Calling all architects, visionaries, dumpster-divers, permaculturalists, and experimental home-makers... a great film about thermal mass, grey water, home food production, building with trash, and battling the powers that be for the right to experiment with housing....

GARBAGE WARRIOR
by Oliver Hodge

Friday Feb 12 - 7pm
Troy Bike Rescue - 51 3rd St., Downtown Troy
Suggested Donation - $3

What do beer cans, car tires and water bottles have in common? Not much unless you're renegade architect Michael Reynolds, in which case they are tools of choice for producing thermal mass and energy-independent housing. For 30 years New Mexico-based Reynolds and his green disciples have devoted their time to advancing the art of "Earthship Biotecture" by building self-sufficient, off-the-grid communities where design and function converge in eco-harmony. However, these experimental structures that defy state standards create conflict between Reynolds and the authorities, who are backed by big business. Frustrated by antiquated legislation, Reynolds lobbies for the right to create a sustainable living test site. While politicians hum and ha, Mother Nature strikes, leaving communities devastated by tsunamis and hurricanes. Reynolds and his crew seize the opportunity to lend their pioneering skills to those who need it most. Shot over three years and in four countries, Garbage Warrior is a timely portrait of a determined visionary, a hero of the 21st century.

heres the trailer:

As a Parks and Trails survey released several weeks ago showed, the Mohawk Hudson bike trail is heavily used. And Schenectady officials hope their new greenway, connecting Central Park to downtown via Bradley Street, Brandywine Avenue and Vale Park, will be too once it is completed in November.

There’s no reason why not; this is going to be a pleasant, safe trail — through two picturesque parks, separated from cars all the way — that can be used for both recreation and transportation by residents and visitors alike.

Back in 2003, city and county planners developed a good bike plan for the city. It called for improving connections between the bike path and downtown to get cyclists passing by the city to get off the trail and come through, perhaps visiting Little Italy or Jay Street downtown, or doing a designated loop through Union College, the GE Plot, Upper Union and Central Park.

Some of those connections have now been made. Using the existing bike path, commuters from Niskayuna can easily get to the new Golub headquarters or the community college. Recreational cyclists can do that loop, sharing the road with cars but on routes chosen and signed for safety. Visitors downtown can lock up their bikes at racks watched by attendants at Metroplex’s parking lots. The Erie Boulevard redesign will feature a bike path. And linking it all up, the greenway, which can be used by all types of riders, kids as well as adults.

Schenectady merchants should start encouraging people to come by bicycle, as some do in Saratoga Springs, by offering discounts. The city should have fun, bike-oriented activities, like bike rodeos for kids or races, or close certain roads to cars on occasion for a bike afternoon or night.
There could be big benefits for Schenectady if it becomes known as a bike-friendly city, and it is on its way.

I was talking with a client today about her marketing plans for the New Year, and she was a bit disheveled from the past year’s marketing efforts. She told me that print has not really worked for her, referring to past ads in Eco-Local Living and others. I then asked about her ads I had seen in a prominent regional web portal, and she commented that that didn’t work either. So I asked, “What does work for you?” She said that her personal networking and referrals work the best. I replied that, of course, personal contact always works great, because it’s you, and your passion, sharing the values of what you can do for a customer. The problem, as she acknowledged, is that she is just one person, and can’t be everywhere all the time. She needs to leverage herself so that her personal message is conveyed in multiple places al at the same time. " need to clone myself," she said.

In marketing, there is no silver bullet – one thing that works all the time for every business. The old media rules no longer seem to work – newspaper, TV, radio, even internet web pages, are all fractured and marginalized, because the audience today is choosing their media on demand. Radio is loosing audiences to the ipod and XM; TV is now T-VO'ed; news is now instant, and people now want it tailored to their interest and ideology, instead of the homogenized corporate mass media outlets of old.

The answer to effective marketing is not one thing, but a combiunation of many things that can create a critical mass messaging that connects with your target audience on a number of fronts. Most importantly, people don’t want to be sold, but they love to buy. The slick commercial videos of the old media are giving way to a more personal message that conveys passion and emotion to the viewer. A relationship video is one that tells your unique story, without sounding like a sales pirtch.  Plus, relationship videos are sharable, which makes them usable with social networking strategies. With things like Facebook, Link'in and twitter, who knows how far your message may go; the imnportant thing is that is goes!

Print still has value, but the broadcast approach of direct mail and newspapers do not have the retention need to create effective branding. Niche publications, on the other hand, are proving to be an effective media that targets a specific affinity group, or demographic segment that is aligned with a certain lifestyle or activity. Because this print media is chosen, it has high retention which creates the opportunity for repeat exposure to your message.

Like niche print publications, the hot place to be on the web is with affinity websites that are hubs of content and connection. People want to be educated, enlightened, and entertained, and they want the ability to comment, rate, and share the information. Having your own web page is no longer good enough; you must now integrate with an affinity group so that your message is captured by the viral networks that are the new town square.

So with all these new options, and and seemingly unlimited ways to spend your very limmited marketing budget, what is the answer?

Enter eco-LOCAL Media...a new marketing company for the new media.  We are now assembling a powerful package of targeted, effective, and measurable tools that will utilize print, video, web, social media and events marketing, with emphasis on the local, independent, sustainablity-minded businesses in New York's Hudson/Mohawk Valley region.  Our simple goal is to create a network of people that, through their combined energies, inspiration and action, will make the Upper Hudson/Mohawk Valley region of New York a better place to live, work and play!

We are in the midst of a transformation paradigm shift that is rewriting the rules of business. The old corporatist economy of extraction, commodification and manipulation is crashing down all around us. It must die, for it was completely unsustainable. From its ashes is a new model that integrates values, connection and collaboration. It is the local living economy, where values originate from the individual entrepreneur, and flow outward to the local community, who then re-invest and compound it to enhance their place called home. A local living economy ensures that economic power resides locally, sustaining healthy community life and natural life as well as long-term economic viability. It is a better way to live. It is the way we must live. We are local. We are the economy.  We are eco-local! Come join us.

by Joseph Constantine, Jr.

The term Green is being used to describe virtually everything these days, but what does it really mean, in terms of the remodeling and construction?