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Reminds me of this Banksy quote: People are taking the piss out of you everyday. They butt into your life, take a cheap shot at you and then disappear. The

Reminds me of this Banksy quote: People are taking the piss out of you everyday. They butt into your life, take a cheap shot at you and then disappear. They leer at you from tall buildings and make you feel small. They make flippant comments from buses that imply you’re not sexy enough and that all the fun is happening somewhere else. They are on TV making your girlfriend feel inadequate. They have access to the most sophisticated technology the world has ever seen and they bully you with it. They are The Advertisers and they are laughing at you. You, however, are forbidden to touch them. Trademarks, intellectual property rights and copyright law mean advertisers can say what they like wherever they like with total impunity. Fuck that. Any advert in a public space that gives you no choice whether you see it or not is yours. It’s yours to take, re-arrange and re-use. You can do whatever you like with it. Asking for permission is like asking to keep a rock someone just threw at your head. You owe the companies nothing. Less than nothing, you especially don’t owe them any courtesy. They owe you. They have re-arranged the world to put themselves in front of you. They never asked for your permission, don’t even start asking for theirs. – Banksy

323 5y ago
> Any advert in a public space that gives you no choice whether you see it or not is yours. It’s yours to take, re-arrange and re-use. You can do whatever you like with it. Asking for permission is like asking to keep a rock someone just threw at your head. Funnily enough, you can say the same thing about Bansky's art: > An artist who defaced several works of famed graffiti artist Banksy has been charged with the crime of vandalism -- which is pretty incredible since Banksy's collection is itself an act of vandalism https://www.tmz.com/2014/04/02/banksy-david-william-noll-ricardo-cabeza-arrested/ https://www.tmz.com/2014/04/02/banksy-david-william-noll-ric... What a hypocrite: > The E.U. Rules Against Banksy in His Trademark Fight With a Greeting Card Company, Citing His Own Statement That ‘Copyright Is For Losers’ https://news.artnet.com/art-world/banksy-trademark-full-colour-black-1971339 https://news.artnet.com/art-world/banksy-trademark-full-colo...
- kdmccormick 5y ago
  What are you gaining by arguing this? What point are you trying to make? Do you really think an artist who hand-paints pieces on walls is comparable to a corporation that copy-pastes their flashing, carefully targeted, profit-seeking message onto dozens of billboards overlooking a highway? Are their motives and the results of their work not wildly different? Your second example is valid. But your first example is a complete strawman. Bansky didn't sue, the property owner did, because they liked Banksy's thing and didn't like what the vandal did.
  - 323 5y ago
    A lot of times people who loudly yell "fuck the system" are also quietly using the system when it suits them, that's my point. Bansky is no "dismantle the capitalism" hero or whatever pedestal people have him on.
    - jrm4 5y ago
      This argument, most of the time, is just bad and not smart. "If you hate capitalism, why do you use iPads? etc." It's dreck and it should stop because it's rarely constructive. Sometimes it's a necessary tool. Sometimes people are experimenting. Sometimes people do actually sell out. The problem with this argument is that it tries to shut down the above questions. Details matter, and bad arguments like the above rarely help.
      - runarberg 5y ago
        A few counterpoints I’ve heard over the years include: * The prevailing system will never be toppled by the conscious choice of the individual consumer. * No one person has the power to overturn capitalism, no matter how persistent. * There is no such thing as ethical consumption under capitalism.
        unethical_ban 5y ago
        >There is no such thing as ethical consumption under capitalism. That's such a useless statement that even were it true, it proves the parent's point. That moral judgement doesn't lead us closer to a world without capitalism. Go to any haven of anti-capitalism and ask for a link to the manual they have for getting from HERE to THERE. Not even a theory on how to dismantle what we have. FWIW personally I think capitalism is the worst system, other than all the others. Rein it in, set principles in stone for what we expect and demand from our system, but markets shouldn't magically disappear because we've lost control once.
duxup 5y ago
> Any advert in a public space that gives you no choice whether you see it or not is yours Welcome to public spaces? Life involves maybe seeing things, idea, people you don’t like. That’s not inherently bad.
- jtdev 5y ago
- drorco 5y ago
