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MODERN_TIMES


                                             March 25, 2014
The "Modern Times" bookstore of San          April  2, 2014
Francisco's Mission district.

This is a place that used to be in a large
location on Valencia Street in the low 20s,
and has since relocated further east to a     Adobe books has had to
smaller location on 24th Street.              do a similar shuffle
                                              from 16th to 24th,
                                              running from Inner
   The name of the place has always           Mission gentrification
   seemed fairly clever to me:
   the "City Lights" bookstore of
   North Beach is famous, but it's
   main focus is somewhat backward
   looking.  Every single publication
   of the Beat Industry can be found
   there...

   "Modern Times" continues the Charlie
   Chaplin motif, but suggests a place         There was also once
   focused on present-day concerns, and        a theatrical bookstore
   indeed "Modern Times" has always been       called "Limelight".
   my "go to" location for left-wing
   political publications...
                                            The Bay Area has some
                                            cachet as home base for
                                            Charlie Chaplain:
                                            
                                                        NILES
                                                                 
                                                             
Modern Times has been in financial trouble of late:

    http://www.sfbayguardian.com/2014/01/07/modern-tragedy
    http://www.sfbayguardian.com/print/2014/01/07/modern-tragedy


If you're a free-market believer,
you shrug at the news of a bookstore             MARKET_BLIND
in financial trouble.  If they can't
pay the rent, it's time to close the
doors and left a more profitable
business take-over, right?                And who needs
                                          brick-and-mortar
                                          when we have Amazon?



    The bookstore as an institution does
    indeed have trouble in a world where
    printed books are less popular, but if
    people don't want to see the bookstores
    close, then one solution is to move         This is indeed the
    toward a non-profit model, where            way that the Modern
    selling books is a sideline used to         Times collective
    reduce expenses, but is not relied on       has been running
    to be the sole source of funding.  Then     the place-- operating
    they can continue to exist as informal      at a loss is okay
    community centers and so on-- but for       if they can raise
    that to happen people have to recognize     enough by donations
    that they want it to happen, that the       to keep going.
    sole function of the place wasn't
    actually just to sell stuff.                It's somewhat
                                                distressing that
    No one objects if a library doesn't         as of January of
    support itself by rental fees.              this year, they were
                                                still trying to
                                                pay off the back rent
                                                on their old location.

                                                This reminds me of
                                                the situation with
                                                Cellspace, but with
                                                even less logic to
                                                it-- if they were
                                                going to close the
                                                old location anyway,
                                                they probably
                                                should've declared
                                                bankruptcy, dissolved
                                                the non-profit, and
While we're on this subject, allow              formed a new one to
me to interject what appears to be              manage the new space.
an unmentionable phrase: "commercial
rent control".

   Someone takes a chance, gets a
   small business running well even
   though operating on a shoe string,
   then the landlord comes by with
   palm outstretched, threatening to
   jack the rent.

   I've heard this story too
   many times...                           MIKEY_TOM

                                             Another example:
                                             There's a documentary
                                             about Shopsin's formerly
                                             of the West Village:
                                             "I Like Killing Flies".



     Rent control is clearly an institution that people
     like because it slows things down a little, it
     puts a brake on the rapid changes that markets
     appear to be prone to (bubbles and collapses).

     Rent control isn't a perfect institution, but its
     one that exists, and does something like what people
     want it to... extending it to commercial rentals
     would clearly help out cases like "Modern Times".

                                                MONOCULTURE




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