Having closed its doors in 2004, and playing host to squatters in recent months, there's finally some good news to report about the Commonwealth Institute in west London. The disused building is to be the welcome recipient of £20 million development plan, with hopes to turn it into an art gallery (yay!), museum (double-yay!) or "centre for a corporate foundation" (erm, possibly yay - we're not sure what that means). This should hopefully mean......

A sad week for LAist as they lose their trusted and amazing editor Tony Pierce to the LA Times, but what a blast his last week was. He shared his 25 Favorite CDs of 2007 and wrote a great review of just a good movie, No Country For Old Men. At UCLA, thousands of students celebrated the end of their quarter by running around campus in their undies (lots of photos in a two-part......

...that the government’s gone a bit loopy, actually. They are still banging on about developing the optimistically titled Thames Gateway region into some eco-wonderland filled with gainfully employed and happy eco-bunnies. Yvette Cooper was due to, er, ‘clarify’ exactly how this can be achieved and for how many spondulicks at a brainstorming forum today. Now Londonist knows that London needs a bit more housing, and is all for the creation of well budgeted, environmentally-friendly utopias......

Ahhhhh, Monopoly. With its cute Scotty dog and get out of jail free cards, it's everyone's favourite rainy day game. But why do people have to keep tampering with it? So far, we've had Star Trek, The Simpson's and a version just for Kent. Not forgetting the really expensive one with the little jewelled houses. Now it seems Monopoly has gone national. And, well it all gets a bit strange after that. You'll no......

Are you related to stabbed PC who died 67 years ago? Students design new police uniform - coloured stripes over shoulder, a bit like old Star Trek. Hatrick of headlines for the rozzers, as plant pot incident launches police chopper. ‘Ridiculous’ totem poles waste money say Tories (no, it's not a Day Today headline). Sl-mo London Marathon runner finally finishes. Bomb plotters go down for life. Image courtesy of Maggsinho via the Londonist flickr......

Michael Halls-Moore is a man on a mission. Or, rather, a man wanting to be on a mission. His dream is to go into space. But he's a student at Imperial College, and not the most likely client for Richard Branson's 100-grand-a-shot Virgin Galactic trips. No matter. He's going to get there anyway thanks to a cunning internet scheme based on the Milliondollarhomepage concept of pixel-based advertising. On his website, BuyMeToTheStars.com, you can purchase......

It's a great day when you can wake up to this headline: Ferrari will not be Tories' mayor. According a study by Loughborough University of 112,000 crimes in London last year, Nokia phones are the thing most likely to get nicked. The Guardian news blog takes a look at 'regretful loners' and communal living in South London. Anyone looking forward to seeing Animal Collective at the TDK Cross Central Festival might want to thing......

Oh no, not more sport! At the risk of sounding like a skipping CD, this is getting ridiculous. With Wimbledon added to the surfeit of sporting action on the small screen, there's even less room for actual, interesting programmes than ever. Summer of sport our collective arse (excluding our beloved sports desk of course!). Come, friendly clouds, and pour down rain on Wimbledon until the sexist pigs who run the thing are made to......

These listings appear every Wednesday. If you want to let us know about any upcoming science or technology events, you can contact us on LondonistSciTech@Gmail.com Event of the Week Isambard Kingdom Brunel: fame and fate, Science Museum It took 1000 men, four years, and 19 000 tons of steel. And that was just to reinforce his silly hat. But Izzy Brunel’s ocean liner, the Great Eastern, was a true wonder of the world in......

Just a mini Troll this week, fans, as we're addicted to the Big Brother (every damn day, 9pm C4) crackpipe and neglecting such things as eating, sleeping and, indeed, moving. Shahbaz hiding all the food was one of the funniest things we've ever seen, all the while muttering about how "it's all their fault" and "send me to Coventry, will you" and "nobody loves me boo hoo hoo". We are hoping against hope that......

Our weekly roundup (late because of the bank holiday) of what went on last week around the Istiverse: Houstonist reports on cross-dressing thieves and undressing educators this week. A Peeping Tom defends himself with a papaya and an outraged onlooker asks Ken Lay, "TATER TOTS OR FRIES?" Also, FEMA wants it's money back. LAist are a bug bunch of geeks. They're Star Trek geeks, David Duchovny geeks and Frank Gehry geeks. During their Cochella preview......

Photograph based on actual events. These listings appear every Wednesday. If you want to let us know about any upcoming science or technology events, you can contact us on LondonistSciTech@Gmail.com Event of the Week Einstein vs. Newton debate at the Royal Society Bit of a hoary old chestnut, this one. With apologies to Darwin, these two heavyweights would easily top a 100-greatest-scientists-of-all-time poll. Channel 4: get commissioning! But which of the pair made the......

Wow, Vanessa the biscuit-muncher from Croydon is turfed out after a mega-tense housemate vote, and this Londonist was lucky enough to see it in person at Elstree studios. (Thank you, Channel 4, for the rather wonderful salmon kebabs and the plentiful Pimm’s.) Davina was kind enough to sign autographs and banter with the polloi; she even managed to pull off the slightly odd executive shorts she was wearing. Only just, mind. But back to......

To the ranks of Singalonga Sound of Music at the Prince Charles and the regular Rocky Horror and Ghostbusters tributes at the Genesis Cinema in Stepney, we can now add ... "The Dude Abides", the annual Big Lebowski tribute night at the Streatham Megabowl. Although the event has been running since December 2003, it has now reached the attention of the national press - the Guardian, to be precise, which covered last night's shenanigans......

Londonist attended the theatre last night. We purchased a ticket for A Life in the Theatre a play written by David Mamet at the Apollo Theatre about a week ago. A Life in the Theatre tells the story of stage veteran Robert (Patrick Stewart) and aspiring actor John (Joshua Jackson) and their evolving friendship on and off stage. The running time is a scant hour and a half. The reviews for it have been here......