Alex Hastings's blog

The future of U.S. media is uncertain. The iconic organizations that pioneered our access to information and defined it as an unalienable right, don't seem to be adapting to the shift of viewers from traditional media to the Internet. Last month's announcement by the New York Times that it will put up pay walls to its most loyal readers, raised hell in the blogosphere and at dinner tables across the country. And Comcast's bid to acquire a controlling stake in NBC Universal for $30 billion is down-right scary. The recent challenges faced by traditional media is partly due to the economy, the growing indifference of over-exposed consumers to advertising, the belief that everyone has the right to high quality content for free, and the diffusion of eyeballs across the Internet.

What if by investing in your own business, you were improving the lives of marginalized individuals across the globe? In many camps across developing nations, like the image above, Samasource is giving impoverished individuals life-changing work - services needed by U.S. companies. Samasource has engineered a way for entrepreneurs in the U.S. to receive competitively-priced services while helping to alleviate global poverty where its needed most. Microwork consisting of digital tasks including clerical and data input, photo tagging and translation, is completed by Samasource's Service Partners in impoverished nations, checked by volunteers in the U.S. via a simple mobile app, and sold to companies and non-profits, many of them start-ups strapped for cash. Service Partners are payed for their work, volunteers feel good about themselves, and customers get their service rendered at a fair price point. Everyone wins.

Instead of tearing down undesirable buildings to construct new ones, a breed of architects are reinventing defunct structures. The recycling of urban landscape, such as factories, office buildings, bridges and parking lots reduces demolition, use of new materials, and construction time (which also means it reduces cost). The Bay Line proposal from San Francisco architects, Ronald Rael and Virginia San Fratello, transforms the unusable Bay Bridge connecting San Francisco to Oakland into private residences and a recreation area. While the Bay Bridge is being replaced by a massive concrete structure (btw, concrete production is one of the biggest industrial CO2 emitters) Bay Line remains a viable solution, costing an estimated $350 million.

If you live in Iowa, the average carrot must travel 1,600 miles to reach your plate. According to research by IBM’s Smarter Planet Campaign, if you eat carrots, you’re a polluter. The truth is if you eat anything from your local grocery store, even the organic section, it has likely traveled a long distance. Only 1 to 2 percent of all food consumed in the U.S. is locally grown.