{"id":5167,"date":"2009-12-15T14:10:45","date_gmt":"2009-12-15T20:10:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.sustainablog.org\/?p=5167"},"modified":"2009-12-15T14:10:45","modified_gmt":"2009-12-15T20:10:45","slug":"green-social-media-one-did-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/green-social-media-one-did-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Green Social Media: One Did It"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"One
One Did It's approach to sustainability: focus on resource inputs<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As our good friend Max Gladwell<\/a> has pointed out repeatedly, the social web provides a wealth of opportunities to change the world through social media<\/a>. Finnish start-up One Did It<\/a> is shooting for a spot on Max’s list: this small company, which shared its story with us on the Finnfacts<\/a> Clean Tech Bloggers Tour, aims to promote European approaches to thinking about sustainability through a decidedly Silicon Valley model. Their platform, which combines lifestyle assessment, action tips, and opportunities for friendly competition among its community, provides users with the means to measure the impact of their lifestyle choices, and to see the effects of behavioral changes on their environmental footprints.<\/p>\n

What gets measured gets managed: the Ecological Backpack<\/h3>\n

It turns out that my use of the term “footprint” illustrates my American perspective on environmental impact; One Did It relies on the metaphor of the “ecological backpack,” which originated in Europe, and has really taken off in Germany. While similar to the footprint concept, the backpack approach provides a bit more comprehensive evaluation of the burden your choices place on natural systems. According to the company’s site,<\/p>\n

Eco-backpack calculations are based on the MIPS-method developed in the early 1990s in the Wuppertal Institute<\/a>, Germany. MIPS stands for Material Input Per Service Unit<\/a>. The method can be used to estimate the environmental burden caused by a product, service, or even a lifestyle. The entire life cycle from cradle to grave (extraction, production, use, waste and recycling) is considered.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"The
The eco-backpack: One Did It's metaphor for environmental impact<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In short, the eco-backpack measures resource efficiency: what are you getting out of the inputs that go into a product. The concept doesn’t focus on waste and pollution; rather, it assumes that more efficient use of resources inevitably decreases these outcomes.<\/p>\n

Weigh your backpack… and then lighten it<\/h3>\n

One Did It starts a user off with its ecological backpack measurement test: users provide information on elements of their lifestyle including<\/p>\n