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Because corporations are doing the majority of that pro-environmental advertising. I mean that both in terms of companies making changes (both real and greenwas

• bilbo0s 4y ago
  This. We need to learn that corporations care even less about the environment than they care about remote work. Invoking the environment to gain their support of remote work is just misunderstanding their priorities. The game is to make remote work attractive to them. You think Elon Musk wants to hear your spiel about the environment? Or does he want you to get back into your office and work a 16 hour day? If we want to get corporate america on the side of remote work, then we need to do it with dollars and cents. Not "indirect savings", not "improved morale", but concrete examples of how remote work is increasing their profit. (Even better, would be if it could increase their revenue as well. That would be a slam dunk.) We almost got there with the idea of lowering rent costs after the pandemic, but now it just seems that the idea of getting rid of office space in favor of remote work is getting a lot of push back. Maybe even backlash would be a better term.
  • crypot 4y ago
    Even the environmentalists don't care about the environment. 45000 people went to cop27.
    • baxtr 4y ago
      Which happened to be in a desert. They cooled the venue down so that people were freezing inside. What a joke.
    • mr_toad 4y ago
      I thought they arrested all the environmentalists and only let the politicians attend.
  • osigurdson 4y ago
    >> Or does he want you to get back into your office and work a 16 hour day? I'm OK with working 16 hour days on something that matters (obviously burn out needs to be kept in check - it can't be done forever). I realize that I might be "wired" differently than others as I care a bit less about work life balance and more about accomplishment (not proud of it). I see no reason why this can't be done at the beach house however. In fact, I'm convinced it would be better as commuting is a burnout accelerator.
    • ako 4y ago
      Not sure how a 16 hour workday fits if you also need to sleep, shop, cook, clean, take care of the kids, keep in contact with your friends and family, and exercise.
      • ljf 4y ago
        It doesn't - unless you need very little sleep. I had a crunch delivery before we had kids, and it was hell. In the office by 9, leaving around 3 or even 4am. 'Luckily' the office paid for cabs and food and tried to make it as good as they good for us, but I didn't see friends, barely saw my wife and felt rotten at the weekends. BUT, we delivered some amazing work, was well compensated, and otherwise rewarded by the company. Many of those who did the work are still there and still rate it as a place to be. It was a one off that we all swore off repeating, but I don't regret it or the work we delivered.
      • deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
    • renewedrebecca 4y ago
      Unless we’re talking about finding a cure for cancer, there isn’t anything that matters enough to work 16 hour days.
• bilekas 4y ago
  > Musk's text message conversation during Twitter-lawsuit discovery I only saw this now : https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2022/09/elon-musk-texts-twitter-trial-jack-dorsey/671619/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2022/09/elon-... It's actually kind of incredible how it all seems to work. The cringe too of the fawning is a good indicator why Musk feels he can do whatever he likes, including attempting to troll everyone on his board. It seems so juvenile.
  • toomuchtodo 4y ago
    Important to note that wealth doesn't improve your character; it simply amplifies who you already are.
    • beebmam 4y ago
      Power corrupts.
      • dehrmann 4y ago
        The interesting point a nearby comment made was it corrupts those around you. That gets lost in that aphorism.
        • api 4y ago
          I think the mechanism is: it makes you surrounded by corrupt people and sycophants, which in turn over time corrupts you.
        • User23 4y ago
          Lord Acton's maxim is "Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely." The dumbed down paraphrases lose most of the insight. It's a little masterpiece of the English language, and as you note, who or what exactly is being corrupted, absolutely or otherwise, is intentionally underspecified.
