www.iLoveMountains.org is an online campaign to end mountaintop removal mining. Using innovative new technologies, the site tells the story of more than 470 mountains destroyed and 1000 miles of streams buried to meet our demand for cheap energy.
Mountaintop removal is a radical form of coal mining in which entire mountains are literally blown up -- and it is happening here in America on a scale that is almost unimaginable. 
Mountaintop removal is devastating hundreds of square miles of Appalachia; polluting the headwaters of rivers that provide drinking water to millions of Americans; and destroying a distinctly American culture that has endured for generations.
But mountaintop removal can be stopped with the help of Americans all across the country, and that’s why we created iLoveMountains.org. The site uses innovative and interactive new technologies to show people the tragedy happening on our own soil and give them a number of ways to get involved and use their own vision and creativity to work for a solution.
Ways people can get involved include:
Spreading the word: iLoveMountains.org incorporates Forwardtrack software, which keeps track of each user's personal impact (how many people they get to sign up, how many people those people get to sign up, etc...) and shows how the campaign is spreading across the country in real time.
Go tell it on the mountain: many people are called to the cause of ending mountaintop removal by their faith and so we created the "Go Tell it on the Mountain" page, a prayer blog that gives people of faith a place to share their prayers for the people, landscape, and culture of Appalachia.
The videos, photos and audio clips are made easy to share online by using YouTube, Flickr, Podcasts, Technorati Tags, RSS feeds etc…
Contribute to the National Memorial for the Mountains, an online memorial that uses Google Earth to show the locations of more than 470 mountains destroyed by mountaintop removal and connect users to photos, stories and interviews of local residents
The participants in iLoveMountains.org are fortunate to have Mathew Gross as the consultant on the project. As the director of internet communications for the 2004 Howard Dean campaign, Matt's team re-wrote the rules of campaign fundraising. By inviting people of all backgrounds to participate meaningfully in the campaign and using existing social networks to achieve a "viral" sort of outreach, the Dean Campaign enjoyed an unprecedented "buzz" in the media and across the internet.
The ability of Matt's team to turn that media buzz into funds was what allowed them to shatter previous fundraising records for presidential primaries. Their philosophy was to invite people to get involved in small ways and gradually build up their involvement until they were asked to contribute financially - a rather significant "ask" for many people who had not previously been involved in politics. It is essentially this model that we are using through our web-based and e-mail communications at iLoveMountains.org.
Another factor in the sustainability of iLoveMountains.org is that it is supported by seven organizations with different donors, networks of supporters and resources to contribute. That not only diversifies the content and perspectives included in the project, but it also creates a diversified "financial portfolio."
The most significant obstacle for iLoveMountains.org is the same as the obstacle that participating organizations face in trying to stop mountaintop removal coal mining: getting noticed. In our experience, almost every American that learns about mountaintop removal is outraged but few people are thinking about what happens in the mountains of Appalachia, least of all the mainstream media. Getting noticed requires continually rolling out innovative and engaging new initiatives. That, of course, is precisely what we are focused on doing at iLoveMountains.org.
The resource we need most is people – caring people who will share their vision and creativity to do something really important for the world. The strength of iLoveMountains.org has come from the kindness and creativity of many: From Bob Dylan donating the rights to "Blowin' in the Wind" and Willie Nelson sending us an original recording, to the regular folks who have contributed photos, poems and prayers, and the people at Google who chose to feature, and helped us perfect, the National Memorial for the Mountains. Mountaintop removal will be stopped through the kindness and creativity of "ordinary" Americans.
Maintaining the interest of an online community requires responding quickly to events and opportunities. With our "Appalachian Mountaintop Removal" layer recently featured in Google Earth, we are still working to spread the word through blogs, social networks and conventional media while at the same time developing new features and attractions to launch in the summer and fall. The most ambitious project in development will allow visitors to trace their electricity from their home to the facilities that supply their local grid, all the way to the mines that supply the coal - complete with photos and stories of local residents.
iLoveMountains.org is a national online campaign to end mountaintop removal coal mining. It was produced by Appalachian Voices with the consultation of Mathew Gross, director of internet communications for the John Edwards presidential campaign and the 2004 Howard Dean campaign.
iLoveMountains.org uses an innovative combination of technologies to lift the cloak of secrecy surrounding mountaintop removal, which has allowed coal companies in Appalachia to destroy over 470 mountains -- flattening almost 1 million acres of land, burying over 1,000 miles of streams, and devastating local communities in one of the world's biodiversity hotspots.
The site is interactive throughout, using Google Earth to allow visitors to see the scale and impact of the destruction caused by mountaintop removal, and using ForwardTrack petition software, which allows visitors to see the impact of their individual activism as it spreads across the nation.
The site also features a number of videos, including an introduction to mountaintop removal with actor Woody Harrelson. Videos are made available both as podcasts and through YouTube in order to maximize the potential for user interaction and "viral" outreach. For the same reasons, the extensive photo gallery is housed on Flickr.
The centerpiece of the site is the National Memorial for the Mountains, which is in Google Earth and features:
A high resolution tour of a large mountaintop removal site:
22 memorials that tell first-hand stories of families and communities impacted by mountaintop removal:
and the locations of over 470 Appalachian mountaintops destroyed by mountaintop removal coal mining:
Perhaps the greatest testament to the groundbreaking nature of the site is the recent decision by Google to include the National Memorial for the Mountains as part of the featured content in Google Earth in their March 6, 2007, update as well as their soon to be released "Global Awareness" program.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.
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