Professional groups in the NorthWest region of the U.S. have been overwhelmingly focusing their 2008 Fall monthly presentation themes on the favorite trendy subject of the past year, “Going Green.” Like many trends that take hold, “Green” momentum continues to rise, gaining acceptance and distribution as the topic des jour.

In Seattle, professional commercial real estate organizations have brought in LEEDs speakers and panelists to discuss how they are implementing green decisions in project planning. Technology engineering groups have developed meetings around new inventions and the process of obtaining venture capital for green start-up ideas in a time when credit is tight.

If Green really is the new Blue, here’s the next question –  what specifically is evolving from all this talk? Is there focus on the atmosphere, the drinking water, the soil? Where are earth-saving changes taking place?

The Green Daily blog reported today that environmental scientists from MIT have found that methane levels in the Earth’s atmosphere rose sharply in 2007. The rise was measured at various points around the world and not just in the Northern Hemisphere near known sources of methane emissions.

Because the rise appeared across the globe and not just the usual locations, scientists are puzzled. Pre-industrial concentrations of methane were 700 parts per million. They’ve remained steady at 1773 parts per billion during most of the 20th century, but rose sharply to 10 pbb in 2007.

Reuters article

The Green Daily Blog: Methan Levels Up

Data released today from comScore shows the largest purchaser of iPhones since the G3’s launch in June 2008 are those with household incomes of $25,000 to $49,999. Coming in second is the $50,000 to $75,000 income group.

Since the release of the first iPhone in January 2007, 43% of all existing iPhone owners earn over $100,000 annually. comScore suggests that the middle income markets are the most active iPhone buyers, right now, because the unit is small and covers multiple functions, eliminating the need to also purchase other devises, hence a savings.

Perhaps the middle market comScore describes are iPhone patrons, earlier in their careers and in their 20s or 30s, catching on more quickly to new technology, favoring a small unit that encompasses more functions, eliminating the need for toting multiple other devises.

For commuters, in particular, less rather than more to tote across town to work is attractive. For long commutes, entertainment is a plus.

Still, Blackberry does continue to be savored for its professional image and lower price tag among business and finance professionals, linking Office email, calendar and contact functions to the phone. It is a good buy.

Like the Blackberry or its equivalant, iPhone also links desktop functions and offers greater flexibility to those using Apple compatible products. iPhone does provide greater options for entertainment through iTunes, games and music. It is first-rate for either office or recreation.

ComScore.com/phone

Economic pessimism is just so totally futile. And, with everyone, everywhere talking about it, it’s also sort of boring. The over-abundance of focus on it obscures those parts of business, community, and industry that are actually making gains, at this very moment, propelling us into a new decade of next level technology with emerging possibilities. Here’s some of the good news:

• Cicsco Systems quarterly growth: 17%
• Google quarterly growth: 39%
• IBM announced better than expected quarterly earnings
• Oracle posted 28% profit
• LinkdedIn received $22.7 million in new venture capital funding
• Amazon.com posted a 48% rise in profit and 31% gain in revenue
• AT&T profits rose 5.5% with brisk iPhone 3G sales

Wall Street Journal - October 10, 2008

Wall Street Journal - October 23, 2008

Social Times Blog - October 23, 2008

NoSlang.com is an internet slang and acronym interpreter that we StumbledUpon. You enter the slang, it gives you the translation.  Gotta love these:

j%2Ft  (Just talking)
dmi  (Don’t mention it)
wayn (Where are you now)
ayst (Are you still there)
ph33r (Fear)
tbh (To be honest)
tbnt (Thanks but no thanks)

Interesting. For the first half of 2008, internet advertising revenue was up 15% over the previous year, according to a recent study released by IAB and PricewaterhouseCoopers. With this financially eventful last couple of months, it will be interesting to see how the second half of 2008 performs, comparatively.

IAB Report >>

We’ve just distributed the October issue of eFAQs, a compilation of educational articles by brandUNITy about social networks, emarketing, and expanding presence on the internet. To subscribe to this monthly resource: MORE>>

Here’s one: Tweetup — a gathering of Twitter-ers for the purpose of saying hello in person. Or, “Auto-Nudge”. You schedule to be nudged if you haven’t twittered in 24 hours.

StumbleUpon has made discovering new websites an adventure like no other. In the first few moments of use, StumbleUpon served up more fascinating, new expert web pages in our interest categories than we knew existed.

StumbleUpon members submit favorite web pages, then members rank the submission with a thumbs up or thumbs down. Sites with the most thumbs up filter to the top.

In your StumbleUpon account, you select your interest categories, then begin clicking the StumbleUpon button to explore. Away you go, across the internet to superb resources that have filtered to the top via thumbs up.

StumbleUpon is said to be attracting a staggering 35,000 new URLs each day by over 6 million registered members.

Members may now install a StumbleUpon toolbar directly on their webpages, foregoing the browser plug-in. Visitors can then give the thumb directly on your site.

Resources:
StumbleUpon

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