life

I've been told about this video about the story of 'stuff' by a number of people over the last few days so it has obviously caught people's attention. And after watching it I've suddenly become much more attuned to the idea that the things we buy might have been designed to fall apart and fail. Take for example the headphones for my mobile phone - I'm on about the fourth set in as many months because they have a pathetic design that makes the ear pieces fall apart within minutes of putting them into your bag....

I resigned from my job today - with mixed emotions. I´m excited
about the prospect of being able to devote my energies to making this
campaign a success and by the idea of being my own boss, but I´m also
going to miss my old job. I´ve worked for Scottish and Southern Energy
for the last three years - as a policy adviser and general agitator -
and it´s been excellent. They have embraced the challenge of climate
change and are now seriously investing in renewable energy and in
developing an energy services business model. It´s been great working
for a company that makes things happen on the ground and I´ll really
going to miss them.

Thinking about on-line social networking, Frank used a very good analogy the other day: it’s like hosting a party – you can create a space for people to get together, let people know about it but then you just have to hope they turn up and have a good time. But what constitutes a good time? Getting dressed up? Meeting new interesting people? Dancing til your feet hurt? In the real world things like alcohol, cool lighting effects, great music help create ‘atmosphere’ – but what is that really? For me the best parties feel like you’ve stepped into a different world, to take part in a random unscripted event which will hopefully leave everyone with something to smile about. Fun things to do seem to be a key ingredient – last night the area around the Royal Festival Hall seemed to turn itself in to an urban Burning Man Festival...

I attended a conference today presenting best practice from around the globe in engaging people to take action on climate change. It was kind of unsettling.

So you happen to be one of the world's biggest oil companies. Then someone asks you to start paying for the emissions you are responsible for. Not from your products mind you, just your rigs and refineries that emit gases in the process of producing fuel. Fuel like petrol which of course also produces emissions but they remain safely unregulated so lets not worry about them for now - no it's just the process emissions your being asked to pay for. How do you react?

The last couple of days have been hilarious. Every good website needs a promotional video so this weekend we made one. Alex, Edwin, Pete, Dr. Tom and I 'sweded' the Hollywood version of climate change - The Day After Tomorrow. 

What is sweding?

a blog about climate change for a change. It's about the two musical highlights of my day. The first took place in Angel tube. A genuine genius had wired up a red henry the hoover (yes the vacuum cleaner) to play saxaphone complete with animated actions, while he modestly accompanied him on guitar.

The second was at the electro acoustic night at the Slaughtered Lamb where the outstanding highlight of the night was a brother and sister act from Japan known as Yaneka: http://www.myspace.com/yaneka

I love London.

This was my first week back in the UK after a two week holiday in Mali. A first visit to West Africa which I decided to approach `blind´ without reading any guidebooks or listening to any Malian music, even though the Festivale au Desert was ostensibly the reason for the trip. It proved to be a fascinating and beautiful country and the music, when we eventually got to hear it, was mesmerising and uplifting and Tinariwen are seldom off the stereo these days.