Planet Earth

The above... is a famous BBC show. Quite excellent.

Were it that some of its employees were on the same one as the rest of us.

Back in November, I had occasion to ask a question of the Working Lunch team, and this resulted in a rather odd reply, the consequences of which rumble on to this day.

I recently had a reply from their complaints department:

Thank you for your emails about previous correspondence you've had with
Deputy Editor for Working Lunch. Please accept my sincere
apologies for the delay in responding.

I contacted her and discussed your correspondence to date. Lynne
explained that the reason she posed the question - "May I ask do you use
"see us on the BBC" on all your promotional literature?" was simply because
of the text in the auto signature of your original email to the show. She
was genuinely interested in this and assures me there was nothing sinister
behind this question.

She did not hear back directly from you (please note that if you sent
further correspondence to the Working Lunch team she may not always receive
this due to the sheer volume of email traffic to this inbox).

Reading her initial response to the question posed about the
competition I trust that this answered your concerns on this subject. Lynne
informed me that all the information about the competition should also have
been on the auto-response email you received.

In conclusion, I trust that this explains why Lynne posed this question to
you. If you have any further concerns about this please contact Lynne
directly on the following number: [I'll spare her this].

Thank you, once again, for contacting the BBC and for your patience in
waiting for a response.

Yours sincerely

Divisional Advisor
BBC Information

As the reply seemed to be 'it's between you and the original person you couldn't get a reply from anyway, and nothing to do with us as we have no power or opinion' (shades of Newswatch?), I decided that it wasn't going to end quite yet:


Thank you for your email.

Please accept my sincere apologies for the delay in responding.

No problem. I know you must be busy. And it's not time critical.

I'm still not too satisfied with this I'm afraid. And don't really see any value in going to the trouble of talking to [her] any more. Her interest was... interesting... though obviously fleeting and soon forgotten. But I am glad there was no sinister intent. I just wonder why the question was posed. I've removed it now just in case, and as it is quite old news.

Appreciating how busy you all must be (I too have a good few hundred emails to address daily, many of which I am not paid a salary to address), may I suggest that if such a question is posed, it may be worth having systems in place to accommodate the answers, if only as common courtesy.

Hence I would like to get another view on this as I appreciate you are only in the position of passing on those of the protagonists. So who do I get in touch with now who is outside of the BBC? OFCOM? Board of Governors?

Yours patiently,

Rather deliciously, this is what came back... again:

We are sorry but our email system will not receive your email unless you use one of our pre-formatted webforms. We realise the inconvenience but hope you will understand that this helps us handle the many emails we receive every day more efficiently and makes best use of your licence fee.


I have now readdressed it to the 'black hole' that is our licence fee consumer. Watch this space.

Too PC. No Comment.

BBC - Birth rate 'harms poverty goals'

Twisting the story

You kind of expect it in a Kansas trailer park, but not so much 'North of the River' (that'll teach those cabbies): How could a tornado hit London?

And because it was not expected, I rather leapt to the conclusion that here, if it were needed, was evidence that things are deteriorating, climatically. And frankly I was poised to make this comment when I started reading more.

Thing is, it is not unheard of. And while 'worst in 25 years' makes for a pithy phrase, that kinda means it was worse 25 years ago.

Not to detract from the climate change argument, which I support by advocating we stop wasting stuff and cut down where we can, but it was refreshing not to have seen more 'See, we're all doomed' bandwagon jumpers come out.

If you don't have enough lemons... borrow them.

This may be cheeky, but if it works it shows that a little ignorance can be a useful thing.

Our hugely complex, vastly expense website currently only allows one picture per article, at least when I upload. And I don't dare ask the IT guys to get out of bed to even quote for making it possible for me to do more.

Thing is, I'd like to add a few more to illustrate stories.

