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- Issue 1 - Hello from the Eco Punks
Issue 1 - Hello from the Eco Punks
Punks who love murals and run marathons
Jan Lemke & Jesse Hirsh
September 14, 2023
Welcome to the first issue of the Eco Punks Gazette!
Hello from your friendly neighbourhood punks, Jan and Jesse! This is the first issue of our publication that is intended as a reflection of our efforts and network. If you dig it, please share it!
Our plan is to send these out weekly providing updates on our work, ideas, and the media that we’re being moved or inspired by. Please reach out if you have any thoughts, feedback, or would like to contribute (you can also reply to this email). Our ultimate goal is to have you identifying and participating as an Eco Punk!
Upcoming Eco Punk Events
Sept 26th - Salon on Health (care) Ecosystems - RSVP via email
This will be the third salon in our current series/season. The first examined the myths and misinformation surrounding AI, generative media, and large language models. The second explored the general confusion around climate change and the summer of heat, floods, and fire that we experienced.
Ongoing Research Projects
We’re engaged in a number of diverse research projects for ourselves and our clients. These range from focused investigations to wide ranging environmental scans or literature reviews. We’ll highlight and share some of these in our Gazette. The following is one we’re currently working on with a deliverable due in late October. We’ll hold a salon on this topic in advance of that.
AI, Public Relations, and Ecosystems of Attention
What used to be conceived of as marketplaces of ideas, can now be described as ecosystems of attention: arguments, memes, and actors (whether human or automated) competing for followers and influence. Truth isn’t dead, even if it is up for negotiation. News is more social than local, and conspiracy is as dominant as ever. Identity is more fluid. Whether they are a bot or not is far less important than whether they care about your story/issue. What does this mean for public relations professionals, and what is the future of the communications industry? What role is automation currently playing, and what role will it play? What are the ethics of AI in PR and how can we establish best practices?
Worth Sharing
We need both a broader aperture and tool-set when we tackle climate change
Cecilia Novell published an excellent article in The Guardian last week in which she managed to remind us that climate change is more than what meets the eye and encourages us to look beyond the surface of wild-fires and record heat, and really understand what the implications of climate change are. Organisms change the way they work and function way before they go extinct with dramatic consequences for the food supply, and oceans deserve a stronger and more pronounced concern in this debate as well. An overall incredibly valuable read:
Reading List
David Epstein: Range. Why Generalists Triumph In A Specialized World
The book makes an incredibly strong case for generalists, and it’s admittedly very reassuring to read that Roger Federer only picked up Tennis seriously in his very late teens and that van Gogh was advised to attend a painting class for 10 year old’s just before he had his big break through. We think you will enjoy this book and find value in it. And next time when you feel that you are wasting your time and are lacking focus on “what really matters”, you can refer back to David Epstein and his science to prove it: There is value in seemingly wasting your time. So go ahead and waste away, and improve your range while doing it. |  |
Where have all the murals gone?
The art of Marketing as Social Commentary is not entirely lost yet
Murals used to be a wonderful thing in Marketing. Being rooted in store signage, they eventually became the predecessor of billboards, which soon became too uniform and boring to look at before they seem to have died a quiet death recently in the light of digital surveillance advertising. Has anybody seen a good billboard recently? We haven’t.
 | If you, too, wonder what happened to all those murals that used to be so beautiful to look at, we’ve got good news for you: they all seem to hang in Williamsburg, New York these days, an admittedly very Bohemian neighborhood in which people are into this kind of stuff. The neighborhood around Bedford avenue even cultivates relics from the past - because they look great on walls. |
Take the store-front and the side wall of the Warby Parker store on N6 Street, for example. There are interesting, relevant and contemporary thoughts and provocations here, all more or less closely related to views and vision. This is interesting, good work. |  |
This Jack / Coke mural is debatable for the same reason as all alcohol advertising is, but that aside, this mural here is simply beautiful to look at and feeling like a warm invitation - to what exactly we’re not sure, but let’s go.
An increasing amount of murals is also more subtle, branding so reduced that one has to at times guess who the originator of the ad is. Take this one for example: The headline calls out the finance-bro-plaque of the city as well as the absurdities that are crypto-currencies and dating, all while at the same time making a very Zeitgeist reference to self-care, and all of that in one sentence. Brilliant. But who is this from? The graffiti in the bottom right corner is not branding, and only a closer look at the billboard around the corner reveals that this mural was brought to us by match.com.
All of the above examples have a few things in common:
They are non-intrusive
They aim at organically fitting into their environment and enhance it, add to it
They are thought provoking and leave some work left to the viewer
We like this kind of work. This is the level at which Marketing and Advertising are becoming part of our culture, are relevant, can even be inspiring and come closest to resembling art. We want to see and promote more work like this in the future. What do you think? Please share your thoughts with us, and send a picture or two of murals that you like in your neighborhood.
Notable Punks
Jim Walmsley and Zach Miller finish 1st and 2nd at UTMB 2023
American Ultramarathoners Jim Walmsley and Zach Miller have finished 1st and 2nd at UTMB last week. UTMB stands for Ultra-Trail-du-Mont-Blanc and is a 106 mile race from Chamonix in France around Mont Blanc through Switzerland and Italy and back into Chamonix.
It’s what got them there that led us to recognize them as our inaugural Notable Punks:
 | Walmsley, by many considered the best Ultra-Marathoner of his generation, managed to win everything thus far but UTMB. In order to accomplish it, he moved with his wife from Flagstaff, AZ, to France, learned and took on entirely new Mountain Sports such as Ski-Mountaineering. In order to “better feel the mountains”, and now, after having dedicated the entire 2023 season to UTMB, finally won the race while also smashing the world record. |
Miller had a terrific 2018 season, got injured, and did not run competitively for 3 years due to multiple surgeries that others would have considered career ending and the corresponding rehab. His Insta looked like a tiny-house themed account at times because he spend the majority of that time as well as the pandemic remodeling an old school bus into a trailer. And now this…!
We are impressed by this level of perseverance, grit, conviction and devotion to a goal and ideal. Life is not a sprint but a (ultra-)marathon, and the tirelessness in which Jim and Zach despite the odds, ridicule and humiliation kept pursuing their dreams and ideals is impressive. Both of them also created their own, new eco-systems to do so.
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