Thursday, November 20, 2008
Financial Statement
Posted by Noah Bonaparte Pais on Thu, Nov 20, 2008 at 11:18 PM
“New Orleans Unchained” sounds just naughty enough to get locals’ attention. What’s that, a meeting group for S&M addicts? Not quite, unless you consider holiday shopping at big-box retailers a special form of masochism — and, come to think of it, you should. The Saturday, Nov. 22, initiative is actually an extension of America Unchained, a national campaign aiming to steer consumers toward the Octavia Books of the world rather than, say, Borders, which just happens to be holding its soft opening in the Garden District on (you guessed it) Saturday, Nov. 22. So go check out those big comfy chairs and expensive coffees on St. Charles Avenue, but make sure you buy that Sierra Club calendar your dad doesn’t want from an independent instead. It’s kind of subversive to do otherwise.
Proud sponsors of our own “shop local” promotion, Gambit Weekly rang Dana Eness of the Urban Conservancy and Stay Local! for the business on small businesses.
What’s the gist of America Unchained?
Across the country, independent business alliances like Stay Local! are all saying, “Let’s take this day, the Saturday before Thanksgiving, to shop conscientiously and try to do all of our shopping at locally owned stores.”
How is Stay Local! promoting the event?
Everybody’s kind of jumping on at different stages. This is our first time to do it, so we’re starting small — reaching out to our member business and saying, “Let us know what you’re doing.” There are so many great things going on. I’m collecting them all on our events page — really creative, win-win-win events.
Any you’re particularly excited about?
The one I love is Mat & Naddie’s pairing up with Anne Baker, who is an urban farm and gardening consultant. She does workshops all over town on how to do pot and container gardening, composting, that sort of thing. She’s doing a “beds and breakfast” workshop. It’s $45, you get wonderful lunch snacks provided by Mat & Naddie’s, she shows you how to do container gardening, and the containers they create stay with Mat & Naddie’s. They keep the flowerbeds that are created, the folks that come get this great lunch and leave with a skill, and proceeds go to Anne Baker’s community garden project in Gentilly. It’s brilliant.
What other types of promotions are happening?
There are lots of others with 20 percent of proceeds going to a charitable organization. La Divina Gelateria has something going on with four artisans selling their wares — a "homespun holiday" idea.
Comments (11)
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I just wish Stay Local wouldn't steal the intellectual property of local writers.
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I support this movement in principle, but using Octavia as emblematic of a typical local bookstore is unwarranted, as they have consistently ignored requests by this local publisher to carry our books, as opposed to every other independent bookstore in New Orleans, all of whom have been supportive. Respect for local stores and publishers ought to be mutual.
An excellent if minimalist site reminding us where to find Local Bookstores. Lately I wander into deVille a lot, if only because I work around the corner, and their selection if eclectic but excellent.
As part of New Orleans Unchained, shutterbugdiva.com will offer a 15% discount on most purchases November 22nd and 23rd. Discounts can be obtained through the following page: http://www.shutterbugdiva.com/website/Sale.html For additional information contact marianne@shutterbugdiva.com
Hi Frolic, Could you be more specific about "stealing the intellectual property of local writers"? Thanks so much, Dana
If my above comments regarding Octavia Books seem too strident, I'd like to qualify my comments by saying that Tom Lowenburg, at the very nascent stages of NOLAFugees.com, was a great friend to the site. In fact, he was the first local independent bookseller to agree to be photographed with our former society columnnist, Cookie. Indeed, Lowenburg is immortalized on page 26 of our first book, Year Zero (available at Octavia), as Cookie writes: "Tom Lowenburg of Octavia Books much friendlier." The tone of the comments in my previous post are due to a recent lack of communication regarding our newest book, "Soul Is Bulletproof," and I am confident that the matters which caused a lack of publisher/bookseller continuity will soon be resolved.
Sure Dana, Your organization routinely reposts full articles from local and national publication. You post a disclaimer saying it's fair use, but it's not (well, only a federal judge can say what is fair use, but you are way out of line with allowed uses). Fair use is matter a balancing certain criteria, and you're right that as a group "on the side of the angels" you gain certain leniency in using copyrighted material. Where you're wrong, I would argue, is in the reproduction of the full articles. The amount of the work quoted is an important criteria. The fact that you reproduce the full articles strikes me as a flagrant copyright violation and not an example of fair use. Let's assume that you're right and I'm wrong. Perhaps you get sued, you take this matter to trial, and a federal judge decides that the criteria regarding the amount of quoted material doesn't apply in your situation. Even if that happened (and I don't think it would), I still believe it's wrong for you to be quoting full articles. Isn't your goal to promote local business? Why undermine the business of people who produce intellectual property? Furthermore, your current actions are directly hurting local businesses. By reproducing the full articles, instead of posting an excerpt and directing people to the original source, you are discouraging people from visiting the sites of local publications. Driving traffic to local publications would be a way of supporting these businesses, but your organization is doing just the opposite. [Apologies for any typos. It's hard to write something in this time comment window.]
Thanks for your thoughtful response, Frolic. Our intent is to get the stories out there, provide a long-lasting archive (links to original sites often eventually go dead), extend the reach of the stories to wider audience and extend the shelf-life" of the stories, and of course, give full credit where credit is due by both crediting the author, citing the point of origin for the article and linking to that original site. Maybe we should talk in person so you can tell me more about what I don't know and we can work toward a satisfactory resolution?
I feel I should apologize to the folks at Octavia Books for airing what should be obvious to anyone paying attention is a petty squabble. The differences between Octavia Books and myself are best left resolved out of the public sphere, and certainly not on such a high-voltage media bullhorn that is blogofneworleans.com. If anyone has been made uneasy, I am sorry.
