Austin, TX
Media production company Rooster Teeth shutting down
AUSTIN, Texas — Rooster Teeth, an online studio based in Austin, announced they’re shutting down production and laying off employees after 21 years, in a memo Wednesday.
In a post on their website, that includes a memo from General Manager Jordan Levin, the Rooster Teeth team explains how they were notified in an All Hands meeting of the company’s closure.
Founded in 2003, Rooster Teeth has served as a production company for gameplay and animation, that was eventually acquired by Warner Bros. Discovery. In the memo, Levin wrote the reasoning for the company’s closure is due to “challenges facing digital media resulting from fundamental shifts in consumer behavior and monetization across platforms, advertising and patronage.”
Although the company is shutting down, the Roost Podcast Network will not be affected by this change and will continue operation, while Warner Bros. Discovery “evaluates outside interest in acquiring this growing asset.”
Rooster Teeth’s hit series “Red vs. Blue”, an action-comedy machinima series that uses footage from the game “Halo”, will close out on its subsequent final season.
The company will be hosting a livestream Thursday, March 7, on their website to answer more questions about their decision.
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Austin, TX
Local advocacy forum challenges billionaire policies ahead of state capitol protest
![Local advocacy forum challenges billionaire policies ahead of state capitol protest Local advocacy forum challenges billionaire policies ahead of state capitol protest](https://cbsaustin.com/resources/media2/16x9/2048/986/0x192/90/9e90ab2c-38ce-4b2d-8841-7009ebdc5384-billionaires.jpg)
AUSTIN, Texas — Ahead of a protest at the state capitol Thursday, the low-income advocacy nonprofit VOCAL-TX hosted a forum to push back against billionaire policies being instituted both nationally and right here in Austin.
VOCAL-TX may have only formally formed in 2022, but their advocacy for the poorest among us goes back years.
“We knew that in order to really tackle the issues that we were working on, we needed to build political power and change policies,” Co-Director Paulette Soltani said. “building power with people who are low income, impacted by homelessness, the war on drugs, mass incarceration and AIDS.”
They partnered with the Austin Justice Coalition Wednesday to host the “Fight Back Against Billionaires” forum.
“When you have the richest people in our country pushing for policies that privatize our education system or privatize our housing so people can’t even afford to live, there’s a problem,” Soltani said.
While billionaires like Elon Musk on the national stage may come to mind…
“We have a majority of the public vote – voting for President Trump,” Musk, speaking at the White House earlier this week, said. “We won the House, we won the Senate. The people voted for major government reform. There should be no doubt about that.”
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Chas Moore with the A.J.C. says what’s scarier are the influences being seen here in Austin at the state and local level.
“There are many institutions that are also in step with this oligarchy that’s forming in the country,” Moore said. “We all need to be made aware and fight back.”
VOCAL-TX criticized the Austin-based Cicero Institute for pushing legislation that would criminalize public camping outdoors, something the United States Supreme Court affirmed last summer.
“We simply aren’t putting the right policies towards tackling these issues in our state,” Soltani said. “Instead, we see a lot of our leaders using policies of criminalizing people, ticketing, arresting people, who simply can’t afford to pay their rent in our state.”
The Cicero Institute calls itself a nonpartisan public policy organization. Its chairman is entrepreneur and venture capitalist Joe Lonsdale.
We reached out to the Cicero Institute for comment, who in a statement told CBS Austin:
“We work on a variety of issues important to Texans, including homelessness. Unfortunately, over the last couple of decades, government funding in this area has focused on drawn-out housing projects that deprioritize immediate services for vulnerable people who find themselves in dangerous circumstances. As my colleague Devon Kurtz remarked, this has turned into a full-blown humanitarian crisis. We all know someone who is struggling that we could name right now. It’s a painful reality and a stark reminder that we need compassionate solutions. Leaving people to suffer while waiting years for housing that may never come is not compassionate, and voters across thenation agree.
VOCAL-TX panelists say the legislation the Cicero Institute is proposing isn’t compassionate either.
“They’re lobbying in our state house right now during the legislative session, and that’s what we hope people walk away from our town hall tonight, kind of being a little bit more educated about what’s happening at the state capitol,” Soltani said.
VOCAL-TX will be gathering on the steps of the Texas State Capitol Thursday from noon until 3:30 to push for housing reform and compassionate service.
Austin, TX
Austin locavore restaurant named one of best in USA TODAY’s 2025 Restaurants of the Year
A popular Austin locavore restaurant has been named one of the best in the country. Here’s what you need to know before you go.
Dai Due named a USA TODAY best restaurant of 2025: Video
Take a look inside Dai Due in Austin, Texas, named to USA TODAY’s 2025 Restaurants of the Year list.
Have you ever wondered what aoudad tastes like? Probably not. You’ve probably never heard of it. But if you want to savor the invasive species that has taken hold in the Hill Country and West Texas, pushing many native bighorn sheep from their land, head to Dai Due. Because nobody else in Texas (and maybe this hemisphere, according to chef-owner Jesse Griffiths) is serving it.
