Comments on: Let’s kill the business card and have an iPhone pow-wow http://ecopreneurist.com/2008/09/23/lets-kill-the-business-card-and-have-an-iphone-pow-wow/ Green & Sustainable Business Ventures: For Entrepreneurs & Investors Wed, 08 Feb 2012 18:59:21 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: the marvelous fing http://ecopreneurist.com/2008/09/23/lets-kill-the-business-card-and-have-an-iphone-pow-wow/comment-page-1/#comment-7233 the marvelous fing Wed, 24 Sep 2008 21:51:41 +0000 http://ecopreneurist.com/?p=683#comment-7233 VERY well said, and to be honest I think that the carbon footprint of business cards pales in comparison to the technological instruments that are discarded year after year as we undergo necessary "upgrades". There are a lot of problems worth discussing here -- a lack of upwardly compatible systems, a lack of electronic recycling resources -- but there are a handful of solutions, too. I live in the bay area and practically NO ONE throws away their old computers...they try to sell them, donate them to students, whatever it takes. There are a lot of inner-city schools with old Apples :). I see a lot of people using "virtual" technology too -- advanced voicemail systems like Gotvmail that replace in-house PBXs and answering machines -- and remote back-up systems that take the place of external hard drives (which have a criminally short shelf life). Forget business cards...get rid of your file cabinet and do ALL documentation through PDF! Yes, computers crash, but back-ups are possible...and let's not forget that paper burns. VERY well said, and to be honest I think that the carbon footprint of business cards pales in comparison to the technological instruments that are discarded year after year as we undergo necessary “upgrades”. There are a lot of problems worth discussing here — a lack of upwardly compatible systems, a lack of electronic recycling resources — but there are a handful of solutions, too. I live in the bay area and practically NO ONE throws away their old computers…they try to sell them, donate them to students, whatever it takes. There are a lot of inner-city schools with old Apples :) . I see a lot of people using “virtual” technology too — advanced voicemail systems like Gotvmail that replace in-house PBXs and answering machines — and remote back-up systems that take the place of external hard drives (which have a criminally short shelf life).

Forget business cards…get rid of your file cabinet and do ALL documentation through PDF! Yes, computers crash, but back-ups are possible…and let’s not forget that paper burns.

]]> By: Gabe http://ecopreneurist.com/2008/09/23/lets-kill-the-business-card-and-have-an-iphone-pow-wow/comment-page-1/#comment-7191 Gabe Wed, 24 Sep 2008 06:07:51 +0000 http://ecopreneurist.com/?p=683#comment-7191 Olga: Thanks for the interesting post. I don't think everyone is ready to end their relationship with the business card, but for those that are - I think it's good to encourage their efforts to reduce paper consumption. Everyone has to do their part in their own way - and we believe that there's no one right way to use technology to improve the world we live in. For our part, we take great pride in the positive environmental impact of our company overall - and both of us founders come from a long history of activism on behalf of the planet. We have articulated (and posted) an environmental statement - and we try to do everything we can to reduce our impact - including offsetting our IT carbon footprint, encouraging our employees not to commute, and being extra vigilant in our overall use of resources. rmbrME's overarching objective is to make in-person social networking more efficient and connected. While this shift (like that of mobile boarding passes for airlines) may not make sense to everyone - those of us on the forefront of this movement are enthusiastic and passionate people. And we very much appreciate the honest discourse. -Gabe Olga:

Thanks for the interesting post. I don’t think everyone is ready to end their relationship with the business card, but for those that are – I think it’s good to encourage their efforts to reduce paper consumption.

Everyone has to do their part in their own way – and we believe that there’s no one right way to use technology to improve the world we live in.

For our part, we take great pride in the positive environmental impact of our company overall – and both of us founders come from a long history of activism on behalf of the planet. We have articulated (and posted) an environmental statement – and we try to do everything we can to reduce our impact – including offsetting our IT carbon footprint, encouraging our employees not to commute, and being extra vigilant in our overall use of resources.

rmbrME’s overarching objective is to make in-person social networking more efficient and connected. While this shift (like that of mobile boarding passes for airlines) may not make sense to everyone – those of us on the forefront of this movement are enthusiastic and passionate people. And we very much appreciate the honest discourse.

-Gabe

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