Earth day coming - looking for suggestions and ideas

Earth Day is on April 22nd this year.

As Paul is suggesting, it is a good time to "get our permaculture stuff into as many brains as possible".

We would like to hear ideas about how to do this.

Thank you!

One idea is to get the Build a Better World Book into many hands.

Maybe a table at one of the events that organized for Earth Day having the book there, either sell it for $1 or give it away, and answer questions related to permaculture etc

Another would be to contact libraries and see if they want to carry the book.

Maybe a table at the farmers market?

Where I live we have tons of events for Earth Day. Some of them are listed here:

https://earthdayor.org/

Anything like this in your neck of the woods?

Summer, fall, winter, spring,
The seasons rotate as each brings
Its special beauty to this Earth of ours.
Winter’s snow and summer’s flowers;
Frozen rivers will flow come spring,
There is a renewal of everything.
–Edna Frohock (1906–97)

Source: How to Celebrate Earth Day

I love all the suggestions in the How to Celebrate Earth Day list.  Telling people about Permies and Permaculture would be an awesome 11th suggestion!

THINKY-BIT-140: While I feel like everything I do is earth day stuff, the most important thing I have is the better world book.  

THINKY-BIT-141: It does seem like earth day is the day where permaculture stuff will go 20 times further than a regular day.

THINKY-BIT-142: if 100 million people read my book, I think most global problems would be solved.

THINKY-BIT-143:  I doubt I could get even a million people to read my book this year, let alone earth day.  Maybe the focus should be 5000 for earth day?

THINKY-BIT-144:  I always thought that making a super sweet deal for 12 of the better world books would lead to exponential growth.  It didn't.

THINKY-BIT-145:  Our printed flyer turned out really cool.  I cannot help but think that getting that flyer into the hands of people will result in joyous good things!

THINKY-BIT-146:  I think the thread about a shy person giving away 12 books is good.  

THINKY-BIT-147:  maybe we should upgrade the 12 physical books thing to include a flyer for each book?  

THINKY-BIT-148:   The carbon footprint vid has the ebook available for free

I wonder if a lot of permies will be manning booths on earth day?

regarding 'infecting 1million brains', current practice seems to be to chop campaigns up into thousands of small chunks and release them in an endless drip feed ie long informational video (cheap heat)  broken down into 20-30 sec, 1-2 minute & 5-10 minute segments, dribbled out regularly over several weeks, optimized for each time zone (of course this can all be scheduled in advance and pushed to several platforms simultaneously).
Have celebrities read aloud short sections of the book.
This can infect brains two ways; the small bits may entice folk to purchase the whole book/video, and by watching many of the short segments folk will accumulate many of the key ideas.
This could be a push toward a target date (earth day) or until all the information is delivered.
If privacy isn't a concern use all the available digital platforms, and remember there are many more billions of souls that use languages other than English. Many open-source projects use the process of translation as a gateway into new communities.

paul wheaton wrote:THINKY-BIT-140: While I feel like everything I do is earth day stuff, the most important thing I have is the better world book.  

THINKY-BIT-141: It does seem like earth day is the day where permaculture stuff will go 20 times further than a regular day.

THINKY-BIT-142: if 100 million people read my book, I think most global problems would be solved.

THINKY-BIT-143:  I doubt I could get even a million people to read my book this year, let alone earth day.  Maybe the focus should be 5000 for earth day?

THINKY-BIT-144:  I always thought that making a super sweet deal for 12 of the better world books would lead to exponential growth.  It didn't.

THINKY-BIT-145:  Our printed flyer turned out really cool.  I cannot help but think that getting that flyer into the hands of people will result in joyous good things!

THINKY-BIT-146:  I think the thread about a shy person giving away 12 books is good.  

THINKY-BIT-147:  maybe we should upgrade the 12 physical books thing to include a flyer for each book?  

