Oprah Winfrey, arguably the most powerful woman in entertainment (if not the world in general), is preparing to pack her luxurious bags. She's announced that in 2011, after a quarter-century of favorite things and heartfelt interviews, "The Oprah Winfrey Show" will be no more. The last program is scheduled for Sept. 9, 2011. One can only imagine who might be her guests.

In syndication across the country, Oprah's eponymous program is the top-rated U.S. daytime show (take that, Days of Our Lives!), with an average viewership of 7.1 million this year.

While not entirely unexpected, the news is likely a bit of a blow to CBS Corporation (CBS), as its CBS Television Distribution arm syndicates the program. Additionally, Walt Disney (DIS) might feel the sting of an Oprah departure as Disney-owned ABC is the primary network that airs the show. And will it impact O, Oprah's monthly magazine published by the Heart Corporation? To say nothing of all of the manic women in the audience who long for a chance at one of Oprah's favorite things.

Hasbro (NYSE: HAS) isn't doing too well today. Shares of the toy entity are down 3.5% at the time of this writing in early afternoon trading. Third-quarter results are the catalyst, apparently. Management must hate this, because on Friday, rival Mattel (NYSE: MAT) saw a bid after its own earnings release.

Hasbro's top line contracted 2%, and earnings per share, even with some dilution from a joint venture with Discovery Communications (NASDAQ: DISCA) and investments in Hasbro's virtual-studio initiative, increased 11% to 99 cents. Expectations were beat by six pennies. Gee, that was better than Mattel's performance. The maker of Barbie actually saw a per-share earnings decline and came in line with forecasts.

Discovery Communications, which owns the Discovery Channel and Animal Planet, hopes to turnaround its failed efforts to get a foothold on the Internet by buying the popular website HowStuffWorks.com for $250 million, according to the Wall Street Journal. Discovery will use this popular base to make its library of videos more easily available to the public.

HowStuffWorks.com, a privately held company whose best known owner is investor Carl Icahn, was founded by Marshall Brain in 1998. Brain is a university professor in North Carolina. He built the audience for the site by analyzing what people were searching for on the Internet and creating content to answer those queries.

In addition to HowStuffWorks.com, the purchase will include several other digital properties including a map database, which are not yet profitable. Discovery hopes that by controlling a website that already gets 3.8 million unique U.S. users each month it will have more success drawing Internet users to its online content. Chief Executive David Zaslav, who has been redesigning Discovery in his own image since taking over in January, told the Journal he believes this acquisition will give Discovery the "online firepower" it's been lacking.

As the name implies, TreeHugger.com is the place to get "green news, solutions, and product information."

And now the company is getting some green from Discovery Communications – that is, in a buyout. The terms have not been disclosed (but the rumors have the purchase price between $10 million to $15 million).

TreeHugger.com is in the form of a blog. But there are also videos, newsletters and user generated content areas.

And it's a popular destination. In June, there were 3.6 million pageviews and 1.94 million unique visitors. Even Oprah Winfrey is a fan.

TreeHugger.com also has some good-natured humor. According to the site: "TreeHuggers know that you don't need to run off to live with the wolves to contribute to the betterment of Mother Nature. (We do, however, prescribe this to anyone with strong urges to pursue cave art and moon howling). TreeHuggers live in the 21st century, make quotidian decisions, consume, have fun and maintain their aesthetic je ne sais quoi."

Oh, and TreeHugger.com has no issue doing some dealmaking, either.

And, if you want to check out some more recent M&A deals, click here.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including the Complete M&A Handbook and the EDGAR-Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements.