I am a Pro-Life, Conservative, Capitalist!

August 11, 2010 by Ben.

Speech delivered at MoveOn.org Fight Washington Corruption Rally
Louisville, KY - August 10th, 2010
by Ben Evans

I am pledging to clean up Washington because…I am a pro-life, conservative, capitalist. Strange right? Now say it with me - I am a pro-life, conservative, capitalist. Let me unpack that statement a little bit.

I am pro-life because I believe that not just human life is important and sacred but that all life is important and sacred - that we must stand humbled and awed in the face of this sacred and fabulously diverse web of life that supports and nourishes us and that we should do everything in our power to honor, protect, and support that web and all of its inhabitants. THAT is pro-life and we cannot allow our language to be hijacked by those who would restrict us to some narrow view of what kind of life is valuable.

I am a conservative because I believe in conserving our most valuable assets - our true wealth - our water, air, land, climate, and biosphere. I am a conservative because I reject the utterly rash and unforgivably radical idea that we can use our planet as humanity’s open and unregulated sewer without devastating consequences for us and all life that supports us. Conducting that kind of uncontrolled experiment on the only home we have - an experiment that we are currently carrying out at full-throttle - is the most insanely radical idea I can imagine and it flies in the face of the very word “conservative.”

And finally, I am a capitalist because I believe in the intrinsic value of natural capital - the real wealth upon which all of our seemingly important human wealth is based and without which none of this would exist. I am a capitalist because I believe in the ability of market forces to conserve and utilize this real capital wisely if, and only if, we have a truly open, accurate, transparent and distortion-free market that accounts for actual consequences and costs over all time frames. This means, among many other things, pricing carbon and adding the true and irreplaceable value of natural capital and the ecosphere to the ledger - because right now the “free-market” that we think we have could not be more distorted or backwards. Or, as noted author and economist David Korten once said to me, “What economic growth really measures is the rate at which the rich are expropriating the real resources of the poor in order to turn them into garbage at an accelerating rate to make money for people who already have more than they need.”

And so I am truly a pro-life, conservative, capitalist - and we need more of those in Washington. We can no longer allow our language to be co-opted by those who would distort and destroy it, anymore than we can allow our government to be. We need to take back Washington and remind them that they work for US. We need a government that recognizes that humanity does not live in a vacuum, that a sustainable human economy and a healthy vibrant ecosphere are not mutually exclusive but, rather, mutually essential - and we need a government that can legislate that way.

We can all do a tremendous amount as individuals in our own lives and communities to protect this planet that sustains us - and I’m definitely all for that. But there are certain essential things that only our government can do. Only our government can enforce true-cost accounting by putting a price on carbon to move us away from our dead-end fossil fuel obsession. Only our government can set renewable energy standards to allow the energy marketplace to function wisely and in our long-term best interests. And only our government can negotiate climate treaties with other nations to preserve the enduring health of our species. We need an effective government, and so long as Washington is run by those who see mowing down our forests, blowing up our mountains, and polluting our water in order to make a buck for the top tax-bracket as “economic progress”, we will not have an effective government.

BP is not a person. Goldman Sachs is not a person. Massey Coal is not a person. And yet, they have more rights than any person - without the same responsibilities. We cannot continue to live in a world run by the likes of BP, Goldman Sachs, and Massey - or we will simply not have a world to live in.

Now say it with me one more time: I am a pro-life, conservative, capitalist. And I want an honest and fair government that knows what those words REALLY mean, and acts like it.

Posted in Events, Issues, Ben, Uncategorized | No Comments »

Wow! You donated $20,000 in December!

January 18, 2010 by Mark.

Dear YERTians,

Thanks to you and dozens like you, YERT received just over $20,000 in donations during December. This is an extraordinary breath of fresh air into the film– one that we plan to use very wisely. We have news about this and more in this latest YERT update!