  It brings up an interesting question. I live in Israel where there are constant conflicts about what is OK to be shown in public, especially between the religious and non-religious. In Jerusalem for example, some ultra-orthodox often vandalize any kind of poster that shows a woman in it. They just tear-out/spray over the women on the poster. Some are ridiculous cases where they defaced a poster of an old woman who survived the holocaust: https://www.timesofisrael.com/female-holocaust-survivors-portrait-defaced-for-3rd-time-at-jerusalem-exhibit/ https://www.timesofisrael.com/female-holocaust-survivors-por... Even other groups could be pissed by posters that include things about women's hygiene or show models in swimsuits. In their eyes these are things they make a lot of effort to block from the eyes of their families, and having it in public breaches the culture and education they try to maintain. This is by itself interesting as public adverts can penetrate the most strict censorship that religious groups and cults maintain. Seculars on the other hand can also be pissed about anti-abortion adverts, religious propaganda, scientology, etc. and ask for them to be banned. As someone who's trying to be a "free-thinker" and tries to promote it, I think there's no point in hiding in a bubble, blocking yourself from seeing other ideas, even if they're crappy advertisements. All of this as long as the adverts/ideas fit within the aesthetics of the city they're in. The risk of doing so is essentially losing free-thinking and some sort of communication with isolated social groups.
  - b3morales 5y ago
    Can we make a distinction between postings for different purposes, though? For example, commercial, political, and public education. Do a Coca-cola billboard, a sign advocating a piece of legislation, and a poster about the local library all get the exact same level of deference?
throwawaycities 5y ago
Seems like perfectly curated marketing. But I do admit I am outraged when a row of stupid fucking scooters blocks my entire running path, when it’s clearly a location no one would ever rent a scooter, rather they are there to deliberately block the path for no other purpose than obnoxious exposure of their brand. I’d love for there to be DAOs to combat those scooter companies, say for example by blocking the executives’ front doors, cars, garages, offices with giant billboards or vending machines.
- ignoramous 5y ago
  > I’d love for there to be DAOs to combat those scooter companies, say for example by blocking the executives’ front doors, cars, garages, offices with giant billboards or vending machines. Interesting. I don't think one can legitimise just about anything with DAOs. But DAOs do represent a form of group think, an in-group, a collective, so that's there too. I wonder if GreenPeace / Amnesty / XR / Anti-FA et al have experimented with DAOs.
  - rideontime 5y ago
    You wonder if GreenPeace is getting involved in crypto?
  - throwawaycities 5y ago
    Well crowdfunding makes sense, but as a DAO members could use the token to apply their own adverts on the billboards attached to the scooter executives’ houses, cars and offices. Not sure what type of utility those non-profits could build into a token. Still I’m not opposed to it being a traditional non-profit, it might be possible to obtain 501(c)(3) tax exemption as a charity under the purpose of “combating community deterioration.”
    - ignoramous 5y ago
      > ...as a DAO, members could use the token to apply their own adverts on the billboards Ah, gotcha. That's an interesting take. A DAO to govern "retail" activist investors / lobby-groups / think-tank, if you will.
blackhaz 5y ago
Fuck that indeed. Very strong message here, and I love it. I wish I could take all those ads and shove them into their asses. But what is being suggested here? What's mine to take? If I see an ad, can I reuse the artwork? No. If I see a car, I can't just copy it's design. Can I just paint over it, or rip it apart? No, that would be vandalism. As much as I hate ads, THEY have re-arranged the world by paying for it in a free market, and we must respect that. Soviet Union had very little ads. So, yes, we must ask permission until we figure out a better way.
- DarylZero 5y ago
  > Can I just paint over it, or rip it apart? That's what Banksy does and says "yes" to. > No, that would be vandalism. So what? That's just a word. > As much as I hate ads, THEY have re-arranged the world by paying for it in a free market, and we must respect that. LOL, but why "must we"? You have no reasoning, no justification.
  - blackhaz 5y ago
    It's not just a word, it's a law, from UK's Criminal Damage Act 1971: "A person who without lawful excuse destroys or damages any property belonging to another intending to destroy or damage any such property or being reckless as to whether any such property would be destroyed or damaged shall be guilty of an offence." But whether we should change that law is probably an off-topic here. All I am saying is that we must respect the law. If we don't agree with the law, we must try to change it, and not just go about destroying each other's property.
    - squeaky-clean 5y ago
      Legal laws are also just words. It's not like you can reproduce punishment for vandalism in a laboratory with a bunch of stones.
    - DarylZero 5y ago
      What does it mean to say "we must respect the law"? Banksy demonstrates that this is not true. You only need to avoid law enforcement. It seems to me, of course I have no way of knowing, but it SEEMS to me that you are NOT EVEN AWARE that you're not making arguments.
sorokod 5y ago
Wery much in the spirit of make it personal from "altered carbon" "The personal, as everyone’s so fucking fond of saying, is political. So if some idiot politician, some power player, tries to execute policies that harm you or those you care about, take it personally. Get angry. The Machinery of Justice will not serve you here – it is slow and cold, and it is theirs, hardware and soft-. Only the little people suffer at the hands of Justice; the creatures of power slide from under it with a wink and a grin. If you want justice, you will have to claw it from them. Make it personal. Do as much damage as you can. Get your message across. That way, you stand a better chance of being taken seriously next time. Of being considered dangerous. And make no mistake about this: being taken seriously, being considered dangerous marks the difference - the only difference in their eyes - between players and little people. Players they will make deals with. Little people they liquidate. And time and again they cream your liquidation, your displacement, your torture and brutal execution with the ultimate insult that it’s just business, it’s politics, it’s the way of the world, it’s a tough life and that it’s nothing personal. Well, fuck them. Make it personal."
- sorokod 5y ago
  On a tangent, if you are interested in Takeshi Kovacs's universe, do yourself a favour and skip the diluted and emasculated product made by Netflix. The books have a raw and anarchistic edge that is not present in the TV series.
  - MattPalmer1086 5y ago
    I loved Altered Carbon the book, but really couldn't get into the TV adaptation either. I could never put my finger on exactly why they felt so different.... there is an energy to the book that isnt there in the TV.
    - aspenmayer 5y ago
      There are more books in the series, at least 3 in total that I know of.
  - stormking 5y ago
freediver 5y ago
There would be noting wrong with ads if they were always opt-in. Even if that included all the privacy-invasive tracking. You want ads, you turn them on. What is infinitely more invasive are ads that are on by default, that do not give you the choice of not seeing them in the first place. The audacity to push an idea on to you feels like a shovel across the face. If you are lucky you can opt-out (on the web usually with an ad blocker) and in the case of ads in public spaces you are just out of luck.
dredmorbius 5y ago
The quote is more Sean Tejaratchi than Banksy. Tejaratchi originally wrote the essay "Death, Phones, Scissors", published his zine Crap Hound in 1999. Banksy adapted it. Tejaratchi is OK with that, and yes, it is a great rant. https://archive.vn/DD4ny https://archive.vn/DD4ny
pier25 5y ago
Hopefully culture will evolve so that this aggressive mind violence will be as evident as physical violence.
kbenson 5y ago
I really, really love quotes like this, which make me look at a prior belief in a different way with more context and nuance, and I really like comments that introduce me to them, so thanks for that. For a long time I've defended the concept (if not the implementation) of advertising on websites as a contract between someone getting something (the user's use of the site) and what they're paying for it (attention bandwidth), with the only caveat being that the current way we serve ads is horrible for both privacy and security. That latter point is how I have justified to myself running an ad blocker. Often I've equated online advertisements to physical ones, and also noted that what we consider "ads" online is fairly narrow and in a way that helps us justify vilifying them. Advertising can be helpful, and not just in the "I didn't know about that product until I saw the ad" way, but in the way that every store name above or on the door is an advertisement, and in it's most minimal form, a purely useful informational one (the sign advertising restrooms is "advertising" that). There is, necessarily, a spectrum along which advertisements run, from informational or coercive and manipulative, but it is a spectrum, and it is important to note what it is we object to, because "advertisements" is a poor substitute for what that is and unless we identify it, we're doomed to inadequately deal with it. The idea that very public advertisements in the real world is an interesting one, because we're often presented with them even when using only public resources. Going into a store and seeing advertisements is one thing, you chose to go there and they control that area, but to be confronted with something while on public thoroughfares is another thing entirely. In some respect I totally agree, why should they be allowed to push these images and sounds towards me? On the other hand, this makes me think of Home Owners Associations and people trying to control their environment (if we assume this is something to be prevented, and not just something we can assume is public domain to remix and use at will if presented in that public manner). In any case, it's an interesting additional context to the idea of advertising in physical and digital ways and how they relate and I'll be thinking on it in the future, so I thank you for sharing it.

323 5y ago

> Any advert in a public space that gives you no choice whether you see it or not is yours. It’s yours to take, re-arrange and re-use. You can do whatever you like with it. Asking for permission is like asking to keep a rock someone just threw at your head. Funnily enough, you can say the same thing about Bansky's art: > An artist who defaced several works of famed graffiti artist Banksy has been charged with the crime of vandalism -- which is pretty incredible since Banksy's collection is itself an act of vandalism https://www.tmz.com/2014/04/02/banksy-david-william-noll-ricardo-cabeza-arrested/ https://www.tmz.com/2014/04/02/banksy-david-william-noll-ric... What a hypocrite: > The E.U. Rules Against Banksy in His Trademark Fight With a Greeting Card Company, Citing His Own Statement That ‘Copyright Is For Losers’ https://news.artnet.com/art-world/banksy-trademark-full-colour-black-1971339 https://news.artnet.com/art-world/banksy-trademark-full-colo...

kdmccormick 5y ago
What are you gaining by arguing this? What point are you trying to make? Do you really think an artist who hand-paints pieces on walls is comparable to a corporation that copy-pastes their flashing, carefully targeted, profit-seeking message onto dozens of billboards overlooking a highway? Are their motives and the results of their work not wildly different? Your second example is valid. But your first example is a complete strawman. Bansky didn't sue, the property owner did, because they liked Banksy's thing and didn't like what the vandal did.
- 323 5y ago
  A lot of times people who loudly yell "fuck the system" are also quietly using the system when it suits them, that's my point. Bansky is no "dismantle the capitalism" hero or whatever pedestal people have him on.
  - jrm4 5y ago
    This argument, most of the time, is just bad and not smart. "If you hate capitalism, why do you use iPads? etc." It's dreck and it should stop because it's rarely constructive. Sometimes it's a necessary tool. Sometimes people are experimenting. Sometimes people do actually sell out. The problem with this argument is that it tries to shut down the above questions. Details matter, and bad arguments like the above rarely help.
    - runarberg 5y ago
      A few counterpoints I’ve heard over the years include: * The prevailing system will never be toppled by the conscious choice of the individual consumer. * No one person has the power to overturn capitalism, no matter how persistent. * There is no such thing as ethical consumption under capitalism.
      - unethical_ban 5y ago
        >There is no such thing as ethical consumption under capitalism. That's such a useless statement that even were it true, it proves the parent's point. That moral judgement doesn't lead us closer to a world without capitalism. Go to any haven of anti-capitalism and ask for a link to the manual they have for getting from HERE to THERE. Not even a theory on how to dismantle what we have. FWIW personally I think capitalism is the worst system, other than all the others. Rein it in, set principles in stone for what we expect and demand from our system, but markets shouldn't magically disappear because we've lost control once.

duxup 5y ago

> Any advert in a public space that gives you no choice whether you see it or not is yours Welcome to public spaces? Life involves maybe seeing things, idea, people you don’t like. That’s not inherently bad.