THINKY-BIT-148:   The carbon footprint vid has the ebook available for free

Paul,  A while back,  you sent me 3 copies of your book because my permaculture cards were late in getting shipped out.  I took 2 copies to 2 local libraries and donated them.  At the larger one I had to talk to the library staff about who you were and why I thought the book would be a nice fit for the library.  That was very easy to do after reading it. The smaller library took it on my word that it was worth having. I'm just wondering what would happen if more people took the time to ask their library about how to donate a book.  Now I have a copy to lend out and 2 copies that are available for anyone who is interested.  
    Another idea (Although I don't know the particulars.) might be to offer it on Amazon Unlimited for free.  I know that the first place I look for a book now is there if my library can't help me.
    I know this will cost money.  I, for one,  would be willing to help with the shipping costs if  needed.  Sincerely,  Jeff

I am thinking of sending out this monthly-ish later today

subject: Earth day is a month away; free better world book for you


This is paul, the action figure ...

I think (IMAAOO) if 100 million people read my better world book, most global problems would be solved.  So I am trying to develop an evil plot to get more books into more brains. Earth day is my best bet beacuse my stuff seems the least crazy on earth day :).

First, a free copy of the whole book, today, for you.  If you go to youtube and find my brand new carbon footprint video, it will have instructions in the video to get the ebook for free.  

Here is what I have so far, for my evil plot:

- Get you a copy of the ebook
- You read it and think "yes! this will work!"
- You buy a dozen physical copies of the book
- give them to people

If a thousand people do this, then, world domination!

Next, I dropped the price a bunch on a dozen of the physical books. For the next few days, get a dozen, with US shipping for $65.  

  https://permies.com/bwb


Maybe it helps to take a look at our thread "How does a shy person give away 12 copies of the book"

  https://permies.com/t/150777

Maybe you can have some ideas to to add to this thread?

We are gonna get the prices on 12 books dropped in the next coupla hours.


For now, anybody see ways to polish this email?  Any other ideas for affecting big change?

Jeffrey Loucks wrote:     Another idea (Although I don't know the particulars.) might be to offer it on Amazon Unlimited for free.  I know that the first place I look for a book now is there if my library can't help me.
    I know this will cost money.  I, for one,  would be willing to help with the shipping costs if  needed.  Sincerely,  Jeff

All of the amazon stuff is done by my co-author.  it would be up to him.

Steven Lindsay wrote:regarding 'infecting 1million brains', current practice seems to be to chop campaigns up into thousands of small chunks and release them in an endless drip feed ie long informational video (cheap heat)  broken down into 20-30 sec, 1-2 minute & 5-10 minute segments, dribbled out regularly over several weeks, optimized for each time zone (of course this can all be scheduled in advance and pushed to several platforms simultaneously).
Have celebrities read aloud short sections of the book.
This can infect brains two ways; the small bits may entice folk to purchase the whole book/video, and by watching many of the short segments folk will accumulate many of the key ideas.
This could be a push toward a target date (earth day) or until all the information is delivered.
If privacy isn't a concern use all the available digital platforms, and remember there are many more billions of souls that use languages other than English. Many open-source projects use the process of translation as a gateway into new communities.

As for the drip-drip:  kinda seems like that is what we do all day, every day, isn't it?  

I suppose for the part where we might do something different, is the part about having celebrities read a bit.  We haven't done that yet.  Any suggestions for a celebrity that we can reach through some sort of fancy celebrity reading service (andres tells me that this is a real thing)?

I'm pretty sure the price of $65 for the 12 books is now set in case anybody wants to test it.

yes indeed, that's what EVERYONE is doing! the trick being of course to get to the top of the pile. I'm thinking of things like youtube 'watchlists', collections of many short vids. Enthusiasts can binge watch and newbies might catch them browsing or pushed by algorithms.
There are agencies dedicated to sourcing talent for cameos, voiceovers etc. WOM or the '6 degrees' may be more effective in securing folk with a personal attachement to the issues that otherwise are difficult to contact ie Earth Alliance co-founder Leonardo DiCaprio, former US Vice President Al Gore, David Attemborough etc

paul wheaton wrote:
I suppose for the part where we might do something different, is the part about having celebrities read a bit.  We haven't done that yet.  Any suggestions for a celebrity that we can reach through some sort of fancy celebrity reading service (andres tells me that this is a real thing)?