In This Update:
• EVENT: YERT featured on FireDogLake TONIGHT, 8pm EST
• EVENT: Coal Free Future Project and YERT film preview on 2/11 in Pittsburgh
• Mark & Ben featured on “The Wall” by Repower America
• Film Festival Update
• Marketing Survey Results + ChicoBag Winners!
• How YERT raised $20,000

EVENT: YERT featured on FireDogLake TONIGHT, 8pm EST
YERT was recently asked to appear on FireDogLake.com– our second appearance on that site. FireDogLake has a regular “movie night” event, and tonight, Monday 9/18, they’ll be featuring three YERT short films with Ben, Julie, and Mark available for Q&A in chat form. Come join us! http://firedoglake.com/booksalon/ . Oh, and here are the three films for discussion:

• YERTpod30: Perennial Good Food in Kansas
• Wes Jackson’s most important challenge for us humans
• YERTpod31: An Epiphany of Three Wise Men in Missouri

EVENT: Coal Free Future Project and YERT film preview on 2/11 in Pittsburgh
We have a very special event coming up in Pittsburgh– Ben is a key performer in and has created short film “faux-mercials” and visuals for the Coal Free Future Project’s presentation of “Welcome to the Saudi Arabia of Coal,” an original multimedia play by Jeff Biggers, American Book Award winner and frequent contributor to Huffington Post and The Nation. From the Coal Free Future Project’s website: “The performance draws attention to the national scandal of mountaintop removal mining, and the grave health impacts of coal mining and coal-fired plants, and the potentially catastrophic consequences of climate destabilization triggered by CO2 emissions.” In addition to Jeff and Ben, the play features and is directed by Appalachian Voices National Field Coordinator and actress Stephanie Pistello, and is set to songs by some of coal country’s finest songwriters. After the performance, we’ll be screening selected “sneak peek” chapters of the YERT feature film– chapters featuring Joel Salatin, Wes Jackson, and other favorite personalities from the trip. We’re eager to get your honest feedback to help shape the creation of the film!

<-- Here's a picture from "Welcome to the Saudi Arabia of Coal," courtesy of the Coal Free Future Project.

The event happens from 8-10pm on Thursday, Feb. 11, 2010 at the Union Project Great Hall, 801 N. Negley Ave., Pittsburgh, PA. Contact mark@yert.com for more details. For more information about the Coal Free Future Project and additional events around the country in Louisville, KY, Asheville, NC, Washington DC, Columbus, OH, Lexington, KY, and NYC, visit http://CoalFreeFutureProject.org.

Mark & Ben featured on “The Wall” by Repower America
Through a bit of magic performed by our friends at Repower America, Mark and Ben have been given exclusive “big boxes” to highlight the videos posted on “The Wall,” a collection of countless videos by activists sharing their views about the need for action on climate change. Ben and Mark created videos sharing our views, and our small squares were upgraded to more easy to see “large squares.” Browse around here and then click on the picture of Mark or Ben to listen to our messages! Here’s The Wall. Or if you want to cheat and go right to our video messages (with, oddly, small squares for us), click for Mark’s message and Ben’s Message.

Film Festival Update
Scott and Ben have been working their tails off on the latest cut of the YERT film, with our most recent film submission going into the Tribeca Film Festival in NYC. The next big entry date is the Mountain Film Festival in Telluride, CO. We’re still waiting for results from the South By Southwest entry. In the meantime, we’re working to get the time of our film down to 90 minutes, with the next big developments likely to be the addition of additional narration and some motion graphics to move the story along more effectively. After that we’ll drop in some custom music. We are currently trying to get the film fully baked by the summer of 2010.

Marketing Survey Results + ChicoBag Winners!
Thank you all for the excellent feedback that you contributed through the marketing survey that we released in December. It was extremely helpful to our planning and marketing efforts– so much so that I’d like to share it with you and put the knowledge into the public domain to help other filmmakers out there. You can check out the data about pricing and demographics here. And there were some wonderful suggestions for marketing an environmental feature film in our open-ended question, with the top 99 suggestions collected in our blog here.

