The City

Moderator:Ill introduce our panelists, and why dont we just sort of hold our applause so I can get through them because they all have very fat bios, and Ive even condensed them, but theyre still long even so. And I also want to thank David Ulin and Bill Deverell and Will Hearst for making this amazing weekend happen. We need to do these symposia more often. So, Phil Bronstein, to my left, hes been executive chair of the board. He is executive chair of the Center for Investigative Reporting ever since the organization merged with The Bay Citizen last year. Previously, he was editor-at-large for Hearst Newspapers and executive vice president of the San Francisco Chronicle. He was, before that, editor of the Examiner, youll be starting to notice the theme here shortly, where he started as a reporter in 1980 doing investigative journalism and foreign correspondence and was a Pulitzer Prize finalist. Next to him is David Talbot, whos been called a pioneer of online journalism by The New York Times. He is the founder and former editor in chief of Salon and former arts editor of the Examiner. Hes the author of the bestselling Brothers about Robert Kennedys search for the truth behind the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Hes also author of Season of the Witch, which was a national bestseller about San Franciscos wild and bloody history. He is now at work on a book about the CIA. Next to him is Michelle Tea. Shes the author of four [???][0:01:33] memoirs including the illustrated Rent Girl and the award winning Valencia, which was recently adapted for the screen. Shes also author of a collection of poetry, a novel, and a YA fantasy series, the first of which was Mermaid in Chelsea Creek. She is the founder and artistic director of RADAR Productions, which oversees the RADAR Reading Series, now on its 10th year, the Sister Spit tours and the Radio Lab in Mexico. Sorry, Radar LAB in Mexico. Shes currently working on a 5th memoir titled How to Grow Up for Penguin. And last but not the least, we have Gary Kamiya. He dropped out of Yale to attend U.C. Berkeley where he was awarded the Mark Schorer Citation in English Literature, all the while driving a taxi in San Francisco. He worked for, guess who? The Examiner, as senior editor of Sunday magazine, Image. He was also a book editor and culture critic before co-founding with David Talbot, Salon.com. In August, Bloomsbury published his bestselling book, Cool Gray City of Love: 49 Views of San Francisco. Please welcome, our panel. So, San Francisco, you know, obviously has a very storied literary history that includes people like Dashiell Hammett, Mark Twain, Jack London, Gertrude Stein as well as modern blockbuster types like Armistead Maupin, who was here yesterday, Amy Tan, Dave Eggers, Isabel Allende. They all live here, too. The scene itself, at least in my view, is fractured but sort of mutually joined in purpose and support, and its booming. Fourteen years ago when we started Litquake, we were kind of the only show in town. And now, theres pretty much, as The New York Times wrote, any night of the week, theres something going on. A lot of organizations that serve various passions from the Rumpus, which was sort of about politics, to 826 Valencia, which is about kids, to live series like Quiet Lightning, Michelles RADAR Reading Series, Literary Death Match and more. San Francisco has also traditionally been at the forefront of great journalism, boundary pressing journalism, starting with Mother Jones in the 70s to Will Hearsts glorious Examiner of the 80s, which we all participated in, which featured names like Warren Hinckle, Hunter S. Thompson, and Armistead Maupin, to the groundbreaking work of Salon.com in the 90s, one of our finest journalism websites. And since the turn of the century in journalism, weve seen the rise of online only news sites like The Bay Citizen and the emergence of the Center for Investigative Reporting as a nationally prominent source for news. And in fact, all of us sitting here have done journalism and books, so there you go. Okay, Phil. Phil is the one that he has hes soon to do a book. Phil, it seems to me like Phil Bronstein:No. Moderator:Hes gotten an agent already. Anyway, it seems to me like the New York, New York has always been associated as being this sort of hot bed of journalism excellence in the city between The New York Times and The New Yorker, but the Bay Area seems like it staked a pretty strong claim in recent years, thanks to the rise of the CIR. I mean what is it about the Bay Area that makes this a place where nonprofits like this, Center for Investigative Reporting, can really thrive? Phil Bronstein:Well, thrive is an interesting word. Its true that they exist, but Ill throw it back to Litquake. I mean Litquake which we were both there from the beginning and you started it along with Jack. Lets be honest, I mean you have to struggle every year to make Litquake happen. And the thing Litquake is getting bigger and bigger and fabulous. Its a fabulous event, but