Britney Spears's manager Larry Rudolph stepped down after 25 years of working with the singer.
Rudolph formally announced his intention to resign in a letter, sent to Britney's father, Jamie Spears, and co-conservator Jodi Montgomery.
Rudolph, 57, said the singer's "intention to officially retire" had prompted him to resign. He is credited with helping her secure her first recording contract in the 1990s.
The move comes two weeks after Britney told a Los Angeles judge that she was forced to perform against her will.
"It has been over two and-a-half years since Britney and I last communicated, at which time she informed me she wanted to take an indefinite work hiatus," Rudolph wrote in his letter.
"Earlier today, I became aware that Britney had been voicing her intention to officially retire. As her manager, I believe it is in Britney's best interest for me to resign from her team as my professional services are no longer needed."
Celebrity support for Britney Spears
The campaign of support for Britney continues, with more famous names publicly backing the singer in her ongoing legal battle to end the 13-year court conservatorship.
A host of stars have spoken out in support of the Lucky singer, including ex-boyfriend Justin Timberlake, fellow singer Mariah Carey and actor and activist Rose McGowan.
Miley Cyrus used a recent stint on stage to publicly back Britney.
The singer performed at the opening of Resorts World Las Vegas on Sunday, July 4. According to audience members, halfway through performing her hit track, Party in the USA, Cyrus, 28, stopped to chant, "Free Britney, free Britney!"
Cyrus's song Party in the USA references Britney, with the repeated lyrics, "That's when the DJ dropped my favourite tune / And a Britney song was on". Rapper Jay-Z is given the same treatment in the first bridge of the song.
Adapting the lyrics, she then sang: "The taxi man turned on the radio / He turned to me and said, 'Free Britney, free Britney!"
This is not the first time Cyrus has publicly supported Britney. In February, she performed at the NFL's TikTok Tailgate Super Bowl Pregame show, where she shouted on stage: "We love Britney."
In 2019, she repeated the lyrics, "Free Britney," during a Memphis concert.
Tesla founder Elon Musk spoke out on Monday. Taking to his Twitter account, he simply wrote, “Free Britney".
On Wednesday, June 23, Britney spoke out about the restrictive conditions she has been living under, in the 13-year conservatorship controlled primarily by her father.
She asked a Los Angeles judge to end the conservatorship, which she called "abusive", and condemned her father and the others who controlled it.
“I want to end this conservatorship without being evaluated,” she said in a long, emotional and sometimes profane speech. “This conservatorship is doing me way more harm than good. I deserve to have a life ... I just want my life back."
On Wednesday, June 30 a judge denied Britney's November 2020 request to remove Jamie from her conservatorship.
“The conservator’s request to suspend James P Spears immediately upon the appointment of Bessemer Trust company of California as sole conservator of estate is denied without prejudice,” the court documents filed stated.
When the request was first filed in 2020, Judge Brenda Penny declined to suspend Britney's father from the conservatorship and appointed financial company Bessemer Trust as a co-conservator. On Thursday, July 1, the The New York Times obtained court-filed documents, in which the Bessemer Trust put in a request to resign from the conservatorship.
In the documents, Bessemer Trust said that “due to changed circumstances”, citing the pop star’s recent court testimony, it no longer wished to be responsible for managing her finances.
In the filing, the company explained it had been told Spears’s conservatorship was voluntary, with her consenting to hire the company.
Bessemer Trust has “heard the conservatee and respects her wishes”, the filing stated.
Britney's family speak out
The singer's mother and sister have both voiced their support for Britney in the days since she appeared in court last month.
"Since the day I was born, I've only loved adored and supported my sister," Jamie Lynn Spears said in a video posted on her Instagram Stories on Monday, 28.
"I'm so proud of her for using her voice," Jamie Lynn said. "I am only concerned about her happiness" and "have nothing to gain or lose either way".
Britney's mother, Lynne Spears, spoke to The New Yorker, about her daughter, saying: "I got mixed feelings about everything, I don’t know what to think. It’s a lot of pain, a lot of worry."
ELIO
Starring: Yonas Kibreab, Zoe Saldana, Brad Garrett
Directors: Madeline Sharafian, Domee Shi, Adrian Molina
Rating: 4/5
Founders: Ines Mena, Claudia Ribas, Simona Agolini, Nourhan Hassan and Therese Hundt
Date started: January 2017, app launched November 2017
Based: Dubai, UAE
Sector: Private/Retail/Leisure
Number of Employees: 18 employees, including full-time and flexible workers
Funding stage and size: Seed round completed Q4 2019 - $1m raised
Funders: Oman Technology Fund, 500 Startups, Vision Ventures, Seedstars, Mindshift Capital, Delta Partners Ventures, with support from the OQAL Angel Investor Network and UAE Business Angels
Step by step
2070km to run
38 days
273,600 calories consumed
28kg of fruit
40kg of vegetables
45 pairs of running shoes
1 yoga matt
1 oxygen chamber
Some of Darwish's last words
"They see their tomorrows slipping out of their reach. And though it seems to them that everything outside this reality is heaven, yet they do not want to go to that heaven. They stay, because they are afflicted with hope." - Mahmoud Darwish, to attendees of the Palestine Festival of Literature, 2008
His life in brief: Born in a village near Galilee, he lived in exile for most of his life and started writing poetry after high school. He was arrested several times by Israel for what were deemed to be inciteful poems. Most of his work focused on the love and yearning for his homeland, and he was regarded the Palestinian poet of resistance. Over the course of his life, he published more than 30 poetry collections and books of prose, with his work translated into more than 20 languages. Many of his poems were set to music by Arab composers, most significantly Marcel Khalife. Darwish died on August 9, 2008 after undergoing heart surgery in the United States. He was later buried in Ramallah where a shrine was erected in his honour.
