I love it. For the video for her song “World on Fire”, Sarah McLaughlin took the average cost of a music video — $150,000 — and donated it to sustainable-development charities in Africa. Then she shot the video for $15, by using a single, live handheld-camera picture of herself.

That’d be cool enough right there. But she went one step further, and used video itself as a piece of agitprop, using Flash-style animated graphics to neatly illustrate the various component costs of producing a video — like that $200-a-day production assistant pictured above — and how much each would buy of food, tools, medicine, or whatnot in Africa. You could argue this is overly preachy, but hey, she’s a folk singer — it’s her job to be numbingly didactic. Plus, she’s kind of, y’know, right.

But, putting on my info-nerd cap here for a second, the video is also remarkable for its sheer interfacial elegance. Check out those modernist-a-go-go animated icons; watch the simple but effective visual metaphors it builds up. It’s like one of those 1970s edutainment animation film-reels they used to have kids watch in grade school. Just lovely!

(Thanks to W=UH for this one!)