Sign of the times I guess : Philly requiring bloggers to pay $300 for a business license | Washington Examiner
Blogging now requires a $300 license in Philly
- Thread starter schockergd
- Start date
I just wana know how the fuck Philly got the addresses of all the people to mail the bill to? Were that many bloggers dumb enough to put up full mailing addresses, or did philly go as far as scraping whois lookups for philly addresses. 
I just wana know how the fuck Philly got the addresses of all the people to mail the bill to? Were that many bloggers dumb enough to put up full mailing addresses, or did philly go as far as scraping whois lookups for philly addresses.
From the article:
"After dutifully reporting even the smallest profits on their tax filings this year, a number — though no one knows exactly what that number is — of Philadelphia bloggers were dispatched letters informing them that they owe $300 for a privilege license, plus taxes on any profits they made."
Lol dont tell the government anything.
That's generally a good idea these days. If you give them any information at all, they chase after you like you're a criminal.
Well that was stupid, who reports anything that doesn't bring in at least a few thousand in a year? "Yea I made 11$ , I want harassment please"
I kinda agree with Sticks here. Now if it were $300 per blog, then I'd have to start breaking shit.
Course if they instead called it a Journalism license people would be doing a riot on their blogs
While I can agree that this is a nice "raise of the bar" to keep the DP like people from flooding the internet more than they already are, I know a ton of people (from colleagues online to friends and family members) who run personal blogs as a hobby or to keep the rest of the family updated on how their new born baby is doing.
Requiring a "business license" in this area is not something the gov should be getting themselves into. Not to mention this could easily evolve from just blogs to all websites requiring a license to operate. There goes anonymity for everyone.
somehow im pretty sure this is obama's fault. popeye will probably fill in the details glen beck style
That is the most retarded backwards ass thing. What's next? Hitting up facebook page owners and digg users? "You're driving traffic that people could possibly pay you for"
...I wonder if she can pull a "well it's hosted in Arizona so my site isn't a local business"
...I wonder if she can pull a "well it's hosted in Arizona so my site isn't a local business"
I'm really curious what happens if you tell them to fuck off and don't pay the $300 in extortion money?
It would be inevitable actually.
I like the optimism that you think this would stop a flood of DP like people from flooding the internet, but this would actually just increase the amount of DP like people since most those people dont live in the US.
All this does is raise the entry for US citizens to start their own blogs and online businesses, and in turn, European and Middle-Eastern counties reap the benefits of their biggest competitors not even being able to plant the seeds of their success just starting out.
Its nice that its $300, about a weeks pay for the average minimum wage full time joe, who is usually living paycheck to paycheck anyways.
Everyone agreeing with this is being extremely short sighted and outright greedy. Just because you cant compete with someone who has no budget doesnt mean its right for the govt to indirectly do you a favor.
You would have to find someone to pay you cash because the city would freeze your bank account. If it came to that.
The only thing not so bad with this, is that it takes a desparation for money to start sinking to levels like this. So, the city clearly wouldnt have the resources to actually enforce it.
original link here:
Pay Up :: News :: Article :: Philadelphia City Paper
And some cities wonder why they can't attract entrepreneurs
Pay Up :: News :: Article :: Philadelphia City Paper
And some cities wonder why they can't attract entrepreneurs
I may not have made myself clear in my first post but I'm not for this at all. The crack I made about keeping DP users from flooding the net was a joke - but as you point out the joke was not thought out as most DP users are in India.
This law hurts American's ability to use their Freedom of Speech right. Many people blog as a hobby and wouldn't know how to justify a business license fee (and renewal fees, taxes) when they probably don't make enough to cover domain + crap shared hosting costs to begin with.