The funniest thing is it's not to protect idiots from themselves... well, kind of, but not really - more that they don't want to have to deal with them when they complain the spell they received was defective...
I guess witches and their clients will now have to transact online via Amazon.
We live in a world that sells us shit that used to be good for us, but mechanized and industrialized and boosted with additives that will kill most of us.
And the masses buy and buy, more than ever before, despite our being smack-dab in the middle of the longest and most costly recession mankind has ever known. Then again, recessions didn't exist before capitalism, so either it will get worse, or that will kill us, too.
But the U.S. have announced their economy has progressed by 1.9% in the first half of 2011 - technically not a recession, which means ''step backwards'', but it has progressed so little - and with 20 million people receiving unemployment cheques (which will expire soon) counting in that number, once those people run out, it'll get even worse.
And yet there was more money spent in the first half of the year than in any 6-month period ever, with the notable exception of that time-frame between 1998 and 2000.
And through the magic of Ebay, I feel I'm contributing more to the American economy than most Americans... although the amount I put in doesn't even equate one person ''sending'' their savings to Mexican drug lords. Now those people have Purchasing Power - and that's why I've always preached that a sales tax-based system will always be better than an income tax-based one, because even the dirty money gets taxed and put back in the system right away.
My heart is pumping like crazy because I'm having an online fight with an Ebay seller. I feel like outing him here, but I'll show more restraint than he has - for now.
Facts: I purchased twice from him in a 3-day span. One order - the second one - made it to me; one 2-disc DVD was missing one disc, but the rest was fine. The other order never made it to me.
Long story short, I asked for my money back. He claims I'm trying to scam him, we're gonna have Paypal judge.
But he made threats like ''You have no idea how I will now vigorously pursue this until you are brought to justice.''
On one hand, I don't care: I know for a fact I never got the items. Even if they search my house with sniffing dogs, they were never here. On the other hand, this fucker has my address. And even when he finds out he's wrong about me, that I'm not scamming, that I really don't have the discs, who's to say he won't still try to send shit or people at my house?
This time, it's by sending $2000 fines for any artist, venue or promoter of any show being postered in our not-even-clean streets. That,s right - the one way to get your show known to the populace, the one promotional material that actually became a known and respected art form elsewhere in the world (Gigposters, for example, lists 8841 recognized poster artists whose works can be purchased from anywhere between $12 and $400; some have even gone to reach over $1000 on Ebay).
Show posters have been a staple of real cities' lampposts since the 60s (notably, at that time, in San Francisco, New York and Los Angeles). A city that bans them is a city that refuses to let its citizens evolve with the times, as they are a testament to what is going on, culturally, at that given time; I guess too many posters out there were advocating and advertising protests and marches (again, totally fitting of our Time, considering the massive corruption all three levels of governments have been involved in)...
But if no one had gone to see Arcade Fire in 2003 due to seeing their names on posters outdoors, would they have been one of the biggest bands in the world in 2005? How about the wave of Seattle bands in the early 90s, whose show posters now reach thousands of bucks for people who want to sell them? How about the Fillmore Auditorium - would it be the Cultural Icon it is today (and has been for the past 45 years) had it not been for the trippy psychedelic artwork of their posters and flyers?
Worst of all, still: there are still posters up there, really ugly ones for crappy movies and mainstream artists' Christmas shows - but they're all put up by Affichage Sauvage, a company allowed by the city to put up their crap, because they're part of The Machine, they're subsidized by the big radios - and the indies can't put up their hand-drawn, spectacular, original, passionately limited-edition, and made from actual human sweat works of art.
