Earth Day Green Campaign - 41 Reasons to Plant a Tree for Your Book: Reason no. 31

We continue today with our Earth Day campaign - 41 Reasons to Plant a Tree for Your Book, where we share with you 41 reasons provided by readers in celebration of the upcoming 41st anniversary of Earth Day!

With more than 190,000 trees planted so far on behalf of readers, authors and publishers working with Eco-Libris, it's no surprise that we think planting trees to green up books is a great idea.. But we also want to hear what readers think about it and why they believe planting trees for their books is a good idea.

So for 41 days until Earth Day, we publish here the 41 best replies we receive, one reply a day. All replies are gathered and presented on the Earth Day 2011 page.

Reason no. 31:
This is a great opportunity to do more for mother earth. Everybody win here - it's good for the planet and for book lovers who gets a chance to take action and do their share - Robin

Thank you Robin for sharing with us your thoughts on planting trees for your books!

Robin, just like all the other readers whose replies we'll publish, is winning one of the great 41 prizes we give away on this campaign, courtesy of our partners. Winners can choose their prize from a great list of gifts including audiobooks from Simon & Schuster Audio (such as The Half Life by Jennifer Weiner, Left Neglected by Lisa Genova and Essence of Happiness by the Dalai Lama) and great books, like Spit That Out! by Paige Wolf and The Healthy Home by Dave Wentz and Dr. Myron Wentz. You can see the full list of the prizes on the campaign's page.

Every day we'll give further details on one of the prizes. Today we present you with the book Four Fish: The Future of the Last Wild Food by Paul Greenberg.

Four Fish: The Future of the Last Wild Food by Paul Greenberg - Our relationship with the ocean is undergoing a profound transformation. Whereas just three decades ago nearly everything we ate from the sea was wild, rampant overfishing combined with an unprecedented bio-tech revolution has brought us to a point where wild and farmed fish occupy equal parts of a complex and confusing marketplace. We stand at the edge of a cataclysm; there is a distinct possibility that our children's children will never eat a wild fish that has swum freely in the sea.

In Four Fish, award-winning writer and lifelong fisherman Paul Greenberg takes us on a culinary journey, exploring the history of the fish that dominate our menus---salmon, sea bass, cod and tuna-and examining where each stands at this critical moment in time. He visits Norwegian mega farms that use genetic techniques once pioneered on sheep to grow millions of pounds of salmon a year. He travels to the ancestral river of the Yupik Eskimos to see the only Fair Trade certified fishing company in the world. He investigates the way PCBs and mercury find their way into seafood; discovers how Mediterranean sea bass went global; Challenges the author of Cod to taste the difference between a farmed and a wild cod; and almost sinks to the bottom of the South Pacific while searching for an alternative to endangered bluefin tuna.

Fish, Greenberg reveals, are the last truly wild food - for now. By examining the forces that get fish to our dinner tables, he shows how we can start to heal the oceans and fight for a world where healthy and sustainable seafood is the rule rather than the exception.

If you want to participate in the campaign, we still have some spots available so please send us your reply it to info@ecolibris.net. We look forward to hearing from you.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainable reading!

Disney and HarperCollins - RAN is just behind you!

We are following for some time after RAN's campaign aiming to ensure children's books are not printed on paper linked to Indonesian rainforest destruction. Their efforts, which included the release of a detailed report report a consumer guide, are focusing now on two publishers that are still: Disney Publishing and HarperCollins.

We were curious to hear how's the campaign is going and asked Robin Averbeck, RAN's forest campaigner and Lafcadio Cortesi, RAN's forest campaign director to tell us more about it.

Hi Robin and Lafcadio. Can you tell us more about this campaign and what you achieved so far?

RAN started this campaign in early 2010 by fiber testing three books printed in China on coated papers from each of the top ten U.S. children's book publishers. We were surprised to find mixed tropical hardwoods and/or acacia fiber, both from the clearing and conversion of Indonesia's rainforests, in 60% of the books we tested. We released these findings in a report in late May and followed it up with a lot education and outreach to publishers.

After a period of education and engagement with publishers, we decided to release a consumer guide in November, which ranked publishers based on their commitments related to Indonesian rainforests and their broader environmental policies and practices. We gave each publisher one of three designations: Recommended, Can do better, or Avoid. Recommended publishers were publishers that committed to phase controversial Indonesian fiber and suppliers APP and APRIL until reforms are achieved and had a comprehensive paper policy or a commitment to create one.

