The other day my man Adam Leiter, AVP and PR Group Account Manager for The Star Group, sent me a link to an article that stopped me dead in my tracks... yes, dead, as in I came to a complete stop.
The article was titled The tale of two IPOs: cleantech vs social media and it appeared on GigaOm. The crux of the article was...well better still, read it right from the author herself:
"Companies that make online games, social networks, and web coupons seem to be able to raise a lot more money in IPOs right now than companies that make energy technology, greener transportation and biofuels. Zynga's reported potential $2 billion raise could deliver Zynga five times Tesla's combined IPO and follow-on offering. If Groupon raises at least $750 million, it would bring in more than the IPOs of Amyris, KiOR, Gevo and Zipcar, and the planned IPOs of EnphaseEnergy and Luca Technologies combined. It's kind of sad, actually."
Scott Edward Anderson also wrote about this very column for his blog, The Green Skeptic and he nailed it with his take...
"We'd rather throw angry birds at pigs than throw our genius at building a productive new economy based on real, tangible solutions to our energy and environmental problems. Rather than produce real food for real people who really need it, we build virtual farms so our virtual friends can help us grow virtual food."
Think about that for a minute... and then think how screwed up our priorities have become. I don' think it's sad as the writer from GigaOm wrote... I think it's downright pathetic. And I say that as an obvious social media devotee and borderline addict.
It's like Lex Luthor times a thousand, a million, etc... if they (the ones creating the Farmvilles of the world) only used their power for good! Ok, I realize it's not quite that simplistic but you get my point.
Here are two charts that display the differences between Green IPOs and social media IPOs:
So, the question is... Has Social Media Become More Important Than The Environment?