Subject:  Note 00010:  Comments from Viridians

Key concepts:  Viridian Commentary: Viridian cuisine; 
Viridian domain name; propaganda tactics; Viridian 
Principles of Design; flood recovery; PEM fuel cells; 
Viridian ranking

Attention Conservation Notice:  Comments to the Viridian 
moderator are ruthlessly edited.  I question whether you 
should read these comments from your fellow Viridians.  
Can these sources be trusted?  Who knows their real 
agenda?  These people could be anybody, even you.

From: jon@lasser.org (J. Lasser)

I was just picking up another computer book (*The Perl 
Cookbook* from O'Reilly and Associates, written by Tom 
Christiansen and Nathan Torkington).  Imagine my surprise 
when I read Larry Wall's introduction:

"Cooking is also one of the oldest of the arts. Some 
modern artists would have you believe that so-called 
ephemeral art is a recent invention, but cooking has 
always been an ephemeral art. We can try to preserve our 
art, make it last a little longer, but even the food we 
bury with our pharoahs gets dug up eventually." (p. xxi)

   This fulfills (literally!) the "Eat What You Kill" 
dictum, the "embrace of decay" (what else would blue 
cheese be?), "Planned Evanescence", and "Viridian 
Inactivism."

    Depending on tastes, cooking can also be compatible 
with the following Viridian principles: "The Future Is 
History," "History Accumulates," "Look at the Underside 
First" (look at the growth of organic foods for a 
cautionary tale), "Design for the Old," "Superstition 
Isn't Inspiration," "Do Less With Less," "There's No One 
So Green as the Dead," "Make the Invisible Visible," "Less 
Mass, More Data" (try nouvelle cuisine), "Seek the 
Biomorphic and the Transorganic," and "Datamine Nature."

   Cooking is not clearly incompatible with any thus-far 
stated Viridian principle. Of course, it's not hard to 
imagine an anti-Viridian meal == for example, a steak 
raised in a burned-over rainforest.


From: weasel@gothic.net (Darren Mckeeman)

If you're going to have a movement, it's not going to do 
to have your URL on someone else's server. We need our own 
domain name to go with the Viridian image. Based on my own 
experiences, I'll go so far as to suggest a 'presence' 
package:

1) A domain name (www.viridian.org)
2) An image package (I can't help you there -- I'm all 
thumbs)
3) a propaganda campaign to get 'Viridian' into the public 
eye
4) a document storage method (otherwise known as designing 
a useful website).

     The first two items are easy. First, find a graphic 
designer.  You can trip over them in doorways here in San 
Francisco. Then you get someone to donate web space. This, 
too, is easy here in San Francisco.

     The second half of my list will take some work and a 
small investment -- maybe $20 per flunkey. Yes, it takes 
volunteers to properly lead a propaganda campaign.  The 
Viridian Movement needs some memetic form of propaganda, 
such as peel-off stickers. I suggest brilliant neon-green 
stickers with our web address.  We can send a roll to each 
person on this list for them to start plastering bus 
stops, cars, bathroom stalls, garbage cans, personal 
computers, street signs, etc.  Human beings love to deface 
property -- let's give in to our own inner nature! 

    Of course, this might appeal more to kids than to old 
people. 


From: richardd@reeseco.com (Richard Dorsett)

Viridian Publishing:  I believe one of the most important 
things we should strive to change is the nature of 
publishing.  Whole forests die so the lumpenproletariat  
can read about Rosie O'Donnell's new diet. The notion of 
chopping down trees to produce romance novels, wrestling 
magazines and tabloid newspapers is especially repugnant. 

   This idea is, of course, openly elitist. I propose a 
ban on the use of physical paper to produce any document 
that does not meet the strict aesthetic standards of the 
Viridian Council. Of course, I realize that our sublime 
edicts will have no authority whatsoever in the "real" 
world, but by issuing press releases (on-line, of course), 
and calling into play "reputation economics," we can focus 
painful attention on publications that are absolute wastes 
of paper.

    As the Viridian Greens gain respect for our many fresh 
ideas and futurist design scenarios, people will heed our 
edicts. "Books" will once again become precious art 
objects, designed to appeal to the eye, the hand, and the 
mind. Magazines, perhaps printed on pure hemp rag paper, 
will once again become things of beauty, following the 
lead of the artists and designers of the Belle Epoque.

     We can start by creating an award to give to 
publishers outstanding in their greed and bad taste. I 
suggest a fine parchment with a photograph of the Tunguska 
blast site or Mount St. Helens, showing disaster areas 
with trees laid flat for miles, with a legend such as "For 
Outstanding Achievement In The Area Of Deforestation."

     We could also reward publishers who design and print 
lovely, worthwhile publications on a stock of older, 
preferably hand-made paper. Soon, our awards will be 
either feared or highly coveted.


From: rsewell@cix.compulink.co.uk (Richard Sewell)

There's a common idea in these principles :

"Eat What You Kill"
"Avoid the Timeless, Embrace Decay"
"Planned Evanescence"
"Look at the Underside First"
"Design For Evil"
"Design for the Old"

They're all facets of designing for the whole effect of a 
thing on the world, over all its users and all its 
lifespan. This suggests a host of similar questions. What 
better but late-developing design might be stillborn if 
this one is successful? What developments will this design 
inspire in a few years? Will this design encourage 
monopoly or competition? How will it change once it has 
become successful and moved downmarket?

    How do Viridian principles rub along with the economic 
imperatives that seem to give industrial design its lack 
of foresight?  Are we just trying to shame them into doing 
it better ?

