If you wander into an inner-suburban bookshop at the moment, the first thing that hits you is the enormous piles of remaindered polemics about the evils of the Bush administration. The second thing that hits you is the number of green how-to guides, promising to teach you the secrets of an eco-friendly existence.
As I and others have noted repeatedly (for instance, on “food miles”), it’s much harder than people usually think to get an accurate handle on the overall impact their actions are having on the environment, and such analysis by its very nature has to be quantitative. Yes, my friends, you need numbers. These books, on my brief flick-throughs, never seem to point to any such studies, let alone explain them. Driving half an hour in a Volvo XC90 to pick up your sustainably-grown coffee isn’t likely to be a net win for the environment, but these books never grapple with this kind of trade-off.
But the prize for the most ridiculous “green guide” has to go to Gorgeously Green by one Sophie Uliano, who seems to market herself as the Green Guru for the Vogue set.
Uliano’s schtik seems to be as a shill for an expert on high-priced “green” fashion, cosmetics, food and other luxury goods, primarily on the basis that they are “organic” and “non-toxic” (whatever that means). Whatever. If people like the feel of this stuff on their skin, great. I spend hundreds of dollars a year on contact lenses, mainly for vanity, so who am I to talk? But the idea that choosing “Simply Divine Botanicals Out of Body Cleanser” over a bar of soap is going to help the environment in any significant way (for one thing, the Out of Body cleanser” appears to come in a glass jar) just doesn’t stand up to the laugh test.
But where it really gets silly is her “travel” section. The products featured include “eco-friendly luggage” which is made from a “renewably sourced polymer called Sorona (which is better for the environment then nylon)”. This may well be the case. But, alongside it, she’s flogging holidays to the “absolutely green” Hotelito Disconocido, which may indeed be efficiently run but is more than 2,000 kilometres away from the United States. Any green credentials of the resort, let alone the damn luggage, completely disappear when you’re dumping several tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere to get anywhere near the place.
Ms. Uliano seems to have found people who are willing to pay her well for this pseudo-greenery, so I can’t really blame her for taking their money. But it does annoy me greatly in that it confuses the discussion of what is really required to be ecologically sustainable. Being (very dubiously) green when buying products with relatively small environmental impacts does not cancel out driving around in luxury cars, flying across continents to “eco-resorts”, and living in enormous houses with halogen feature lighting by the kilowatt. Snake oil salespeople like her make people think that being environmentally sustainable is about buying lip balm with an “organic” sticker on it, and make it a lot harder to push through the much less palatable actions required.
I visited the website and was shocked so I wrote to them:
“Laughable is the only way to describe your website. That you would even put something saying “Fly to Hawaii and be absolutely green” or “fly to Peurto Vallarta and reduce your impact on the environment” is the height of absurdity.
Sorona luggage? Here’s what Dupont has to say about Sorona “Now, some of the basic materials and fuels we use every day can be derived from renewable, farm-grown sources, including corn, soybeans, sugar cane, wheat and other renewable sources.” The rest of the world calls this “food”.
Your business is clearly yet another sad attempt to cash in on the hard work of others who are trying to do something decent on the planet.”
Well said, both Robert and Steve D.
Yeah, gives me the sh*ts too. If you want to be sustainable, don’t buy stuff, don’t do stuff, and don’t go anywhere. That’s the harsh reality.
I do my best, but sometimes I think: F*** it! No-one else is doing anything, why should I?
Which makes me think of old George Monbiot and his second hand diesel Renault Clio, not flying anywhere, not going anyway and taking the p*ss out of uber hypocrites like Chris Martin:
(As much as one is tempted to say “It ain’t easy being green” my real point is) it seems that being ‘green’ or ‘eco-friendly’ has become just another consumerable luxury. They are just another way to do one better than the Jones that doesn’t prick the conscience.
Yeah, this sort of woo is pretty annoying.
I don’t know – apparently if you find the right economist to tell you, flying won’t have any impact at all: http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2008/06/fly-to-tokyo-an.html
And there’s also carbon offsets – which are a whole another debate in themselves.
But do you reckon she even mentions offsetting anywhere on her website?
The better carbon offsetting schemes certainly do some good, but I can’t convince myself they undo the damage I do when I fly. Can you? Really? Deep down in your heart-of-hearts?
Like I said, if you want to be geniuinely sustainable: Don’t buy stuff, don’t do stuff, and don’t go anywhere.
That’s it carbonsink, to truly be green, you must ‘don’t buy stuff, don’t do stuff, and don’t go anywhere’ (maybe except via your own two feet), but to feel green and to continue your uber consumer lifestyle, buy green, and go to eco tourist spots and make your conspicuous consumer lifestyle choices of the green kind. One of the ladies mags ( I cant remember which it was Cleo? Cosmo? I saw the cover while doing my shopping and didn’t flick through it) was selling the ‘green’ edition and proffering the type of advice like Ms Uliano’s I’m sure.
Robert, presumably you are unaware of the advertising link below that is being run on this blog and in between this post.
http://www.thegreenroad.com.au/?pcsmebu300
Just sayin’.
Joe2: hadn’t seen it. In any case, we don’t sell the ads, I’ve had no contact whatsoever with the organizations that advertise on LP, and would tell them where to go if they did.
The only thing an organization advertising on LP proves is that they’ve paid our ad agency money to do so. I don’t endorse or disendorse any of them.
FWIW, I personally receive no financial benefits from the advertising, either (because there are LP contributors who need the money more than I do, not because I think it’s inherently unethical to receive dosh from advertising).
So I’m no longer a parasitic dole-bludger but a luminous paragon of green awareness? Sounds interesting. If anyone wants me to keep saving the planet, please post funds to Me, 101 Pedestal road, Moral Ground Heights.
Yeah, Green is the new Black for the fashionistas. They’ll move on next season!
But as for the line:
Are you just trying to be cute or are you serious? ‘cos there’s nothing “sustainable” about collapsing the entire world economic order thru a collapse in demand!
I mean, most human beings throughout most of history have lived “sustainably” by that definition ie. they haven’t bought anything on account of having no money and there being no market anyway to buy anything, they haven’t done anything on account of there being nothing to do but hoe the field, and they haven’t gone anywhere because travel meant likely death or impoverishment. That’s not a “sustainable” life, it’s a nasty, brutish and short life.
I’m not at all opposed to a serene life in which one lives simply and modestly. But life would get rapidly unpleasant for everybody (and I don’t mean “unpleasant” in the sense of “oh noes! You mean I have to walk somewhere?!”) if there was wholesale abandonment of the economic system. Just sayin’.
