This past Saturday, two Austinites took home Independent Spirit Awards! Chris Eska took home the "John Cassavetes Award" for his feature August evening, and Laura Dunn took home the "Truer than Fiction Award" for her film The Unforeseen, a documentary look at the controversy surrounding Austin's real estate development and its impact on the Edwards Aquifer and Barton Springs....

Michael Olsen could get his job back with APD on a technicality. Man's body found near North Campus area; police say he fell off the roof. Obama's rally tomorrow night will close down roads downtown, so don't say we didn't warn you. Hillary trying to nab the Longhorn vote by wearing burnt orange today?...

Photograph of the Trump Soho by Riccardo Sinti...

Despite the obvious themes of power and faith, PT Anderson's vast, visionary epic There Will Be Blood isn’t primarily about oil, or about religion, or about extremism. Rather, it’s a thorough excavation of the foundation of American identity. And on top of all that, it’s the best film of the year....

AngelouEconomics will host the annual Economic & Technology Forecast next Thursday, January 24, at the Austin Convention Center. The Economic & Technology Forecast is billed as the largest business event in Austin, with attendees including public officials, educators, media, economic analysts and business executives from Central Texas’ technology, legal, real estate and services industries. Speakers include Angelos Angelou, the Founder and CEO of AngelouEconomics, and Zanny Minton Beddoes, the US economics editor for The Economist....

Photo by my favorite yarn on flickr Sgt. Michael Olsen is appealing his firing by APD. While the housing market everywhere else is on the decline, Austin still a place to buy, according to real estate expert. David Letterman in Austin for a Habitat build. Someone is going door-to-door claiming to be raising money for Big Brothers/Big Sisters. Video: Bobby Knight's neighbor isn't happy about how close Knight is shooting to his property. New, more......

Image by the "Subway Cyrano," from GothamistNew York City was at its strangest and swellest this week. On Sunday, tens of thousands people ran in the NYC Marathon, including Mrs. Tom Cruise, aka Katie Holmes, who ran it in just under 5 hours, 30 minutes. Gothamist also found out that limes in Corona are sometimes illegal, the weird maple syrup might be back and a famous punk music pioneer-turned-real estate broker was possibly killed by......

CWS Capital Partners seems to be attempting to generate the appearance of grassroots support for their plan to donate land along the southern shore of Lady Bird Lake in exchange for a variance. Extend Our Trail popped up recently as a counter to Save Town Lake. Katherine Gregor at the Chronicle called shenanigans, saying that Extend Our Trail was just a front for CWS. M1EK asked for proof. Katherine added that "Confirmation that CWS......

Division Day Beartrap Island (Eenie Meanie) Formed in Santa Cruz in 2001, Division Day honed their craft in a small sound-proofed bedroom. They put together an EP, The Mean Way In, in 2005, and have earned a bit of blogosphere recognition since then thanks to their catchy indie pop hooks and knack for a good cover song. Beartrap Island, their first full-length, is full of toe-tapping, old fashioned sing-a-long start and stop rock'n'roll that......

There will always be chatter about Austin's changing landscape, much as there will always be supporters for both developers and the environment. We want the privilege of taking a dip in a glistening spring-fed pool, but we also want to have a robust economy that allows us to continue working and living in this city. Some would argue that the two desires aren't mutually exclusive, but we all know that it's a sticky subject.......

Believe It or Not: My Bloody Valentine reuniting for Coachella 2008? Last weekend, the American Psychological Association rejected a moratorium that would have prevented its member psychologists from participating in interrogations at U.S. detention centers in Guantanamo Bay and secret CIA "black sites" around the world. Venetian Macao Aims to Transform Chinese Gambling Enclave Into Full-Fledged Resort City. Leslie Feist, joined onstage by members of Broken Social Scene, The New Pornographers, Grizzly Bear, The......

It's official: Whole Foods now owns its biggest rival, Wild Oats Markets. Despite a juicy scandal over Chairman and CEO John "rahodeb" Mackey's anonymous web postings and the Federal Trade Commission's earnest efforts to prevent what they believed was a serious antitrust violation, the deal was given the green light by a federal appeals court last Thursday. Whole Foods' buyout offer called for purchasing all outstanding shares of Wild Oats for $18.50 a pop;......

ACL Previews Austinist Launches Dedicated ACL Page! Preview: Manchester Orchestra and Patterson Hood Preview: Ian Ball and the Little Ones Interview: Paolo Nutini ACL Band Clash, Round 2: The Killers Vs. Björk Weekly Features Tales Of Mere Existence Hots On #9: Sound Off New Release Tuesday: Frisell's Floratone The Argyle Academy New Movie Releases: The Invasion, Superbad, Death at a Funeral, and More Truesday: Friesday The Laurie Show News, Features, and More Travis County......

A San Antonio-area nonprofit is suing to have their chimpanzees returned from Louisiana Is someone trying to take down the Dollar General? The City of Austin has opted to extend the waterway ban on Lake Austin until Friday The Texas Department of Transportation begins inspections on possibly suspect bridges A 6-year-old girl in North Texas crashed her bike into a parked trailer and gets her head punctured by 4 inches of rebar Bars and......

In the hopes of increasing registered and polite participation in our comments section, Austinist has decided to publish a "Top 5" list of our favorite reader responses from the past week. There are no prizes this week, but one never knows what might develop in the future. Now, on to the main attraction! 1 "I'm gazing into the abyss, but all I'm seeing is a 6-BR split-level mansion, with swimming pool & cabana in back."......

