Time is a fungible concept when you're deep in trascendental meditation pondering koans, hence we're a tad late. But not too late, as Bears fans in Berkeley will probably be humming om and pondering the unknowable ("What in the hell is a Sun Devil?") until just minutes before the 12:30pm kickoff against Arizona State today. Which brings to question, "With two good offenses, is the best offense still defense?" Cal fell like a tree... [continue]

Man, things couldn't get much worse for Stanford football fans. Not only did they lose to lowly San Jose State last weekend, 35-34, but the infamously irreverent Stanford band has been put on provisional status after a series of incidents culminating in vandalism of the 'Band Shak' last July. Meaning that the only horns blaring at Stanford Stadium this weekend will be playing for the Navy's Midshipmen. Don't be surprised if you see a maudlin... [continue]

Tonight: The Canvas Gallery is hosting "Ask a Scientist," with Nancy Garland, a Technology Development Master at the U.S. Department of Energy, discussing Alternative Energy: A Cleaner Future for Cars. Tuesday: The best thing about bubbles is how they warp concepts like "There's no such thing as a free lunch." Hitachi Data Systems is hosting Lunch 2.0 in Santa Clara -- eat free, play foosball, and if you're so inclined, check out any of ten... [continue]

This SFist was actually kind of excited about the chances of the college football programs around the Bay this season, with the Pac 10 looking wide open. Then Cal got whipped like cream by Tennessee, getting nothing from potential superstar Marshawn Lynch (whom we've been watching closely for years), while Stanford was creamed like butter by Oregon, saddling themselves from the start with a conference loss. So when we were asked to write a weekly... [continue]

Since we have to lead with anything Journey here at SFist, check out the YouTube clip of the ad for Atari's "Journey Escape" we found on Kotaku. Avoiding (pixelated representations of) crazed fans and manipulative music industry types never looked so fun! Buy it now! If espionage is more your game, then the cloak-and-dagger shenanigans at HP should be up your alley. Even reporters were entangled in the web of lives spun to discredit... [continue]

In honor of Labor Day, we'd like to point out that every employee, freelancer and consultant in Silicon Valley has to bargain their health benefit terms on their own or take what the company offers, and many end up one of the 46 million Americans without. So this techie is rooting for Tom Ammiano to legislate health security, at least for San Franciscans. While individual entrepreneurial successes like the Mercury News' Matt "Silicon Beat" Marshall... [continue]

For the week that burners are most burnt out, there's a lot of mess on tap. Even (and maybe especially) excluding the postponed Women on the Web mixer. Tuesday: The monthly Silicon Valley blogger meetup (every first Tuesday) is happening at Santa Clara's Barefoot Coffee. We're not sure who HyperScope is or what they do, but hey, parrr-tay in Menlo Park, babies. Wednesday: There's a 'New Tech' meetup at CNet's offices on 2nd in SOMA,... [continue]

There are few places where people get their collective geek on like Burning Man. A lot of folks are staying home this year -- Violet Blue gives some good reasons why -- and taking a chance to relax on the full-press coverage and pimp as much anti-party legislation as they can while the freak vote is out of town. Of course, just because you decided not to crash diet to look good in your sand-filled... [continue]

The 'Gate is reporting that Josh has been granted bail by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, to wit:In a brief order, two judges of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said Wolf was entitled to bail because the government had not shown his appeal of a judge's contempt-of-court ruling was frivolous or intended solely to delay the proceedings...The court said another panel would rule on Wolf's appeal of the contempt order while he... [continue]

The big news yesterday, which hit our feed reader right before our wifi crapped out, was Google CEO Eric Schmidt driving down the 101 to Cupertino to join Apple's Board of Directors. Considering some of the trouble Apple's been in lately -- suppliers suing newspapers over reports of overworked employees in China, a less-than-stellar environmental record, stock option backdating scandals -- could this be a way for Google to outsource all the evil they're supposedly... [continue]