jtdev 5y ago
drorco 5y ago
It brings up an interesting question. I live in Israel where there are constant conflicts about what is OK to be shown in public, especially between the religious and non-religious. In Jerusalem for example, some ultra-orthodox often vandalize any kind of poster that shows a woman in it. They just tear-out/spray over the women on the poster. Some are ridiculous cases where they defaced a poster of an old woman who survived the holocaust: https://www.timesofisrael.com/female-holocaust-survivors-portrait-defaced-for-3rd-time-at-jerusalem-exhibit/ https://www.timesofisrael.com/female-holocaust-survivors-por... Even other groups could be pissed by posters that include things about women's hygiene or show models in swimsuits. In their eyes these are things they make a lot of effort to block from the eyes of their families, and having it in public breaches the culture and education they try to maintain. This is by itself interesting as public adverts can penetrate the most strict censorship that religious groups and cults maintain. Seculars on the other hand can also be pissed about anti-abortion adverts, religious propaganda, scientology, etc. and ask for them to be banned. As someone who's trying to be a "free-thinker" and tries to promote it, I think there's no point in hiding in a bubble, blocking yourself from seeing other ideas, even if they're crappy advertisements. All of this as long as the adverts/ideas fit within the aesthetics of the city they're in. The risk of doing so is essentially losing free-thinking and some sort of communication with isolated social groups.
- b3morales 5y ago
  Can we make a distinction between postings for different purposes, though? For example, commercial, political, and public education. Do a Coca-cola billboard, a sign advocating a piece of legislation, and a poster about the local library all get the exact same level of deference?

throwawaycities 5y ago

Seems like perfectly curated marketing. But I do admit I am outraged when a row of stupid fucking scooters blocks my entire running path, when it’s clearly a location no one would ever rent a scooter, rather they are there to deliberately block the path for no other purpose than obnoxious exposure of their brand. I’d love for there to be DAOs to combat those scooter companies, say for example by blocking the executives’ front doors, cars, garages, offices with giant billboards or vending machines.

ignoramous 5y ago
> I’d love for there to be DAOs to combat those scooter companies, say for example by blocking the executives’ front doors, cars, garages, offices with giant billboards or vending machines. Interesting. I don't think one can legitimise just about anything with DAOs. But DAOs do represent a form of group think, an in-group, a collective, so that's there too. I wonder if GreenPeace / Amnesty / XR / Anti-FA et al have experimented with DAOs.
- rideontime 5y ago
  You wonder if GreenPeace is getting involved in crypto?
- throwawaycities 5y ago
  Well crowdfunding makes sense, but as a DAO members could use the token to apply their own adverts on the billboards attached to the scooter executives’ houses, cars and offices. Not sure what type of utility those non-profits could build into a token. Still I’m not opposed to it being a traditional non-profit, it might be possible to obtain 501(c)(3) tax exemption as a charity under the purpose of “combating community deterioration.”
  - ignoramous 5y ago
    > ...as a DAO, members could use the token to apply their own adverts on the billboards Ah, gotcha. That's an interesting take. A DAO to govern "retail" activist investors / lobby-groups / think-tank, if you will.

blackhaz 5y ago

Fuck that indeed. Very strong message here, and I love it. I wish I could take all those ads and shove them into their asses. But what is being suggested here? What's mine to take? If I see an ad, can I reuse the artwork? No. If I see a car, I can't just copy it's design. Can I just paint over it, or rip it apart? No, that would be vandalism. As much as I hate ads, THEY have re-arranged the world by paying for it in a free market, and we must respect that. Soviet Union had very little ads. So, yes, we must ask permission until we figure out a better way.

DarylZero 5y ago
> Can I just paint over it, or rip it apart? That's what Banksy does and says "yes" to. > No, that would be vandalism. So what? That's just a word. > As much as I hate ads, THEY have re-arranged the world by paying for it in a free market, and we must respect that. LOL, but why "must we"? You have no reasoning, no justification.
- blackhaz 5y ago
  It's not just a word, it's a law, from UK's Criminal Damage Act 1971: "A person who without lawful excuse destroys or damages any property belonging to another intending to destroy or damage any such property or being reckless as to whether any such property would be destroyed or damaged shall be guilty of an offence." But whether we should change that law is probably an off-topic here. All I am saying is that we must respect the law. If we don't agree with the law, we must try to change it, and not just go about destroying each other's property.
  - squeaky-clean 5y ago
    Legal laws are also just words. It's not like you can reproduce punishment for vandalism in a laboratory with a bunch of stones.
  - DarylZero 5y ago
    What does it mean to say "we must respect the law"? Banksy demonstrates that this is not true. You only need to avoid law enforcement. It seems to me, of course I have no way of knowing, but it SEEMS to me that you are NOT EVEN AWARE that you're not making arguments.

