We’re past this now.

So the New York Times Magazine this week was The Green Issue. The articles are pretty good, and they’re online with what looks like a lot of other media. I am excited for instance about electric cars that swap batteries rather than refuel. The weekly profile is on Stewart Brand (Whole Earth Catalog, WELL, Clock of the Long Now), who is fascinating and inspiring. But here’s my gripe: Windsor?
avocado

For this issue, the magazine’s feature headlines are all set in this most un-current of types. I know that I am a type geek, but I bet you can see it too this time: these bulbous, deco-a-go-go letters signify the past as surely as tie-dyes with bell-bottoms. Look at the characters “2009”: it looks frickin’ ludicrous to see our current date clothed in this type. It looked old-fashioned the first time Woody Allen used it (he favors the condensed cut) and it’s only gotten more willfully apart-from-the-times in the dozen times he’s kept using it since. (It looked old-fashioned even in the 1970s; like so much of the vernacular type of the day it was stolen from the art movements from half a century ealier.)

The rationale seems to be because it was used for the Whole Earth Catalog, but that doesn’t fly with me. This indicates to me the reader that environmentalism is best thought of as a phase from the 70s. If you’re going to report on the state of the world right now, NYTM, please please don’t use the vernacular type of yesteryear. In fact unless you want to evoke the 70s best to just keep your ITC locked away.

Ok, rant over.

Water water every steer.

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Happy Earth Day folks (though we hope that by April 2009 you’re thinking of the Earth more than one day a year)! I’ve been thinking a lot about how difficult it is to reframe one’s thinking into ecoefficient decision making. I for one am a fan of infographics for this.

Good Magazine has an infographic comparing the water consumption involved in various things you might do in your day that clearly shows something that few of us consider. While using a low-flow showerhead may save a dozen gallons a day, opting out of a pound of beef saves 1500 gallons. See more info on how to save your water here !

The experts don’t want to be preachy about it, but jeez. First Michael Pollan showed us how inefficient an example of sunlight-calorie rationing meat was, and now this? Less beef, people. Many more people eating somewhat less beef, please, for the future?

Also, folks at Good? Nice infographic. You had me at 1500 green drops.
Meat is Murder Water.

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via Kottke.

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