wheres the money? Wheres the support? Moderator:Its going to the CIR. Phil Bronstein:The Center of Investigative Reporting, right. So, are we saying that theres only a small pool of people? I mean I went to a ProPublica fundraiser, and ProPublica is the only other organization nationally that does what we do at the Center of Investigative Reporting and, you know, it was very hip, but they didnt collect a lot of money. And so, I think New York, New Yorkers have been very snobbish and arrogant about how theyre superiority and in some cases, theyre right, but not in every case. But lets focus about lets focus on San Francisco because here, we have this great essential Salon for the literary fans of San Francisco, the readers, the writers, the would bes, and its struggling. And why is it struggling? Because the opera is not struggling, as far as I know. The symphony is not really struggling. The ballet is not struggling that much. And so, I think the problem we have here that may exist in New York, but theres just more money there, is that the big money goes to these few traditional institutions and I think that as much as David and Gary with Salon have tried, Francis Coppola in the 70s when, you know, he started Zoetrope, bought a building for live theater. He started a city magazine. People trying to generate that kind of energy, theyre not generating enough support. And so, you know, thats what I feel distinguishes us, unfortunately, in the sense of New York[PH]. Moderator:We have all these great ideas, but not the money to back them up? Phil Bronstein:We have these great actuations. Were actually, its not were executing on great youre executing on great ideas. These guys executed on a great idea, and what happened? I mean I think Salon David Talbot:Its not a San Francisco institution anymore. Phil Bronstein:Its struggling. David Talbot:And its moved to New York. Moderator:But Phil Bronstein:As did Rolling Stone. Moderator:But the my question would be dont you think that San Francisco is the ideal place to launch Salon.com because we were sort of, that was during the salad days of the internet taking off and, you know, it seemed kind of perfect that it was located here. David Talbot:Yeah. So look, I was fascinated by the earlier panels today by Kevin Starrs remarks and by the panel that we just saw on scientific, science fiction and kind of the tension between a utopian and a dystopian view of California and San Francisco in particular. And, you know, my book, Season of the Witch, was, what I was trying to do there was to chronicle how this oasis, and I really did see San Francisco as an oasis as a kid growing up in Los Angeles in the 60s. Its where I wanted to be. It was, to me, the height of creativity and freedom. And but I think, and that struggle that helped bring that about, I mean San Francisco, as Kevin Starr would say, you know, those roots are very deep and go very far back. The progressivism, the, you know, innovation of Salon. But certainly, it really took off in the 60s and 70s, and it was a very traumatic event for this city, series of events. And the city had to grapple with its very identity. And at the end, we came out with what we now know as San Francisco values. And so, my book is a tribute to that social, creative, political struggle in the city that had brought about. But I have to say, more recently, I would lean more in Phils direction, seeing the problems with the city. I think now that its not, its a beleaguered city when it comes to fostering creativity and change and bringing young people here who arent involved in the technology industry. I think what were seeing today is a tale of two cities and you can see it just walking outside here where you have Oracle plastered all over city hall, and we have a CEO, I think, instead of a mayor, Ed Lee, whos deeply embedded with the new technology regime, while you have, you know, the army of the homeless using the library as their place to wash and the one kind of sanctuary that they can go to. So, the creative class in this city is being pushed out. Thats the fact. I dont know that many writers who can hold on to San, you know, to their lifestyles here and live in this city anymore. I mean the middle class is being pushed out, the underclass, and its a playground more and more I think for the Larry Ellison. So, I think thats the, really, the tension in the city these days. Moderator:I think that is absolutely accurate and I think its a perfect point for me to toss it to Michelle Tea, who has sort of thrived to San Franciscos reigning sort of literary underground goddess for many years now. But, you know, you have written your books about the sort of, a sort of literature of the disenfranchised. I think, you know, Peter Plate and you and others that have sort of written about the non-tourist, tourism side of San Francisco. And yet, how would you, how do you think that has succeeded? Do you think that youve succeeded in sort of drawing attention to the sort of struggling mission district kids who have a hard time