Britney Spears "channels inner Cleopatra".

Britney Spear wrote:  'Channelling my inner Cleopatra today at Elizabeth Arden Fantasy Twist shoot. Fragrance is out in Sept. 1st look on Path.'

Prince Charles admits family connection to DRACULA.

Prince Charles is campaigning to save the forests of Transylvania, inspired by his ancestral links to Vlad the Impaler, the 15th century nobleman better known by his patronym, Dracula.

Rapid economic growth in Romania - which is now part of the EU - means that the forests of the Carpathian Mountains are under threat from development and logging.

The Prince is calling for the forests, some of the last untouched wilderness areas in Europe, to be protected before they are lost, like the woodland that once covered Britain.

He claims a family connection to the area through Vlad III, Prince of Wallachia, who earned the sobriquet Vlad the Impaler thanks to his favoured method of torture and execution.

The 15th century nobleman, notorious for his bloodthirsty campaigns against the Ottomans and fierce repression of his people, is a distant ancestor of Charles's great-grandmother, Queen Mary.

The total number of his victims is estimated in the tens of thousands, many killed by being impaled on huge metal stakes.

His reputation for cruelty is said to have helped inspire Bram Stoker's diabolical villain, Count Dracula.

In a new documentary about the Carpathian mountains, Charles makes fun of his ancestral links to 'Count Dracula'.

'The genealogy shows I am descended from Vlad the Impaler, so I do have a bit of a stake in the country,' he quipped.

The Prince has recently bought a five-bedroom house in the village of Zalanpatak, which is said to have been founded by one of his Transylvanian ancestors.

Charles is expected to use the 150-year-old home as an isolated holiday retreat, and it will be used as a guesthouse when he is not in residence.

The Prince first visited Transylvania in 1998 and has bought three properties there, including the Zalanpatak house and a £43-a-night guesthouse in the village of Viscri.

Traditional farming and building techniques used in the area are said to have inspired his plans for Poundbury, the Dorset village created by his Duchy of Cornwall.

He has since sold a manor near the medieval town of Sighisoara, while the Viscri and Zalanpatak guesthouses are managed by Count Tibor Kalnoky.

'It seems to me in Transylvania there is a combination of the natural ecosystem with a human cultural system,' the prince told the documentary, according to the Daily Telegraph.

'This extraordinarily unique integrated relationship is so hugely important. People are yearning for that sense of belonging and identity and meaning.'

If development goes ahead, Romania could end up barren like swathes of the Highlands of Scotland or Canada that were once dense with virgin forest, Prince Charles warned.

Two-hundred-and-fifty-thousand hectares of virgin forests are in urgent need of protection, according to Magor Csibi, country manager of the World Wildlife Fund's Danube-Carpathian programme in Romania.

The area, home to brown bears, lynx, wolves, and 13,000 other species, represents up to 65 per cent of Europe's remaining virgin forests.

STEVE JOBS HAS DIED, 10/5/11 AT 7:36 AM.

Steve Jobs, the visionary in the black turtleneck who co-founded Apple in a Silicon Valley garage, built it into the world's leading tech company and led a mobile-computing revolution with wildly popular devices such as the iPhone, died Wednesday. He was 56.
*Did this actually happen today, or is it a marketing ploy?*

Corey Feldman Says Pedophilia No. 1 Problem for Child Actors, Contributed to Demise of Corey Haim - ABC News

 

Corey Feldman Says Pedophilia No. 1 Problem for Child Actors, Contributed to Demise of Corey Haim - ABC News

Justin Bieber gets Hebrew tattoo.

Justin Bieber and his father pose topless, showing off their matching tattoos.
A newly-released photo shows the father and son in Israel earlier this year where they had the etching done together.
The pair had the word 'Yeshua,' - which many believe to be Jesus' Hebrew or Aramaic name - etched onto the left side of their torsos.

The name Yeshua frequently appears in the Hebrew Bible to describe Joshua the High Priest.
Bieber first showed off the etching when he went on a Hawaii break with girlfriend Selena Gomez in May.
It came as Justin's second tat, with the teen seemingly sharing his father's love of the ink.
The Baby singer also has an etching of seagull on his left hip, which he had done to celebrate turning 16.

