sǝuoſ ǝuıɥsunS | notebook, journal, inter-web log

Is it just me, or does the “new economy” seem to be getting a second wind?

I look around the world and find the same hair brained ideas that soaked the city of san francisco and all the investors before falling into chapter 11 and dumping… leaving nothing but sky high rents, and an unlivable city that’s much too small to support such callous “metropolitan” bullshit actually thriving.

can this be true?

I see new companies opening up for business, new nightclubs, new isp startups and more, only instead of being based in san francisco where everyone decided about 5-10 years ago that they needed to come in order to fuck up our city, and grab all that they could before heading back to boston or bangalor (respectively,) these new faces are in brooklyn, manhattan, baltimore, virgina… the corridor between NYC and South Carolina seems to be abloom with the promise of a second boom.

Only this time it’s got some salt to go with that sheet of acid.

Well, i can’t say that it’s going to be a tragedy if rural MD’s real estate values double, or if the unemployment rate in virgina drops to single digits, or even that manhattan’s young and innovative get to work providing a new economy for themselves.

It’s perhaps more likely, as Manhattan was unlivable and unrealistic economically before hand, so there’s really no way a business could fake it too long without some serious intent, or a benefactor’s delusional sense of charity. So maybe NYC is the place to give cyber sex the finger in lieu of true business infrastructure constructed via the web.

having been a cultural precursor to the boom (and bust.) and never having made my living from that business, i suppose i am ultimately unqualified to even comment on it. It’s impossible for me not to be jaded, and pissy about the dot-commies who rampaged my neighborhood, south of market in san francisco. they arrived in pairs, taking over long vacant live/work spaces built for twos and threes. it was nice to see them. But soon these new arrivals of east coast expatriates began to expand and multiply. very quickly they had overrun the place, displacing and deposing long standing residents (including the elderly, section 8 families, and residents who were born and raised in rented homes who simply could not afford to pay a sudden 500% increase in rent [no, i am not kidding and yet, every single one of them lost their personal battles in court.]) In no time at all our once deserted city parks had exploded with unexpected population, and were crawling with activity like a jr. college campus. It was stunning, offensive, and enough to tickle your landlord’s greedy bone back to life. It was over as soon as it began… “what’s so great about San Francisco?” they asked each other… and now, out of work, they boarded the planes and headed back to… um, er… well, back to wherever they came from leaving san francisco bloody, beaten, deflated, raped, and defeated in their mindless exodus.

back home they would start blogs… continue their efforts to learn better code, create new applications, use the world wide web in a new and interesting way, albeit somewhat more practical now than before. they said in their blogs, when challenged by a west coast thinker or opinion, “I lived in San Francisco for a while… I don’t see what’s so great about it.” other times they would straight up bash her with “Stuff it hippie, San Francisco sucks!”

Well, it’s true. To a cynical new yorker, or business minded mover and shaker from anywhere east of ohio, my city would have to end up little more than a quaint, one time vacation.

And that’s the way we like it. Perhaps that’s the way it should have been.

But don’t think for a moment that you know San Francisco. Isn’t that as audacious as me saying i “know” Manhattan after my 3 dozen visits there? Or that i “know” Baltimore after my many trips down the I95?

I know my response to Manhattan. I know my response to Baltimore. But that could never compare to being a native, and knowing the city… knowing what’s at the end of Alica Ana at the harbor’s edge, having worked at the caf?� there for three years in college. Or knowing what’s on the other side of the slight rise that stops the inland view from downtown (are there houses back there?)

But then, as i really reflect upon my San Francisco, i get misty and wistful. Let’s face it, she’s gone. They came, they soaked and then abandoned her… like a pretty girl who just didn’t know better… Well, we still have to resume construction, rebuild this great city.

I am glad, in a way, that willy brown is gone, arnie is governor, and shrub is president right now. We seem to have received the politicians we deserve as a reflection of how we behave. And there is barely enough money here to complete the earthquake retrofitting of the freeway and bridges. Let alone the non stop gutting of all the buildings pre 1970 and turning them into “lofts” and “Shared living environments.”

It seems we have hemorrhaged our last leech. And there is no more blood spurting out of our wounds.

We are, strangely enough, right back where we started. Union square full of tourists, the windows laced with unattainable trinkets and needless nik-naks. The billboards comforting us with the thought of vodka and a new car. The people sporting mohawks again, rushing about beneath an overcast summer sky, in our patented hot/cold weather of july’s broken promise. I was in the Castro last night, and i noticed how straight it had become. I spend a couple hours up there, and i saw breeder couple after breeder couple shopping, strolling, and perusing the restaurants. Funny to imagine that one day the Castro would become an affluent heterosexual neighborhood again. It is unthinkable now, but what more likely a candidate than such a clean, boutique-laden, safe, and accessible section of san francisco? And if the polk gulch can evaporate into thin air, and be all but forgotten as the world headquarters of the gay community, simply replaced by the castro, where old queens always went to die (and get political) then really anything can happen.

I wonder who will fill our streets and line our pockets next?

from San Francisco with Love,
Sunshine