Clear Channel’s L.A. Billboards: Ignoring Outdoor Advertising Industry Code of Principles

I am often criticized for addressing my concerns through improper methods and told I should operate within the law if I take such a strong issue with OOH advertising. I understand the concern but the industry I am up against has never played by the rules so why should I? 

VIA: Ban Billboard Blight

Several months ago, we pointed out the fact that a Clear Channel billboard on Lincoln Blvd. in Venice violated an outdoor advertising industry code regarding the proximity of alcohol ads to schools and places of worship. That ad for New Amsterdam vodka was recently removed, but what’s displayed now on that 52 ft. high, 624 sq. ft. sign? An ad for Camarena tequila. More [HERE]

Funny Math? Clear Channel’s $3.9 Million Donation to the LAPD

Dennis over at Ban Billboard Blight is a solid crusader who sees through the bullshit and tells it like it is regarding all things advertising and public space in LA. Follow his insights for the incredibly specific and yet oddly universal tactics that the billboard industry is using to edge its way further into the LA city fabric.

VIA: Ban Billboard Blight

The Los Angeles City Council is expected to vote this Wednesday on accepting Clear Channel’s donation of space on 12 billboards for LAPD public safety messages. That space for ads running for five weeks is worth a total of $3,978,630, says Clear Channel, which has been heavily lobbying city councilmembers to allow more digital billboards on city streets and to grant amnesty to hundreds of billboards that don’t have permits or have been altered in violation of their permits. More [HERE]

More Billboards Coming To Los Angeles? Judge Rules City’s Off-Site Sign Ban Unconstitutional

Just when I was beginning to like Los Angeles.....Ugh

VIA: Ban Billboard Blight

Los Angeles has been trying to shed its label as the country’s billboard capital, but Clear Channel and other companies pushing to put up new digital billboards got a major boost this week when a Superior Court judge ruled that the city’s ban on new off-site signs violates the free speech guarantee of the California state constitution. More [HERE]

L.A.’s Digital Billboards Go Dark. What’s Next?

VIA: Ban Billboard Blight

Does anyone out there believe that the final chapter of the city’s digital billboard saga has been written? That the collection of black billboard faces pasted into the visual landscape like minimalist art pieces is Clear Channel and CBS Outdoor’s farewell gesture to long-suffering residents of the city? More [HERE]

Most of Los Angeles's Digital Billboards Have Now Gone Dark

LA has been waging a war against Clear Channel Outdoor for nearly 6 years now, a battle which has cost the city unimaginable amounts of money. Finally today those offending digital signs which are at the center of this debacle have gone dark by court order. While I am happy to see the city of LA take back control its streets from a company who essentially thought it was above the law, I am disheartened that this battle has been waged due to the illegality of the signage and not more ideological issues about advertisings place on our city streets. One battle at a time I guess as I look forward to NPA, and CPI, finally packing their bags from NY and heading back to a city which supports its illegal flyposting business. 

VIA: LA Curbed

Notice a lack of blinky flashiness on the roads yesterday? That's because billboard companies Clear Channel Outdoors and CBS Outdoors actually turned off their digital billboards yesterday, per court order. The move is just the latest in the long-running and surprisingly kind of dramatic battle between billboard companies, other billboard companies, and the city. CBS and Clear Channel put up about 100 signs...More [HERE]

Legal Wars: L.A.’s Mobile Billboard Ban Upheld By Court

VIA: Ban Billboard Blight

The city’s ban on billboards mounted to trailers and parked on city streets was upheld this week by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. A San Fernando Valley company responsible for many of the billboards had sued the city shortly after the 2011 enactment of the ban, claiming that it violated the company’s First Amendment rights. More [HERE]

Legal Wars: End of the Line for L.A.’s Digital Billboards?

As per usual, Ban Billboard Blight has followed the digital billboard scandal in LA with incredible detail and has recently posted about a potential victory for city residents. What I find incredible about the entire sordid affair that is LA's billboard debacle, is the audacity with which OOH companies act in the face of public outcry and municipal demands. Most recently BBB reports that Clear Channel is threatening to sue the city of LA for well over 100 million dollars in lost revenue and damages if they force the company to remove its digital signage, which was put up illegally during a city wide billboard moratorium. I mean are you fucking kidding me? What other industry do you see acting illegally and then threatening to sue the government when they are told to stop doing illegal things? It is fantastically outrageous and at the same time incredibly disheartening that somehow they continue to get away with these tactics. It is scandals like this, and the many others we report on here at PublicAdCampaign that lead us to believe there is no compromise to allow outdoor advertising a place in our public spaces and that an outright ban is the only way to insure our streets and our minds are treated with the respect they deserve. 