    • Jenk 4y ago
      It's also incredibly lonely at times - despite being constantly surrounded by people - which I figure can warp your mind much like too much solitary confinement can. I don't say this from personal experience (un)fortunately, I say this as someone who has a family member that is a confidant of a billionaire from the middle-east (whom I'll refer to as Bob.) The family member is one of their close staff - travels with them everywhere and is in close proximity, daily - and possibly their most intimate friend as a result of this close proximity for the better part of 40 years, and the below. In Bob's life he is surrounded by sycophants waiting for handouts, never wanting to be seen to annoy Bob nor lose his favour. Bob does not know who to trust. He has had those that he considered real friends and deeply trustworthy turn out to be thiefs and liars. A former school friend was secretly living in one of Bob's holiday homes _for years_, successfully evading detection by Bob by using his friendship to know where and when Bob will be. He was using his ties to Bob (and Bob's success) to gain favour in his own business and was using some of this money to bribe Bob's staff into silence. Apparently the friend went full "villain in disguise reveals his secret vendetta" when Bob asked if the friend needs help. Bob was heartbroken. Maids, servers, and other staff are stealing things all the time - Bob maintains and reviews an inventory of stolen property with his security detail, with monthly targets... theft of his belongings is an ever present cost to Bob. e Bob's own family live an excessively sheltered life. His young children's best friends are their personal body guards - former military personnel that must be present around the clock as a stipulation of their kidknap/ransom insurance. This isn't a perceived threat, either. Bob's eldest son was abducted on at least one occassion, by a policeman no less. Bob's life is managed for him. His staff manage his diet, his wardrobe(s), his social diary, of course his work engagenments take him all over the world often with little notice. He is never entirely certain where he will be and when. He is a slave to his diaries. Bob spends the majority of his birthdays alone, on the phone to my family member, often crying about how lonely he is. All that for money seems like a lot to sacrifice. There's also a fascinating effect that happens when the cost of things are literally of no consequence. Sentimentality is the only measure of value and material objects are just.. nothing but utilities. Anyway, I would safely assume being a billionaire is not all doom and gloom, but it certainly has a different set of life-problems.
• _huayra_ 4y ago
  > and revitalized suburban neighborhoods (e.g. more walkable areas) Without other changes, this would not happen (in the US at least). The default would be every more cookie-cutter suburban sprawl, with the cul-de-sac-y construction of these neighborhoods creating a more labrynthian, difficult-to-walk place to live. Until there is more mixed-use zoning in the US, with high enough density to justify frequent public transit arrival times, WFH would only save the car and infra wear-and-tear (and pollution level) from commuting, but it would not necessarily create a "third place" automatically.
  • rustybelt 4y ago
    I disagree, yes zoning changes could be needed, but the presence of more daytime workers at home in suburban areas creates new opportunities for restaurants, coffee shops, and other conveniences that cater to those workers.
    • neutronicus 4y ago
      Right, so the main road will have a Starbucks off it
      • Spivak 4y ago
        I mean yes and. There's an entire industry of restaurants that cater to providing food to workers in business districts. They move to where the people are. I don't think suburban neighborhoods having hyperlocal businesses would ever be considered a bad thing.
        • neutronicus 4y ago
          Well, the comment up the chain implied that more demand for businesses would result in suburbs getting more walkable. I was implying that the demand would likely be met with strip-malls and residents would still drive everywhere.
        • b3morales 4y ago
          The restaurants are there and successful because of the density, though. The falafel shop around the corner from three multi-storey office buildings can't afford to have a location in every suburb that formerly sent workers to the business district. There's existing evidence for this: how many restaurants do you see in standalone office parks? A few perhaps, but nothing like what's downtown.
• makestuff 4y ago
  Aren't suburban neighborhoods actually bad for the environment though. Also the lack population density makes it hard to support the infrastructure costs for a large area with fewer people.
  • Spivak 4y ago
    It's complicated, so yes because the reasons you state but in a world where significantly fewer people commute it becomes less of an issue and so it's a matter of changing the things we can change. So yes, wouldn't it be great people lived in denser environments? Oh yeah, but that's not the choice we're making today. The choice we're making is given that lots of people live a 20-60 minute drive from their jobs would we rather they commute into work or work remotely?
    • anikom15 4y ago
      The incentive to live in a dense environment is being close to work. If work is at home then that incentive is gone.
      • akgerber 4y ago
        A dense environment also has a lot of daily destinations within walking distance. That's also very nice when one works from home— either working from home in my Brooklyn apartment, or working from home at my parents' house in a Midwestern streetcar suburb where restaurants/coffeeshops/grocery stores/parks/bars are also a pleasant walk away.