And, as promised, we’ll be shipping out a YERT ChicoBag to five special survey participants, chosen at random (via random number generator in Excel). Congratulation to the winners, specifically…

• Joan Hare
• David Buscher
• Callie Williams
• Aaron Meyers
• Ellie Gordon

How YERT raised $20,000
We are thrilled and a little stunned by the incredible flow of donations from YERT supporters all around the world. We received contributions from over 30 brand new donors in December, bringing the total number of donors to 119, raising just over $20,000 in December. We blew away the matching donation of $3,000, and apparently that got the ball rolling with people coming out in waves to support the project. Most (95%) of the money came through checks written to Pittsburgh Filmmakers, with 5% coming through PayPal.

We were wondering how we were going to find the funds to finish the film, and this round of support lets us worry much less about that and focus on finishing the film. We still need more money to do it right, but this keeps the core team in gear for the foreseeable future. It also gives us more options for marketing and distribution when that time comes around– increasing the impact of the YERT film even more.

We can’t thank you enough for all of your incredible support. May you have a happy, GREEN new year, and please keep in touch.

Peace,
Ben, Julie, and Mark
team@yert.com

http://www.yert.com

Posted in Events, Ben, Mark, Uncategorized | No Comments »

Just $650 of matching funds left!

December 29, 2009 by Mark.

Since we announced our $3,000 matching contribution on Dec. 17, we have received an amazing $2,350 of contributions. Doubled, that comes to $4,700 raised in less than two weeks! Can you make a donation to use up $650 of remaining matching funds before the end of the year?

Click here to make a tax-deductible and MATCHED donation to YERT!

And if you haven’t had a chance to check out the “YERT Filmmaking Lair,” take a look! You’ll see Ben, Scott, and Mark discuss the nitty gritty elements of eco-filmmaking.

Click here to watch the “YERT Filmmaking Lair”…

This is your last chance in 2009 to put your money where your mouth, or your mind, or your heart is. Every penny removed from the “extractive” economy and delivered to YERT helps to bring about a more sustainable world in a direct, loving way. Can you help us reach our year-end goal of $10,000?

Count my donation as a vote for a more sustainable world!

As always, we’re funded by love, encouragement, and your financial contributions. Thank you for sending them our way!

Happy New Year,

Ben, Julie, and Mark

team@yert.com

Posted in Events, Video, Ben, Mark | 1 Comment »

WATCH: Inside the YERT Filmmaking Lair

December 17, 2009 by Mark.

Dear YERTians,

We’ve created a new video to give you an inside look at the “YERT Filmmaking Lair,” where our feature film is coming to life– see our grand plans on the giant whiteboard, meet our editor, Scott, and then find out what gives him his secret powers!

Click here to watch the “YERT Filmmaking Lair”…

We also just received a generous matching offer from an anonymous YERT donor: $3,000 of funds to double donations given before January 1st!

Click here to make a tax-deductible and MATCHED donation to YERT!

We’re trying to raise a total of $10,000 by the end of the year, which will give us the funds to pay our editor for a few more months and kick start our grass-roots distribution and fundraising plans for the new year. Can you spare a dime? Please consider making a year-end tax-deductible donation at
http://yert.com/donate.php.

We believe that the planet and those working for her care deserve a voice, and the YERT feature film will do just that. We’re funded by love, encouragement, and your finacial contributions, so please help us keep the message alive and well by making a MATCHED donation.

Thanks for your support!

Ben, Julie, and Mark

team@yert.com

Posted in Events, Video, Ben, Mark | 1 Comment »

YERT Submits to SXSW Film Festival

December 17, 2009 by Mark.

Just wanted to let you all know that Ben and Scott submitted a fresh new cut of the YERT feature film to the SXSW (South by Southwest) Film Festival! They pulled a butt-kickin’ all nighter last friday and today I received official notice that our submission was received. So now we wait. Looks like we’ll find out it we’re in the festival on or before February 12, 2010. Stay tuned!!

Best,
Mark

Posted in Events, Ben, Mark | No Comments »

And the Sundance results are…

December 4, 2009 by Ben.

