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| Photos via We Built This City |
They also have the shittiest tags I've ever seen.
Anyway, a proper hue and cry was raised, and Carla Marinucci of the 'Gate was ON IT:
Gordon contacted the advertising firm contracted to do the work. The person she spoke with said his firm had tried to contact several city departments to get permission to post the logos, but was rebuffed. Still, more than 60 logos popped up on sidewalks Monday.
Gordon said the contractor — CivitasNow owner Jacob Taylor — told her his company would begin removing them.
But Blue Wolf CEO Eric Berridge doesn’t see the harm in plastering his company’s logo on the public sidewalks.
“We think it’s great for the city of San Francisco,” Berridge told us, noting that he lived in San Francisco for years after going to UC-Berkeley and growing up in Belmont. He said his company employs “hundreds” of people in the Bay Area.
He shrugged off any possible penalties from the city, saying “I’m sure that it will all work itself out. Everyone seems to be enjoying it. We went through the proper channels.”
Here's everything people loathe about tech companies in one neat package. Utterly oblivious tech CEO thinks "it's great for the city of San Francisco." How far up your own ass do you have to be to think that the City of San Francisco will enjoy your ugly graffiti that's meaningless to 98% of us? And who's enjoying it? Show me one person not employed by Bluewolf who's saying "Man, I wasn't sure this boring-ass lanyard party was going to be any fun, but these ads I can walk on have REALLY TURNED THINGS AROUND FOR ME!!!"
Sigh. It's just another example of tech treating San Francisco like their own little private playground and not a city with hundreds of thousands of people who don't give a shit about building digital solutions or optimizing results. Remember when that other tech thing celebrated making a ton of money by trashing Dolores Park and then walking away? Yeah, it's like that.
Jesus Christ, it's not that complicated. DON'T PAINT ADVERTISING ON PUBLIC PROPERTY. How can you not know that?
I do appreciate the irony of using a stencil to say that you "value personalities that don't fit molds."
ReplyDeleteHaha, I hadn't even thought about that. There's a whole #longread to be written about how tech companies loudly bray about how "disruptive" and individual they are when they're really super-conformist but I'm not the one to write it.
ReplyDeleteAgreed, although I think you are very capable of writing it. Sometimes "disruptive" means you've found a better way to do things and you are challenging those who benefit from the status quo. Sometimes, you're just an a$$hole.
ReplyDeleteI had to detach from this whole issue because it was raising my blood pressure too much, but the "Everyone seems to be enjoying it" bit was what really pushed me over the edge. Glad I wasn't alone.
ReplyDeletePure externalized cost. "How much does a billboard cost? Any wiggle room on that figure? Any way you can get it to zero? We can do it on the street for zero." I hated it when Arcade Fire painted ads for Reflektor on sidewalks around town, and I hate this, too. A little bit more.
ReplyDeleteCan't believe they think we're 'enjoying it'.
ReplyDeleteSigh. It just looks bad and if they were doing my marketing campaign, they'd be fired...
our "district attorney" made a big deal about going after a tagger who'd spray painted his stuff on public property to burnish his law and order credentials.
ReplyDeletehe is silent on this instance of graffiti though.
then again, this is the same district attorney who did all those tv ads for prop. 47, which is why burglaries and auto breakins are climbing
typical SF these days....oh well