Weekly archive
December 31 - January 6, 2007
Saturday, Jan. 6
Jacob Soboroff has video up now with Times employees celebrating their success at bringing a union into the paper's downtown and Orange County pressrooms....
My favorite posts, or just the newsiest, from the first week of 2007. The lost Hollywood tape of Dr. Martin Luther King. Jim Lampley and El Cucuy get arrested, but...
General Otis (and Otis Chandler) must be rolling in their graves. For the first time in a long while, workers at the Los Angeles Times have voted to affiliate with...
Slate's Jack Shafer identifies the Los Angeles Times newsroom stars he says are vulnerable to poaching by other media outlets if the Tribune-induced fear and loathing doesn't settle down soon....
What a story. Two high-ranking city traffic engineers, Gabriel Murillo and Kartik Patel, were charged Friday with breaking into the city's automated traffic system and disabling the lights at four...
The newly re-designed and re-conceived Wall Street Journal got a thoughtful review from Mark Lacter on Wednesday at LA Biz Observed. Today it's Tim Rutten's turn in the Times. He...
Friday, Jan. 5
Anthony Pellicano can represent himself at his racketeering and wiretapping trial, a federal judge rules. Better than paying a lawyer, the PI figures. CBS2Ed Boks' official city blog has gotten...
If you live in Los Angeles and don't want to chop up your Christmas tree so it fits in the green trash barrel — or abandon it on the sidewalk...
Remember when South Bay bagel shop owner Lynn Diane Olson shocked the legal establishment by getting elected last June to the Superior Court? Although rated not qualified by the county...
Not everyone gets or appreciates Gustavo Arellano's satirical and increasingly popular ˇAsk a Mexican! column in OC Weekly. Now reading it can be dangerous to a person's livelihood, at least...
Climatologists say the odds are that this year will be the hottest on record, based on a resurgent El Nińo in the Pacific and global warming. Considering that a new...
Noted, since it hasn't been included in the mentions here of Jim Lampley's arrest: "I am innocent of the charge of domestic abuse that has been leveled against me and...
Examining a plan to inject the city's daily mountain of sludge into the ground under Terminal Island, CityWatch's Marc Haefele revisits past schemes to dispose of the treated (but still...
I won't repeat my rantlet (and here) about casual abuse of the word 'gridlock' by local media and pols. Just check out this photo of the real thing from Xiamen,...
Mayor Villaraigosa picks up another tribute from People en espańol, a strange phone call to Channel 2 about Jim Lampley's arrest, Pellicano's day in court and a flock of other...
Thursday, Jan. 4
Posters at Chowhound L.A. only voted 94 times, so consider the very small sample of Los Angeles foodies. But among those who cast ballots, Providence topped the Ultimate Los Angeles...
Now this is cool. The Jewish Journal has turned up and posted on its website an audio recording of the Rev. Martin Luther King giving a sermon on Feb. 26,...
Michael Goodwin was convicted of murdering his former business partner, Mickey Thompson, and the racing legend's wife in 1988. Prosecutors will not seek the death penalty. CBS2 Alleged details...
Not good, blogs Colleen Cuisine. She didn't go in looking for a gourmet experience but "just hearty good food:" After shuttering its doors for remodeling nearly two years ago, Du-par's...
Symbolic little twist to the news that Home Depot's departing CEO Robert Nardelli leaves with an exit package worth $210 million. In an ad on page A11 of today's Times,...
By last night's web stats run, more than 2,200 visitors had found their way to LA Observed by searching on Google for Stephanie Edwards. That's in just the first three...
The difference between the news side of the L.A. Times and the newly and earnestly irreverent opinion side was on display in the handling of this photo from the Gerald...
There's a full helping of media items after the jump today, leading with the arrests of El Cucuy and Jim Lampley, the dropping of Jamie White's morning radio show, and...
There was yesterday's piece in the Christian Science Monitor (which prompted some email), now outgoing chief administrative officer David Janssen says Los Angeles County needs a powerful executive to make...
The Times' Pressmens Club blog has photos up of all the anti-union banners and placards placed around the Olympic plant (and presumably in Costa Mesa too) in preparation for today's...
Wednesday, Jan. 3
Ax falls at Channel 2/9: veteran reporter Paul Dandridge has been taken off the bio page, though his blog remains — last updated in August. Newsroom sources say that Inland...
All that bravado about making the party scene on crutches is so last week. Gov. Schwarzenegger's office just announced that his broken femur will keep him away from tomorrow's inauguration...
