What's in a name? A lot, if you've got an inconvenient one and you want to change it. Would John Denver ever have become beloved, or even reviled, as Henry John Deuschendorf?

Thus you can understand the disappointment of the makers of high-fructose corn syrup this week after the U.S. Food & Drug Administration rejected a request by the corn-refining giants to allow them to change the name of their product to "corn sugar."

The agency said that it defines sugar as a solid, dried and crystallized food — not a syrup. Plus there's already something that technically is a solid corn-based sweetener, dextrose. Thus, the corn refiners are stuck with the moniker — better known by the acronym HFCS — that might as well appear as a skull and crossbones on nutritional labels, the way many American mothers see it.Continue reading...

Boston isn't the only US city that's not sweet on sugar these days. In what seems to be a classic case of the pot calling the kettle black, sugar producers are suing corn processors in Los Angeles for peddling unhealthy products.

C&H Sugar and other groups of sugar-cane and beet farmers sued in Los Angeles this week to block Cargill, Archer-Daniels-Midland and other members of the Corn Refiners Association who produce high-fructose corn syrup from rebranding their product as "corn sugar."

The court battle kicked off today, with sugar farmers claiming they want to save nutrition-minded Americans from the companies' false advertising and efforts to undermine good ol' American healthy eating. 

It's no surprise that even sugar producers would want to keep their distance from the HFCS Complex these days.Continue reading...

Al Gore prepares 24-hour global warming Climate Reality live-stream event.

Angry Birds spurs 1M t-shirts and 1M plush toy sales per month for Rovio.

AT&T will use plant-based packaging for accessories as Coca-Cola's PlantBottle arrives on UK shelves.

Bank of America announces 30,000 job cuts.

Boston Globe newspaper puts up online paywall.

British American Tobacco gears up for legal battle vs. the Australian government.

Broadcom bets on web traffic for mobile with $3.7 billion NetLogic deal.

Glenn Beck says his new TV network is "not for slugs."

Google - just another ad company?

Groupon sued by its own employees.Continue reading...