Earth Hour

[Pathless]

Holy Blackouts Batman!!

Google is urging us in the U.S. to participate in Earth Hour:

Google users in the United States will notice today that we "turned the lights out" on the Google.com homepage as a gesture to raise awareness of a worldwide energy conservation effort called Earth Hour. As to why we don't do this permanently - it saves no energy; modern displays use the same amount of power regardless of what they display. However, you can do something to reduce the energy consumption of your home PC by joining the Climate Savers Computing Initiative.

On Saturday, March 29, 2008, Earth Hour invites people around the world to turn off their lights for one hour – from 8:00pm to 9:00pm in their local time zone. On this day, cities around the world, including Copenhagen, Chicago, Melbourne, Dubai, and Tel Aviv, will hold events to acknowledge their commitment to energy conservation...

etc.

http://www.google.com/intl/en/earthhour/

Interesting event, interesting times. With the U.S. (and global) economy imploding, weird weather increasing (we have a couple of inches of snow on the ground here in late March; parts of Kentucky suffered massive flooding last week; tornadoes ripped through midland South Carolina a few weeks back; etc), oil production peaking and dropping off while consumption continues to soar, food prices escalating, food riots in Egypt (hope all is well with you, Sally) and elsewhere, and now google advertsing a massive token environmental initiative (good stuff, don't get me wrong), do all signs point to The Long Emergency?

Don't mind me, though, I'm just catastrophizing. (U.S. citizens: catastrophe here)

Damn. I gotz to learn to farm, find a cooperative bunch of Quakers, hippies, and Indians to get with. Might not be a bad idea to buy a gun, too--just in case.

Are we all fecked?

[gp1628]

Interesting stuff. Thanks for all the links.
I tend to watch the planet killers myself. Asteroids, super volcanoes, plate-shift quakes, methane explosions in the depths of the ocean, magetic poles flipping, etc.

[Pathless]

In related news, from Slate.com:

The Los Angeles Times leads with a follow-up to the World Food Program's recent emergency appeal for more money and takes a look at how the worldwide phenomenon of rising food prices is leading to more hunger and food shortages. The WFP director calls it "a perfect storm" because not only does it cost much more for the agency to continue its current programs, but the number of people who need help is continuously increasing.

[Pathless]

Originally Posted by gp1628

Interesting stuff. Thanks for all the links.
I tend to watch the planet killers myself. Asteroids, super volcanoes, plate-shift quakes, methane explosions in the depths of the ocean, magetic poles flipping, etc.

Yeah, the magnetic pole shift is wacko to think about. Don't know 'bout no methane explosions in the depths of the ocean, though. Earth flatulence? In the bathtub? Whoooo-eeeee.