Chekhov's Mistress
My Green Pledge
Ah, Earth Day. Like National Poetry Month, these days/months mean little if you are already in to them and once a lot of people become do aware they feel like they’ve outlived their usefulness at best and a little cheesy at worst (although who doesn’t enjoy a good poster now and then). I don’t think I’ve made even one mention of NPM this month, except for mentioning Greko’s annual blogging endeavor.
Tell you the truth, the only green I’ve been thinking of lately is the sort that spews out of ATMs. Funny how having three kids will do that to you. Nonetheless, Green, “for lack of a better word, is good” so I thought I’d revisit an organization I mentioned here once before:
EcoLibris says its aim is to “strive for a world where reading books doesn’t have adverse effects on the environment” by facilitating tree-planting offsets for book buyers. You pay a small fee according to the number of books you buy (“20 Million trees are cut down annually for virgin paper used for the production of books sold in the U.S. alone”), and they offset your use of trees by planting new ones. They also work as an advocacy group to encourage publishers to adopt good green practices.
I’ve thought a lot about the idea of offsets, an idea not without its detractors, but I like them (see the link on the word “offsets” for more information) because they foster awareness and an environment where individuals can take responsibility for their actions where otherwise we might feel overwhelmed by an inability to make an impact. On the downside of course, offsets may just be emotional salve and make us feel as though we are “doing something,” absolved of further responsibility.
Of course, I being the heretic, think that the best way to lesson the impact books make on the environment is to use electronic readers. Sure, we’re not there yet, but imagine at the least if the book industry were required to distribute advanced readers copies electronically. That kind of leads to a major problem with the adoption of e-readers: How do you market a book when the all look the same? Not all countries dress up their books the way we Americans do, so it may be doable, and then again, music marketing has managed to survive the minimization of album art (and Apple has turned cover art into a whole new electronic reality reviving dineresque jukebox coverflow).
At the very least I believe that all periodicals should be distributed solely through electronic means. My pledge to myself this year was to stop all paper-based subscriptions. That’s not easy to do. I’ve forever been a magazine/newspaper addict (although I gave up paper newspapers several years ago) and I get tons of free trade magazines as well as the ones I shell out for. I often have as many as 20 different subscriptions and more often than not I don’t bother to count. I just throw away the pile when it gets so big it topples.
Progress? Because I couldn’t resist the offer, I just subscribed to Fence for $1, already going back on my own pledge. And then there’s the fact that I have so many subscriptions that I can’t keep up with when some of them expire and several have pernicious auto-renew features that shock me when I get notice. So let’s just say it’s a work in progress. I should do what the government does: By 2012 I will phase out all paper-based subscriptions (grandfathering free trade subscriptions where there is no electronic alternative, small magazines who depend on subscriptions for their livelihood, important periodicals who deserve to be archived, and journals I want to save for my children). There, I feel better.
Seriously, there’s just no reason for all these piles of unread paper when the Web and other means are a viable and often better alternative. Print Periodicals, I put you on notice. We’ll talk about books later.
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About this Post
- Posted by: Bud Parr
- Date: April 22, 2008
- Filed Under:
Wise Men Fish Here: Literature
- Comments:0
- Links to this Post: Technorati
