The artist is hunched over a table top of sketches stained with coffee rings, deadline looming, until an “A-ha” moment—where the dark clouds part and a solitary ray of inspiration shines through—and everything falls into place. It’s great drama, just like the witness breaking down on the stand and tearfully crying, “Yes! I did it!” or the bottom-of-the-ninth grand slam to win the big game. All of these things actually happen from time to time, but seldom mark the end of the journey. Tomorrow, the lawyer will file paperwork, the baseball team will practice for the next big game, and the artist will endeavor to turn that perfect sketch into valid XHTML.

It’s one thing to remind ourselves that great works take great work. After all, Thomas Edison was famously quoted, “Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration.” almost 100 years ago. Or you could look to Morihei Ueshiba, founder of Aikido, and passage 94 from Art of Peace.

Progress comes
To those who
Train and train;
Reliance on secret techniques
Will get you nowhere.

These are lessons that, despite those among us always looking for a short-cut, reside deep in our hearts.

It’s another thing to fully embrace what many creative professionals consider the ultimate enemy: the revision. Yes, the dilution of pristine output into stuff barely recognizable as art, fit only for lowest common denominator mass consumption. That’s certainly one way to look at it, but if that’s what is happening to your work, I have to say “Ur doin it wrong”.

The guys behind LOLcats inspired a lot of these concepts, actually.

For the last four years, I’ve served as a webmaster for a non-profit organization. A good definition of webmaster is a web designer that has to live with the consequences. My organization had big intentions online and my first few years were spent sewing a patchwork of beautiful but disparate designs we’d commissioned from multiple agencies into a quilt that provided some sort of comfort to the people actually visiting our site. Before long, I took the reigns myself, started saying “no” to a lot of otherwise enticing ideas, and focused on traffic stats and user behavior while re-crafting our online presence. In a year, the Web Team had decreased our bounce rate by almost 20% and dramatically increased conversion to both our email list and online donations.

I don’t fault the agencies. They each danced the dance that all designers do, partnering stated client needs with personal choices both informed and intuitive. That is the ultimate role of an expert, listening carefully and then leaping forward with confidence and experience.

But they only did it once.

Briefing, brainstorming, delivery, invoice, goodbye. What made the in-house designs more successful (if the goals were objective visitor conversion and not subjective aesthetics) was each day’s attention to the previous day’s decisions. “Living with the consequences” was ultimately the fast path to good design.

Creative work is at a crossroads, struggling with what it means to be an expert in the face of the wisdom of crowds. I believe a path has presented itself and, by not taking it, we are missing a chance to fully engage the interactive nature of today’s culture.

The first books were oral traditions written down; it would be centuries before the chapter was invented. The first films were plays with a camera aimed in their direction; the innovation of the close-up caused hysteria. The web, even as it manages to wriggle out from under the book’s metaphors of pages and authors to achieve its destiny as a mode of communication, still labors under an obsolete model for its design process.

Am I just talking about Agile web design? Yes, but also how it must effect our relationships.

What would a better model look like? Consider regular check-ups with your doctor, “Looks like we’ve made some progress on your cholesterol, let’s keep working on that. How’s your back feeling, any better?” Good designers do this already. They form plans with their patients, earnestly listening to their ailments before writing any prescriptions, and providing supplemental education when important… but why stop there? Why not have the same conversation with the data?

I love the duck-billed platypus. Besides being a web-footed, duck-billed, egg-laying mammal, they also have poisonous claws and can sense electromagnetic fields. No designer, no matter how inspired, would have presented the duck-billed platypus and no client, however savvy, would have approved it. Yet, after generations upon generations of adapting to fit its environment, here it is.

It’s not hard to imagine a design process that places evolution at its center. Instead of projects guided by hunches and filled with pre-determined deliverables, we would have extended engagements guided by research with more milestones after a launch than before it. Client and designer both would sit down with statistics and decide which numbers should go up and which down, leading to either subtle or radical redesigns on a weekly basis. All of this would result in a final product quite different than anyone had expected at the onset, but evolved to fit its environment.

True not only for visual & interaction design but copy-writing, viral videos, or anything else you could measure the success of.

This kind of process requires a certain kind of designer and a certain kind of client. Both have to be willing to try new things but temper their own enthusiasm with the cold hard facts. It would require a creativity that can maintain its vitality when mixed with reality, a confidence that expertise still has a place in a world filled with data. It would require a faith that putting process over product ultimately yields a better product.