So I have a plan. I'm going to try breaking out the pictures from the blog references, hopefully in sequence. That way blog readers can view above or below (and mayeb the nasty word breask will no longer happen, which is a plus), and I can pop in a URL to site articles to more info visuals. Not elegant, or optimal, but in the spirit of bodge, let's see what happens...

I'm Dreaming of a Green Christmas - Photo Archive

L2R: The stand. JunkkMale in demo mode. A lot of questions. The panel.

Little Victories

[Lesson 1 - last post of the day at the top, but not necessarily with pictures in the right order]

Just one day away again, and I am struggling to keep up with the backlog.

But this one was worth it. Because, dear reader, last night's jaunt to London was a) fun and b) ended with a bit of a result.

We were there for 'Dreaming of a Green Christmas' at the Science Museum's Dana Centre.

A hundred were invited, and I'd say sixty or so turned up, and it was a pretty packed affair at that.

I'll let the link take you to who was there, but it was an eclectic mix and I learned a fair bit.

Met some nice folk, from co-panellists/exhibitors, to audience members. My personal favourite comment was from one who, on being asked why she voted for Junkk.com, said 'Well, reuse is the best eco-option there is' (taking reduction as a given). Nice to see, live, that people 'get' what we're trying to do. The stand was popular, and I have a few new items I made for the event that went down well and must post.

I also got speak, and pitch for Junkk.com on a few award category criteria, including 'best for' recycling, reuse, energy effciency and sustainability.

Well, with much chuffingness, I can advise we managed to score top slot in 3 of the 4.

And with a couple we did it by quite a margin. See that big bar in the picture.... us!

A bit of a boost, and another notch on the way.

Mind the gap

Business warned of 'creativity gap'

"There’s currently a coffee commercial, rather a lush one in fact, whose main message seems dedicated to a rather contrived joke, instead of the product benefits. The wise and benign plantation owner asks his hapless charge what he is doing there, and on being told it is the youth’s gap year, comments: ‘Gap between the ears, more like!’ Oh, how we laugh when that comes on.

However, it seems a worthy metaphor for the sate of British advertising, and now business, and I rather suspect our performance internationally is already registering blows as a consequence.

The 4% statistic is shocking, but not surprising. Though how the question was posed may offer some insights. I wouldn’t want Tracey Emin pitching for me either.

In fact the word creativity rather suffers from a broad range of interpretation. What, exactly does it mean? As suggested, it probably means an awful lot of things to different people, ranging from pure artist, to creative/media industries to... ‘them’.

Personally, I choose to interpret it, at least in the business sense, as seeking innovation; ways of doing things that have not been done before - to get a better result, to stand our more, etc. But there is one small problem with that: risk.

We seem to have arrived in the most risk averse era yet. And we can’t just blame the bean-counters (who may soon figure that if you don’t make any more beans, there’s no job counting). Even those MBA-toting, metric-spouting, blue-sky-thinking communicators and marketers in business and government seem so worried about losing their jobs, they all rush to be first to be second. But usually that means they end up last.

At least in the marketing world they soon end up ‘pursuing other options’. "

Not one for the main site!*

Partly becuase it is not reuse (please, let it not be recycling), but mainly becuase it's got to be the most gross-out bizarre thing I have ever been sent.

But, in a strange way, I felt compelled to appreciate the imagination shown.

Tampon Crafts

* Though most 10year olds will find it a hoot.

Empty (or in this case full) gestures

Eco warriors get a lift in Golden Square office

Staff arriving at M&C Saatchi’s offices in Golden Square were surprised to be forced to take the stairs yesterday.

To publicise a new green initiative, the advertising agency filled its lift up with balled up pieces of paper with the slogan: "If we recycle this much paper in an hour, we can save three trees a day".

My reply to the City Editor:

Let’s just hope they remember to recycle the paper in the lift.

But they did get the PR! Though what green initiative was/is that? If my experience of agencies is anything to go by, they'll have sent a junior in a taxi to buy 5 reams of virgin recycled paper stock to scrunch up.

