BlogHer - BlogHer08 - Comments

Good points

GreenMoms — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 22:24:45 -0500

I agree that using re-usables and compostables are the best way to go. It takes such emense energy and water to manufacture plastic, and of course, the manufacturing of plastic puts off so much pollution into our atmosphere. Makes sense to me.
I like how you linked to specific books and photos to show evidence. That is so helpful and informative!
I also think that BlogHer is just delving into 'green' and they have at least made some attempts instead of not doing anything at all. Let's also praise them for what they have tried to do. BlogHer seems open to greening their conferences especally with all the helpful suggestions and comments of the many green posts regarding the conference.

GreenMoms, Melinda

www.GreenMomsCoastside.com

Green On! Your Children Will Thank You For It.

Convenience of plastic a charge against our children's future?

thesmartmama — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 12:38:08 -0500

Thanks Beth for tackling the doesn't it use more energy to wash debate? v. using disposable plastic. Mary Clare Hunt's reminder that it takes an evaluation of the impacts over the product's complete life emphasize that using disposable plastics are NOT more green and eco-friendly than simply washing a glass plate. (And I prefer glass to other materials because it doesn't contain toxic chemicals as some glazes do and is infinitely recyclable.)

Whatever we do will affect the world our children will live in, and our children's children. We can't use the convenience of disposable plastic to charge a huge debt against their future - a debt that they may not be able to pay.

Let's do everything we can to green BlogHer'09.

Jennifer, Smart Mamas Do It All, Naturally, TheSmartMama

Helpful information!

Jenn_S — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 21:45:22 -0500

Thanks for the great post-- this is handy info to have, because I'm always getting the "disposable v. reusable" question-- and now I've got the facts to back it up!

-Jenn

****************************
http://www.tinychoices.com

A Life Cycle Assessment uncovers these processes

Mary Clare Hunt — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 14:24:14 -0500

Beth, you flagged the BIG ELEPHANT in the room, how do you make sense of it all... how do we know we are making the right choices?

The answer lies in what manufacturers are doing now, i.e. conducting Life Cycle Assessment (LCAs) of their products from the gathering of raw materials, through the processing, distribution, use and maybe recycling and reuse. LCAs measure the entire process for it's carbon and pollution footprint. Once all facts are gathered, then companies and consumers can make intelligent choices.

The 12 environmental impacts include: global warming, acidification, eutrophication, habitat alteration, natural resource depletion, solid waste generation, ecological toxicity, human toxicity, ozone depletion, smog formation, indoor air quality and embodied energy content.

When you look at that full picture, companies, investors and eventually consumers will be able to see exactly what a product is doing much like reading a nutrition label.

Whew! That's more than most of us want to know - we just want to have lunch (or buy the shoes...)

What you don't know is that the biz market is already demanding LCAs that are audited by a third party. For a look at what marketers are doing, go to Sustainable Life Media. For the record, I endorse the SMaRT Sustainable Product standard because it covers 1200 potentially harmful chemicals and also BANs the Stockholm POPS, persitant organic pollutants. More info on that group here http://chm.pops.int/

I always learn from you!

Mama Bird — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 12:21:59 -0500

This is even better than reading GarbageLand (and I love that book)! Cause I really met you at BlogHer - and I share(d) your frustration. I found it so odd that the intro emails we got encouraged us all to bring reusable water bottles but then there were only plastic bottles around the conference, no pitchers. Hopefully next year the efforts to green the conference will be thought through more fully - with the help of commentary like this.

SurelyYouNest.com

Thank you!

AlliesAnswers — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 11:09:40 -0500

I love that you took up the argument of washing vs. disposables! I've heard so many people use that as their excuse for not using reusables.

I join you in the detox.

Liz Rizzo — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 19:51:55 -0500

I actually left BlogHer thinking that that's the last time I let myself eat like that. The minute I'm away from my normal life it's crap food, crap food.

I was bloated from the carbs by the second day because I usually do South Beach and my system was in total shock. Next year I am scouting the hotel restaurants and if I have to pay $20 for a breakfast with eggs, then that's what I'll do.

Avoiding the sweets... that's another whole challenge!

Liz Rizzo

I blog at Everyday Goddess.

