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Original Story: Whale-Sized Marshmallows Deployed to Thwart Japanese Whalers

I’m actually rather excited today though, since one of the accounts I set up and manage on Twitter, @greenmoms just won the 2008 Shorty awards for green. I’m looking forward to going to New York City to accept the award along with the Greenmoms founder, Lynn, from organicmania.

There, are, of course, more and more green social media success stories and today I’d like to talk about one – Paw luxury – their tagline – eco-living for the everyday dog.

Adam and Wendy, live in Williamsport, PA successfully ran YourAuctionCompany, where they sold on eBay for people locally for over 5 years. Adam describes how they got started with Pawluxury and their vision as follows::

… we meet some wonderful people along our journey. So, then we decided that we needed a change and one day we looked at our little boxer girl Lola (our child) and had a light bulb moment. We answered the age old question “What are we passionate about?” We realized we were passionate about the earth, our dog and making a difference in the world.

Evolving from the overwhelming love of our beautiful, loyal, carefree, lovable and cuddly boxer named Lola, Paw Luxury was born. As proud parents we wanted to give Lola the best nature had to offer but found it difficult to find eco-friendly products under one roof. So we went sniffing with Lola, searched high and low and dug a few holes along the way. Then we thought to ourselves why not create a one-stop online destination that caters to the need for healthy alternatives.

As well established users of online media, they entered the social media space and have built up quite a following using a variety of social media tools, starting with Youtube. Adam says:

We use Youtube to create video & viral content that dog owners and animal lovers will enjoy. By creating a profile and including a link to our blog or website in it, the exposure gained on Youtube we create brand awareness and increase traffic to our blog, our online store, other social media outlets, or any other content that we created. We often do video product giveaways, video of Lola, post product reviews of items sold on pawlux.com, how to video, tips etc. We have in the works a podcast we will also be placed on youtube. Youtube is a great way for people to get to know us and our adorable Lola personally and people can put  a face with the company. We want to always be transparent with the social media communities we are proud & lucky to be a part of.

Youtube is only part of their strategy though. Their twitter profile, @pawluxury has over 11,000 followers. They use their Facebook page to enable fans to get updates on PawLuxury happenings, blog post, view pics of Lola, watch other viral funny viral pet related youtube videos & more.

Adam sent me a list of the various social media and social bookmarking sites they have and I spent some time looking through them. Like most of us in social media, they diligently update some and let others fall by the wayside. They keep their Flickr photostream and Linkedin profile updated and have let some of their social bookmarking profiles fall by the wayside. They are also very active Twitter users.

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Campaign politics dominated the headlines in 2008, making it a banner year for the armchair pundit and the politically uninitiated alike. 2008 was also a year that issues like energy use, climate change and carbon footprints came to the forefront of popular culture and political reality. And that’s where we came in.

In the tradition of more credible media outlets, we’ve compiled our most popular stories of the year into an easily digestible top 10 list. As it is based purely on pageviews, we realize that our list of the top ten environmental politics stories of the year is by no means scientific - and we’re okay with that.

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Ah, reddit. In many ways the cute little bugger is the forgotten genius brother to Digg, and, no matter how hard he tries, his smartness can’t seem to shine above Digg’s trophy-winning varsity jock prowess (if you hung out in the periodical room in high school, you know what I mean). But perhaps this is for the best, because what we’re left with is what civil commentary can look like on the internet when it’s dominated by graduate students, scientists, know-it-alls, and the generally reserved.

And as it turns out, all of those folks enjoy reading Gas 2.0. So, without further adieu:

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Ah, Digg. That beautiful beast. There are some who say she even controls the internet as we know it. In her all-knowing and random wisdom, she giveth and she taketh away. Actually, if truth be known, she mostly taketh. Yet when she does giveth, man does she giveth in a huge way. For that we pay her tribute by exposing the loins of her Gas 2.0 grace. Uhhh… ick. Sorry.

