Hungary is killing two birds with one stone. It wants to raise funds to help the victims of the recent toxic sludge spillage and it needs to dispose of its collection of communist era artefacts.

Almost two months after the toxic sludge spill the government is to auction off paintings, photographs and sculptures that are no longer required and are gathering dust in the basements of government buildings.

The unwanted relics, 230 in total, are to be auctioned at Budapest’s Pinter gallery. The government expects buyers from all walks of life including investors, students and serious collectors from across Europe and the US.

Paintings and pictures of Lenin feature prominently but there are also many more paintings on offer. An oil painting entitled “Soviet-Hungarian Friendship” has a starting bid of $1500.

The auction is being held tomorrow, December 6, and has been named “Never again! For the third time” which is a play on words as to what an auctioneer, gavel in hand, would say and the hope that communism never returns to the country, according to a gallery spokesman

The proceeds from the auction will be given to the Catholic “Caritas” charity which will use the money to help victims left devastated by the toxic sludge spill. this occurred when a reservoir dam at an alumina plant ruptured flooding the surrounding area. Several people were killed and it is expected to take up to a year to clean up the damage.

In an interview with rock legend Patti Smith, writing for Vanity Fair, actor Johnny Depp reveals that Disney chief executive, Michael Eisner, said of him “He is ruining the movie”.

During the filming of the Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of The Black Pearl, Michael Eisner had questioned whether Depp was “some kind of simpleton, if he was drunk or if he was gay”. Eisner could not stand Depp’s controversial interpretation of Captain Jack Sparrow. Depp was nominated for an Oscar for his performance in the flm.

Johnny Depp has said that he based Jack sparrow on Keith Richards, guitarist of the Rolling Stones. Mr. Richards appeared in Pirates of the Caribbean: At Worlds End the third film in the series, released in 2007.

A Disney spokesman said ” Disney could not be happier with Johnny Depp’s performances in the Pirates trilogy which is why we are so excited to be bringing back a fourth instalment to audiences next summer,”

The trilogy of Pirates Of The Caribbean films has grossed over $2.5bn in worldwide  box office sales. The fourth film in the series, On Stranger Tides, is currently under production and is due for release in May 2011.

The charity, Keep A Child Alive, which is fronted by singer Alicia Keys is a running a campaign called Digital Life Sacrifice in order to raise money on Wednesday, 1 December, World AIDS Day and is being supported by a host of stars from the entertainment industry.

The latest celebrity to join the campaign is Lady Gaga, who has joined Justin Timberlake and Serena Williams amongst others who will be signing off from their social media accounts at Facebook and Twitter.

These celebrities have a big following on their Facebook and Twitter pages. Lady Gaga for instance is extremely popular and has nearly 24,000,000 fans on Facebook and more than 7 million followers on Twitter. By quitting, the celebrities are hoping that their fans and followers will donate funds to Digital Life Sacrifice and once $1 million is raised they will sign back online.

This is a new and novel approach to raising money for charity. Singer Alicia Keys said, “It is really important and super cool to use mediums that we naturally are on. It’s so important to shock people to the point of waking them up”.

Some of the celebrities have already filmed their own “last tweet and testament” videos which will be used in adverts showing them lying in coffins which are meant to represent their digital deaths.

Other celebs who are supporting the campaign include Jennifer Hudson, Ryan Seacrest, Usher, Kim and Khloe Kardashian and Swizz Beatz, the rapper-producer husband of Ms. Keys.

Keep A Child Alive provides treatment, love and support to families affected by HIV/AIDS in India and Africa. It not only provides medication but also provides essential nutrition, shelter. education and support for those affected. It was officially founded in 2003 by Leigh Blake and Alicia Keys, both devoted to fighting against HIV-AIDS.

The campaign is not just about celebrities says Ms. Keys. She is hoping more people will become involved, both famous and non-celebrities, once the campaign gets underway. “It just doesn’t have to be just because you’re a celebrity or something like that. It can be anybody.” She went on to say that despite being busier than ever as a wife and mother she wants to help others even more. “As a human being, you deserve to have a chance at life”she said.

Pierre Le Guennec, a retired electrician in the south of France is at the center of a legal battle after revealing that he was in possession of 271 pieces of art produced by Pablo Picasso. The previously unknown pieces have now been confiscated by specialist art police while they conduct an investigation.

The pieces include cubist paintings, a water color, lithographs and notebooks with an estimated value of €60 million. Mr. Le Guennec claims the pieces were given to him by Picasso’s wife with Picasso’s knowledge after he installed security alarms at a number of Picasso’s residences across the south of France in the last three years of Picasso’s life.

