Sundancechannel.Com Launches Original Web-Series “Eco-Heroes”

Sundance Channel has launched the original 13-part web series, “Eco- Heroes,” hosted and created by Majora Carter, an environmental activist and host of network’s eco-destination, THE GREEN. The web-series was announced today by Sundance Channel Senior Vice President, Digital Media and Business Strategy, Christopher Barry. “Eco-Heroes” will also air interstitially as part of THE GREEN each week on Sundance Channel on Tuesday nights.

Each “Eco Heroes” piece is a two-minute webisode in which Majora Carter interviews one person who has been an inspiration to her and her work.

The subjects of “Eco-Heroes” take advanced, cutting-edge environmental thinking and break it down in a manner that makes the information accessible to the general public. The video pieces are available to view at www.sundancechannel.com/thegreen and further information about the subjects are also available within Eco-mmunity, Sundance Channel’s online environmental forum featuring blogs, news and discussions, located at www.sundancechannel.com/ecommunity. Also featured on the Sundance Channel micro-site for THE GREEN are blog posts, discussion boards, extra footage and photos.

“‘Eco-Heroes’ continues Sundance Channel’s commitment to create original content for our digital platforms,” said Barry. “Majora Carter is an inspiration to so many people and to feature the people that inspire her is a great addition to our website.”

Eco-Heroes Subjects

Ira Ehrenpreis – General Partner Technology Partners
Ira leads the firm’s Cleantech investment practice, investing in Energy Technology, Water Technology, and Materials Science opportunities.

Shai Agassi – Founder and CEO Project Better Place
Shai is working to take the entire country of Israel of all oil.  View the video here.

Jerry Fiddler – Chairman Salazyne
Solazyme is a synthetic biology company that unleashes the power of marine microbes to create clean and scalable solutions for the renewable energy, industrial chemical, and specialty ingredient markets.

Sarah Gitlin – Student Activist
Sarah is working to make her highschool, Dalton Highschool in New York City, more environmentally friendly.

Zem Joaquin – Founder and Editor-In-Chief of Ecofabulous.com
Zem is a promoter of Cradle to Cradle design, meaning that everything that comes from the earth (and what doesn’t) should go back to the earth either as a biological nutrient or should include a plan for the next incarnation of the technical nutrients.

Adam Green – Founder and Director Rocking the Boat
Rocking the Boat is a boat building and environmental education program for students in the southwest Bronx.

Sherry Strong – nutritionist
Sherry is a chef & nutritionist who teaches people that what’s good for the body is good for the planet while still pleasing the palate.

Jonathan Demme– filmmaker
Majora and Jonathan discuss the representation of environmental issues in feature films.

Robert Thurman – Buddhist
Robert Tenzin Thurman is co-founder and current President of Tibet House U.S., a cultural institution dedicated to preserving and promoting the wisdom and the arts of the distinctive and endangered Tibetan civilization.

Zena Nelson – Founder South Bronx Food Cooperative
The South Bronx Food Cooperative is a green shopping alternative to what is generally offered in
the Bronx providing healthy and affordable food available to all who want it.

James Wells – South Bronx Greenway Steward
After spending ten years in jail for armed robbery, James graduated from Sustainable South Bronx’s Ecological Stewardship Training (B.E.S.T.). He now works as one of their Greenway Stewards tending to the trees and plants and installing green roofs in the South Bronx.

Morgan Simon – Co-Founder and Executive Director of Responsible Endowment Coaltion
The Responsible Endowments Coalition works to foster social and environmental change and to promote corporate reform through university endowments by educating and empowering a diverse community of university members and allies.

Joanna Opot – Executive Director of Starting Bloc
StartingBloc provides socially conscious undergraduate students and young professionals with the education, career opportunities and networks necessary to drive social, economic and environmental change through their careers and lives as engaged citizens.

THE GREEN, Sundance Channel’s Tuesday night programming destination devoted entirely to the environment, offers entertaining sources of information and inspiration about the planet we call home. THE GREEN original programs and interstitial segments provide viewers with ideas and tangible opportunities for all facets of their lives, demonstrating how to work green, play green, eat green, dress green and live green. THE GREEN can be found online at www.sundancechannel.com/thegreen; also find other green resources at Eco-mmunity, Sundance Channel’s online environmental forum featuring user-generated eco information, located at www.sundancechannel.com/ecommunity and on the Eco-mmunity Map, Sundance Channel’s green map tool that features local green resources throughout the world, located at www.sundancechannel.com/map.

Here is an ECO HEROES video with ADAM GREEN

Source: CSRwire

93 year old woman publishes first novel

A 93-year-old woman is having her first novel published and with the book’s proceeds plans to buy a large house in Devon so she can give a real home to some of her friends who are currently in nursing homes

Lorna Page of Surrey says: “I started writing as soon as I could hold a pencil; fairy stories, poetry, short stories, and now my novel, a who-done-it. Seems I’ve been writing for a hundred years and that’s practically true!’’

Ms. Page’s book A Dangerous Weakness is being published by AuthorHouse this July.

Lorna Page is busy at work on her next book, a collection of short stories.  “After all,” she says, “I have to buy a jolly big house for all the friends I have who are alone and need a home.”

A signed copy of A Dangerous Weakness can be ordered directly from the author at lornapage@gmail.comThis email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it or is available from Amazon.com.

Olympic athletes that beat the odds

If you live in the United States and plan to watch the 2008 Summer Olympics you will certainly hear inspiring, and deservedly heart warming stories of althletes that succeeded in spite of significant challenges.  In the sport of swimming alone you’ve likely already heard about Dara Torres and Eric Shanteau.  Torres, coming out of retirement at the age of 41 is setting records and Shanteau is battling testicular cancer but plans to postpone treatment until after the games.

Looking outside the US one can also find tremendous stories of athletes achieving their dreams while overcoming tremendous obstacles.

The BBC has a series online titled “Against the Odds” which profiles such inspiring athletes.   Follow these links to see the following stories:

Nery Brenes
Costa Rican sprinter who left behind a town hit by gang violence to get to Beijing

Bernadett Baczko
Neither family tragedy nor serious injury deterred this Hungarian judoka

Hem Bunting
A crumbling Cambodian athletics stadium is home to marathon runner Hem

Ziad Richa
Meet the Lebanese clay pigeon shooter training in the hills around Beirut

Vijender Kumar
An unsung boxing champion fights for recognition in cricket-mad India

Samiya Yuusf Omar
A 16-year-old’s amazing journey from war-ravaged Somalia to the Olympic Games

The BBC should be lauded for creating such a compelling series.

Positive Media legislated in Romania

Whether one sees the glass as half full or empty, one thing seems to be for sure in Romania - half is the right amount.

Last month, the Romanian Senate unanimously voted a law proposal forcing media to distribute 50% of positive news.  According to its instigators, the law will help to fight against “the extraordinary harms of negative news and their irreversible effects on health and people’s lives.”

The Senate wishes that TV and radio news programs feature as much ‘negative’ as ‘positive’ news.  The Romanian’s National Council for Audiovisual broadcasting is to validate the law - under which it will have the responsibility to decide what constitutes good or bad news.

But the Council swiftly criticized the law. “News is news, it is neither positive nor negative, it simply reflects reality,” said the Council’s president, Rasvan Popescu.

Press freedom organizations such as Reporters Without Borders have also criticized the proposal, comparing it to similar laws in authoritarian regimes.  While a number of editors may agree that the news agenda tends to be vastly ‘negative’, no law should seek to force the reverse.

Source: Lemonde.fr (link in French), The Editors Weblog

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