That head-butt in the World Cup final has swiftly become the butt of many an Internet joke. Fans across the globe may be divided about whether French star Zinedine Zidane deserves sympathy or
condemnation for the act, but jokes on the Web are prevalent; some are merciless. One of the most pervasive is an interactive game in which the users control Zidane and try to head-butt as many
Italian defenders as they can in the given amount of time. A score is tallied and presented to the player at the end, along with a red card. On viral video site YouTube, the most widely viewed video
on Wednesday was "A New Way to Solve Problems," from Austria, in which a succession of a dozen or so innocent street encounters result in, yep, a head-butt. For example, a tourist asks a man on a
bicycle for directions. He doesn't know the answer. "What!? You don't know the answer!?" is the response. The biker's only recourse to quell the angry tourist is to thwack him in the chest with his
head. Another video circulating on YouTube and other sites is about the Italian national team, which has a reputation for flopping and complaining. The footage is actually from a 2004 ad campaign for
the British paper The Guardian. A fictitious soccer team, said to be Italy's, stands in front of its coach with no soccer ball in sight. It shows the team falling to the ground in exaggerated agony,
clutching themselves in various positions and pointing to the referee with pleading gestures. Yes, they're practicing diving, something Italians have long been rumored to do on a regular basis.
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