WRAPPERS - 50cent... or free

Of course, we could mention another alternative for that over-stretched budget: newspaper!

Getting my goat (or not)

Confusing times.

Here I am, trying to figure out what's best for the family, budget and planet, and so I turn to the Sunday papers for inspiration.

And what do I find? Ads for buying goats for the 3rd World, neatly indispersed between articles (quoting charities) saying it's a bad idea!

Which is it!!!?

This is a serious issue. Twerps like me have little time to get into the minute details of this, and once we suspect it's going pear-shaped we turn off.

And when that happnes, what goes first, the head office pension fund or what the poor sods in the field need?

Just one last, wafer-thin mint

Gotta love the chattering classes. They can chatter all right: Global warming? I'll bring you some back from Macy's

"Remember Mr. Creosote? It was a fairly gross, but effective, satire on the notion of testing one's ability to sustain excess by the expedient of blowing up when you reach the point of no return. And now we have the latest commentator for this fine organ pitching in with another 'we really must stop... soon' piece. And that's about it. Bless. I guess it was just delicious irony I'd popped over from Mr. Juniper's article about how we are no longer the dirty man of Europe. If it's shopping, maybe it's now 'The dirty man and woman not in the UK but Macy's?'. Even better, there's this ad at the top offering me the prize of a holiday to the Caribbean. And, puh-lese, can someone explain to me this trading thing? Is it only between those in Notting Hill and Luton, or can the rest of us join in, including the entire population of sub-Saharan Africa?: link - “We can trade, but that doesn't stop emissions. And what of those who share the air we breathe, as opposed to flying through it?"

You have to love this post:

Um, these wouldn't be the shopping trips to New York thoroughly covered in Saturday's Guardian, would they?

Just saying.

Thanks Ian!

Big in the City.

I'm seeing a trend here, and it is a worrying one. Half thought-out notions being floated, seemingly with reasonable concerns, but by folk who live and work in places most set to benefit (or at least suffer least) from them: Admit it, we’re travel addicted. Let the taxman put the brakes on

My reply:

Dear Mr. Jenkins,

I admit it; 'we' are. But while I have to agree with all you have identified (and applaud that you have, at least, unlike most commentators, researched broadly and attempted a fair assessment of the situation along with most possible options), on present evidence have to raise a question mark as to the best person to apply the brakes.

I have some experience of all this. Well over a decade ago, when living and working in Singapore, the road pricing system had already well and truly 'popped up'. I also happened to meet a local lady, who is now my wife. Subsequently we moved back here to the UK; not to where my source of work was most conveniently located (London), but to be close to my dying father, and now dependent mother. There are compensations, such a massive boost in quality of life, and even the work issues are now mitigated by such as broadband, but there's no escaping our social and business communications - in person - are not optimal. For a start, one half of the family is 11,000 miles away.

Hence we not so much crave mobility, but by any reasonable measure need it through circumstance. No one sane seeks to spend 12hrs in a plane or 2hrs on a motorway. But yes, to an extent that has been our choice. So you are right that we have worked within an existing framework in planning where we are and will need to be, along with the associated costs of time and effort.

These of course are now changing. Radically.

I suspect you are right that the easiest and quickest way to restrict me... us.. is price. It has worked already. I cannot afford to fly, so come a family affair I am not sure what we will do when the need arises.

And when you say 'Rationing is by congestion or it is by price', why not also develop on the component of rationing itself?

Of course, for a start it would be a logistical nightmare. And while congestion is a vote loser it's not really accountable, whereas price is more easy to apply to the author, and hence erring on political suicide. Especially when there is the very real accusation to be made that it favours those in cities (when we are being told to become home workers, and many do not live in a city) with reasonable transport systems and is, in a related way, favouring the rich over those less able to fund their addiction, necessary or not.

