i was there a few weeks ago but i didn't busk the market i went downtown, i have some anarchist friends there who tell me the same management is in place they just want to improve the image. i for one find it difficult to ever forgive people who illegally use the police to enforce their imagined rights. i really widh my friend who was arrested had sued the bastards but he had no real resources and the courts in ontario are hardly open to the causes of the poor--but you could get lucky.

the market management assumed that they had the right to regulate the open sidewalk. the spot where i was threatened with arrest is in front of the antuque store on the main street--i'm sure you know it as it was the best money making spot. that's the same spot my buddy was actually arrested. the law in ontario gives the regulation of the street to the city, which could delegate it to the market but they haven't, if you want to know more about these feasicts the ottawa based band sabotabby has members who know the whole story as one of them was the guy arrested. they do a regular bar jig when they are in ottawa.

the other buskers all knew the tale when i was playing there a few years ago. now the money was good and the buskers seemed to cooperate, agreeing to a hour per spot. as i said i played longer as no one arrived. i did well before noon and no one else seemed to want to -lay then so i usually played from 9 to noonish, on one or more spots as seemed required.

i did have a few runins with a beggar who definstly thought he owned his corner--i don't know if he is still there.

the other incident was the management of that market used the picture of a busker without his permission in their promotional literature. he threatened to sue and after a few months they realized that they had to pay him. but the management didn't want to do it, their lawyers did it to avoid litigation--they are also the people who tolf the market they can't arrest people for truspass when palying on the street, but they continued to make the threat though the police would no longer do it so you could tell them to fuck off--they'd steam but they'd fuck off.

i mean it when i say they are fascists, they are just beginning to realize that it's not good business to piss off tourists and hence buskers and the arrest made a couple of dozen e lists at the time--aqnd the ottawa paper.

i may be back there in late july or early august but i have no plans except to ignore the fascist management of the byward market.