The name, the topic or the shame?

lenaramore — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 16:44:21 -0500

The category itself is too broad to navigate. The impact of this is less participation because, when time is limited and valuable we choose the most specific topic, in order to quickly benefit from relevant information.

Wander into a "personal finance" section and you could be hearing about - -well, check out our 6 posts so far - -real estate, insurance, accounting and Linsey's initial comment which was "curiosity on the definition." Then add the filters for different classes, ages, and obligations and you've got one heck of a mess to wade through to find something relevant.

What I have found in my work with both male and female clients is that very few care about personal finance qua finance - -what they care about is the lifestyle that their personal finance delivers or impedes. Personal finance is like a car, in that the mechanics and wiring of the machine are yawners but speed, comfort,efficiency, safety and reliability are always top of mind.

"Lifestyle provisioning" is the phrase I use with my clients to segue from the cosmetic stuff to the mechanical stuff - -perhaps something like "making money work" or "paying for your lifestyle" would gin up hits.

Best to all - -
Laura

www.thehomezonecompany.com

I was at the Beutiful Blogging session, too!

Sugar Mama — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 00:36:31 -0500

Oh, boy, that was the most amazing time. I haven't stopped thinking about all the women I met there. I was really moved by Krysten as well. I sent out a bit of a call to action slash poll to friends. I hope it gets some legs around this area. I really connected with the Off The Rocks blog. Alysa and I have similar situations. It was so great to hear someone else be honest about the realities of this struggle. You can still smile and have hope... and that's what I took away from that amazing session.

They don't get it...

Sugar Mama — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 17:04:16 -0500

I love that we got info on syndication, monetization, and basic searchability, but like I said at the Beautiful Blogging session, I was there to find community. It's hard to explain this medium to your friends at home. It's also hard to explain why it is that we bother posting. It always gets me when the inevitable question about money comes up. It's hard for people to get their heads around the fact that some things are a labor of love. And if money comes along, well, that's just gravy.

Here's what I got out of the conference:

http://livingintheory.blogspot.com/2008/07/coming-out-of-fog-blogher-2008-san.html

Thanks, WhyMommy!

lauriewrites — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 02:05:55 -0500

Those folks are new to me so thanks for pointing them out. : )

Laurie

LaurieWrites

That's awesome, Liz.

lauriewrites — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 02:04:31 -0500

Now that I read this, I think I may have sat at a table with your mom at the open space but I didn't know it was your mom. : ) Cool.

I also love what she said about everyone having stories. It is so true and I think what moves me most about the connections that I see and feel at the conference is that everyone there is meeting/talking/reconnecting because they dug each other's story - either that day or years ago. Love it.

Laurie

LaurieWrites

More moms ... and babies!

whymommy — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 22:37:51 -0500

Paull Young brought his mom Cate, Mothergoosemouse brought her baby Oliver, and Canape brought BOTH -- blogging mom and blogged-about infant, and it was wonderful.

WhyMommy

http://toddlerplanet.wordpress.com & http://motherswithcancer.com

Moms and daughters at BlogHer

Liz Henry — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 14:03:00 -0500

Minnie and I brought our mom to BlogHer. We had a great time. I enjoyed getting to introduce my mom to so many amazing bloggers! Lisa Stone complimented my mom on her great DNA, which made us all laugh.

I think she might have expected it to be mostly younger people at the conference, and she was pleasantly surprised that there were a lot of other mid-life bloggers present and speaking up. Her comment afterwards was something to the effect that the women around her will never seem ordinary or unnoticable again; any woman she passes on the street might have a really interesting life - and might write about it - like the bloggers we met at the conference.

-----------------
Liz Henry
lizzard@bookmaniac.net
Contributing Editor, World and Latin America

Four hours a day - wow - that's some heavy networking

Vered — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 18:12:02 -0500

I didn't get Twitter initially, but I get it now. I probably spend around 30 minutes/ day on the site. To me it's about networking and social interaction. Of course it's not going to work as a customer service solution now that everyone is trying to use it in that way.

I just wish they would add a feature that lets you sort the people you follow so that you can choose to follow some more closely than others. I'm sure they will add it in the future, but right now they seem to struggle just to keep the site up.

Oh, and I wouldn’t feel sorry for Comcast.

Vered DeLeeuw

http://momgrind.com/