Beijing Air

If you've been paying attention to the news recently you'd know that the poor air quality in Beijing is a major concern for athletes from all over the world. They are afraid that the air is so bad that they will have respiratory problems that will negatively affect their performance. In the image above, a biker from team USA makes a point by wearing a mask as soon as she arrives in the airport.

We at First Breath are glad that people are paying attention to air quality - hopefully this will lead to people the world over demanding clean breathing air! But we must point out that the media is missing half the story; the biker in the above photo is making a political statement sure to upset our Chinese hosts while ignoring the fact that cities back home (such as LA) also suffer from terrible air quality. Children in our cities are breathing poisoned air their whole lives! The solution is not wearing a mask designed only to help yourself - an action both inherently selfish and probably ineffective (particulate masks don't filter out most pollutants such as NOx, CO2, O3, SO2, etc.). The solution is taking concrete steps towards improving air quality for everyone!

Finally, the Main Stream Media has been entirely ignoring The Black Cloud here in CA. It is suspected that the Chinese are basing their air-quality reports more on politics than sound science, but what about similar censorship right here at home?

Maury Green
Tuesday, August 5th 2008

Keeping 'em Clean!
First Breath is pleased to announce that we are working with an group of smart young environmentalists in Los Angeles to study the local air quality and in the process find out something about the Black Cloud.

This week we were able to locate and claim one of the PuffTron sensors, while the students who joined the dark side claimed three. This is an example of how competition, so central to our capitalist system, always has victims. But First Breath will not remain unseen!

Even though we have collected less data about the Black Cloud, we lucked out in that our PuffTron is located at a local dry cleaning establishment. We are presented with the opportunity to study a potential polluter; Dry Cleaning Fluid (also called "Perc" or Tetracloroethylene) is a skin and respiratory system irritant. Our data on Volatile Organic Compounds and other pollutants reveals some interesting trends. Hear more about our adventures and analysis on this Video Blog;



Thursday Update; First Breath has claimed another sensor!!! Mother Earth thanks you, Scarleth!

Maury Green
Thursday, July 24th 2008

Guerrilla Gardening!

We at The Daily Polluter are frustrated about the progress of our investigation into the Black Cloud. Many of the PuffTrons used to study the data are not controlled by either First Breath or Xylon Corp., making it difficult for us to gather precise data about the cloud. Chief among our concerns is to determine whether the Black Cloud is benevolent or sinister, good or evil.

To this end, Maury Green, our resident environmental expert, has suggested that we take DIRECT ACTION to reduce pollution in our neighborhoods. He argues that if the Black Cloud is an evil cloud of pollution that is trying to hurt us, that this action may reduce its power. And if it's not harmful, then the direct action will probably please it. "It's a win-win situation," said Green.

To that end, First Breath and The Daily Polluter have arranged for Mr. Stamen, a representative of the L.A. Guerrilla Gardeners to come in and teach us about his organization. I won't attempt to explain what this amazing group does - you should check out the site!

To the students who are working with Mr. Green and Ms. Woods; you might not want to wear your fanciest clothes tomorrow (Wednesday Aug. 5th) - we are going to be making some "seedbomms," and as you can see, they are 99.9% DIRT-y... For more on seedbomms, visit here.

For tomorrow everyone should look for a good spot for a Guerrilla Garden around Manual Arts or in your neighborhood. We're not talking about your yard or in a park. This should be a PUBLIC but under-used space, accessible to all, where a garden would happily grow if only someone planted it. For example, have any of you seen any empty "tree pits" (those squares of dirt on the sidewalk where trees are supposed to be planted...)? Those are perfect! Use your eyes, street smarts, and imaginations and come to class prepared with a description or drawing! If we find a really good site perhaps we can actually plant a garden there!!!

Lastly, we should say that this activity is going to be inclusive - even the Brits can get in on it!

Anthernonymous
Tuesday, August 5th 2008

Latest Cloud Message?

