Weekly Roundup for June 14th through 24th, 2011

It's been 11 days since I provided a weekly roundup (mirrored on Dreamwidth and LiveJournal) of my posts on Crazy Eddie's Motie News, so I'm overdue for the next one. I may as well using the timing of this post to announce that I'll be posting my weekly reviews on Friday or Saturday from now on. First, the weekly cycle really begins with the weekend linkspams and continues with the stories that spin off from them, so treating them as the end of the cycle just does not reflect the reality of my posting schedule. Second, I have more time on Friday than on Monday to write the roundup. Third, since I am promoting the blog as a whole on Kunstler's Clusterfuck Nation instead of specific specially written posts, I no longer have to post these roundups so that they're the first thing Kunstler's readers see. Finally, weekly retrospectives make more sense at the end of everyone else's week than at the beginning of a week.

Also, since this roundup is for the convenience of my readers, consider it a Fan post for Nablopomo.

Enough meta. Time for the roundup.

The week started off with Model D Media for June 14, 2011: Livernois the Avenue of Fashion and Detroit compared and contrasted with New Orleans, which was my summary and reaction to last Tuesday's news from Model D media's Features. Both stories serve as good examples of Model D's philosophy of "optimism, but not business as usual."

Model D's coverage of local redevelopment stands in stark contrast with the rest of the local media on the subject, which I highlighted in Transformation Detroit, when Business as Usual attempts sustainability. I'm glad the powers that be are interested in sustainability, but I'm not fully convinced or impressed.

The next set of posts consisted of my continuing coverage of oil and gas prices. It started with Gas prices fall back below $4.00 in metro Detroit, continued with Oil dropped 4% yesterday, and concluded a week later with Gas prices drop for a second week in Metro Detroit, which was my 100th post on Crazy Eddie's Motie News, which means this post is my 101st. In that post I buried the lede by emphasizing that the angle about gas prices continuing to drop locally. the real story was about how Obama and others are trying to push oil prices down by releasing oil from their nation's petroleum reserves to stimulate their economies during a slowdown, if not outright stall, in an already weak economic recovery.

After a day off, I reposted two entries that were originally on my Dreamwidth and LiveJournal, Blast from the past: Snyder reorganizes Department of Labor, Energy, and Economic Growth, first posted on Dreamwidth here, and Blast from the past: I'm an Eco-Avenger, first posted on Dreamwidth here. I happened to be going through my Dreamwidth for a fan post about Hysterical Raisins and found them. Besides, it was a slow day for me.

My regular weekend sustainability news linkspams followed immediately afterwards. Part one was
Sustainability news from Michigan's research universities for the week ending June 18, 2011. Part two was Sustainability news from midwestern research universities for the week ending June 18, 2011. Both of the above were strong on the individual sections of science, society, and economy, but weak on general sustainability. On the other hand, part three, Sustainability news from national and local commercial sources for the week ending June 18, 2011, was so strong on general sustainability yet weak on the individual sections that actually had to find relevant local stories thate weren't already used in that weekend's Overnight News Digest: Science Saturday on Daily Kos. That doesn't happen very often.

Two more tightly themed entries based on news that started off in the linkspams, but got spun off, kicked off the next work week. On Monday, I posted It's redistricting time! This post is part of an ongoing series on the U.S. Census and how Michigan has been reacting to official recognition of the state's contraction during the past decade. Watch for more on this ongoing story. The other post spun off the linkspams was Kroger in Royal Oak, the videos, posted on Wednesday. This is another ongoing story, so watch for more about how what looked at first like "just a zoning and development issue, but has turned into something else entirely," namely a major local controversy over sustainabile built environment and sustainable local business. I have a lot more to write about this topic as well, so stay tuned.

In between the two posts above were two entries that were simultaneously posted to my Dreamwidth and LiveJournal, Not a Fan: Driving and Happy Solstice, Everyone!

The penultimate post for this roundup was Paul Gilding, another Crazy Eddie, in which I took the big picture view. While this is a change of pace, it isn't off topic. As I wrote in the post, "Just because I blog about sustainability in Detroit doesn't mean that I forget about this blog being about collapse and how to stave it off or survive it. After all, I read the description every time I look at my own blog." This article ended up being included in The PowerSwitch Peak Oil Daily the next day.

Finally, the number one entry from the "back catalog" of the blog last week was U.S.-China EcoPartnerships: The CoDominion plans for sustainability, originally posted on May 15, 2011. I promoted it on Kunstler's blog the next day, and it was the least viewed of any of my promoted entries the week it was posted, which I found disappointing, as I thought it was well done and interesting news. Interest in the post has revived during the past couple of weeks with 5 views today, good for second, 15 views during the past week, tying it for third, 62 views during the past four weeks, placing it fourth, and 106 views overall, good for eighth place and still climbing. I am no longer disappointed by the reception for this post.

With that, the past week's cycle ends. It begins anew with the weekend sustainability news linkspam, which I will post starting tomorrow night. See you then!