Billboard by social music tracking service Next Big Sound.  

"The Social 50 provides a weekly snapshot of the artists that music fans engage with the most in the social arena, which in today’s world is a significant validation of their investment in an act," says Billboard Chart Director, Silvio Pietroluongo.

The Social 50 will focus on friends/fans behavior over other activities, followed by artist page views and song plays. The final ranking also measures the ratio of page views to fans.

The Social 50 will appear alongside other charts on Billboard.com and Billboard.biz every Thursday, and in Billboard magazine every week.