A couple of recent issues of Ode: For Intelligent Optimists fell into my hands recently. It's a magazine that I would like to like (who wouldn't, with that subtitle?) but have a tough time with. Ode is slick and photo-rich but content-thin. The ads are obtrusive and at times embarrassing (e.g., "Get More Affection with Pheromones!", "The Only Cigarette Made with 10% Organic Tobacco!", and some really strange products). The main articles in Ode are profiles of people who are doing good, or trying to. But there's a repetitive sameness to their projects, which usually involve alternative medicine, making electricity or automotive fuels in unconventional ways, achieving enlightenment, helping third-world economies, rescuing endangered creatures, and other such noble activities. All well and good—but reading uncritical coverage of long-shot experiments seems perhaps less socially useful than actually doing something oneself and helping others do likewise ...

(cf. ConspicuousAnticonsumption (2004-09-17), ...) - ^z - 2009-02-23