Robert,
Cool down … the reason “These books, on my brief flick-throughs, never seem to point to any such studies, let alone explain them… these books never grapple with this kind of trade-off.” is that books that do wouldn’t sell very well. Not everyone is an academic, or in the mood to grapple.
This website looks OK to me – there’s this on the homepage: “For example, our past analysis of ingredients in more than 23,000 products, discovered that nearly 1 of every 30 products sold in the U.S. fails to meet 1 or more industry or governmental cosmetics safety standards. We also found nearly 400 products sold in the U.S. containing chemicals that are prohibited for use in cosmetics in other countries, and over 400 products contain ingredients the U.S. cosmetic industry?s own safety panel has determined to be unsafe when used as directed.”
So it’s telling people interested in cosmetics that they could be a danger and pointing them in the direction of purer ones. For people with the money and habit of flying somewhere to holiday it points to simpler places. For people not ready to step out of Gucci into sackcloth and ashes it advertises better clothes. Organic here probably means the soil fertility is being maintained more sustainably than in other agricultural systems.
There was a phrase used in the 60s “consciousness raising” – which can be a step by step process: maybe this site is getting a particular sort of person to look at what they’re consuming and making them aware, when they buy, that there are better alternatives that are still enjoyable. That’s kind of ‘empowering’ to people – they will become familiar with concepts and prepared to listen to more, and take further steps.
For people like me who don’t plan on giving up their cars, it might be a better strategy to make small, efficient, cleaner fueled (but personal) vehicles seem cool, desirable and more responsible than the average behemoth. But don’t bother speaking to me about cycling and public transport because I’m not listening. This website doesn’t suit you, but it might be a step in the right direction for others.
“But don’t bother speaking to me about cycling and public transport because I’m not listening…”
Sort of says it all really.
Adrian,
I wrote that because I’m tired of that sort of gleeful tone you find from people who seem to enjoy the thought that people might not in the fuure have the convenience of cars. There are lots of things that I couldn’t do, and many that would be a lot harder, if I didn’t have a car. And I think that there will be ways of powering cars for quite a long time to come. I’d rather hear (what I think) are more realistic ways of living responsibly with cars, than all this praise for a 19th C. model of public tranpsort which suits very few people.
But the point of my post is that you can dismiss people like me or the customers of Gorgeously Green as so selfish and deluded and simple that we’re not worth talking to, or you can say that the steps that these people take are maybe very small steps, but at least they’re on a better path than they were.
“food miles” is very simplistic, as Robert Merkel hints, but raising the cobncept at all, may give some people pause for thought; and the idea has apparently led some economists to delve more deeply: calculating the embodied energy (which often correlates with C emissions) in foodstuffs.
Some regions (due to their soils or climates) are simply better areas to grow certain foodstuffs than other places are.
Good on you Robert for keeping this debate bubbling along. No-one has the “moral high ground” in this huge area. Everyone can make a positive change, large or small though it be. But small changes now are just practice runs for the big changes yet to come.
I rather like horses, though they’re hard to get up on and you feel like you’re miles off the ground. The transport of the future.
Carbinsink, I couldn’t agree more.
Mercurious, the entire world economic order is driving (furiously) the destruction of the world’s ecosystems. There is no way around this. I am not against using money as a medium of exchange (we all understand it, and so it ‘works’ for us, in that way), nor do I believe in some mythical socialist future. However, we in the ‘West’ have been living in a fool’s paradise for far too long, and this needs to come to a halt. If it takes a long-lasting global depression (of the economic sort) to keep our ecosystems functional, then that is the depression we have to have (to paraphrase Keating). Then all we need to consider is how to stop the world’s poor from paying (yet again) for our profligacy.
If you can conceptualise a world economic order that can operate sustainably, I am happy to listen, but as of now, it just ain’t happenin’
Paul Burns, I wonder what the calculus would be on comparing a bale of hay to a barrel of biodiesel, in terms of emissions, human food not grown etc?
I suspect it’s a better bet for a farmer in a self-sufficient, post-oil future, to set aside a proportion of their land to grow an oil crop than to grow hay for a team of draft-horses. I’m sure someone has done the calculation?
wilful,
Don’t know. The present wotld food shortage has come about partly because of land previously dedicated to agriculture now being used a biofuel source. But then again, apart from the problem of growing hay for horses, there is the methane they release into the atmosphere. Reckon we’re all caught in a notorious double-bind. I despair.
“But then again, apart from the problem of growing hay for horses, there is the methane they release into the atmosphere.”
Maybe the methane could be harnessed to drive a sulky heater, like some pernicious advertising, helps keep L.P. warm and alive.
Horses are ‘pseudo-ruminants’, so I don’t think they belch methane in the way cows and sheep do.
OK I don’t really know about that, should check.
Yep it’s true:
Pseudo-ruminants (horses and mules) produce less methane than ruminant livestock and more methane than monogastric animals.
I really wonder whether anyone is much taken in by these kinds of publications and claims. As far as the beauty industry is concerned, yes probably. But I doubt that many people, among those who really do mean well, don’t at least grasp the logical problem in incitements to ‘green’ consumerism.
Although on the other hand, I read a fair number of craft blogs and it’s true that some of the crafters who pride themselves on not being wasteful consumers are patently consuming just as much stuff as the next person, only they are making their kids too many jumpers and teddy bears instead of buying them.
On carbonsink’s point – ‘don’t buy stuff, don’t do stuff, and don’t go anywhere’: this is really interesting to me. I think for people like myself who have a garden capable of growing food, and live close to the train line & don’t really need a car, this is absolutely correct. I won’t bore you with the details of the relatively radical principles we’ve decided to adopt. But I’m trying not to think of this as giving up on havign a life, and so far, finding it surprisingly easy and pleasant (not that the big decisions have really been tested yet – the day the washing machine breaks down will be interesting.) One of the things that makes it not seem a burden or sacrifice is comparing how we live to how the people live in the early nineteenth century novels I study. They don’t go to distant places, they don’t have much stuff – they do ‘do things’ – but their lives aren’t deprived because of this. If they are unhappy it is for other reasons.
Mercurius said something about economic collapse brought on by mass not-buying things. No. A statistic from the period I worked in the fashion industry has always stuck in my head: (this was in about 1996 but I don’t think it would be any different now) in Australia, women’s cotton t-shirts priced between $20 and $35 are worn an average of five times each before being given to charity or thrown in the bin. Five times! this is what unsustainability is. We could very easily spend just as much money in total on clothes and other goods but not buy disposable things with hidden costs paid by exploited workers and too-cheap materials and fuel.
