The bloggers who helped bring the taco truck ban in unincorporated areas of Los Angeles to national headlines have done some sleuthing with a particular commenter's IP address (it's like a digital fingerprint) who left comments bashing the cause to save the savory street food. When they compared the address left on their website to the address listed on Wikipedia page edits about the County, it was the same. What they found was that someone......

Speaking to poor planning and development, an opinion piece from last week in the St. Petersburg Times talks of bloggers moving from idea maker to action taker. "Many of us are angry about the impoverished environment we've inherited... Because of this brutal lack of place and community in our real world, those who Richard Florida calls 'the creative class' have been agitating for positive change by using the Internet to exchange ideas... it's just a......

Local music blogger, Kevin Cogill, 27, at Antiquiet streamed nine unreleased Guns N' Roses songs from the album Chinese Democracy back in June. It was a pretty big deal: fans have been waiting for this album for about 14 years now. That excitement led to so much traffic, his site crashed. Then the FBI got involved (and many media outlets), who he has been in touch with since the whole thing started. But this morning......

TMZ caught Orange County Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez on video in Denver at the DNC yesterday. She's certainly hopped on something (life, baby!), probably just general excitement of the atmosphere over there. However, it's just more fun to call her stoned and "four lattes past hyper," as TMZ proclaimed. Or maybe it's the water in Orange County. Also: TMZ has the 911 tape for Christopher Stampolis, the former head honcho of the California Democratic Council and......

DCist and the -ist network is participating in a first of its kind credential program at this year's Democratic National Convention. We're serving as the selected blogger representing the District of Columbia in the DNC State Blogger Corps (California's rep is Calitics). Here's how The New York Times described the desirability of our credential: For bloggers attending the Democratic convention at the Pepsi Center in Denver, two types of credentials are offered. The first is......

DCist has been chosen to be part of the District of Columbia's Democratic National Convention state blogger corps (the California rep is the state politics blog Calitics). That means they get unlimited floor access to the whole shebang. LAist will be syndicating the content as Editor Sommer Mathis writes in. You can also keep tabs on where she is and who she's talking to as it happens on Twitter. Yesterday, she explored the DNC's media......

The above sign has been over the Santa Monica Freeway since July 21st. Ever wonder who puts up those signs along freeways advocating for some cause or the other? One person is the Freeway Blogger who has hung over 4,000 signs against the war on freeways across the California and the western U.S. The above photo is from late July, but at least five went up yesterday afternoon, according to the blogger in an......

Reviews of Jay Babcock's review of Los Angeles didn't go so well in the comments section yesterday. Babcock, the man behind Arthur Magazine, left Los Angeles for Brooklyn earlier this month. Soundboard on LA Times caught up with him and quizzed him about his move and Babcock went off on Los Angeles. Today, Babcock explains his side of the story on the blog at Arthur Magazine's website: "I recently talked to an LATimes dude......

Cable network Current TV has recently launched this pod that features the LA Times' Homicide Report, which happens to be the only blog of its kind in the country. Although the Times is struggling these days, the Homicide Report is one of the best things about our city's biggest newspaper. The documentary focuses on reporter Ruben Vives, who believes the victims are people who deserve to have their stories told.......

Oh Those Dangerous Girl Scout Cookies | Photo by aka_kath via Flickr Girl Scouts got a rude awakening in March when Claremont Mayor Ellen Taylor told them to scram after they'd setup shop on the street corner outside her office. While Taylor claims she was merely worried about their safety, the Girl Scout troop leader, Maia West, was furious that Taylor had taken what is usually such a positive, empowering, entreprenurial skill-building experience and......

Today on Kevin Roderick's weekly LA Observed spot on KCRW, he talks up the latest lay offs at the LA Times. In addition to "the paper also began saying goodbye to 150 editors, reporters, designers, photographers and other journalists." The publisher was also fired. And that's not all as Roderick predicts that this was not the end of it: "the cruel truth is that this week was probably just a mid-step on the way to......

After hearing about music blogger Kevin Bronson leaving the paper amid the many staff cuts, we find out another great blogger is slated to leave. Jesus Sanchez was one of the paper's online reporting staff and has been writing at LA Now this past year. "I'm not sure what it means when the breaking-news blogger is laid off at a time when Blogging Will Be The Paper's One And Only Salvation. Hrmph," snapped one commenter.......

Sad news today for the local rock music reporting scene. Early last night, Kevin Bronson from the LA Times sent out an e-mail titled "Yeah, it's true." The body of the e-mail broke the news. "I'm history. My last day at the Times is Friday." He then linked to Kevin Roderick's post about the massive amounts of layoffs at the paper. Bronson was a huge asset to the Times and had a wonderful blog called......

If you're part of some drama and TMZ is around, it doesn't matter if you're a celebrity or not. You're going to be online and in-house publicists are going to e-mail every blog in town about it. Last night outside of STK, the swanky La Cienega Blvd. restaurant, a girl was hit by an SUV that sped off after. The victim's boyfriend chased down the SUV and confronted the girl until police and paramedics arrived.......

In another round of job cuts for the LA Times, the paper announced today the planned sacking of 250 jobs across the company which includes 150 editorial ones. The paper will also reduce the number pages it prints by 15%. This is due to a declining revenue, some which is blamed on the internet (which is also a blessing, depending on how you look at it). "You all know the paradox we find ourselves in,"......

