Google?

[Phaneuf]

Is the background black for anyone else?


edit: i see that it's something to do with 'earth hour'

[Winsor_Pilates]

not mine

[Dion]

I clicked from my iGoogle setup to the classic version and saw black also.

[dionfan]

It's because they're promoting Earth Hour.

Google users in Canada will notice today that we "turned the lights out" on the Google.ca homepage as a gesture to raise awareness of a worldwide energy conservation effort called Earth Hour. As to why we don't do this permanently - it saves no energy; modern displays use the same amount of power regardless of what they display. However, you can do something to reduce the energy consumption of your home PC by joining the Climate Savers Computing Initiative.
On Saturday, March 29, 2008, Earth Hour invites people around the world to turn off their lights for one hour – from 8:00pm to 9:00pm in their local time zone. On this day, cities around the world, including Copenhagen, Chicago, Melbourne, Dubai, and Tel Aviv, will hold events to acknowledge their commitment to energy conservation.

http://www.google.ca/intl/en/earthhour/

[BlackArcher101]

Asking me to lower power consumption during a battle of alberta. Ya right.

[getbak]

Hopefully the Flames turn the lights out on the Oilers from 8-11 Saturday night.

[dionfan]

If anything's gonna be lights-out, its gonna be the Oilers' playoff hopes after tomorrow night.

[iggypop]

Kinda stupid that if you have iGoogle it's still white... oh well

[photon]

So I turn off all my lights in my house for an hour and save a bit of electricity, but then my furnace has to work a little more to replace the heat lost from not having the lights on, using more natural gas. Brilliant.

Have this during the summer when it actually makes sense.

[FireFly]

Originally Posted by photon

So I turn off all my lights in my house for an hour and save a bit of electricity, but then my furnace has to work a little more to replace the heat lost from not having the lights on, using more natural gas. Brilliant.

Have this during the summer when it actually makes sense.

During the summer in the northern or southern hemisphere? Perhaps what you mean to say is that they should have two of them...

I'm just wondering how much heat you think your lights give off? Perhaps you should think about changing your lightbulbs if they heat your house that much when they're on...

[ricosuave]

Originally Posted by photon

So I turn off all my lights in my house for an hour and save a bit of electricity, but then my furnace has to work a little more to replace the heat lost from not having the lights on, using more natural gas. Brilliant.

Have this during the summer when it actually makes sense.

No, more like this being an utterly useless symbolic gesture to make people think that doing this, this one time, will make a difference in their otherwise consumeristic driven, SUV gas guzzling, bottled water drinking, 60" plasma-hot tub-A/C and other unnecessary creature comforts, world.

I'd be more impressed if society all switched to cfls or went around performing random acts of kindness for an hour rather than this nonsense.

Seriously, after today, will anyone really care that this happened? People have to be committed for the long run, not some stupid symbolic gesture that helps them sleep at night...

/ end cynicism

[bluejays]

Originally Posted by ricosuave

No, more like this being an utterly useless symbolic gesture to make people think that doing this, this one time, will make a difference in their otherwise consumeristic driven, SUV gas guzzling, bottled water drinking, 60" plasma-hot tub-A/C and other unnecessary creature comforts, world.

I'd be more impressed if society all switched to cfls or went around performing random acts of kindness for an hour rather than this nonsense.

Seriously, after today, will anyone really care that this happened? People have to be committed for the long run, not some stupid symbolic gesture that helps them sleep at night...

/ end cynicism

Ain't that the truth. People can be so hypocritical when it comes to this stuff and it's amazing they don't see through their own pretentiousness. Do people honestly think that turning most of their electricity for 1 hour, for one day, out of the 365 day year, will make a difference? Seems like a proposition brought forth by a yuppie trying to make a name for themselves. I'm with you Rico, it's a joke, and I'll be watching the Leafs get smacked around in it's entirety tonight.

[photon]

Originally Posted by FireFly

During the summer in the northern or southern hemisphere? Perhaps what you mean to say is that they should have two of them...

Summer wherever it is, or anytime where heating your home would not be desirable.

I'm just wondering how much heat you think your lights give off? Perhaps you should think about changing your lightbulbs if they heat your house that much when they're on...