Partly sh*t stirring, partly serious, but lets look at it one-by-one:
This is a no brainer. Doesn’t matter how you travel (short of a nuclear-powered French train) you’re emitting carbon. Bus and rail are the lesser evils, but if you drive any distance, or God forbid, fly somewhere, you’ve emitted more carbon than a small African town. Now you may delude yourself that paying a few dollars for carbon offsets will undo the damage, but the reality is, carbon emitted today will do more damage than can be undone by carbon absorbed tomorrow, or prevention of carbon emitted tomorrow.
Nope, the best thing you can do for the planet is just not travel. If anyone tells you otherwise they’re kidding themselves.
Given that pretty much everything we buy these days was made thousands of kilometres away, everything we buy has a considerable carbon footprint … and the heavier and bulkier the item, the bigger the footprint. So the MP3 player, mobile phone and laptop computer probably aren’t too bad, but the 2m wide telly, the Euro-appliances for the kitchen or laundry, or the ultra-efficient imported car, took a lot of carbon to rail/ship/truck to your doorstep. Oh, and the imported S. Pellegrino probably isn’t a good idea either, especially when perfectly good water comes out of the tap.
So perhaps I should qualify that: “Don’t buy heavy stuff that came from a long way away”
It depends what you do of course. If you go for a walk around the neighbourhood, ride a bike to the shops, kick a ball around with the kids at the local park, its good for you and good for the planet, but most recreational activities have a carbon footprint. Swim a few laps at the pool (that pool costs a lot energy to run). Run the kids across town to play soccer on a Saturday (ever noticed how many cars the local soccer game attracts?). Go to the footy/cricket (big lights, mountains of rubbish, disposable everything, traffic jams). Eat out on Saturday night (ever seen the waste that comes out of a commercial kitchen? I don’t think they compost). Weekend in the countryside with the spouse/partner (lets say 400km of driving minimum). A week in Thailand, Fiji, Bali … Hmmmm.
Again, the best thing you can do is stay at home and do nothing. I know, it sucks, I’m no happier about it than you are, but them’s the facts.
You forgot: don’t eat anything (beef or that wasn’t grown locally)
Not buying things eh? Anyone who works or has a partner working in the public service, like I do, best remember that the money to pay the wages/Super and maintain the institutions/offices has to come from somewhere.
Business contributes alot of tax to the system. And people need jobs to survive. And keep occupied. And use their skills. And stretch their imaginations. Fulfil their dreams.
Imagine the population all out foraging & competing to grow plants in the forest, selfishly protecting the water holes w/ all types of weapons, killing animals to make clothes & fill their tummies? Bloody disaster I reckon.
It’s good for those of us who have gardens to grow a few veges provided we think about the type of mulch (we compost from vege scraps & such, but could use some animal dung), fertiliser & amount water we’re using…but unless we go out and buy from others, exchange services and so on, we’ll end up in the nightmare we see in places like Myanmar.
We bought our dinner at a Thai restaurant here in Logan City last night. The Thai family was glad to see my wife, they made delicious vege dishes including a HOT green curry I especially asked for, and cashews in stir fried veges and one w/ a beaut peanut-based sauce. They earnt their money. Sometimes capitalism works well.
We don’t often eat out…but if we can help others & get to relax for once in the process…then I’m all for it. We eat out or takeway in MODERATION.
It’s really about common-sense & using the knowledge of the wise, those kicked in the head enuff to think things thru, to educate the younguns to not be so ME ME ME & wasteful. How about some litter bins & signs & fines?…worked well in Canada years ago. And that goes for the adults too…tho sometimes I wonder if moral development has stopped for many at age 12. Think GW Bush. Changes in the media message helps too.
And arresting people for drug use that promote constant flying & business class on TV in order to shut their money-raking gobs seems to work well too.
If I had a kid at Uni I’d buy them a Vespa, or other scooter…& write on influential blogs about the need for scooter/motor-bike lanes & the promotion of hybrid scooters that can use fuel made from inedible seeds located in NZ & probably can be grown here.
Every year, I buy my wife cosmetics on-line that are cruelty-free & supposedly less harmful to the environment. This year I bought from INIKA. They’re Aussies, and had a good site…& we got the goods, they didn’t end up in a van that was mistakenly identified as a terrorist running vehicle and consequently blown up speeding away from a killer bird run by remote control from Nevada…& my wife likes the lipstick & the eyeliner. She smiles. I’m happy.
I thought of a very flippant comment about methane and farting, but I won’t …
Carbonsicnk, it doesn’t suck. Really, staying home is not a burden – not when the alternative is throwing tons of sulphur into the atmosphere to block out the sun or saying goodbye to arctic ice. Stay at home and handstitch a patchwork quilt out of pieces of clothing that’s got holes in it, read a book, grow vegetables, listen to your lover playing the piano, and on the weekend walk to the park to watch the local football, drink soup out of your thermos, visit the library and drop in on your friends on the way home, and pick up some food scraps from behind the local shops to feed to your chickens and the compost bin.
Don’t eat beef certainly, any red meat in fact, but I’m not so sure about restricting yourself to locally grown food. The small local market garden may in fact be more carbon intensive per unit of food produced than the mammoth agribusiness 1,000km away. Economies of scale you see. Of course, it won’t be 100% certified organic, so it wouldn’t qualify as environmentally correct according to Gorgeously Green.
Perhaps not for you laura, and perhaps not for me, but for the 99.9% of the population who haven’t even begun to contemplate the implications of these issues, it will be an impossible sell. Try telling your baby-boomer parents they can’t spend their twilight years travelling the world because it might harm the environment. I have, and the answer is always: “That’s why we’re doing it now, we won’t be able to do it in five years time” … and to hell with the grandchildren.
If there is a silver lining to the dark, dark cloud that is peak oil, its that change is no longer optional. If oil was still cheap and plentiful, we could have, and I suspect would have, continued on with BAU until the planet fried. But the twice-a-year overseas holiday will become impossibly expensive with oil at $150, $200, $300 a barrel.
Carbonsink says:
“Again, the best thing you can do is stay at home and do nothing. I know, it sucks, I’m no happier about it than you are, but them’s the facts.”
Home for me is an acreage that was an eroded horse paddock when I bought it 9 months ago. Staying home and landscaping and replanting this area with native and productive plants is the most enjoyable thing I’ve ever done in my life. From the room where I type I can see parrots, blue wrens, red browed finches, new holland honeyeaters going about their business and late in the afternoon western grey kangaroos and a senile old swamp wallaby turn up for a feed. It’s the greatest show on earth I reckon.
You and me both mate. I’ve spent the past 18 months ripping out Lantana, Cassia, Singapore Daisy, Tobacco Bush and Umbrella trees from my block that adjoins a national park, and replanted an eroded creek bank with a few hundred native trees and shrubs. There’s nothing better than seeing the bush regenerate and “little volunteers” pop up, but that is an experience that a) isn’t available to most, and b) many wouldn’t appreciate. For the vast majority of people everything they enjoy, and everything they value in life, has to be severely curtailed.
