Adam Minter's Blog, page 2
June 16, 2015
Anatomy of a Myth: the World’s Biggest E-Waste Dump Isn’t.
Let’s start with two photographs. The first was shot by me in China’s Hunan Province. It shows a warehouse that contains roughly 5,000 old locally-collected televisions awaiting recycling. This photo only captures a portion of what is a big inventory, … Continue reading →
April 13, 2015
Junkyard Planet – the Paperback.
I’m very pleased to announce that Junkyard Planet: Travels in the Billion Dollar Trash Trade, was released in a paperback edition today, Tuesday April 14. I have a copy sitting beside me right now, and – as usual – Bloomsbury Press … Continue reading →
March 19, 2015
The actual reason nobody’s interested in stealing your scrap metal, anymore.
On Monday the New York Times ran a very good portrait of a Detroit metal scrapper going about his business, scrounging for metal and seeking places to sell it. Business isn’t what it used to be, the Times tells us, … Continue reading →
February 25, 2015
I’ve been cloned … on twitter. [UPDATED]
[UPDATED 10 March 2015 — Well, after publishing this, I started hearing from other foreigners in China, all of whom had been cloned in precisely the same way – legit twitter handle of another China entity, followed by random numbers and … Continue reading →
I’ve been cloned … on twitter.
A few months ago a friend emailed to say that he’d searched for me on twitter and found twenty accounts using my name, photo, and bio. I looked, and he was right: I was being impersonated. But here’s the thing: … Continue reading →
February 16, 2015
Watsons Malaysia Explains Itself – Badly.
It’s been one week since I blogged about a bottle of tampered-with, over-the-counter medicine that I purchased at Watsons, Asia’s largest personal care chain (a drug store, basically). The blog post – and the story behind it – went totally … Continue reading →
February 12, 2015
American Dockworkers Are Savaging Your Recycling Bin.
Last year, roughly one-third of the recycling generated in the United States was exported to more than 160 countries and territories. That’s 42.8 million tons – enough weight to fill over 2 million standard-sized shipping containers – worth $23.7 billion. … Continue reading →
An Update on My Watsons/GSK Kerfuffle
My Monday blog post taking issue with Watsons Malaysia and its handling of product safety and social media has been circulated much more widely than I ever expected. This is, in large part, due to says.com, a Malaysian news site … Continue reading →
February 9, 2015
Watsons Malaysia Isn’t Safe for Shopping or Social Media – a Shanghai Scrap investigation.
[aka the triumphant return of Shanghai Scrap, shopping avenger.] Last week I badly wanted a bottle of Panadol (a product my US readers would know as Tylenol, ie acetaminphen), so I went down to my local Watsons (specifically, the Amcorp Mall … Continue reading →
February 4, 2015
More iPhone, More Carbon.
Earlier this week, when Apple announced that it was building a solar-powered data center in Mesa, Arizona, I immediately thought of their phones. To be sure, there’s much to admire in Apple’s commitment to reducing its internal carbon footprint. But … Continue reading →
