Blogging, much like joining a convent, is a noble tradition of sacrifice. We write for your education, fulfillment and the small furtherance of the misguided belief that our opinions matter. We were excited, therefore, to discover a new breed of bloggers: they are called journalists. They are different in many ways: they work in offices, use PCs rather than coffee stained Macbooks and carry crude iPhone-like devices know as 'Blackberries', but most crucially, they......

Fears that UK tourism won't be funded well enough to take advantage of the 2012 Olympics were broached today in a report from the Parliamentary Committee on Culture, Media and Sport with the £9m cut to Visit Britain's budget coming in for criticism. The report tells us that tourist trade isn't anticipating a major influx for the Games itself but the presence of 20,000 journalists in town to cover the event certainly provides an......

Rapha makes clothing for serious cyclists - the couriers, the racers, the hardcore fundraisers pedalling over the Andes. They are also organising one of the most unusual events we've had the privilege of hearing about: this Saturday is the second Rapha Roller Race Culture Clash which is "a four-way clash between teams of bicycle couriers, cycle journalists, media folk and a ‘dark horse’ Dutch team made up of unnamed riders." And before you try......

A slap on the wrist for Londonist - we're three days late in previewing this year's Oxjam music festival, and we haven't even got a "dog ate our homework" excuse to cover our blushes. Must try harder next time. So what is Oxjam? It's only the most fun you're ever likely to have raising money for charity. Throughout October, thousands of budding Michael Eavis's are promoting gigs and club nights across the country. Working......

Londonist has learnt with relief that London’s Community Wardens are to be taught to smile. Well, they are at least to be taught stuff other than marshalling resentful kids, scribbling reports on graffiti and harassing shopkeepers who infringe on the pavements 1cm too far. The London Development Agency is to train 200 or so of our boys (and gels) in blue (and red and black and yellow) to be nice to tourists, with a......

What we now know about the killing of Jean Charles de Menezes- * The stories that Jean Charles acted suspiciously by running away from the police and jumping the barriers at Stockwell tube are untrue. * He was not wearing a bulky jacket or a bomb belt with visible wires hanging out. * Members of the police force knew this (for instance, the ones that followed and shot him.) * Senior officers knew that......

With the news that Boris Johnson is polling 6% ahead of Ken Livingstone among current voting intentions in the capital, were he to be selected, you might think that his rivals for the Tory nomination would just quietly throw in the towel and get behind the man. Not Andrew Boff, who, as we noted previously is not one to take a hint from the electorate, and has taken some time to give a lengthy......

By which we mean 'tests the patience of those in charge of public safety and wastes everyone's time, money and resources.' Not wanting to be outdone by the Evening Standard's scaremongering, the Daily Mirror sent two journalists to the Stonebridge Park train depot to plant a fake bomb on a freight train, in order to test the security measures in place. A similar exercise was carried out last year when two Daily Mirror journalists......

Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson, MP for Henley, journalist, historian, author and everyone’s favourite upper-class twit is being considered as the Conservative candidate for London’s mayor. After being questioned on whether he would like to run in 2008 against Mayor Ken, Boris enthusiastically harumphed, "Being Mayor of London would be a fantastic job and anyone who loves London would want to consider the possibility very carefully." He went on to state that he does......

Only a fortnight to go now before central London is engulfed by the two-wheeled juggernaut of the world's most celebrated race. "Le Grand Depart" is the title given to the weekend of sport and festivities from 6th - 8th July that marks the first visit to the UK capital of the Tour de France, a cycling contest in the same way that a royal wedding is a quiet ceremony in a local family church.......

As the morning of the 2007 Champions League final dawns and Liverpool fans throng the streets of Athens, desperate to acquire a seat for tonight's match from amongst tens of thousands of corporate matchgoers, it seems an appropriate moment for the launch of our new series of articles looking at where football is going, particularly regarding off-the-field issues which seem increasingly to dominate newspaper back pages. Liverpool's opponents tonight, Milan, are especially apposite for......

Japanese animation is a bit of a mixed bag nowadays - when it first reached our shores, you could only get hold of Akira and ultra-violent tentacle porn. Nowadays, it's available for all ages and tastes - with TV shows and movies ranging from pre-school simplicity to complex interleaving plotlines. Pity, then, the poor marketing executive, confused about how to promote the latest DVD release of Naruto - an anime series about "a loud,......

"This was meant to be the epitaph for Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark. Evidently it isn't." So said an overwhelmed Andy McCluskey, lead singer of OMD, as he introduced the song "Walking on the Milky Way" to a Hammersmith Apollo full-house that, from first note to last, roared the re-formed band on to a performance on Friday night that must have been one of the most electrifying they have ever given. Billed as a......

This is our favourite assault on police story ever. The headline: Woman accused of spraying cop with breast milk The details: It is alleged she was detained for trying to steal shoes from Lizard, in Hill Street, Richmond. After being arrested for theft she sprayed an officer with milk from her right breast. There's a 'right tit' joke in there somewhere... We expect the Standard to start an anti-breast campaign later today. The Sun......

Seb Coe has announced the first official sponsor of the 2012 London Olympics - a race of monochrome aliens known only as the Kanamits: "Since first discovering that the Kanamits had landed on Earth and promised to be nothing but helpful to the cause of London's 2012 Olympic bid we have kept things under wraps. We were of course initially wary of the intentions of such a highly advanced race", Lord Coe told a......

