Cityfeeds.com - San Francisco

Bomb Squad Finds Mortar In Golden Gate Park Cole Valley

Fri, 04 Jul 2008 02:40:59 GMT

SFist sources tell us that the bomb squad has been called to ~~Golden Gate Park at JFK and 30th Avenue~~ Carl Street in Cole Valley at around 6 p.m. Now, which one of you accidentally left your pack back in the park? But seriously, folks, we're not sure what the entire story is yet, or if there even is one, but we'll update when we know more. Stay tuned.

Update 6:56 p.m.: Well, we're not sure what's going on exactly. Some people on NJudahChron are saying they heard it was a shooting, that's a "man cleaning out his garage found an old WWII mortar shell" (another one? Jesus fucking Christ, old men. Seriously. Get rid of that shit, will ya? Or call someone who can take care of it for you), or...who knows.

Update: 7 p.m.: Ah, the real news knows what's up. According to KGO, "Residents have said they have heard that a mortar shell was discovered inside an apartment, but this has not been confirmed by San Francisco police. Officials have rolled out a remote-controlled bomb robot." No confirmation? Then by all means, readers, go ahead and make wild assumptions until we know for sure! (But, please, stay out of the Carl Street/Cole Valley area for now.)

Update: 7:03: Jim Herd, who told us about the bomb squad, snapped up this shot of it all going down. (Really, Herd is a San Francisco treasure. He's everywhere all at once.) Also, yeah, it was a mortor. Jim tells us "they picked up the mortar at 200 Cole and then went on a caravan." What a way to kick off the 4th, eh? Eh? Eh?

Olds take back Valleywag [The Olds]

Fri, 04 Jul 2008 00:00:00 GMT

Now that Valleywag's Straighty McStraights are out of the closet, it's time to stand up for another oppressed demographic: The Valley's middle-agers. No, not the professionally groomed gray-haired...

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Debian death threats? Come on, send us the emails [Harassment]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 23:40:00 GMT

"I was *shocked* to hear that one of our community has been the target of death threats as a thank you for her work," wrote Debian project leader Steve McIntyre, near the bottom of a long message...

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Blogging Old Media KILLS! [Clay Felker]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 23:20:00 GMT

Forty years before Valleywag, a middle-aged man named Clay Felker took over a newspaper supplement and turned it into New York magazine, deliberately breaking the rules in order to bring back readers...

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Forget One Night Of Fireworks, We Like Twinkling Lights Year Round

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 23:00:00 GMT

While we might be a bit underwhelmed by the “luxury/chic/designer remodel” of the kitchen, we’re most definitely not underwhelmed by the terrace and views. Have a safe fourth of July. ∙ Listing: 10 Miller Place #901 (2/2) [MLS]...

Yahoo rents surf simulator for summer party [Caption Contest]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 23:00:00 GMT

A faux-surfer bails on a compress-air wave at the summer party held on Yahoo's Sunnyvale campus yesterday. Have a better caption? The best one will become the new headline. Yesterday's winner:...

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Americans resign themselves to crappy Internet connections [Telcos]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 22:40:00 GMT

If the latest study from Pew is any indication, most Americans have resigned themselves to what passes for broadband in the United States. 72 percent of cable and 62 percent of DSL subscribers are...

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Q: Does Texas law now require PC repair techs to get a private investigator's license? A: Sometimes [Overreactards]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 22:20:00 GMT

Internet libertarians and Texas-haters are eagerly piling on a new Texas law that they claim requires all PC repair techs to obtain a private investigator's license. Infurating? Yes. True? Not...

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Another Round Of Virtual Applause: SoMa’s Emerging Midtown Panel

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 22:15:00 GMT

Another round of virtual applause for our plugged-in panelists last week who were willing to share their thoughts - and the scoop when you cornered them - on SoMa’s emerging Midtown. From left to right above: ∙ Nina Gruen,...

SFist Tonight

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 22:08:48 GMT

FILM: Cult classic B-movie Little Shop of Horrors, a tale about bloodthirsty foliage, received the Broadway treatment in the '80s with a zany showtune-laced remake. A few years the musical got the Hollywood treatment. Broadway kept the gloomy ending in tact; Hollywood cut it out. But who cares. The 1986 version of LSH, screening tonight in the Castro, stands on its own with fun performances by Steve Martin, as a sadistic dentist, and Eileen Green, playing a domestic violence victim with a heart of gold. (Part of the 70MM Film Festival.)

7 p.m. & 9 p.m. // Castro Theatre (Castro & Market Sts.) // $9.50

PERFORMANCE: Although they claim not to have started the fire, tonight's performance art piece thingy, GenXishly titled "Baby Boomers Fucked Everything," question's Billy Joel's stance on the Greatest Generation via "an abstract light show and sound excursion." According to the press info, Steven L. Anderson, Karl Erickson, and Robby Herbst, three Los Angeles based artist, will put on a psychedelic light show that will take you on an "epic journey of sight and sound exploring the war’s effect on the American psyche to mark Independence Day and the closing of Hopeless and Otherwise." Bring your boot flasks.

