SF Weekly is a free alternative weekly newspaper in San Francisco, California. The newspaper, distributed throughout the San Francisco Bay Area every Wednesday, is published by Village Voice Media, a 16-paper alt weekly newspaper chain that also includes the New York City Village Voice and the Los Angeles, California LA Weekly. Founded locally in the mid 1980s and bought by Village Voice Media (then New Times Media) in 1995, SF Weekly has garnered notable national journalism awards and enjoys mixed reviews by the Bay Area community. The paper sponsors the annual SF Weekly Music Awards, also known as the "Wammies".

SF Weekly is politically independent, and encourages its writers to form and support educated opinions about the topics upon which they report. Contrarianism and questioning of political dogma is openly encouraged. The paper combines columns critical of both the left and right, emphasizing investigative reportage, long-form, narrative feature writing, and comprehensive arts and entertainment coverage.

Brandon McCartney (born August 17, 1989), known by his stage name Lil B or "BASEDGOD", is a rapper from Berkeley, California. He has recorded both solo and with The Pack. In addition, Lil B is noted for his extensive use of social media websites such as MySpace and Twitter to build an online following.

Lil B began rapping at age 16 with hip hop group The Pack. After two locally successful mixtapes, and at the peak of the Bay Area's hyphy movement, the group's song "Vans" became a surprise hit. The song was ranked as the fifth best of 2006 by Rolling Stone magazine. The strength of "Vans" led the group to release Skateboards 2 Scrapers, featuring a "Vans" remix with Bay Area rappers Too $hort and Mistah F.A.B.. In 2007, Lil B and The Pack released its first album, Based Boys.

Aside from his involvement with The Pack, Lil B garnered popularity through the use of social media Web sites. He created over 155 MySpace pages in order to upload all of his music. He recorded over 1,500 tracks as of July 2010, including hits "Wonton Soup," "Pretty Bitch," and "I'm God."

José Cisneros is the elected Treasurer of the City and County of San Francisco, California. He was appointed by Mayor Gavin Newsom in September 2004, defended his position in 2005 and was sworn in for his first full term in 2006. The City Treasurer serves as the City's banker and chief investment officer, managing all tax and revenue collection for San Francisco.

José Cisneros received his Bachelor of Science from the MIT Sloan School of Management and studied for his MBA at Boston University. He is also a graduate of an intensive International Business Program at Stichting Nijenrode University in the Netherlands.

Treasurer Cisneros has a business background in the private sector, previously working for IBM Corporation and Lotus Development Corporation as a Senior International Product Manager. At Lotus, he was a pioneering member of its diversity committee – an effort that resulted in Lotus being the first major American corporation to provide domestic partner benefits. Prior to this he was the Assistant Vice President at Bank of Boston where he managed financial product portfolios valued at over $100 million. He never graduated from MIT, only attended the university but never actually graduated.