Online Planet

Just how do you get Internet at 82 degrees North?

... or how we traveled back in time to dial-up connections and email without attachments.
Warning: This is an entry that might interest more the geeks among you than the general public.

The Arctic Sunrise is on top of the world right now, at 82 degrees North, and the difficulties encountered are not just weather related. Because so few people live that far North, satellite cover is almost nonexistent, and staying in touch with the ship is a complicated operation.
We had to install iridium phones on top of the crow's nest to create a very low bandwidth dial-up connection.

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Posted by Juliette at 12:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

First I laughed, then I cried.

I keep thinking Fox News can't go lower, and then they impress me with things like that (you may want to take a deep calming breath before and after watching this):

As very well said on the Grist blog: "If crime rates are rising, how come I didn't get mugged today?"
(via Grist and Media Matters)

Posted by Juliette at 1:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

What's on your blogroll?

I'm currently trying to put together a list of environmental blogs that we should watch for touching. The natural starting point was my blogroll, but it soon became obvious that it reflected more my personal preferences than something others could work with. I then looked a bit further, browsed newspapers websites and blogrolls here and there, asked Technorati...
I found some great stuff that I had barely looked at before, discovered a few hidden gems. However, it still feels that I may be missing something, and that the mother of all environmental blogs is still out there. I'm also short on specialist blogs, while generalist ones are a pound a penny. So I'm asking you, Greenpeacers from everywhere, what blogs do you read, before or after this one? What's your blog (don't be shy, self-promotion is authorized today)? Are you more interested in general blogs like Grist or Treehugger, or specialists, like RealClimate? Comment away!

Posted by Juliette at 3:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Rotterdam action eye candy

It looks like the action in Rotterdam this week-end had some public - besides all the media that reported it. I have just found two slide shows of beautiful photos by a Dutch photographer.
For your viewing pleasure, here they are. The first one has photos of the night and early morning, and the second shows mainly the ships and banners.

For more nice photos of the Greenpeace ships, feel free to look around the flickr group dedicated to them (and submit photos if you have had the pleasure of seeing one!)

Posted by Juliette at 10:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Mapping our losses

For some time I've been looking for software that will produce maps of the world where the size of territories is distorted by some relevant metric (population, carbon emissions, GDP per head etc). Now I've found the World Mapper project, which while it doesn't let me upload my own data or generate my own maps has got a wide selection to look at.

Here's a map of known species extinctions since 1500 CE (current era)

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Posted by Martin at 2:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

One for the blogroll

Via real climate I've just found

http://cejnewsviews.blogspot.com/

one for your RSS reader I think

Posted by Martin at 5:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Making Waves comes 10th out of the top 100 Best Green Bloggers

Making Waves got an email this morning, from the Greenpeace UK webteam. It seems we've been listed as number 10 in the best UK green blogs by The Daily (Maybe) blog. Of course, we're delighted to have gained this recognition - trailing behind sucn luminaries as George Monbiot and Paul Kingsnorth, as well as The Guardian's Paul Tatchall. And not to forget to commend the winner, Kitchen Witch.

Funny thing is, Making Waves isn't really a UK blog. Yes, we've got British contributors. If it has a nationality, Making Waves is Dutch, as its run out of the Greenpeace International office in Amsterdam. But that doesn't even really explain it. We've got contributors in, yes, the Netherlands and UK, but also New Zealand, Sweden, the US, Ireland and even Bermuda! There's probably more locations - as our writer's list is growing all the time. So, if anything, it's a globally-focussed blog.

I hope this does't disqualify us...

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Posted by Dave at 4:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Google Earth shows environmental destruction

Google and the United National Environmental Program have teamed up - and are using Google Earth to show areas of extreme environmental degradation worldwide.

The UNEP overlay for Google Earth includes successive time-stamped images illustrating 100 areas of extreme environmental degradation around the world. From the deforestation of the Amazon to the fallout of raging forest fires in Sub-Sahara Africa and the decline of the Aral Sea in Central Asia, this before-and-after imagery spanning the past 30 years offers users an online resource for learning about the environmental crisis zones around the world.

Google Earth
(After Installation, look in the "Featured Content" menu tree under "Layers" and select "UNEP")

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Posted by Dave at 12:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Greenpeace Argentina shortlisted for Mobile Messaging Awards

Our guys in Argentina have been shortlisted for the "Best messaging app: Public Sector/not for profit" of the
Mobile Messaging Awards. The Mobile Messaging awards are open to all companies with a suitable messaging product, service or initiative which has been launched after May 2005. Well done to Hernán and team...

The Zero Waste campaign was the first initiative of Greenpeace Argentina in which mobile-activism was the primary tool used to achieve a goal. We used the mobiles phones for pressing local legislators with calls and text messages. Greenpeace Argentina has presented a “Zero Waste” initiative in the Parliament of Buenos Aires. The city, with a population of 3 million, produces between 4-5,000 tons of waste daily, all of which goes to landfills situated in the suburban areas. Shortly after introducing the legislation to Parliament, we launched a communication strategy aimed at influencing specific targets.

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Posted by Dave at 4:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Google Trends

The Greenpeace web community is currently obsessed with Google Trends ("See what the world is searching for").

There's still more love than war in the world

And more sex than violence

However, Brian's found that War is preferable to Britney Spears. It's a sad state of affairs when we need more Britney.

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Posted by Dave at 12:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)