We finally received the results from Sundance and they are:

YERT was not accepted…

…but all is certainly not lost. (In fact they only took one environmental documentary film out of nearly 10,000 total submissions.) This just makes all of you, our grassroots supporters, all the more important. In fact, we’re convinced more than ever that the feature film will move countless environmentalists to action– both new and battle-tested activists alike. We just need a little more time to get it ready for prime time. We’re seriously examining the possibility of self-distribution, but we need to collect more information to do it well.

Please take our “YERT MARKETING SURVEY” by answering 10 quick questions here:

http://yertmarketing.questionpro.com/

As a thank you, we’ll give away five YERT ChicoBags to five lucky survey responders, selected at random.

Our submission to Sundance was very rough and incomplete– nothing compared to what we expect to create with a little more time (and money). Now we have our sights set on several other solid festivals - SXSW, Florida, and Tribeca. While the film remains far from done, we’ll keep whittling away at it until it finds its way successfully out into the world.

In the meantime, stay tuned for continued updates and thank you for helping us get this far. And don’t forget to fill out the YERT MARKETING SURVEY!

http://yertmarketing.questionpro.com/

Happy Holidays,
Ben, Julie, and Mark

P.S. Many thanks to our awesome unpaid marketing intern, Vidya Sarma from Chicago, for assembling the survey!

Posted in YERTpoll, Events, Julie, Ben, Mark | No Comments »

YERT in CA - Full Report!

November 30, 2009 by Mark.

Dear YERTians,

YERT had a fantastic visit to Los Angeles and San Francisco, just before Thanksgiving. We gave sneak peeks to a few chapters from the upcoming YERT feature film and received extremely positive reviews across the board, from average citizens to industry professionals– from Sony, Warner Brothers, and Disney! Read on for highlights…

While Ben and Scott pulled multiple all-nighters to finish key chapters in advance of our Sony screening, Mark gave 11 YERT presentations in one week, introducing the project to hundreds of people– many working in the heart of the entertainment industry. Ben was planning to join me in CA, but a last-minute bout of family flu on the home front kept him in Kentucky to hold down the fort. I missed him on the trip, but his editing efforts at home that week were invaluable…

Here’s a quick outline of what you’ll find in this update:

• All Saints Church in Pasadena
• The Great Waste Challenge
• Warner Brothers
• Sony Pictures
• EPA and Berkeley
• Green Festival
• Presidio Green MBA Friends
• Wrap-up
• ChicoBags for Sale!

All Saints Church in Pasadena
Things got off to a great start with a presentation packed by 50+ eager audience members at All Saints Church in Pasadena. All Saints is a hotbed for activist activity, and the audience was delighted and inspired by the footage and stories from the road trip– so much so that we’re going to try to visit again for another presentation. That event sparked all sorts of interesting activity, including a presentation at USC (University of Southern California) and a private screening for eco-activist friends of Don and Mary Thomas on Wednesday of that week.

The Great Waste Challenge
We also made some headway in the long process of presenting inside elementary, middle, and high schools in the Los Angeles area. A connection through Pittsburgh’s own Carl Kurlander (writer of “St. Elmo’s Fire” and producer of “My Tale of Two Cities” ) put us in touch with Janet Loeb, a parent and green consultant working to bring sustainability to schools in Los Angeles via the “Great Waste Challenge.” They’re working on innovative ways of reducing waste in schools (similar to YERT’s “one shoebox of garbage” challenge), and planning to eventually integrate composting and farming projects to the mix. We love what they’re doing and hope to work together down the road as they bring environmental awareness to schools in fun, creative ways. If it takes off in LA, then we hope to see it expand nationwide!

Warner Brothers
Janet also put us in touch with friends of hers in the media industry, who promptly invited me to their home for a private screening. The husband in that friendly couple is an executive at Warner Brothers, and he was extremely impressed by the YERT project and immediately started brainstorming with me on ways to get our film funded and our footage out into the world. We’ll keep you posted on those efforts as they develop.

