You want transparency? No one gets a decent salary here at Barcelona Alternative Media. No one. In fact, only one person gets anything and it’s #nimileurista at that. So if there’s any problem, any bump in the road, it’s #nicieneurista. And, no, this is not equivalent to Rajoy claiming he checks his bank account at the end of every month, and that his wife needs to work, and that he has the same problems as the rest of us, all before exposing himself and his 200,000 euro/year salary.

And when aforementioned sobre-king and his government decided to hike the IVA on culture 13 points in September, we knew it would get ugly. Sure enough, come January, BCN Mes lost a couple very valued cultural clients (temporarily, they assured us, until they got a handle on their IVA and the crisis and the utter uncertainty of getting even a single subvención). We feel for them, because they are fighting tooth and nail, like us, and haven’t quit yet. But we, admittedly, shat our pants.

When is it right to give up? It would be so easy to stop, wouldn’t it? We think about it at least once a week. We’re tired. The pope is quitting, for Christ’s sake. Popes don’t quit. Popes die! And if being god’s number two isn’t enough to keep one going, wtf is? Then again, maybe the pope wasn’t getting emails with postscripts like this:

P.D. A vosotros y vuestro pequeño equipo os digo: Get with it. Stay with it. And don’t f*cking give up. Con el frio que hace, os necesitamos. Gracias.

Thank you so much, writer. You know who you are. But maybe you don’t know what it means to receive an email like that every once in a while. It means everything to us.

We have new advertisers. Check them out; some new bars and restaurants and cultural associations we are very proud to feature and work with. They support the paper you hold in your hands (and/or the pixels you’re perceiving). We thank them. And thank you, readers. And thank you, writers. And thank you, city. Here’s to community driven by insatiable appetite for creation and humanity, however raw, and for as long as it lasts.

Saludos,

Los Editors