It's cool and even greener to read books on a mobile phone, but can a 3.5 inch screen beat the Kindle?

There's an interesting article today on the New York Times about the growing popularity of the usage of cellphones as e-readers. It looks like more people are willing to read books on a 3.5 inch mobile screen and some wonder if mobile phones are indeed the ultimate Kindle Killers.

It might be a new round of a struggle between a device that is basically limited (almost) to just one main function to a multi-functional device that also has the capability to provide this function. If we look at the example of GPS, where the mobile competition plays an important role in the sales decline of GPS devices, then the Kindle, Sony Reader, the Nook and others are going to deal with a fierce competitor that has the potential to take a nice bite of their market share.

Another fact which was not mentioned in the article ("Novels, 3.5 Inches At a Time") is that it's much more environmental-friendly to use a multi-functional device because then you just need to manufacture one device and that's it. And the same goes to ending the life of the device - it's almost always greener to deal with one device than two or three devices.

But, and this is a big but, can we really read books on cellphones? I find it very not comfortable and I believe that many other readers feel the same. And this is I think the biggest obstacle of cellphones in their "fight" against the Kindle and other e-readers - no matter how cool and relatively green they are and how more features they have, it is still no fun to downsize your reading experience to a 3.5 inch screen.

What do you think about it? I'll be happy to hear your thoughts and what's your prefarable way to read books - mobile? e-reader? paper?

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: promoting sustainable reading!

Green books campaign one week after: This is just the beginning!

One week passed since our green books campaign went online and we're still overwhelmed by the great feedback it received. We got great response from everyone - readers, publishers, bookstores, authors and bloggers who found the campaign important, valuable and inspiring.

We would like to thank all of the bloggers who participated in the campaign and assisted us in spreading the word about sustainable reading. The 110 reviews of green books written for the campaign were read by thousands, if not tens of thousands of readers, and made an important statement about the importance of printing books responsibly.

We also want to thank the 39 publishers who took part in the campaign and provided the green books for the bloggers. You deserve a big kudos for your efforts to get greener and for your responsible printing practices demonstrated by the participating books!

We believe this campaign is just the beginning, not the end of these efforts. We hope it will generate discussions and inspire innovative thinking on how to merge "green" into publishing and help making sure books will be as eco-friendly as possible.

And last but not least - we have winners! As I mentioned earlier, we got 6 prizes for bloggers with the largest number of feedback on their review post: five audio copies of the new Al Gore's audiobook, "Our Choice" (gift of Simon & Schuster Audio) and a 3-month membership at BookSwim, the Netflix for books. The First prize is the audiobook of Al Gore signed by him!

The winners are:

First place - Jen of Tripple Pundit. Jen's prize is a signed copy of Al Gore's audiobook, "Our Choice".

Second place - Kathy of Bermudaonion's weblog. Kathy's prize is a copy of Al Gore's audiobook, "Our Choice".

Third place - Serena of Savvy Verse & Wit. Serena's prize is a copy of Al Gore's audiobook, "Our Choice".

Fourth place - Ana of Things mean a lot. Ana's prize is a copy of Al Gore's audiobook, "Our Choice".

Fifth place - Alyce of At home with books. Alyce's prize is a copy of Al Gore's audiobook, "Our Choice".

Sixth place - Trish of Trish's Reading Nook. Trish's prize is a 3-month membership at BookSwim.

Thanks again everyone!

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainable reading!

A paper company loses a contract worth $55m annually following Greenpeace protest in Indonesia

While the expectations of the upcoming Conference in Copenhagen seems lower and lower every day, Greenpeace is still working hard to remind us (and the world's leaders) of the urgent need to take a decisive action on climate change, especially when it comes to deforestation. It also reminds paper companies that it's still a watchdog with very sharp teeth. Just ask APRIL.

But first, the protest: As reported on Grist, last week, about 50 Greenpeace activists blocked rainforest destruction in Indonesia’s Kampar Peninsula by chaining themselves to excavators. Activists then draped a bright red “Obama You Can Stop This” banner over the destruction and called on the world’s leaders to stop deforestation at next month’s climate talks in Copenhagen.

