It's Cloud Cleaning Time!

Cloud cleaning? Did you read that right? Why yes, you did! But no doubt you're wondering "what in the world does that mean?". Well have no fear, I have the answers you need~!

Every day, our lives revolve more and more around the phenomenon that is “the cloud" whether we realize it or not. It's where everything we do on the grand ol' Internet is stored -  our email, music, the photos we share online, saving our video games, our status updates and more. The Cloud plays a major role in how we connect with our family and friends online.

But there's a dirty secret to this. Our Cloud isn't clean like a good cloud should be. Rather than being powered by clean, renewable energy, it's being fueled by dirty coal power! And if we don't demand major technology companies like Amazon, Apple, and Microsoft to clean our cloud, we're looking at huge, expanding databases burning more coal and emitting more carbon pollution into the atmosphere. All that just to keep our amazing Internet constantly humming for millions of people to frequently access.

Of course, it doesn't have to be this way! There is always a solution and the solution for this problem is getting Amazon, Apple, and Microsoft to quit coal and power their growing databases with clean, renewable energy. If we can get them to commit to this, other tech companies will surely follow suit. Sounds fantastic, right!? Who doesn't love breathing clean, non-polluted air!?

Thus, I introduce to you Greenpeace International's newest campaign, Clean Our Cloud! As you already picked up, Greenpeace is working to get these big tech companies to go clean in their energy resources now. That way, as they expand their databases to support this growing Cloud, they aren't relying more and more on disgusting coal energy in the process. Now then, I'm just going to stop right there and let a lovely, awesome video do the rest of the talking~ (And while you're at it, visit the Clean Our Cloud website for more information; trust me, it's interesting and you're going to want to know all about this campaign since this is just the beginning).

This campaign was just launched last week so it's still a baby as far as campaign years go, haha. But it's one kickass baby!! So to spark off this new awesome campaign, on Tuesday April 24th, 2012, I participated in my first (relatively) large action!

There were four different roles during this action.

The first is obvious and crucial: the photographers, videographers and the Tweeter (who took awesome photos on his iPhone and tweeted them on the CleanOurCloud Twitter page).

The second was the Clean Our Cloud reps who dawned blue shirts with one of our main campaign logos to appear as Apple employees. I was not one of the reps, but I still got an awesome shirt just for being a part of the action.

Check it out!!

Pretty awesome, I know~

Most of the blue shirted reps were on the balloon releasing team. Their mission: let go of over 200 black cloud balloons into the Apple store and up to the skylight!

Look at 'em flying!

On that note, just in case you're wondering, all the balloons used are biodegradable and were not released outside. Therefore, they did not impact the environment in any way (we wouldn't do anything stupid like that of course, haha).

The third role were the oh so dutiful cloud cleaners! Suited in black skinny jeans and a black long sleeve shirt with their title Cloud Cleaning Crew on the back, these activists took squeegees, brooms, rags, and a mop to help clean up Apple's dirty cloud.

Check them out in action!

Aah yeaa, squeegee on that Clean Our Cloud decal~!

Careful where you walk, there are some dirty clouds around here.

The fourth role is where I came in. Well, actually, I was in from the very beginning without any of the employees or customers knowing~ Along with two others, I played the "civilian", just your average customer browsing around in the Apple store. Or was I just browsing and pretending to compare features on different products? As the civilian, it was my job to assist the blue shirted reps in changing the background of every iPhone, computer, laptop and iPad to this:

That way whenever a customer walked over to check out a device, they would see the logo of our very important campaign.

But before entering the store to do this, part of my job was to help carry one of two of these large Clean Our Cloud cones and place in near the front of the Apple store to draw major attention!

In addition to changing backgrounds, us civilians also nonchalantly re-setted the homepage of laptops and computers to our campaign homepage (which looks rather similar to Apple's advertising page)~

Check me out in "secret ninja in an obvious red-jacket" mode!

A big thank you to Mr. Action Tweeter DanS [that's his nickname, haha] for this awesome photo! He even said that this was one of the cooler shots he took that day. Whoo!

The funny part about going from one device to another was that the Apple employees were onto us. They noticed that the backgrounds and homepages were being changed and therefore reacted by resetting each device so that they were no longer displaying our message.

But that didn't stop us. We just went back and did it again and again until the action was over. At one point, some of the employees got suspicious that I was one of the culprits. In order to lose their trail and make them actually believe I was just a customer, I pretended to just have fun with the computers and laptops by checking out the Apple websites. Then, I just walked away to the next device without having changed anything. After checking to see if their computer was tampered with, the Apple employee would find that everything was okay and that I was not another activist messing with their gadget. The moment they left, I changed the background and homepage of the next computer I was on. They didn't even see it coming, ha!

And that's basically the gist of what went down on Tuesday. At first, I felt pretty cheated out of a good and fun role when I found out I was just a "civilian" and had to wear regular clothes rather than the cool blue shirts or even a cloud cleaning crew shirt. But it was either stay annoyed by it or make the most of it and obviously I went for the latter (I still got a shirt so yay). So in the end, I had a super awesome time and even if none of the customers, employees or media folk knew that my two other "civilian" friends and I were in on it, we still played a major role and had fun acting like undercover agents, haha.

The best part is that this action got great news coverage! The L.A. Times has an especially amazing article all about this event and I highly recommend that you read it. It even talks about the prep/planning meeting the night before the action. So go go go, take a break from this blog post and reaaaaaad iiiiit (it really won't take you that long)!

While we're on the topic of media coverage, check out these articles later if you like (if you want my opinion, I say read them after you finish this blog update)~ They're pretty awesome:

• Greenpeace Shames Apple With, Um, Fake Window-Washing
• Apple stores targeted by Greenpeace activists

And there's your super awesome update! Oh and before I forget, no I didn't get arrested, haha. But I could have although the chances of anyone getting arrested was very slim. Actually, it turned out that the Apple employees were extremely cordial and let the reps and cloud cleaning crew hang around in the store a bit before nicely asking them to leave. The only three who didn't leave until the very end were us civilians, hehehe~

So there you go~ Hope you enjoyed reading about my awesome day as much as I enjoyed experiencing it, haha!

Until next time~!

~Sara