This group included Scholastic, Hachette, Simon & Schuster, Pearson/Penguin Group, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Macmillan, and Candlewick Press. Publishers that can do better include Random House and Sterling Publishing. Both made commitments to improve their paper practices and phase out controversial Indonesian fiber until reforms are achieved but had not committed to eliminating controversial suppliers APP and APRIL. Lastly, publishers to avoid are Disney Publishing and HarperCollins, and they have made no commitments to protecting Indonesia's or other endangered forests.

When we started this work, only one company, Scholastic, had taken formal action to eliminate ties with APP and APRIL and phase out controversial Indonesian fiber from their supply chain, but after engaging the others through the report and consumer guide process, we helped the vast majority of major U.S. children's book publishers to realize their impact on Indonesia's forests, understand the severity of the problem, and take action. We plan to ensure that publishers really follow through and implement their commitments and also keep up the pressure on the remaining laggards of the industry, HarperCollins and Disney Publishing. Here’s a blog we just wrote about Disney’s recent paper policy, which sadly falls short for Indonesia’s and other forests.

Why do you think Disney Publishing and HarperCollins don't agree to join the other publishers in taking steps to protect Indonesia's rainforests?

The only way to really know is to ask Disney Publishing and HarperCollins. If I were to speculate, I would guess they haven't taken action because it costs more money to be environmentally and socially responsible, and they believe they can get away with business as usual by simply paying lip service to these issues rather than taking meaningful action.

Do you think readers care about this issue? If they do, is there any evidence that they're willing to take these concerns into consideration when buying children's books?

I know readers care about this issue. From our first emails about this work to our most recent blog posts, people are following this campaign and have a lot to say. Mostly, people are shocked to discover that some of their favorite books (even those about environmental issues) are being printed on papers contributing to destruction of some of the world's most precious rainforests. People downloaded our book guide in large numbers, and many contributed to our rainforest-safe book database by going out to their local bookstores and sleuthing for books printed on recycled and FSC-certified papers.

From your experience in this campaign - What are the most effective ways to increase book lovers' awareness and get them to do the right thing?

Well, book lovers by and large are people who already care about the environment. For us, any sort of educational outreach has been met with a very positive response. However, to some extent consumer choice is different in the category of books than it is for other paper products, like toilet paper for example.

If someone wants a certain book but it is printed on environmentally unsound paper, they can't just buy a different book and get the same product. That's why it's so important that consumers put their concerns directly to the publisher to advocate for changes. Right now, we have an email campaign to Disney where people can voice their concerns, but picking up the phone, sending personal emails and letters, writing concerns on publishers' Facebook pages, etc. are always great too.

Of course, buying used books or using the local library are also good environmental options that we support. However, for a reader, these options won't always yield the book that is wanted, so again, it’s essential for consumers to voice concerns directly to the publishers.

It’s also very important for authors to learn about and talk with their publishers about these issues – requesting that their books be printed on environmentally responsible paper. The authors we’ve spoken with care and some have already taken action.

What do you tell supporters who ask you whether buying e-books won't be the most simple way to solve the problem and hence publishers should be encouraged to move from paper books to e-books?

Well, we know that electronic devices don't solve our environmental problems, they usually just present a different set of challenges related to mining, disposal, etc. We haven't done a lifecycle analysis to compare environmental impacts of e-reader vs. paper, so we can't speak to comparative pros and cons. We can say, however, if you're using paper, make sure it's good paper.

What will be your next steps in this campaign?

RAN will continue to track the progress of publishers we included in our first consumer guide as well as others. We also plan to keep up the pressure on the remaining laggards of the industry, HarperCollins and Disney Publishing. You can look forward to more from us in the months ahead, and for anyone who would like to keep up with us, they can join our Rapid Responder list.

Thank you Robin and Lafcadio!

To learn more visit http://www.ran.org/bookguide

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainable reading!


* Photos courtesy of RAN

Earth Day 2011 Campaign - 41 Reasons to Plant a Tree for Your Book: Reason no. 30

We continue today with our Earth Day campaign - 41 Reasons to Plant a Tree for Your Book, where we share with you 41 reasons provided by readers in celebration of the upcoming 41st anniversary of Earth Day!

With more than 180,000 trees planted so far on behalf of readers, authors and publishers working with Eco-Libris, it's no surprise that we think planting trees to green up books is a great idea.. But we also want to hear what readers think about it and why they believe planting trees for their books is a good idea.

So for 41 days until Earth Day, we publish here the 41 best replies we receive, one reply a day. All replies are gathered and presented on the Earth Day 2011 page.

