Sounds Rather Familiar
The recent spate stories about the Vancouver Public Library and VANOC sponsorships caught my eye. Disapproval seems widespread but this strikes me as a very ordinary moment in a public culture that is constantly enmeshed in corporate sponsorships. I seem to recall rather similar discussions about Pepsi logo’d cafeteria cups in a non-public workplace.
My guess is that the VPL memo is a fairly ordinary piece of internal communications. And VANOC’s intervention, whether direct or indirect, and its attempt to control the flow of money is equally ordinary. A quick Google search will turn up dozens of examples of VANOC’s vigorous objections to non-official (ie, non-paid for) linkages between the games and commercial or charitable organizations.
The thing that puzzles me though is the idea that libraries would solicit food donations for in-house programs. As well it’s not clear to me whether the Olympic-inspired guidelines are tightly connected to the VPL’s publicly posted sponsorship policy. Supporting Coca Cola over Pepsi or McDonald’s over Wendy’s: does this “undermine the integrity of the non-commercial public space”?
Suggested Reading: No Logo.
