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Public relations is a tricky job, especially for the companies that operate illegal signs across Toronto. They've already got to deal with a site dedicated solely to putting an end to the practice, an increasingly aware and increasingly concerned populace, and those damned vandals who forgo legal means of dissent by dealing with the problem directly. So it comes as a bit of a surprise that Posterchild, a prominent member of (and advocate for) the lattermost group, has decided to lend a helping hand to add some much-needed accountability to the whole operation.
Last Monday—using data gleaned from Rami Tabello's IllegalSigns.ca—Posterchild stenciled solicitations for feedback below three illegally-run fascia signs downtown ("persistent violators," as he put it). A play on the now-ubiquitous "How's My Driving?" slogan typically seen on the back of big rigs, the stencils feature the number of the City's Building Division, which is, among other tasks, responsible for sign permits. Posterchild, an equal opportunity stenciler, hit one sign each of Astral Media, Titan Outdoor, and Strategic Media. (Titan and Strategic, by the way, are the two companies currently suing the City. And Astral Media is a whole other story.)
See the three offending signs after the fold.
464 Bathurst Street
As Tabello notes, the site—now used by Titan—was formerly abandoned by Maxximum Outdoor because the "sign got vandalized on a daily basis....Somebody was even climbing on the roof and cutting the sign down and paint bombing it." So, really, this is a step up.
375 Queen Street West
Here, Tabello says, a fascia sign is being operated under a mural permit by Astral Media. (For the distinction between fascia and mural, and the reason why that distinction is important, read Tabello's explanation. Titan Outdoor is suing the city because, they argue, making the distinction between fascia and mural signs is unconstitutional.)
128 Peter Street
Strategic Media is operating this sign without a permit, says Tabello. Until last week—and when Posterchild put up the stencil—an alcohol ad filled up the frame. When he returned to photograph the sign the day after putting the stencil up, though, the ad was gone. Says Post: "the huge Peter ad was taken down the next day and it appeared as though the stencil was half-heartedly crossed out!" The security camera trained on Post the night before might have had something to do with it.
All photos courtesy of Posterchild.
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Globe and Mail, June 2
he biggest offenders in Toronto are Pattison Outdoor Advertising, CBS Outdoor Canada, and AstralMedia Outdoor, Mr. Tabello says.
Astral holds a $1-billion, 20-year contract with the city to build and control all of its street furniture, such as benches and bus shelters.
This is proof that Astral's advertisements are above board, says Luc Sabbatini, president of AstralMedia Outdoor.
"If you call the city, they will say that Astral is a good partner with the city," he says. "So I don't think that on one side we could be a good partner with the city and on the other side do things that are not in line with the bylaws."
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is what happens when City Staff loses its bottle and advises councillors not to add a "legal ads" rider to the Street Furniture contract - Astral trades on the business relationship to the media while continuing to do what it thinks it can get away yet.
I would love to get rid of the illegal signs all over the city, but I really can't commend your chum "Post" for the graffiti, which surely is equally illegal and presumably less appreciated by the building owners.
Wouldn't his approach would have greater moral merit if he actually painted the signs themselves, rather than vandalizing the properties on which they're mounted?
If they're illegal, would it be OK for a ragtag band of vigilantes to remove them?
Nice work, Posterchild.
I don't like graffiti or tags but anyone who can bring down some billboards is doing some good.
>If they're illegal, would it be OK for a ragtag band of vigilantes to remove them?
The overuse of the word 'illegal' has muddied the waters on this issue.
Almost all the signs aren't 'illegal' persay (they are legally allowed to be at most locations that they are at).
The 'legality' of the whole thing and Rami's *sarmcasm* ace in the hole *sarcasm* is the painted versus vinyl debate.
If you tried to remove them you'd be charged as such.
Titan is a different story, they really do have a LOT of illegal walls all over the city.
Advertising against advertising is about as contradictory as it can get...
To verbally nitpick two points:
- Posterchild's stencils are not ads. (Insofar as they were not paid for, are not selling a product or service, and were done without permission of the City.)
- The ads pictured are, under Toronto's sign by-laws, all illegal. (In that they are not in accordance with the law, in this case Toronto's sign bi-law. Posterchild's stencils are also illegal.) It is fine to debate over "painted vs. vinyl," but the fact remains that the signs are currently illegal. They are not legally allowed to be at the locations they are.