Justin's Christian faith is important to him, with the star saying prayers in English and Hebrew before going on stage to perform.

The singer was raised primarily by his mother Pattie Mallette, but he has remained close to his father over the years.
'I have a great relationship with my dad,' he told Seventeen last year.
'When I was younger, he taught me how to play some songs on the guitar, like 'Knockin' on Heaven's Door' by Bob Dylan.'
'He taught me how to drive, too," Justin added. 'He's cool.'

Amy winehouse found dead, joins 27 club.

Amy Winehouse was found dead in her apartment in London today ... this according to several reports.  A press release from the Metropolitan Police, which doesn't specifically name Winehouse, says: " Police were called by London Ambulance Service to an address in Camden Square NW1 shortly before 16.05hrs today, Saturday 23 July, following reports of a woman found deceased. On arrival officers found the body of a 27-year-old female who was pronounced dead at the scene. Enquiries continue into the circumstances of the death. At this early stage it is being treated as unexplained. "

Last month, Winehouse canceled her European tour after a performance in Serbia where she seemed completely out of it. Story developing ...

News of the World phone-hacking whistleblower found deadSean Hoare, the former News of the World showbusiness reporter who was the first named journalist to allege that Andy Coulson was aware of phone hacking by his staff, has been found dead . Hoare, who worked on the Sun and the News of the World with Coulson before being dismissed for drink and drugs problems, was said to have been found at his Watford home. Hertfordshire police would not confirm his identity, but said in a statement: "At 10.40am today [Monday 18 July] police were called to Langley Road, Watford, following the concerns for the welfare of a man who lives at an address on the street. Upon police and ambulance arrival at a property, the body of a man was found. The man was pronounced dead at the scene shortly after. "The death is currently being treated as unexplained but not thought to be suspicious. Police investigations into this incident are ongoing." There was an unexplained delay in the arrival of forensics officers at the scene. Neighbours said three police cars and two ambulances arrived at the property shortly before 11am. They left around four hours later, around 3pm, shortly after a man and a woman, believed to be grieving relatives, arrived at the premises. There was no police presence at the scene at all for several hours. The curtains were drawn at the first-floor apartment in a new-build block of flats. At about 9.15pm, three hours after the Guardian revealed Hoare had been found dead a police van marked "Scientific Services Unit" pulled up at the address, where a police car was already parked. Two officers emerged carrying evidence bags, clipboards, torches and laptop-style bags and entered the building. Three officers carrying cameras and wearing white forensic suits went into the flat at around 9.30pm. Hoare was in his mid-40s. He first made his claims in a New York Times investigation into the phone-hacking allegations at the News of the World. He told the newspaper that not only did Coulson know of the hacking, but he also actively encouraged his staff to intercept the calls of celebrities in the pursuit of exclusives. In a subsequent interview with the BBC he alleged he was personally asked by his editor at the time, Coulson, to tap into phones. In an interview with the PM programme he said Coulson's insistence he did not know of the practice was "a lie, it is simply a lie". At the time a Downing Street spokeswoman said Coulson totally and utterly denied the allegations; he had "never condoned the use of phone hacking and nor do I have any recollection of incidences where hacking took place". Hoare said he was once a close friend of Coulson's, and told the New York Times the two first worked together at the Sun, where, Hoare said, he played recordings of hacked messages for Coulson. At the News of the World, Hoare said, he continued to inform Coulson of his activities. He "actively encouraged me to do it", Hoare said. In September last year he was interviewed under caution by police over his claim the former Tory communications chief asked him to hack into phones when editor of the paper, but declined to make any comment. Hoare returned to the spotlight last week, after he told the New York Times that reporters at the NoW were able to use police technology to locate people using their mobile phone signals, in exchange for payments to police officers. He said journalists were able to use "pinging", which measured the distance between a mobile handset and a number of phone masts to pinpoint its location. Hoare gave further details about "pinging" to the Guardian last week. He described how reporters would ask a news desk executive to obtain the location of a target: "Within 15 to 30 minutes someone on the news desk would come back and say 'Right, that's where they are.'" He said: "You'd just go to the news desk and they'd come back to you. You don't ask any questions. You'd consider it a job done. "The chain of command is one of absolute discipline, and that's why I never bought into it, like with Andy saying he wasn't aware of it and all that. That's bollocks." He said he stood by everything he told the New York Times of "pinging". "I don't know how often it happened. That would be wrong of me. But if I had access, as a humble reporter … " He admitted he had had problems with drink and drugs, and had been in rehab. "But that's irrelevant," he said. "There's more to come. This is not going to go away." Hoare named a private investigator who he said had links with the News of the World, adding: "He may want to talk now, because I think what you'll find now is a lot of people are going to want to cover their arse." Speaking to another Guardian journalist last week, Hoare repeatedly expressed the hope that the hacking scandal would lead to journalism in general being cleaned up, and said he had decided to blow the whistle on the activities of some of his former NoW colleagues with that aim in mind. He also said he had been injured the previous weekend while taking down a marquee erected for a children's party. He said he broke his nose and badly injured his foot when a relative accidentally struck him with a pole from the marquee. Hoare also emphasised that he was not making any money from telling his story. Having been treated for drug and alcohol problems, Hoare reminisced about his partying with former pop stars and said that he missed the days when he was able to go out on the town. On Monday evening the curtains were drawn at his home, a first-floor apartment in a new-build block of flats. A neighbour living opposite, Nicky Dormer, said three police cars and two ambulances arrived at the property at 11am; police left at 3pm, shortly after a man and a woman, believed to be grieving relatives, arrived at the premises. She and another neighbour described Hoare as a jovial man who would often sit on his balcony, overlooking the block entrance, and talk to residents. They said he lived in the block with his partner, a woman called Jo, who they believed had been away on holiday. Neither had seen Hoare for a few days. Paul Pritchard, 30, another neighbour, said Sean Hoare was "the most sociable" resident, and they would regularly see him watering the communal front lawn. "It is just such a shock. About a month ago he said he felt unwell and he said he went to the doctors for a checkup. Then I saw him again and he seemed well."

