I shared and linked to videos I show my students in The Wall Street Journal explains 'Why America’s Groundwater Is Disappearing'. I don't have one about groundwater contamination, so I might show this one, too.
Replaced video for Detroit Hives post
Aug. 17th, 2024 02:31 pmI found a version of this video with a preview image I liked better forDetroit Hives for World Honey Bee Day on National Nonprofit Day.
National Geographic had already featured Detroit Hives in Detroit’s Urban Beekeepers are Transforming the City’s Vacant Lots | Short Film Showcase.
National Geographic had already featured Detroit Hives in Detroit’s Urban Beekeepers are Transforming the City’s Vacant Lots | Short Film Showcase.
These urban beekeepers are rebuilding Detroit one hive at a time.
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Tim Paule and Nicole Lindsey are converting Detroit's vacant housing lots into urban bee farms. The young couple is transforming their community one hive at a time by bringing diversity to the field of beekeeping and creating opportunities for the city's youth. Detroit Hives shares their story in this film by Spruce Tone Films.
Rejected video for Bananapocalypse post
Sep. 13th, 2023 09:17 amI decided this video was too basic for Vice News on the 'Bananapocalypse: Why Bananas May Go Extinct'.
Postponed video for Food Day post
Oct. 24th, 2022 09:09 amI plan on using this video for next year's Food Day post. This year's is Vox explains 'The chicken industry’s worker safety problem' for Food Day 2022.
I didn't use the following video in PBS NewsHour and WUSA explain 'How climate change is impacting the wine and spirits industries' because it didn't feature the author of "Crushed."
Cut off video for California drought post
Jul. 26th, 2021 05:32 pmI composed California's drought causing a crisis in agriculture and rural communities before I found the following video. I could have written a follow-up post, but decided to write Diversity one of the themes of the Outstanding Commercial nominees at the 2021 Emmy Awards instead.
Happy (first) Johnny Appleseed Day!
Mar. 11th, 2021 12:59 pm
Over at Crazy Eddie's Motie News, I'm observing the tenth anniversary of Fukushima triple disaster. Here on Dreamwidth, I'm joining
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ecosophia and his followers, including many of you and all my new subscribers (thanks for subscribing!) in observing the first of two Johnny Appleseed Days. Here is the first paragraph of the holiday's description from National Day Calendar.March 11th – On National Johnny Appleseed Day, we remember a man who made apple (and pear) trees bloom across the nation. The day celebrates a kindly legend who lived by sage teachings and labored to bring the shade of fruit trees across much of the United States.
'King Corn' for National Food Day
Oct. 24th, 2020 03:15 pm
Happy National Food Day! For this year's celebration, I am taking a break from my five year project of blogging about "Food, Inc." on this day. It's only a slight break, as I am instead writing about a movie my students have been able to use for extra credit in addition to the assignment on "Food, Inc.," "King Corn."
My students are watching 'King Corn' for extra credit on National Food Day 2020
Over on my LiveJournal blog, I have a tag that I use as a catch phrase, "While the world burns, Farmville thrives." I've been wondering when I'd find a story to blog about here on Crazy Eddie's Motie News where I could use that tag. I finally found it, courtesy of one of my Twitter followers, @WhereMyHoseAt.
Time: Take Your Farmville Addiction a Step Further - Become an Online Farmer
You've played Farmville on Facebook. Now you can play farming for real.What the National Trust is doing is crowd-sourcing farming and turning that project into an educational game. As for how that will work out, I'll just say that the video game experts are skeptical. From the story in The Guardian that Time picked up on.
The UK's National Trust (a charity established to preserve and protect ancient buildings and countryside landscapes) has set up My Farm, a people-powered online farming project.
But Nicholas Lovell, a games consultant and founder of the Gamesbrief blog, is yet to be convinced: "There is something in the idea that people like to grow, nurture and beautify things. But Farmville's success is down to the craftsmanship of hooking into basic human psychology: the need to finish things we've started, to return gifts when we're given them and many, many more.As The Guardian reported, Zynga refused to comment.
"A Farmville for which people had to pay £30 to access would have flopped miserably. By charging for access, the National Trust is taking the success of Farmville as being about farming, when I think it was about bringing accessible, cost-effective, well-designed gaming to a new audience."
This project is also a charity fundraiser.
Arthur Potts Dawson, co-founder of the mutual business, the People's Supermarket which now has 1500 members, said: "MyFarm is brave, even mad, but the People's Supermarket was considered mad when we started. Both help prevent you blindly walking around a supermarket not knowing where your food comes from." The online farmers will need to pay a one-off £30 fee to join, which also allows them to visit the farm in person. Reynolds defended the fee. "We are a charity and there is a big upfront cost we need to cover. It feels like a reasonable cost. If we get many more [than 10,000] we could reduce the fee in the future conceivably."In addition to getting access to the real life farm should they ever choose to visit, the virtual farmers will get a vote in how the farm is run. That should be interesting to follow.