On that note, I would be interested in hearing why you think that "if you tried to remove [the signs] you'd be charged." It is, in fact, the City's duty to remove illegal signs (not the public's). I can see that the City may not want the public to deal with all law enforcement themselves (hello vigilantes!)—but I can also see why they wouldn't care if someone was happily doing this job for them. As the City has mentioned many times, they're short-staffed to deal with the problem and could use some help.
We're definatley not going to agree on what is advertising and what is not.
Posterchild is selling a message. no matter how you slice it up (to me) it IS advertising (IMHO).
The reason you'd be charged...
1. It's private property - plain and simple
2. The signs HAVE a permit even though they might not be following the permit's language (painted vs vinyl) and therefore are allowed to be at said locations.
3. is a quote from your para: the City's duty to remove illegal signs (not the public's).
The violation aren't as cut and dry as Rami makes it sound. The locations (mostly) have permits to be there. What's actually posted at the location is what is questionable.
Bylaw officers don't 'remove' the signs. They simply ask the company to comply or face a fine (from what I understand they rarely do neither).
So again, the word illegal paints a slightly different picture then reality, it's not like the Toronto Police Services come down to the outdoor companies and arrest the presidents.
The OED accepts that one of the definitions for "advertisement" is "A (written) statement calling attention to anything; a notification, a ‘notice.’" but notes that that definition is obscure or archaic. The primary use now is "a public notice or announcement," specifically "a paid announcement in a newspaper or other print." Wikipedia has a more expansive definition that would not at all apply to Posterchild's pieces.
Setting that aside, though, even if both are "selling messages" (where for one "selling" is literal, and the other figurative, and "messages" means two very different things for each) I think we can agree that the stuff inside the frames are very different from the stuff stenciled below them. It's not like Sprite saying "image is nothing, obey your thirst!" which is "advertising against advertising." This is a little different. Who is Posterchild advertising for? Himself? (maybe) The City's signs bi-law? (sort of) The law? (yes?) Who stands to benefit or profit from what he put up?
The word "illegal," though, is absolutely the apt one. You associating it with cops knocking down doors is your association. It doesn't mean the word—which means not legal, or going against a law—is wrong. Murder is illegal. So is parking where you're not supposed to. If the signs have a permit and do not follow the terms on that permit, they are breaking the law and are thus illegal. Whether laws are ethical or not is another question, but if you break them, you're doing something illegal.
As for the signs being "private property"—well, that's a whole other mess. Illegal ads on the side of buildings aren't exactly the best example of the clear distinction between public and private space. I'll send Robin Rix an e-mail and see if he can't help with that.
I think it comes down to this: do you believe the signs that the stencils are posted below should be legal? (Rami's explanation is a very very good one for the mural vs. fascia distinction.) Because if you think they should, I can understand why an illegal stencil put below it would be, well, more illegal.
I tend to think that IllegalSigns.ca has the right approach to the situation: "destroying illegal billboards with the rule of law." They investigate whether signs are illegal, they report them to the authorities, and they press the city to enforce its own laws.
What they don't do is take matters into their own hands. Like it or not, these signs are private property: they belong to the manufacturer, and they are there presumably with the consent of the people who own/occupy the land that they're on.
>Who stands to benefit or profit from what he put up?
umm... Rami? I highly doubt this is being done out of the kindness of his heart, we'll see in upcoming years I suppose how the site has 'benefitted him'.
okay well 'advertisement' definition aside (I warned you lol).
Yes you are doing something illegal. But you can't do something illegal in order to rectify something else that is illegal.
It would be like seeing someone illegally parked and you vandalizing their car.
I think it should be obvious where I stand on this issue. Yes I think they should be legal (painted vs vinyl). if they do not have a permit, they are illegal plain and simple. If we're splitting hairs over an outdated bylaw (written before vinyl existed) then this seems like so much energy wasted on something that is hardly worth fighting (IMO).
Just to touch on your point about private/public property. This is actually the one thing that should be pretty black and white. Just because something faces a public sidewalk does NOT make it public property. It's private property PLAIN AND SIMPLE. By The Public Space argument, I could setup shop on your front yard and claim that as public space.
Anyways, at risk of my opposing opinion concluding in me being verbally abused by people on this site, I think it's safe to say this:
The courts will soon decide from what I read on this whole issue. Hopefully companies like Titan and the like that give all advertising a bad name by their guerrila ad tactics will be dealt with by the city/agencies in charge.