paying their bills? Michelle Tea:No. Moderator:No? Michelle Tea:Not at all. Well, I mean the problem is systemic and its structural and its a lot larger than anyone literary subculture in the city, you know. And I think that whats happened here with all the influx of money, theres this really frustrating, I mean not only am I a writer and all of that, but Im also, I run a nonprofit, so Im really involved in nonprofit arts funding and that whole, you know, world. And theres been a lot of talk, all this optimistic talk about how the tech sector thats here, its a creative sector and theyre somehow going to be this cross pollination between, you know, the literary or the arts groups and individual artists in this city are somehow, were going to like, theyre going to make it reign for us, you know, from the tech sector and its, it just seems crazy, like its never happened. Like my organization, we have no connection to tech people. I mean like my fianc works for [???][0:11:52]. Thats like my big connection, but like we dont have its not like we can just go knock on a door, it wouldnt be like, Hey, were awesome writers. Fund us. Its like those connections arent being made and I feel like on this larger thing that theres this like, I dont understand why our city doesnt have a sort of task force thats charged with, you know, looking at the effects of gentrification on this city as a whole. Theres so many problems that were facing that doesnt have, they dont have to happen. I mean theres like things with like rent and just landlord greed and all of that stuff. Like we could possibly be a city that had a thriving art scene and, you know, thriving nonprofit scene and a thriving tech sector. I dont know why it has to be so oppositional, but the city is doing nothing to make it easier. You know, its very hard on struggling people when all of a sudden wealth is all over your city. And my literary scene has always been very like working class, lower[PH] class, self-taught writers and, yeah, and a lot of those people have moved to Los Angeles. Moderator:Is that right? Michelle Tea:Oh yeah, absolutely. Theres a Ive lost a ton of the writers that I used to work with have moved to Los Angeles because its affordable. They have rents or you can get so much for your money there. Theres a great art scene happening because thats also where young people are moving now, whereas maybe people wouldve come to San Francisco in the past. L.A. is so vast. Theres actually a huge, like Bohemian cool, like queer art scenes going on there that arent going on here, you know? And theyre going on in Oakland, too. I mean Oakland is awesome. People are totally toughing it out in Oakland and theres really great stuff happening over there, but San Francisco is just insane. Moderator:So, Gertrude Stein was wrong, basically? Michelle Tea:That is, its whether there is. Moderator:Okay. Michelle Tea:That is whether there is. Yeah. Theres no theyre here. So, yeah. And, you know, as far as funding for arts goes here, I mean its all of these organizations fighting over this kind of tiny grants where, as the operas, you know, nobody is really struggling except the small arts organizations here. And in my arts organization, weve had a few great years. And now, were having were really, really struggling right this year. And theres a lot of grants that are offered for projects. So, what ends up happening with an organization like mine, like RADAR, is, you know, we need funding and were really creative and I can like write a grant for like any, I can think of a million great ideas. So, we get all these funding for projects and then we have no organizational support to do the projects. So, were all burnt out and stressed and like, Fuck, we cant You know, like we just had to actually pull out of a bunch of grants because well probably get them and we wont be able to carry it out because we dont have the organizational support. Moderator:Well, you know, Gary, your recent book is sort of a, isnt it something of a love letter to San Francisco, the 49 Views? Gary Kamiya:Absolutely, but Moderator:So, you mustve found something to like in this messed up city of ours. Gary Kamiya:Well, on this subject, in some ways, I think Im gloomier even than my other panelists about the possibility of rectifying this economic situation. David Talbot:Were really bumming you out today. Moderator:I know, but I swear well get to cheerful material in a minute. Gary Kamiya:Im also perhaps but theres an upside. Im also, perhaps, more guardedly optimistic and so the gloomy side first. This is a really unique place on planet earth from a financial point of view, 46 square miles where everybody in the world including massive money from the far east, international money, they all want to come in here. Theres only I agree I definitely think the city needs to create a lot of housing opportunities for middle class people. The city is pretty good with the very poor. Its not so good with the middle class. And when David speaks of the creative class, you know, I dont know