We used to have a choice about this, we don’t anymore.
CS said:
Not sure that is true. We just flew ACT to Surfers and back cheapest ever. In a month we are going to Thailand – again, cheapest ever at $950. Even with fuel at say $250 it would only add a few hundred to the price – which is what we paid 5 years ago.
“For the vast majority of people everything they enjoy, and everything they value in life, has to be severely curtailed. We used to have a choice about this, we don’t anymore.”
That’s about as attractive a proposition as combining “There is no alternative” with “Life wasn’t meant to be easy”! It won’t sell – people aren’t going to be encouraged to change things by that message.
What’s disappointing is knowing of all the changes we could have made, that would have cost us no real pain at all. Here we are in Perth in a gas crisis -Perth is probably the sunniest and windiest city in the world – if we had been steadily taking steps over the last 25 years we could easily be supplying 30% of our present power needs from renewables. Perhaps this crisis will be an opportunity to persuade people to get serious about doing this now.
If petrol gets really expensive it might mean that many of us would be allowed by employers to work from home a couple of days a week – something which would improve my life, not destroy it. Cars will certainly become much, much more fuel efficient and less polluting. Laura may be able to travel overseas in a new version of the old sailing ship. (Laura, many people who do some family history find that people moved all over the place in the 19th C, look how many people came to Australia – the longest and most expensive trip to a place anyone could imagine!)
Good luck Peter, on your trip to Thailand, and just hope the pilot is not just ‘topping up’, as he goes, as we are.
Oh dear. Google “airline fuel hedge”.
An example:
Er, yeah. Hence my comment @30 that it “will be an impossible sell”.
Thing is, if oil prices keep heading skywards these changes will no longer need to be sold, they’ll just happen. Anything related to oil that is, which is, well, everything.
CS said:
Er, CS – that’s a pretty snobby way of pointing out something that everyone already knows about.
Do the math. The airlines point out that fuel now represents roughly 35% of the cost of a flight. Thats $300 to Thailand. Double the cost of the fuel. That adds $300 to cost of the flight which is exactly what we paid 5 years ago. OK?
It’s also worth pointing out that the cost of flying to a holiday destination is only a small fraction of the cost of a holiday.
I reckon the whole thing is a storm in a tea cup. The hysteria here and over at the oil drum is quite amusing at times.
BTW if everyone is so confident that the price of oil is going to hit $200 or whatever, why not make a killing and buy some oil futures? The current price for dec 2009 and dec 2010 is about the same as now (unless I read it wrong). A $1000 investment could net you somewhere around $60,000.
It’s advertising.
.
Meeting in the boardroom:
.
PETE: Dave have you collated the report on environmentalist impacts on profit margins?
DAVE: Yes Pete I have
PETE: Good let’s hear it.
DAVE: The way we see it we have to projected strategies. We can either a. reconfigure production in line with sustainability outcomes or deploye PR resources to convince the public that we have.
PETE: Costs Dave costs.
DAVE: Strategy one would cost a zillion zillion, strategy two would cost a 24% increase to our $12 million dollar budget for advertising and PR.
PETE: Well then that’s decided. Let’s just bullshit the morons. Excellent work Dave.
DAVE: But Pete…
PETE: Yes Dave.
DAVE: There’s the issue of the environment to consider. Climate change and toxic levels. I got kids Pete. I’m worried. Maybe we should spend the money and make the world a better place. Isn’t that the most important thing? Isn’t that more important than your stock options?
Silence
PETE: Dave. Your performance hasn’t been up to scratch lately. I can’t remember the last time I actually thought well of the job you do…
DAVE: But…
PETE: We’re gonna have to let you go Dave.
DAVE: But…
PETE: Security!
Are you are saying the recent run up in oil prices (which is at least 5 times the impact of any proposed carbon tax or ETS) will not affect demand for air travel?
I ask you, if a 13-fold increase in oil prices over 10 years will not affect your decision to fly to Thailand, then what will? Certainly not the inevitably timid attempts at carbon pricing by governments.
So what’s it to be? Yes, high oil prices will affect demand, and that gives us hope we can combat climate change, or No, high oil prices will not affect demand, and the planet’s going to fry.
You can’t have it both ways. You can’t continue to have cheap holidays to Thailand and expect that global carbon emissions will be significantly reduced. I mean, if Garnaut says we need 80% reductions by mid-century (and emissions reductions are applied equally across all sectors) then that means 80% fewer flights to Thailand, or jet planes that are 80% more efficient with no growth in airline travel.
Yeah I know, I’m kicking myself: Phil Mathews’ $1 billion oil win
I didn’t say higher prices wouldn’t affect demand. You said it would make a twice a year holiday overseas “impossibly expensive” – for some people yes but for most definitely no. High prices will also spur supply.
The problem is you assume that because some experts reckon you (never themselves) will have to curtail your carbon foot print, that it is true. I say it won’t happen. Seriously do you really believe that:
Boeing and Airbus who intend to sell, and have orders for thousands of aircraft – have it wrong?
Investors in hundreds of resorts opening all the time have it wrong?
300 million (and growing rapidly) employed in the tourism industry have it wrong??
China building dozens of new airports – has it wrong??
China, Barzil and others busily creating new aircraft industries – have it all wrong??
Expectations that the world airline passenger numbers will double or triple over the next 20 years?
All these people have it wrong? I somehow doubt it.
I should also have mentioned dozens of new airlines starting up.
I’m not trying to be a troll here but really, sometimes the hysteria here and elsewhere gets way over the top, with supposedly sensible people advocating policies that are frankly totalitarian. Who is going to enforce these draconian 80%+ reductions? Some mythical world government – when billions can’t even get piped water due to stupid anti-market policies (similar to ones often advocated here)? Which country will go first and watch its best and brightest go elsewhere? Or will *that* be stopped also?
No, you just said you wanted to have your cake and eat it.
No they won’t, but that’s another discussion…
A qualified yes, because airlines will want to replace older inefficient planes with more efficient aircraft, but overall demand will decline as passenger numbers decline.
Yes, unless they are close to large population centres.
Yes. Definitely. There will be mass unemployment in tourism soon, in fact, its already happening.
Yes, well, China subsidises petrol and diesel (at least they used to) not sure about jet fuel. Depends how long they can afford to keep the subsidies going. At least until after the Olympics I suspect…
Yes, although from memory, one of the bigger turboprop manufacturers is Brazil’s Embraer, and turboprops are making a comeback.
Yes. Definitely. More likely they will halve.
Again, you cannot expect that car travel will decline (as was discussed last week at LP), but also expect that air travel will double or triple. Air travel is more exposed to the price of oil than car travel.