This guy is obviously an outdoor ad industry employee. Only the outdoor ad industry claims the by-law was written "before vinyl existed." Affidavits filed by City staff say that at least one of the ad companies challenging that part of the by-law tried to do the same thing back in 1994 when the issue first arose because vinyl was already an ad industry tool.
So why doesn't "TorontoTheGreat" stop posting on here and start doing some good for this city by taking down all their illegal billboards.
Torontothegreat says "The signs HAVE a permit even though they might not be following the permit's language (painted vs vinyl) and therefore are allowed to be at said locations." This is surely like saying "I have a licence to drive a car so I can drive a bus or a truck" If the permit is for a mural sign or a first party sign then only mural signs and first party signs are legal.
>This guy is obviously an outdoor ad industry employee
Why, b/c I believe in the free market?
OMFGBBQWTF?!?!?!?!?!?!
bullet proof logic my friend... bullet... proof :P
>This is surely like saying "I have a licence to drive a car so I can drive a bus or a truck
the only glaring difference is that one endangers the public, while the other doesn't... So yea, exactly the same thing *sarcasm*
Is there any reason why Posterchild is stencilling the buildings rather than the ads themselves? Are the building owners and the advertisers the same guilty party?
If they aren't the same entity, one might conclude that the building owners are complicit in the illegal sign posting because they are permitting it on their property.
TTG^ Free market? Ha! You haven't made a single argument oriented on the free market. You're just making excuses for who ever is cutting your pay cheque.
Gloria^ The building owners sign contracts with the outdoor ad industry that allows them to commit crimes against civic spaces all in the name of greed. If the owners don't know what's going on under their noses then they ought to have known.
advertising is completely linked to capitalism, which is by definition, the 'free market'.
My apologies. I didn't realize this was a paint by numbers debate...
Secondly...
1. I am not a 'guy'
2. I do not work for any outdoor advertising company (although I did for many years about half a decade ago).
So... You seem to be 3 for 3 today. Fancy that!
Anyhow, you're obviously just a troll. So I'll stop feeding you.
Green Sulfur - Lets turn down the hyperbole. Your response to Gloria is weak.
Should landlords that rent out an apartment or commercial unit know what's going on in said apartment or unit? Are you as a landlord going to knock on your tenants door and say "hey, what are you doing in there" every day?
TTG, apologies for assuming gender. But your advocacy on behalf of advertising companies and defending the free market aren't the same thing. Until I called you out, you hadn't taken an ideological stance. Obviously this is just an advertising company hack ducking for cover where ever they can find it. Sad really.
Vincent, Landlords are responsible for maintaining their buildings according to the law. The law says that they must have valid permits for third party advertising. While the ad companies may facilitate the permit process, the permit is, in fact, held by the landlord, not the sign company. So absolutely I expect the landlord to uphold the law when it's their permit.
They may be privately owned, but they are in public space. That is, indeed, the entire reason they're used for advertising.
Imagine if you were to buy a billboard and put up hardcore pornography, graphic violence, and pictures of babies doing crack and swearing. You'd probably be fined, maybe even charged — but not for breaking private property laws, but for violating standards based on public decency. Pretending that advertising structures exist in some sort of bubble because they're owned is disingenuous.
Rek, agreed (although this is clearly private property which borders or can be seen from public property).
But the distinction is false and unhelpful. It's illegal to deface all property, public and private. Also, advertising structures don't receive any special protection, so you are being a little disingenuous yourself.
I like this piece because it nicely brings into conflict attitudes about illegal (or non-conforming) ads and graffiti. The only logically consistent view to hold if you are anti-illegal ad is to be anti- all other unauthorized uses of property (including graffiti). When you boil it down, the argument is that the ad companies breach the public trust by not conforming with the sign by-law to the letter. Graffiti is also clearly against the law, and in its disregard of the legal uses for public and private property, a breach of the public trust.
As I have pointed out before, the graffiti cheerleaders on this page strangely are also hardliners against the ad companies.
Green Sulfur, If your entire argument is based on an assumption that I am an "advertising company hack", then you have absolutely no leg to stand on. Advertising and the free market ARE one in the same. Without a free market, advertising wouldn't exist. Without advertising a free market would struggle to exist. The 2 are absolutely synergised (sp?).
