At my office they use the Styrofoam drinking cups next to the water cooler which is just terrible.  The water from the drinking fountain tastes pretty bad, so we go through a lot of those cups every day.  I feel guilty every time I use one.   I imagine that the old fashioned Dixie Cups we used as kids would be an improvement since they insist on using disposable containers. 

Apparently my office used to have glasses, mugs, a microwave, fridge and coffee machine, but took them aways as people wouldn’t clean up after themselves.   In this case, both the workers and the environment pay the price for a cleaner office.

I heard this podcast about this company that leases recycled carpet flooring squares to offices and is doing extremely well.  Wall to wall carpeting is costly and the high traffic areas wear much faster than the rest of the carpet.  Also, traditional new carpets emit some pretty toxic gases so that is avoided as well. 

So this company came up with a sensible solution to lease carpeting to offices.  Businesses can write off the lease as an Operating Expense and the carpet company takes out worn squares of carpeting and replaces them with new ones (recycling the old ones), so the office winds up with carpeting that always looks like new and without any large up front capital investments.  

Interface Flor  is a company that seems to really have its act together and they appear to have products geared both toward commercial and residential real estate.   I’m pretty sure they are the same company who’s owner I heard interviewed on the podcast.  Greenfloors  is another company that appears to do this pretty well.

As a society if we were less focused on convenience we would all keep more money in our wallets and our world would be a healthier place.  What do you think about this?  Are you concerned about what’s going on at your office and do you have any tips on how to change things?

Hi folks,

I am playing with the new Media Gallery Feature located in the Dashboard.  I uploaded a couple of photos to the Gallery and now I am going to add them to this new blog post by clicking on the “Add Media” function.

 If that’s not clear, check out the video tutorials.  That guy sounds like a pretty cool cat.  Wish I had a British accent so I could sound cool too.   ;-)   Maybe in England there someone things I sound cool.  Think so?

President Bush did his old oil buddies a solid today by proposing that offshore drilling be allowed in a half dozen areas that are currently considered off limits.  This will have to be taken up by President Elect Obama and his new Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar.

In spite of a global decrease in demand for oil Bush is seeking to allow drilling in new areas off the coasts of California, Alaska as well as in the Gulf of Mexico and along the Atlantic coast.   It will be interesting to see how the Obama administration responds to this.

If you are interested in business and sustainability, you should really read the Road Map to Natural Capitalism by Amory and Hunter Lovins and Paul Hawkins.   The link above is to the free PDF of this brief paper published by the Harvard Business Review.

To call them a group of visionaries would be a gross understatement.  Natural Capitalism is consistent for today’s focus on sustainable living and involves four major shifts in business practices.

1. Dramatically increase the productivity of natural resources.
2. Shift to biologically inspired production models.
3. Move to a solution based business model.
4. Reinvest in natural capital.

It is time for business and consumers alike to wake up and recognize that reducing the wasteful and destructive use of resources is good for business and consumers alike.

Is WordPress sustainable?  You bet!! 

As a Content Management System (CMS) it does promote the sharing of information and by utilizing WordPress MU (Multi-User) and BuddyPress we are leveraging this open source code to provide a platform to help shape and improve the world. 

I am very excited that WordCamp will be coming to Denver so we can learn about all things WordPress and get to know some of the local folks.   WordCamp will be on Saturday, February 28, 2009 and will run from 10am to 5pm local time.  It is being held at the Sharp Auditorium in the Denver Art Museum at 100 W. 14th Ave Parkway, Denver, CO  80204

Confirmed speakers include:

• Matt Mullenweg (Automattic)
• Alex King (Crowd Favorite)
• Jane Wells (Automattic)
• Jeremy Harrington (crawlspace|media)
• Jim Turner (One By One Media)
• Josh Pigford (Sabotage Media, The Apple Blog)
• Brian Warren (Be Good Not Bad)
• Dave Moyer (WordCast, Ars Technica)
• Gil Asakawa (Audience Development, MediaNews)

It only costs $20 so buy your ticket fast before they sell out!

Code is Poetry

I was watching a minister on TV yesterday talk about tithing. For those of you that aren’t familiar with this, according to the Old Testament we are supposed to tithe 10% of our gross earnings. That 10% might go to a church, community outreach program to help the poor, a land conservation group or some other worthy cause.

What caught my attention was the minister mentioning that what if every person and company had to pay a 10% tax as well. Then there would be more than enough money to run our country. Then what if all the countries set aside 10% of their money to help provide for nations struck by famine, disease, natural disaster, etc.

What would happen if everyone reduced their carbon footprint by 10%. How big a difference could that make if companies and people alike made this change.  I know that 350.org and Al Gore have identified 350 ppm (parts per million) as the goal to try and turn around our present course of climate change.  The most reading I’ve seen was at 387.   Hmmm… 387 less 10% would put us at 348.3, so maybe we’re really onto something here.

It seems like the 10% solution could really make this world a much better place