And it would require diligence.

For what better a word than diligence to describe the act of enthusiastically doing your best each day and soberly evaluating the fruits of that effort the next day, knowing that this behavior—and not any “secret technique”—is the character of great work?

It is my experience that designers and clients such as these are bountiful. My last five years in the non-profit and responsible business communities have introduced me to a great number of people and organizations that pick big fights, take on insurmountable odds, and somehow get up each morning with the same devotion. They are guided by a trust that victory, while in some circumstances a long way off, is inevitable in the face of diligence.

Maybe you are one of these people. To work with me, please visit DiligentCreative.com.

The first is that, despite (or rather because of) your natural instincts, recessions are a good time to start a business. The risks associated with jumping into a tumultuous environment is a natural herd-thinner. Here, there be dragons. Those who are looking for security or opportunity find it somewhere else, leaving the field of start-ups reserved for the lean and hungry.

Imagine if innovators of the early naughts remained shell-shocked from the Dot Com bursting (a bubble worth $5 trillion!) and played it conservative, never giving their big idea a real shot. We’d live in a world without Wikipedia (‘01), MySpace (‘03), del.icio.us (‘03), Flickr (‘04), and lots of other examples.

Beyond the lack of competition, there are genuine economic reasons to start a business in a recession. As unemployment goes up, expectations for salaries and benefits fall—good news for an owner and bad news for an employee (or interviewee). This principle applies to other “resources” beyond labor. Office vacancies decrease rent, for instance, and overhead shrinks.

The second reason I’m not crazy is that this decision, while seemingly impulsive given the weather outside, has been a year in the making and has involved my reading half a dozen books and attending two conferences on the subject. When I stopped learning new things, I knew it was time. For my life goals, this is the right thing to do now.

Living in San Francisco and working at a non-profit is a recipe for permanent Bohemianism (or YAWNism, at least). While that’s a lifestyle that I find not only acceptable but even attractive, it’s not a one that can support the opportunities I want to provide for my children (none yet, just thinking ahead). If starting a business is the primary path to wealth, that’s a path I need to take today—not when I’d be subjecting a family to the risks I am willing to bare myself^*.

The third reason is, well… yes, I am crazy. But that’s okay.

At the recent Start Conference, Ev Williams (founder of Blogger and Twitter) gave “hallucinogenic optimism” as a prerequisite for entrepreneurship. A few panels later, Marc Hedlund (founder of Wesabe) painted a picture of obsession as a key personality trait, quoting fellow entrepreneur Paul Hawken, “Do the idea that won’t leave you alone.” A few panels later, venture capitalist David Hornik confirmed, “This is hard work. You have to be crazy.”

So, whatever you think about the bailout you won’t have to worry about me. I’ll just be over here in the corner watching Apple’s “Crazy Ones” video and pretending they’re talking about me.

Next episode: What I’ll actually be doing.

^* And Sarah’s being awesome about it all.

Quoth Howard Beale:

I don’t have to tell you things are bad… everybody knows things are bad… it’s a depression… everybody’s out of work or scared of losing their job… the dollar buys a nickel’s worth… banks are going bust… shopkeepers keep a gun under the counter…

It’s hard to listen to the radio or watch television or whatever verb it is you do to blogs without noticing that several important systems are all falling apart. It’s equally hard to maintain a cheery attitude without being accused of either having buried your head in the sand or being callous to the woes so real for so many people. If you’d like to be happy, and who wouldn’t, I might suggest you embrace the concept of a market correction.

Financially speaking, a market correction is the sudden drop in a stock when a bunch of people simultaneously realize that it’s overpriced. All those tips that had seemed really good as your brother-in-law was pitching you over beers wither to dust in your hands as people come to their senses and realizes that everyone was excited only because everyone else was excited, when there was no reason to get excited in the first place.

Getting more metaphorical, it’s a way to maintain hope that an established system will ultimately regulate itself and that a short-term disaster doesn’t threaten the underlying paradigm. It’s a way to say, “Hey man, I know things seem pretty fucked up right now, but the fundamentals of our economy are strong.” Despite any sarcastic tone, I think they’re great.

