In the 85 years that the Los Angeles County Fire Department has been around, no woman has ever been promoted to the rank of deputy chief. Today that changes when Helen Jo will be officially promoted to chief of the department's Financial Management Division, according to the Long Beach Press-Telegram. She will manage the department's fire fleet services, materials management and construction and maintenance divisions, which is considered the three busiest in the department.......

Councilman Eric Garcetti once explained to a group of people that traffic is a sign, a good sign. A sign of a strong economy. If there was no economy, people wouldn't be traveling to their jobs, thus causing traffic. Today in the print edition (and in the blog yesterday), LA Times' Road Sage, Steve Hymon, backs that theory up. He shows two different maps: one of population density and another of job density. "The maps......

According to an independent market-research firm, AIMRCo (Adult Internet Market Research Company), the porn industry, specifically online properties providing adult content and erotic material are experiencing some swollen numbers in recent weeks thanks to the checks of up to $600 for individuals and $1,200 for married couples that the Bush Administration’s Economic Stimulus Plan handed out this spring. In a press release issued today by the firm that “specializes in gathering, interpreting and distributing data......

A job listing popped on Craigslist yesterday that might be music to the right web and graphics dork's ears. It seems Nine Inch Nails is on the prowl for "an internet-savvy web and graphics assistant who will work with an art director on a wide variety of tasks relating to web development, graphic design, video editing/production, and online marketing." The basic blabbity-blah-blah expected know-hows follows (CSS, HTML, Flash, Javascript, et. al) along with design chops......

Jobing.com: Employment for Bad Spellers | Photo by Andy Sternberg for LAist This billboard has been bugging me for months and it's all over LA. WTF is "Jobing?!?" Surely it's more than just a website designed to capitalize on typos of the unemployed. But what is this Jobing Community of Greater Los Angeles all about anyway? Is it community in the Eco-Village sense? Is there a secret society that worships the prophet Job? Do......

A report of how workers feel about the job market indicates that we Californian "workers are becoming increasingly less confident in the job market, economy and in their personal employment situation." The California Employee Confidence Index, released on Friday, has our state-wide points at 50.3, which is both a 2.5 drop, and "the lowest level seen in the history of the survey"--a dubious distinction at best. Some of the downright depressing statistics garnered from the......

OOOwww! Good evening Los Angeles! Wooo! How you all fee-ull? People. You know! I don't believe the LA Forum has a chimney... so if y'all want Santa Claus to come pay us a visit you're gonna need to raise the roof off this mother!! And I think if all twenty thousand of you flick your lighters in time with the beat we can turn this place into the biggest Christmas tree in the world!......

There are a lot of people out of work right now. A lot of people who are looking for odd jobs. Not all of them are obligated to walk in picket lines twelve hours a week, or are the object of scorn and derision by other people who are out of jobs. Here are some tips to survive, with your soul intact (provided you still have it!)...

Nine are dead in Omaha, Nebraska today after a man opened fire in a shopping mall, and then shot himself. Police do not have a motive so far. Did you have this conversation this morning? "Sorry, boss, I can't come in to work today...a terrible cough, I, uh, flu symptoms, definitely -- what waves? Uh, I don't know what you're talking about...." Lots of SoCal surfers took a sick day and busted out on......

Stuck in the muck of collegiate winter fun (and by fun I mean endless hours of non-comprehension of Middle Eastern languages and religious legal texts, staring and pretending to read as your eyes begin to learn to work under the constant rain of exhaustion), I, in my perpetual procrastination mode, rummaged through my emails to find the title "The Wolf of Wall Street" leap out at me. Needless to say, I was as ecstatic......

It is estimated that 200 firms, 6000 workers and 1200 actors produce 4000-7000 adult films a year in Los Angeles. Yes, there are more porn-related, adult industry jobs than software jobs in this town. With $4.3 billion in sales and rentals (which is still nothing compared to the $12 Billion made from toys and books), the Adult Entertainment Industry puts $4 billion in revenue back into the local economy. “It’s in an industry producing......

We heart our sister -Ists: today, SFist Editor Bock Keeling was profiled in the SF Weekly. We find out that Gus Van Sant hates SFist and a funny picture of a woman modeling in front of an oil spill crew is now being featured on the site. Pro football player Sean Taylor has died from injuries sustained in a mysterious and tragic shooting incident; he was 24 years old. Police are still searching for......

Read our exclusive LAist interview with G4TV's Olivia Munn to find out how she feels about playing Gay Chicken with Kevin Pereira, living in Los Angeles, and making out with her spray-tan lady...

Dear WGA: Being Thanksgiving weekend and all, I have spent a lot of time the last few days thinking about what I am thankful for. I am very thankful that I have been able to make a living as a writer. I am thankful that every day I am able to do something creative, something I love. As I’ve walked the picket lines, I’ve been very thankful for the overwhelming support I’ve felt from......

In the world we live in now, Pixar is nothing less than an institution. Every film it releases is an event and each of them receive excellent reviews and make piles of money. Of course, Pixar wasn't always so admired and ubiquitous. It was once a money-losing division of LucasFilm that was sold off to Steve Jobs for a paltry 5 million dollars. All of this is laid out in a behind-the-scenes feature on......

