Trader Joes, based here in Southern California in Monrovia, made a big announcement today regarding imported food from China:
Garlic, frozen organic spinach and other "single ingredient" food items from mainland China will be phased out by April 1, although products that include ingredients from both China and other sources will remain.more ›
The WGA is engaging in talks but that doesn't mean that the Oscars still aren't in danger. For an idea of what the economic impact of a canceled Oscars will be check out the diagram to the right from the 01/28/2008 issue of Business Week. Obviously the entire dollar amount is not exclusive to Los Angeles but a significant portion of it is localized ($26.5 million on limos, security, and gifts??). After reading some comments about the WGA strike here at LAist it's obvious that a lot of people are in pain over this but it's seems silly to me to blame the writers for the situation - this is a chance for all the affected industries to put pressure on the producers, studios, and networks to be a little less greedy.
In a preemptive move, the Director's Guild of America (DGA) announced yesterday that they'd made a satisfactory deal with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), giving them a new contract and therefore eliminating the need to strike once the current contract ended. So what does this mean for striking writers and the likelihood of an impending end to their current three-month-old strike?
The Los Angeles Times is predicting that we can expect gas prices to continue climbing, possibly hitting $4 a gallon in 2008. Citing high demand and persistently strong crude oil costs, it is estimated that prices will hit $3.40 a gallon by next Spring (which is not that far off from the $3.10 charged at Mobil this morning, or the $3.22 advertised at Shell).
LA named one of the Best Places for Artists in America "... one of the reasons Los Angeles leads the list is because it has 56 artistic establishments for every 100,000 people, a diversity index of 84.2, and an arts and culture index of 100 (on a scale of 1 to 100)." (Business Week) City's Cultural Affairs Department gets new Head "I am thrilled to put forth such a visionary and inspiring leader as...
• Its official, June 11th is iPhone day. Start saving now. • Is Google too powerful? Business Week speculates that it might be. • The Treo 755p in the wild. If you still care at all. • SonyBMG music retires the requirement for new artists to submit a demo tape -- at least in Europe. Now, artists can upload demos to the company's website instead. They will probably still be rejected but at least...