So, before I make myself sick, let me present you with a stroll down the Gas 2.0 memory lane.

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I grew up in Massachusetts where the Kennedys—for all intents and purposes—are treated like royalty. I do hold Senator Ted Kennedy in very high regard for all the excellent work he has done in his 46 years in the U.S. Senate.  That is why I am especially troubled by the senator’s long-standing opposition to the proposed offshore wind farm in Massachusetts. As news broke late last week that there might be yet another delay in the eight year battle to get Cape Wind approved, I had to wonder if Kennedy’s hand was somehow behind it. And according to reports, that is at least plausible.

As I reported yesterday**, Minnesota Rep. Jim Oberstar sent a letter to Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen asking for a delay in the Guard’s final recommendations on Cape Wind. Acting as Chair of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, Oberstar’s letter demanded a delay for public comment on the project’s potential impact on marine radar.

Well, apparently it worked.

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A tea company dedicated to saving the world, inspired by none-other than Digg founder Kevin Rose? No kidding. You can even get a discount below.

As an eco-minded foodie, I can often be found touting the benefits of going organic. It’s healthier, better for the environment and you can feel good about doing your small part to help farmers, as well as helping to limit the use of pesticides in produce and antibiotics and growth hormones in animals.

But I recently stumbled upon a new organic tea company whose primary goal is to literally save the world through tea.  Save the world by drinking tea? I was intrigued and determined to find out more.

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Back in May, we penned the original 10 Ways to Change the World Through Social Media. Though most of those first 10 are still relevant, the pace of innovation and advancement on the social web means many more have emerged in the past five months that deserve attention. These are the tools and resources that individuals, corporations, and nonprofits alike can use to communicate, create, and connect on the social web…for social change.

1. Blog It Out: When the die is cast on social media and final judgments are made, blogging will reign supreme as the single greatest force in Web 2.0. Whereas social networking is broad and shallow, blogging is deep and focused. That’s the power behind Blog Action Day, which takes place this Wednesday, October 15th, 2008. It’s a day when bloggers the world over draw attention to a single issue and (hopefully) inspire action. This year’s topic is poverty. And given the current financial crisis, it would seem many bloggers have gotten a head start.

2. Twitter Green Events: In the first 10 Ways, we wrote about the Twitter greenstream, a tagging mechanism that organizes and aggregates Twitter messages (Tweets) about doing green things. What’s evolved since then is the widespread use of unique Twitter tags at events. Most recently, we covered West Coast Green by tagging our Tweets with #wcg08. This helps people at the event to find and meet up with fellow Twitter folk. It also enables those who aren’t attending the event to follow what’s going on and what’s being said in real time. There are a couple ways to do this. One is to follow through Twitter Search (formerly Summize), where you can track keywords and tags. Another is to send a Tweet as follows: “track word: [insert keyword]“. And then you’ll start receiving all Tweets with that tag or keyword directly into your feed.

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Editor’s note: We’re pleased to welcome Max Gladwell, of MaxGladwell.com, as a regular guest writer on sustainablog. Max Gladwell covers the nexus of social media and green living. We feel that these two trends and technological developments hold tremendous promise for improving quality of life for everyone on the planet.

If you’re reading this blog, then you’re on board with social media. There’s a good chance you belong to social networks like Facebook or MySpace. It’s likely that you Digg stories and even possible that you Twitter. These technologies and services, together with a growing number of others, make up the social web. It’s much like the regular web, but more interactive. More…social. It invites and even demands active participation from everyone. It has a global reach with viral capacity, and yet it’s bringing local communities closer together. It enables people to connect, organize, and make a difference as never before. Indeed, social media is a powerful force, one that the world’s CEOs are starting to acknowledge and take seriously.

Many entrepreneurs, activists, and marketers are leveraging the social web for positive change. In the process and by its very nature, they are giving each of us the tools to change the world and make it a better place. There are thousands of examples, which is precisely why Max Gladwell exists. Here are 10 worth exploring.

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