Forests fires are market corrections, trading decaying oaks for nutrient-rich soil, thus ensuring the long-term life of the forest. Earthquakes are market corrections, drifting tectonic plates stuttering to catch up with one another to avoid gaping trenches of magma. When this planet finally kills off the humans to prevent more carbon from spilling into the atmosphere, it will be a market correction.

I can’t help but feel optimistic, even giddy.

Perhaps you’ve sensed that something like this was coming for a while. Admit it, things have felt a little “wrong” lately. Your intuitive self sensed a deep cancer within the body of buying houses on interest-only loans and flipping them onto the next guy who does the same like a game of musical chairs. Well, now the music has stopped and we have a quiet moment of lucidity, when the lights have come on and—although startled at first—we look around and find joy in the way things could be, should be, and will be again.

If you’ve been frustrated about the “childbirth bubble” where expectant mothers are first given pain medication and then labor inducers, and then pain medication, and then labor inducers, until finally their’s no choice but to perform a Caeserian, you’ll be happy to know that there’s a market correction going on.

If you’ve been irked by the “global food market bubble” making your food tasting bland, unsatisfying, and full of ingredients you can’t pronounce, you’ll be happy to know that eating local and urban farms are forcing a market correction.

If you think that the “partisan politics bubble” has made the national discourse too divisive, despite your sharing more and more values with your neighbors and that, “the reality of gun ownership may be different for hunters in rural Ohio than they are for those plagued by gang violence in Cleveland, but don’t tell me we can’t uphold the Second Amendment while keeping AK-47s out of the hands of criminals.” You probably already know that there’s some markets getting corrected lately.

And if you think the “lists of links to lists of links bubble” has left the blogosphere a wasteland of search-engine optimized lists, Digg-bait headlines, and lifehacks distracting you from the life you’re supposed to be hacking, you’ll be pleased to find out that the Internet is receiving a long awaited market correction.

Yes, there are growing pains. Yes, the coming world will destroy the current one in its wake. But I have confidence that the turmoil we’re seeing on the world stage is merely a generation of chickens coming home to roost, breaking some eggs, and tomorrow we’ll all be eating some mighty tasty omelettes.

A few years ago, I read an inspiring article on Treehugger that changed my whole attitude toward solar-powered homes. I had been thinking that solar was a multi-thousand dollar commitment that required complicated wiring and hard-to-understand deals with power companies. It turns out solar is (like marriage) something you can transition to slowly as your means permit.

The original Treehugger set-up (which is based on a post from Off-Grid.net) promises to keep the initial set-up at under $600 and indeed it does:

However, when I set out to purchase all of those items, I found the reality to look more like this:

Maybe the professionals have a line on super-cheap (and discontinued?) solar products, but it was clear that their recommended gear was not going to work for me at the price suggested. I’m the kind of guy who likes to let other people make my mistakes for me (which is why I love libraries) so I became nervous when the exact system they mentioned wasn’t available. I considered getting an all-in-one kit like those from Sunwize, but for $600 I would end up with a 5 watt panel and a 19 amp hour battery. If I wanted to get ripped off, I’d buy ridiculously expensive Chuck Taylor knock-offs.

Eventually, I had to bite the bullet and learn me about some solar. I bought a Kill-a-Watt monitor and went from plug to plug measuring my appliances. Then I did some reading about solar systems in general and what I could expect from the sun in my area (San Francisco). Finally, I did a lot of online research and came up with my own shopping list:

Close enough! There are some definite improvements to my own list, if I do say so myself. The obvious ones are the bigger inverter and charge controller—the latter especially important, as it will allow me to support up several more panels and batteries when I’m ready to grow. The battery is AGM (Absorption Glass Mat) which is safer and can take more punishment than the slightly old school gel batteries. Finally, the size of the panel doubled and is a size that’s not discontinued. The Uni-Solar panels from the original plan are definitely the way to go, as they’re light-weight, glass-free, shade-tolerant, graffiti-proof, and lots of other hyphenated descriptors.

Still on my list is a digital multimeter, because not knowing the precise number of volts here or amps there is going to drive a number-obsessed fellow like me crazy. Oh, and I need to talk to my landlord about all this… you don’t think he’ll mind, do you?

The last few years, controversy has followed around Adam Werbach like a shadow. From his landmark “Is Environmentalism Dead?” speech to the work with Wal*Mart that’s left even his supporters scratching their heads, all along he’s promised that answers were coming. Answers have finally come… and in a form no less substantial than a total re-imagining of “sustainability” and a model for organizing how we tackle it as a planet.