that theres an absolute correlation between economic class and creativity, but its like a farm team. You want poorer people to be able to afford to come to a city and live here, and thats increasingly not happening. However, the dark side is I honestly dont see the clock turning back. This is San Francisco is going to become a little bit like Carmel or like Taos, New Mexico. Its going to be a boutique city filled with rich people. This is not going to stop. Theres no way that its going to stop. Well be able to stop it to some degree, but thats the way its going to go. Its too desirable of a place. So, you know, weve got to get used to that and I think that the, and do everything we can to rectify it and to make it work as well as it can. But in terms of it being a richer city and the tech revolution, I hear what Michelle says that like, you know, this utopian talk. The techies started to come in and suddenly theres going to be this great interchange between artists and techies. No. I dont necessarily see that happening, but looking at it from a long historical perspective, not just wealth and poverty generates creativity. San Francisco has been creative in part because of ferment, because of change, whatever that change maybe. So, were going through a lot of change now with the tech revolution thats hit the city. A lot of it is bad. A lot of it technology by itself has nothing to do, generally speaking, with creativity. It is a channel that allows creative impulses to take place. It, itself, doesnt allow creativity, but that doesnt mean that the fact that its in the city that we cant have ferment and change and writers that appear as a result of the ferment in the city from that alone. And its also a two-tier thing. Lets face it. A lot of the greatest writers that live around here are middle class people. Theyre not like, you know, Michael Chabon is not poor. Dave Eggers is not poor. These are great writers. So, its, you know, we have to remember that it isnt as if, you know, a life of noble poverty is required for writing to take place. But we do need the city to be as dynamic and multifaceted as possible. Moderator:But then, how do we tie it into how do we tie this sort of grim picture into the fact that the literary scene has never been more thriving, at least to my recollection, and Ive lived here most of my life. The New York Times was right that pretty much any night of the week, all you have to do is look up in listings and theres something to go to, and this is all bubbled up from, this is were not talking about popup magazine at the opera house. Were talking about, you know, Quiet Lightning at the Conservatory of Flowers and this sort of very cheap, free events, put on by people that dont have any money, but just do it for the love of it. So, how does that how did that scene come to be in this sort of extremely uber competitive and black/white economic picture? Phil Bronstein:Americas Cup. Moderator:Dont go down that road, please. Phil Bronstein:I mean, you know, if you want to look at the most recent example of what the problem is and perhaps what the solution is, just look at Americas Cup. I mean its not even creatively corrupt, you know? San Francisco and Kevin, we should ask Kevin to give us a brief speech about corruption, creative corruption in San Franciscos history because its fabulous and filled with great characters, and what do we got now? Willie Brown, you know, I mean the reality is is that you can have all the interests, the intellectual interests which we do at every single level because there are writers who are very wealthy, and in fact, [???][0:18:51] organization, the Center of Investigative Reporting is, we are plugging into some of the technology organizations in San Francisco and businesses and some of the technology billionaires who, at some point in their life, start realizing maybe they need to do something besides buy another car or another house or another island. And some of them, you know, whether its the billionaires pledge or however they get there, I dont care, but there is some change taking place underneath, you know, the ice that is uncracked of political, of really boxy political corruption here. I mean, you know, you just, you need some support, institutional support from San Francisco and youre not going to get it because theyre too busy with this really boring corruption that is represented by Willie Brown whos got a piece of just about every company thats been started in the last 10 years, and we all go, what a great character he is. Wow! Isnt that fun? Isnt that entertaining? Moderator: I liked what David said about the mayor being more like a CEO. Phil Bronstein:And, you know, we also dont have an institutional voice, and thats probably good reason than bad, Herb Caen was that institutional voice and what Caen did, he was not a brilliant writer, but what he did was he created these characters out of real people and made them larger than life, that includes Willie, and then he knitted them together on a day-to-day basis. So, you