Brooklyn Brewery found themselves in an unlikely battle recently against the Trappist monks of Belgium. Who, apparently, you do NOT mess with. CityRoom reports that BB owner Steve Hindy started making a refermented ale called Brooklyn Local 1, which borrowed a method from the monks. But the problem was in the design of the bottle he used for it: "an amber bottle design featuring a double embossed ring at the base of the neck. It was not unlike the single-ringed bottle used by the Westmalle Abbey in Belgium and by the New Belgium Brewing Company of Fort Collins, Colo." First his friend Kim Jordan, owner of the New Belgium, warned him of her "protracted negotiations with the monks of Westmalle on the use of a ringed bottle in the United States...She told him it was her duty under the partnership to defend the trademark." Hindy soon backed down, took a loss of $60K and noted of the monks: “God is on their side." However, it looks like the press images that got out there still include the old design. Developing... like dark clouds of a wrathful God. more ›

Roughly 100 protesters, most of them Tibetans, demonstrated outside the United Nations today against the Chinese government, which has been trying to put down protests and rioting in Lhasa. Three demonstrators were arrested for trying, unsuccessfully, to enter the U.N. and six were arrested for disorderly conduct. more ›