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The NSA surveillance scandal is rooted in the Bay Area. Who was involved, when did it start -- and how can you protect your privacy?

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 NSA scandal's bay roots, Frameline film fest, Lily Tomlin, Juggalos, Battlehooch, Ramen Shop, more. Articles Online | Digital Edition (iPad, Android enhanced)

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Every night is teen night

YBCA Young Artists at Work inspire — and are probably smarter than you

04.25.13 - 1:16 pm | Caitlin Donohue |
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VISUAL ART What if every artistic high schooler were taken aside and taught how to write a grant proposal? At the risk of sounding hyperbolic, the world would be a different place if every young person with a spark had the tools and know-how to fund their work. Or if nothing else, the gallery scene would be a hell of a lot more interesting.Read more »

Hot Chip off the old block

With New Build, Al Doyle pulls back layers from LCD Soundsystem and that other favorable act

04.25.13 - 1:01 pm | Ryan Prendiville |
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Bands have hierarchies. James Murphy was essentially LCD Soundsystem, Alexis Taylor and Joe Goddard are Hot Chip. If anyone knows this, it's Al Doyle; the multi-instrumentalist was the guitarist for LCD before it disbanded in 2011, and continues to be a crucial member in Hot Chip.Read more »

Boom life: Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore talks about 'The End of San Francisco'

04.25.13 - 12:52 pm | Marke B. |
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A picture of Brian Goggin's iconic site-specific sculpture "Defenestration" (that 16-year-old "furniture leaping out of an abandoned building" piece in SoMa that may be demolished soon) is pictured on the cover of Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore's latest book, The End of San Francisco -- which I reviewed in this week's Guardian.

It's an almost too-perfect image to represent the book's contents -- "Defenestration" cheekily channeled the out-the-window frustration of the dawning of the first Internet boom, with its hordes of tech gold-rushers pushing out old San Francisco culture. (And now, in the middle of another tech boom, the artwork itself will be pushed aside to make way for affordable housing -- the term for anything under $2500 per month rent pretty much at this point.) The End of San Francisco takes us on an atmospheric, highly personal through the turbulent period of the '90s and early 2000s, while asking some hard questions about the queer activism, participatory gentrification, and "alternative culture" of the period. Along the way, Mattilda intimately delves into issues like her recovered memories of sexual abuse as a child at the hands of her father; the rampant drug use, mental illness, and hostile attitudes of Mission queer culture; the gynophobia and transphobia of many "underground" scenes, and much, much more. 

I asked Mattilda a few questions over email in advance of her appearances here at City Lights (April 30) and the GLBT Historical Society (May 9) to help set her book in the context of what was happening then, and what's still happening now. As always, she pulled no punches. 

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Care clash

UC hospital workers allege unsafe working conditions

04.25.13 - 12:23 pm | Rebecca Bowe |
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The first week in April was a rough time for Connie Salguero. The Filipina nursing assistant, who says she would've been eligible to retire in two years, reported to her shift at the University of California San Francisco medical center at Mt. Zion on April 1 — and was told she was laid off. Two days after that, she was forced out of her home through an eviction, but fortuitously met an elderly Filipina woman who said Salguero could stay with her until she gets back on her feet.Read more »

Solomon: It's time to renounce the "war on terror"

04.24.13 - 8:05 pm | Norman Solomon |
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Norman Solomon is co-founder of RootsAction.org and founding director of the Institute for Public Accuracy. His books include “War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death.” He writes the Political Culture 2013 column.

As a perpetual emotion machine -- producing and guzzling its own political fuel -- the “war on terror” continues to normalize itself as a thoroughly American way of life and death. Ongoing warfare has become a matter of default routine, pushed along by mainline media and the leadership of both parties in Washington. Without a clear and effective upsurge of opposition from the grassroots, Americans can expect to remain citizens of a war-driven country for the rest of their lives.

Across the United States, many thousands of peeling bumper stickers on the road say: “End this Endless War.” They got mass distribution from MoveOn.org back in 2007, when a Republican was in the White House. Now, a thorough search of the MoveOn website might leave the impression that endless war ended with the end of the George W. Bush presidency. Read more »

The hype, reality, and accountability of collaborative consumption

04.24.13 - 5:48 pm | Steven T. Jones |
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Collaborative consumption, aka the shareable economy – the labels given to a new generation of Internet-based companies that facilitate peer-to-peer exchanges of goods and services – certainly has some positive attributes. But does it really live up to the overhyped claims of its biggest boosters, who evangelize it as a “revolution” that forever alters the economy in only positive ways? Read more »

The vultures of greed

04.24.13 - 3:19 pm | Tim Redmond |
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A small but enthusiastic crowd marched through the Castro April 20 to bring some attention to the rash of Ellis Act evictions that are forcing seniors and disabled people out of the city. The activists stopped at the home of Jeremy Mykaels, whose plight is symbolic of the state of housing in San Francisco today. Mykaels insists he's not a public speaker, but his remarks were poignant; we've excerpted them here:Read more »