read it like a tableau and you said, I want, you know, I want to be part of that. Thats pretty cool even though some of it wasnt true, and Herb was getting free meals and God knows what else. David Talbot:But Herb also had a sense of civic duty and he had a sense of what San Francisco should be and he reminded people of that every day in an entertaining format, and it was a city of tolerance, it was a city of fun, it was a city where you didnt let people fall through the social safety net. He was a good, liberal Jew and he promoted those values every day in his column. So, what I think this city is lacking, you know, and I agree, I agree. We shouldnt be too depressed here, Jane. There is lots of literary ferment, and youre right. Every night, theres something going on in the city. I have two young sons, 19, 23, they love this city and theyre having a great time in it. But, you know, I can see a movement. The kind of movement that created city lights, you know, the beat movement in the 50s and early 60s, or the hippie movement in the 60s really taking route in this city the way those two cultural movements did because they found funky, you know, low income housing that they could, those poets and those musicians where they could get a foothold in this city. And, you know, I think its getting harder and harder to do that. Now, Phil talks about the billionaires. Look, I think, you know, John King wrote a good column on this in the San Francisco Chronicle a few days ago and he reminded us that there are, there is a tradition of wealthy people in San Francisco who do give back. Those tend to be older Jews. Warren Hellman, God bless him. You know, Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival going on this weekend because of him. Center for Investigative Reporting, Warren Hellman, again, helped out in a huge way there. We had the two meta achieves[PH], Bill Hambrecht, the investment banker and John Warnock, the founder of Adobe software company, were responsible along with Gary and me and the editorial people we pulled together for founding Salon. They put up the money for it and they continue to hang in there with us until this very day. But those are thats an older generation. And the new generation of tech wealth, I think, has yet to be heard from when it comes to not just as Phil said, buying a third or fourth house or an island, but really contributing in a significant way to the life of this city, the civic life of this city, the creative life. We need meta achieves[PH]. We need a new generation of meta achieves[PH] to do that. And San Francisco should be the Florence. It is the Florence of America in so many ways. And yet we, I think, lack that, you know, people of that stature. So, you know, we should start demanding that. Moderator:So, just to kind of try and steer it back towards the literary for a moment, this is an awesome discussion, but its sort of like what writers think is wrong with San Francisco as opposed to, no, which is great, but its also, I think you want to hear about the history, the literary history of San Francisco. And I just wonder, as long as were being negative, is there no, in a good way. I mean is there a literary movement in San Francisco that was probably undeserving of all the, you know, adulation, i.e., The Beats? I mean every time, every Litquake that comes around, somebody wants to do a Beat thing, and Jacks eyes start to rotate in their sockets, but and yet at the same time I feel like they were, you know, progenitors of McSweeneys and I mean they were sort of the mavericks of their era as we have now in the city, but I mean what do you think? What do you think of The Beats? Is there another group that we think, probably, were in the right place at the right time, but didnt have a lot of literary significance to them? Michelle Tea:Yeah. All the dykes that have been writing in San Francisco since the 90s. Seriously, like I just think theyre all as good, if not better and more innovative than The Beats. But its like, talk about a kind of culture voice, its like completely removed from power and removed from like male privilege, removed from heterosexual privilege, removed from, you know, usually financial privilege. So, its very hard to get published and its very hard Moderator:Can you tell us some, tell us some names, so that Michelle Tea:Oh, yeah. Ali Liebegott. Moderator:Yeah. Michelle Tea:Whos like she hasnt published a book that hasnt won an award. Lynn Breedlove, Daphne Gottlieb, Justin Chin is not a lesbian, but I dont hold it against him. I think he would probably love to be a lesbian. Rhiannon Argo. I mean theres just like theres a lot of people, and having been a writer and in this sort of, you know, I started doing Sister Spit as an open mic in 1994 in San Francisco and currently, Sister Spit is a national tour, and were also a publishing imprint with City Lights, which is amazing. So, weve been Ive been like just working with just different kind of young, queer female writers since the 90s, all who have like really strong