If there is no such thing as bad publicity, then we suppose yesterday's Cash Tomato promotion was a resounding success - if a melee as people tried to grab money works for you. The event, which involved giving away $29 to individuals in honor of Leap Year - wait, make that $29 attached to tomatoes, resulted in a Union Square riot with one person hospitalized and police and paramedics on the scene. From the......

In the wake of the horrific tiger escape resulting in one death and two injuries at the San Francisco Zoo, zoos around the country are examining their tiger exhibit set-ups. Tiger Mountain at the Bronx Zoo has the following set-up, per the Post:Tiger Mountain is surrounded by a moat about 10 feet wide and is enclosed by a fence that is 15 feet high and has a five-foot overhang. That means that the last......

Intertube-savvy metropolitan diners now have yet another way to make sure their every culinary craving is sated: the new website FoodieBytes, now beta testing, lets users search restaurant menus based on the food they desire. For instance, typing in “pesto” and “whole wheat pasta” yields over a hundred New York eateries. You can narrow your search by neighborhood and, once you find a restaurant that seems appealing, peruse the entire menu, get the hours,......

This week, Phillyist saw the waters of a landmark fountain run red for a Showtime marketing stunt, the Phils pull ahead, and some serious nostalgia. They also got a chance to review an awesome tribute album, reminded folks to see the King, and appreciated their beautiful skyline. Chicagoist knows what it's like to like the Cubs. But naming your kid Wrigley Fields? At least they can breathe a little easier now that Grossman's out and......

What’s worth watching on food-TV this week? Tonight on No Reservations (10pm on the Travel Channel), Bourdain goes to South Carolina. He’s also got an upcoming holiday special that features Queens of the Stone Age (wearing Christmas sweaters from QVC, no less). We can’t wait for that one. Read about it in ">Rolling Stone. On Top Chef, Episode 12 airs Wednesday at 10pm (Bravo). The guest judges are Sirio Maccioni and Andre Soltner. Grub Street......

Happy first weekend of September - and happy Labor Day weekend, too, for our American cities! Let's take a look at what's been happening around the Ist-a-verse. The deaths of two firefighters shook Bostonist this week. Boston's firefighters bent over backwards all week long - first, they fought flames pouring from the Boston Tea Party museum, and then a restaurant fire killed two and injured many more. Their efforts make everything else - like Tom......

We at the Gothamist network would like to express our heartfelt wishes to the people of Minnesota in the days after their tragic bridge collapse. We're not trying to discount the severity of the accident by making note of it in opposition to our usual -Ist lightheartedness - we just wanted to take a moment and recognize those affected last week. After the Minneapolis bridge collapse, Bostonist did a little research and found that Massachusetts......

While SFist cringed at the fatal dose of crime littering the Bay Area, it found solace in Hillary Clinton's San Francisco campaign headquarters opening, which featured loads of exposed mammary glands. In other news, SF Taxi Commission ruled that Satan's cab must keep its (in)famous medallion number, 666; and in an un-fashion-forward frenzy, San Francisco Fashion Week (chortle) bars bloggers from covering and getting smashed at their shows and parties, respectively. Also, they found a......

This week ended with the launch of the seventh and final Harry Potter installation. But while the world was consumed with Pottermania, it's important to remember that there were more serious things going on in the world, too - two of them in -Ist cities. Sampaist was shocked when a passenger jet crashed into the center of Sao Paulo, killing at least 200 people. The airplane, an Airbus A320, skidded off the runway at the......

Banner week for SFist as the site's new editor introduced himself -- hooray for Brock! While the NY Times weighed in on SF's mayoral race, only SFist had the (insert tongue firmly into cheek) hard-hitting latest on candidate/activist Josh Wolf. Coverage of a protest vs. gentrification spawned a fantastic debate amongst SFist's readers. Finally, from the sublime to the ridiculous: video of a man that confused a Board of Supes meeting with "open mic......

LAist was comped front row seats by the Dodgers due to Malingering being struck by a foul ball last week, and she came back with some great photos, and earlier made fun of 4th of July on Venice Beach. But the biggest stories of the week was that the Mayor's Hot Tamale was revealed, and that a Kwik-E-Mart was erected in Burbank. Phillyist was busy doing the Fourth of July up right, exercising their......

It's the day for the Apple iPhone to be released to the public, and the public is doing its job to feed into the media frenzy. If you're not on line waiting for the iPhone, you've either seen people waiting on line or mocked people waiting on line (while secretly coveting one, of course). WCBS has some photographs of people on line this morning - someone even brought his dog, which is named Beta!......

Happy Father's Day! For those of you who have dads, are dads, or know dads, this one's for you, from all of us at the Gothamist network." It was a week of bizarre, embarassing headlines at DCist. The trial of the local administrative law judge who sued his cleaners for $54 million over a pair of missing pants left everyone shaking their heads. Then the capital city was nearly brought to its knees, twice, by......

The Red Hook ballfields are back in action, and Eat for Victory was there to give us a report. Eater lists the James Beard Foundation Media Award winners, including the SF Chronicle which picked up the Best Newspaper Food Section and Leite's Culinaria for Best Website Focusing on Food, Beverage, Restaurant, or Nutrition. The remainder of the awards will be announced at tonight's gala. Top Chef season one winner Harold Dieterle officially opens his......

MOVIE: One Ring Zero is a lit-rock fans dream come true. The band features Paul Auster, Jonathan Lethem, Dave Eggers and Margaret Atwood’s lyrics set to the music of trumpets, theremins, claviolas, and metallophones. Director Joe Pacheco captured the band on film and presents it now as a documentary, As Smart As They Are: The Author Project. Here's a song/video with lyrics by Michael Chabon: 7pm // Barbes [376 9th St, Park Slope] // Free......