Instead of spending the rest of this post explaining exactly what that is, here’s a full transcript of his speech and more about the platform from which he’s planning on doing his part. Yeah, it’s an advertising company—get over it. Now that we’re on the same page…

Though he namechecks Switzerland for the name Blue, it’s clear that this vision is the thoughtful and considered construct of one who has faced his demons—the IPCC reports things are worse than we’ve feared even as carbon emissions continue to rise, all the while Werbach’s been a leader in the Green movement—and emerged a wiser man. Environmentalism, despite all the dire warnings and alarm bells, has succeeded in little more than everyone feeling scared, guilty, or just angry. Now he’s ready to stop saying “the world is ending” and move from crisis to possibility.

In this way, he aligns himself with similar transformative thinkers—notably Van Jones (unfortunately, no relation). Though I haven’t heard yet if Jones endorses a “Blue” re-framing, he’s certainly been wary to define Green as limited to the organic foodfest or Prius-equals-redemption model popular among the gatekeepers of Green. His anxiety around the Eco-Apartheid that we seem determined to create and the consequences it would have on lasting sustainability are addressed by Blue in ways Green pays only lip service.

Also sharing this vision might be Alex Steffan of Worldchanging, who recently declared that “optimism is a political act.” Indeed, Blue is accepting and positive on a scale that makes even Bright Green (which “forgoes the bleakness of protest and dissent for the energizing confidence of constructive solutions”) seem a bit dim. Blue will likely mean saying yes enthusiastically to things to which we’ve been trained as activists to say no.

Werbach recalls:

I remember the conversation with Jan when she told me that her new PSP was a diet. “Really?” I asked, obviously disappointed that this born leader had chosen to go with something so…ordinary.

“What do you mean, ‘Really?’” she snapped back.

“Well, I just figured that sustainability—I said it slowly this time—has to have something to do with protecting the earth.”

Jan gave me a kind sigh. “Where do you think all that food is coming from?”

This letting go will be absolutely necessary to reach the most startling aspect of Adam’s plan. We have five years to grow Blue to one billion people (for reference, that’s about the size of the Internet). If we’re going to move at the speed necessary to address climate change, that’s the number of people we need to reach. That means we have to talk about things that address the concerns of more that just “Mac users… coastal states and college towns”. The impossible mass of the American Midwest, land of strip malls and big box stores, must in turn be joined by the waking giants of India and China and all feel as much a part of Blue as I now do.

I have to admit I think the name is unfortunate. Yes, it’s next on the spectrum but that wavelength is already well-tread by the U.S. Democratic party and yet another color name makes the “Blue is the New Green” jokes unavoidable.

Here are a few metaphors that I hear thrown around in activist circles that, as Inigo Montoya might say, “do not mean what we think they mean.”

Low-hanging fruit

The first is not unique to activism, business uses it left and right as well. In case you happen to have never been in a meeting when someone uses it, the phrase “low-hanging fruit” is meant to convey benefits that can be attained with minimal action. So, if I want to get 500 signatures to put in a bike lane, the low-hanging fruit might be bike messengers. I could probably quickly acquire a few hundred signatures with not a whole lot of effort.

The problem is, that’s not how you pick fruit. Fruit is normally picked starting with the “high-hangers” for two important reasons. First, pickers start at the top and fill their basket as they go down, otherwise they’d be climbing with ever-heavier loads. Second, the fruit lower on the tree is partially shaded by the higher branches and often last to ripen.

So, for the bike lane example, the “low-hanging fruit” would be folks whose names would make it more difficult to get others to sign and who probably aren’t high value names to begin with. Elementary school kids, maybe.

Silver bullets

Silver bullets often come up when we’re looking for a simple solution to a complex problem. An example might be installing solar panels in remote African villages. This fairly simple solution manages to address issues ranging from social (providing power without making the community reliant on fuel) to environmental (cleaner than coal or nuclear) to political (no foreign-owned powerplants requiring a government-owned grid).

However, the term comes to us from old European legends about werewolves. Werewolves, immune to normal bullets, can only be killed by silver ones. Far from being simple solutions, silver bullets are actually more difficult to make than regular ones and substantially less bang-for-the-buck, as silver is both softer and more expensive than lead. In short, you’d probably want to avoid using a silver bullet unless you’re facing something like a werewolf that can’t be defeated through conventional means (which addressing energy needs in developing nations just may be).

