Graffiti Machine - via infectious videos

" This is a great vid of a graffiti machine - used I guess to ease the work load on the vandals! Although I can't see the kids taking to this contraption any time soon. "

I didn't see any vandals in the video, unless it was the white guy with his baseball cap on backwards, but he was just holding a video camera. Maybe the vandal was the guy who pressed Enter on the laptop. I find, sometimes, that I just don't know what people are talking about. I mean, for an act of vandalism, one would have to be very stupid, indeed, to put in all the time to set up this contraption, and to sit around and watch is do it's thing. I can't imagine it would be all that easy making a fast getaway when some "Good Citizen" notifies the fuzz that there's vandals about.

Anway, nice video over there. Groovy tool.

Meanwhile, On the North Side of the Island...

Taipei's graffiti artists try to say it with paint

The Taipei Times had this story, pg 2, in their Sunday edition. There's mention of the graffiti park in Xinmending, and of a teacher who is working with artists thinking that "but graffiti artists that have been properly guided can be allowed to express themselves." A graffiti buxiban?

More importantly, there was this little nugget:

On Wednesday, the Taipei City Government's Bureau of Environmental Protection announced that in an effort to clean up the city, graffiti artists will now face fines of between NT$1,200 (US$37.50) to NT$6,000.

To collect, the city has set up a 24-hour "environmental protection hotline" to report illegal activity with a cash carrot for snitches. As much as I want it to, the article does not say that the pro-environment folks in the Taipei goverment are particulary concerned about litter, or unsightly real estate advertisements that are crudely affixed to light posts around the city, ads which leave spent adhesives up and down poles so that the visual unpleasantness can carry on.

Unless "Article 27 of the Waste Disposal Act (廢棄物清理法), which prohibits the polluting of the ground, pools of water, drainage gutters, walls, beams or pillars, utility poles, trees, roadways, bridges and other structures" can be interpreted to include the fliers, handouts, and call-girl phone numbers that paper my scooter if it's parked outside for too long.

It's a shame the phone number wasn't given. I'd like to report some litterbugs.

As far as I know, Taichung writers are safe from arrest. I could be wrong. Maybe I'll go ask the cops.

Fresh Paint

Before the rain on Monday, I drove around downtown and found this wall across from a KTV near the park. The representative of the KTV who saw me shooting arrived as I was changing lenses to express his displeasure at my taking pictures of a wall in an empty parking lot. I think he had privacy issues. I asked him if it would be ok to come back later when there were lots of cars in the parking lot. We seemed to be having communication problems. I think he was saying "Don't take pictures here," but the "Give me a good reason why" was lost on him.