LA Observed's Kevin Roderick gave blogging some major props in his weekly KCRW report, citing three big names in the local blogosphere who are part of the changing face of mainstream media: the Times' Patrick Goldstein, Patterico’s Pontifications' Patrick Frey, and Witness LA.com's Alan Mittelstaedt. He ends with this thought that hits right at home here: "Blogs, the better ones, are changing the media scene in Los Angeles -- like everywhere. Even with the occasional......

This upcoming weekend is probably the biggest weekend the LA Derby Dolls have had so far. In a first tournament of its kind, the best skaters from Los Angeles, San Diego and Orange County are having it out on a banked track. Not only will there be tons of games throughout Saturday and Sunday, there will be bands, food, beer and general awesomeness. What the Derby Dolls do is very special and unique to Los......

Nic Adler (left), Mario Maglieri, and Lou Adler at the House of Blues. The elder Adler was honored along with fellow Sunset Strip icons Maglieri and Elmer Valentine on the eve of the 1st Sunset Strip Music Festival. | Photo via The Roxy. Nic Adler grew up at The Roxy. His father, Lou Adler, opened the club the year Nic was born. He would spend his afternoons after school at the club and grew......

The Austin Powers actor who played Mini-Me is suing TMZ over a video they posted showing clips from a private sex video between he and his girlfriend. Also named in the lawsuit is Kevin Blatt, who is known for distributing the infamous Paris Hilton video, and SugarDVD, the company that has offered Blatt $100,000 to distribute the video even further. A representative from TMZ declined comment to LAist.......

The LA Times lightly digs up the dirt on the digger himself: Blogging was so easy, he took it up as a hobby Launched in 2004, the original PerezHilton.com was called PageSixSixSix.com, but the real Page Six people -- the New York Post -- sued him. The website's "name reflects his Cuban roots and 'the wacky world of celebrities.'" Paris Hilton loves the name. Per day: 40 posts, 7 million pageviews, $54,000 for one day......

This guy's happy about something, maybe it's the Webbys | Photo by soundfromwayout via Flickr Webby Award Winners (basically the online Oscars) were announced today. A handful of locally based sites were nominated last month, but only a few made the grade. Congrats to all! Here are the winners: The Huffington Post walked away with both The People's Voice and official Webby Award. The Los Angeles Film School won the Webby Award for Best......

Photo by Zach Behrens/LAist Over at the Los Angeles Police Department's blog, Lieutenant Rick Banks as been assigned as the "Officer in Charge," and in his introduction post, he touts the success of the web tool and how it has been valuable for the department. But he goes on with a warning to those anonymous finger pointers. "The blog allows you to have a good amount of influence and more with complete anonymity..." Unfortunately,......

One hour ago, Eric Richardson of blogdowntown used Twitter, a microblogging text based social network, to tell his readers a fact about streetcar construction while on the streets of Portland. "Portland streetcar track construction went at one block per week, with construction only taking one lane and not the sidewalk," he said while on a Los Angeles delegation to the Pacific Northwest to study the public transit mode. Earlier, he tweeted from the airport, then......

Back in March, LAist contributor Julie Wolfson interviewed Design*Sponge's Grace Bonney. Among the questions was... Soon you will be in LA for the first time. What are you looking forward to doing while you are here? Oh man, first of all I'm looking to get out of cold, grey Brooklyn and get into the sun. But mostly I'm just looking to soak up a new city, new culture and take in as much as possible.......

Photo Megan Geckler's art by susan catherine via LAist Featured Photos This is a purposefully backdated post for a National Arts Marketing Project (NAMP) workshop called "The New Frontier Part Two: Blogging, Social Networking and YouTube!" organized by the LA Stage Alliance with guest speakers D. Jean Hester and LAist Editor, Zach Behrens. The following are notes and reference links for workshop participants. BLOGS - Video: Blogs in Plain English - General Blogs: boingboing,......

From everyone at LAist and in front of Grauman's Chinese Theatre, congrats! | Photo by discarted via LAist Featured Photos on Flickr While the Pulitzer Prize announcements yesterday gave nothing to the LA Times and as the LA Weekly noted, this year marked the first time since 2006 that the Weekly didn't win a Pulitzer, effectively ending their current streak (at one), the Webby Awards were announced today and with locals nominated. Epic-Fu --......

You may have seen this ad-mural go up at Melrose & Fairfax. It's part of clothing company 55DSL's viral-ad-whatever-the-fuck-it-is campaign to get people applying for a new job opportunity. The job: travel around the world in 55DSL clothes, or, as they say, "roam the earth and find all that is good and pure and kick ass." The application: a video application 1:55 seconds long. But if you plan on staying on planet Los Angeles......

A very Zen moment: "I bet he is thinking, 'where did I park my car?'" | Photo by hinducow via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr Rest in Peace, Mister Egg McMuffin inventor! Now you will not live to see the day when McDonald's food is made up entirely of plastic and high fructose corn syrup. So apparently Mexicans hate emo kids so much that they are now rioting. Somebody please remind Death......

So what DOES Rick Astley think of his accidental role as star of the viral Internet prank that keeps on never giving up? Despite rumors of a possible Super Bowl halftime appearance and the pining of journalists and geeks around the world, the Rick behind the Rickroll has remained mum. Or perhaps nobody bothered to call his management. But in a breakout week for the Rickroll that included a nod from the Gray Lady, David......

Photo of the Vincent Thomas Bridge by Jonathan Alcom (Sundogg) via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr We've been covering the city's police force a lot lately -- and before you think those officers just sit around eating donuts all day, you should definitely check out the LA Times guide to the Best Eats on the Beats. (Think Mexican food.) In more fun food news, EaterLA gives us the breakdown of Los Angeles......