The credibility of Twitter

04.24.13 - 2:26 pm | Tim Redmond |
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The stories on the latest Twitter hack -- which caused the stock market to plunge and wiped out $136 billion in investor value in an instant -- have focused on the vulnerability of the social network to malware and intruders. Twitter's apparently hiring some new people to improve its security. That's all just fine, but it's the wrong point.Read more »

City-owned electricity generation works

04.24.13 - 1:16 pm | Tim Redmond |
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I remember years ago a loser of a supervisor named Bill Maher tried to make a lame joke in opposition to a public-power measure. "If the city tries to run an electric system," he said, "every time I throw a light switch my toilet would flush."

Ha. Ha. Ha.

But it's a common refrain: We can't even run the Muni on time -- how can we run an electricity system?Read more »

Ammiano's on a roll

04.24.13 - 12:14 pm | Tim Redmond |
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Willie Brown, the former mayor and current unregistered lobbyist, has been trying to undermine Assemblymember Tom Ammiano for years. But take a look at two Ammiano bills this spring and you get a sense of how effective San Francisco's veteran representative can be.Read more »

On 8 Washington, it's No, No

04.24.13 - 10:53 am | Tim Redmond |
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The November ballot may contain not one but two measures addressing super-luxury condos on the waterfront. And that could pose a serious problem for the developer of the 8 Washington condominium project.Read more »

Chiu and Herrera roll up their sleeves for spring cleaning in City Hall

04.24.13 - 10:11 am | Rebecca Bowe |
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For some time now, oft-labeled “power brokers” with undue influence in San Francisco city government have taken heat for failing to register as lobbyists. At the same time, politically connected insiders are often criticized for manipulating the permitting process for major real estate developments far outside the public gaze.

It’s said that sunshine is the best disinfectant. Yesterday, City Attorney Dennis Herrera and Board of Supervisors President David Chiu introduced a package of reforms designed to shed more light on lobbyists’ practices.Read more »

Tribeca Film Festival report: opening night (and beyond)!

04.24.13 - 10:10 am | Kimberly Chun |
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Ah, welcome to the land of Law and Order — and the Tribeca Film Festival —as Richard Belzer introduced the event's opening night movie, Mistaken For Strangers, on April 17.

"As if Bob doesn't have enough money with his American Express commercials ...," he drawled of festival founder Robert De Niro and its splashy sponsor. He went on to say that De Niro started Tribeca to bring people back to the neighborhood after 9/11, so it follows that this year's fest is dedicated to those suffering the after-effects of the Boston Marathon bombings.

After a brief monosyllabic appearance by the Bob himself — it's really not about him despite his presence on key red carpets; he quickly passed the spotlight to cofounder Jane Rosenthal — out came the grateful, guileless-looking Mistaken For Strangers director Tom Berninger, brother to the National vocalist Matt Berninger and the maker of the doc ostensibly about the band but a really about brotherly love, competition, and creation. Looking like a viking Zach Galifianakis and playing like a bumbling, hard-partying, apolitical Michael Moore in the film, Tom Berninger looked like he could not quite believe his incredible luck as he was joined on stage by the suited-up National, as well as his small crew, the latter thanked for editing down and "cleaning up this mess."

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Red-eyed trends: 420 fashion at Dolores Park

04.23.13 - 8:03 pm | Caitlin Donohue |
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For the really sloppy, you had to go to Hippie Hill. All in all, Dolores Park last Saturday looked pretty much the same as any other gloriously warm Saturday in San Francisco. Course, we love a theme. Read more »

Help fund Goldie winner Jamie Meltzer's latest doc!

04.23.13 - 3:01 pm | Cheryl Eddy |
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When I last spoke with filmmaker and Stanford assistant professor Jamie Meltzer, it was at the 2012 Guardian Local Outstanding Discovery (a.k.a. Goldie) awards ceremony. I selected him for that honor — the Goldies are meant to recognize up-and-coming artists who are making impressive work but haven't yet gotten widespread recognition — based on the two documentaries of his I'd seen: 2003's cult favorite Off the Charts: The Song-Poem Story, and 2012's Informant, about a prickly activist-turned-FBI-informant-turned-Tea-Partier, which premiered at the 2012 San Francisco International Film Festival.

Well, chances are, that widespread recognition is soon to come Meltzer's way. Informant was picked up by Music Box Films for distribution (look for it late summer or early fall in the Bay Area), and his latest project, Freedom Fighters, sounds highly promising: "The film follows three exonerated men from Dallas, with 57 years in prison served between them, as they start their own detective agency to look for innocent people who are still behind bars," Meltzer wrote in an email late last week. "It's a documentary detective film — a documentary noir, if you will." (NPR broadcast a story about the men on April 16; listen here.)

I called him up to learn more, including details on the Kickstarter he just launched to help fund the next phase of shooting.

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