VIA: Ban Billboard Blight

The final death knell for the 101 digital billboards now flashing their brilliantly-lighted ads on city streets may have been sounded yesterday, when the California Supreme Court refused to review a lower court ruling that says the permits issued for the signs must be revoked. More [HERE]

Will L.A.’s Digital Billboards Be Going Dark? And If So, When?

The hits just keep on coming. It does not matter if the company is a small time wildposting OOH like NPA outdoor, or a mega giant like CBS, the quest is for profit without consideration. Something about the practice of selling public space to the highest bidder for commercial products we all don't need, makes you act above the law. I do not understand why our cities allow OOH companies to outright bully them despite having clear set laws imposed by citizens. The fact that we spend so much to defend ourselves from these agressive business maneuvers, instead of filling our schools with more teachers, boggles my mind. The business as a whole has proven its inability to get along with our cities and our rules and should be outright banned from operating at all. We would all be better off for it. 

VIA Ban Billboard Blight

Yesterday’s California Appeals Court decision ordering the revocation of permits issued for 100 digital billboards in Los Angeles was ample cause for celebration by those who have been saying since 2006 that the backroom deal struck with Clear Channel and CBS Outdoor to allow more than 800 of the brightly-lit signs with their rapidly changing messages was illegal because it violated the city’s own ordinances. More [HERE]

The Digital Billboard Preservation Act: A Brief History

This site often focuses on the public space issues associated with outdoor advertising, aesthetics, mental health, public accessibility, consumer behavior, etc. While these are all issues which we think outdoor advertising has a net overall negative affect on, an area we often overlook is the political implications that come along with big profits. Ban Billboard Blight takes the time to fully explain the inner workings of the outdoor advertising industries quest for profit in LA, and the backside of these politics do not look good for the public at large and the political process in general when so much money is involved.

VIA: Ban Billboard Blight

Late last year I met with a small group of billboard company representatives and lobbyists for lunch at a downtown cafe. I knew that Clear Channel and other major billboard companies wanted to make a deal with the city to protect existing digital billboards and allow new ones in exchange for taking down some conventional billboards and giving the city a share of digital billboard revenue. I also knew that the purpose of the meeting was to deliver a sales pitch to me–and by extension, the communities where digital billboards are a hot-button issue–on this idea. More [HERE]

This Space Available - Brian Lehrer Interview

Gwenaelle and Marc Gobe speaking with Brian Lehrer about their documentary film "This Space Available"

Fuel Outdoor: In With a Bang, Out With a Whimper…and a $1.8 Million Fine

Dennis over at Ban Billboard Blight has reported on a big hit to Fuel Outdoor. We couldn't be happier that this brazen company is getting their due and are curious if our own offenders here in New York City will ever get their comeuppance after winning the first of their legal battles.

Via Ban Billboard Blight

New York-based Fuel Outdoor was one of the first rogue companies that rode into L.A. with the following strategy: Put up billboards and supergraphic signs all over the city without regard for ordinances and requirements for permits, then sue the city when the citations start coming and get the courts to declare those ordinances–most importantly, the 2002 ban on new off-site signs–an unconstitutional infringement of free speech. More [Here]

Ads on Illegal Signs: Who’s the Responsible Party?

VIA Ban Billboard Blight

Until recently, southbound motorists on the 110 freeway near the L.A. Convention center were greeted with huge fabric Pepsi signs draped over two sides of a seven-level parking garage. On Highland Ave. in Hollywood, an even larger Pepsi sign hung from the side of a historic building housing a film archive, dominating the view from blocks away. And for several months, the familiar Pepsi logo adorned a building alongside the 405 freeway in West L.A. [More Here]

Public/Private Partnerships: Will Commercialization Save Our City Parks?

Dennis Hathaway at Ban Billboard Blight is a constant source of inspiration as he follows the ins and outs of LA's outdoor advertising sign developments. This recent post asks some serious questions about LA city council members' approach to public debate and asking the hard questions that would reveal the motivations behind public/private partnerships which would bring commercial advertising to public parks in LA. Riding a wave of red ink, it would seem that the outdoor advertising industry is only too willing to step in and pick up the slack. The question Dennis raises and which should have been raised by the city council is why do we not have money for our parks when we have millions in tax breaks for real estate development and millions in outdoor advertising violations unpaid. Clearly parks aren't underfunded, we simply underfund them.