sorokod 5y ago

Wery much in the spirit of make it personal from "altered carbon" "The personal, as everyone’s so fucking fond of saying, is political. So if some idiot politician, some power player, tries to execute policies that harm you or those you care about, take it personally. Get angry. The Machinery of Justice will not serve you here – it is slow and cold, and it is theirs, hardware and soft-. Only the little people suffer at the hands of Justice; the creatures of power slide from under it with a wink and a grin. If you want justice, you will have to claw it from them. Make it personal. Do as much damage as you can. Get your message across. That way, you stand a better chance of being taken seriously next time. Of being considered dangerous. And make no mistake about this: being taken seriously, being considered dangerous marks the difference - the only difference in their eyes - between players and little people. Players they will make deals with. Little people they liquidate. And time and again they cream your liquidation, your displacement, your torture and brutal execution with the ultimate insult that it’s just business, it’s politics, it’s the way of the world, it’s a tough life and that it’s nothing personal. Well, fuck them. Make it personal."

sorokod 5y ago
On a tangent, if you are interested in Takeshi Kovacs's universe, do yourself a favour and skip the diluted and emasculated product made by Netflix. The books have a raw and anarchistic edge that is not present in the TV series.
- MattPalmer1086 5y ago
  I loved Altered Carbon the book, but really couldn't get into the TV adaptation either. I could never put my finger on exactly why they felt so different.... there is an energy to the book that isnt there in the TV.
  - aspenmayer 5y ago
    There are more books in the series, at least 3 in total that I know of.
- stormking 5y ago

freediver 5y ago

There would be noting wrong with ads if they were always opt-in. Even if that included all the privacy-invasive tracking. You want ads, you turn them on. What is infinitely more invasive are ads that are on by default, that do not give you the choice of not seeing them in the first place. The audacity to push an idea on to you feels like a shovel across the face. If you are lucky you can opt-out (on the web usually with an ad blocker) and in the case of ads in public spaces you are just out of luck.

dredmorbius 5y ago

The quote is more Sean Tejaratchi than Banksy. Tejaratchi originally wrote the essay "Death, Phones, Scissors", published his zine Crap Hound in 1999. Banksy adapted it. Tejaratchi is OK with that, and yes, it is a great rant. https://archive.vn/DD4ny https://archive.vn/DD4ny

pier25 5y ago

Hopefully culture will evolve so that this aggressive mind violence will be as evident as physical violence.

kbenson 5y ago

I really, really love quotes like this, which make me look at a prior belief in a different way with more context and nuance, and I really like comments that introduce me to them, so thanks for that. For a long time I've defended the concept (if not the implementation) of advertising on websites as a contract between someone getting something (the user's use of the site) and what they're paying for it (attention bandwidth), with the only caveat being that the current way we serve ads is horrible for both privacy and security. That latter point is how I have justified to myself running an ad blocker. Often I've equated online advertisements to physical ones, and also noted that what we consider "ads" online is fairly narrow and in a way that helps us justify vilifying them. Advertising can be helpful, and not just in the "I didn't know about that product until I saw the ad" way, but in the way that every store name above or on the door is an advertisement, and in it's most minimal form, a purely useful informational one (the sign advertising restrooms is "advertising" that). There is, necessarily, a spectrum along which advertisements run, from informational or coercive and manipulative, but it is a spectrum, and it is important to note what it is we object to, because "advertisements" is a poor substitute for what that is and unless we identify it, we're doomed to inadequately deal with it. The idea that very public advertisements in the real world is an interesting one, because we're often presented with them even when using only public resources. Going into a store and seeing advertisements is one thing, you chose to go there and they control that area, but to be confronted with something while on public thoroughfares is another thing entirely. In some respect I totally agree, why should they be allowed to push these images and sounds towards me? On the other hand, this makes me think of Home Owners Associations and people trying to control their environment (if we assume this is something to be prevented, and not just something we can assume is public domain to remix and use at will if presented in that public manner). In any case, it's an interesting additional context to the idea of advertising in physical and digital ways and how they relate and I'll be thinking on it in the future, so I thank you for sharing it.