Greenpeace explains on their website that "with up to a fifth of global greenhouse gas emissions coming from cutting down and burning forests, it's clear we cannot avert a climate disaster unless world leaders take action of their own to stop the destruction."

And now for their interesting findings abut Asia Pacific Resources International Holding Limited (APRIL), a pulp and paper company - Greenpeace reported that in response to a letter they sent voicing their concerns about forest destruction in he Kampar Peninsula on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, APRIL stated that it had ceased operations in the Kampar Peninsula.

Greenpeace claimed it has now proof that APRIL is actually destroying this rainforest and draining forest peatland on Sumatra’s threatened Kampar Peninsula. Greenpeace also brought this evidence to a public meeting held by APRIL in the regional capital of Pekanbaru where the company was introducing the latest of a string of so-called 'High Value Forest Assessments' aimed at greenwashing its image.

The consequences were quick to follow - UPM, a Finnish-owned company which supplies products like photocopier paper to markets including Europe, the US and China, decided to cancel its contract with APRIL due to the company's poor environmental record. This is not a small hit for APRIL - Greenpeace estimates that APRIL’s contract with UPM was worth $55m annually, or over 4% of APRIL’s total pulp production.

So now couple of interesting questions arise here:

1. Will other companies follow suit and cancel their contracts with APRIL as well?

2. How much time will it take to APRIL to respond to Greenpeace and what will they do?

3. Will political forces follow the example of the business sector and do something about our poor environmental record at Copenhagen?

I hope we'll have answers to these questions in the next couple of weeks and we'll of course keep you posted once we'll have more updates.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting responsible printing!

Subscription option is available on Eco-Libris website

We would like to remind you with an option that is available onEco-Libris' website - subscription.

If you have a big library at home and you want to green it up one bookshelf or bookcase at a time, balancing out 5 or 10 books every month on regular basis, can be a good fit for you.

The process is very easy and similar to one-time purchase: On the subscription page you choose how many books you want to balance out each month. Then just click on the 'Buy' bottom and complete the payment process on the PayPal page. That's it.

Then, every month we'll balance out for you the amount of books you chose by planting trees in developing countries with our planting partners. You will receive a confirmation email from PayPal following the monthly payment, and of course you will also receive our stickers on monthly basis.

If and when you'll decide that you want to suspend your subscription, you will be able to do it easily and quickly on PayPal website.

We are very happy to offer this option to all the eco-conscious readers out there who want to balance out many books but want to do gradually. If you have any questions about the subscription option, please feel free to email me at: raz [at] ecolibris [dot] net.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Plant a tree for every book you read!

A new book, "The Secret Green Sauce", by Bill Roth is going green with Eco-Libris

We are happy to announce on a new collaboration with Bill Roth on his new book - THE SECRET GREEN SAUCE™ : Best Practices being used by actual businesses to grow green profits.

Roth, Green Business Coach for Entrepreneur.com and the founder of Earth 2017, partnered with Eco-Libris in the past to green up his important book, "On Empty (Out of Time)".

Now he has a new and a very exciting book entitled "The Secret Green Sauce" and now we're happy to collaborate with him again, planting one tree for every copy sold! Readers will also receive with their copy our "One tree planted for this book" sticker they can put on the book.

"The Secret Green Sauce" profiles the best practices being used by actual companies to grow green revenues. Bill Roth assembled these best practices through a two-year effort of searching from and interviewing, the business pioneers who are successfully building green businesses and launching green products.

Bill Roth is offering a FREE 1st chapter on Earth 2017 website. The book is available for sale both in a paper and electronic versions on the website at www.earth2017.com/free-the-secret-green-sauce

I'm already reading it and I find it very innovative and interesting. We'll soon post here a review of the book, as well as an interview with Bill Roth on his book, so stay tuned!

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainable reading!

Green printing tip no. 23: Are there inexpensive Green papers for brochures?

We have another tip for you on our weekly series of green printing tips, where we bring you information on green printing in collaboration with Greg Barber, an experienced eco-friendly printer.

Today Greg continues a 4-part series that is focusing on paper and paper companies and writes about one of the most well known eco-friendly papers.

