Geo-tagging helps pin down popular places


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Competition is rising up over social media’s latest craze: geo-location. Designed for mobile users, geo-location allows you to share your location with friends. There are several applications currently leading the geo-location bandwagon, including Foursquare, Gowalla and Facebook’s Places, which was introduced Aug. 18. Not surprisingly, the feature, just more than one year old, is not […]

Leaving behind medicine for music


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Brian Ralston — renowned film composer and graduate of Thornton School of Music’s Scoring for Motion Pictures and Television program — was once an emergency medical technician involved in clinical research for pharmaceutical companies and poised to apply to medical school. For any artist, starving or not, a career in medicine is a clear antithesis.

Three staples for college cooking


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Unless you’re still living with your parents, chances are that you’re either sharing a small kitchen with several other housemates or you’re stuck in a dorm without a kitchen where you barely have room to store a Heinz squeeze bottle. Therefore, you might not find it wise to purchase more last-minute items, but you might […]

New site boosts privacy


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The first week of school is always exciting. Classes are full, faces are smiling and first impressions are being made, whether you realize it or not. “Don’t judge a book by its cover” is a hard mantra to abide by, especially when everything is new — from the school year to the campus to the […]

Jokers to help the oppressed


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In 2006, USC Professor of theatre practice Brent Blair got a gig putting on a theater workshop  for Downtown Los Angeles’ oppressed garment workers. But this was not a morale-boosting production of Midsummer Nights Dream. In fact, Blair didn’t even bring a script. Instead, employees who worked within the largest concentration of garment industry sweatshops […]

Student amps up career


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Peter Lee Johnson, a sophomore majoring in popular music performance, is at the forefront of the rebellion that our generation heralds, but he once shared in the same uncertainty that most college applicants face amid the cautionary din of overzealous parents. From the age of 4 Johnson was immersed in classical music, a hobby that […]

Restored film takes a twist on fairy tale


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In 2009, the digitally restored print of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s classic, The Red Shoes, debuted at the Cannes Film Festival. This marked the final chapter in a seven-year restoration effort led by Martin Scorsese and longtime editor Thelma Schoonmaker. Last July, a copy of the print was released by Criterion on DVD and […]

City’s transition leads to a renewed sense of community


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While the dust is settling on USC’s latest overhauls — University Gateway apartments and the Commons-turned-Ronald Tutor Campus Center — Los Angeles is going through a long overdue remodel. Just as the stale square building in the center of campus has been replaced with a lofty community center flanked by an expansive plaza, neighborhoods across […]

Twitter gives USC students new avenue for information


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To Tweet or not to Tweet? That is the question. After signing up for Twitter, I found myself compelled to Tweet something as proof of my membership. With no followers, my first tweet in May 2009 read, “ah twitter confuses me,” and after a few more insignificant status updates that week, @Beccalett remained out of […]