Um, 100% of the energy from a light bulb (regular, CFL, whatever) ends up as heat, so except for the light going out your windows the rest of it is being used to heat your home. Doesn't matter if it's a 60W bulb, or a 12W CFL replacement. If I leave my office light off for one hour, my furnace will have to make enough heat to compensate for the 60Wh or 12Wh of heat lost.

[4X4]

Eh, pho... Now that I think about it, I wouldn't doubt if you're pretty much right. When I come home and all has been off for hours, the thermostat has regulated my suite to 22 degrees. After being home for a couple of hours, I notice that the temp has gone up at least 2 or 3 degrees.
I always thought it had more to do with body heat or something... But yeah, now that I think about it, light bulbs are hot as hell. I never considered that they contribute to the heating of a space.

[Flames in 07]

Originally Posted by photon

Summer wherever it is, or anytime where heating your home would not be desirable.



Um, 100% of the energy from a light bulb (regular, CFL, whatever) ends up as heat, so except for the light going out your windows the rest of it is being used to heat your home. Doesn't matter if it's a 60W bulb, or a 12W CFL replacement. If I leave my office light off for one hour, my furnace will have to make enough heat to compensate for the 60Wh or 12Wh of heat lost.

I don't know this for sure, but my thought here is that although what you say about the heat given off from the lights will reduce the output from your furnance at a 1:1 ratio is true, I think the efficiency of generating heat from a lightbulb vs the efficiency of generating heat from your furnace is different and therefore makes this point a little misleading. ie if your furnace is going to require less input to generate a kj of heat and therefore more green.

[photon]

Light bulbs are 100% efficient at generating heat, every joule that is used by the bulb ends up as heat. Only 85% of the natural gas burned by my furnace ends up as heat on the other hand.

Now if the question is which has a greater/lesser impact on the environment, 1j of energy from the electrical grid or 1j of energy from burning natural gas in your furnace, that's a good question. EDIT: And I think the answer depends on where you are, if your electricity comes from hydro or nuclear, then I'd rather leave ALL my lights on (from an environmental point of view). If it's coal fired plants, maybe not so much.

That's the big problem I see in all these things, no one seems to look at things from end to end, but just at one small portion of the system.

[You Need a Thneed]

^Even though all the energy end up as heat, light bulbs a terribly unefficient heaters. You'll use WAY more energy trying to heat your house with light bulbs then with a furnace.

[4X4]

This message is brought to you by a friend of mine who is a lurker without a username...

Originally Posted by A Lurker

TURN YOUR ING FURNACE DOWN!

UGH. Really? These people don't think it would make a difference to turn off lights for an hour. God forbid they actually are talking about the environment for a moment. And the point is to conserve energy, not to have your life exactly the same while this is occurring. So, compensate for the heat issue by turning down the furnace and wow, guess what??? Even more energy saved. You think that it won't make a difference? Turning one thing off once helps. This is a whole lot of super, what I call, Americana, but we're in Canada, but it still works. Do something, do anything, because by doing nothing it's worse. They have the attitude that if people are still driving their cars and suvs and my furnace will compensate for the energy anyways, then hell, I'm not doing anything. Start somewhere for gods sake.

Rant over. And that my friend, is why I don't have a user name.

[Winsor_Pilates]

Originally Posted by ricosuave

No, more like this being an utterly useless symbolic gesture to make people think that doing this, this one time, will make a difference in their otherwise consumeristic driven, SUV gas guzzling, bottled water drinking, 60" plasma-hot tub-A/C and other unnecessary creature comforts, world.

I'd be more impressed if society all switched to cfls or went around performing random acts of kindness for an hour rather than this nonsense.

Seriously, after today, will anyone really care that this happened? People have to be committed for the long run, not some stupid symbolic gesture that helps them sleep at night...

/ end cynicism

I don't think that's the point. No body actually thinks 1 hour without any further commitment will do anything. But if people do 1 hour today, they may start to think of other ways/times they can do it again.

The point is to get people thinking about it and maybe some of them will start to do this on a more consistent basis.

[ricosuave]

^ maybe so, but the NEED of doing so is already there. If these kinds of people can't already see it, then I will wager that they are also the kind of people who wont do this on a consistent basis. Just doing it today is kind-of 'hip', much like Live 8 was 'hip'