the buzz log
Lottery Ticket Story—Indigestible?
Lottery Ticket Appetizer and Entree
A 2 a.m. visit to the convenience store can mean some impulse buys. Phillip Brunelle decided to shell out for a Massachusetts State lottery ticket while buying a Red Bull. He went home, scratched his Billion Dollar Bonanza ticket, and went right back to claim his $1,000 proceeds.
Probably feeling a combined high from his lottery largesse and the energy drink, the 29-year-old wedding photographer decided to blow $20 of his winnings on a Money Mania ticket. Then, with a scrub from his lucky penny, bingo: a $1 million win and some hyperventilating.
Brunelle isn't unfamiliar with long odds, although not always in his favor: Last April Fools' Day, he got conked by falling concrete. The injuries forced him to quit his job and undergo four reconstructive surgeries.
Brunelle 'fessed up to UPI to feeling a bit "greedy," but in this case, greed is good: He'll be helping out his mom, who suffers from cerebral palsy. And replacing the flat tire he got on his victory drive home.
Incidentally, the odds of winning the million is 1 in 436,800. The odds of winning the million with proceeds from a winning ticket? Priceless.
Filed under: Lottery
$232 Million to the Winner in Winner
In today's rough economic times, the dream of winning the lottery looms large. This week, somebody's dream came true. The lucky winner hasn't come forward yet, but various news outlets are reporting that someone in Winner, South Dakota (yes, that's the town's real name), has a ticket worth $232 million. The numbers, in case you have a time machine and want a cut of the winnings, were 5, 6, 12, 16, 21, and 7 (Powerball).
News that there is a flimsy piece of paper worth close to a quarter of a billion bucks inspired a mad rush to the Search box. Though they were nowhere near as popular as the "lotto winner" queries, searches on "lottery curse" were conducted by more than a few. Indeed, there seems to be many times when someone wins millions of dollars only to suffer misfortune shortly thereafter.
An ABC article from 2007 highlights some of the more glaring incidents. A couple won $25 million and saw their marriage end just months later. In 2002, another man won millions of dollars but "his life was consumed by hardship," including the death of his granddaughter and the end of his marriage. Most bizarrely, a 1996 lotto winner was kidnapped and killed by his sister-in-law and an accomplice.
But before you get too depressed, let's get back to today's news: A very lucky $232 million ticket. Queries on "powerball numbers may 27 2009," "powerball winner," and "powerball winnings" posted immediate gains.
Also surging among the greedy and curious: "biggest lotto win ever." While $232 million is nothing to sneeze at, it's far from the biggest jackpot ever. That title belongs to a $390 million jackpot from 2007. (Although, according to MegaMillions.com, that prize was shared between two winners. Sheesh, only $195 million each? Why even bother?)
Here's hoping the winner of this recent windfall manages to do what so many past winners have tried to accomplish: Do some good while continuing to live a happy life. Oh, and don't forget to pay your taxes.
Filed under: Lottery
Powerball Mania
Wednesday and Saturday nights are hopping nights in the Buzz for Powerball—that's when the phenomenally popular Lotto game reveals its winning numbers. But this week, with the jackpot beginning to assume Jabba the Hutt proportions, searches on the multi-state lottery really raked in the searches. "Powerball" (+200%), "powerball numbers" (+184%), and "powerball and lottery" (+173%) all landed with a thump and a ka-ching in our top 100 movers.
The Powerball empire recently welcomed North Carolina to its dollar-bedazzled midst, and citizens of the southern state have turned out en masse to play ball. North Carolinians are snapping up tickets, and their state topped the nation in online searches for "powerball" this past weekend. Meanwhile, the following state lotteries registered their own feverish spikes...
- Louisiana Lottery +213%
- Kansas Lottery +205%
- Colorado Lottery +184%
- Oregon Lottery +181%
- N.C. Education Lottery +156%
Powerball Rolls in Buzz
With no winner from Saturday's jackpot drawing, Lotto mania has snowballed as folks unleash their inner Charlie Bucket and try to claim the golden ticket.
Who has more of a gambler's mentality, men or women? We checked the searches and found that guys are more concerned with the way the balls fall -- 60% of Powerball searches are performed by dudes. But wait, we haven't even scratched the surface of Lotto data. With the help of our lucky scratchin' nickel, we found these other Power-ful searches on the rise...
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And if you're going to buy a ticket for Wednesday's drawing, steer clear of the polite folk of Minnesota. The state claims all three of the top metros for Powerball searches (Mankato, Rochester, and St. Paul), so we're betting there are some long lines in the Land of 10,000 Lakes.
Filed under: Lottery
top movers
| Rank | Subject | 1-Day Move |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ford 400 | Breakout! |
| 2 | Indonesia Ferry | Breakout! |
| 3 | Jordan Chandler | 3481% |
| 4 | Evan Chandler | 2322% |
| 5 | American Music Awards | 1841% |
| 6 | John F. Kennedy | 1529% |
| 7 | Turkey Stuffing Recipes | 1361% |
| 8 | Liam Hemsworth | 1172% |
| 9 | Lou Dobbs | 1142% |
| 10 | Hendrick Motorsports | 888% |
top leaders
| Rank | Subject | Move | Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Black Friday | +340 | 1290 |
| 2 | NFL | +489 | 670 |
| 3 | Jennifer Lopez | +451 | 515 |
| 4 | New Moon | -67 | 250 |
| 5 | American Music Awards | +236 | 249 |
| 6 | UFC | -36 | 239 |
| 7 | Miley Cyrus | +66 | 169 |
| 8 | Hulu | -11 | 154 |
what's the buzz?
A subject's buzz score is the percentage of Yahoo! users searching for that subject on a given day, multiplied by a constant to make the number easier to read. Weekly leaders are the subjects with the greatest average buzz score for a given week.
For more detailed information, visit our FAQ.