Getting Up In Arms About Africa

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Nothing says "eliminate Third World poverty" like Beyoncé in a bootyliciously short skirt. On Saturday, Destiny's Child and more than 100 other acts sang in front of more than 1.6 million concertgoers--and a TV audience of over 2 billion (the shows are also available on AOL)--for Live 8, a 10-city music extravaganza that organizer Bob Geldof called "the greatest concert ever." The free concerts in all the G-8 countries, plus South Africa, were meant to raise not money but awareness of poverty in Africa ahead of this week's G-8 summit in Scotland. Of course, it's not up to rock stars to decide whether the global antipoverty campaign will ultimately be effective. But they were still at their persuasive best. Sting, part of the star-studded London concert, below, rewrote the lyrics to Every Breath You Take to send the G-8 leaders a message: "We'll be watching you." And Madonna kept the profanity to a minimum. At the very least, the London reunion of Pink Floyd--playing together publicly for the first time since 1981--might have helped potheads all over the world get off the couch and do something.