A clever new brand challenges consumerism with a line of ethically sourced products and an ironic message: use less.

How many consumers does it take to wreck a planet? More importantly, how many people will it take to fix it?

It might seem like semantics, but there’s a fundamental difference between people and consumers. As marketers, we tend to think of them as one and the same. We refer to consumer packaged goods, consumer value propositions, and business-to-consumer models. It’s the catch-all term for all those who buy, use, and dispose of stuff. Of course, there’s no escaping the consumer designation. At the end of the day, each of us becomes one of them. Unless.

Unless we make the conscious decision to stop being consumers. This isn’t to suggest that we stop buying and using things but that we simply stop using the term and falling victim to the designation. This semantic shift could lead to a psychological shift, where we stop using this short-sighted and demeaning term to refer to ourselves and others in the collective. Are we consumers or people? If we decide on the latter, perhaps we’ll stop acting like a blind mob with zero accountability and start behaving like conscious individuals. Perhaps.

All of this is a long way of introducing a new consumer people brand known as USELESS.

When we first heard of USELESS, it immediately struck us as brilliant. USELESS is a brand that is well ahead of its time. It’s aspirational. It challenges and speaks up to you. You either get it or you don’t. And while USELESS defies comparison, we’re tempted to call it FCUK with a purpose. It’s that good. And so is its mission and underlying story.

We met with USELESS founder Mark Simmons on a few occasions to discuss the brand and his goals for it. He’s made several appearances at BlobLive LA, where he pitched it to a live audience of fellow entrepreneurs. That’s how we got the below interview. Today, USELESS is a line of branded products, but we see it as much more than that. The brand is a universal message. It’s a reminder that we should not think of ourselves or others as merely consumers. Because we’re people, and we can always strive to use less.

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The 11th way to change the world through social media: a coordinated and simultaneous multi-blog post.

On May 12th, 2008, we published Ten Ways to Change the World Through Social Media as a guest post for Sustainablog. It was our first-ever guest post and came just six weeks after the launch of Max Gladwell.

We had a sense that this would be a significant step. We saw the potential for this content to establish the brand and clearly communicate the Max Gladwell message. This was our mission articulated in a headline.

The post became popular on Digg and generated plenty of discussion. We followed up five months later with 10 More Ways, which also found its way to Digg. The list became part of the Max Gladwell identity.

On May 12th, 2009, we published the third 10 Ways to Change the World Through Social Media, but we took a much different approach. As we considered the first anniversary of the list, it occurred to us that there might be a better way to share and distribute the content. There might be a better way to get it to more people who would find it valuable. The brainstorm lead to the idea for a simultaneous guest post across multiple blogs. Had this ever been done before? We weren’t sure. So we set a goal of publishing the third list concurrently on 100 blogs in a coordinated fashion. This is how it went.

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The confluence of events that lead to the serendipitous success of the #EcoMonday Twitter meme.

The genesis moment for #EcoMonday was April 24th, 2009, at precisely 1:34 pm Pacific Time. We know this because Twitter keeps up-to-the-minute records of everything we Tweet and Retweet. It was a Friday, and a unique series of events would lead to this Tweet.

On the previous Wednesday, Brian Wallace of NowSourcing Skyped us about trying the #HealthyHumpday follow meme for health-related Tweeps (Tweeps  = people who Twitter). Two days later he wrote Beyond #FollowFriday: 24 Daily Twitter Memes, a guest post on Mashable.

“So, how can we create a lasting meme? Simple. Make it happen weekly. Much of this started with the genius of @micah’s #followfriday. But hey, why stop with #followfriday? Here are 24 daily Twitter memes to help you meet new Twitterers and discuss common interests.”

We read the post and found it curious that despite a large green contingent on Twitter there wasn’t a follow meme for the sustainable set.

Concurrently Shea Gunther was dealing with a slow news day at Mother Nature Network (MNN) and decided to post 10 Green Twitterers You Should Follow. This was published at 11:24 am Pacific Time and happened to include Max Gladwell. Two hours and ten minutes later, we sent the original #EcoMonday Tweet.