outsider voices and its like you just watch people not been able to gain traction because they dont have, they just dont have the connections or the resources and you watch them sort of like, the reality of paying the bills kind of like continue to kind of weigh on them and theyre writing sort of peters out and then theyre gone. And its like, I just think like what were those novels that didnt get written because the city got expensive? You know, they didnt have the contacts in the world like thats why I feel like what we do at RADAR is we try to hook people with publishers. We try to hook people up with audiences and stuff like that to give people a reason to write. Because when I started writing in the 90s, it was when Spoken Word was really taking off. And so, there was a different open mic that was free every night of the week and it was a huge scene. And so, I felt like theres always something for me to do with my writing. I could bring it somewhere. But I just feel like when youre that kind of disconnected, if you dont have a place to bring your writing and you dont feel like being published is necessarily an option for you, you could be really talented and have a lot to say, but you just kind of peter out because what are you going to do with it? Moderator:So, wheres the source of the problem with, you know, outsider voices is that, you know, San Francisco says, come on in, but then, New York or whoever says, were not interested or like where is the breakdown there? Michelle Tea:I think the breakdown is just I mean I think theres a lot of things going on. You know, I think were talking about like a very complicated sort of psychology, almost, of being like outside and not having inroads and financially or into like publishing industries. San Francisco is not very connected to a larger publishing industry. You know, I will say this about San Francisco thats awesome is that they have cultural equity grants, which are really wonderful, and they have them for organizations and for individual artists that are either queer or if youre individually a person of color or if the organization is led by a person of color, they have these grants and theyre really excellent and they do recognize what the disadvantage youre at in this, and probably this city more than others, and they give a lot of economics [interposing]. David Talbot:Thats a good question. Why hasnt San Francisco been able to build a lasting publishing infrastructure that can support the local talent here? Michelle Tea:Yeah. David Talbot:One reason I started Salon was because I knew New York was so provincial and there was sort of huge amount of talent here that wasnt being exploited and tapped. Michelle Tea:Yeah. David Talbot:I thought lets do it here in San Francisco. And Gary and I, were able to leave the Examiner and go off and do that. But I, you know Moderator:No fisticuffs please. David Talbot:But look, Salon has, like I said earlier, has now essentially moved to New York like Rolling Stone did. Ramparts, of course, disappeared years ago. WIRED is still here, but owned by Cond Nast. So, we have a great tradition of being the entrepreneurs, the creative entrepreneurs, who create these institutions which are much more original than anything being created in New York in the last several decades, frankly, in publishing, and yet, they fade out. We cant sustain them except for, you know, the few exceptions, City Lights in the bookstore realm. Michelle Tea:Yeah. Moderator:McSweeneys. Michelle Tea:And Manic D. David Talbot:And McSweeneys. Moderator:McSweeneys. David Talbot:Yeah. Moderator:Manic D Press is really great too. Michelle Tea:Manic D. Moderator:Theyve been able to stick it out. David Talbot:But, you know, one of the great things that I thought about the business model of Salon, when Gary and I were running it, are, you know, it never got really much coverage. We got 100,000 people to pay $40 a year. That was $4,000,000. We generated revenue directly from our readers, and then we made up the rest from advertising. To me, that was a major breakthrough in sort of internet thinking because no one wanted to pay for anything, still dont want to pay for publishing online. Thats what it comes down to. We have to somehow connect with the base of readers, of people, who actually enjoy and appreciate what were doing, who are willing to help sustain us. Gary Kamiya:I think that its San Francisco just has a real problem with, you know, not feeling the sense of the patron of the arts model, which people are talking about, is problematic because its worked sometimes historically, but look at France, for example. The, you know, the French have this enormous pool of money that they hand out to stimulate art and it ends up becoming almost Stalinist [PH] at times. So, I think its good. I we should absolutely try to educate the rich donors in San Francisco, the wealthy techies, all the new money to support the arts. But I actually like what David and Phil are saying about, you know, trying to actually create audiences where you