VIA Ban Billboard Blight

Public/Private partnerships. At last week’s meeting of the L.A. City Council’s Budget and Finance Committee, the term kept bobbing like a life preserver grasped for by city agencies at risk of drowning in a violent tide of red ink. Councilman Bill Rosendahl, speaking of the Recreation and Parks department, said that in the absence of such partnerships “we’re not going to be able to sustain our parks, it’s as simple as that.” The other committee members who spoke–Paul Koretz, Greig Smith, and Chairman Bernard Parks–all nodded assent to Rosendahl’s declaration, apparently feeling no need to examine either its truth or its implications for the city’s future. [More Here]

New Legal Strategy? Latest Billboard Company Lawsuits Name Community Activists

Dennis Hathaway over at Ban Billboard Blight just sent me a link to the Blu mural controversy in the LA times. He thought I would find it interesting, although I'm not sure I want to speak directly about the censorship at this time. That said, Dennis has a unique understanding of media production in public space in LA. This position makes him acutely aware of the abuses of public space by commercial media and the incredible pressure the public must put on advertising companies to have them act within the will of the general public. Commenting on the Blu mural removal, he sees a deep disconnect between public media production and private media production in our shared spaces. He writes...

"The irony is that on Thursday the city planning commission is holding a hearing on a major development just a few blocks away that proposes to have large swaths of electronic advertising signs embedded into the walls of the building. So public space can be appropriated to display the products of capitalism, but that space must be kept free of comments upon capitalism."

While Dennis clearly sees the irony within which public space continually operates, championing commercial forces while tip toeing around public media productions, his concerns are dismissed wholeheartedly by the companies promoting private media within Los Angeles. This is made clear in a recent lawsuit in which Dennis, amongst others, challenged permits obtained by CBS Outdoor and Clear Channel to convert standard billboards into digital signage. The companies claimed that the parties had no right to challenge the permits in court as none of the parties were "aggrieved" by the billboards in question.

While there are many reasons why a politically active and socially engaged citizen might take issue with specific outdoor signage as well as the companies' continued abuse of the law and public opinion, in light of the recent Blu mural controversy Dennis seems to define another reason why regular citizens should be "aggrieved" by outdoor medias abuse of public space. Time and time again, massive controversial commercial signage is allowed to stand despite public outcry and or basic disregard to the law, and time and time again, public media productions are forced into a theatre of public opinion.

While the later is not a bad thing, the disconnect between the response to the two types of media production is enough to make any concerned citizen irate. We all know the common saying "money talks and bullshit walks", in this situation the bullshit we are talking about is the very means to which the public creates and identifies social issues and common concerns in public space. If public conversations through public media productions are silenced because they don't have the "money to talk" in public space, well we clearly aren't operating our public spaces in a beneficial manner.

VIA Ban Billboard Blight

The president of the Coalition to Ban Billboard Blight (CBBB) and the heads of homeowner’s groups who challenged permits issued for digital billboards in the Westwood area have been named as parties in lawsuits filed against the city of Los Angeles by Clear Channel Outdoor and CBS Outdoor. More [Here]

Billboard Liberation Front Hits Mobile Sign in L.A.

VIA Ban Billboard Blight

Are Billboards Good For Business? For One Major U.S. City, the Answer Is An Emphatic NO

While it is often argued that outdoor advertising is an integral part of an economically viable metropolitan city, Dennis over at Ban Billboard Blight gives us some strong evidence otherwise.

Via Ban Billboard Blight

Houston, Texas, the fourth-largest city in the U.S, has some definite similarities to Los Angeles in terms of size, racial and ethnic diversity, and spread of suburbs far beyond a central city core. One thing L.A. doesn’t share with Houston, though, is the latter city’s long-standing commitment to reducing the number of the billboards, both as a beautification measure and a stimulus to economic development. [More Here]

David Ogilvy and Jordan Seiler: Adman and Agitator, Defenders of Public Space

It's Friday and I finished installing a mockup of my submission for the Urban Canvass Design Competition for the Dumbo art fest about 8 hours ago. This post from Dennis Hathaway is a little self congratulatory but I want to use it as an opportunity to talk about my appreciation. Over the last two days I was helped by Keith Schwietzer of No Longer Empty and two other volunteers I only know by first name, Dan and Alex. Their physical and moral support was unparalleled and I cannot thank them enough. I want to tell them both that this is the last weave install. While I love the design, it is time to move on in an attempt to prevent branding of PublicAdCampaign imagery.