It was the combination of Brian’s and Shea’s related but disconnected posts that lead us to the following consideration:

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Together with BlobLive, this is open-mic night for social entrepreneurs and green businesses.

This Monday, May 18th, from 6:30 – 9:00 PM Pacific Time, you can attend or tune into BlobLive LA with Max Gladwell. If you’d like to attend, feel free to RSVP via Facebook. If you’d like to watch the live webcast, you can participate via Twitter using the hashtag #bloblive. Doors open at 6:30 PM and live streaming begins at 7:30.

In conjunction with Max Gladwell, BlobLive hosts a monthly themed networking event for green business and social entrepreneurs in Santa Monica. Come share an idea, support an idea, or get inspired by one. New and existing ventures of all shapes and sizes are encouraged.

Are you working on a green or social venture? Are you interested in others who are? Do you have an idea to start one? Come listen, share, or promote your idea. In a supportive and relaxed environment, you can step up, practice your pitch, and share your ideas. BlobLive provides the food and the venue while everyone else in the room (and those watching the event streamed online) offer feedback, advice, and ideas for connections.

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Citizen journalism, open government, status updates, community building, information sharing, crowdsourcing, and the election of a President.

Our children will inherit a world profoundly changed by the combination of technology and humanity that is social media. They’ll take for granted that their voices can be heard and that a social movement can be launched from their laptop. They’ll take for granted that they are connected and interconnected with hundreds of millions of people at any given moment. And they’ll take for granted that a black man is or was President of the United States.

What’s most profound is that these represent parts of a greater whole. They represent a shift in power from centralized institutions and organizations to the People they represent. It is the evolution of democracy by way of technology, and we are all better for it.

For most of us, social media has changed our lives in some meaningful way. Collectively it is changing the world for good. Given the pace of innovation and adoption, change has become a constant. Every so often we find the need to stop and reflect on its most recent and noteworthy developments, hence the following list.

Please note this is not a top-10 list, nor are these listed in any particular order. It’s also incomplete. So we ask that you add to this conversation in the comments. If you’d like to Retweet this post or take the conversation to Twitter or FriendFeed, please use the hashtag #10Ways.

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A San Francisco start-up is combining the principles of activism, capitalism, and social media. They call it Activism 2.0. But it could be much more.

Virgance CEO Steve Newcomb is one of the most successful and savvy entrepreneurs of our generation. At 39, he’s been involved in building nine companies, creating over $3 billion in market value. His most recent exit was Powerset, a semantic search technology that was acquired by Microsoft last year. Newcomb is also chairman of Serious Business, a Facebook application company, and the founder of SF Green, a San Francisco-based event that brings together leaders in activism, business, and government. And while that’s all well and good, Newcomb clearly sees Virgance as his legacy play.

“I believe that in a hundred years, people aren’t going to look back and remember that Powerset was a new search technology, even if it was better than Google,” he says. “They’re going to remember that this was the time when a select few had the courage to begin the process that ultimately enabled us to overcome the biggest issue of our time – sustainability. That’s what Virgance is all about.”

We had a call with Newcomb last week to discuss his vision and approach. It was immediately clear that our values and ideals were aligned. Virgance consists of a talented and dedicated group of social entrepreneurs leveraging social media to achieve social and environmental objectives that are also profitable.

This approach and ideal is quite familiar and consistent with Max Gladwell, so it comes as no surprise that the brands are each rooted in epic tales. Virgance is a Star Wars: Episode I reference that means “the birth of powerful new force in nature that can be used for good or for evil.” And Max Gladwell is inspired by Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged. Each views the mission of sustainability as a heroic endeavor.

When we considered Virgance’s broader context, though, it occurred to us that they may have crossed into the realm of Web 3.0. It’s just not in the same way we typically define it.

