1983groke

Hi all, I'm in a new SE22-based band looking for a bass guitar player to complete our line-up. We've been putting together a set of original songs for a couple of years and are looking to play our first gig in the autumn. The influences most audible in our music might be New Order, Pixies, Parquet Courts, Soulwax and Can, and our style could be desribed as indie-electro-psychedlic-punk-krautrock! Our music is quite bass-led, and although we have a set already written, we're hoping our new bass player will become a central past of the creative process in future. We currently use a drum machine / sequencer (no live drums at the moment) + 2 x guitars + synths + vocals. If you are interested or know of anyone who might be, then please drop me a line. Cheers, Christopher

Hi again, There's no Adblock Southwark yet, but I have joined the newly formed Adblock Lambeth group. We're working to stop the installation of a large digital advertising screen on Brixton Road. You can read more about this and the reasons we are opposing the screen here on the adfree cities website: https://adfreecities.org.uk/adblock-lambeth-digital-screen-brixton-road/ Even though you probably don't live round that way (this being the ED forum), the chances are you will travel along that road at some point whether as a driver, cyclist, bus passenger or pedestrian. Advertising in any form is, of course, trying to get your attention, but digital billboards with rapidly changing images are perfecting the art of attention-grabbing. This cannot be good the safety of anyone using the road or walking alongside it. If you would like to object, you can do so in about 5 minutes through the Lambeth Council website here: https://planning.lambeth.gov.uk/online-applications/applicationDetails.do?activeTab=summary&keyVal=QMZ3RNBOHV200 The blog linked above gives some tips on things that the council consider to be legitimate objections. You can also sign our petition here. https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/say-no-to-large-digital-advertising-screen-brixton-road-london/ Thanks very much for taking the time to read this. Christopher

I'll leave it there for now then, but in case you're interested, here's a very short blog on the psychology of advertising and how it manipulates you even if you think you don't notice it. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/ulterior-motives/201008/what-does-advertising-do Its a clever game. It leaves you thinking you can easily ignore you and it doesn't affect you while it has been manipulating you all along. Mostly people think they are immune to it, but you have to ask yourself - if that's the case, why do companies keep ploughing their millions into more advertising? I'll post here again if AdBlock Southwark ever gets going.

Hi roundtable, Thanks for your comments. I agree that capitalism and advertising go hand-in-hand, but I'm not really proposing doing away with all advertising, nor am I proposing communism. My point is solely about advertising in public spaces. Our capitalist system is full of laws and regulations about what corporations can and cannot do. It is not a free for all, otherwise we wouldn't have regulations about food standards, hygiene, product safety, and indeed advertising. There are already plenty of restrictions on advertising (tobacco for example, and now sugar). Democratic decisions are made all the time about what is legitimate within the bounds of our economic system. Just as a democratic decision was taken to ban smoking in indoor (public) spaces or having lead in petrol, it is perfectly possible that a council could decide to put limits on advertising in public spaces. In fact, they already do - it is just that they are not particularly consistent or strong regulations. These regulations could be expanded quite easily should the will be there in the future.

Thanks for all of the responses. Nigello - I agree with you entirely that corporate advertising is going to be with us for a long time yet. To my mind, advertising in public spaces is a form of pollution - psychological, rather than the physical pollution we are subject to in the air we breath. It isn't really something that people are talking about much yet, so nothing will change over night of course, but groups like Adblock in Bristol have quite quickly found some success- stopping the introduction of 21 new digital advertising screens in the past year through collective action. Similar groups are starting to pop up all round the country. I suspect Spring Time's JC Decaux comment was slightly tongue in cheek, but you are right that currently the only way to have serious influence over the messages and images that are imposed on us as we walk around town is by paying for those advertising spaces through companies like JC Decaux. Clearly this is not a viable option for ordinary people. The points about online adblockers absolutely highlight what I'm talking about- there is no equivalent for the real world. Spartacus and Sally Ann - you make interesting points about more targeted advertising and the scary thing is that this is where we are headed with advertising in our public spaces. The podcast I posted includes some disturbing stuff about how digital billboards are fitted with cameras that can read our moods and personalise adverts to us as we pass by. The functionality is there, but it hasn't been switched on - yet. Spring Time - your point about useful posters is a good one. Public health information is a really good example. I think most people would agree they are a good thing. Are there any adverts - real adverts trying to sell us things or ideas in public spaces that we would feel the same about? Ones we would want to put there if JC Decaux hadn't? If we were deciding as a community what we wanted our public space to look like would we include posters and screens trying to make us want burgers, cars, holidays and lifestyles that we don't need or can't afford? Or we would we choose something else?

If you want to avoid the messages and images of TV advertising, you can switch your TV off. If you want to avoid the messages and images of magazine advertising, you can put the magazine down. Even with online advertising, if you don't want to see the adverts, you can switch off your phone or close the laptop. Why is it then that we seem to have no say in whether we, and our families, are exposed to corporate messages and images as we move around East Dulwich? The messages they want us to see as we move around the city? If we're really going to 'build back better' after COVID, shouldn't we have more of a say in what makes up our local environment? It would be interesting to hear what ED residents think about this. Find out more from the Adfree Cities Network: https://adfreecities.org.uk/ As well as the Message Recall podcast about outdoor advertising in UK cities: https://messagerecall.co.uk/all-consuming

It now looks like someone drank 10 pints of Stella, ate a kebab, and vomited over the East Dulwich Hotel on their way home. 'Stunning', apparently.

It's a shiny APMS (private provider) building, but other than one excellent doctor, my experiences there (and my girlfriend's) were always pretty terrible. Doctors that are embarrased by human bodies, shocking failure to understand very simple issues (demonstrated when I got to the physio and heard what had been written on the referral) and an appaling appointments system. I work for the British Medical Association so I understand how these things work - this practice will get paid (in broad terms) based on the number of patients on their list - hence why they clearly have way too many registered patients and it is so difficult to get an appointment.