        • anikom15 4y ago
          The Midwestern environment doesn’t have high-density housing though. That’s what matters for conservation.
          • akgerber 4y ago
            There is plenty of dense housing in prewar sections of Midwestern cities. Not as much as there used to be, unfortunately, but quite a bit, and available very affordably.
• ibejoeb 4y ago
  I don't intend to de-rail the convo, but this is an important one. > improve inter-family relationships It could, maybe, but it can also be a significant source of strife. It's tough spending all day, every day with someone. Because of that, you find that people are either looking for larger homes in order to have private work spaces or renting office space. Both of those shift the cost burden from the company to the individual.
  • ljf 4y ago
    You are very right - I am very lucky to have a shed/office I can hide away in and get some great work done in. I'd say it is a far better and more comfortable space than any office I've worked in. But when I had to work at the kitchen table with my wife and family in other rooms in the house it was so much harder. For those with room, especially if you have a good sized commute, remote working is great (I really really value being able to eat with my kids and hang out in the evening), but you are right that if you are two people in a small 1 bed flat, or a few people in a house share, or just a family in a standard family house, then yes remote working is not always going to be a bonus.
    • Asooka 4y ago
      I can't imagine living in a home where every member doesn't have their own quiet/study/work space. I say this as someone who has lived most of his life in apartment buildings where that was a bit challenging, but definitely not impossible. I guess maybe if you are used to living your life outside of the house an just visit to eat and sleep you feel differently, but that's the beauty of WFH - you get to pick what best works for you.
      • ljf 4y ago
        Very much this, but I've been lucky and riden the house price increases well to end up in a largeish place - but even then if I didn't have a garden office it would be hard. Two friends if mine move to the nearest city and got a small one bed as they both do a lot out of the flat - theatre, movies, bars, sports etc - so the house was really a place to sleep and shower, plus eat and relax a little. Home working for them meant losing space in their kitchen/livingroom/dining room - and having one of them work from the bed room. Inner city UK flats are often very small, and still relatively expensive.
• JTbane 4y ago
  It's kind of depressing that greenwashing is so effective: see companies like ConocoPhillips getting stellar ESG ratings despite their business models.
• krageon 4y ago
  Exactly this is the reason, but I'll go even further and say that no corporation will advertise something "green" that might require actual effort on their part. The clear fact is that environmental impact is almost entirely the fault of corporations. Advertising for consumers to do anything to impact this is distracting them from the real issue: the corporations advertising to them. It is for this reason that you will never find anything that makes sense advertised as green or efficient. Corporations are things that exist solely to exploit: nothing in their core impulses moves them to be kind or understanding. Anything that makes it seem otherwise must be regarded with suspicion.
  • opportune 4y ago
    In my experiencing greenwashing is just as likely to be used to shame normal consumer behavior into reducing costs for businesses (do you really want those plastic utensils with your takeout? Do you really need to use that much water in your hotel room? Do you really need fresh towels every day?) as it is to actually help the environment. Most of the time corporations claim to be doing something in a carbon-neutral way it's because they are purchasing offsets where you just have to believe that they are actually computing the carbon costs appropriately and the offsets are "real" anyway.
    • antifa 4y ago
      > do you really want those plastic utensils with your takeout? There's a place where I always uncheck "include utensils" and they always give me 8 people's worth of them anyways.
    • kmacdough 4y ago
      At its core, "reduce" generally benefits both the environment and the bottom line. Additionally, many employees wish their company was more environmental, but cannot make their case unless it aligns with the business. A slight rewording of your point highlights the opportunity: change happens when business and environmental needs align. This means, the people's best (only) play is to craft policies and institutions that align business incentives with environmental goals (e.g. emission cap 'n trade, grants, etc.). For example, a central repository of public holistic impact assessments could force PR teams to focus on real impact over trivial greenwashing campaigns. While the national level gets the most focus, local/state governments can move move faster and serve as models for larger change.