Alan Gutierrez

In response to Bart Everson’s post Ugly, I considered the following. In addition, it might be further consideration about the nightmare I had, where I’d found I’d returned to Michigan to live. A Michigan booster addressed me in the comments, and I’ve neglected to respond.

I have a very confused sense of place. I live in New Orleans. I cannot leave. I cannot live anywhere else. I had a conversation recently, where I was asked how long I plan to say in New Orleans. I said I plan to die here, so the duration is any one’s guess. The follow up was a request to give three reasons why.

1. I am unemployable anywhere else.
2. I have absolutely no means by which to leave New Orleans.
3. After two weeks in any other city I am profoundly depressed. Since living in New Orleans this is much worse, because I am aware of the depression.

Which is to say that I am trapped in New Orleans.

Yet, I am delighted to be trapped in New Orleans, since it gives me the sense of place, and an entitlement to that sense of place, that I did not have before.

There is no sense of place to which I can return, no place to return. I am from Detroit originally, but my family left in 1976 when I was four. If I say that I’m from Detroit, people in the know will ask, are you really from Detroit? Which is to ask, which suburb of Detroit do you come from? By taking part in the economic evacuation of the Motor City, I’ve relinquished my claim.

I am from Huntington Woods, a suburb of Detroit. A nice suburb, but there is no sense of place. It is lovely housing stock, but it is housing, only housing. There is no place to return, no place to visit. Scotia Park? Burton Elementary? I sat in the park across from my childhood home a few years back, and was concerned that I’d get reported for loitering.

Note: If you’ve forgotten the Series of Tubes speech, Jon Stewart does an excellent job of explaining Ted Stevens’ explaination of the Internet. A classic, you can hear the whole Seriese of Tubes speech on YouTube.

The following story does little for my confidence in the future of Michgian’s technology industries. It is a cause for concern for those of us tracking the decline of it’s manufacturing industries.

A man in Grand Rapids, Michigan was arrested and charged with a felony for checking his email from a coffee shop’s WiFi connection from the comfort of his parked car. The cringe worthy local news story casts it as human interest in Wireless (In)security — A wireless felony, while Ars Technia recongnizes it for the statewide humiliation that it is in Michigan Man Arressted for Using Cafe’s Free Wifi From His Car:

An enterprising police officer looked it up on the books, and based on a year 2000 reivision of a 1979 law, checking your email from an open Wifi hub in Michigan is considred computer tampering. The man is actually going to pay a $400.00 fine and do 40 hours of community service for this Michigan crime.

New Orleans has whole streets covered with Wifi from various providers, plenty of open hubs, and we’re establishing mesh and municipal Wifi networks. Our pedestrian streets have coverage from many different hotspots. In fact, do any of us even know if we’ve connected our current coffee shop’s Wifi, or the Wifi of the bar next door? People put up these hubs and don’t think about it.

The reactions of the denizens of Grand Rapids in the forums of WOOD are very different form the reactions of the savvy at Ars Technia who make such lucid comments as…

> This law needs to be challenged. A wireless access point is a radio transmitter. The Communications Act does not allow broadcasters to place restrictions on who may access their transmissions. The coffee shop cannot pick and choose who can use their public unsecured radio broadcast. It falls upon the shop owner to secure access if he wants only his customers to use his wireless network.

It is enough to make you cluck your tounge and shake your head and think, “Well, at least I don’t live there anymore. I don’t have to worry about this.” That can’t be something that Lansing wants a expatriot native Detroiter and nine year Ann Arbor resident to think.

Regarding the use of open Wifi hubs the Kent County procescutors office is stern.

> The next time you’re tempted, though, think of Sam Peterson. “People need to know that this isn’t legal and if you get caught there are some pretty serious consequences.”

Again, I don’t have to worry about this.

My friend Stephen Goodfellow sent me the Detroit fireworks, or the fireworks of the International Freedom Festival, to be perfectly clear. What’s the reasoning behind having them so far in advance of July 1st and July 4th?

If you live in Detroit, you are liable to form the opinion that anarchy is the best form of government. Or maybe, if you have formed that opinion, you are drawn to the anarchy of Detroit. Either way, you can do your part to stick it to the man, by listening to the Cass Corridor based Layabouts on MySpace. From Stephen Goodfellow, “In existence since 1981, The Layabouts is not so much band as a community of musicians who hold similar beliefs about the state of the World. They express this by composing and performing music of their own making, meaningful lyrics set to a beat that set your feet a-dancin’. Rock, reggae, ska – lyrics that’ll make you want to pull down the pyramid of authority while you gyrate to a beat that is in harmony with the Universe.” I always loved listening to the Layabouts perform at Dally in the Alley and the 4th Street Fair.

