Topic: Culture & Society

EDGE Publications, in partnership with the "Bay Area Reporter," today announced the official launch of EDGEsanfrancisco.com, a new online destination with news and entertainment serving San Francisco's gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community.

A new site is aiming for gay visitors who live in the "Bagdad by the bay" area. EDGEsanfrancisco.com delivers eight major channels of information to its readers, including daily news, business & finance, weather, arts & entertainment, heath & fitness, style, sports and travel. Additional channels provide local coverage of nightlife, shopping, lodging, dining, plus a local business directory and calendar of events.

After watching "Severe Visibility," audiences will no doubt be divisive in regard to what the film is more than implying. But it can arguably be said that you will be thinking about this implication for some time to come.

After several delays, the 9/11 feature film Severe Visibility will have its American premiere at the New York International Independent Film & Video Festival in Los Angeles on September 30th, 2007. The film has been on a roller-coaster ride since the beginning of production in 2006.

When natural disaster strikes, people around the world are left wondering how they can help. On August 15th, an 8.0 earthquake hit Peru, devastating the country and leaving many without the bare necessities of survival. Robin Poirier, a Vancouver resident, had been planning her move to Lima for months before the disaster when she suddenly found herself in a unique position to help. Discover how one person made a difference, and how you can too.

When the devastating earthquake hit Peru on August 15th, destroying 85,000 homes and killing over 500 people, Robin Poirier, like much of the world, knew she wanted to help. She just wasn't sure how to do it.

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Some damage caused by August's earthquake in Peru.

Modern marketing meets the green revolution with the Green Coupon Book - an idea that was just waiting to be discovered.

Today, everyone knows it's cool to be green. It's in the papers everyday. So why hasn't the idea of "green consumerism" taken hold among middle class Americans?

A new study by University of Alberta researcher Paul Joosse cautions against any surety about the ideological motivations behind the Earth Liberation Front. The Earth Liberation Front (or ELF, for short) uses an organizational strategy called ‘leaderless resistance,’ whereby small cells choose when, how, and against whom to act - and then make a claim of responsibility on behalf of the mother group.

Ask the FBI, and they will contend that a dangerous wave of "ecoterrorism" has swept North America in the past decade. Ski resorts, new condominium developments and corporate logging headquarters have all been the target of arson attacks, pushing the damage tally of a shadowy organization called the Earth Liberation Front past the $100 million mark. The FBI’s concern has reached such a fervor, in fact, that it labeled environmental terrorism as the number one domestic terrorism threat in 2005.

Rare book collectors and religious historians are abuzz with the recent discovery of an 1830 First Edition Book of Mormon. The book was discovered while cleaning out an estate near Palmyra, New York, the birthplace of the Mormon religion. The book will be featured in a Wednesday, September 19th combined Estate Auction.

Hessney Auction Company of Geneva, NY recently discovered a rare first edition 1830 Book of Mormon by Joseph Smith Jr., while cleaning out a Wayne County estate near Palmyra and Fayette, NY, the birthplace of Mormonism. The rare Book of Mormon book will be featured in a Wednesday, September 19th combined estate auction beginning at 10:00 am at the Hessney Auction Center.

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1830 Edition of Book of Mormon.

Twenty-four 2.5 megawatt wind turbine generators will produce enough carbon-free electricity to power 24,000 homes.

British Petroleum broke ground Wednesday on its first wind project in Texas. The project, named Silver Star I, is located 80 miles southwest of the Dallas/Fort Worth metropolitan area. The 60 megawatt (MW), $100 million project is owned 85% by BP Alternative Energy and 15% by Clipper Windpower.

Canadian hemp acreage declines in 2007 as expected.

The Hemp Industries Association (HIA) is pleased with the latest statistics on hemp markets and acreage from Canada. The statistics, released by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Health Canada and Statistics Canada late last month, show that the decade-old Canadian hemp industry is continuing its growth, but at a more moderate and sustainable pace.

International peace parks can work as a tool of diplomacy in war zones around the world, concludes "Peace Parks," edited by University of Vermont professor Saleem Ali, and praised by Harvard biologist EO Wilson. The book will be released at the Parks, Peace and Partnerships Conference at Waterton Lakes National Park in Alberta, Canada. These parks have defused conflict between Ecuador and Peru and hold promise for building trust between Iran and Iraq and elsewhere, Ali's research and book conclude. By sharing management of ecologically significant borderlands, conflict resolution and conservation goals have been achieved when other efforts failed.

Peace parks can work. Not just for managing cross-boundary wilderness areas, as occurs in the Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park at the US/Canadian border, but as a powerful tool of diplomacy in war zones around the world.

Children of the Great Depression sought stability, those coming of age during World War II were stoic, duty-driven team players, and early Baby Boomers were hedonistic social activists. How will those coming of age around the time of the fall of the twin towers be affected by that event?

Charles D. Schewe, a marketing professor at the University of Massachusetts and well-known author on generational cohorts, says the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001 jolted the nation and the people who were coming of age at that time, but it’s unclear whether these events mark a true watershed moment with the intense impact of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy or the attack on Pearl Harbor.