To reward consumers for making green-friendly purchases, the UK's Co-Operative bank recently began issuing its "Think Credit Card." The card is made from PETG plastic which is a bit more eco-friendly than the usual PVC plastic that other cards use.

On my commute downtown to our warehouse this morning, I realized it was time to revisit the Green initiative I had set forth here at DistinctiveFabric.com, some months back.

And I was also thinking back on yesterday's Lucent Dossier rehearsal. As a dance troupe, it's expected they'll have a large member base and a higher percentage of cars than anyone else at our warehouse. But what I don't understand is why they can't work to better coordinate each others travel plans. If even only half the troupe were to carpool, we'd see an immediate and significant reduction in cars (as well as parking issues for the rest of the tenants here).

As a pioneering creative force within their community and beyond, it seems especially vital to me that they start making some personal sacrifices to provide a better model for what attitude and action entertainers take towards the environment. There are some other area's that I see also requiring some attention, mostly in regards to trash, recycling, and energy usage.

This observation isn't just limited to just them, however. Our own company and team still has a number of steps to take, as do our other roomies, The Do LaB. And nor is this an attack on anyone person or group, just a reminder that we all as leaders need to step things up several notches and do this think like the rock stars everyone so thoroughly enjoys pretending to be.

Anyway, to date DF has made slow but steady progress with regards to its operation. Warehouse and office waste including trash, recycling: paper, plastic, glass, toner cartridges, etc. are all mostly accounted for (we still have to find some way to reduce and better dispose of our plastic bags); sustainable office and cleaning supplies are purchased as much as is feasible; and our transportation habits are pretty modest: half our team walks to work everyday and its other half (Josh and I), do our best to minimize our driving: packing lunch or eating within mere minutes from the warehouse and carpooling whenever possible. Granted, neither of our cars are Green but we are offsetting their emissions yearly now, along with any other aspect of our remaining
(negative) footprint.

Lastly, we're constantly powering down our office equipment when not in use: computers, printers, postage meter, lights, etc. And if we're walking through the warehouse and see any unattended lights we'll shut them off (which happens almost daily at this point, I'm afraid to say). While it has never been directly expressed for any one person or company to take charge with these mattes here, we have made the initiative to step and do so ourselves, again and again, without thanks or any other incentive but to do our part, as the custodians of our nearly 10,000 sq ft sanctum.

Next in line for us to tackle, are the area's of:

1. Lighting: updating our current system w/modern, energy-saving fixtures and bulbs for our 1/3 of the warehouse
2. Carbon Calculator: designing and deployment on our site at checkout to empower our customers with greater choice and exposure to
enhance Green-conscious consumerism.
3. Solar Web-hosting: go off the grid with our website via 100% solar-powered web-hosting.
4. Community: besides our warehouse roomies, we wish to initiate efforts to spread awareness and coordinate activities within our neighborhood to start cleaning up our immediate surroundings here in downtown, Los Angeles (CA).

We're excited and honored to assume even greater responsibility in our growth towards greater, conscious business and sustainability. We also look forward to sharing more of our progress and hope to hear about yours as well!

Hello from Los Angeles, where we think far and then drive there in heavy traffic.  

I am both excited and sad to be leaving my home here, for home it truly has become.  But a new adventure lies ahead in whatever place Beau decides to attend grad school as our commitment to experience life together really commences.

We are getting married on the full moon in June this year.  According to official sources it just happens to be a blue moon and since that complements our story so nicely, we're going with it.  (second full moon in a calendar month)  Our loved ones are joining us for a summer weekend in Big Sur where we can really begin our lives together according to all of our values.

I've been traveling on and off for the last two months working on various projects, brainstorming on how our national transpo currently functions, interviewing a number of different business owners, investors, family, friends, strangers and the like to gain a wider understanding of how the Green movement has begun to effect them and wanted to sum up a few thoughts as I settle back into Dianovo HQ.

The online green world is growing! It seems like there are new options to get your green information and tips almost every day.

One new-comer to the scene is Green Options, a collection of blogs by some of today's top green bloggers (plus some new voices), discussion forums, a Green Life Guide, and the latest green news in the Green Report.

The blogs promise to be the best part of this site. With a diverse group of bloggers touching upon a wide range of green topics - from politics and science to green living tips. Nice info.

 

The Christian Science Monitor just published a great article on a grassroots approach to climate change called Low Carbon Diet: A 30 Day Program to Lose 5000 Pounds. It’s an illustrated workbook that guides individuals and small groups through a 22-step program to reduce their CO2 footprint. The author, David Gershon, spent a couple of decades researching how to get people to change their behavior concerning the environment—and the conclusion he reached is: if you work with a small peer support group, you are much more likely to actually do something different. (as in, Weight Watchers/AA meets Global Warming). He created a program call “Eco Team” which got a lot of praise for its effectiveness at shifting consumption behavior. Then he created the Low Carbon Diet based on the Eco Team program to specifically tackle climate change. Apparently, they’re getting great results. You can read the Monitor article at: http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/1228/p14s01-sten.html

While holidays, birthdays and other occasions (especially Christmas!) are a great opportunity to show how much you care for someone, it's as equally important to remember the earth and to be as green savvy as you can in your holiday gift shopping.