Radical

Perhaps the most understood metaphor, yet one that activists employ to the point of self-identity, is the notion of “radicalism”. Literally “radical” refers to the root of something, most often a plant. Activists who identify as “radical” maintain that they are getting to the root of the problem—with the implicit or explicit suggestion that all other strategies will fail to produce true change. Accusations of not being radical enough equate to not being serious about one’s beliefs.

Again, reality begs to differ.

Instructions for removing an unwanted tree all begin with cutting the tree down first. Once you’ve removed a tree’s leaves and its ability to photosynthesize its food, it’s much easier to deal with the leftover roots. The stump can continue to generate new growth, but diligence will ensure that it never amounts to a new tree, leaving the stump to eventually die. Removing stumps is so difficult that the most common methods include drilling poison-filled holes and setting them on fire.

Knowing the truth behind this metaphor encourages a remarkably different angle for activism than “radical”, namely removing the ability of destructive systems to feed and perpetuate themselves before attempting to address the “root” of the problem. Maybe everyone working on corporate power should switch to campaigning against advertising. Afterall, it would be difficult for companies to lobby Washington if no one bought their products.

It’s hard being a complete douchebag these days. Movies have trailers that specifically tell you to turn off your ringer. With the sullying of hands-free headsets, the “you think I’m talking to you, but I’m actually talking to someone more important” trick that used to be great fun is now played out. Next to go was the “even though I’m actually talking to you, you’ll notice I’m wearing my Bluetooth earpiece at all times in case someone more important than you wants to talk”. Sheesh, it’s almost as if people are deliberately making it rough for you to show how unimportant they are.

Yes, it’s time to bring your douchbaggery into 2008 with this amazing Bluetooth handset.

The idea is simple. Bluetooth microphones and speakers are now getting so miraculously tiny, they can be placed into a ring. But, as a fucking douchebag, you might ask, “why not two rings?” You could put the microphone into a pinky ring and the speaker into a thumb ring and I think you know where this is headed…

You’re once again the envy of all your douchebag friends as you use the universal symbol for “hold on, I really need to take this one” to, in fact, “take this one”. Confuse those Luddite Midwesterners by talking to “imaginary friends”. A quick “call me” gesture after a lovely date could actually be arranging a booty call once you’ve dropped off the Nice Girl. The possibilities are endless!

What are you waiting for? Buy one today! Operators are standing by… no wait, they… they’re actually talking to people… that’s really confusing.

Okay, first you need to watch the original. This is a real ad from a real politician who is really running for president of our country. No doctoring, no mashing-of-up, nothing like that. People made this sans irony.

Now you can skim through “Planet of the Arabs” which made it to the top of Digg three days ago. It’s a compilation of Hollywood movies featuring vicious stereotypes of Middle-Easterners.

The two were clearly made for one another, so I got them drunk and they got busy.

Note some important improvements to the original advertisement:

1. I removed the video footage of Benazir Bhutto. Some might consider it risky, since she was only tragically murdered a week ago, and might turn out to have been a “bad guy” after all. Oh, and Rudy himself was quoted saying, “I think it’s inappropriate to see [her death] in political terms.” So out it comes.
2. Also, if you’re kicking Arab butt, you need an action movie star. Inevitably, there will be a movie someday about September 11th starring Rudy Giuliani, focusing on he bravely prevented one of the greatest tragedies in our nation’s history. But until that day, Chuck Norris is the go-to guy.
3. Oh, and the end title needed to be in Trajan. Everybody knows that. Der.

Just on the off chance that Rudy happens to win the Republican nomination and subsequently the presidency, I’ve taken the liberty of already starting a “Pre-emptively impeach Rudy Giuliani!” petition over at Care2. Feel free to go ahead and make some protest signs, too. Oh, and somebody should tell CodePink.

It really is a mixtape, too. It has two sides and each is less than 30 minutes, so you could theoretically copy them onto a cassette… you know, if you had one… uh, and a device you could use to record onto it. Let’s be honest, this is going straight into iTunes.

Side A - Out with the Old (download)

The first half is a mix of tracks of my own that I happened to have laying around from the last two years or so. Maybe you’ve heard them, maybe you haven’t. Either way, I had to do something with them because I’d like to move past them and they’re in the way. Sedate and serene, this mix hovers around 120bpm.

