We live in an age of information consumption. We have more power at our finger tips to impact the world around us than any prior generation. So why is it that so many of us still are stuck in the “wow, someone should really do something about that” phase when it comes to social issues? Even though we have all of the resources of social media and data there’s still a sense of overwhelming odds and disempowerment. To be sure it’s understandable from the standpoint of the sheer magnitude of many of these issues.
Take litter for example. According to the World Bank , an average of 1.3 billion tons of garbage is generated worldwide per year. This is expected to double by 2025. Findings show that urban areas account for the largest amount of this waste. There are no worldwide statistics on the amount of litter this produces. But take a look around on any given street and you can imagine that the percentage has to be pretty high. The impact of litter has both local and global ramifications. According to a study appearing in National Geographic, 8 million tons of plastic trash ended up in the ocean in 2010.
Someone should do something, right? And someone has. We’re incredibly excited to have Jeff Kirschner, founder of Litterati, on #H2HChat to talk about the way he’s leverage Instagram to start a global grassroots movement against litter. Using geotagging, the Litterati community provides information on litter hotspots in various communities that then gets used by companies and organizations to be smarter about their anti-litter campaigns even down to where they place waste bins.