CS a bit of cheap point scoring by googling around unfortunately proves very little.
So turboprops are making a (very small) comeback on regional routes. Never said they wouldn’t. Sure flights are being cancelled – this is probably due to over enthusiastic prospects by some airlines. In the few years that Virgin has been in Australia I’ve seen flights from ACT to Surfers go from 1 per week to daily, to none at all and now back to daily on a smaller Embraer. They used to fly Sydney – Alice and cancelled years ago because of lack of demand not fuel prices. The airline business as always been in a crisis of one sort or another. Its imminent collapse is way oversold though.
A drop in tourist numbers to north QLD as proof of an imminent global collapse (80%) of the tourist industry? Give me a break. Its happened before and will again. The high Aussie dollar would affect the cost of a trip to Aus way more than a hike in the airfare. The fact is that Aus is now an expensive destination ( I had friends from Germany over last year and they reckon the cost of living here is higher than Germany, which greatly surprised me).
The fact that there has been a small drop in the number of miles travelled by car in some western countries is some proof of doom is a bit rich and completely ignores the huge increase in the number of miles travelled elsewhere.
And if you don’t think supply will increase why not bet on it and make some money?
Anyway if you want to spend your days down by the river washing clothes like Laura intends to do be my guest.
The strong Australian dollar is certainly a factor in the downturn in international visitors to FNQ.
When did I suggest this was “proof of doom”? Its a necessary response to high oil prices. The entire thrust of Robert’s post on the elasticity of petrol was that a downturn in Australian petroleum imports (and the decline in US Vehicle Miles Travelled) was a good thing, because:
My view is that oil demand is very inelastic, which means prices still have plenty of upside, but obviously there will have to be demand destruction eventually.
What makes you think I haven’t?
Well, I’ll tolerate it, because I understand the reasons why we need to use less energy, but I won’t enjoy it. Besides, as I keep saying, we don’t have a choice about this any more. You’ll be down by the river with everyone else.
I’m an optimist CS…. by the time oil runs out I’m sure some smarty pants has worked out a way to store electrical power more efficiently and I’ll be zipping around in my car using stored nuclear energy.
The human race is amazing… just think of the spectacular progress we’ve made in the past 100 years. Are we really going to hit a dead end on technology progress in the next 100?
I’m sorry to rain on your hairshirt parade…
Andrew, You may be an optimist, but you will still be down by the river with the rest of us (nice image, CS).
There is one reason the human race (perhaps you mean the ones of us that weren’t living a subsistence lifestyle) has been so ‘wonderful’ and ‘powerful’ over the last 100 years – cheap oil.
Oil is an amazing substance – one of the most energy-dense substances we know, plus easy to store and transport to boot. With it we can do amazing things. But as supply gets tight we can’t do all those same things, and while this won’t bite bigtime for a while yet, eventually we will have to make impossibly difficult decisions about how we use the precious remnants.
Human beings are great inventors but at present we are not finding any magic bullets, despite the media-hype. At the moment there are three viable potential renewable technologies with room to grow, wind, solar PV, and solar thermal. That’s it. The rest (tidal, geothermal, hydrogen from algae, hamsters on wheels, etc. etc.) are all just stuff to dazzle optimists like you. Go on, invest in a few, and help keep the world optimistically afloat. I’m not prepared to.
However we do know how to use less energy, and how to use it more efficiently, and we should be doing so by any means necessary. We’re already going down in history as ‘The Age of Greed’, but Greed AND Stupidity?? Let’s not get that label too…
Ah, yes, Andrew – there’ll be New Technology (TM) which will allow us to keep on doing things the same way.
This morning on the radio some idiot journalist (yeah, I know, almost a tautology) was wittering on about how hybrid cars were out-of-date and we’d all be getting around in hydrogen fuel-cell powered cars in just a couple of years. The spiv from the energy company who was talking this up was really, really evasive about the costs of electrolysis and the difficulties of moving hydrogen around, but still. It’s The Way Of The Future (TM).
Don’t project your ideas of whacky overreaction onto me please Peter. That’s so not helping.
Yep David – there will be New Technology (TM)…. we’re forever inventing smarter, faster, more efficient ways of doing more with less. That plasma that used to cost $10k, now sells for $3k. Moore’s law and all that.
I agree that oil has been the most important energy source of the last century – but we will find a replacement. Yaz – you forgot nuclear.
It must be rather horrid being a pessimist… nothing to look forward to!
Can you invent whole new ecosystems and the services they provide to humans?
Andrew wrote:
It won’t, it just will become impossibly expensive.
You see, I really am an optimist (you should see the real doomers!) I just think we’re in for a tough period where the only option will be conservation. Eventually the clean, renewable energy sources will emerge, but that will take time, and I’m under no illusions that weaning ourselves off fossil fuels will be easy.
David: Yes, the “hydrogen economy” simply refuses to die. I don’t know why.
Yaz: Why do you dismiss geothermal?
CS,
Geothermal works well for countries like NZ and Iceland, but its use is unproven elsewhere. In SA they have spent a lot of money digging very deep holes which they are going to pour lots of water down and hope it comes up the other hole as steam to drive turbines. But perhaps it will just leak away… The problem with it is more that it is going to be a crapshoot each time, because we can’t judge the structure of the earth kilometres down with any accuracy. Do you really want a power source that potentially wastes megalitres of water (ooh, sounds like nuclear power)? So I am hopeful about geothermal, but you have to ask why it isn’t already generating megawattage.
Andrew,
I am an optimist, which is why I teach in early childhood. The children I teach remind me every day what a joy it is to be alive. It is just things like futile energy wastage and endless consumer consumption that gets me down. Western culture may be good at making geegaws, but its main product seems to be endemic depression, heart disease, obesity etc, not happiness. Who knows, perhaps washing our clothes down by the river might be much more fun than dragging them out of a washing machine and stuffing them into a dryer. ‘Ooh, look at that heron…’
And as for nuclear. Yes, it’s a great power source, no doubt about that, but noone has solved/resolved any of the problems. The richest country in the world has been spending billions trying to find a secure storage for the waste for decades and still hasn’t managed this. And I don’t think that dumping it in a poor country is a good idea either. So get back to me when they have solved the waste disposal and hazard issues, and I will jump for joy, and perhaps dance and skip as well. Did I mention that if we substituted all our current energy sources with nuclear, it is calculated that the world’s uranium supplies would only last us another 30 years. So that could be problematic when our nuclear power stations are sooo expensive and time consuming to build. Besides, someone else is maintaining a much better nuclear reactor out in space, and letting us use some of the power, and it is not scheduled to be decommissioned for another few billion years…
The thinking on this thread is a bit of a challenge to me. Carbon sink , steve m and Laura are all for the life of abstinence and good luck to them pursuing it.