The PublicAdCampaign project, while funded and run by myself, has relied heavily on the participation of other artists and citizens. I have not found a proper way to thank these individuals despite the importance of doing so. In particular, I want to talk about the participants in the NYSAT and TOSAT projects. I feel like I personally benefit from the projects more than the individual artists. While benefit is an odd word to use when talking about a public space activism project, it is something that has weighed heavy on my conscience.

I run these projects because I think they are important. I think they challenge the steadfast rules of public participation. I think they challenge people to consider themselves as active participants in the curation of their shared spaces. That said, there is no way that these projects would ever happen without the submissions, support, of all of the individuals who selflessly donate their work and time to the cause. These people are the true champions of civil disobedience whether they want to admit it or not.

Recently I read through the PaperGirl newspaper that was produced for PaperGirl 5. It spoke heavily about the act of gift giving as an important aspect of the project. It investigated what the benefits of gift exchange might be and how that might be worthwhile pursuing as an artistic and public project. I could not agree more with the conclusions they came to and I would like to use that idea to thank all of those who have contributed to the takeover projects.

While I have not come up with a way to champion the individual artists involved in the takeover projects beyond listing them on the website and thanking them individually, I would implore them to consider their work as a part of a symbolic gift exchange never seen before. Not only does their work act as a gift, enlivening public spaces worldwide, but their gift also functions as a tool for public protest, invigorating the profundity of their gift.

What do we expect from a gift given? truthfully we cannot expect anything, and in the words of PaperGirl, maybe a nod, or a wink of appreciation is the extent of our return. With the takeover projects, the individual artist gets no physical return on investment and this is what weighs heavy on me. I have not found a way to thank them appropriately. I hope and assume that return is not the motivation but still want to find a way to return the favor that is their donation and participation.

I guess what Im getting to here is that I want to continue to do these takeover projects in the future. I see an extended life for these projects and once ten deep, an appreciation for the publics concern for public space, both nationally and internationally. I see these projects expressing a global concern for how public space is being used. That said, to continue to do these projects I must rely on the countless brave and selfless individuals that donate their work without compensation or renumeration, again something I have not figured out how to provide appreciation for. In the end, the donation of work comes from an individual's belief in the ideals of the project. With that said, the donation of work also comes with, however little this may matter, my deepest appreciation for the individuals interest in promoting a healthy public space. I cannot thank them enough and I hope this small post, however trivial, expresses my deepest gratitude and helps motivate the continued participation from artists who might have more pressing concerns on their agenda.

VIA Ban Billboard Blight

The late David Ogilvy, who founded the Madison Avenue firm of Ogilvy & Mather that created such iconic campaigns as “The Man in the Hathaway Shirt,” is sometimes known as the father of modern advertising. So the fact that he also had a passionate hatred for outdoor advertising may come as something of a surprise. [More Here]

Billboard Advertising: Sex, Violence, and the Art of Marketing

VIA Ban Billboard Blight

Depending upon whom you ask, the billboard above could be a creative conflation of high art—think abstract expressionists like Jackson Pollock—and the low art of titillation in the service of commerce, or it could be an offensive depiction of a female posed as victim of violence, meant to attract voyeuristic glances in a cynical ploy to stamp a brand—in this case designer jeans–upon the public’s consciousness. [More Here]

Blade Runner II? Developer Wants To Wrap Downtown Towers With Huge Electronic Advertisments

As per usual, Ban Billboard Blight has some fantastic content. While outdoor advertising for a long time relied on size and repetition to get your attention, new focus on your specific consumer needs will draw you ever closer to the brink of dilution.

VIA Ban Billboard Blight

Almost everyone’s either seen or heard about the 2002 film “Minority Report” with its scene of Tom Cruise walking past digital advertising signs that call out to him by name and deliver sales pitches for such things as Guinness beer, Lexus, and a trip to an island paradise. And almost everyone’s read or knows about “1984,” George Orwell’s novel of a dystopian future that spawned the iconic phrase, “Big Brother is Watching You.” Now, thanks to tiny chips embedded in millions of credit cards and cell phones, those sci-fi fantasies may soon become a reality. [More Here]

The Naked City: More Supergraphic Signs Disappear

Los Angeles has been making some amazing strides towards controlling the proliferation of illegal supergraphics, thanks in no small part to Dennis Hathaway and his unprecedented dedication.

VIA Ban Billboard Blight

Supergraphic "Sex and the City 2" ad being removed from Santa Monica Blvd. office building Northbound travelers on the 405 freeway in West L.A. might be asking what happened to the supergraphic signs that used to be stretched across the face of a 12-story office building on adjacent Sepulveda Blvd., advertising such products as movies, cellphones, ... [More Here]