Rationing could (if agreed and applied fairly, which it won't be. If the reduced eco-tax on a ODPM new build plonked on a flood plain in Kent is equated to the penalty on my 17th century cottage - insulated as best it can be - is anything to go on) be fairer and attempt to take into account the infinitely complicated impact we are all having on the environment. And yes, if it's gas into the atmosphere, stopping it has to be the priority.

But when it comes to fair, we are forgetting the global element. While I might reasonably be awarded a trip to the rellys once a year, what is poor Madonna to do to conduct her job, and to acquire more children (at least she is addressing - though I doubt for the reasons I allude to - the greatest actual problem the planet faces, namely population expansion, which puts travel in the shade whilst adding to its necessity. If you can't survive where you are, you need to move), in comparison to my more modest needs? Well, we could trade, and I get richer (along, I suspect with much-traveling City types trading in it all) as a she travels more, but that doesn't stop the emissions.And what of those who share the air we breathe, as opposed to flying through it? If we 'assign' one long haul, two short haul air trips and 10,000 miles in a car and 20,000 in a train to a every Kalahari bushman and Mekong boatlady, the potential for planetary disaster is magnified as they gain new items of value to trade with the addicted.

It's also a matter a of priority. As you rightly point out. How can we tax travel when the reasons to need it (more distant hospitals - I will soon blog on two signs in our City - not local, as I was require to take my Mum 20 miles away - hospital; one advocating the use of friends or relatives to help with transport, the other saying appointment priority would be give to those who use an ambulance. So I help and am penalised?!) are multiplying. It's the result of a political and administrative culture where success is measured in isolated targets, and the process is more important, and career-rewarding, than the final result.

It should be, but is less travel really the intention? Because fewer cars and travel means less revenue. And while a reduction in congestion may be nice in central London, if the same amount of fuel is going up in the sky at the periphery, then the planet is not gaining, while the policy wonks fly to Bali for a conference on global warming, funded by the money made on the charges. As you say, heaven help us if these guys stay in charge.

On Wednesday I am bringing the family to London for a show Junkk.com has been invited to appear in. There is no alterative for reasons of practicality and sheer cost (£40 petrol (at least Science Museum is giving parking to me- like the event, free) vs. £200 train fares) or time (last reliable train home 6pm; show ends 8.30pm). I have no choice, socially or for my work. Penalise me by taxes alone, set by and supported by those who live in a city earning a lot more, and the urban/country divide over something as petty as fox hunting will extend to a massive gulf.

Rgds,

ps: I doubt this will fit in the blog reply section, and so will attempt an edit. So forgive my sending direct first. But as you will have gathered, this is not something that can be dealt with in a pithy phrase or sound bite piece of legislation.

ADDENDUM:

Call me a suck-up (and, let's face it, few do), but I am pleased to say I have had a reply from the author, and when it is one of the few commentators I truly respect I take total pleasure in sharing it:

Many thanks for your e-mail. I appreciate your predicament, but am not sure what your proposed solution is, unless we simply learn to live with global warming. As for choice, everyone thinks their own is a necessity.

With best wishes,

Simon Jenkins

He has stung me with that comment on a lack of a solution, which I feel moved to address. Watch this space (or maybe one above)

BBC: Youth Poll

Drawn, hung and quartered

Actually, they all seem to have an episode on it (Simpsons, etc), you really have to hand it to the cartoon industry to put the ire in satire.

If you can, catch this: Futurama.

I think, therefore I am. I do, therefore...

Before I forget, a quote I just saw from author Terry Pratchett:

"Igenuity can get you through times of no money. But money cannot get you through times of no ingeuity."

Were it true.

He obviously has had little dealings with politicians, the media or big business.

Laugh? I could have died!

I think I may have written about Bad Science before, but it is worth the reminder.

Basically a Blog by a very well informed chap called Ben, who either has more time on his hands than me, or doesn't sleep. I was going to say you may not agree with all that he says (a lot don't), but as he takes the time to sift the facts from the 'bad science', it's hard to argue with him.