Stephen Goodfellow has invited me to the 2006 Flower Party. It is Saturday, May 6th, 2006 from 6:00 pm to 8:00 pm at 146 Farrand Pk, Highland Park, MI. Fun party. You make a wreath of flowers and put it on your noggin. Can someone go in my place and tell me how it went?

Ed Peper responds for General Motors on the GM Fastlane blog regarding the recent Chevy Tahoe promotion that did not go awry. In the promotion, people were invited to create their own Chevy Tahoe television ad.

A fair number of parody advertisments were created. Images of the Tahoe motoring through the snow were overlaid with text reading “Like this snowy wilderness? Better get your fill of it now. Then say hello to global warming.”

GM FastLane Blog: Now that we’ve got your attention

So, a few media pundits seem to think this social media program was a failure and others seem to revel in the apparent anarchy. We, on the other hand, welcome the opportunity to clarify the facts regarding fuel economy, vehicles equipped with E85 capability, and consumer choice. In our opinion, this has been one of the most creative and successful promotions we have done.

General Motors and specifically Chevrolet were early to build the modern concept of branding. Does anyone recall “See the USA in Your Chevorlet?” or “Baseball, Hot Dogs, Apple Pie, and Chevrolet?” If not, it may probably be in Chevy’s best intrest.

The quintcential all-American brand name. A brand name stamped on almost half the cars made in 1950s.

Which is why it doesn’t concern me to see the buzz at the expense of brand equity. The brand equity has been slowing draining since about 1965.

The stock footage of a bowtie clad truck rolling down an winding road is banal and meaningless. You can turn off the sound and recite the financing offers yourself.

Pink Moon is an advertisment that still means Volkswagen. Not a car on winding roads, but a brilliant vinette about winding roads, or Synchronicity, which rolls down Royal Street. Volkswagens will forever after be about the Road of Life. The only advertisments that told stories about driving, rather than about about a vehicle.

Look at the way Dodge pokes fun at it’s muscle car legacy in their advertisments about the Hemi. A way to remind folks that Dodge has been making V-8s since before you were born. A humerous evocation of the Mopar legacy.

Much better than that horrible attempt to ressurrect the late, great Harley Earl that Buick untook in recent fit of heresy. “My name is Harley Earl, and I’ve come back to build you a great car,” says veteran Miami Vice actor John Diehl.

This Tahoe experiment? There’s no place to go but up.

Bob Lutz, GM Fastlane Blog: Stop Me If You’ve Heard This One Before…

We can and will do a better job of advertising and communications in the traditional sense, but we need to step up our non-traditional communications and word of mouth, and get our message directly to the people on a grass roots level. This blog is one example — but we need more avenues, and bigger ideas. What do you think?

This comes to me via Debbie Wiel, where she paraphrases the Bob’s comment thus…

Debbie Wiel, BlogWrite for CEOs: Bob Lutz mentions GM’s “financial state” on FastLane blog

I don’t know about you but that sounds pretty transparent to me for a Fortune 500 blog. Translation: we’ve got a problem. Can you help? So far, 178 readers have left comments on this entry. Fascinating to read: lots of specifics, on warranties, 1-day take-home test drives, tips on how to deal with MSM’s approach to the GM death spiral story, etc.

Other than Bob Lutz, I can’t think of any automotive CEOs that I read weekly. Does it help? I think so. When I read Lutz, GM’s products don’t seem half as dowdy as they do on their television commercials. GM is learning to listen and communciate with it’s customers in a new medium.

It may well be an revolution in automotive marketing, from the same guys who brought you a car for every purse and purpose.

Dave reflects on the nature of Detroit in the spotlight, in his post The Morning After. He muses on how Detroit behaves like an ugly narcissist when the media comes to town.

Suds & Soliloquies: The Morning After

Detroit is the most insecure city on the planet.

If you’ve lived around here your whole life — as I have, more or less — you know the drill. Whenever something big like the Super Bowl happens in the city, the local media run story after story about the national media’s coverage. The word “image” is used incessantly, as in “What will this do for Detroit’s image?” The “this” may refer to the event itself, or else to the latest murder or arson or other high-profile crime that inevitably accompanies the event.

Dave didn’t note how, in the 80’s, Detroit would celebrate a sporting victory with assorted property damange and violence. The Tigers in ‘84 spawned a riot. The Pistons in ‘89 were followed by 8 murders. The big news story when we reached the penultimate game was as much about the pending mayhem as it was about the pending victory.

The days of Hockeytown were comparatively peaceful.

Think the story has played itself out. It might be time for the Detroit media outlets to write a new script. People are still astounded by the width and bredth of the blight when the visit Detroit, but I don’t think they pay attention to the plight.