However, the authorities and the artists estate see it differently  and Mr. Le Guennec is under investigation for theft and handling of stolen goods.

Mr. Le Guennec contacted  Picasso’s son Claude in September in an attempt to have the pieces of art authenticated as Picasso’s work. However the son dismissed Mr.  Le Guennec’s account of how he came to be in possession the pieces claiming that his father would never give so much of his work to one person.

Pablo Piccaso was such a productive artist and a poor record keeper that these pieces of his work were unknown. Picasso’s estate claim that Mr. Le Guennec has remained silent all these years knowing that a statute of limitations for theft would have expired and hoping to benefit from the sale of the pieces. Although the statute for theft might have expired, handling stolen goods has no time limit.

Earlier this year Picasso’s 1932 painting Nude, Green Leaves and Bust sold at auction for $106.5million and “Portrait of Angel Fernandez de Soto” sold a month later for $52 million.

So finally the Fab Four’s music is making its official digital debut on the Internet at Apples iTunes store. The absence of the Beatles songs has left a gaping hole not only at iTunes but at all the worlds other legal music download services.

Following years of negotiations and the withdrawal of opposition from Sir Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr and the widows of George Harrison and John Lennon digital downloads will now be possible. But is it too late.

Illegal digital downloads of their songs have been available for years across the internet and Beatles fans have probably got most of the tracks on their hard drives already in lossless format for quality. CD’s are available cheaper than the price being asked for at the iTunes store.

Remastered CDs are available for $7.99 from Amazon and £7.99 from Amazon UK. You can get 239 tracks on a USB memory stick, digitally remastered in 2009, that looks like a Granny Smith apple for £149.99 from Amazon UK or $269 from Amazon in the US.

Prices at iTunes for Beatles music is $12.99 for an album or $1.29 for a track and in the UK it is more expensive at £10.99 and £.99.

The group’s 13 remastered studio albums, the two-volume Past Masters compilation and the classic Red and Blue collections are available for purchase and download at the iTunes store. The Beatles Box Set features the Live At The Washington Coliseum 1964 concert film, a worldwide iTunes exclusive which captures the Beatles’ very first U.S. concert.

The Beatles were offered on iTunes on Monday with a black and white image of the Fab Four appearing on Apple’s iTunes home page. The offer is being backed up with a TV advertising campaign with the slogan The Band That Changed Everything.

Generating more income by offering the tracks on iTunes seems a good idea for some. EMI’s owners Terra Firma are deeply in debt and need additional income. Sony ATV, the music publishing joint venture between Sony and the estate of Michael Jackson, which manages the rights to the lyrics and music of 251 Beatles songs will also see more income.

Hard to imagine but the copyright to the Beatles’ earliest recordings will start expiring from the end of 2012, some 50 years after Love Me Do was released. This would allow them to be distributed for free. In the early days the Beatles were very productive so tunes will constantly be becoming copyright free over the next few years.

A new album of Michael Jackson songs is due for release in December. The album, entitled “Michael” will include never before heard songs from the King of Pop.

The new album has been produced by Jackson’s estate and Epic Records who will be posting a teaser clip on Jackson’s official website followed by one of the singles, called “Breaking News”, on Monday.

In a statement Epic Records said “Unbeknownst to many fans around the world, (he) was writing and recording songs continuously everywhere from a friend?s home in New Jersey to studios in Las Vegas and Los Angeles with a small group of handpicked collaborators.”

Before his death Jackson had been working with several singers including Will.i.am, Ne-Yo and Akon. But only three months ago Will.i.am said it was “disrespectful” to release the unfinished material as Michael was not able to give it his blessing.

Devoted fans of Michael are not happy at the prospect of the album’s release. A Facebook group called “Michael, This Was Not It” have complained that the album contained “scrapped songs or songs he never wanted to release with Sony. Not his vision”.

However Epic Records’ take is, that the album will give his fans “a chance to hear the songs he most recently created along with tracks that Michael had a desire to bring to fruition”.

The track, “Breaking News” will be streamed for one week starting on Monday. The song was recorded in 2007 in studios in New Jersey and was “recently brought two completion” according to Sony.

Artwork for the cover for new album has been created by the painter Kadir Nelson in 2009. The record company had this to say about it. “In the oil painting, Kadir — who is known for story telling through his art — takes us on a journey through some key moments and important people in Michael Jackson?s life.”

Billed, “The Clash off the Simons”, a soon to be started battle, to control global television and music markets and the billions of dollars they generate, between Simon Fuller and Simon Cowell.