>Until I called you out
Don't give yourself so much credit. You didn't 'call anything out' other then your own childish response, in fact you were incorrect about everything you said to me lol. If you've read any articles on this site concerning this issue you would see that I have been as open as it can get about my background and opinions on the subject. My stance is realistic not ideological. Thinking you're going to 'take down the outdoor advertising industry' is about as (ideo/ill)logical as you can get.
rek, pretending that public space exists to the extent you're thinking is also disingenuous (IMO). I would love to hear a more intelligent explanation regarding public space, to date I haven't. By your argument anything the eye can see is/should be considered public space. So for your sake, close your blinds, otherwise you may find someone sitting on your couch watching TV one day or setting up shop on your front yard.
I also feel that your example is pretty bad, because you could come to the same result w/o buying a billboard, so it's not exactly unique to outdoor advertising (content standards & decency). Your example simply illustrates criminal law and has nothing to do with the article or the outdoor advertising industry. Still, it doesn't change the FACT that these structures exist on private property. Nobody is claiming that they exist in a 'bubble' as you put it. They have their own set of standards outside of criminal and property law, you'd be surprised at the kind of creative that gets rejected (showing a woman's shoulders is one that comes to mind from some campaign years ago). So if anything the content that appears is held to a higher standard then any criminal or property laws that currently exist. However, I digress... If billboards do not in fact have a permit to be at said locations, they absolutely should be removed and the companies fined. If billboards have a permit but are subject to an environmentally unfriendly, archaic bylaw, then I feel that we have a problem here, we need to make a change to move forward. I think Rami does an excellent job in the former point and I commend him for it, but vandalizing these structures is not only bad for 'the cause' as a whole, it provides absolutely no value besides provoking yet another glaring mishap for public space advocates.
I work in the non-profit sector and I can't imagine trying to raise awareness or funds for our cause w/o (outdoor) advertising. Whether it's guerrilla postering or vinyl billboards, there would be very little we could do to leverage so many eyeballs. Outside of the internet (which can be dicey at best sometimes), outdoor advertising for PSA's give us such a massive soapbox to speak from. I think you might be surprised at how many donators check off 'saw advertisement' in the 'how did you hear about us' box of our donation form.
It's not going away anytime soon (advertising), especially in Toronto. Working at finding a common solution, is to me, a much better approach then utter hatred w/o a solution (I think that might be fine if you're like 15). If your only solution is to get rid of them entirely then your ideology is not only misplaced, but also a pipe dream.
TTG - is it your view that laws only need to be adhered to if the effect is public endangerment?
In The Rebel Sell, Andrew Potter (who we interviewed a while back) and Joseph Heath argue that since advertising is a collective action problem (where when one company advertises their product it forces the other company to, and then the other has to more, and so on and so on), and has exploded for precisely that reason, one of the ways to reduce it would be to prevent it from being 100% deductible for companies. "This would not prevent companies from advertising," but "....One simple change in the tax code would do more to curb advertising than all of the culture jamming in the world." So there's that...
And x_the_x:
There is a fundamental difference between advertising and street art (which I pointed out above) that your argument completely ignores. Not that it isn't messy; I'm pretty ambivalent about most graffiti.@David Topping
It's interesting that you bring up the Rebel Sell. While Heath and Potter bring up an extremely valid point, the entire rest of the book is about how WE as consumers are allowing it to get out of control and how we as consumers drive it all. Advertising is simply the catalyst for us being steered in the general direction of a particular company for a product that we already desire.
I don't have the book in front of me (it's one of my faves), but I do recall a selection about the SUV craze and how we feel that it gives us 'freedom' to drive where we want etc. which stems from the hippy 60s days (baby boomers) WE want that freedom. W/O demand there would be no product.
Changing the tax code may somewhat curb it. The amount of money spent each year on advertising though... well either the ad companies would suck the cost up or put it back on the clients. What needs to change in order to affect it is CONSUMPTION. Something I believe we as a society do far too much of.
Consumption is based on desire (mostly). Until we live in a society that looks at desire as evil, we will always desire products. When we can't desire products any longer, we'll find new desires to desire. A sad case of chase the tail really.
>TTG - is it your view that laws only need to be adhered to if the effect is public endangerment?
No, but I also don't believe every single letter of the law should be enforced to the fullest extent. Not only is this impossible to acheive resource wise, most of us would get arrested/ticketed on a daily basis.
x_the_x and torontothegreat: I was only pointing out that these things exist in public space, regardless of who pays the rent, as evidenced by public standards superceding their private ownership status. I wasn't trying to argue that they're fair game for anyone with a marker/can/bucket of wheat paste for that reason.