Reason no. 30:
Because trees and books are great treasures and it's a wonderful way to conserve them both! - David

Thank you David for sharing with us your thoughts on planting trees for your books!

David, just like all the other readers whose replies we'll publish, is winning one of the great 41 prizes we give away on this campaign, courtesy of our partners. Winners can choose their prize from a great list of gifts including audiobooks from Simon & Schuster Audio (such as The Half Life by Jennifer Weiner, Left Neglected by Lisa Genova and Essence of Happiness by the Dalai Lama) and great books, like Planet Home by Jeffrey Hollender, Spit That Out! by Paige Wolf and The Healthy Home by Dave Wentz and Dr. Myron Wentz. You can see the full list of the prizes on the campaign's page.

Every day we'll give further details on one of the prizes. Today we present you with the audiobook Gideon's War by Howard Gordon.

Gideon's War - Howard Gordon - the longtime executive producer of the hit TV series — makes his fiction debut with a tale of political intrigue and international terrorism. Gideon Davis has just 48 hours to bring his rogue agent brother in—before a twisted global conspiracy turns deadly.

GIDEON DAVIS, whose behind-the-scenes negotiating skills have earned him the role of peacemaker in conflicts around the globe, knows more about hush-hush discussions in Capitol corridors than he does about hand-to-hand combat. But his more practical, tactical skills come into play when he’s called on by family friend and government bigwig Earl Parker to chaperone a rogue agent from Southeast Asia to D.C. The agent, Tillman Davis, has promised to turn himself in— but only to his brother, Gideon.

Although the two brothers have been estranged for years, Gideon cannot fathom how his brother could have turned into so ruthless a man. But when the plan for Tillman’s surrender goes awry and Earl Parker is taken hostage, Gideon is forced to embrace his dark side in order to evade hostile locals in war-torn Mohan to make his way to the Obelisk—the multimillion-dollar, state-of-the-art oil rig that has been seized by terrorists led by Tillman himself. It is with the help of oil rig manager Kate Murphy that Gideon launches an unlikely one-man rescue.

If you want to participate in the campaign, we still have some spots available so please send us your reply it to info@ecolibris.net. We look forward to hearing from you.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainable reading!

Earth Day 2011 Campaign - 41 Reasons to Plant a Tree for Your Book: Reason no. 29

We continue with our Earth Day campaign - 41 Reasons to Plant a Tree for Your Book, where we share with you 41 reasons provided by readers in celebration of the upcoming 41st anniversary of Earth Day!

With more than 180,000 trees planted so far on behalf of readers, authors and publishers working with Eco-Libris, it's no surprise that we think planting trees to green up books is a great idea.. But we also want to hear what readers think about it and why they believe planting trees for their books is a good idea.

So for 41 days until Earth Day, we publish here the 41 best replies we receive, one reply a day. All replies are gathered and presented on the Earth Day 2011 page.

Reason no. 29:
""I used to think that trees actually had hearts that beat (perhaps they do). They are beautiful and awe inspiring, especially considering the age some attain and the history they have witnessed. They are also the "lungs of our earth," giving back the oxygen we need. We should revere them, not wantonly destroy them." ~ Josephine Wall" - Rachael Butler

Thank you Rachael for sharing with us your thoughts on planting trees for your books!

Rachael, just like all the other readers whose replies we'll publish, is winning one of the great 41 prizes we give away on this campaign, courtesy of our partners. Winners can choose their prize from a great list of gifts including audiobooks from Simon & Schuster Audio (such as The Half Life by Jennifer Weiner, Left Neglected by Lisa Genova and Essence of Happiness by the Dalai Lama) and great books, like Planet Home by Jeffrey Hollender, Spit That Out! by Paige Wolf and The Healthy Home by Dave Wentz and Dr. Myron Wentz. You can see the full list of the prizes on the campaign's page.

Every day we'll give further details on one of the prizes. Today we present you with the audiobook Essence of Happiness by the Dalai Lama.

Essence of Happiness by the Dalai Lama - Meditations and Spiritual Wisdom on Achieving Lasting Happiness from His Holiness the Dalai Lama

The Dalai Lama inspired millions around the world with his wisdom and compassion in The Art of Happiness. Now, in The Essence of Happiness, some of His Holiness’s most unforgettable insights are presented in a meditative audiobook that listeners will return to again and again. Offering sage advice on defeating day-to-day depression, anxiety, anger, jealousy, and other emotions that get in the way of true happiness, The Essence of Happiness contains transforming reflections on overcoming suffering and obstacles to create a fulfilled, joyous life.