If you haven't heard about Christina Ricci, Samuel L. Jackson and Justin Timberlake's Southern Gothic exploitation movie, Black Snake Moan, you may have been living under a movie-free rock. Ricci plays a bad, bad girl who must learn to mend her ways under the racially and sexually fraught tutelage of jazz musician Jackson. How shall he do that? Why chain her to the radiator until she repents of course. One of this movie's key words......

TASTING: Forget wine and cheese...come pair up your favorite fromages with some beer! FreeNYC points us to Bierkraft - Park Slope's proprietor of some of the finest microbrews, cheeses, and chocolates. They're having a pairing of 5 beers with 5 cheese tonight, here's what's on the menu: Beer Samplings: Slyfox Pale Ale Rogue Brutal Bitter Southern Tier IPA Oskar Blues Gordon Smuttynose Imperial Stout Cheese Samplings: Chebris Zamorano Polder Schapenkaas Cambozola MiraBleu Yum! 7pm //......

Where are all the rich, single guys in Manhattan? Why, the East Side and Chelsea, of course. We figured that out using GeoIQ's heatmap technology, which displays information using futuristic gradient shading. They've released two sample maps: a New York vs. San Francisco demographic comparison (rich, single men in SF seem to congregate near Union Square!) and a traffic map, which you can use to compare congestion in various cities. For instance, here's NYC......

Let's take a look back at a week that raised this Zen koan: if Kevin Federline got into a wrestling ring with a wrestler, who would you root for? Austinist was in an entertainment state of mind as they covered the dickens out of the Austin Film Festival, depicted all the Big 12 football coaches as South Park characters, and interviewed Jose Gonzalez. Chicagoist talked about the passion as they bid adieu to Bell......

While not listed on the website, a small bird-shaped source tells us that the gigantic (website says 66k vs. 90k sq.ft. in reality) Whole Foods in the Avalon Christie on Houston & Bowery will open in April 2007, an almost 1 year delay. Same little birdie says that contrary to reports elsewhere, they will also get to build a Whole Foods wine store (maybe not liquor) to replace the one forced out of the Columbus......

In 1996, Texas is the Reason released an album called "Do You Know Who You Are?, " and while on their way to potential superstardom, abruptly broke up mid tour in Germany to the disappointment of many. Ten years later, all four original members found themselves living in New York again at the same time, and decided they needed to get back together for one last show and finish it where they started. We caught......

As we sat down to write this week's Best of the -ists post, a car blaring "21 Questions'" passed by our house. And that started us thinking about how some of the best -ist posts out there have at their hearts questions, some of which are answered, and some of which are left open. Check out the Best of the -ists from this week, and see if you agree. Londonist answers the questions "How......

With the release of more census data yesterday, a few other trends for NYC emerged: - NYC has the second highest median age - 35.8 years old, after SF's 39.4 years - and the third highest number of people over age 65 years, with 11.9% of the population clocking in over 65 (SF was first, followed by Philly) - New Yorkers wait a long time before getting married - And we have the third highest......

The internets are abuzz with Jason Kottke's "Manhattan Elsewhere" project. In it, he uses Google Maps and Google Earth to place Manhattan on the same map as other cities (Chicago, SF, Boston, Minneapolis, and the teeming metropolis that is Barron, Wisconsin!) The project is a loving remake of Bill Rankin's Errant Island of Manhattan project-- check that one out for LA and Philadelphia comparisons. Six years passed between the two projects, and it is......

The 2006 Bicycle Film Festival is here, kicking off in New York today, and then traveling to nine additional cities across the globe. The BFF began in 2000, started by Brendt Barbur after he was struck by a bus and decided something positive needed to come from this experience. Brendt is also one of the founders of Critical Mass. The BFF brings people together to celebrate two-wheeled transportation, and we love festivals that provide valet......

Two Gallants...

Seattlest saw a house party get senselessly attacked with a shotgun and end in seven dead. A local senator is debated and their version of the big dig is investigated. To truly get to the bottom of it they interview the writer Jonathan Raban. Bostonist has its first birthday party and investigates how to attach more gambling dollars to the Red Sox. Benjamin Franklin is celebrated and Johnny Damon is not. Image by Ethan Bagley......

So you thought you were going to spend tomorrow sleeping in, lounging around your fetid apartment, and maybe watching some TiVo'd Olympic coverage? Wrong! Tomorrow at 2pm you will be in Union Square, armed with pillows, preparing to beat the stuffing out of numerous strangers. The details: Feathers fly and teddies soar as you converge on Union Square for a massive urban pillow fight! Swing and whack as you evade pillow-wielding assailants on E......

To heck with the old New York or LA fight (or even the once strong NY v. SF meme), USA Today is trying to stir up some trouble by pitting our fine Capital of the World against the Second City (the capital of the Midwest?). "Chicago magazine got into the debate in its February issue with a statistical comparison of the USA's largest cities: New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston and Philadelphia. The bottom......

Finally! It's as if our Christmas wish was answered early, for we must hail pandafix, the only website (that we know of) that aggregate all the insanely cute pictures of pandas DC, SF, China, and more in one place. Pictures of sixteen panda cubs from the breeding center in Wolong? Check! Somewhat embarassing photos of Bass's 25th birthday? Check! Side by side comparisons of Tai Shan and Su Lin climbing outside? Check! Thank you,......