This page lists the agent / business representation for every actor and movie person https://pro.imdb.com/

Basically you can hit them with a proposal of the project and hopefully theyll get back to you with a juicy quote.

$65 for twelve books!?

That is awesome Paul, I'm going to take a stroll down to my library and see about any resources they might have to not only keep a copy but other ways to distribute in our rural system.

Time to infect some minds.

Timothy Norton wrote:$65 for twelve books!?

Yarp.  70% off of retail - and it includes shipping.

I'm not doing this for the money, I am doing this to infect millions of brains.

Zac Effron might be a good option also!!

Andrés Bernal wrote:

paul wheaton wrote:
I suppose for the part where we might do something different, is the part about having celebrities read a bit.  We haven't done that yet.  Any suggestions for a celebrity that we can reach through some sort of fancy celebrity reading service (andres tells me that this is a real thing)?

This page lists the agent / business representation for every actor and movie person https://pro.imdb.com/

Basically you can hit them with a proposal of the project and hopefully theyll get back to you with a juicy quote.

Andres, Are you signed up for the premium?  Are you thinking Paul could sign up for the Premium and we could contact the actors with the books?  Glad there is a resource to contact them!

paul wheaton wrote:I'm pretty sure the price of $65 for the 12 books is now set in case anybody wants to test it.

A couple of people have given it a try.  Seems to be working good.

Does the monthly-ish look okay?  I think I'll send it out in a few hours.

Purchase works... I think.

Two comments:

PayPay still requires you to create a PayPal account or login to use.  (I did not use this).

Stripe doesn't require you to create an account, but I got this after purchasing so I am not sure if the purchase went through or not. YOu either create a new account, sign in to an existing one, or cancel the purchase.

sandy


Update: After posting this I received a purchase notification, so evidently you dont have to link the purchase to the acocunt, it already IS LINKED. So I wonder why the popup asking to link it?

Earth day is my best bet beacuse my stuff seems

correct "because"...

Who is your audience?  What audience do you want?  Taylor Swift just came off a world tour, is mega popular and has a massive following.

S Smithsson wrote:Purchase works... I think.

Two comments:

PayPay still requires you to create a PayPal account or login to use.  (I did not use this).

Stripe doesn't require you to create an account, but I got this after purchasing so I am not sure if the purchase went through or not. YOu either create a new account, sign in to an existing one, or cancel the purchase.

sandy


Update: After posting this I received a purchase notification, so evidently you dont have to link the purchase to the acocunt, it already IS LINKED. So I wonder why the popup asking to link it?

I'm asking devaka to look into this.

I think (IMAAOO) if 100 million people

Maybe I'm the only person but I have no idea what IMAAOO means.  Might distract people from your message if they aren't familiar with that acronym?...

Mike Haasl wrote:

I think (IMAAOO) if 100 million people

Maybe I'm the only person but I have no idea what IMAAOO means.  Might distract people from your message if they aren't familiar with that acronym?...

I also don't know what that means, and I do frequent reddit. My guess based on Paul's demeanor was that he injected a few sarcastic self-deprecating words between In My...Opinion. I agree it might be slightly distracting especially if internet acronyms aren't your thing, but putting it in parentheses does allow an English reader to just pass on by with little consequence.

Edit: I am purchasing a bundle of books to just leave out at a local Non-Profit's Earth Day program - Conococheague Institute in Southern PA. I might save one back for the local library. All good suggestions.

I will definitely save one for the local library - after checking their online catalog, they do have the e-book and the e-audiobook version, but no physical copy. I rated those 5 stars as they had no ratings so far, and there didn't seem to be any way to see data on usage.

I believe IMAO is In My Arrogant Opinion.  Just not sure if the extra A and O are deliberate or typos...  

In My Awesomely Arrogant Official Opinion?

Well there are many options for you already. But world domination I am so there . Ruth

Mike Haasl wrote:I believe IMAO is In My Arrogant Opinion.  Just not sure if the extra A and O are deliberate or typos...  

In My Awesomely Arrogant Official Opinion?