     Thinking about the artifacts I use and love the best, 
many of them (my favourite coat, my sewing machine, my 
bed, my lathe, my chair) are decades old. They work well 
and last a long time, far beyond original market 
requirements.  They are Viridian exemplars in that they've 
generated a lot of utility from a little bit of resource.  
They've avoided leaving useless components behind by not 
becoming irreparable or obsolete (yet). They are all 
targeted at long-term needs.



From: LangiG@parl.gc.ca (Greg Langille)

Hi Bruce.  Fab list of principles.

As far as requests for candidates, a few obvious ones 
occur in the power-generating industry.  Perhaps a scale 
could be used, eg.:

0 - 10 where 0 is the perfect Viridian object.

1 - wooden water turbines
5 - solar panels ( what do you do with the hardware when 
it breaks?)
10 - nuclear power

Perhaps a formula could be used:

Viridian Quotient = (time in use) / ((time to create) + 
(time until 100% decomposition))

This would give a "working life" figure.  A broom made of 
sticks would have a higher figure than the Nuclear Plant, 
but lower than a song performed live by a band.


From: rinesi@espacio.com.ar (Marcelo Rinesi) 

Concerning the handling of flood disasters, by a member of 
a flood-ridden society (Argentina).

    I live in a city in the shore of the Paran'a River, in 
South America, which is a zone frequently flooded. Based 
on what I've seen, I believe that society simply gets used 
to floods. After a time, floods become part of the 
landscape, like corrupt politicians.  Long term solutions 
aren't pressed for. Humans just adapt.

    I infer that natural disasters alone won't generate 
much political pressure to change policy. We will have to 
factor something else.

     Societies long-exposed to certain disaster tend to be 
aware of its signals.  In my city's case, the river's 
level makes headlines often.  We should speed the creation 
of the awareness for those disasters, to make society more 
efficient on dealing with them.  Education on climatology 
and individual access to large, global, disaster-
prediction systems should be made available.  This might 
be a necessary step toward finding the will to prevent or 
solve disasters.

     A BBS-like system to post notices of natural 
disasters could be implemented almost overnight.  Warnings 
would be issued by research scientists, and the post-fact 
assessment and help could be issued directly from field 
experts, especially those in other countries. That system 
would be  "very Viridian," as it would work almost 
biologically, like a nervous system for the planet.

     A nervous system seems to be very needed now, as so 
far we only have some sort of "brain" (the Net). 
Widespread, low-level, sensory, global nervous systems 
aren't available or working yet, and maybe one of the 
goals or means of the Viridian movement should be to 
implement them.

    Our material possessions can't be moved from the path 
of disaster overnight (I sadly learned this by my own 
experience), so they are particularly disaster-exposed.  A 
less materially-based culture, which the Viridian movement 
wants, will paradoxically ease some of the effects of 
natural disasters, making them less fearful and urgent.

    A highly data-based culture might be ideal for an 
environmentally stricken planet.  It should be part of our 
contingency plans in case of failure.  (We are going to 
have contingency plans, aren't we?)


From: jim@smallworks.com (Jim Thompson) 

    You should do something on 'fuel cells'.  The (fairly 
new) Proton Exchange  Membrane (PEM) cells hold huge 
promise for cheap, clean, safe energy (and lots of it) 
from renewable sources.

     Basically, a fuel cell is like a battery where you 
put in some low-grade  hydrocarbon (ethanol, methanol, 
kerosene, LP Gas, Natural Gas, diesel,  methane). You get 
DC power out, with pure water and heat as the by-products.

     The huge advantage to the PEM-based cells is that 
they run cool (50C-120C, .versus up to 1800C for other 
types) and they don't need hard-to-handle catalysts 
inside.

     Several companies are getting commercial-grade PEM-
based fuel cells ready for  deployment around 2000. 
Personally, as soon as they're available, I'm taking my 
home off the grid.   PEM technology is very Viridian, 
since it is cute, sexy and glamorous.

There are photos at:

http://www.gate.net/~h2_ep/10kw_pem.htm

A 10 kilowatt stack of cells with a volume of 37 liters 
(less than 2 cubic feet) weighs 65kg (about 140lbs).

Get 5-6 of those going, and you can replace the 
220V/200amp service to your home.  Practice a little 
conservation, and you can get by with far less.

     Plug Power (http://www.plugpower.com/) is one of the 
companies attempting to make a product for the consumer 
market.

*******************************************************

Bruce Sterling remarks:  Thank you for your generous help, 
both in this public posting and behind the Viridian 
scenes.  It is much appreciated.   I will now formally 
distribute chevrons and stars in a glorious flurry of 
Viridian reputation capital.

jim@smallworks.com^^^^^^*
rinesi@espacio.com.ar^^*
weasel@gothic.net^*
richardd@reeseco.com*

Ian.Griffin@Corp.Sun.COM^^^
jonl@well.com^^^

geert@xs4all.nl^^
pacoid@fringeware.com^^
rdm@test.legislate.com^^
robot@ultimax.com^^
tbyfield@panix.com^^
TuckerV@frogdesign.com^^

ASKornheiser@prodigy.net^
Cooper409@aol.com^
dave@va.com.au^
dhlight@mcs.net^
gail@well.com^
gordy@nytimes.com^
infinite@beaming.com^
jon@lasser.org^
jrc@well.com^
kaiser@acm.org^
LangiG@parl.gc.ca^
merlan@visa.com^
nehrlich@sfis.com^
philg@martigny.ai.mit.edu^
quest@inetarena.com^
SeJ@aol.com^
steven@iisl.co.uk^
sdhurley@ican.net^
thack@design-inst.nl^
whiz@ricochet.net^