The Essence of Happiness is truly an indispensable guide for living.

If you want to participate in the campaign, we still have some spots available so please send us your reply it to info@ecolibris.net. We look forward to hearing from you.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainable reading!

Earth Day Campaign - 41 Reasons to Plant a Tree for Your Book: Reason no. 28

We continue with our Earth Day campaign - 41 Reasons to Plant a Tree for Your Book, where we share with you 41 reasons provided by readers in celebration of the upcoming 41st anniversary of Earth Day!

With more than 180,000 trees planted so far on behalf of readers, authors and publishers working with Eco-Libris, it's no surprise that we think planting trees to green up books is a great idea.. But we also want to hear what readers think about it and why they believe planting trees for their books is a good idea.

So for 41 days until Earth Day, we publish here the 41 best replies we receive, one reply a day. All replies are gathered and presented on the Earth Day 2011 page.

Reason no. 28:

I am a librarian in a primary school. In our library, we have 20,000 books! I wonder how many trees that is! I love books and I love trees. I want to plant trees so that we will always have trees and books in our beautiful world. -Debbie Nance

Thank you Debbie for sharing with us your thoughts on planting trees for your books!

Debbie, just like all the other readers whose replies we'll publish, is winning one of the great 41 prizes we give away on this campaign, courtesy of our partners. Winners can choose their prize from a great list of gifts including audiobooks from Simon & Schuster Audio (such as The Half Life by Jennifer Weiner, Left Neglected by Lisa Genova and Essence of Happiness by the Dalai Lama) and great books, like Planet Home by Jeffrey Hollender, Spit That Out! by Paige Wolf and The Healthy Home by Dave Wentz and Dr. Myron Wentz. You can see the full list of the prizes on the campaign's page.

Every day we'll give further details on one of the prizes. Today we present you with the audiobook $25 gift card for Strand Bookstore.

$25 gift card for Strand Bookstore - Located in 828 Broadway (at 12th St.), this New York's independent landmark bookstore is one of most famous bookstores in the world. With over 200 employees, more than 2.5 million used, new and rare books, a renovated main store and a growing author events program, the Strand looks forward to offering great books at great prices to book-lovers worldwide for another 80 years.

Don't forget to check their list of events at www.strandbooks.com/events_upcoming-events/. On April Strand will host authors such as Meg Howrey, Mira Bartok, Professor Nan M. Sussman, Siva Vaidhyanathan and many others so check it out!

Strand bookstore is also a partner of Eco-Libris. Strand are taking part in our bookstore program and customers at the store can plant a tree for every book they buy there and receive our sticker at the counter!

Here's a video with Fred Bass, the owner of NYCs legendary Strand Book Store, who talks about the past, present and future of the store his father opened on New York's famous Book Row in 1927:



If you want to participate in the campaign, we still have some spots available so please send us your reply it to info@ecolibris.net. We look forward to hearing from you.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainable reading!

Earth Day Campaign - 41 Reasons to Plant a Tree for Your Book: Reason no. 27

We continue with our Earth Day campaign - 41 Reasons to Plant a Tree for Your Book, where we share with you 41 reasons provided by readers in celebration of the upcoming 41st anniversary of Earth Day!

With more than 180,000 trees planted so far on behalf of readers, authors and publishers working with Eco-Libris, it's no surprise that we think planting trees to green up books is a great idea.. But we also want to hear what readers think about it and why they believe planting trees for their books is a good idea.

So for 41 days until Earth Day, we publish here the 41 best replies we receive, one reply a day. All replies are gathered and presented on the Earth Day 2011 page.

Reason no. 27:
I would plant a tree because a tree can be so much more than a book, than an offset for the paper I use or for the emissions I send into the atmosphere. A tree for me defines place, provokes thought, and is a subject of amazement. It is a tiny tick mark in time, like a book is, but forever timeless. - Joost

Thank you Joost for sharing with us your thoughts on planting trees for your books!

Joost, just like all the other readers whose replies we'll publish, is winning one of the great 41 prizes we give away on this campaign, courtesy of our partners. Winners can choose their prize from a great list of gifts including audiobooks from Simon & Schuster Audio (such as The Half Life by Jennifer Weiner, Left Neglected by Lisa Genova and Essence of Happiness by the Dalai Lama) and great books, like Planet Home by Jeffrey Hollender, Spit That Out! by Paige Wolf and The Healthy Home by Dave Wentz and Dr. Myron Wentz. You can see the full list of the prizes on the campaign's page.