10 p.m. // Southern Exposure (417 - 14th Street) // free

CLUB: Help build a children's village for kids orphaned by AIDS in South Africa by getting smashed and, ahem, waiting in line for the bathroom at this swank SOMA joint. NextAid is having a benefit/party there this evening, featuring DJs Solar, Late Night Sneaky, Alland Byallo, Monty Luke, Laird, J. Phlip, and Amber.

9 p.m. // Supperclub (657 Harrison) // $15-20

Will Ferrell promotes latest movie online with least funny clip ever [Startups]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 22:00:00 GMT

Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly made an appearance at IBeatYou, the online video competition site founded by basketball star Baron Davis and Jessica Alba baby daddy Cash Warren, to promote the comedy...

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Google retrenches in Dallas and Denver [Googleplex]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 21:40:00 GMT

This is not how the Google's story supposed to go: Google is closing offices in Dallas and Denver. The locations may well be duplicative — a Google Maps search shows three Dallas-area offices...

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EMI sues Hi5 and VideoEgg for listening to EMI [Copyfight]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 21:20:00 GMT

Record label EMI may have tired of suing individual file sharers for copyright infringement. But a number of music-industry plaintiffs, all partners and subsidiaries of EMI, are suing social network...

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Boing Boing's unapologetic eleventh-hour apologia [100-word Version]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 21:00:00 GMT

Boing Boing's readers, hopped up on free-speech rhetoric, continue to find the tech-culture blog's act of unpublishing unspeakable. Hoping to put the Internet's most enduring drama llama this month...

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Happy Day Before Fourth of July!

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 20:56:46 GMT

Ah, an oldie but goodie. Oh, and remember to have a safe and sane Independence Day, folks. Ka-blam! (Follow the jump for more scenes of explosions gone awry.)

Breaking News: FTM Guy Gives Birth

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 20:46:54 GMT

Thomas Beatie, the with-child transgender male who stole the nation's heart on Oprah with his good looks and big baby beer gut, gave birth to a baby girl on Sunday. We repeat, the pregnant dude gave birth! That is all.

The real secret of Steve Jobs's success [Apple]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 20:40:00 GMT

Everyone likes to talk up Apple's innovative design. It's a much more attractive story than the real reason why Apple has come to dominate first the MP3 player market, and soon, the smartphone...

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IBM's new antitrust muddle [Politics]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 20:20:00 GMT

European regulators are looking into whether IBM is unfairly dominating the mainframe market. What, is this 1968? IBM's purchase of Platform Solutions, a 36-person rival which made cheaper versions...

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Dell and Sony discover gold in the old [Feature]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 20:00:00 GMT

A relentless neophilia is Silicon Valley's signature characteristic. One must have a new iPhone, a new Twitter, a new electric car. You're either in beta or in the grave. That's why I'm intrigued by...

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Good help is so hard to find [Startups]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:40:00 GMT

Valleywag editor Jackson West posing as her personal shopper, is looking for someone to serve as shrink, chef, personal assistant, filling-station attendant, agent, booker, and cheerleader. In other...

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I Can Has Cheezburger CEO allergic to cats [Catenfreude]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:20:00 GMT

newVideoPlayer("/canhasallergies.flv", 506, 423,""); Consider this: Ben Huh runs a site that takes submissions of stupid cat pictures with pidgin English captions written across them. That site, I...

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Text the Police!!!

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:14:18 GMT

In lieu of calling 911 or you local police station when you need to report a crime anonymously, now you can do so via text messaging. And it's too easy! At least according this article in today's Examiner it is. A brilliant idea, right?

All you have to do is this: Text "TIP584 [insert dramatic tale of criminal wrongdoing]," and then send it to 274637 -- or CRIMES. After that, you'll receive a response "within 5 to 10 seconds" giving a code number. Text that code number, and then you can "conduct a two-way dialogue with law enforcement totally anonymously.”

But the texts don't go directly to the police. While the Examiner says that "Bay Area law enforcement officials are urging residents to instead help collar criminals through text messages," your tips first go to Crime Stoppers, the nonprofit that offers cash rewards to anonymous tipsters. Which? Seems strange. Why do even need Crime Stoppers? Why can't the messages go directly to the cops? What are the police for, then? Are Crime Stoppers saying they can do a better job? And if the Ex reporter is correct, and law enforcement folks advocate using Crime Stoppers instead of the police, has law enforcement just given up? Strange.

Anyway, the service will allegedly double the volume of tips. A huge public-information campaign is expected to launch in a couple of months, but you can usethe system today.

Yes, there's sex online after 50 [Sex Trade]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:00:00 GMT

The 50-and-up set form one of the fastest growing demographics of those looking for love online. That nugget of hope, care of Match.com CEO Jim Safka, comes tucked into Newsweek's Sex & the Single...

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Now we can breathe: Sarah Lacy has found a personal assistant [We Read Twitter So You Don't Have To]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 18:40:00 GMT

So you know how in Sex and the City: The Movie, Carrie Bradshaw interviews, like, a bazillion young women trying to find a personal assistant before finally deciding on the sassy, "urban," but safe...

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Photo du Jour 162

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 18:31:24 GMT

One-person protest captured by Flickr user volcanojw outside the American Geophysical Union's annual conference. You tell 'em!

