Sean Paul Music Triggers Woman's Seizures

Music-Triggered Epilepsy Is Rare But Treatable
Stacey Gayle really liked dancehall reggae artist Sean Paul's music, but it turned out one of his popular songs was also triggering her epileptic seizures.

"It was terrible," said Gayle, a 24-year-old New Yorker. "It didn't even have to be that loud."

The seizures were so bad that Gayle recently had part of her brain surgically removed in an effort to control her problem.

Gayle began noticing the connection between the seizures and the music in 2006, when one of Sean Paul's tracks, "Temperature," was popular. One of the first music-induced seizures happened at a cookout where the song was being played, "then it happened at a restaurant," said Gayle.

"She realized her life was going out of control with these seizures happening," said Dr. Ashesh Mehta, the director of epilepsy surgery at Long Island Jewish Medical Center.

Mehta recalled meeting Gayle last February to discuss her condition. When Gayle's mother played '"Temperature" on an mp3 player for her daughter to hear, a music-induced seizure followed.

"It was amazing to me," said Mehta. "We got a seizure when we put her music on."

Seizure Soundings

More than 3 million people in the United States are affected by seizures and epilepsy -- a diagnosis that typically comes when someone has a pattern of repeated seizures.

A number of different sensations can trigger an epileptic seizure, including certain odors, loud noises, touching and flashes of light.

But musicogenic, or music-triggered, seizures are far less common.

"We typically see one or two patients a year who have it," said Dr. Orrin Devinsky, director of the epilepsy center at New York University Medical Center.

There is no one type of music that triggers such reactions. For some, jazz might set off the seizure; for others, rock 'n' roll is the culprit, or country music. And in many cases, it's not the actual sound or rhythm of the music that poses the problem; it's the emotional connection that one has to the song he or she is hearing.

Essentially, the part of the brain that processes music and emotions associated with music can be overlapping with areas of the brain that trigger seizures, explained Devinsky.

For example, one of Devinsky's patients had seizures when she heard a certain type of opera music.

"She grew up in Italy, and Neapolitan operas aroused the strongest emotions in her," said Devinsky.

Getting It Out of Your Head
For Gayle, the seizures started with Sean Paul's music, but they did not end there.

"I was on this boat ride and we told them, 'Don't play Sean Paul,'" but the other hip-hop tracks began to elicit a reaction, said Gayle. "I almost ended up jumping out of the boat."

About 70 percent of people with epilepsy are able to control their seizures through medication. For those who still have seizures or cannot handle the side effects of the medication, doctors then consider brain surgery.

"We did try a number of different anti-seizure medications, but it was clear that her epilepsy was not responding," said Dr. Alan Ettinger, chief of the epilepsy center at Long Island Jewish Medical Center. "In her case, in addition to music setting off the epilepsy, even the very thought of the song started to provoke the seizures."

At her worst, Gayle said she was having four to 10 seizures a day, so her doctors planned two operations in October 2007 to treat her.

In the first procedure, they set out to find the areas of the brain from where the seizures were occurring by placing more than 100 electrodes on the right side of Gayle's brain. They were then able to pinpoint the problems in her temporal lobe by playing the Sean Paul song to set off a seizure.

In the second operation, doctors removed the problematic portions of the brain.

"The prognosis is excellent for her," said Ettinger. "She's been completely seizure-free since the surgery."

In fact, Gayle recently did something she never thought would be possible.

"I went out and bought his CD," she said, referring to the Sean Paul album that carries the song. "Just looking at it made me nervous."

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Online golf game

Online golf game handicaps productivity
A web-friendly golf game is teeing up in offices everywhere. U.S. productivity, meet your new worst enemy.

Whether the economy improves or weakens over the next year is anyone's guess, but I'd like to make a bold prediction for 2008: by June, white-collar productivity will fall through the floor like a Looney Tunes anvil dropped from a skyscraper.

How can I be so sure? I hesitate here only because I worry about the ethics of doing what I am about to do. In sharing what I know, I could be blamed for the looming meltdown. Would Einstein have published his theory of relativity had he known it would lead to the bomb? Like him, I can't hold back the inevitable.

Three words then: World Golf Tour.

Where I live, in San Francisco's Bay Area, someone is always gassing on about the Next New Thing or the Killer App. Increasingly, the Killer Thing they're buzzing about has to do with gaming.

I'm not talking about the Wii stuff your kids play in the living room. I mean games you play online on your computer. It's a fast-growing segment of the industry that market research firm Strategy Analytics estimates will generate $5 billion in revenue this year - and more than twice that by 2011. Internet gaming, after all, is what drove Activision into Vivendi's arms last month, creating one of the largest digital game publishers in the world.

So when a friend sidled up to me and whispered "World Golf Tour" in my ear, I chalked it up to the usual hype. I mean, digital golf games are as old as Moses and about as much fun. But then I checked it out one afternoon. Days later I stumbled away from my computer to eat and, if there was time, bathe.