As far as being logically consistent is concerned, it's my view that if advertisers have the right to engage us in conversation in this fashion, we have the right to reciprocate in kind to the best of our individual ability. And when advertisers circumvent the numerous lawful avenues they're already afforded and it's allowed to slide, while street art is considered criminal, it ticks me off.
Also what David said; advertising and street art are done for entirely different reasons, and so can't be judged by the same standards.
rek and calorie-free Topping, I understand that you believe there is a difference between graffiti and illegal ads based on your like and dislike of both categories (and fair enough), but both are breaches of what is deemed acceptable (i.e., legal) messaging in public. From that standpoint they are entirely the same. I do think its inconsistent to promote some breaches of the law on the basis that some of the malefactors entertain you. I would think at the very least that a proponent of graffiti would be unable to take a hard (and sanctimonious) stand against ad companies.
Often the logical inconsistency is explained by some sort of power analysis between the person doing the messaging, which in case you are going that way, I also find entirely unconvincing.
As I outlined above, my position has nothing to do with the entertainment value of street art. If you'd care to read it this time...
I read it. You dislike ads and (would) like a regime that promoted or permitted responses. I too would like all of my personal preferences to be reflected in law, but unfortunately there is the rest of the political community who muddies everything.
I didn't say anything about changing the laws. Are you sure you're reading this blog?
dumbest. thead. ever.
Wooster'd.
>x_the_x and torontothegreat: I was only pointing out that these things exist in public space
How is private property 'public space'? I'm still unclear on this uber-ambiguous definition of public space.
>As far as being logically consistent is concerned, it's my view that if advertisers have the right to engage us in conversation in this fashion, we have the right to reciprocate in kind to the best of our individual ability.
Are you saying that if we're given the right to say spray paint a wall, then advertisers have the right to equally break the law? Because as I'm sure you realize it would work both ways.
>And when advertisers circumvent the numerous lawful avenues they're already afforded and it's allowed to slide, while street art is considered criminal, it ticks me off.
I agree. Then again, police do about as much to stop graffiti as bylaw officers do to stop vinyl being posted in spots marked as painted murals.
So both sides are being treated fairly equal. It's not like the Toronto Police Services have a hard-line on graffiti, in fact I'd go as far as saying that the TPS do about as much to stop graffiti as Toronto By Law Officers do to stop billboards without the correct permit(s).
>advertising and street art are done for entirely different reasons, and so can't be judged by the same standards.
well duh ;) We can definately agree on that!
torontothegreat - Not all private property is, well, private. We're talking about something meant to be seen by people passing by, rather than a select few on some by-admission-only viewing platform. Billboards exist to interact (one-directionally) with the public, so they are part of public space. That doesn't extend any particular rights to anyone, though, I'm not saying that either, but it's undeniable that advertising is an element of the open, public experience.
Advertisers are already given the right to "spraypaint" walls in their own way, and they do. It's the general public that has no equal format/medium to respond (or just say whatever they want) in a similar and realistic fashion. Street art, in my opinion, corrects that oversight.
The persistence of illegal/illegal-used billboards and the inaction of the City, versus the grafitti removal notices, shows the city is more willing to act on graffiti than against advertisers. (Is the city responsible for the pressure washers that blast posters off garbage cans?)
"(Is the city responsible for the pressure washers that blast posters off garbage cans?)"
That's a whole other mess.
>torontothegreat - Not all private property is, well, private. We're talking about something meant to be seen by people passing by, rather than a select few on some by-admission-only viewing platform. Billboards exist to interact (one-directionally) with the public, so they are part of public space. That doesn't extend any particular rights to anyone, though, I'm not saying that either, but it's undeniable that advertising is an element of the open, public experience.
So are the flowers in my flowerbox and the Canadian flag on my flag pole.
It doesn't make them any more public then say... an advertisement. They exist on private property. Period.
btw, I'm not trying to be super argumentetive, I think we just won't see eye to eye on this. I appreciate your efforts in explaination, I just don't think I can agree with you.
Jonathan - So it would seem no, it's EcoMedia behind that. I've advocated the city going after street teams in the past, but EcoMedia shouldn't be the one issuing fines regardless of their contract with the city.