Meant to re-post this oldie but goodie from 2004 for New Year's. On Dec. 31, 1897, a cameraman for Thomas Edison shot movie footage of the street scene in the...
Workers in the L.A Times press room on Olympic Boulevard downtown begin voting tomorrow whether to bring in a union. The paper, of course, has long been anti-union within its...
A study at Central Connecticut State University ranks the most literate cities in the U.S. based on "newspaper circulation, number of bookstores, library resources, periodical publishing resources, educational attainment, and...
Eat the Press analyzes how Technorati's somewhat-incestuous Top 100 (which measures not readers or popularity, just inbound links from other blogs) looks different now than it did a year ago....
Twenty gray whales have been spotted traveling south across Santa Monica Bay this week, one has been poking its head up at the Redondo Beach pier, and "Immense pods of Common Dolphins are also being spotted offshore, feeding on the abundant bait fish (probably anchovies)."
Arts blogger Tyler Green lives on the East Coast but covers Los Angeles like a glove — all but one of his ten favorite shows of the year were here,...
Today's Christian Science Monitor takes up the question of whether Los Angeles County should have its own elected executive. Reporter Daniel Wood takes off from Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky's remarks at...
City news junkies will soon start hearing more about the "912 Commission." More formally called the Neighborhood Council Review Commission, it is required by the City Charter revamp that created...
Tucked away neatly after the jump are items on the Getty's threatened Aphrodite statue, Chief Bratton's future with the LAPD, scant details on Lydia Kennard's departure as airports chief and...
Tuesday, Jan. 2
→ Los Angeles magazine's January Restaurant Awards issue proclaims Hatfield's the best new place in town, Bottle Rock the best new wine bar, Square One the standout breakfast spot, Swinging...
Last-chance talks between Dutton's management and the city of Beverly Hills failed to stave off the Dec. 31 closure of the Canon Drive bookstore. The doors did not reopen today...
We urged City Hall reporters to make the calls last week. Nobody got a story out of it, and now the news breaks on its own: Lydia Kennard is stepping...
Judith Regan's upcoming fight for her honor with Rupert Murdoch's empire inspires the NYT's Sharon Waxman to muse on Hollywood court battles of yore: think Bette Davis meets Joan Crawford...
Laura Mecoy looked at the Sacramento Bee's offer of recall to the home office and decided it wasn't for her. Instead, the paper's soon-to-be-ex Los Angeles correspondent takes a page...
Time magazine credits convicted Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff with one of the quotes of the year: "God sent me 1,000 hints that he didn't want me to keep doing what...
An unsigned editorial in the Columbia Journalism Review calls on Chicago's Tribune company not just to sell off the Los Angeles Times, but to quit the newspaper business entirely. After...
In his Times column today, Joel Stein drums up web traffic and blogosphere chatter by throwing down with his readers. Don't email him, Stein writes, because he doesn't care what...
Karen Grigsby Bates, who interviewed me last year for NPR's "Day to Day," gets the Q-and-A treatment from Kate Coe at Mediabistro.com. Bates is an L.A. correspondent for the show...
Federal courts and post offices are closed for the national day of mourning for former President Gerald Ford. County and city offices and public transit in Los Angeles are keeping...
Right blogger Patterico's fourth annual review of a year in the life of the Los Angeles Times is up. It has become kind of a yearly event for the conservative...
One last look at the year just past, through the lens of the subjects and posts that LA Observed readers devoured, forwarded and talked about the most. In order, from...
Monday, Jan. 1
KTLA's own viewer forum filled up today with more comments about the Rose Parade broadcast than on any other topic in months. Most are strongly pro-Stephanie Edwards and vent at...
Before we get to the Most Clicked On stories of 2006, here are some personal favorites that don't fit anywhere else. Most interesting car wreck in years: Take an Enzo...
You can't make this stuff up. Some gems from the archive: Antonio and the schools: Mayor Villaraigosa began the year talking tough about taking over LAUSD, compromised in the Legislature...
Here are some of the top local media items from LA Observed that won't quite make the Most Clicked On list for 2006: Mel Gibson: TMZ got the scoop on...
Sunday, Dec. 31
Did the Los Angeles Times have a tough year or what? Lots of unhappy departures, speculations about a dark future and criticism aimed at the paper. There also was much...
Some of the Los Angeles-area institutions, famous and not, that didn't make it though the year — as covered by LA Observed. Ambassador Hotel Tower Records Rhino Records Dutton's North...
