I have said this in the past and I will say it again....Junk mail in my postal mail box irritates the hell out of me. It is nothing but a crime. I have written to and called many of these junk mailers. Junk reduces for a little while and then it picks up again. It never goes away.Needless to say when Joel Makower blogged about a new startup company called greendimes, created to stop junk mail for 3$ a month, I couldn't help but say... Why didn't I ever think of that?
Founded by Pankaj Shah, greendimes will, in their words, "hound" the junk mailers till they stop and get your name off the mailing list. At the same time they will also plant trees. All this for 3 dollars a month(a dime a day). Here is what they say...
We ha’ve built a database of all the major direct marketing companies (aka junk mailers) and we send a request to remove your name and address from their mailing lists. These companies are required to remove you from their marketing lists. Also, using the Federal Fair Credit Reporting Act we direct them not to sell, share, or trade your personal information with other companies. Then, to make sure they don't put you back on their lists, we'’ll check up on them regularly.I agree with Joel Makower, the value proposition is simple and straightforward. I do however have a few concerns. First of all, junk mailers are persistent parasites. I have tried and tried and have not been successful in getting them off my back. Secondly, tree planting is a good notion but one that needs careful and commited execution. We all know what happened to ColdPlay's good intentions of planting trees & carbon neutralizing their second album.
We have developed partnerships with reforestation and agri-forestry projects in Haiti, India, and Senegal. Your tree a month does much more for these countries than reforestation though; our reforestation partners work in the local communities to keep local people productive on their own lands, preserving their traditional livelihoods and cultures for generations to come
Having said all that, I think I will give it a try. The possibilities outweigh my concerns
1 comment:
greendimes is great, i think more wealthy celebrities and athletes should give up some of the ridiculous amounts of money they make off of the general public to sustainable organizations and efforts. The problem is there not always smart about it, like ColdPlay, I think its because their more worried about the publicity they are going to get by doing it. If you want to give money do annoymosly because you want to, not so everyone will see how good you are.
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