Are there inexpensive Green papers for brochures?

Tip #23

I started my paper discussions with Mohawk and Neenah in the past two weeks and this week I want to bring you up to date with Cascades, and the number one question I am asked.

Cascades, formerly known as Rolland Paper, from Canada, was one of the first paper mills that I featured, along my 20 year mission. They developed one of the first 100% post-consumer waste papers, and that grade was called New Life DP. For many years I sold that grade to the government under a GSA contract I was awarded.

Approximately two years ago, Rolland became Cascades, and New Life DP became Enviro 100. I certainly agreed with the new name, and Enviro is one of my favorite environmental papers.

The reasons are:

1. Enviro prints well.
2. Enviro is third party certified for 100% PCW and 100% PCF.
3. Enviro has terrific bulk in their text & cover weights.
4. Enviro is "priced" to compete against non environmental papers.
5. Enviro comes in 20# for Xerox and laser work.
6. Enviro has good opacity.
7. Enviro has been my house sheet for 10 years and we have gotten rave reviews from many of our clients.

Enviro comes in 50#,60#, 70#, 80# and 100# text and 80# and 100# cover, as well as the 20# for Xerox jobs.

When young designers ask me if they can switch their clients to being environmental and be price competitive, I tell them Enviro is priced like an inexpensive opaque paper, but prints like an expensive text line. I have an example on my website at www.gregbarberco.com of saving one client $7000, on the paper alone on a brochure job, that needed 5000 pounds of paper. The
savings on Enviro was the reason we both got the job.

The Cascades mill uses BioGas for their energy. They are FSC certified, and they are less than 10 hours from our market, which helps the carbon footprint.

As I mentioned, I have a very good experience with the Enviro - I have done jobs for Diesel Jeans, Feed LLC, Gaia Soil, several art galleries, and many colleges and universities. I also sold to the EPA, and the U.S Fish & Wildlife the 20# paper, during my GSA contract days, with great results.

Interested? Call me (or email me at greg@ecofriendlyprinter.com) for samples.

Also, if you have any questions you would like us to address in future tips please email us to info@ecolibris.net .

Latest tips:

Green Printing Tip #22 - What does I-Tone mean?

Green Printing Tip #21 - What new developments have surfaced in Green papers?

Green Printing Tip #20 - How to create a green packaging job?

Green Printing Tip #19 - How can graphic designers make a difference and green up your printing jobs?

You can find links to all the tips we published so far on our green printing tips page, which is part of our green printing tools & resources.

You can also find further valuable information on Greg Barber Company's website - http://www.gregbarberco.com.

Yours,

Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: promoting green printing!

Looking for a unique and affordable green birthday gift?

What's the connection between Leonardo DiCaprio, Charles Manson and actresses Calista Flockhart (or should we say Ally McBeal) and Demi Moore?

They were all born on November 11! If you're also celebrating your birthday today - happy birthday to you too!

We love birthdays and therefore we're happy to remind you of the option to celebrate a birthday of friends, family members, colleagues and anyone you care about with Eco-Libris!

Eco-Libris is offering you now to plant trees to balance out the books of your loved ones who celebrate their birthday. Not only that new trees will be planted to balance out their books, but they will also receive our stickers with a beautiful birthday card made of recycled paper. And we also try to keep it affordable - the added charge for the birthday card is only $1.5.

All you need to do is to choose how many of the birthday person's books you want to balance out on our special birthday gift page (http://www.ecolibris.net/birthday.asp), change the shipping address on the payment page to the address of the gift receiver and we will take care of the rest!

This is also a great green add-on if you're buying a book as a gift for the birthday person, especially if you're buying her or him a green book.

The birthday cards we send are made by Doodle Greetings (see picture above of one of their cards). Not only these cards come with a beautiful design, but they are also eco-friendly - printed on 100% post-consumer recycled paper and are made chlorine-free and acid free. Sounds like a good fit with Eco-Libris stickers!

And of course, if it's your birthday and you want to give yourself a green gift - get yourself a nice green book and plant a tree for it with us!

Happy Birthday!
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: promoting sustainable reading!