It just strikes me as odd to be celebrating a life without .
Where I live most peole live like this already and they are considered poor and uneducated. So maybe you’ve all hit on the solution – let’s call being poor being green and being uneducated a denial of consumption choice .
As long as this doesn’t become an orthodoxy that governments may view as a viable political philopsophy we can still hope to receive the benefits of the numerous welfare agencies that exist in our town and which provide a major chunck of it’s income.
murph abstinence is not what I am on about at all.
All I’m saying is, I am avoiding buying any more stuff that is disposable, or buying stuff because I’m bored with the things I already have. My life is just as fun as it was ten years ago, and we have much more money and a produce a lot less garbage than we used to. I don’t understand your comment about being uneducated. Education is totally compatible with reducing needless overconsumption.
Laura – I agree with you wrt to buying “stuff”, but travel, especially overseas travel for those of us fairly geographically isloated in Australia is an important part of a broad education. There’s only so much you can learn from reading books, stuff on the internet and documentaries. Being immersed in other cultures, especially non native language ones can be incredibly educational, and to do that you really need to jump on a plane.
“Laura – I agree with you wrt to buying “stuff”, but travel, especially overseas travel for those of us fairly geographically isloated in Australia is an important part of a broad education.”
I agree Chris…as I do w/ much that Laura says…but it’s easier to stay at home & write poetry/novels, paint, garden, reduce your carbon footprint if you have planned it out w/ your partner…&/or have inherited wealth.
Hermits are good at it.
I’m one of the fortunate ones, upon retirement from the education sector, I see myself as working for my wife & our future. Doing the accounts/bills, cleaning(use your imagination, it’s endless), feeding the animals, recycling, gardening/watering/planting/trimming/mowing, making shopping/recipe lists, cleaning/maintaining the computers, researching & gathering/downloading entertainment/educational tools, washing clothes/putting them away, some cooking & preparation, herbal tea for when she gets home, making essential phone calls, emailing family & friends, participating in paid surveys, contributing to blogs, helping out w/ people in need if the situation arises…the list goes on & on…
and in the process she can participate intensely in the career she loves…and in turn, feel she has a secure, well run home to come home to. Consequently, we use less petrol. And don’t need to hire a gardener (tho we do have a collection company for waste, Greencycle), nor hire a cook, or eat out heaps…tho i guess some might say that means we create less jobs. I see it as moderation. It works for us. A little bit of this, a little bit of that.
There’s no requirement for every human to follow the same path. Some decide not to have kids, or may have no choice, but rather spend a great deal of time educating children. Or looking after animal needs. Or assisting others w/ mobility challenges. Or helping farmers deliver the fruit & veges required for children to grow healthy, well-rounded & wise. Or all of the above. Some decide to remain alone…& write children’s books…or invent toys…or safety gadgets. Everyone can contribute to the growth of children, regardless of whether they have kids or not. The same can be said for reducing your carbon footprint. Different reduction strategies for different folks.
Here’s a controversial thought in this STRAIGHT era, war on everything days…perhaps medical marijuana can be handy…if approved seeds are given to grow a coupla plants at home & the doctor recommends it. Why should ill people feel the need to travel & use petrol if they could grow a couple of plants that help them w/ pain reduction? Seems bloody wasteful to me. It’s not my scene due to asthma & neurons that fire up in weird ways sometimes…but I’ve seen people who benefit from it during my trip around the world. We have to start thinking wider. Not be blocked by foolish religious fanatics, oil barons, doctors & researchers working for Big Pharma & all those media & politicians who benefit from MORAL PANIC & FEAR/DISTORTION campaigns. Who often chuff themselves in secret…or have.
Certainly dope has its problems & negative side effects. But so do Big Pharma drugs. And they can end up using more water & energy to produce.
Would be nice to travel again in the future…shame there are so many earthquakes and such in the Indonesian region…a Chunnel woulda been handy. I hope people don’t get put off ferries ’cause of the tragic Philippine incident. The ferries that run from the UK to Europe and so on are very handy.
I’d luv to take a low carbon trip to China, Japan, South Korea, Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam, Cambodia & many other places, take photos, make a doco, write poems, or keep a journal…perhaps they’ll be maglev trains, and mega-sail boats & zeppelins & heaps of bike tracks, solar vehicles and other marvellous energy-saving transportation devices available oneday so we can make that trip from Australia? And a bridge or such that crosses from Australia to our closest neighbour.
Who knows?
After a lengthy period in the home, you feel the need to spread your wings…meet & share stories with the other humans who share our DNA…& see for real the homes & lives of those other species we share this planet with. The armchair imperialist escapes the couch & computer seat & travels to distant lands. Sounds great. Maybe some journos should do same…;)
I agree wholeheartedly. I really, really, REALLY don’t want to give up overseas travel, but unfortunately flying is monumentally damaging to the environment. I can emit more carbon in 24 hours of flying, than I can in a year of driving. That’s the inconvenient (and extremely depressing) truth.
Air travel is also uniquely exposed to the price of oil. There are alternatives to car travel (rail, bus etc), but there’s no alternative to jet fuel that’s remotely feasible for the foreseeable future (cue hydrogen plane and bio-jetfuel links from the “optimists”). Flying has to become very, very expensive, and we will all be flying less, and possibly flying slower, in more efficient turboprops.
CS @ 59
The problem with this is that – at least as I see it (eg Monbiot) – it assumes that all sectors of the carbon producing economy must reduce their footprint more or less equally. This can’t and won’t happen. It is quite likely that air transportation will be one of the last to decarbonize. To insist that all sectors must do their share – by force if necessary – will lead directly to the situation where we will in fact all (at least the few who survive) be washing our clothes down by the river.
I really don’t see why we can’t decarbonize our electricity first with a mix of nuclear, wind and solar (emphasis on nuclear) and gradually introduce electric cars etc.
My main worry with all this is the mass hysteria that is being whipped up. This will always lead to bad outcomes. We are already being ‘warned’ that democracy itself may have to be put on hold, the remaining private oil companies need to be nationalized or their ‘excess profits’ expropriated (never mind that their investment decisions may have been made based on these exact circumstances) or their CEOs locked up for spreading false information. This isn’t healthy.
But there’s the catch. Its transportation that’s utterly dependent on an increasingly expensive resource. The price signal from the oil market is screaming !SUBSTITUTE OIL! but we ain’t got one, especially for aviation. For electricity generation there is no pressing (economic) need to substitute our current source of energy (coal) apart from climate change, which will require government intervention.
