Being Amber Rhea

Article in Southern Voice today:

The owners of Spring4th - which has hosted gay leather parties and events produced by Atlanta’s queer Femme Mafia - encountered the parking requirements when the venue expanded in summer 2006, with the number of required parking spaces tied to a location’s size. The expansion also attracted the attention of various neighborhood groups, who attempted to close down the venue.

Before going to the official city committee, the Spring4th parking and liquor license applications were required to wind through groups like the Midtown Neighbors’ Association and the area Neighborhood Planning Unit. An MNA committee originally indicated it would not oppose Spring4th’s applications, but MNA members began making allegations about illegal activities taking place at Spring4th, according to owner Rick Day.

The accusations ranged from charges that the expansion included construction work without a permit, to an anonymous e-mail that alleged Spring4th was secretly a sex club. Midtown neighbors also allegedly doctored an advertisement for an event at Spring4th so that it advertised “BYOB - All ages” and “Underage girls welcome,” according to before-and-after images posted on Spring4th’s website.

In April 2007, the MNA board voted to oppose Spring4th’s liquor license application and parking waiver.

According to the minutes from the MNA’s April 26 meeting, a board member allegedly received an e-mail that stated, “If you want to know what goes on in the building with the red door - sex.”

The MNA board rejected the Spring4th applications, “as it is not appropriate for the neighborhood,” according to the meeting minutes.

Read the whole thing, and leave a comment or write a letter!

I will probably write something later, but right now I’m just feeling so exhausted, I don’t know if I can muster it. I hope everyone who can, though, will make your voices heard.

[Cross-posted on the Sex 2.0 blog]

Sex 2.0 has lost its venue. Spring4th has been forced to close its doors due to the meddling of the Midtown Neighborhood Association (the same people responsible for the appalling harassment of street prostitutes) and the arcane hoops through which the City of Atlanta has forced them to jump. We are currently seeking a new venue. We need all the help we can get - time, energy, MONEY, resources, everything.

If you can help, please join the Google group ASAP.

More details to come soon.

[Cross-posted on the Sex 2.0 blog]

In many ways today has been a good day. First and foremost, I bought a new car!

Also, it snowed - and the snow actually stuck. This is a Very Big Deal in Georgia.

(I’ll have more photos of the car once the snow melts.)

But then there’s also this email that came in just now…

As some of you are well aware, the city has decided we can not change the use of the building without strict criteria for parking.

The business demands over $10,000.00 per month to keep open.

As much as we want to honor our dates, it looks as if we can not afford more losses.
Therefore, it is with great regret that due to the meddling of the neighbor’s association, along with the ridiculous stubbornness of the City to work with us, we can not honor your date in 2008 for your event.

I know I made verbal promises to you in the past, but without some drastic concessions from our landlord, I’m afraid there is nothing that we can do to accommodate any event past February.

Translation: Sex 2.0 has lost its venue.

*sigh*

I can’t deal with this right now. Someone else needs to deal with it. I already emailed the Sex 2.0 Google group about this, so hopefully someone(s) will step up soon.

Oh and by the way… the people responsible for Spring4th’s untimely closure? It’s the same assholes mentioned here.

Good job, Midtown. You’ve successfully driven another locally-owned small business out of your neighborhood.

I’m very excited, because Sex 2.0 plans are progressing nicely!

We now have a confirmed venue, which means we have an idea of how much money we need to raise; which means we can start contacting sponsors! Sex 2.0 will take place April 12, 2008 at the Spring4th Center.

Rusty is going to write a press release tonight or this weekend, and then we can use that, along with bios and such, to put together a media kit to send to potential sponsors. I already have several local companies/organizations in mind that I’d like to approach. Other people will be in charge of approaching sponsors elsewhere (and with helping me approach them here, because really, this is something I definitely cannot do on my own).

We have four sessions nailed down; and there will be more, many more! The fabulous Audacia Ray is also confirmed as the keynote speaker.

If you have an idea for a session, please add it to the sessions page on the wiki; the password is sex20. I will not be coming up with ideas for any sessions. Like PodCamp, this is an unconference created by YOU the participants!

Two of the confirmed sessions have detailed descriptions… here they are:

Choose Your Own Adventure: How has the escorting business changed with the advent of the Internet? - Kristi Kane

Thanks to the Internet, certain hit-or-miss aspects of the escorting business are going by the wayside.

For men, this includes: Looking up random escort agencies in the Yellow Pages, and not knowing what they’ll get; Calling an agency, asking for a petite redhead and getting a heavy brunette; Or having the right girl show up, but not performing the advertised service.

For women: Working for an old-school agency and not knowing who they’ll be seeing or where they’ll be going; Having to wear a blonde wig to an appointment because the guy asked for a blonde; Placing ads in alternative weeklies and fielding tons of bizarre calls from undesirable clients; Having to give half of their hard-earned money back to the agency; And worst of all, walking the streets or dealing with pimps.

For girls who don’t mind answering their own phones, doing their own client screening, and of course, doing their own advertising online, the Internet offers not only a more lucrative arena for putting their assets to work, but gives both providers and hobbyists a place to “choose their own adventures.”

Erotic Writing 101 - Rachel Kramer Bussel

Do you have fantasies waiting to be set free? Do you long to tell someone your deepest desires - or invent whole new erotic scenarios?

Just how kinky can (and should) you get? Are you looking for a career in dirty words?

Learn the tricks of the trade, including how to create tension, passion, and dirty talk, incorporate real-life elements into your smut as well as write from the POV of other genders/sexual orientations, along with erotic writing for big bucks. Taught by acclaimed author and editor Rachel Kramer Bussel (rachelkramerbussel.com), contributor to over 100 anthologies, including Best American Erotica 2004 and 2006. Workshop will cover basics of erotic writing, pseudonyms, sensual letter writing for lovers, writing for websites, magazines and anthologies, how and where to submit your work, as well as exercises to practice in class and at home. Rachel has edited over a dozen naughty books, including He’s on Top, She’s on Top, Caught Looking, Ultimate Undies, and Naughty Spanking Stories from A to Z 1 and 2, is Senior Editor at Penthouse Variations and a Contributing Editor at Penthouse, and hosts NYC’s monthly In The Flesh Erotic Reading Series.

And please add a Sex 2.0 badge to your blog or web site!

Note to self: Stop being such a cheapskate and order more MOO cards. I couldn’t send nearly as many as I wanted to Dacia, Rachel, and Regina. I need to keep reminding myself that yes, in fact, it is okay to spend money on things that aren’t “essential.” :P

On that note, here’s a note to everyone: Feel free to make your own MOO cards, ’cause the logo is on Flickr for everyone’s Creative Commons-friendly use.

I ordered 100 MOO MiniCards with all the pertinent Sex 2.0 information that I could fit on ‘em, and they came yesterday. Check out the hotness:

I plan to give these out at BlogHer, Dragon*Con, and anywhere else where there might be people interested in Sex 2.0. And if anyone is interested in making your own to give out, the Sex 2.0 logo is on Flickr, so just save it to your photostream and use it to design your own cards. (Side note: I’ve gotten a few weird requests on Flickr to “trade” these. Is that a thing? Do people trade MOO cards like baseball cards?)

Also, as of yesterday, our venue is confirmed: Sex 2.0 will be happening at the Spring4th Center. Yay!