CALIFORNIA

ConocoPhillips, the third largest energy company in the U.S., is expected to post higher fourth-quarter earnings as soaring crude oil prices offset big losses anticipated in the company's refining operations.

Lauren Conrad is expanding her namesake collection to encompass eco-friendly cosmetic accessories. And she is doing it all with cotton candy pink hair! Who said this Laguna Beach alum was just another pretty face?

Xi is largely an unknown entity to U.S. officials.

The tech giant Apple has reportedly burned $100 million against HTC in the first round of the legal battle between them, Newsweek columnist Dan Lyons wrote, Monday, on his blog.

Brigantine Advisors has raised its first-quarter profit estimate for Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) on strong iPhone shipments.

Philip Vannatter, the investigator in the 1994 murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman, died in Southern California on Friday, his brother told the media. Vannatter was 70 years old.

On Tuesday, January 24, the nominations for the 84th Academy Awards will be announced.

As state and federal officials near a deal with top banks to settle claims of foreclosure abuses, left-leaning activist groups have stepped up pressure on the officials to reach a deal that demands more from the banks.

Super Bowl 2012 will be a rematch of 2008's New England Patriots - New York Giants game, but don't expect that to push ticket prices down too far.

Starbucks will be extending its beer and wine offerings to even more markets, launching stores in Atlanta, Southern California and Chicago by the end of 2012.

The Westboro Baptist Church, known for its infamous God Hates Fags slogan and unwelcome funeral pickets, has announced that it will protest at the funeral of renowned Penn State football coach, Joe Paterno.

The video Yosemite HD from Project Yosemite captures stunning time-lapse footage of California's iconic park.

Chipmaker Intel Corp said it has agreed to buy networking products maker QLogic Corp's InfiniBand assets for $125 million in cash to strengthen its networking and high-performance computing capabilities.

If you look at the back of any iPhone, you're likely to come across the words, Designed by Apple in California. Assembled in China. Indeed, from the very first generation iPhone to the latest iPhone 4S, the world's most popular smartphone have come to be made in China and not in the U.S. An analysis, based on interviews with Apple's former and current executives and employees at Apple's supply chains and manufacturing experts by The New York Times, has now revealed why the wo...

The year, however, will not be completely bad. There will be presidential elections in the United States, Russia, Taiwan, France and India, as well as the election of Hong Kong's Chief Executive, he said on the publication. So there will be changes bringing about a new phase to the politics of these countries and this is also a sign of bold progress and reform brought about by the powerful ocean water of the year, he added.

The top after-market NASDAQ Stock Market gainers are: Sears Holdings, Astex Pharmaceuticals, Cogo Group, G-III Apparel Group, Achillion Pharmaceuticals and Tuesday Morning Corp. The top after-market NASDAQ Stock Market losers are: Spreadtrum Communications, NetScout Systems, First Defiance Financial, Ocean Rig UDW, Pacific Biosciences of California and Ancestry.com.

Office Depot Inc., the second-largest U.S. office-supply retailer, is testing PayPal's new point-of-sale (POS) system in a few stores, a top executive told Reuters. The news comes a few days after eBay Inc.'s PayPal unit said it had begun testing in-store payments in 51 Home Depot stores.

The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration closed its investigation into fires in the Chevrolet Volt electric cars, concluding that Chevy Volts and other electric vehicles do not have an increased risk of fire compared to gas vehicles.

In the summer of 2007, Apple's Steve Jobs received a note from then-Palm chief executive Ed Colligan, according to correspondence revealed in a lawsuit over employee poaching.

There are already as many as 15 U.S. states that allow patients the use of marijuana, as a legal substitute, to manage their pain and advocates fighting to legalize, regulate and tax cannabis claim they are now near victory.

University of California (UC) Irvine scientists have established the existence of a disease-fighting protein in human tears that could go a long way in early detection of cancers and other chronic diseases.