The man responsible for killing a woman and her two young children in a street-racing accident last month has been tracked down and arrested in Mexico; Martin Marones is expected to be charged with three counts of murder. So many questions! Has "Heroes: Origins" been shelved? Or just "postponed" due to the writers strikes? Will we ever find out who's been offing the group of twelve? And what's up with this ADAM guy??? Two......

From the Front Lines I bring you "Day One of the Strike." The mood is very light and almost jovial; this shift has only been out here three hours. I think that is going to change fast. They caused a lot of rubber necking traffic but no real problems. They did get a lot of attention. There was lots of food to go around, and an official station for people to check in. It's a......

Utilizing his iPhone the way Steve Jobs hoped he would, LAist contributer Brad Herman took these pictures of the WGA writers strike from what appears to be out front of the Fox studios in West LA. Here we are now almost all the way through Day One of the strike and there doesn't seem to be any acts of violence or retribution, nor have any souls of teenagers found their way into their middle......

The first time I was in Compton, I didn't even know it until later when I was at a restaurant looking at the menu and noticed the address. It appeared the world's stereotype was wrong, maybe gone or I just happened to be in the "right" part of town. "Compton is beautiful, there are horse ranches there," a co-worker who grew up there told me at a previous job a few years before my......

Yesterday, another LAister, Jessica Pauline asked about Hollywood shortcuts. A few people gave suggestions, such as the now "not-so-much-a-secret" Fountain but other commentors plain old said, "I'm not giving up my secrets to you greenie." I was reading over the comment and got to thinking... In a town like Los Angeles, a good short cut is like a good dive bar. You don't want the hipsters to take over your secrets and blast them......

Orlando Bloom will not be prosecuted after an October 12th incident in which he injured his two passengers in a car crash involving parked cars. He said he was avoiding a photographer who suddenly changed lanes. Seeing these paparazzi in action, we suspect it was them who caused the crash, most likely on purpose for some higher dollar photo sales. Starting from last week today, the San Jose Mercury News has a great timeline......

Comedian Jen Kirkman doesn't think humanity could handle world peace. After all, there's people who can't even handle raising kids and keeping track of whether they live on a flat or round planet. And the fact that those people are on TV while a comedian capable of telling stories as hilarious, unique, and honest as Jen's is not is plain wrong. Sure, Jen's been on VH1's Acceptable TV, Comedy Central's Premium Blend, and provided......

Nearly 500 Teamsters tired of not being able to work for the weekend - because they have to work on some weekends - went on strike early this morning affecting Long Beach, Compton, and Sun Valley. About a quarter million people will be touched by the strike that is based around two major issues, long hours and respect. [Waste Management] said the [Teamsters] contract expired in September and that its latest offer included a......

"Revelation satisfies all doubts, explains all mysteries except her own, and so illuminates the path of life, that fools discover it and stray no more." - William Cowper Sometimes I wonder how it happened. I try to think about how I used to be on the other side, a Cult of Mac hater...a Steve Jobs-despising PC fanboy. But now every time I boot up my Macbook Pro I think about how stupid I am......

View Larger Map They are on trial, facing possible felony charges if convicted, for unauthorized access to city's computer system in order to make traffic even worse at four busy intersections last year August. Who are they? Meet Gabriel Murillo and Kartik Patel, both in their 30s and both high level Department of Transportation transportation engineers with the Automated Traffic Surveillance Center.Prosecutors said the men changed computer codes preventing transportation managers from reprogramming and reactivating......

A few months ago I came home from work to find one of my roommates sitting on the couch with a glass of wine in hand. From the time I first met this friend, one thing was very clear: he loved wine. In fact, he had a very special relationship with one brand in particular, Charles Shaw. Good ole' Two Buck Chuck was a loyal friend to my roommate all through college. Chuck had......

Within the first 10 pages of Brandon Christopher's Dirty Little Altar Boy, a black-rubber dildo makes an appearance, a church's Eucharist wafers get stolen, and young Brandon reveals that he has to wear two pairs of underwear to deal with the anxieties of sixth grade. That's when you start to realize that you're not reading the standard collection of childhood reflections, but are perusing the memories of a great storyteller, one with the ability to......

Fuck Bill Plaschke. Fuck TJ Simers. Fuck the LA Times. Fuck Grady Little. Fuck Ned Colletti. Fuck Frank McCourt. Fuck Jeff Kent. Fuck the Dodgers. When I read Plaschke’s column Wednesday morning that basically put Matt Kemp in the hangman’s noose, my blood started to boil. How does he have the unmitigated gall to scapegoat Kemp and let the veterans have a free pass just because they have “experience”? This entire mess became public......

Since Wednesday’s White Stripes show at the Forum was cancelled, those of us with tickets were forced to find something else to do. Some probably went to other concerts, maybe some drank their sorrows away. I went the more obvious route – I went to Babeland to learn how to blow a banana. Babeland is the very woman-friendly sex store on Melrose and La Brea. They’ve been open for nearly two years here in L.A.,......

Just got an e-mail from NYTimes.com confirming the end of the two-year-old TimesSelect subscription experiment. Our friends in New York are thrilled about this and so are we. All the content fit to publish should be freely available. The e-mail isn't exactly a Steve Jobs-esque love letter, leaving us to wonder whether or not there will be rebates for those who recently plunked down $50 for the right to indulge in the opinions of Maureen......