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Don’t Choose Extinction: Frankie the Dino takes New York

September 28^th, 2022

What a week! In collaboration with UNDP’s partners EarthX and PVBLIC Foundation for the ‘Don’t Choose Extinction’ campaign, a ferocious, life-like Utahraptor dinosaur (AKA me, Frankie the Dino) visited New York City during the United Nations General Assembly to urge leaders to act on the climate crisis now and discuss the urgent need for fossil fuel subsidy reform. But you can’t visit New York and not see the sights, so I also roamed around the city making new friends and crashing a select few climate change events.

Don’t Choose Extinction: Frankie the Dino takes New York

I’ve become somewhat of a public figure since I took the liberty of making an, er, unscheduled visit to the United Nations General Assembly a few months back. I was doing a favour for my friends at UNDP and their climate change campaign, “Don’t Choose Extinction”. My message to diplomats and dignitaries was simple: it’s time humans stopped making excuses and started making changes to address climate change.

The film of my speech was a hit. More than 1.8 billion people have seen me sharing what’s on my mind. I hope they all listened, because when it comes to extinction, I know what I’m talking about.

Before UNGA kicked off I needed to have a word with a few influencers, so I stopped by the SDG Media Summit, convened by UNDP with PVBLIC Foundation.

Making sure first that I was ready for my close-up, I spoke to more than 100 leaders in advertising, marketing, communications, public relations, broadcast, digital and technology to talk about ways their work can promote the Sustainable Development Goals.

Frankie surprises the audience at the GREEN Awards at GREENTECH Festival

On 15 September the GREENTECH Festival returned to New York City celebrating the greatest innovations for our planet. At the heart of the festival, the Green Awards recognize the most innovative projects and minds, highlighting sustainable companies and awarding outstanding contributions to a greener world.

My film was screened and I appeared as a guest speaker. Really getting the hang of this limelight stuff.

Frankie walks around the UN

I was able to meet several leaders and important UN executives to address the urgency around fossil fuel subsidy reform and #DontChooseExtinction. I do hope my perspective of a few hundred million years was helpful.

Along the way, I was available for selfies. What can I say? As well as being dead serious about helping humans avoid the catastrophic effects of climate change, I’m also remarkably photogenic!

I don’t think I had an invite, but when you’re my size, nobody really asks the hard questions, so I rolled up for the We Don’t Have Time broadcast on 20 September, viewed by more than 9 million humans.

We Don’t Have Time is a movement and a tech startup that leverages the power of social media to hold leaders and companies accountable for climate change, something I can really get behind. I also made a short appearance, alongside movers and change-makers in climate conversations.

Next up was the Nest Summit Campus, a platform set up to encourage policies and programmes that support meaningful climate action. The campus was home to hundreds of climate-focused brands and citizens. After an appearance on the main stage, I toured the campus and chatted with some new friends and discussed our common goals, such as phasing out fossil fuel subsidies.

The Javits Center on the West Side of Manhattan is a well known convention venue, but probably not many people know that it also has a rooftop farm that produces up to 40,000 pounds of fruits and vegetables a year, which means when you eat at the Javits, the food has likely come from right upstairs. Well done, humans! You’re really getting the hang of this #DontChooseExtinction stuff.

Frankie the Dino visits Times Square

When in New York you have to visit Times Square, am I right? I got to meet some real New Yorkers and tourists and speak about the ‘Don't Choose Extinction’ campaign. I learned that around 340,000 pedestrians pass through Times Square each day, and it became largely car-free in 2009, which has made it vastly more pleasant if, like me, you go about on two feet. The good folks at AFP took some great pictures and video that got picked up by the media.

I made it in the best photos of the day in the National News and my Times Square appearance was used in articles such as this one in Fortune, that discussed the global energy crisis during UNGA, addressing the Don’t Choose Extinction campaign.

But I’m not getting a big head, I promise. Well, no bigger than a normal Utahraptor.

YouTube Creators Summit

Global Citizen and YouTube hosted a high-level thought leadership summit preceding the tenth anniversary of Global Citizen Festival. The event was designed to inspire sustainability action among the world’s top YouTubers. I was invited to meet those influencers, with a total global reach of hundreds of millions. I made sure to spread the urgent message of climate action.

Frankie joins the Global Climate Strike

And I saved the best for last. While I can’t deny that there’s a bit of an age gap between me and the young leaders of the Global Climate Strike, who better than me to show that humans (and dinos) of all ages can work together to solve the climate crisis?

Footnotes

Frankie the Dinosaur, as a symbol of concern for the planet, was such a hit in New York City that he made it on NYC’s Official Fall guide, thanks to nycgo.com. Special thanks go out to EarthX, PVBLIC Foundation and Social Revolt Agency who helped bring Frankie to life in New York City.