Every day we'll give further details on one of the prizes. Today we present you with the audiobook Essence of Happiness by the Dalai Lama.

Essence of Happiness by the Dalai Lama - Meditations and Spiritual Wisdom on Achieving Lasting Happiness from His Holiness the Dalai Lama

The Dalai Lama inspired millions around the world with his wisdom and compassion in The Art of Happiness. Now, in The Essence of Happiness, some of His Holiness’s most unforgettable insights are presented in a meditative audiobook that listeners will return to again and again. Offering sage advice on defeating day-to-day depression, anxiety, anger, jealousy, and other emotions that get in the way of true happiness, The Essence of Happiness contains transforming reflections on overcoming suffering and obstacles to create a fulfilled, joyous life.

The Essence of Happiness is truly an indispensable guide for living.

If you want to participate in the campaign, we still have some spots available so please send us your reply it to info@ecolibris.net. We look forward to hearing from you.

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainable reading!

Interested in borrowing an ebook? Check our comparison of BookLending and eBookFling

As ebook lending becomes a growing trend, we see more websites that fulfill the role of marketplace, matching ebook lenders and borrowers.

But who are these websites? And what they offer those of you who want to take advantage of the feature allowing Kindle and Nook users to swap ebooks with each others? We decided to provide you with a comparison of the three websites that seems to lead the ebook lending market - eBookFling, BookLending and Lendle.

At least that was our initial intention. We contacted the owners of these 3 websites and asked them to answer couple of questions, but only Catherine MacDonald of BookLending and George Burke of eBookFling got back to us. Although we wrote couple of times to Jeff Croft of Lendle, we didn't hear back from him. Therefore it's going to be a comparison between BookLending and eBookFling.

We hope you will find it useful and if you have any information or experiences with one of these websites you would like to add, feel free to add a comment!

First, a short video from each of the two websites and then a comparison between the two:







1. Who created the website?
BookLending (BL): Catherine MacDonald
eBookFling (EF): BookSwim

2. Lending Length
BL: 14 days
EF: 14 days

3. Where you're located?
BL: We are Canadians who are currently traveling abroad
EF: New Jersey

4. How many users you have? Are you serving also non-US users?
BL: We have over 19,000 users and we do serve non-US users.
EF: We crossed the 10,000 user mark in less than a week after launching. We've been growing steadily. These are all US-based members with plans to expand as soon as Amazon/B&N open up lending overseas.

5. Is it only available to both Kindle and Nook users?
BL: Yes, only Kindle users.
EF: Available to both Kindle and Nook users

6. Is it a free service?
BL: Yes. You don't need to pay anything to borrow ebooks, no matter if you make e-books available for loan or not.
EF: Yes, but only if other users borrow books from you. You get one credit point for every book you lend which can be used to borrow another ebook. But if you don't earn credit points (i.e. no one wants to borrow your books..), you will need buy credits for $1.99 per credit.

7. Do you need to loan books to others to be able to borrow?
BL: No. There's no such requirement.
EF: No, but then you'll need to pay $1.99 for every ebook you want to borrow.

8. What's your best user-friendly feature?
BL: Members love our Browse by Genre and "Read It Today" features.
EF: eBookFling.com allows members to manage notifications on books in their wishlist so they're not inundated with "this book is now available" emails for books they're not yet ready to read. Similarly, we send out loan requests one at a time, rather than blast all lenders every time someone asks to borrow a book.

9. How many people operate your business?
BL: Right now, we have a core group of two plus our wonderful development team.
EF: 4 of BookSwim's team initially founded the eBookFling.com service and we're expanding. We just hired a social media manager and are on the lookout for an ad-sales person.

10. What Is your business model?
BL: Commission and display advertising based.
EF: Revenue from credits, commission on ebook sales and in the future selling ad space and providing other services (acting as marketing tool for authors and publishers for example)

11. In one sentence - What differentiate you from the other websites?
BL: We're not just a free, fair and easy-to-use platform, but also a community of Kindle book enthusiasts.
EF: A. We manage the entire lend process by masking a book requester's email address which keeps the privacy of all our members while also allowing us to track when a book has been successfully delivered and reaching out to others if the loan never came through. B. Our use of credits as a swapping currency ensures that there is never any deficit of available books to borrow. C. As far as I'm aware, eBookFling.com is the only service with Nook and Kindle titles, allowing for more availability of books.

For more information visit eBookFling at http://ebookfling.com/ and BookLending at http://www.booklending.com/

Yours,
Raz @ Eco-Libris

Eco-Libris: Promoting sustainable reading!