A few weeks back we brought you the tale of a man who, out of the kindness of his own heart, takes people's broken iPods, fixes them for free and passes them on to others. Could there be a nicer man in the whole kingdom? Well, yes there could. His name is Richard Burdett, and he edits a free magazine for homeless people. The Pavement has no big charity backing and is almost entirely......

I reviewed Kristin Hersh's spellbinding album preview show at the Arts Theatre last time and on Tuesday night I got the opportunity not only to watch her perform a powerful acoustic set with The McCarricks but to meet her in person. We had quite a chat... First of all how are you, how are the shows going, are you enjoying yourself? I haven't had any shows really because it's a promo tour. I'm about......

Yesterday we said: West Ham’s new owners are playing two hands. If they stay in the Premiership, fine and dandy, but if not there’s the possibility of moving into the Olympic stadium in a few years which might allow the lucrative sale of their existing ground. Only a few hours afterwards, faced with relegation and ejection from the Premiership "spaceship bound for Planet Megabucks", they showed the first of their cards in ruthlessly dismissing......

The Nelson Mandela Challenge football match between South Africa and Egypt scheduled to take place at Brentford’s Griffin Park stadium on Wednesday November 15th is in danger of being called off. Two weeks ago, the South Africa Times announced that this annual fundraiser would be moved to London for the first time “to raise its profile,” but, with the game less than a fortnight away Brentford claim to have received no more than a......

If you're the type who would sleep better if you knew what to do in a hostage situation, then clear your diary for tonight. Aimed at journalists and anyone likely to be working in war zones, the Frontline Club is holding a talk titled Managing a Hostage Crisis, covering what to do if you find yourself taken hostage and what the rise of kidnapping situations in war zones means for war reporting. The panel......

It was always going to be tricky to pull off a quirky road movie centred upon the Taliban, but Kabir Khan almost pulls it off. And seeing as Kabul Express is produced by Yash Raj Films (the most successful Indian film studio, more used to financing over the top Hindi blockbusters) it's a miracle that this is as restrained as it is. Khan's background as a documentary filmmaker puts him in good stead, but......

Alan Crompton-Batt: 23rd March 1954 - 21st September 2004 Londonist raises a glass in memory of a bon viveur and rock'n'roll restaurant PR great. Alan Crompton-Batt was the public relations consultant credited with creating the notion of the celebrity chef. He also used to manage the Psychedelic Furs in the late 1970s and was known in some circles as The Man Who Turned Down Dire Straits Before They Were Famous. The son of an......

Forget the Middle East, the streets of London is where the real battle is. And the ammunition is newspaper ink... ...at least, that's what we'd possibly write if we were lazy, scaremongering Standard journalists who had been drafted in to write filler copy for a new free afternoon newspaper. The possibility of an Associated Newspapers afternoon freesheet has been reported today as their response to News International's September launch of thelondonpaper (also known as......

They went to Feltham Young Offenders' Institution, went on TV, they broke a few rules, cost the taxpayer a hell of a lot of money... and they're the ITV News film crew. The crew were among the broadcast and print journalists invited to the West London institution for last Thursday's publication of the release of Mr Justice Keith's report into the racist murder of Zahid Mubarek, who died in a horrible attack when made......

This week, we have a film about Irish Republicanism (The Wind That Shakes The Barley), a nonsensical thriller with Demi Moore (Half Light) and a movie about true-life legend of patriot fighter-hero, Huo Yuanjia (Fearless). First up, The Wind That Shakes The Barley, a film that won director Ken Loach the Palme d'Or at this year's Cannes film festival. As discussed at the end of last week's Friday Film News, there has been a......

Just when you thought there could be no more depressing London property stories and just as you were beginning to pray that lazy journalists couldn't come up with any more contrived Olympics-related crap, along comes: First time buyers will not win housing gold until London Olympics. 'Housing gold'...God help us. Yes the story here is that evil old house price inflation and the fact that those of us still on the 'first diving board......

LondonEnglandFans are organising a "World Cup Send Off Party" tomorrow night featuring German stand-up comedian Henning Wehn with his act entitled "Three World Cups and One World Pope" and magician Sven the Great (who can make a world cup disappear before your very eyes). The evening will also include a head to head debate between journalists from Suddeutsche Zeitung and our very own Observer on the respective chances of Germany and England as well......

If our Blogging Demystified event last month didn't answer all your questions (hey, we're only human you know) then can we suggest you get yourselves down to the Adam Smith Institute tomorrow night for their bizarrely-titled Dead Trees & Pyjama Kids talk which promises to take a good look at "the interaction between the mainstream media and the blogosphere" (that's Adam on the right there by the way). The discussion will kick off with......

The local Croydon news site is reporting that a "disgruntled resident has refused to pay £20 of her council tax bill, the amount levied towards the cost of hosting the 2012 Olympic Games." And so it begins. 52-year-old Helen Burrows is quoted as saying that the bill "is completely out of order" and that she has "no real interest in the Games," because, "they will not benefit me or my family and I don't......

How can the majority of England fans drag the cameramen and reporters away from focussing on a violent minority? Tonight from 7pm at The Offside Bar, 271 City Road, London EC1, over a hundred fans who will be travelling to Germany will be meeting the media to seek support for their campaign for good news stories this June. They will be expressing their concern at the constant anti-German angle to much of the pre......