Sony Pictures
The Sony presentation was a highlight of the week, and I spent most of the day on-site at their massive studio facility in Culver City. It was a “green Sony day” of sorts, and after lunch with my friendly hosts, I proceeded to attend an event in which they discussed all the ways in which Sony was going green. Kind of amazing to see such a massive business grapple with the early steps of greening their entire organization. They introduced the YERT project by name and encouraged all attendees to go to our screening later that evening! Next I spent a couple hours downloading newly finished film chapters from the all-nighter-pulling dynamic-editing-duo of Ben and Scott, integrated the footage into the presentation, ran through it a couple times, then wandered off to meet my hosts for happy hour, and then on to the screening room for the presentation. I had two full hours in a beautiful screening room– perhaps the most beautiful setting of any YERT screening to-date! I ran through a handful of film chapters, combined with short films, brief video clips, photos and stories. The audience (probably about 25 people) was delighted by the results and I stayed for a while afterwards meeting with viewers who were eager to offer their support and assistance. I’m still busy following up on all those leads as I write this…

EPA and Berkeley
The next big event was a lunchtime presentation at the EPA in San Francisco. I shared stories and videos with the employees there, and made a few contacts with scientists who may be able to help us fact-check elements of the film. Then I drove over towards Berkeley for a private presentation at the home of YERT fans and family Erin and Dio. We had over 20 people that evening, and once again the response was overwhelmingly positive. People laughed and smiled and reflected and talked about what they saw.

Green Festival
I spent the remaining days connecting with friends in San Francisco, including a visit to the SF Green Festival, where I met up with YERT friends Joey Shepp (green new media consultant/entrepreneur - http://www.joeyshepp.com/ ), Theo Chocolate, Bainbridge Graduate Institute, and a few others. I also found a couple of new things that I felt were worth sharing with you: DogFlushies.com sells water-soluble dog poo baggies that you can flush down your toilet after walking your dog. Amazing. And Rentalic.com, a website that lets you rent items that you own (or want to borrow) (like lawn mower, vacuum cleaner, garden tools, video projector, or other tools that you may use once in a while) for a small fee– helping people do more with less consumption. Everything else was green and interesting, but didn’t jump out like Rentalic and DogFlushies.

Presidio Green MBA Friends and More
I also want to give a shout out to Ali Hart and Ted Ko from the Presidio Sustainable MBA program for helping to spread the word about YERT throughout California. They were instrumental in getting the Sony presentation set up and continue to be thoughtful inspirations and sounding boards for YERTy ideas as they surface. And I also want to thank Damien Somerset (http://Zaproot.com and http://ShiftLogic.org) for more great connections and helpful brainstorming in Los Angeles.

Wrap-up
It is difficult to put into words the support and encouragement– not to mention the joy– that I felt and received from enthusiastic old and new YERT fans during this recent adventure. It put wind into the YERT sails and gives us a good feeling that the film to which we have (yourselves included) dedicated so much time, money, blood, sweat, tears, will make a powerful difference in the lives of those who experience it. All we need to do is finish it up and get it out there– and that will surely come in the months ahead.

ChicoBags for Sale!
We’re still low on funds and need thousands to properly finish the film. Please consider a tax-deductible YERT donation this holiday season: http://www.yert.com/donate.php . A healthy, YERTy planet may well be the best gift you can give to your children. We are also sitting on an inventory of nearly 300 YERT ChicoBags, and would love to sell them to continue funding the film. They make great holiday gifts (and gift WRAPPERS) — please check them out and buy a few at our online store: http://www.yert.com/shert_shop.php .

Thank you all for your continued enthusiasm and support for YERT and our planet. It’s going to get more and more interesting as these days pass…

YERTfully Yours,
Mark (and Ben and Julie!)
team@yert.com

Posted in Events, Travelog, Ben, Mark | No Comments »

YERT Submits Feature Film to Sundance!

September 28, 2009 by Mark.