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Creative Citizen asks the question that needs to be asked and looks for answers in the Twittersphere.

Green has gone mainstream. It’s fashionable, marketable, and politically expedient. But it’s not reality.

There’s a lot of hype surrounding the green movement, but we’re not seeing a lot of habit. The results just aren’t materializing. Relative to the chatter, there should be much more change. Everyone is green in principle, but very few are green in practice. Why is that?

This is the question being posed by Scott Badenoch and Argam DerHartunian of Creative Citizen, a green wiki community for creative green solutions. And in no way is this question being asked rhetorically.

Scott and Argam want answers, and they intend to get them. They want answers from green thought leaders. They want answers from green celebrities and policy makers. And they want answers from that bottomless well of knowledge and insight that we call the Twittersphere.

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The former Commander in Chief appears uniquely suited to this new role.

While covering the 2009 Fortune Green Brainstorm conference, we were fortunate enough to sit next to Greener World Media Chairman and Executive Editor Joel Makower during President Clinton’s closing keynote. Not surprisingly, the speech was quite compelling. Joel offered to us that someone should bestow on Mr. Clinton the title of Eco Geek in Chief. We tend to agree and feel confident in supporting that nomination.

Mr. Clinton has a serious command of the issues and brings the presidential approach to sustainability. He has the ability to see the big picture and understand all of the competing or complementary forces down to the smallest details while simultaneously balancing them and offering both the most realistic and idealistic solutions.

The transition to a sustainable global economy is certain to be disruptive. The impacts and considerations range from the technological and economical to the social, political, cultural, legal, and ethical. Mr. Clinton understands all of these issues and his solutions reflect that.

Above all, he understands that the environmental problem is fundamentally an economic problem.

The most important thing to me … the most important thing you can do … is to prove that the transformation we are all committed to be undertaking is, or can be made to be, good economics. That will do more than anything else to give the United States a good climate bill. –Bill Clinton, Eco Geek in Chief

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Celebrating Earth Day and the honorary date of Max Gladwell’s birth.

First, we want to thank everyone across the Max Gladwell network for their warm wishes. Today is Earth Day, a global celebration of the environmental ethos. Not coincidentally, it is also Max Gladwell’s symbolic (some might say spiritual) birthday.

As most hopefully realize, Max Gladwell is a brand. It’s a persona. It represents an ideal and a worldview. This unique positioning was driven in part by the nature of social media and the need for Max Gladwell to engage on that level. We’ve always maintained full transparency on this, though it’s understandable some could be mistaken. (Truth be told, it lets us know which PR flaks don’t actually read the blog when they address their e-mail pitches to Max.)

When we launched MaxGladwell.com on April 2nd, 2008, we built out a network of profiles across the social web including Facebook, MySpace, Digg, StumbleUpon, and many (many) more. These profiles often require specific demographic information as part of the terms of service (not to mention ad targeting). You often don’t have the choice but to enter a date of birth. And while we could have chosen any Earth Day for Max Gladwell’s honorary birthday, the inaugural made sense for a several reasons (none of which include appearing young, of course).

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Day one of the Fortune Green Brainstorm Conference gets right to the point with energy policy, climate change legislation, and an interview with Bill Ford.

The Fortune Green Brainstorm conference could very well be “the premier green business event of 2009.” This hyper-focused leadership conference includes panelists from FedEx, HP, Ford, Dell, IBM, GE, Wal-Mart and many others in the Fortune 100. The title of “Chief Sustainability Officer” appears throughout the program, and the marquis speakers include Van Jones and President Bill Clinton.

By and large, this elite group isn’t here because they’re passionate environmentalists. They’re here because it’s mandatory. They’re here because green encompasses the fundamental business principles of risk management and competitive advantage. It’s a business necessity, and the largest companies have the most at stake when it comes to these uncharted waters. It reflects the clear and growing market for green. Which means that this audience is not here in response to protests or threats but rather demand–demand from their many stakeholders. And that’s precisely how the market should function.

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