Urban Inversion was a "mayfly" as described by David Kipen in a poem he wrote in 2009 about the Los Angeles literary landscape of his youth. A mayfly is a short-lived, adult insect.
Poetically speaking, that perfectly captures the character and lifespan of the former bookstore & community hang-out located on Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood.
Thanks to a neighborhood computer whiz, it offered on-line book purchases starting in 1995 at the same time as or before the behemoth that we would all come to know as Amazon.