Is Barack Obama's online campaigning truly interactive, or just an ATM? [Politics]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 18:20:00 GMT

While political pundits gasp with awe at the amount of money Barack Obama has been able to raise online, the leftist wonks at Alternet are ringing the alarm bell over the candidate's support of the...

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Dumpster Muffin Down

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 18:14:18 GMT

After nine months of living in the UC Berkeley oak groves, Dumpster Muffin (AKA Amanda Tierney) finally climbed down yesterday. Alas. The 21-year-old activist, according to ABC 7, was "having troubles standing up," which prompted her surrender. She was then arrested by UC Police for trespassing the moment she touched ground. But! The battle isn't over. Three tree sitters still remain up high for at least another "two weeks, when Cal's lawyers go to court again."

It’s all fun and games until someone starts a wildfire [Valleywag Calendar]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 18:00:00 GMT

Tonight comedian and Phd Tim Lee’s will be performing his PowerPoint comedy routine, “Off the Charts” at the San Jose IMPROV. It’s like watching a YouTube video only live and you can laugh out loud...

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A Killer Spam Tale: Farm Sluts (2003)

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 17:46:37 GMT

guest post by mikl-em This is part of an occasional series I’ll be doing of internet-related comedy, highlighting some great perhaps under-appreciated comedy that originated on or deals with the internet tubes. Before Chris Parnell hit everyone’s computer screens with Lazy Sunday he starred in this short 17 minute film about a man whose life is undone [...]

Bernal, Bright And Even A Few Built-Ins For Under $500 A Square Foot

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 17:45:00 GMT

It’s in Bernal, bright, and even offers a few built-ins for under $500 per square foot. But it's currently only one and one-half baths and there is no parking - at least not that’s not leased (note pet peeve)....

The Yahoo board members we'd most like to see fired [Yahoo Raid]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 17:40:00 GMT

Corporate greenmailer Carl Icahn, some old dude who was stupid enough to buy a lot of shares of Yahoo on the premise that Microsoft would buy the company after it said it wouldn't, wants four seats...

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Featuring birds -- the sequel

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 17:30:36 GMT

A few weeks ago, we blogged about the preponderance of avian imagery in local fashion . Turns out stores and restaurants have the fever, too. Check out the logo for white-hot cocktails and pizza...

Google Street View goes to Paris -- vive la France! [Google]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 17:20:00 GMT

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.Google has expanded its Street View feature, which shows roadside photos taken from vehicles driven by underpaid workers, to include...

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Bay Area Launches Water Saving Hero Campaign

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 17:16:22 GMT

Residents living in EBMUD zone -- East Bay water district -- are under mandatory water rationing. The same restrictions don't yet hold true in the rest of the Bay Area....

Another Morning Muni Mess

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 17:12:57 GMT

The kinds folks over at WhatImSeeing sent us this harrowing image of another Muni meltdown, which happened this morning. Trains were backed up from Embarcadero to Townsend. Possible "police activity at Civic Center" might be to blame. Stay tuned.

Insidious exodus dynamic grips Yahoo [Exits]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 17:00:00 GMT

When Yahoo cofounder Jerry Yang became CEO last year, BusinessWeek found a senior executive to anonymously sing his praises. "I was so wrong," that source now tells the magazine. "This thing can be...

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Wikimedia Foundation botches budget [The Sum Of All Human Knowledge]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 16:40:00 GMT

There are lies, damn lies, and budgets. Wikipedia users donate money to the Wikimedia Foundation under the ruse that most of the cash goes to buy and run servers. Ha! As Danny Wool, a former...

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Tax rebates stimulate economy, genitals [Porn]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 16:20:00 GMT

Know those $600 stimulus checks George Bush & Co. sent out to the poors, the underfunded and executive assistants earlier this year in order to rejuvenate the economy? Independent market-research...

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When 520 Lives Like 800 (And Bonus Points For Use Of “Trendyloin”)

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 16:10:00 GMT

We’ve always had a thing for the Art Deco Hamilton building at 631 O’Farrell (one of the first hotel/apartment to condo conversion buildings in San Francisco). And we’re particularly fond of units that let 520 square feet live as large...

Pay For 520, But Live Like 800 (With Bonus Points For “Trendyloin”)

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 16:10:00 GMT

We’ve always had a thing for the Art Deco Hamilton building (one of the first hotel/apartment to condo conversion buildings in San Francisco). And we’re particularly fond of the units which enable 520 square feet to live as large as...

Pay For 520 But Live Like 800 (With Bonus Points For “Trendyloin”)

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 16:10:00 GMT

We’ve always had a thing for the Art Deco Hamilton building (one of the first hotel/apartment to condo conversion buildings in San Francisco). And we’re particularly fond of the well designed units which enable 520 square feet to live...

Google to tell Viacom how many times you watched LonelyGirl15 [Your Privacy Is An Illusion]

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 16:00:00 GMT

Two rulings came down in Viacom's copyright infringement suit against Google and its video-sharing site YouTube yesterday. The first: Despite Viacom's wishes, Google will not have to turn over...

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