We were busy geeking out in the Sierra this weekend. Luckily, you won't find yourself covered with hundreds of tiny leeches after diving into any of these events. Tuesday and Wednesday: Flock, "The web browser for you and your friends," is hosting meetups in San Francisco (Tuesday) and Mountain View (Wednesday). Pass along your feature requests, we hear they're gearing up for a new version. Thursday: Adobe is hosting a free event, "InDesign Inside Out,"... [continue]

With SFist Rita's report yesterday about Apple settling with Creative, Apple fanboys can console themselves with the news that Microsoft is also getting dinged for even more money in a patent infringment suit. Meanwhile, retail workers who downloaded the development version of Apple's new OS, Leopard, are getting canned left and right (scroll down). But BusinessWeek thinks good iPod news is on the way, while Wired News explores the back alleys of Chennai in search... [continue]

Locally, the big news was the second best blog party last Friday thrown by TechCrunch down in Menlo Park. Scott Beale was commissioned to take the photos, including the one above featuring an uneasy handshake between Valleywag's Nick Douglas (left) and his favorite whipping boy, TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington. Nick had been bumped off the exclusive invite list, but Michel must have relented. If he had been dis-invited, apparently crashing the party was not an... [continue]

First off, if you're one of crowd that heads to Austin each year for South by Southwest ("South by So What to the locals, apparently), the polls are still open to vote for what panels you'd like to see at the Interactive portion. So vote now, and we hope to see you there next spring. Tuesday: Tough call. There's our (slightly) older sister Metblogs drinking beer at the Toronado, or old-timey tech from the 1915... [continue]

The good news is that the first battle in the legal fight against the NSA's wiretapping program has been won by everyone who doesn't work for the NSA. The bad news is that internet-enabled vigilante mobs could be the next big fad here in the States. Eh, we're too busy applying a new Dasani-branded profile treatment to our MySpace profile and checking out some of the videos. Damnit, we were totally going to lead off... [continue]

We've held out this long, and we're only gonna make this jokes once, but this summer, watch out for... Drinks on a plane! (We'll now run across the street and demand of the priest an appropriately harsh prescription for penance.) But don't worry, technology and, to a lesser extent, the Bush and Blair administrations, are here to protect you. With biometric terrorist detectors, other tech that's been around for generations, and the latest in arbitrary... [continue]

A new column devoted to the less-than-celebrated world of tech mixers, drinkups, LAN parties and other events for nerds and by nerds. Nothing says that computer junkies have to be anti-social! Monday: The penguin army descends on the Moscone Center for the LinuxWorld Conference and Expo. Come celebrate open source operating systems, gripe about hardware support issues, and make unflattering comments about the BSD kernel. Also, Web Monday, a regular event for web developers in... [continue]

It's been a while since we published a tech roundup. But the Internet turned 15 last Sunday, we got a new laptop from an entrepreneur and friend who'll be enabling this 'Fister's addiction to blogging, and SFist Chuck, whom we dearly miss, was kidnapped by Disney, who force him to Imagineer at gunpoint. All the while, you've been lost in the unmapped multiverse, wondering who Supr.c.ilio.us and TechCrunch are, and which is the hipper one... [continue]

Friend of SFist TMPP wrote to tell us about two new blogs in the local 'sphere. First would be his own project, now loosely based on that dude with the red paper clip, but with a deliciously sinful San Francisco twist, called "Take My Porn Please" (needless to say, potentially NSFW, but all nipples have been tastefully removed). From the FAQ:Q: Are you going to be trading up, a la One Red Paperclip? A: I... [continue]

Screw getting Dooced, Josh Wolf has set the blogger bar a bit higher than getting fired. He's been jailed. Judge William Alsup, presiding over a federal grand jury case investigating the attempted burning of a police car and assault of an officer during an anti-war protest last year, has held Mr. Wolf in contempt of court, and ordered him imprisoned. The crime? Refusing to answer a subpoena from the U.S. Attorney's office for raw... [continue]