Wow adidas! You are SO PROFESSIONAL! You should feel proud! I went to your premier on Saturday in San Francisco, and wow, you are total piles of shit who have no respect for skateboard culture. Let's get into it a bit, shall we?
1) In both LA and SF you made SKATEBOARDERS going to a SKATEBOARD video premier check their skateboards at the door of the theatre. That's right:
SKATEBOARDS ARE NOT WELCOME AT ADIDAS SKATEBOARD VIDEO VIEWINGS.
What the fuck is that shit? Its the type of shit that happens when non-skateboarders set up a skateboarding event.
Don't try to blame the venue, because you could have ASKED IF SKATEBOARDS WERE ALLOWED if they made the rule, but when talking to a Castro theatre worker, he said he was pissed he had to enforce such a stupid rule. I've skated to the Castro many times, and until ADIDAS had a SKATE VIDEO SHOWING, there was never a problem. Along with that, those checking in boards said "take a picture of your board just to be sure." Cool, you confiscate our skateboards at a skateboard video showing, and then won't even ensure they will be treated properly.
Again, don't blame the venue, you fucking booked it in both SF and LA and could have figured that out, if you actually were run by people who cared about skateboarders aside from the money they have to spend.
2) This ticket BULLSHIT. So in LA and SF you had both tickets required and a guest list for people who skated for shops. How did that work out?
Well, in LA, people who had tickets and were on the guest list were denied entry. Why? Because FUCK skateboarders. I had a friend on a shop's guest list (I won't mention the VERY LARGE southern California skate shop, not chain, my friend was on the list with as to not drag them into this), he got there early, lined up, was on the list and was denied entry. We know Nike had no problem throwing shops under the bus once they got big enough, it appears as if Adida$ is all about it too. But y'all wanted that, let's be real.
Then in SF, you had the opposite- you gave out more tickets than the theatre had seats again- which is total bullshit and disrespects your customers with a false ticket, but this time, the theater didn't fill up. I wanted to grab something from my car and wanted to walk out of the unfull theatre real quick, knowing at this point that they weren't even asking for tickets. I go to the front door and I am told if I leave, I may not come back. What the fuck was that? Was this a high school dance or a skate premier? I literally told the guy the theater wasn't full, and you didn't need tickets to enter. He said he was going to remember me if I left and intentionally not let me back in. Cool, so now I'm some sort of criminal? FUCK YOU.
The tickets had ZERO correlation with admittance. In LA, a ticket wouldn't get you in, and in SF, you didn't even need one. Just some sleazy marketing trick that intentionally disrespects anybody who thinks the ticket they just got means anything.
3) Marc Johnson. Not much else needs to be said that hasn't already. No respect there.
Here's my main point- Adidas may market itself as being down with skateboarding and all about the scene, but when it comes down to actually doing business with and interacting with skateboarders, they don't have any respect for us. They don't care how our culture works, they don't care how our scene works. They disrespect shops, shop riders, and people who actually *gasp* ride their skateboards to a skateboard video premier.
Let's be real, you can like Adidas shoes if you want, just acknowledge, they ain't skateboarders, they don't care about skateboarders or skateboarding aside from the money they can take from us.
If this event was a sign of things to come in the skateboarding scene, then things are looking very depressing moving forward.
Don't buy their shit, especially this video. You can EASILY pirate it from online, and most people I know already have done so. Just ask around. Those fucks don't respect you, why on earth would you give them your dollars? Why on earth would you respect their right to treat you like shit and take your money?
Fuck that.
Fuck adidas and their corporate bullshit. No matter how much marketing you do, no matter how many experts you hire, you'll never be skateboarders and you'll never understand skateboarding. Go the fuck away.