He's also very funny.

I cite this one The Natural Home of Silliness simply becuase he moved me to write in.

"Thanks for that.

The world is going to heck in a handbasket and now I have a further insight into the mentality and priorities of those who would lead us out.

At least we'll die laughing."

Sane is as sane does

There are certain publications who ask for your opinion, and then don't print them. This is one. Recycling no longer domain of ‘loonies’. Quite rude really. Not to mention a tad behind the curve. Why do I bother? Well they do give me grist for my mill:

'Nicely put. Of course, one could argue that if what we live through is sane, then maybe the loonies have a point.
Nice to read that one of the more significantly sized, and daily high-profile brand’s marketing directors has his finger on the pulse of consumer expectation.
There are many ways to save money, boost sales... not to mention gain some good PR, perk up the CSR from Greenwashing to something less cynical, and... oh, I don’t know... make some more money?
Actually I think most companies do recycle their paper, if for no better reason than they can suffer financially (fines if they don’t; refunds if they do). Bit of a no-brainer. So I can only assume those bags you see are not In Barnet, or the council prefers fining individuals and not business ratepayers, or in fact they are there to be picked up by recyclers.
Consumers are getting to grips with green issues, and are desperate to do so. Not that it is made very easy for them. But look at the amount spent on recycling communications, backed by high-profile fines, etc, which make me wonder who can afford to be not bothered, much less unaware.
Off for my bath now. But maybe it should in fact be a shower... with a friend?"

It's AIDS day

I read somewhere that there are not enough days for all the 'Days' we now have, and if we reduce it to a Day then this actually detracts from the rest of the time. I have to say, by my own reaction (oh, fine, now what?), I tend to agree.

What I did find an interesting commentary on the state of media and who reads/watches what, is that I only picked up on it thanks to Google.

Those who write for (recycled) glass eco-nanny media, shouldn't fly to conferences

Sorry. Couldn't resist (only read this becuase of his name, which I thought was an eco-topic): Off to New Zealand to discuss the future

"I was going to cock an eyebrow at the headline and wonder... ‘the future of what?’, but then saw it qualified in the first line of text.

To this the irony of traveling and meeting corporeally has been mentioned, but one does have to wonder at the location as well. All’s fair in geographically sharing around, so I guess next year it will be Blackpool. Though the weather isn’t so nice this time of year (but I guess you guys are doing your bit to correct that.). Those Kiwis are pretty up on eco-stuff so I guess they’ll have lots of tips.

Who’s paying for the trip? And the carbon whotsists? I know it was/gets done for travel writers. But Is it everyone? I guess it’s not up to the paper for this one. If so, is there anywhere left to whack in a fir tree to compensate for all the journos going to conferences all the time. i belive there is actually one on global warming coming up in Bali.

ps: Actually my family uses newspaper for wrapping paper, as it sets off the presents inside. And we use the money saved to buy stocking fillers. The kids love the boxes to play with, but the paper just goes to stoke the fire in 10 seconds.

Thanks for inspiring great reuse idea for our second use website : actually print the news on the pages in such a way as it can be folded so the colourful ads and maybe some key visuals end up on the outside and look like Xmas wrapping. Now wouldn’t that be neat instead of an extra printing... reuse built in!"

The latter is a good idea, though.

ps: I mislabelled the file 'GiftWarp'. Seemed appropriate.

Don't Try, Don't Get

Hey, you never know: Christmas Gifts: best of the bizarre (Or is that bazaar?) Spend! Manufacture! Retail! Advertise! Spend some more!


'Nice to see a few there that may conceivably be deemed to have the environmental Xtra Factor, too.

There really seems little point 'buying' something for he/she who has everything, so for that truly personal gift may I suggest making it instead:)

We have a few idea to share.

And some will be on show at 'Dreaming of a Green Christmas?' next week at the Science Museum.'