The cover of this week's San Francisco Bay Guardian bears the headline "Is Oakland Cooler Than San Francisco?" Not that we haven't heard this before, like, from our Oakland friends, but lots of hip cats live over there! Artists and folks who enjoy cheap rent and true, gritty, urban experiences! The Guardian's main objective is to criticize San Francisco's "failed housing policy," because if we had more affordable housing, they say, we'd have more cool people staying here. But isn't there a difference between abundant and cheap housing and formalized "affordable housing," which is in the city's control to zone for and protect?

There just seems to be a flaw in the logic in this cover piece. First off, it stands to reason that rents are always going to be higher in San Francisco because it's the bigger city with more desirable amenities and (slightly) better public transportation? And last we checked, rents for market-rate and newer spaces in Oakland aren't so low these days — it's just that there is available housing stock in rougher neighborhoods and less desirable buildings, and more un-gentrified neighborhoods to look in.

The Guardian says San Francisco is losing its "diversity, cultural edge, and working class to the East Bay" due to the City's policies favoring development of expensive, market-rate housing. But we're not so sure that one follows the other. Yes, most of the artists fled Manhattan after the 80s because they couldn't afford to live there any more, but the market is the market — many more people wanted to live in Manhattan in the 90s and beyond... could New York City ever have stopped that momentum? A city government can't control the market, all they can do is make an effort to provide more affordable housing units for the people who qualify.

The question remains: Would building more affordable housing keep the artists here? We'd argue that most newly developed affordable housing, with its income limits and application processes, favors the poor and elderly on fixed incomes with stable lives, and not 25-year-olds who move around and travel a lot and can't afford better housing because they have transient and inconsistent jobs. The cool kids are always going to need cheap housing, but they're not looking for it in city-sponsored affordable housing complexes.

Anyway, we like Oakland. We know it's not all crime and murders, and we regret, as a news source, having to repeat the crime stats as they tick up. And there are plenty of truly nice places to live in Oakland (which aren't cheap)! As soon as we get married and want a yard we might even move there.

[SFBG]

Not long ago, Leanne asked readers to weigh in on Zipcar vs. City CarShare. The subsequent brand-identification debate was not quite as acrimonious as the typical Mac vs. PC debate, or even the heated Wrangler's vs. Levi's debate we once overheard in the Houston airport.

We're not sure what the above photo means in the context of the car-sharing debate. Are we seeing, as with SF Weekly and the Bay Guardian, a national chain using unfair tactics to crush the local competition? Or does this photo simply show that, again as with SF Weekly and the Bay Guardian, most people don't distinguish between the two companies and even their customers can't always remember which is which?

Oh man. Like... wow. This is entertaining, exciting stuff.

Let's back up a bit: It all started last Friday after a not-so-innocent yet fraudulent slate card endorsing Migden boasting the SFBG logo (something SFist knows a little something about) showed up on doorknobs across the city. Of course, SFBG Editor Tim Redmond had to issue a WTF-we-didn't-do-this -shit post.

Also, and get this, Chris Daly was behind said slate card. Redmond says:

I called Sup. Chris Daly, who was behind the card, tonight and told him how unhappy I was, and he said he didn't care. "I'm unhappy, too," he said. "You endorsed Mark Leno, who is not a progressive."

Okay, we can argue that forever, but it's not the point. It's not cool to use the Guardian logo and (I hope) good name and reputation to confuse the voters.

But then in the comments is where it gets good. Real good.

After a local jury found SF Weekly guilty of illegal predatory pricing and awarded the local alt weekly a cool $6.39 million (the verdict subject to "treble damages," which bring the total award to $15.6 million), SFBG Executive Editor Tim Redmond tells the harrowing tale of the five-week trial in his own words:

But the verdict sends a clear signal to small businesses, independent newspapers and the alternative press that a locally owned publication has the right to a level playing field and that a chain can’t intentionally cut prices and sell below cost to injure a smaller competitor.

The trial had been underway for more than five weeks. The Guardian charged the Weekly with violating the state’s Unfair Practices Act, a Progressive-era law that bars a company from selling a product below cost for the purpose of destroying competition.

Evidence produced in the trial showed clearly that the Weekly had been selling ads below cost. In fact, the paper had lost money every year since the New Times chain, now known as Village Voice Media, bought it in 1995.

But wait. It gets better! Redmond goes on to say "Lacey [VVM Editor In Chief] could be heard mumbling 'shit' over and over again." Ouch. Anyway, an appeal is more than certain, a process that "can take years."

Years? Ack. Let's hope that print publishing is still around by then.

In the end, though, this litigiousness all boils down to two important thing: where is the an open-bar celebratory party and is SFist invited?