There are a number of ways to accommodate both, it just takes a little thought and creativity. Below are a few of our recommended green companies for holiday gift purchasing and, be sure to check out Blue's how to on greening your holidays for more personal and creative gift ideas.

Welcome...

I'm daftly excited to welcome you to what is just the beginning of a vast and powerful green, conscious social network. We've been pushing each other along with as much love and support to get this up and running in time to premier at this weekends Green Festival in San Francisco, CA where we'll be to start promoting and sharing the good word on what we Dianovo, have in store for anyone interested in the green movement. For a quick look at just how serious this industry is becoming, check out Inc.com's "The Green 50".

But first, what's green? What's conscious? And what are the differences between the two? (I assume you know what an online social network is by now, if not read here.) These are two very important concepts both in and out of time, right now.

Let me first explain these concepts by way of my understanding and perception of them in relation to environmental, Web 2.0 thinking.

Green - is the vehicular term with which the global voice has termed the movement endeavoring to empower, educate and save our world, as we speak. Other variations of the phrase include: green business, green enterprise, greening of America, sustainability, greenwashing...to name a few. As the internet continues to push past both old and new boundaries, the dissemination of information continues to accelerate from one corner of the world to another, with astonishing speed. And as it does, it brings tidings of both positive and negative developments, one of which is the state of our ecological world and what's turned out to be one of the most devasting acknowledgment's of dis-ease the world has ever seen: the rapidly declining health of our great mother, Earth.

With every day that passes comes another wave of revelation from the world's scientists, who as time marches on, sound together in greater unison that virtually every prediction, time-table and screencast is outdated before it's even been printed, dried and cached by the record keeping Google Juggernaut. So with these tear-jerking (be it heartfelt emotion or noxious toxins) stories of self-induced, eco-terror comes the enterprising mind of humanity, but for once in an honest and sincere attempt to do right. OK, I know what you may be thinking, but for the most part at least the majority of those of us involved are.

Those individuals who, like ourselves, have taken upon themselves to do what they can to counter-act the world communities ill-begotten measures through an untold number of approaches: carbon offsetting, treeplanting, sustainability, lobbying congress, filmmaking, bookwriting, blogging, teaching, self-sacrificing and other entrepreneurialistic efforts.

Conscious - is a term most commonly associated with the mind, that part of us that analyzes, deduces, calculates and just never shuts up (for most). For others it represents some form of spiritual awakening or truth. Still others have come to view it in terms of green business ethics, which quite pointedly is the case for yours truly. Other variations may include: awake, awakening, enlightened, divine, connected, present, depth, being and so forth.

By and large, mass cultures' consciousness has been driven blindly by a chosen/select few. But again with the advent of an ever powering, super-charged internet, the many are waking up. As those of us step forth from shadow, in stillness but with great action those still yet to and just waking up, find surer footing on their path to greater truth, purity, sanity and prosperity.

Translation = people (who run businesses especially) see the greater picture between their microcosm of creation and destruction in the workplace, home and the macrocosm of the world. By doing so, they start to see just how they're impacting the environment, locally and collectivelly with the world. Upon realization, many (myself included) have gasped in dismay if not horror upon closer scrutiny that their passion, hobby, job, or business was contributing grossly to global warming; some business owners like Interfaces' Ray Anderson have simply put it: "I wanted to throw up".

Dianovo

All right, you may be thinking: I hear you but what's the deal? How is what you're doing here on Dianovo any different? What are you doing?

Well, it's quite simple: we're working to place powerful tools for communication, self-expression, and creation of change in as many peoples' hands as we possibly can. Upon creation of one's account/profile, you can immerse yourself as heavily and deeply as you desire with a diverse userbase of environmentalists, business owners, teachers, spiritual leaders, students, and otherwise everyday people trying to do better, by being green and sharing one another's insights, skills, wisdom and whatever else you've developed along the way to enchance your process.

Now you can pass it on, without barriers.

Utilizing some of the most versatile programming modalities like Drupal and PHP we've enabled a highly customizable environment for you do so with many of the features expected from the Web 2.0 realm: blogging, rss feeding, customizeable profile and personal homepage and much more coming soon. But most importantly we feel, is our focus and intention of merging the Green and Conscious identities with the Web 2.0-ness if you will, to deliver a powerful medium with which to enhance and propel your already powerful and timely voice, message and self...for all to see.

Getting Started

So continue on in and explore our green, budding world by first creating your profile. We've got a whole lot more in store over the coming months but would love to get your input along the way to make this the best green social network in the world!

Thanks for reading and we look forward to hearing from you soon!