A man police said they believe to be Sean Hoare, a former reporter at News Corp.'s now-defunct News of the World tabloid, was found dead at his home yesterday.

The death is being treated as unexplained. and isn't thought to be suspicious, police in Hertfordshire, England, said in a statement today. Hoare was the first person to allege that former News of the World editor Andy Coulson encouraged phone hacking by his staff, the Guardian newspaper reported.

Hoare worked as an entertainment reporter at the News of the World with Coulson, who resigned as U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron's press secretary this year as a result of the scandal arising from the phone-hacking accusations. Coulson was arrested on July 8 by police investigating phone hacking.

David Sonn, a lawyer for Hoare, said yesterday that the death was "a terrible tragedy."

There is no evidence of third-party involvement, and the death is not suspicious, Hertfordshire Police said in a recorded telephone message after a post-mortem was performed today. Police are waiting for the results of toxicology tests, the statement said.

London's Metropolitan Police are investigating allegations that reporters at the tabloid hacked into the phones of celebrities, politicians, and murder and terror victims, and that they bribed police to obtain information for stories. The scandal led News Corp. to shutter the 168-year old News of the World and led to the resignations of two senior executives at the company.

Hoare, who first alleged in an interview with the New York Times last year that Coulson encouraged his reporters to hack into mobile phones, had worked with Coulson at News Corp.'s Sun tabloid before he was dismissed for drug and alcohol problems, the Guardian said yesterday.

Previous Probe

The police reopened the probe in September of last year after a report in the New York Times citing Hoare as saying that everyone at the News of the World knew about phone hacking. The tabloid said in a statement at the time that the article "contained no new credible evidence" and was "motivated by commercial rivalry."

Hoare refused to comment to police after the New York Times report, leading prosecutors to close the probe again because of a lack of evidence, Director of Public Prosecutions Keir Starmer said in December. Coulson has said he didn't know the hacking was taking place.