I'm not going to give you the web address. Anyone who wants it can Google (GOOG, Fortune 500) those three magic words and enter at his own risk. The game is still only a demo; in its current state, you play nine holes of a closest-to-the-pin competition. But when the full site goes live, sometime in the next six months, you'll have access to all 18 holes of the famous Ocean Course at the Kiawah Island Golf Resort. A half-dozen real courses will be online by year-end. That's when business life as we know it grinds to a halt.

World Golf Tour combines three elements that could prove irresistible to corporate slackers: (1) It puts you on world-class golf courses in stunning, high-definition color; (2) it streams the game through any garden-variety browser without extra downloads (which means you can play in your cubicle without running afoul of the corporate firewall); and (3) you'll be able to play with your pals - to meet up for a virtual foursome or play in a league - from your desktop.

While that last point isn't new to web-savvy teenagers, it's a pretty radical step for games aimed at older guys. World of Warcraft, for instance, Vivendi's bestselling multiplayer game, has attracted more than nine-million mostly male combatants who meet online to engage in quests and smite each other with battle-axes. It's also a cash machine that generates nearly $1 billion a year.

It was World of Warcraft that inspired YuChiang Cheng, co-founder and CEO of World Golf Tour. He was working for a company that handles back-office systems for casinos and gaming sites last January when he had his big idea. "I was watching things like World of Warcraft take off and spending way too much time with my fantasy football team," he recalls. He started thinking about what "mature men want to play online." World Golf Tour, he says, aspires to be "World of Warcraft for older sports guys."

Cheng partnered with co-worker Chad Nelson, who had a hand in creating scores of games for the PC (and who claims to be a scratch virtual golfer), and J.F. Prata, the former COO of game companies Westwood Studios and Maxis. Together they devised a novel way to map the rules of Newtonian physics that drive animation-based video-games onto high-definition photos. In other golf games that use video, a relatively small number of canned shots are recycled to simulate play. With World Golf's technology, however, the video feedback is virtually infinite. You feel as if you are really there.

Backed by first-round funding from venture firm Battery Partners, the World Golf team has been taking high-resolution pictures of every square inch of far-flung golf courses - from Pinehurst in North Carolina to the Bali Hai Golf Club in Las Vegas - using a small fleet of helicopters and radio-controlled drones. It takes a dozen people six months and $200,000 to make one World Golf course simulation, says Cheng. But that's a bargain compared with the millions it can cost to design, animate, and distribute a conventional video or PC game. Cheng says the site will make money through advertising, sponsorship deals, and various premium offerings.

To date, 100,000 Internet duffers have found the demo site through word of mouth. One top-rated player is reported to be playing 30 hours a week. "He's an adult, and he has a job," says Cheng. "His whole office is now playing." You've been warned.

more golf news

Golf-Golfweek editor fired over noose cover
Golfweek magazine has fired its editor Dave Seanor for the controversial decision to depict a noose on the cover of the Jan. 19 issue, the latest chapter in the Tiger Woods "lynch" affair.

Seanor has been replaced by Jeff Babineau, the switch coming nine days after American cable television network The Golf Channel suspended one of its presenters for two weeks for making a racially sensitive comment at the expense of Woods.

Anchor Kelly Tilghman, a former playing professional, joked in a telecast with Nick Faldo during the PGA Tour's season-opening Mercedes-Benz Championship that players bidding to challenge Woods might have to "lynch him in a back alley".

Golfweek apologised in a statement on Friday for its Jan. 19 cover, which carried the headline: "Caught in a Noose" with the subtitle: 'Tilghman slips up and Golf Channel can't wriggle free.'

William P. Kupper Jr., president of Turnstile Publishing, Golfweek's parent company, said: "We apologise for creating this graphic cover that received extreme negative reaction from consumers, subscribers and advertisers across the country.

"We were trying to convey the controversial issue with a strong and provocative graphic image. It is now obvious that the overall reaction to our cover deeply offended many people. For that, we are deeply apologetic."

Babineau, who has worked for Golfweek for the last nine years in roles ranging from editor and deputy editor to senior writer, added: "We know we have a job ahead of us to re-earn the trust and confidence of many loyal readers.

"Our staff is very passionate about the game. Our wish is that one regretful error does not erase more than 30 years of service we've dedicated to this industry."
Tilghman's "lynch" comment was made to Briton Faldo on Jan. 4 after the second round of the Mercedes-Benz Championship on the Hawaiian island of Maui.

PUBLIC APOLOGY

She apologised to world number one Woods before issuing a public apology four days later.

"During our golf broadcast, Nick Faldo and I were discussing Tiger's dominance in the golf world and I used some poorly chosen words," Tilghman said.

"I have known Tiger for 12 years and I have apologised directly to him. I also apologise to our viewers who may have been offended by my comments."

Mark Steinberg, Woods's agent, said in a statement last week that the story was a non-issue.

"Tiger and Kelly are friends and Tiger has a great deal of respect for Kelly.

"Regardless of the choice of words used, we know unequivocally that there was no ill-intent in her comments. This story is a non-issue in our eyes."

Tilghman is working as an anchor for a second consecutive season with The Golf Channel, which became the PGA Tour's exclusive cable partner in a 15-year deal starting in 2007.

She is scheduled to return to the commentating booth at next week's Buick Invitational outside San Diego where Woods will be bidding to win the title for a four successive year

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