It's me! In the newspapers!

[devi]

There's an article about my letter experiment in The Independent today. Oh my. I am apparently "writer Deirdre Ruane", or just "Ruane", which is very weird.

Go read it, and then go to postwodehouse.com, which is the website I've been asking for help with this week. And for pity's sake, if you participated (or even if you didn't) and you can think of something to say, post something on the message board! It's got tumbleweeds blowing through it.

Thank you again to everyone who joined in - I've still got letters to go out to some of you! - and everyone who helped me test the site. And to rhodri, who did a great job.

I'm in the paper. Holy cow.

Comments

[amuchmoreexotic.livejournal.com]

What a great idea!

[strange-powers.livejournal.com]

Well done, Ruane (as I shall now hereforth refer to you).

[http://users.livejournal.com/_alanna/]

How fantastic! :o)

Did you tell the papers about it in the end?

[bluedevi.livejournal.com]

I was going to, but never got round to it. Then rhodri rang me at the start of last week, saying he'd do something on it.

I'm glad he did - he's been pitching things for years. I'd never have had the guts to approach the Independent.

[tubewalker.livejournal.com]

So cool, it is just the best idea.

[bluedevi.livejournal.com]

I wanted to mention Tube Walks on the site somewhere (that's the reason I was at Devons Road at all, for a start) but I wasn't sure you'd like me pointing random strangers at your LJ. Dude, you should put all the photos and the alternative tube map and stuff on a website as well!

Sorry I didn't make it on Saturday, and hope you and Cloid are ok.

[triskellian]

That's so cool! And my comment about post sacks in the river is in there, too!

And now I'm once again sad for the letter I'll never be able to read :-(

[dyddgu.livejournal.com]

Sadly, an entirely accurate comment on the state of Oxford's postal service...

[abigailb.livejournal.com]

I'm thinking it might be interesting to try this experiment in different cities all over the world, and see what, if any, effect that has on the success rate. Maintaining equivilance in the drop sites might be hard though.

[bluedevi.livejournal.com]

Well, whatever about the stats being valid, I do hope lots of people will decide to send me serendipitous letters of their own from other places...

[inskauldrak.livejournal.com]

excellent! : )

[fluffymormegil.livejournal.com]

Yay! Fame!
Never did receive the letter :(

[bluedevi.livejournal.com]

Bastards. It was in a really easy place too. But the other one I put in Liverpool Street didn't get through either.

[al-fruitbat.livejournal.com]

I wonder if Red Ken will have you done for littering? ;-)
That was an excellent article, congratulations to the both of you!

[bluedevi.livejournal.com]

I was thinking that about the littering...

[anam-uk.livejournal.com]

Damn I forgot to mention I recived one, I haven't got round to replying yet.
Now its time to find hte article on the web :>

[bluedevi.livejournal.com]

Cool, must update the stats table...

[tokyo-mb.livejournal.com]

Congratulations on the article!

Still no sign of that letter here in Tokyo... now makes me discount even the slight chance that it followed one of my other letters to Sweden and then by boat to Yokohama (taking 12 weeks in the process).

[bluedevi.livejournal.com]

That's your letter in the picture on the main page, by the way!

[davefish.livejournal.com]

Yay!
Congratulations on the coverage :)

[thecesspit.livejournal.com]

Nice work, fella(-rette).

[atommickbrane.livejournal.com]

Yowsers! Well done Ruane! Glad the website is up and running happily by the way!

[huskyteer.livejournal.com]

Holy wow! Nice one!

[dyddgu.livejournal.com]

Congrats! :D It was such a cool idea...

[bluedevi.livejournal.com]

Innit. :) I wasn't expecting anything to come of the experiment...

[ultraruby.livejournal.com]

That's so ace! I've been telling my real life friends about the letter experiment for ages, because it really is just such a cool idea. It's the kind of thing that should happen and should get in the papers.

[specialknives.livejournal.com]

That is really nifty. I also rather like your web design: simple, tasteful, attractive.

[bluedevi.livejournal.com]

Gosh, thanks. I haven't made a website, much less done any programming, in four years - so I'm surprised people like it. There's some really antiquated HTML in there :)

[kyte.livejournal.com]

Go you!!! :-)

[mooism.livejournal.com]

*grins*

[bluedevi.livejournal.com]

I didn't put the form where you wanted it - I had the best of intentions, but it got to 2am and I collapsed. (Then New Zealanders started hitting the site and I got all excited and had to have a glass of port so I could get to sleep, but I still couldn't face any more PHP.)

[the-elyan.livejournal.com]

Indeed - the centre of the London mailing universe jumps a couple of hills north from Mount Pleasant.

You never know - maybe years from now your writer's mansion will be besieged by the returning fruits of your labour, and auctions the world over will be alive with buzz of "a genuine Ruane original" coming onto the market.

As opposed to "a genuine Ruane", of which there is but one...

[bluedevi.livejournal.com]

And I shall wince to be reunited with my rambling scrawls and inept cartoons...

Nice idea, though.

[ki.livejournal.com]

my goodness that was a long article! congrats! (:

[bluedevi.livejournal.com]

Yeah, he pitched it as a short-cut type thing, then they got excited and said they wanted 1800 words... rah!

[annasilverlight.livejournal.com]

Love the letter idea: I am going to try one. Letters are brill - they're far more personal than emails and I can write much faster than I can type. I still have a whole box of them spanning several years... and I had a penfriend for years and years who I never met. My sister once sent a letter addressed to "Jean and Anthony Barry, Ipswich, Suffolk" and miraculously it arrived at at the house of the addressee...

[bluedevi.livejournal.com]

Excellent - go sign up with your email address and I'll mail my postal address to you!

[trishna.livejournal.com]

Hey Deirdre, way cool! Great article and lovely promo of you. The new site is very swish as well.

Do you think that now your letters may start getting through more because as people read about the experiment, they will want to be 'involved' by posting stranded letters that they find?

[bluedevi.livejournal.com]

I've been wondering about that - it might become something like bookcrossing, with people getting all excited to have found a Postwodehouse letter! The experiment would lose its validity, of course, but it would be a lot of fun.