We just received a strange message from Nick Boole. He claims it came from the black cloud directly to his phone! He faxed us a photo of it from a copyshop. The transmission was poor, but it resolves to this text:

I have a dream: The air is fresh
but smog blows through my heavy mesh
fifteen cars I make them legal
with the fed and for the seagull

Let us know if you can figure out what it means, and post to the sightings. Save the planet!

Thursday, July 24th 2008

Spreading the Seeds
I must hand it to Mr. Green, today was quite fun indeed. Mr. Stamen and Roly Poly were very informative and clearly they are working towards the same future as Xylon: a greener one.

Speaking of green (and I don't mean Green!),
the Xylon Corporation has hit another home run with PuffTron Prediction.

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Here are the predictions followed by results. Fantastically accurate! (The plus sign indicates predictions that are correct within one hour..)
Brenda AKA Brenduh1 church
VOC@15:15 19% [ electricity was turned off ]
CO2@13:04 1336ppm
dB@12:06 98
Temp@13:04 30.03'c
Light@12:06 1lx
09:24 PM July 24, 2008 from web

Sandra AKA sandraMAHS NUMBER ONE SOUTH WESTERN CARROTS MY PREDICTION
LIGHT @ 12: 30 a.m. [ 0:30 ] +
TEMP @ 4:00 p.m. [ 15:50 ] +
CO2 @ 12: 00 p.m. [ 12:30 ] +
Noise @ 1:30 p.m. [ 22:50 ]
VOC @ 12:30 a.m. [ 1:42 ]
05:57 AM July 24, 2008 from txt

Katherin AKA katherinfmahs clinic..,
voc @ 2:30am, [ 21:46, 11% ]
coz @ 12:30pm, [ 11:28, 550ppm ] +
db @ 10:00am, [ 12:25, 183dB ]
temp @ 2:00pm, [14:06, 29.2°C ] +
light @ 8:00am. [10:31, 121lux ]
08:52 AM July 24, 2008 from web

Karen AKA karito3
light @ 11am, [ 11:38, 779lux ] +
temp @ 11:30, [ 11:56, 36.6°C ] +
DB @ 2pm, [ 8:18, 162dB ]
CO2 @ 2:30pm, [ 23:23, 672ppm ]
VOC @ 10am [ 20:32, 19% ]
01:45 PM July 23, 2008 from web

Now that we know what causes high peaks in the data, we can begin to discover ways to lower those values. Here are some ideas Xylon members have come up with so far:


And since we were asked as well, here's what Professor Niemeyer, Mr. Green & Mr. Garcia had to offer:



So, bang up job guys! Really cool! I can't wait to see what you've got for me this week.

Penny Woods
Wednesday, August 6th 2008

Or You Could Just Carry a Coin to Flip
Life consists of millions of little decisions.

Which side of the bed should I get up on?
What should I have for breakfast?
Should I clean the dishes after?
Does this go in the trash or the recycling?
What should I wear?
Where should I go?

People turn to higher sources to ease the burden of all these decisions. A religious person has their holy text to guide. Asking "What would Jesus do?" is easier than asking "What should I do?"

An obedient citizen has the law to guide. There are fewer legal and socially acceptable activities than there are illegal or unexpected ones.

It seems that a religious, law abiding person would have the easiest life. Of course, life is more complicated than that. When a poor man asks you for change, do you do what Jesus would and give, unquestionably? Or remind yourself that panhandling is illegal and avert your gaze?

So how can Xylon ease your worried mind? We don't want to stop you from thinking. Quite the opposite— we want your mind to be absolutely free from tedious decisions, so it can focus on higher callings. What if you never had to worry about what to do with your trash, where your water will come from, where to buy things. We want to provide you everything you need in the greenest way possible.

At Xylon, the earth is our holy text. Our research on cleaner air and greener lives will never end. Let Xylon decide for you, and decide for Earth.

Penny Woods
Monday, July 28th 2008