You might find the animal formed into juicy meatballs on Dai Due’s dinner menu or made into a brunch sausage served on flatbread with chile yogurt, marinated cucumbers, chile morita sauce and wood sorrel za’atar. Like the aoudad, everything on that housemade flatbread comes from Texas. It’s the Daie Due way.
The restaurant’s commitment to local sourcing and the exceptional dishes created by a kitchen overseen by executive chef Janie Ramirez have made Dai Due one of the best restaurants in Texas for a decade. Now, Dai Due’s made national news.
According to USA TODAY’s 2025 Restaurants of the Year list, the Austin favorite is one of the top 44 places to eat in America.
“It’s an exceptional honor considering how high the standards have been set here in Austin. I’m grateful that the hard work of our entire team is being recognized in such an incredible way, which wouldn’t be possible without the producers that have supported us over the years,” Dai Due chef-owner Jesse Griffiths told the American-Statesman.
What makes Dai Due stand out
Griffiths and Mayfield started their business as a supper club that served 80 people at events three times a month. Inspired by trips to Europe and the burgeoning local foods movement in America championed by Alice Waters of Chez Panisse in California, Dai Due committed to serving only products from the surrounding area.
“It was hard but I absolutely loved it. It was compelling. It was all happening in parallel to the local foods movement and farmers markets and people having this reckoning around where their food came from. It was really exciting,” Griffiths said.
But after moving to different locations each week, hauling their tables and chairs in and out of storage each week, and working 20-hour days that often started with early morning visits to farmers markets, the duo realized it was time to open a restaurant.
Encountering the jarred beef tallow and sauerkraut, the cartons of farm fresh eggs and vintage stoneware crocks as you enter the market side of Dai Due, you could be forgiven for thinking you had just walked into the idealized version of your Texas grandparents’ ranch home. But they probably didn’t have a massive handcrafted metal grill suspended over handsome wood-flamed, button-backed booths, and a tap wall with Texas wines and beer.
All of the proteins, produce, beverages and homemade accouterments have roots in the Lone Star State, from the smoked porterhouse hog served with apple butter to the tallow-roasted mushrooms you can drape over crusty sourdough spread with whipped cherry lard. And Dai Due takes specific pride in serving invasive species like wild boar and nilgai, which was originally brought to the King Ranch in South Texas from India in the 1920s.
Dai Due has spent $6 million with Texas farmers and ranchers and another $1 million with Texas wineries in the decade since it opened.
“That’s everything right there. That’s super meaningful,” Griffiths said. “I take immense pride in it — keeping your neighbors that are doing things the right way in business.”
The restaurant’s leadership in sustainability earned Dai Due a Green Star from the Michelin Guide in 2024, making it one of only 32 restaurants in America to garner such a distinction, but the restaurant deserves as much credit for how the food tastes coming out of the kitchen as it does for how the product got to the kitchen in the first place.
What to order at Dai Due
Pork chop. The best pork chop in Austin makes a great argument that open-flame grilling is the greatest way to cook meat. The oak grill infuses the brined chop with a touch of smoke, and the flame sears the black pepper and caramelizes the honey for a slightly sweet and tingly finish.
Wild boar. Whether served as a sausage, in a flauta or a torta ahogada, wild boar always has a place on the menu at this restaurant that is dedicated to the sustainable sourcing of this invasive species.
Pastrami sandwich. Rippled folds of pastrami bulge from the edges of grill-marked, house-baked bread, slathered with the earthy tang of beet Thousand Island.
See the full menu.
Details: Dai Due, 2406 Manor Road, Austin, TX; 512-524-0688; daidue.com
Austin, TX
Texas' Madison Booker is AP women's basketball player of the week
The Associated Press national player of the week in women’s college basketball for Week 14 of the season is Madison Booker from the University of Texas at Austin.
The sophomore wing had her fifth double-double of the season with 20 points and 11 rebounds in a win over then-No. 2 South Carolina that ended the Gamecocks’ 57-game regular season conference winning streak. Booker also had 20 points, six rebounds and four blocks in a win over Vanderbilt. She has scored in double figures in 20 games this season and the last eight in a row.
Runner-up
Aziaha James, N.C. State. The senior guard averaged 29 points per game in wins over then-No. 10 Duke and No. 22 Florida State. She had 36 points in the victory over the Blue Devils, including making 15 of her 19 shots. She moved into 20th on N.C. State’s career scoring list with 1,375 points.
Honorable mention
Grace Larkins, South Dakota; Emma Ronsiek, Colorado State; Laura Ziegler, Saint Joseph’s.
Keep an eye on
Gardner-Webb senior guard Ashley Hawkins had 28 points and five assists in a win over UNC Asheville. She was 12 of 13 from the free throw line and scored the Runnin’ Bulldogs final 14 points to seal the win. Hawkins followed that up with a 30-point effort against Charleston Southern.
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