Tonight the Google ‘turned the lights out’ in an effort to raise awareness for an energy conservation cause called Earth Hour.  The company didn’t actually turn the lights out…it changed the white background of its homepage to black.

Apparently Earth Hour encourages people around the world to turn off their lights for one hour, from 8pm to 9pm, on Saturday March 29.

Ok, big deal.  I mean really, I never really understood the idea of energy conservation.  We pay for power after all…if energy conservation was really that important we should be taxed for using power, or energy utilities should bump up their prices.

It’s not even like we’re running out of power either.  Everyone in california remembers rolling blackouts, and we’re just not there now.

I dunno, I hate to be a pessimist…well, actually I love being a pessimist…but really, what is Earth Hour really going to accomplish?  The fact that we have to get people to volunteer to turn off their lights symbolically for an hour really shows that we don’t have any power issues whatsoever.

This is kind of a cool video of an elephant painting a picture of an elephant.  It’s kind of a long video…but pretty amazing if you ask me.

Basically the elephant paints with a brush in his trunk.  It does a surprisingly good job of drawing, including legs, an eye, ear and tail.  What’s interesting is the elephant has pretty good control over the brush, even going back over lines to darken parts of the picture.  Check it out.

Even if you don’t know about hip hop, you probably know 2pac.  His music is pretty classic.  He’s one of those rap icons that will outlast nearly all others.

But since his death, 2pac’s name has been…well, slowly squeezed dry.  You may notice that the guy has come out with almost as many albums after his death than he did before he died.  And most have 1 or 2 decent singles and another 12 filler tracks.  Horrible.

More recently, 2pac’s image has been used on other merchandise, like t-shirts and hats.  That’s not bad, I guess.  The guy’s family has a right to make some money off of his image, sure.

But today I walked into 7-11, and saw something that went too far - a 2pac energy drink called Hunid Racks.

The can features a low resolution picture of 2pac lifting up his shirt with the ‘Hunid Racks’ logo on his abdomen.  The top of the can reads, “Respect the Name - Respect the Game - Respect the Drink,” while the bottom of the can reads “Energy Drink for the Real Hustlers.”

The drink’s website, 100racks.com,  explains the beverage’s concept.  For example, the site gives the definition of 100 racks:  “The term Rack comes from black folks in the hood. “How much are you selling your car for? 5 Racks ($5000.00).”

Also, in addition to the 2pac drink, Hunid Racks offers a Mac Dre drink, pictured.

I have yet to try the drink…I’m going to save one as a collector’s item for sure.

But really, this represents the lowest of the low for 2pac.  It begs the question what’s next?  You can’t sell out much more than putting your image on a soda can.