can be self sustaining as an artistic and journalistic enterprise. I think thats a better leg to stand on than the patron of the arts model. I think you need the patron of the arts model, but I dont think we should be completely become enamored of it. I think its problematic and I think that, this is where Im a little bit optimistic about the techies. I see them as a tabula rasa. I think the techies are like, you know, they dont know who they are yet. A lot of them are really young. Theyve come here. Youd see these pop-up magazine phenomena. You know, thousands, you know, they sell out [???][0:30:10] in like one day and a lot of these are like these young, 25-year-old hipsters that you see on Valencia Street and theyre going. This is nominally a magazine. Dave and I were gnashing our teeth. We used to try to have public events and bring people in. No one showed up. Its all about marketing. Its about social media. And they sit there and theres a bunch of people that do magazine pieces on stage and they get thousands of people for this David Talbot:They sold [???][0:30:30]. Yeah. Gary Kamiya:So this, this is encouraging and its sort of like, how do you frame the, you know, its like eat your spinach. If they think that if you can convince people that the literature that youre putting out, the writing, the journalism is something that is interesting to them, theyll start reading it and then there could be a business model in which theyll start paying for it. So, I think its youve got to have some of the patron of the art stuff, but Im wary of it and I think that theres some optimism in terms of educating. Its like were going to have to educate the wealthy people coming in to this city. Michelle Tea:Yeah. I mean I think the beauty of Litquake, and I dont know how the tables got turned on me, but so be it. Gary Kamiya:Youre a player here, honey. Michelle Tea:is that an idea that began organically, and because it was an all inclusive idea, I think its the reason that its now 9 days long and 800 authors big because we never told anybody, you know, you cant play in other words. So, people say, Hey, thats a great idea. Can I bring my organization to the table? And before you know it, its this huge thing. But our fundraising has not kept up with the size because it was started by writers, and what do we know about fundraising? And its only been in the last few years that we finally got smart and brought in outside help, but Gary Kamiya:But dont you charge? I mean dont you make money? Michelle Tea:We our ticket money is just a small fraction of, because we, about 80% of our events are all free to the public. So, we dont charge for very much. So yeah, really good model, right? Phil Bronstein:Well, no. But the thing about Litquake is that the narrative is interesting. The narrative itself is interesting so we, CIR, were running these things called The Lunch Club and theres a bar in Hearst building called The Local Edition, which I dont know if youve been to, but those of us who are old newspaper hacks, you know, wed feel very comfortable there. Its like a newspaper museum. Its a cross between a [???][0:32:25] and newspaper museum and we have these things that we invite, you know, guest donors, people who are already donors to CIR, potential donors, board members, obviously, you know, our staff. But what we do is we tell the story behind the story. In other words, we never imagined for a second that what we do is actually interesting to anyone else and how we do it. It turns out it is and people want to hear how you got that story and, you know, driving down Americas 50 worst charities and how do you bust those people and chasing the guy down the street. And we created sort of these dramatic events, which now fill up. And we are not charging people yet, but I think we intend to charge people. And I think its true of any genre in the arts. Theres a tendency to want to be, you know, self sufficient, but also kind of you want to live in your own world and you dont necessarily want to partner with other people or think about how you could create a narrative around Litquake isnt just a bunch of great authors talking to people who are fans. Litquake is a great institution in San Francisco and I dont think, despite The New York Times, which is not God, believe it or not, I dont think that the narrative of Litquake has been told often enough and in enough places, and I think that if we can do that, if we can interest people in what it is were doing, its not going to be a magic shoot of money is going to open up, but I do think the audience will open up and will have a bigger audience. We do something with the Tides Theatre in San Francisco. They take our investigations and they turn them into One Acts. And they fill its a 100-seat theatre, right? So, not ACT[PH] but they fill the theatre for seven or eight shows. And why? Because, you know, journalists are normally very nervous about people taking liberties with their facts, but one of our great journalists, Pulitzer Prize winner, Ryan Gabrielson said