I think

    in my something something something opinion

is close enough

Dear Sir;

(All hail the awesomely mighty Paul & helpers)

There can be no question if I "should" or "should" not help.  (yes I fell down your rabbit hole, I'll be re-reading that post many times)

Thanks for the free book offer, I would be glad to buy the twelve book deal.  I cut up my cc's some time ago, so I'll have to mail a check or send
cash.

Where in the world is zone 4??  Do you use US dollars???  Do you have polar bears???  Does the sun shine there???

Sorry, I'm still aflutter from the "should" thing.

Our system is currently set up to take plastic and crypto.

For anything else https://permies.com/wiki/186450/buying-digital-market-stuff-paypal

S Smithsson wrote:Stripe doesn't require you to create an account, but I got this after purchasing so I am not sure if the purchase went through or not. YOu either create a new account, sign in to an existing one, or cancel the purchase.

You would get that message if you make the payment on stripe without having being logged in on permies. This is because we can't tell which account the purchase should be connected to until you log in.

S Smithsson wrote:Update: After posting this I received a purchase notification, so evidently you dont have to link the purchase to the acocunt, it already IS LINKED. So I wonder why the popup asking to link it?

When you logged in to permies to post this message, it automatically connected the purchase to your account.

Pass them out at festivals.

Well... I got the e-book several hours ago now and read it.  So, yup just ordered the 12 physical copies.  I have a few friends that need a copy with bookmarks in relevant sections for them to read; but I'll put at least one copy in my own Little Library and scatter the rest around several other little libraries in the metro area I live in.  I might see if my local library wants a copy too...

My farm just built its first hugelbed and the plan is to spend a lot of time on building more rather than on burn piles.

How about asking everyone for a picture(s) of their hugelbeds and a list of the plants they have grown on them. 'The March of the Hugels'.....


Edit - we have our farm garden laid out conventionally - and it looks like a vegetable garden. We may use some hugels for conventional plantings, but mostly I plan to plant perennials that might not be recognizable as food patches.

University of Michigan just published a paper internationally concluding "Fruits and vegetables grown in urban farms and gardens have a carbon footprint that is, on average, six times greater than conventionally grown produce." If people start believing the regulators could start looking at home grown produce with 'climate change' in mind, having access to a pictorial on hugel techniques and associated perennial edible, might be appealing.

Dear Paul Wheaton,
    You are getting the word out.  It may not be overnight like you desire, but you,  along with your team are succeeding.  I had absorbed everything put out by 3 permaculturists in Australia.  I even paid to become certified by one by taking online courses.I had subscribed to numerous homesteading sites that regurgitate the same information as a thousand others. I ended up putting in a larger garden than I had for the last 30 years.  Your advice has helped my wife and I to actually make changes in the way that we live.  Our grandchildren are interested and so are some other younger folks in our area. One of which will soon be one of the largest land farmers in the lower SW corner of Michigan.   (I just gave his wife the 3rd copy of your book you had sent me. )
  So Thank You Paul.  My wife and I (and extended family) are now healthier and happier than we have ever been.  Our grandchildren get excited about coming over to our little farm.  We give away the surplus like eggs and vegetables because it generates discussion on how we accomplish so much considering our age and being on a fixed income.  From there it's easy to work your ideals into the process. So, again.  Thank you.  Sincerely,  Jeff and Renee

Jeffrey,

Thanks for the kind words!

I feel like the world is desperately hungry for the information in my book - but they don't know it exists.  I see tons and tons and tons of:

    - oh no! record climate problems and there is NOTHING we can do about it!

    - heat pumps are the new thing!  Learn all about heat pumps!

    - sacrifice (and it turns out to not help)!

    - buy crap in the name of the environment! (turns out to not help)

    - be angry!

    - write to politicians/corporations

    - drive a thousand miles to protest petroleum

And the comments have none of the stuff I suggest in my book.  And if I am foolish enough to bring it up myself, I think I am wrestling with bots attempting to protect the interests of their overlord.



This is to say that i have put a lot of work into trying to solve things.  And I am certain it will work if enough people get this stuff into their head.  

I have a lot of hard work ahead.  And I'm going to try hundreds of things.  

I was sure that this book was a slam dunk:  you hand out a dozen copies and one of those people hands out a dozen, etc.