So yes, from a climate change perspective, it makes a lot of sense to decarbonize electricity generation first, and transportation later. But unfortunately, peak oil has reared its ugly head, and is giving us a very strong price signal that we need decarbonize transportation first.
So in the end, we have no option but to conserve oil, and we will conserve by the market making it very, very expensive.
As an aside, last night we bought 2 tickets Bangkok ->Phuket for $30 each. This is about the same distance as CBR->GoldCoast where we paid nearly $70 and thought we were getting a bargain. You really do have to love free enterprise!
I’m so glad that Ansett collapsed and with it the government duopoly and annual Christmas strike by their cosseted employees. Absolutely no sympathy there.
CS @ 61
It could also be saying increase supply. Part of the problem is that when oil was $10 there was little incentive to look for more and build the required refining infrastructure. There has also been a lot of opposition to building new refining capacity and looking for oil (eg ANWAR and US coast) over the last 20 years and this is now starting to bite us in the arse (and as a result will soon change). Very similar to our current water problems and the refusal to build new dams etc. Engineers have been warning us for years that this will eventually cause probs but it looks like we need a bit of hardship every now and then to remind us.
Just the other day I read that excess electricity capacity in the US is now close to the point where brownouts and blackouts will become increasingly common. Exactly the same problem – NIMBYism and the green movement have meant that all these problems have been put into the too hard basket by governments for decades now ( a good resaon for *not* relying on gov’t for much at all ) and will bite us all hard. However there are pretty obvious signs that this is changing – nuclear very much back on the agenda for instance.
Sure, its screaming !CONSERVE OIL!, !INCREASE SUPPLY! and !SUBSTITUTE OIL! all at the same time. I would contend that only one of those things is possible in the short term (conservation) and two in the medium to long term (conservation and substitution).
Now I know its heresy to suggest that supply won’t increase with prices so high (after all the roosters should stay laying soon) but I cannot see how. I’ve looked at the estimates for all the oil and gas meagprojects currently in the pipeline, the production forecasts for tar sands, CTL, shale and biofuels, and I don’t see how we’re going to increase production fast enough to offset declines in the big mature fields.
cs @ 64
goto 42
Ummmm, your point is?
Where’s the supply coming from? You know, like actual projects, with numbers and things.
I’ll leave you with an economist joke:
Yaz says – “Western culture may be good at making geegaws, but its main product seems to be endemic depression, heart disease, obesity etc, not happiness. Who knows, perhaps washing our clothes down by the river might be much more fun than dragging them out of a washing machine and stuffing them into a dryer. ‘Ooh, look at that heron…’”
Yaz, you might claim to be an optimist, but that’s a very pessimistic way of viewing ‘western culture’!
I’m not going to argue that “heart disease, obesity etc” aren’t nasty by-products of a pro-development, free-market, consumer society. But frankly, focussing on the negatives whilst ignoring all the positives is a pessimistic mindset. The positives in ‘western culture’ absolutely swamp the negatives. To paraphrase Churchill – western culture is the worst form of society apart from all the others.
Yes – there is something romantic about the ‘noble savage’ paradigm – washing our clothes in the river and all that. But the reality of subsistance living is a long way from the ideal.
Cheer up and enjoy what you’ve got – there are billions of people on this planet who envy our way of life.
Andrew,
I’d love you to list some of things worth admiring about Western culture, because I am having a hard time picturing them. I like flush toilets, but think plasma screens are just plain silly. Wouldn’t it be better to make some stuff worth watching first?
But the noble savage thing? Don’t bushpeople of the Kalahari work four hours a day to survive compared to our 10 or so. Maybe not so smart…
I hope Kevin Donnelly isn’t reading this blog ……
Yaz, despite favouring the rich etc our Western justice systems aren’t too bad, the education and health systems are fairly admirable in their coverage …. come on, I’m sure you can think of a few things you like … variety, if nothing else.
“I like flush toilets, but think plasma screens are just plain silly. Wouldn’t it be better to make some stuff worth watching first?”
They’re only silly if you haven’t paid yer other bills off & haven’t budgeted appropriately. Over-use of plastic is just DUMB. Plasma TVs work if you do the research & have spent many years watching mini TVs & suddenly realise after nigh on 50 years that it would be nice to relax at home & play some of the DVDS available for rental…& the foreign, sci-fi & animal shows ya luv…and be able to see the three lovely lasses in parliament behind Anthony Albanese in widescreen. Sweet.
Yaz, the films worth watching have been made. It’s getting access to them that is the thing.
I can think of a good use for flush toilets. To clean up catty spew.
I like the click click noises that some bush people make. Remember the cyberpunk series ‘Otherland’? If only we had wings like wee monkeys? Do we have a Felix Jongleur & The Other? Mebbe if they disappeared we’d all turn GREEN & CLEAN.
Russell and Nasking, of course I can think of things I like. I am such a geek that I get a frisson of excitement every time there is something new invented. Then my family’s puritan heritage kicks in and I think, ‘Do you really need that?’ (thanks, Mum) and I realise of course that I am already happy enough without it.
So what do I love…
I love a beautiful, warm house, lovely fabrics, bamboo, my espresso machine (hard to use without power, but that’s what I’d use my carbon budget for, though I might have to beg for the beans), my bike, etc. etc.
I guess I’ve been shaping my desires to fit in with a low carbon future for so long, I’ve forgotten how to be a good capitalist and just SPEND dammit! I still have the reflex action, but it is atrophying fast.
Happy everyone? Anyone?
“I’d love you to list some of things worth admiring about Western culture, because I am having a hard time picturing them.”
Well one of the delights of Western culture is that self-righteous twats like you have whole new forums in which to behave like self-righteous twats.
It’s difficult to briefly dismantle how much crappitude was packed into your previous comments. However here’s one quick observation.
“Wouldn’t it be better to make some stuff worth watching first?”
There’s shitloads of great stuff out there worth watching. Why can’t you find it? Too dumb to work out how Google, Amazon, Powells, Limewire, etc, etc works? Or even too dumb to go into a retail outlet and hand them cash for the sale or rental of a DVD?
Anyone sitting in front of their TV complaining that broadcast TV is shit, obviously hasn’t grasped that you get what you pay for with free to air these days.
Thanks for your thoughts Mao-Con. You seem angry about something. Am I perhaps not buying enough of your products?
Yes, I rent DVDs sometimes, and occasionally I actually watch something great. I’m a bit of a technophobe, but yes, I can and do use Amazon, Google, Youtube etc.
Nonetheless, the ratio of crap to fantastic seems very high to me, and my only point, such as it was, was that people buy very large TVs, and then still end up watching a whole bunch of nothing. You do realise that a lot of people still watch free-to-air TV, including all those edifying Big Brothers and Wife Swaps?!? That just didn’t see to encapsulate the heady heights of western culture that others have been trying to enthuse me about.