Dear YERTians,

Thanks to some extraordinary efforts by Ben and our trusty new editor Scott Irick, we have submitted a rough cut of the YERT feature film to Sundance. It is a milestone and a launching pad to the next round of YERT filmmaking efforts. Read on for more information…

* YERT submits feature film to Sundance Film Fest
* YERT to be featured on FireDogLake.com TONIGHT
* YERT presenting at two Bioneers conferences
* We need donation$ for music and motion graphics

YERT submits feature film to Sundance Film Fest
THANK YOU YERTIANS!! It’s true, after countless late nights (and a true all-nighter from which I (Ben) am still recovering), at 10:36pm last Thursday night, the YERT editing team rushed a relatively watchable ROUGH cut of the film out the door and through the Louisville rain to FedEx and on to the Sundance submission office in Beverly Hills - a whole 24 min. before the late submission deadline! Even a week ago, this literally looked like an impossible deadline - and now some “lucky” intern at Sundance will have the privilege of watching Ben manure-wrestling with pigs, Mark getting “faced” by a snowblower, and Julie giving birth to a conehead (albeit, an adorable, life-changing conehead). And so, this is the part of the blog where we send out an ENORMOUS THANK YOU to all our transcribers and other volunteers who worked diligently to help us comb through our mountain of footage and get this rough cut out the door. You know who you are, WE know who you are - and we are eternally grateful for all your time and care spent on behalf of YERT and the planet. It would not have been possible without all of you. But our work is just beginning, as we revise the rough cut and zero in on our final cut, we’ll need all of our wonderful YERTians more than ever so stay tuned. (A special thanks to Ange Vesco who transcribed over 30 hours of tape single-handedly!)

YERT to be featured on FireDogLake.com TONIGHT @ 8pm EST
Mark recently visited the Netroots Nation conference when it came to Pittsburgh back in August, and at the event we bumped into some folks from Firedoglake.com! They became interested in the project and to make a long story short, YERT will be featured on the front page of their blog tonight during a live “meet the ‘author’ book salon” session focused on our Dugout Dick video and also our recent efforts to get into Sundance. It will be a Q&A text chat format– go to FireDogLake.com website at 8pm EST and click on the link for Dugout Dick. It should take you to a page where you can submit questions to Mark, Ben, and Julie all about YERT. In the meantime you can see we’re queued for action at this book salon link.

YERT presenting at two Bioneers conferences
Mark (in Pittsburgh) and Ben (in Louisville) will be will be presenting all about the YERT project at their cities’ respective Bioneers events. They’ll be sharing stories from the road, YERT short films – and sneak peeks from the upcoming feature film… Catch Ben’s YERT Presentations at Louisville’s Bluegrass Bioneers event at the UofL Rauch Planetarium Friday 10/16 at 4:15pm and Saturday 10/17 at 8pm AND at Mark’s YERT Presentation at Pittsburgh’s 3 Rivers Bioneers at the Pittsburgh Project on the North Side Sunday 10/18 at 10:30AM.
Click here for more details about Ben’s presentation in Louisville
Click here for more details about Mark’s presentation in Pittsburgh

We need donation$ for music and motion graphics
The YERT submission to Sundance had almost no music in it. That’s because we need to lock down much of the video before it makes financial sense to tie music to it– and there are many more changes in store for the film. That said, once that golden hour arrives, we have several excellent musicians eager to score portions of our film and we’d like to hire them, but we don’t yet have the money. The other element that we’d like to add to our film is animation! We have some professional animators on deck, ready to go, but we need up to $9000 in the bank before we feel comfortable setting them loose.

Can you help us add music and motion graphics to our film? DONATE HERE.

And if you haven’t yet, can you send this link to friends and family, and embed the video in your blogs? YERT FEATURE FILM TRAILER

We’ll be working our tails off this fall the pull the loose ends of the film together and prepare it for viewing by audiences around the world. We couldn’t do it without your support and encouragement– thank you for believing in us and this project!

Humbly Yours,
Mark, Ben, and Julie
team@yert.com

Posted in Events, Julie, Ben, Mark | No Comments »

YERT Urgently Needs Transcribers!

June 23, 2009 by Mark.