In one corner is Simon Cowell, the ‘in your face’ panalyst of American Idol, The X Factor, Britain’s Got Talent and America’s Got Talent, with a fortune of $240mn and in the other corner is Simon Fuller the soft-spoken industry titan with a $520 million fortune and the man behind American Idol and So You Think You Can Dance.

Next year Cowell is planning to take the British X Factor show to the US to compete against Fuller’s American Idol, and the man who turned Simon Cowell into the success that he is.

Cowell thrives on publicity and being in the limelight whereas Simon Fuller prefers to keep his own public profile below the radar. Cowell is actually employed by Fuller to front the American Idol.

The two Simons have known each other since the early 80s and were competitors in the UK pop music scene. Cowell started as a pushroom boy with EMI but later helped build, Fanfare Records, which at one time had five number one records. But the business crashed leaving Cowell heavily in debt.

Around the same time Fuller launched his company, 19 Entertainment in 1985. His first success was Paul Hardcastle’s anti-war classic 19. He steadily built his business which included the Spice Girls, Annie Lennox, Amy Winehouse and Claudia Schiffer. In 2001 he created Pop Idol which was first ran in the UK. The franchise has since been sold to 33 countries and generates $750 million a year in global revenue.

For the past nine years it has been the top-rated show in the US and Simon Cowell has been the Mr. Nasty judge on the panel. Fuller controls all aspects of the show and the winners each year signed a four year recording contract with him and go on tour on a basic wage while Fuller profits from ticket sales and merchandising. American Idol acts have sold 120 million singles and albums over the years.

To most people Simon Cowell is seen as the face of American Idol, and he has earned $35 million over the years but the real winner has been Fuller of who takes home more than $90 million a year as its creator. Simon Cowell is dissatisfied with the situation and has now left American Idol. In 2004 he split away from Pop Idol in the UK to launch the X Factor, based on a similar theme as Pop Idol.

A resulting lawsuit for copyright infringement was settled out of court in 2005 with the proviso that the X Factor could not be launched in the US for five years. Fuller also received 10% of X Factors earnings. Now five years down the line Cowell is preparing to launch the X Factor in the US and he has vowed to crush Fuller.

Simon Cowell’s company Syco also produces Britain’s Got Talent and America’s Got Talent but he only gets to keep 50% of profits from record sales, the other 50% goes to Sony music. His most successful act so far has been Susan Boyle.

American Idol has drastically changed the fortunes of Fox which was languishing in the TV ratings behind NBC, CBS and ABC. Next year American Idol will run on Fox from January to May and the X Factor will be launching in September.

“Mr. Nasty,” Simon Cowell has been the face of American Idol. Love him or hate him he helped to turn American Idol into a success story. Now Simon Fuller has lost Cowell he has reportedly spent $30 million to bring Jennifer Lopez and Steve Tyler onto the panel. Critics argue that Lopez and 62-year-old Tyler are too old and not hip enough to be the right judges for prime time show. On the other hand Pussycat Dolls Nicole Schwerzinger is a favorite to be an X Factor judge.

After two weeks the “Battle off the Hobbit” has come to an end when the New Zealand parliament passed legislation to keep the production of the two new Hobbit films in the country.

Parliament agreed to amend the labor laws in order to seal the deal with Warner Bros. to keep the $670 million production in the country. There had been protests all across New Zealand after Warner Bros. threatened to move production elsewhere after unions had threatened to stop production of the two films because of a dispute over actors terms and conditions.

The New Zealand Labour Minister, Kate Wilkinson, said “We were not prepared to see the hard work of the many talented New Zealanders who build our film industry from scratch put at risk”.

This decision has not gone down well with everybody. The opposition in Parliament has criticized the deal. Labour Party lawmaker Charles Chauvel said “What is the government going to do next. give in to any multi-national that asks for a labour standard to be diluted in return for some form of investment?”

Following a threat from the unions New Zealand’s film industry had suffered a setback with its reputation as a top location for film production seriously undermined. Warner Bros. decision and willingness to invest the money in New Zealand to make the two Hobbit films could provide jobs and income for up to 2500 people.

Warner Bros. executives flew to New Zealand earlier this week to try to resolve the issues and talk to the government. Following two days off discussions a deal was reached where Warner Brothers could walk away with tax rebates of more than $100 million.

The new legislation defines the role off the film industry workers as independent contractors rather than employees. The unions had wanted local workers and actors to be hired as fully fledged employees on union contracts. An Australian union, the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance (MEAA), was using New Zealand actors to target The Hobbit and had been at the center of the dispute.

The New Zealand film industry has had several successes in recent years including the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Avatar, Tom Cruise’s The Last Samurai and King Kong.