As for what appeal this might have to Farmville players, Time has an answer.
But if you feel you've got as much fun as you can from Farmville, perhaps this is the logical next step. Either that, or buy your own actual farm. This option is somewhat cheaper.
Maybe this will work. In the meantime, while the world burns, Farmville thrives.
Originally posted at Crazy Eddie's Motie News.
Crazy Eddie's Motie News: Detroit Food and Sustainability News for 4/4/11
Detroit Free Press: Indoor shrimp farming could grow into big industry for Michigan
People talk a lot about Detroit as a center for urban agriculture, but this is the first story I've seen about urban aquaculture here. Honestly, I have to say I find this one to be a complete surprise to me. As for his idea, it will most likely work (he already raises 25,000 pounds of shrimp a year in Okemos), although I wonder how sustainable it really is. Shrimp are tropical and require a lot of heat.
Associated Press via Detroit Free Press: Environmental rule on large factory farms upheld
For various reasons, I don't quote AP articles. However, I will link to them if I find them worth reading. This one is, as it describes how factory farms have to abide by water quality standards.
And now, someone worth watching, or keeping an eye on, depending on your perspective.
Detroit Free Press: In Detroit, urban farming waiting to take root
There are 99 comments on this article. I suggest you read them; you'll get a good idea of the controversies around this project, and the range of agendas and concerns that people have about urban agriculture.
Video reports on Hantz Farms and the non-profit organization Urban Farming along with news about Detroit's water system and municipalities in metro Detroit coping with the economic crisis at Crazy Eddie's Motie News.
Detroit Free Press: Indoor shrimp farming could grow into big industry for Michigan
To ramp up the automotive industry in Michigan, Henry Ford built the Rouge Plant -- a manufacturing infrastructure that could produce everything needed, from glass to steel, to make cars.There is a photo gallery.
Today, Russ Allen is looking for a way to build a shrimp Rouge Plant -- a pollution-free, recirculating facility that could breed, grow, process and ship a million pounds of shrimp a year.
It's not as far-fetched as it sounds. Allen, who spent 23 years establishing outdoor shrimp farming in Central and South America, has been raising shrimp indoors in Okemos since 1994 at his Seafood Systems research facility.
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"This could be the start of an entirely new industry for Michigan, a clean industry, with new jobs," he said -- if he can find the $10 million he needs to build a commercial plant.
People talk a lot about Detroit as a center for urban agriculture, but this is the first story I've seen about urban aquaculture here. Honestly, I have to say I find this one to be a complete surprise to me. As for his idea, it will most likely work (he already raises 25,000 pounds of shrimp a year in Okemos), although I wonder how sustainable it really is. Shrimp are tropical and require a lot of heat.
Associated Press via Detroit Free Press: Environmental rule on large factory farms upheld
For various reasons, I don't quote AP articles. However, I will link to them if I find them worth reading. This one is, as it describes how factory farms have to abide by water quality standards.
And now, someone worth watching, or keeping an eye on, depending on your perspective.
Detroit Free Press: In Detroit, urban farming waiting to take root
When Detroit's city council approved the sale of 20 parcels of land to the proposed Hantz Farms project this month, it looked like commercial urban agriculture might be about to start in the city.Last year, my neighbor showed me a newspaper clipping about Hantz and asked me what I thought about him and his idea. I think the idea has merit, but I'm not sure about him. The article mentioned that he was inspired by the ideas of Ayn Rand. I really don't care for Rand or her followers and think anyone who thinks favorably of her could be real trouble.
But the council imposed restrictions on the sale of the land, which lies behind a warehouse owned by businessman John Hantz at 17403 Mt. Elliott. Hantz Farms, a subsidiary of the larger Hantz Group of financial service firms, cannot grow crops or sell any produce from the site without the city's permission.
Instead, Hantz Farms will beautify the roughly 5 acres of blighted land behind the warehouse with landscaping, either with grass or some small plants, as a demonstration of how it can clean up an abandoned site, said Michael Score, the president of Hantz Farms and a former Michigan State University agricultural extension worker.
Hopefully soon, Score added, the city will allow Hantz Farms to farm the site and others in the city.
There are 99 comments on this article. I suggest you read them; you'll get a good idea of the controversies around this project, and the range of agendas and concerns that people have about urban agriculture.
Video reports on Hantz Farms and the non-profit organization Urban Farming along with news about Detroit's water system and municipalities in metro Detroit coping with the economic crisis at Crazy Eddie's Motie News.
