The Challenge Your World Blog

Silicon-based solar panel are expansive. So expansive that they can't compete with the fossil fuels in terms of efficiency and cost of the installations. This could change, though, because researchers are making progress in the paintable solar cells area. This "ink" could be applied on any surface: roofs, walls and even windows, as the ink is semi transparent. Even if the project is not near completion, the scientists achieved a 1% turnout on the solar power, and according to them, achieving 10% would be sufficient for commercial use. This would be a cheaper and more efficient alternative to solid solar panels that are now available on the [...]

Google's web mail service could be the greenest one you can use for your business or personal emails. The computer and technology spheres aren't often seen as green because of their energy use and materials used in their fabrication. Google's servers have a very good Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) rating ( and most useless components (like graphical components on monitor-free servers) are stripped out for less power use. They have a 1.1 rating where the best possible rating is 1.0. For reference, Microsoft's PUE rating is 1.6, which is also considered quite good. Google also reuse their water in the vapor form in the server-cooling process. Since [...]

For the weekend, I'm going with something a little lighter, and I discovered a nice slideshow about the current situation around the health care reform in the U.S. I'm linking it here because it is very informative and easy to read through.

http://www.slideshare.net/danroam/healthcare-napkins-all

 

Sierra Magazine released their results for the 2009 Cool Schools survey, grading 135 U.S. Universities on a green scale. Grades were given in different areas, like Waste Management, Transportation, Energy, Academics, Administration, and more. The top 3 of this honor roll are University of Colorado at Boulder, University of Washington at Seattle and Middlebury College. This honor roll is accompanied, of course, by the full ranking consisting in 135 universities ranked. The bottom 3 of the class were Texas Tech University, University of Missouri and Kansas State University, getting respectively 11, 18 and 19 points out of a possible 80. Head over to [...]

 The Happy Rock wrote a list of why they think it sucks to be a part time entrepreneur. Of course, something of that importance is usually a full-time business, but not everyone is able, or wants, to jump off the wagon and start something new, there is too much risk involved. The list is long, and while all points are valid, I collected what I think are the most interesting points made. Sacrifice. You can’t do it all.  Areas of your life will suffer and gather cobwebs.  If it is important to you, other things must take a backseat. No help. When you want go on vacation you can’t without major planning.  No breaks, you do everything. Yourself. [...]

Pamela Slim wrote an article on the hardships and the phases any entrepreneurs goes through. She defines the characteristics, things to remember and the "mantra" of each phase to reassure you what you're going through is normal. The four phases she mentions are the following: Square one: Death and Rebirth Square two: Dreaming and Scheming Square three: The Hero's Saga Square four: The Promised Land Of course she mentions that it can easily be a cycle, and that any entrepreneur is likely to be back to square one after a while in the last section of that journey. Head over at www.openforum.com to get the full descriptions [...]

A team of researchers at MIT are working on Project Trash Track. The project is exactly what its name implies. They use special electronic tags to track waste in New York and Seattle to find out where the trash ends up. Project Trash Track wants to create awareness of garbage-disposing facilities, to avoid the "take out and forget about it" aspect of garbage collecting. Following the garbage and finding out its final resting place creates a feeling of responsability for the people. The project should culminate in September and will be on display at the Architectural League in New York, and the Seattle Public Library. [...]

The Infrastructurist has simplified a document from guardian.co.uk, which listed 20 ideas to change the world. The ideas rank from downright crazy to somewhat doable. The list does not take itself too seriously, but there are some important ideas behind it. To change the world, we first have to change how we think. Here are some of the ideas I thought were the most interesting: 1. Dump Billions of Tons of Limestone Into The Ocean
Unless you’ve been living in a cave, you’ve probably heard that CO2 is making the oceans more acidic (or, strictly speaking, less alkaline). This threatens the viability of many of the creatures–including krill–that form [...]

Fast Company wrote an interesting article on why age doens't matter all that much anymore. The time of guessing the interests of your potential customers through their age has passed. With the internet and all the technology available to you nowadays, people actually tell you what they like. You need to base your ads on relevance, and what type of customers will react to your product or your service.  They list the 5 following reasons:

1. People are age shifting and not living lives based on traditional stereotypes for their ages.
2. The top end of a demographic (34) usually has almost nothing in common with the low end (18).
3. Age demos

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How you advertise your brand or service is a crucial decision to take; it dictates how people will see your product, of course, but also how they see you. There is a blog post on StartupNation that uses lemondade stands to make a parallel between the kind of sellers or advertisers. The way they promote their stands show a great deal about how they see their own position in the market. The writer, Melanie Rembrandt, denotes 3 different types of promoters: 1- The Spammer 2- The "One-That-Doesn't-Really-Want-To-Be-There" 3- The One-That-Loves-That-He-Does Read the full text as it is very interesting and will lead you to think about some things [...]