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Is your cell phone reporting how long you’re at the market? Are store video cameras tracking more than theft? The Economist reports on how technology is being used for market layout, olfactory purchasing cues, etc.
I just marked a set of emails as spam. This is the first group of emails that I’ve received that targeted me as interested in “green” purchasing. I was fooled at first. I started thinking to myself “Hmm. My Green Choices sounds pretty cool. Is this an organization that I’ve contacted to explore potential partnerships?” My memory didn’t tip me off to (more…)
Aaron K. Chatterji and Michael W. Toffel of Harvard Business School are taking a closer look at how environmental practices change when companies are publicly rated for their performance.
Here’s what I took from their paper: (more…)
GoodGuide.com has released a scientist’s take on socially responsible ratings guides. Learn about this and other socially responsible guides on our updated Research Guide. That is where you can find ways to contribute that take as little as two minutes of your time! (more…)
Ravens (our metaphor for tools that help us share socially responsible product information) that are prevented from retrieving a bit of food can direct others how to get it. New research shows that they can also remember which humans are threats using facial cues. They even teach their neighbors which faces are potentially threatening. (more…)
“‘This year’s class reveals an empowered group of consumers. From their purchasing decisions and media consumption to their pull at the polls, this college consumer is clearly in control and showing their strength in numbers.’
College students demonstrate strong commitment towards the brands they feel are contributing positively (more…)
Lucy and I after the July Somerville Arts festival. In case you were wondering what we looked like after a hot afternoon of handing out fliers and dancing behind a 5 person bicycle (while wearing black feathers and sandwich board signs.)
It’s nice to see the seeds of a movement using technology to enable individual socially responsible actions. Cool People Care and Free Rice represent different ways that the internet can help people make a difference. (more…)
Yesterday’s Supreme Court majority opinion, written by Justice David Souter, could have significant consequences for everything from consumer to environmental protection. Souter’s opinion has capped the punitive damage assigned in the Exxon Veldez oil spill case so that the still thriving oil giant need pay no more than the cost of the spill’s cleanup. (more…)
There’s yet another controversy brewing in the chocolate industry. Should manufacturers be allowed to replace traditional ingredients like cocoa butter when making chocolate? I bet that there are a lot of different angles to this story depending on which of Buy It Like You Mean It’s socially responsible interests you care about. Here’s a website to introduce the topic.
Curious about which sections of Boston could be underwater as the ocean level rises? Show up wearing blue or dressed as a shark at the Parade for the Future on Sun, June 15th, 4:00-5:30 PM and find out. Meet outside Park Street Station under the giant blue wave.
Non-profit lifers coming to terms with a younger generation of online social citizens are the intended audience of this Case Foundation report. But after the first couple pages it offers a deeper discussion about mobilizing tech savvy youth. Can you help us figure out what we’re doing right and what we could do better? Leave a comment or send us an email.
In my world there are a lot of worthwhile problems to address. So let’s get past divisive grandstanding. No sane activist belittles someone else’s concerns to make the point that their own concerns need addressing. That’s why Buy It Like You Mean It gives you the ability to empower your point of view with people who share at least part of your perspective.
Eoin O’Carroll rightly blogs that Wired could do better.
ThoughtAndMemory.org’s user generated educational content is freely available (so is our open source Community Information Platform). By signing the Capetown Declaration we have joined a global community of educators and organizations in support of this movement. Go team!
Estimating the carbon footprint of a product is more difficult than it sounds. British market Tesco is attempting to label the carbon footprint of all of its products. So far only one product has been labeled. Perhaps ThoughtAndMemory.org’s decentralized system will make accuracy in life cycle analysis easier in the long run.
Did you know that you can automatically estimate and offset the carbon footprint of the purchases that you make when you shop at climatecooler?
A study by the Pew Internet and American Life Project suggests that teenage girls are more frequent bloggers, web page designers, and online social network contributers than their male counterparts.
The number of female students who go on to take college level computer science classes is still remarkably low. A study by the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School “suggests that girls’ online practices tend to be about their desire to express themselves”. [Photo and story from The New York Times, February 21, 2008. P. E1]
Remember Alice? Alice is a new computer science curricular tool that teaches computer programming fundamentals through 3D story design. It is testing very well with female students (and its really fun to use!)
Membership in this online spoof of carbon offsets could make an excellent Valentine’s Day gift… not really. The spoof is that they’re paying stable couples to be faithful to each other so that others can do as they like. Carbon offsetting, although in many ways practical, is pretty similar.
We’re currently testing out ThoughtAndMemory.org’s system for cooperative research about socially responsible corporate practices by focusing on the chocolate industry. In the news today:
Here is an example of an organized community that has adapted technology and business to meet its concerns.
In Israel, ultra-Orthodox Jewish communities have used combined purchasing power to alter the pricing system and functions of “kosher” phones.
