For the past three years, Marilyn Bess has operated MS Philly Organic, a small, low-traffic blog that features occasional posts about green living, out of her Manayunk home. Between her blog and infrequent contributions to ehow.com, over the last few years she says she's made about $50. To Bess, her website is a hobby. To the city of Philadelphia, it's a potential moneymaker, and the city wants its cut.
In May, the city sent Bess a letter demanding that she pay $300, the price of a business privilege license.
This blog has never earned a penny. It is a hobby for me. If I were sent a bill, I would probably do one of three things- close the blog, ignore the bill, or build coalition with every other blogger or any stripe to go on the attack against the City on 1st Amendment grounds.
Yeah, the latter. Business licensing is plain wrong, and this case illustrates it as well as any. Who is protected by running out small-time blogs? Yeah, local governments.
(h/t: Josh Gillespie)
2 comments:
Top of Drudge tonight:
Philly requiring bloggers to pay $300 for a business license
Ironic that in Philadelphia the seat of the revolutionary Colonial Congress,
they are trying to impose the type of tax that caused our
forebears to revolt.
Please read Pay
Up Got a blog that makes no money? The city wants $300, thank you very
much in Philly Citypaper.
Do you remember a news story about the government shutting down a
kid's lemonade stand? Philly, again!
There's an infamous internet hoax about bill 602P to enact
email postage. It even got into the New York U.S. Senate debate in
2000: Both Oppose
E-Mail Tax Bill (Good, Because It Doesn´t Exist).
Today's hoax is tomorrow's law.
Mike:
Somewhere along the way, someone got the words LICENSE and CONTROL mixed up.
Now they use them synonymously.
Bet'cha Webster is spinning in HIS grave (as are the Founding Fathers).
Good post.
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