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The End of Hannah Montana Is Near

andPOP Staff — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 02:56:43 +0000

Posted on andPOP:

This is the sound of a million 15-year-old hearts breaking: Miley Cyrus may be ready to leave her Hannah Montana role in the dust.

“We’re thinking this is our last season,” Cyrus told Yahoo news.

Production on the new season begins in early August, with an option to continue the show. However, Cyrus may feel the role is exhausted – and exhausting.

“I just think we did a lot of episodes,” she said. “We basically did two seasons in one last year. Usually people would do one season that would be, like, 16 episodes, and we did almost 30 episodes! It seems like it’s been on, like, longer.”

Cyrus has been desperately trying to shake her good girl image and develop an older audience.

Google Walks Away from Digg Deal

andPOP Staff — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 17:52:21 +0000

Posted on andPOP:

The Google/Digg acquisition negotiations were going smoothly as of last Tuesday, and the two companies were in final negotiations in the $200 million range. However, by late Thursday or Friday, Google decided to walk away from the deal, according to techcrunch.com.

By the time Google had walked away from the deal, they had had already reviewed Digg’s technology and financial statements. The negotiations were in the ‘term sheet’ stage, by which point the buyer already has a very good idea of exactly what they are purchasing, according to techcrunch.com.

Two sources close to the companies said that an issue that arose during the technical due diligence was to blame for the breakdown of the deal. Another source indicated that the issue was more personality driven, and that Google decided Digg’s top team wasn’t a fit for the search engine enterprise, according to the article.

The deal appears to be dead, and is the latest addition to the long list of failed Digg acquisition deals, including Yahoo Inc. Techcrunch continues saying that when a company is ‘left at the altar’ of an acquisition deal, other buyers are typically hesitant to step up.

Ebert and Roeper Say Farewell

andPOP Staff — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 08:03:59 +0000

Posted on andPOP:

Say goodbye to “Ebert and Roeper at the Movies.”

Both of the famed film critics will not be renewing their contracts with the show because Disney has decided to take it in a different direction.

Roeper released a statement Sunday, explaining that “Several months ago, Disney offered to extend my contract, which expires at the conclusion of the 2007-08 season. I opted to wait. Much transpired after that behind the scenes, but an agreement was never reached, and we are all moving on.”

Ebert followed suit yesterday, announcing his departure on the Chicago Sun Times web site.

He said that though there would be changes, the trademark “thumbs up” rating system would continue.