David Herrold

Google goes goth

Posted by Dave | Filed under Google

Is Google going goth or perhaps making an homage to heavy metal concert t-shirts (ROCK-N-ROLL…where’s the stage)?

No, my fellow creatures of the night, they are not. According to Google:

Google users in the United States will notice today that we “turned the lights out” on the Google.com homepage as a gesture to raise awareness of a worldwide energy conservation effort called Earth Hour. As to why we don’t do this permanently - it saves no energy; modern displays use the same amount of power regardless of what they display. However, you can do something to reduce the energy consumption of your home PC by joining the Climate Savers Computing Initiative.

On Saturday, March 29, 2008, Earth Hour invites people around the world to turn off their lights for one hour – from 8:00pm to 9:00pm in their local time zone. On this day, cities around the world, including Copenhagen, Chicago, Melbourne, Dubai, and Tel Aviv, will hold events to acknowledge their commitment to energy conservation.

I thought I hit an odd key combination this morning that inversed my screen colors (command+option+control+8 on a Mac). I stopped for a minute, cocked my head in a a befuddled way and clicked on the Earth Hour link.

Ah, it all makes sense now. It was simply Google giving us a dose of environmental awareness at 72 DPI.

Thanks Google…I need more coffee.

Tags: earth hour, energy, environment, Google