Side B - In with the New (download)

Two-thousand eight is already full of hope. The topics range from personal endeavors to national politics to global challenges but, regardless, my hope that the year sounds something like this. Mercilessly bouncy, I have a hard time not dancing to these songs. None of them are mine, but they represent a sound I’m interested in (especially Rex the Dog, he’s so dreamy). Consider it a statement of intention at an effervescent 130bpm.

I’ve decided against attaching a track listing of the second mix, for fear that roving Googlebots will discover I’m giving away free music and notify The Man. Email me if you positively must know a track.

Switching to Blueprint has left the Stanifesto design with some rough edges… look for that and many more things to be resolved in 2008. Official “Resolutions” to come!

No one knows the answer better than organizations that try to navigate the dark and often deadly middle ground between “selling out” and “dropping out”. They receive criticism (both sincere and feigned) from concerned parties on either side of them in the activist spectrum.

For a good example one need not look further than Act Now Productions. Founded by environmentalism’s Wunderkind turned L’Enfant Terrible, Adam Werbach, Act Now has come under… let’s just say “scrutiny” for working with everyone’s favorite discount superstore, Wal-Mart. Since the partnership began, talk of Act Now is met with (depending on company) eye-rolling distaste or backhanded compliments. As to whether they were hypocrites or irrelevant, I’ve always wondered.

An article in this month’s Fast Company tried to set the record straight. They acknowledge that Act Now has its critics, from smaller radical organizations to Werbach’s previous employer Sierra Club, but mostly stick to puff piece territory, covering the controversy of working with Wal-Mart in far greater detail than the work itself. It ends with the uplifting quote from Werbach on his ability to change a trans-national corporation, “I’m going to try. I’m trying.”

Much more troubling is the single line slipped in slyly, “Wal-Mart would not allow Fast Company to interview employees”. I was not the only one to notice it, as San Francisco alternative weekly paper SF Weekly ran an article the following week tearing apart the Fast Company piece.

[A]fter reading the Fast Company piece, and doing a little more reading and talking to people, I’m afraid Werbach’s detractors are right. His current role as Wal-Mart’s greenwasher-in-residence is almost certainly doing more harm than good.

SF Weekly author Matt Smith calls up Wal-Mart employees and asks them about the measures mentioned in the Fast Company piece. Not many have even heard of any, those that have say they’re being perverted by middle management into ways to make employees’ lives harder. The goal of greening Wal-Mart is being translated into moralistic, high ground arguments on why associates need to lose weight or stop smoking.

Upset with the pictured painted by the extremes of the two articles, and the vast room in between, I gave up and went to go talk with some folks from Act Now. They were hosting Sze Ping from Greenpeace China and it was a great opportunity to call them out on the two articles and get at the truth.

Everyone I talked to had read both and were eager to share their perspective. For the most part, they thought both were crap (my paraphrasing, they were very polite). They acknowledged that the Fast Company piece was fluffy, saying that it skipped both the really good and the really bad things that Wal-Mart is doing. “They have to be diplomatic,” someone offered. Similarly, the SF Weekly article garnered sighs. “We only started the program in April and Wal-Mart has over a million employees, I’m sure it’s not hard to find some who haven’t heard of it.” Even so, they’re thankful that someone’s keeping an eye on them. “It’s understandable. It’s about accountability.”

Sze Ping shared some of the clever ways that Greenpeace China gets around the rigid state censorship. “We can’t praise, but we can’t criticize. And we certainly can’t stay silent.” Instead, they’ve partnered with Coca-cola to co-brand energy-efficient technology throughout the upcoming 2008 Olympics in Beijing. In the U.S., this would be a sin, the ultimate sell-out. In China energy-efficiency is a more radical path to sustainability than dropping a banner in Tiananmen Square. “But you would get a free plane ticket to somewhere,” Ping laughs.

Ultimately, Act Now agrees that Wal-Mart, like China, is dark territory. It embodies the difficult decisions that activists have to make. Just as we can’t solve climate change without addressing the industrial explosion in China, we can’t transform corporate America without someone working on Wal-Mart. Both involve rolling up some sleeves and getting dirty, compromising ideology for progress. Hypocrisy and irrelevance both become tools in the social change toolkit to find the position in the spectrum where your pressure has an effect on more than your own ego.