With respect to all involved:
Cars and motorcycles always seem to end up in porn sites. Hell- Import tuner car magazines ARE porn with all the half clothed Asian models/girlfriends littered throughout those mags. And clothing and shoe companies by default are in pornos too. Imagine if Harley said they are in the motorcycle business and not pornos. What would be the worldwide reaction if they refused to underwrite Sturgis because women bared breasts and some of those breasts near the motorcycles ended up on XXX hotties or whatever those sites are called?
The religious right (Christian and Muslim) would no doubt be happy, but that is not my point here.
I haven't been to a consumer car or motorcycle show that did not allow cameras, or at least made any attempt to enforce such silly rules. If the Pleasanton fairgrounds banned cameras the event would dry up. This seems like a totally unenforceable rule, and I guarantee that the few people who do show up at all, if they have cameras, or cell phones, or Polaroid's, or whatever, you are going to create such a mess outside, the event will turn into a meeting with 100 framebuilders and 2 pro photogs (and me of course) and not much else. In effect there will be no show. I would relish a trade only event since I'm in the business, but the fremebuilders show is not designed around my companies needs, it is expressly for framebuilders to show off their stuff to present and future customers.
If a single framebuilder is pissed off that an image of one of his frames was used in an unauthorized way, why does Don feel responsible to protect Pauls images at the expense of everyone else's freedom of expression? If, say, a TomMartin frame ended up on a 'ultraliberal' website and I was aghast that such a website had a photo of my bike on it, and I complained to Don and he decided to refuse admittance to 'known liberals', what do you think the grumblings would be about?
Tom Martin Oakland CA Any publicity is good publicity
-----Original Message----- From: DonWalkerCycles@aol.com [mailto:DonWalkerCycles@aol.com] Sent: Monday, August 08, 2005 7:46 PM To: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org Subject: [CR]NO CAMERA'S? but why? revisited
Ok, the fallout from pissed off folks has me pissed off to the n'th degree. Its rather simple. A builder had some pics from the last show end up on a porn site. This did NOT make him very happy. He isnt in the porn business, he makes bikes. After talking with him again this afternoon he said " i make bikes, not porno's, its not that I have anything against porn, but my bikes dont belong with that stuff." Now, if anyone else was promoting this show they would do the same thing. Regardless if you have 99% of the other builders ok with their stuff on a porn site, if 1 builder is upset that it happened, then I need to take the steps to make sure it cant happen again.
I have had 1 wingnut go so far as to call me arrogant because of this...and if anyone truly knows me, they know I am anything but.
Richard Sachs, Brian Baylis, Paul Sadoff, and many more of these builders are not only my colleagues, but my friends. I value their opinions as well as advice, whether or not I agree with it. They all understood my intentions with this and had no problems with what I am trying to accomplish.
If you cant live with the rules that I have set forth, then dont attend.
Sure, I would love to have you all there, but the rules are what they are and thats the bottom line. This is a tough job organizing this event and I know that there is no way to please everyone, so I do what I feel is the right/best thing to do.
I am sorry if this upsets you all, but I have alot of builders that rely on me to do the right thing. I truly am sorry some of you want to boycott the show for your own reasons of not being able to take pics, but ask yourself honestly, what is better...a show that you cant take pics at, or no show at all.
I hope you see my point.
DW PS to the dude who called me arrogant, call me at home and lets talk and you will change your opinion of me. My number is on my website.