Funny Story about Fido and the Fringe

So about a month ago, the Fringe Fest received a vist from Fido (the cellphone company) in which, with all the shmaltzy sales pitch you can imagine, the Fido rep tried to convince Jeremy that it would be a great idea to park a big honking bus completely rammered with logos and the like right in front of the Fringe tent. The corporate courting began with an email, which Jeremy was generous enough to share with yours truly. It’s in French, so here’s the anglo gist “we are so lucky bc we have a 24 foot truck in Fido colours that, once on site will attract a wild crowd attracted by it’s look and lounge style and you’re so lucky we chose you because our hip plugged in crowd will be your crowd!” heh. yeah. Clearly they’d never been to the festival. Excitedly, they included pictures:

Brièvement, notre promotion Fido est quelque chose d’unique pour les
québécois puisque nous sommes les premiers à débuter et promouvoir ce
que nous appelons du mobilemarketing.Effectivement, nous sommes
munis d’un camion de 24 pieds aux couleurs de Fido, qui, une fois sur
le site,attire une foule de personne par son look unique et son
lounge urbain et stylé. Évidemment une photo vaut mille mots, et c’est
pourcetteraison que j’ai inséré un croquis en attache pour vous
donner une idée.

Sur ce, il y a donc une possibilité pour vous d’amasser de l’argent
etde renforcir votre événement, puisque notre public cible sera
également le vôtre!Si cela vous intéresse, ce que je souhaite, je
vous invite à entrer en communication avec moi dès que possible.

Merci de votre temps et je vous envoie mes salutations les plus
distinguées

So Fringe got the email, took the meeting, listened to the schpeil. While inwardly guffawing “no fucking way” out loud Jeremy said: “How much?” Fido’s answer? 400$. At this point Jeremy’s inner monologue became.. um.. outer. Suffice to say, the idea did not appeal and the price was nowhere near high enough ” for 5 grand I wouldn’t let you park that monstrosity within 100 feet of my festival” was I believe the gist of it. Jeremy is a sweet dude, and also more then capable of getting his point across.

So he thought the matter was done with. 400$ is an insult and worthy of much mockery.. the whole tone of the approach to the Fringe missed it’s mark by a mile and screamed a complete lack of understanding regarding what the festival is like, what’s it’s about, not to mention a large headed blinkered perspective on how people (Fringe and non alike) will react to a 24 foot product-pushing presence at the street fest.

Aaanyway.

If the story ended here it would be funny enough.. but no…

After a loud and thunderous NO from the Fringe honchos, they thought they’d made themselves clear on the whole Fido subject. Not so. Less then a week before the fest, Jeremy sits down again, this time with some people from the St.Laurent street association, the crew behind the street fests, who do all the organization involved in shutting down the city’s major artery and filling it up with vendors and more. And low and behold, there it was, right there in their mockups and the planners happily pointing “here is where we’ll put the Fido trucks!” And by “here” they meant exactly in the spaces designated for our Indyish events - the Car Art would have nowhere to go and the daily art markets would look out on the back of a 24foot screaming street ad packed with grumpy staff. (So the street association took the offer of 400$? not sure, but sure sounds like it..)

According to the representative from the street association 1. the parc was the Fringe’s but the street was there’s to do as they liked with and 2. they had a responsibility (get this) to add cultural events to the street fest. (I know, sputter gawk gasp laugh puke.. a Fido truck is not culture.) Anyway, Jeremy pitched a voluable fit that went something like this: “This festival has been in existence in the city for 15 years, there are events planned in that space. If that truck is near my parc on opening night of the Fringe festival, when there are 600+ people onsite to launch and celebrate, I will personally get onstage and send those people out into the street .. and if you don’t remove it we will.” Can’t you just picture the indyish, the fringe actors, the bands from Fringe Pop and all the frineds and fans unleashing holy hell on Mobile Marketing, rolling it down ST.Laurent behind the Striptease Parade? I admit, I laughed maniacally when they told me and made sure they knew we’d be pushing with the best of them (dispite our weak nerdy limbs) and spreading the word as far and wide as possible on the web. The street association caved (after some tears) and moved the sucker down the block.

In the Fringe offices with Jeremy and Geoff days before the festival we looked at the mockups for the mobile makreting again and laughed. I wondered aloud what rappers they would be able to bring in the perform on top opf the truck, as proposed in the mock up (presumably this would be the cultural content) and Geoff called it right when he replied “they’re won’t be any rappers”. He was right, we could see the sad thing across the street from us, quiet and fat with money spent on ads and “fido colours” and staff trying fruitlessly to get the milling crowds interested in coming into the “lounge” which was of course pretty much just a freaking cell phone store on wheels. The top didn’t look stable, or flat, or equipped in any way for the rappers depicted in the hopeful mockup. Meanwhile, on the stretch of street they’d tried to colonize for chump change, we enjoyed the events we’d worked for months to organize.

And if the story ended there we could laugh and feel superior, mock corporate idiocy and call it a day, but real life is more complicated. Yesterday my charger for my (yes) Fido cellphone broke. I went to the place I’d bought it, they were out but they sent me to another store, where the rep told me, puzzled, that he didn’t know why I’d been sent there, since each store is a separate franchise and if he replaced it for me they wouldn’t be reimbursed. My anger level with bs bureaucracy mounting, increasingly frantic thinking of the next 8 days of event managment ahead of me, and the perpetual shitstorm that entails, and imagining doing it without a cellphone and no time to go wrassle with Fido headquarters, me and the Fido rep on the job that day talked it out a bit more. He had what I needed, he asked if I could pay for it and I said you know, I just don’t think I should have to, the charger broke after 1 month of signing a contract with your company. I knew it wasn’t his fault and made sure he knew I knew it. He looked me in the eye, slid the charger across the counter and gave me a small nod. Blown away by the sudden reversal, and very much aware that this was one nice guy bending the rules, I askedvhim if there was something I could do for him in the way of trades - any shows he wanted to see during the fest? He said he was busy, but thanks, and then he took my hand and said, “this is how it works, you do something good for somebody else now, and pass it on.”

I walked out astonished and smiling.

The screening of What is Indie? last night came right on the heels of this interesting paradox with Fido. The film reminded us that the music industry is changing, the independent of mind and spirit are reshaping the corporate culture that had been the norm, where companies owned the rights to you, and what you did, and what you wore, and everything you made. Fielding phone calls on my way home from the What is Indie evening, it was impossible to deny that the lines between corporate and independent, good and evil, smart and dumb, are wayy more complicated then we sometimes get ourselves hepped up to believe. Every company in the world is made up of individuals, and most of them are good people, and all of them are able to affect change, add disruption, make human connection beyond the dumbass hype. Don’t lose sight of those people, or of the happy power we have together when we’re aware of it, and change is not only possible, it’s cumulative, momentuous, and undeniable.

I have tons more to say on this - about how companies can be smarter about getting involved in fests like the fringe - Fido could have sponsored all the walkies and phones for the runners, box office managers, and technicians for example - in a subtle way they could have been hugely more visible at this massive festival, and created creative posivite associations instead of angry/mocking ones. Or like Celtx, the Assembly art relay sponsor they cuold have been supportive: they let us design tshirts and then made them for us, they figured out that USB’s would make our life in the relay way easier so they supplied them, they make a free open source software for artists and still worked hard to find out what we wanted to do and how they could help out.

Anyway, for now - That’s my tirade and story for the morning. Sarah and Tessa are hard at work prepping and I’m off to the tent to meet them for our first Assembly meet on site! Peace and cheers and yes yes change is coming.

Risa