I certainly am on a path of enlightenment. Land is tricky, as previously stated - there's not a lot of undeveloped land in the LA area, finding a flat lot is near impossible (unless you have a million + to spend), reasonably priced land available is usually expensive to build on due to the slope, and there are any number of other things that can make the land not buildable (at a reasonable cost).
Once I found a few pieces of land I thought were viable, I headed out and visited them. This was critically important as you can only tell so much through the listing and from Google Maps. Like buying a home, you might not like the neighborhood, the surrounding structures, or the isolation. If possible, I also hike the properties, stand at different points around them and always take plenty of pictures as it all starts to run together after the third or fourth one visited. Since I was looking up in the hills of LA, visiting the land also gave me a great sense of how far away it is from things and what my commute might look like (some of those canyon roads can become major traffic bottlenecks).
If a property seems viable, I would then engage a real estate agent. Since I'm the buyer, engaging an agent doesn't cost me anything and I've found that they can do a lot of the legwork in tracking down documents and past research done on the land that is not attached to the listing. This is where my biggest education started. Land requires a ton of investigation, determining if a plot is buildable usually requires a survey, slope analysis, soil testing and geology reports. It also helps to know if there are any neighborhood or town requirements as well as the history of the property. All, or none, of this might be available as part of the listing, if not, I'm responsible for investigating the property. Granted none of this is a requirement to purchase, but if you're looking to build on the land - wouldn't it be nice to know it's possible (within a reasonable budget) prior to purchase? Depending on what documents are available, be prepared to invest time and money to understand if the land is right for you.