The Pier on Lake Austin, an old staple of Lake Austin boat cruisers and Hill Country folks since the 1920s, closed its doors back in 2005 after the restaurant/music venue/gas station lost its lease. Since that time, the place has basically sat unused. As we reported in April 2006, the original plan was to replace The Pier with a three-story development that consisted of a mix of casual and finer dining. Evidently this plan fell......

Finding hot button issues in Austin is not unlike finding a needle in a needlestack and no issue is as passionately debated as real estate. When Liz Lambert left her law practice with the Attorney General’s office and purchased the run down San Jose Motel, she had designs to create an oasis of hip on South Congress Avenue before the condo-boom had even begun, and little did she know that what she was building would......

Our Hot Real Estate Listings column is pretty much dead, but we still cruise the MLS on occasion and this beauty popped up as the most expensive listing in central Austin right now (beating out 3 Niles Road, which has been for sale for a while). It is the Allen-Von Boeckmann Building, a historical structure dating from around 1874 (the listing says 1869, but 1874 is pretty clearly carved into the cornice), at 811 Congress......

The Statesman headline is "Hutto project to rival Southpark Meadows in size: Mixed use development in works on nearly 500 acres." It sounds like another greenfield lost to development caused by the toll roads and another strip mall + suburb using New Urbanist language to market suburban crap. The first concern is true - SH130 runs through the plot formerly know as the "Hutto 400" (now re-branded the "Crossings of Carmel Creek") and has made......

With all the hype surrounding high-rise condos and New Urbanism, it is easy to forget that the dominant form of growth in Austin is still 20th century style, car-centric, suburban sprawl. Small developments (like The Shops at Silverado, shown right) or large (like the 425-acre Southpark Meadows, shown above), most new construction in Austin comes in the form of sparse, single-use, single-story sprawl. Southpark Meadows co-opts the language of New Urbanism as a marketing......

About half of the land around Rainey Street near downtown is up for sale by Perry Lorenz, Robert Knight and the Knight Real Estate Corp. The area is already home to the Milago condos. The MACC and the Shore are under construction. Construction of the Legacy Apartments is expected to start soon. Despite that, except for one modern interloper, Rainey Street between Driskill Street and River Street probably has the best collection of unaltered......

Successful, creative collaborations between artists and real estate developers don't happen all that often, but we think an event tonight may prove the exception. The Gathering, a one-evening-only exhibition, will feature work "facilitated" by Skyline CityHomes and -- more importantly -- contributed by the following groups and individuals: Sodalitas Art Collective (Shea Little, Jana Swec, and Joseph Phillips; GAT 5 Art Collective (Charles Ferraro, James Ferraro, and Val Brown); The Austin Figurative Project (Chris Chappell,......

Our favorite posts this week: Kristin posts on her SxSW so far. Norbizness gives his SxSW Music recommendations. Sort of related, we hear that one drunk woman offered someone $5 to sneak her in to see Donovan. Steve at Austin Real Estate Blog assures a SxSW visitor that it is faster to walk to 6th street from 15th and Guadalupe than to try to hitch a ride from someone. La Dilettante says, "Whistling is......

One of the films we're most excited about seeing at this year's South By Southwest Film Festival is Laura Dunn's The Unforeseen, a documentary look at the controversy surrounding Austin's real estate development and its impact on the Edwards Aquifer and on Barton Springs. Co-executive-produced by Terrence Malik and Robert Redford (who reportedly learned to swim at Barton Springs), the film explores the unseen relationships between our natural environment and our urge to destroy it.......

SXSW Film Festival recently released their lineup of feature films to be screened this year. Check out the full roster after the jump. LONE STAR STATES Forfeit Directed by Andrew Shea, written by John Rafter Lee. Featuring: Billy Burke, Sherry Stringfield, Gregory Itzin, Wayne Knight. An ex-con tries to manage his way back into society, reunite with his high school sweetheart, and commit one more crime. (World Premiere) Inside the Circle Directed by Marcy......

In case you haven't had a chance to look at your calendar, January is almost over. Christmas is a distant memory, SXSW is almost upon us, and the year is already in full swing. If you haven't had time to look on your own, let us help by sharing the best of last week's Missed Connections... Pterodactyl Porn - We need it If you have the video of pterodactyl porn, please send it to......

Ask any mop-haired kid roaming the UT campus with clingy jeans and just a hint of bong water breath, and said youth will tell you By The End Of Tonight is the hottest thing since Malibu real estate. Lucky for him, and you, they're playing a post-extended-hiatus set at Emo's tonight. The Alvin, TX quartet render layers of messy, metallic instrumental post-rock into songs that meander towards catharsis like a lost baby deer wandering into......

We've been a bit lax in our celebration of Austin's bloggers, but we're back, baby. Our favorite posts for this week of November 27th: Austin Real Estate Blog ponders real estate east of IH-35. Sarah at BondBlog caught the quick reference to the Alamo Drafthouse on Heroes Monday night. Rocky Balboa has caused some strong audience reaction already, Jette at celluloid eyes noticed. It's probably not the reaction the studio is hoping for. Red......

It took ten years for ex-Sunny Day Real Estate front man Jeremy Enigk to release a follow-up to his first solo album, Return Of The Frog Queen - and it's been well worth the wait. Though not as grandiose as its predecessor, World Waits (released through Enigk's own Lewis Hollow Records) combines all the best bits of Enigk's various projects. And though it doesn't cover much new musical ground, World Waits will definitely please fans......

After a short hiatus, the Hot Real Estate Listings column is back and the same as ever! Here are the listings for today: 809 Jewell Street - $1,250,000, 4,200 square foot house built in 1900. Taken! Had your $1.25M ready to go for this one, didn't you? Too late - it got an offer super quick after listing. Awesome looking house. Original wood detail all over the place, beautiful porch. Bouldin is mad-hot, yo.......