(Below, we’ve updated our original “call for transcribers” post from a few months back to reflect our current status and some big news - out trailer is done, and because of some key positive responses, we’ve got a good chance to send this film to Sundance. To do this, WE STILL NEED NEW TRANSCRIBERS, now more than ever…and now we can PAY you if you sign up for at least 3 tapes per week. Can you help us get to Sundance? Send me a note– mark@yert.com.) Here’s the updated post:

We’re making great progress on our transcription project – tackling a mountain of 500 hours (19,000 clips) from our year-long road trip – but we still need more help! We currently have 40 people signed up to help, but we’re looking for 60 more people to lend a hand — for a total of 100. That’s right. 100. This is a big job – it takes about 4 hours to transcribe one hour of footage, so we’re looking at about 2000 people hours to get this footage prepped for the editing process!

And to get this thing to Sundance, we need to finish by the second week of July!

With 100 people on board, each can contribute a very reasonable 8-10 hours per week and we’ll cross the finish line on time. By logging all of these clips quickly, we can make the Sundance deadline, and get this film out to the general public soon and in a big way – and we all know that our lovely planet doesn’t have days to spare.

Think about it: When was the last time you could powerfully help the planet by sitting down to watch a video?? Now you can. Seize the moment and watch a clip for the planet. For more information about volunteering, please contact Mark Dixon at 415-672-5537, or mark@yert.com. We’ll chat for about 30 minutes and then get you logging ASAP!

Thanks for all of your support! We’re thrilled with every little bit of it and want to be sure you know that this project would not be possible without your continued support, both verbal and financial.

Peace,
Mark & Ben

Posted in Events, Ben, Mark | 6 Comments »

YERT: The Film - Trailer

June 22, 2009 by Mark.

Get ready for YERT: The Film. This is going to be the full road trip story you’ve all been waiting for jam-packed into a powerful feature-length film, and this new film trailer is the first real glimpse into what it’ll be like. We’re shooting for Sundance, so spread the word to all of your friends and family - we want this trailer to travel around the world.

We need your help!

• We need transcribers. (you earn some cash)
• We need donations. (tax deductible)
• We need your friends. (and their friends)

Also, be sure to check out the synopsis below for a less-quick look at what the film is all about.

Please Transcribe (we just might pay you!)

We’ve got a tight deadline for the first possible entry date into Sundance, and boy do we have our work cut out for us! We’ve been working to transcribe our footage for months, but still have quite a ways to go, and we need an army of helpers– yourself included. And if you can sign up for at least three tapes a week we will pay you $10/tape. If you’ve ever wondered how you can help Mother Nature, now is the time– and she’s paying cash. Send an e-mail to mark@yert.com for more information.

Please Donate (get your name in the credits!)

We’ve put over $160,000 of our own money towards the YERT project and creation of this film. Now we’re asking you, our favorite planetary supporters, to put your money where your angst is and pitch in $20, $50, $100, $1000, or more to help us finish this film while the planet still stands a chance. We think we’ll need between $60,000 and $200,000 to finish as quickly and professionally as possible. You can make a tax-deductible donation to YERT by making out a check to “Pittsburgh Filmmakers” and noting “Conduiting Program: YERT” in the memo line of the check. Then mail the check to “Mark Dixon - YERT, 327 Denniston Ave., Pittsburgh PA 15206″. All donors who request it will get their names added to the credits of our feature film. For donations of $100 or more we’ll send you a free, autographed copy of David Korten’s new book: Agenda for a New Economy, or you can choose an autographed copy of his YERT-inspiring book The Great Turning. Many thanks to David Korten for donating the initial batch of autographed books to make this offer possible!

Tell 5 Friends (in 10 seconds)

If you’ve ever wondered when a tiny action on your part can make a huge difference to YERT, now is that time! Please tell five friends about this new trailer by simply sending them this link: http://www.yert.com/film.php . That’s all. It takes 10 seconds. You’ve done it before, or maybe you haven’t, but we hope you’re inspired to do it for us right now. Extra points if you “favorite” us in YouTube. Even more extra points if you Digg, StumbleUpon, or share us on Facebook (use the links to the right of the video player one this Trailer Page).