Global state-owned investor ranking by size
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Company profile
Name: Steppi
Founders: Joe Franklin and Milos Savic
Launched: February 2020
Size: 10,000 users by the end of July and a goal of 200,000 users by the end of the year
Employees: Five
Based: Jumeirah Lakes Towers, Dubai
Financing stage: Two seed rounds – the first sourced from angel investors and the founders' personal savings
Second round raised Dh720,000 from silent investors in June this year
more from Janine di Giovanni
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Ferrari 12Cilindri specs
Engine: naturally aspirated 6.5-liter V12
Power: 819hp
Torque: 678Nm at 7,250rpm
Price: From Dh1,700,000
Available: Now
If you go
The flights
There are direct flights from Dubai to Sofia with FlyDubai (www.flydubai.com) and Wizz Air (www.wizzair.com), from Dh1,164 and Dh822 return including taxes, respectively.
The trip
Plovdiv is 150km from Sofia, with an hourly bus service taking around 2 hours and costing $16 (Dh58). The Rhodopes can be reached from Sofia in between 2-4hours.
The trip was organised by Bulguides (www.bulguides.com), which organises guided trips throughout Bulgaria. Guiding, accommodation, food and transfers from Plovdiv to the mountains and back costs around 170 USD for a four-day, three-night trip.
Sholto Byrnes on Myanmar politics
TOURNAMENT INFO
Opening fixtures:
Friday, Oct 5
8pm: Kabul Zwanan v Paktia Panthers
Saturday, Oct 6
4pm: Nangarhar Leopards v Kandahar Knights
8pm: Kabul Zwanan v Balkh Legends
Tickets
Tickets can be bought online at https://www.q-tickets.com/apl/eventlist and at the ticket office at the stadium.
TV info
The tournament will be broadcast live in the UAE on OSN Sports.
COMPANY%20PROFILE
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EName%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EQureos%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EBased%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EUAE%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ELaunch%20year%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E2021%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ENumber%20of%20employees%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E33%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ESector%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3ESoftware%20and%20technology%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFunding%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E%243%20million%0D%3Cbr%3E%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Benefits of first-time home buyers' scheme
- Priority access to new homes from participating developers
- Discounts on sales price of off-plan units
- Flexible payment plans from developers
- Mortgages with better interest rates, faster approval times and reduced fees
- DLD registration fee can be paid through banks or credit cards at zero interest rates
More from Neighbourhood Watch
Our legal consultant
Name: Dr Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
More from Neighbourhood Watch:
KILLING OF QASSEM SULEIMANI
The specs
- Engine: 3.9-litre twin-turbo V8
- Power: 640hp
- Torque: 760nm
- On sale: 2026
- Price: Not announced yet
ESSENTIALS
The flights
Emirates flies from Dubai to Phnom Penh via Yangon from Dh2,700 return including taxes. Cambodia Bayon Airlines and Cambodia Angkor Air offer return flights from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap from Dh250 return including taxes. The flight takes about 45 minutes.
The hotels
Rooms at the Raffles Le Royal in Phnom Penh cost from $225 (Dh826) per night including taxes. Rooms at the Grand Hotel d'Angkor cost from $261 (Dh960) per night including taxes.
The tours
A cyclo architecture tour of Phnom Penh costs from $20 (Dh75) per person for about three hours, with Khmer Architecture Tours. Tailor-made tours of all of Cambodia, or sites like Angkor alone, can be arranged by About Asia Travel. Emirates Holidays also offers packages.
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
SQUADS
South Africa:
JP Duminy (capt), Hashim Amla, Farhaan Behardien, Quinton de Kock (wkt), AB de Villiers, Robbie Frylinck, Beuran Hendricks, David Miller, Mangaliso Mosehle (wkt), Dane Paterson, Aaron Phangiso, Andile Phehlukwayo, Dwaine Pretorius, Tabraiz Shamsi
Bangladesh
Shakib Al Hasan (capt), Imrul Kayes, Liton Das (wkt), Mahmudullah, Mehidy Hasan, Mohammad Saifuddin, Mominul Haque, Mushfiqur Rahim (wkt), Nasir Hossain, Rubel Hossain, Sabbir Rahman, Shafiul Islam, Soumya Sarkar, Taskin Ahmed
Fixtures
Oct 26: Bloemfontein
Oct 29: Potchefstroom
Maestro
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EDirector%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EBradley%20Cooper%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EStarring%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EBradley%20Cooper%2C%20Carey%20Mulligan%2C%20Maya%20Hawke%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3ERating%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%203%2F5%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
India squad for fourth and fifth Tests
Kohli (c), Dhawan, Rahul, Shaw, Pujara, Rahane (vc), Karun, Karthik (wk), Pant (wk), Ashwin, Jadeja, Pandya, Ishant, Shami, Umesh, Bumrah, Thakur, Vihari