Don’t worry, Yaz, your position is entirely reasonable IMHO. I know a lot of people with giant plasma TVs and I just can’t see the point. They also totally dominate whatever room they happen to be in, and to me like 4wds, have come to symbolise excessive materialism.
Mind you, I’d love a coffee machine. What sort have you got?
“people buy very large TVs, and then still end up watching a whole bunch of nothing”
(1) If you have received a baby bonus & bought a BIG TV w/it you’re probably irresponsible. Unless you’re rich or financially comfortable & can fulfil all your child’s needs whilst using the bonus to keep companies rolling in the doe…then you’re lucky. Thank goodness for means-testing. And TARGETED ASSISTANCE.
I might add, I’ve been a critic of the baby bonus, or at least the lump sum aspect, for quite some time. Yes, I warned on numerous occasions over the years, as a few other did, that the Libs were using wily tactics to enslave the Aussie population for corporations & their mates.
This included: Howard promoting the idea that leaving school after year 10 might be a good idea; working alongside a MEDIA CAMPAIGN/TSUNAMI to ensure Peter Costello/The Nation’s kids kept coming; permitting, by slack regulation & other devious measures, credit card companies in cooperation w/ big retailers to act like SIRENS & draw new families into the shipwreck of debt; working in tandem w/ certain State polies/property developers, the mainstream media (ads, house/flat auction & restoration shows etc.), providing targeted tax cuts to assist certain investors & real estate companies, allowing banks/finance companies to irresponsibly suck in vulnerable home owners to take out further massive loans in order to be fooled by well-connected and unscrupulous financial advisors to purchase investment homes they really couldn’t afford, & adjustments to the First Home Owner’s Grant…all to drive up the cost of a HOME & in turn lead to a furthering of the DEBT BURDEN…a Manitou that will sit & feed on the back of many Australian thruout their miserable lives & will lead, as I warned, to an addiction to cheap crappy fast food, toxic goods/toys & marriage breakdowns, child abuse/neglect & heaps of STANKIN’ PROFIT for the perpetrators of this CON. I’ve seen it all before.
(2) We didn’t fall into that TRAP. We can’t have kids anyway. And we were content to stay in our modest, wee HOME in Logan City…regardless of the dopey, ignorant, somewhat racist & discriminatory “Why on that side of the tracks/highway?” comments we had to put up w/ from those now DEEPLY IN-DEBTED – because the rates are lower, the area is nice, we don’t listen to HYPE & my wife’s work is close hence less petrol use).
My wife teaches younguns & tries to help the families & students who are now feeling the PAIN, somewhat thanks to the deceitful campaigns of the Libs & the Corporate media…hopefully some corporate-based bloggers/journos – those who sit awkwardly under the limelight of ABC TV exposure & mumble like someone possessed and obsessed w/ the need to speak ancient languages such as CRAPOLA & in turn bring chuckles from confused/embarrassed audience members by the use of inane, stating the bleeding obvious asides – will take the time to REFLECT on their support for the ways of King John…& as collaborators might consider the SUFFERING that is HAPPENING to many families & worse to come…& attempt to redeem themselves by not taking a
“I’m smarter than the average Arthur or Martha & they deserve what they get, greedy bast*rds”
approach, as they so often do in their moments of GRANDIOSE justification & moral certitude…but rather realising how INTENSE & UNRELENTING the “HAVE KIDS & BUY BUY BUY” campaign was & in turn, attempt to right some wrongs.
(3) Consequently, we could JUST afford the plasma TV. But we decided not to go to the movies or rent out DVDs on a regular basis or go on a trip overseas in order to pay it off…& considering how we have just paid off a new bed that doesn’t feel like it has rocks underneath (which lasted 11 years)…& some Christmas gifts we bought for our friends & family…whilst still paying down our rather minor mortgage (minor amount owing compared to those who were fooled into selling their compact, not as perfectly located, but still filled w/ love & plenty of effort HOME in order to buy a McMansion)…and have barely paid a pretty penny in interest on our plastic card…& still manage to give to charities & such on a regular basis & keep our animal mates fed & in good health…and keep Mr. Murdoch, Mr. Packer & Telstra happy enuff by subscribing to Foxtel (which fails & collapses far too much for my likings)…I think we can safely say that purchasing said PLASMA/HD TV after our last one went green & no matter how many companies I rang not a soul could be bothered coming out to repair it (as is so often the way in the LAND OF SOD THE OLD BUY NEW NEW NEW from Asia thnx to the luv of & wisdom of King John & Associates) we decided after mucho research to purchase a new one. And we’re happy w/ it.
(4) We watch The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, World Movies, Scrubs, Arrested Development, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Inspector Frost & other murder mysteries, Farscape (which failed to record by way of IQ last time…grrr), Stargate, Stargate Atlantis, Battlestar Galactica, various shows on Animal Planet, certain CNN & BBC World News shows, UKTV including re-runs of The Office, Ab Fab, The IT Crowd & episodes of Doc Martin, Dr. Who & other shows that we missed on the ABC…the list goes on.
There are heaps of good shows on. And many are also shown on the ABC, SBS. But try watching Lost, Battlestar Galactica, the finale of Fraser, the American version of ‘The Office’ & plenty of other shows on ad-ridden free-to-air TV & tell me the constant time-shifting, sudden dropping of shows, sitting thru IN YER FACE ads, addition of interrupting banners, logos & Lotto numbers doesn’t drive you to distraction & put yer blood pressure thru the roof.
I’m not a fan of Murdoch world in general, as some on here know, but I reckon he & his lot were on top of the PAY-TV thing. But now the movie/TV show DOWNLOADS are coming…& soon, hopefully, a more efficient internet system (thanx for nuthin’ Libs) and access to tech systems that can be added to your TV to play the HD/digital downloads, I’m passing on any more CHANGES/PURCHASES/SUBSCRIPTIONS until I know EXACTLY what’s going to be available.
Hint Hint Mr. Communication’s Minister. What’s the future…what’s clean & green enuff?
Yaz @ 73
90% of everything always was crap. The problem is knowing which 90%. My wife likes watching what I regard as crap but who am I to say. Go into any news agent and there are hundreds of magazines for any taste. I think most (99%) are crap but I like computer, electronic and model railway mags which I am sure most (99%) others would find a complete waste of time as well. Same with movies – even within our our family there are huge differences in taste.
So I am with Mao-Con @ 72. Only doubled.
Peter,
I’m hurt. Doubly self-righteous! Maybe just boring instead!
Adrian,
Rancilio Silvia. The only coffee machine worth buying at that price. Makes great coffee and will last forever if treated right…
Adieu