Synopsis

YERT (Your Environmental Road Trip) is a groundbreaking adventure and a celebration of the American spirit in the face of adversity - a thought-provoking, inspiring, and sometimes hilarious, documentary about the courageous and creative individuals, groups, businesses and leaders of this country who are tackling the greatest environmental threats in history. Called into action by the ever increasing threats of planetary catastrophe (from climate change to toxic pollution, from water scarcity to habitat destruction), the three of us - Mark Dixon, Ben Evans, and Julie Dingman Evans - upended our lives, pooled our collective life-savings, and set off on a first-of-its-kind, 50-state, year-long journey of discovery to personalize sustainability and to answer a critical question: ARE WE DOOMED?

On July 4th, 2007, with camera in hand, tongue in cheek, and packing ourselves, our supplies, and our filmmaking equipment like sardines into a used hybrid car, the YERT team set out from the Rachel Carson Homestead in Pittsburgh, PA to document environmental sustainability in every state in the union in a single year. We wanted to find out: What can Americans do to save the planet? What are they already doing? Why aren’t we all doing more? Is it possible that doing right by the planet is more economical, joyful, and fulfilling than not?

But this film isn’t just about documenting change, it’s about living it. We were on a mission to personalize sustainability, and as the National Academy of Sciences pointed out back in 1990, humanity is currently “conducting an uncontrolled experiment with the planet.” So as we traveled and filmed, we decided to BE the experiment - we would never turn on an incandescent light bulb, we would radically reduce our water usage by any means necessary, and, above all, we would attempt to generate zero waste, keeping all of our garbage (and recyclables) with us for the entire year…in our packed-to-the-gills hybrid. To pull this off, all of our garbage each month would have to fit in…a shoebox. We scoured the country, conducting over 800 interviews, amassing nearly 600 hours of footage, and bathing ourselves in America’s unique approach to environmental sustainability - the good, the bad, and the weird. We found everything from a 92 year-old caveman who’s built an entire cave community in the mountains of Idaho to an electrical engineer working to repower America with solar roadways; from outrageous green personalities like Missouri’s Eco-Elvis and Florida’s Earth Man to incredible new businesses like Tom Szaky’s Terracycle in New Jersey that’s making a mint turning garbage into almost anything; from the utter devastation of Mountain Top Removal coal mining in Appalachia to the revolutionary agricultural genius of Wes Jackson and the Land Institute in the Kansas heartland.

Several months in, an unexpected pregnancy instantly and dramatically changed life for all of us (particularly Ben and Julie, who had been told they could never have children) and pushed the team to the brink. Facing the potential derailment of the entire project, the team had to grapple with new challenges and questions - How long could two dudes and a pregnant woman survive in an enclosed space? Would we all be able to finish the trip? Would the needs of the pregnancy wreck the team’s environmental goals and challenges? Were Ben and Mark up for birthing a baby in the Alaskan wilderness? As both Julie and the garbage expanded, would the car actually explode? And as our personal journeys progressed and we dug deeper into the causes of climate change, it became clear that creating a sustainable world is about much more than simply combating global warming. Everything is tied together, and we began to connect those dots. Efficiency, renewable energy, and technological advances are critically important, but we can’t begin to address climate change unless we also address how we grow our food, how we use our water, how we measure our economy, how we approach human health, how we create/protect community, and, ultimately, how we find fulfillment and understand ourselves. Global warming is but the most dire symptom of some very fundamental issues about how our species functions on the planet. As the godfather of green building, Bob Berkebile, reminded us, we must “move beyond the current environmental movement which is about doing less harm. Our responsibility is not to do less bad, but to do something creative, and regenerative, and restorative, and loving.”

It’s taken more than 150 years to get ourselves into this mess, with America leading the way. The science tells us we have 5-10 years to get ourselves out of it. The question is, will America be leading the way or…are we doomed? You’ll just have to watch the movie to find out.

YERTfully Yours,
Ben, Julie, and Mark - Your YERT Team
team@yert.com

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