PICTURES: Sao Paulo Goes Advertising-Free

boingboing.net — "Back in December, 2006, the mayor of the 11-million-person Brazilian city of Sao Paulo banned all outdoor billboard advertising, citing advertisers' unwillingness to comply with the city's rules on what sort of billboards can be placed where. Now the rule is in effect, and Flickr user Tony de Marco has documented the eerie sight.." Apr 14, 2007 View in Crawl 4

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freegrace Apr 15, 2007

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The difference between São Paulo in December and now is huge. There are still a lot of billboards, so there must be some sort of exemption or loophole. I think the city looks much better now. Driving in São Paulo has always been difficult. Especially for me since I do not know the city very well, so I would use the billboards as navigational landmarks. Now I actually need to know where I am going. Maybe I´ll by a map, but it was always easier to just "turn right at the 40 foot Gisele."

localzuk Apr 15, 2007

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So prices for accommodation will now rise, as will bus and taxi fairs. These markets are subsidised by the advertising income and if that subsidy disappears, the companies will get that money from elsewhere - namely, you, the customer.I doubt the law will last long, as annoying some of your largest tax payers because of an 'eye sore' is not a good way to keep the coffers full...

localzuk Apr 15, 2007

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Err... You obviously don't know much about how public transport companies operate then. Buses are driving billboards. Without then prices most definitely will go up significantly!

trueisnotfalse Apr 15, 2007

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Looks post apocalyptic to me.

smackhero Apr 16, 2007

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i'm sure the advertising industry can survive on reasonable advertising that's within the city's guidelines--as in other countries. also, street-side advertising is a small percent of the advertising market. there's still tv, radio, magazines (the bulk of advertising for small to mid-sized firms) and newspapers.if anything, it just means more people will change from advertising to less annoying industries. i say good. just like we ought to outlaw spamming altogether and make spammers find productive jobs that serve society rather than annoy it.also i don't see a bunch of advertisers (a white collar job) and marketers all of a sudden turning into street hoodlums. most have probably gone to college, so it should be expected of them to have gotten a well-rounded education that ought to have imparted in them skills that can be implemented in various types of jobs.

smackhero Apr 16, 2007

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serious. a lot of graffiti artists would probably do it for free too and do a wonderful job. they, unlike advertisers, are true artists and actually want to make their environment more beautiful. this would be a great way to allow graffiti artists to paint legally.

atomic1fire Apr 16, 2007

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It would be a bad thingbut apparently people don't like ad company's trying to make them custominionsperhaps if they worried more about quality and satisfaction they wouldn't need advertising so muchI don't care ether way

smackhero Apr 16, 2007

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@f00kies:right, i'll just walk around the city (drive/cross roads) with my eyes closed. think before you speak. advertisers buy billboards because people are guaranteed to look. if it were a choice, then most people would choose not to look at billboards, but that's why they're placed in targeted areas. you can make an effort not look look at each billboard for more than 1 or 2 seconds, but you would still see them all over the place, and in some areas you'd have to just stare at your feet if you didn't want any ads in your field of vision. that's why this kind of thing is being implemented around the world.

byronm Apr 16, 2007

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Billboards are terribly.. I grew up in Houston - home of the billboards hundreds of feet in the air and remember when they finally put caps on size/quantities in areas but to this day you can see billboards stacked high & deep.The most annoying ones though are the ones you see when driving through areas where you want to observe the scenery. Now i haven't been to Carlsbad New Mexico in a few years, but growing up we vacationed there a lot as we headed up to colorado/utah (moab/canyonlands) and there would litterally be 100-200 signs along the way saying how close you are to some tourist trap and how you can get this and that and oh yeah, we're proud of our 100 miles of signs!

Closed Account Dec 3, 2007