The evolution of snail mail

I had post last night.

It had a hand-written envelope - oh, that's the good stuff.
That means it'll be something nice, something interesting. This was definitely not a bill.

A slight sinking of the heart then, on discovering it was a leaflet to a art course I had been looking at online. And from April, soaring postal costs will probably mean the option of having something sent by mail will only diminish further.

"I saw this and thought of you" was the major post office campaign to get people re-connecting by royal mail again and it worked, at least for a little while.

People imagined once again opening letters from grandparents and seeing a Natural History Museum dinosaur rubber tumble out. Or a knitted scarf from an auntie in Wales.

And then we metropolitanised - even on our coasts and in our valleys - with email, Facebook, Twitter, mobiles, online banking and electronic billing.

Why post when you can post to someone's Facebook wall? Why send when you can do just that on email without ever being weighed with the burden of knowing what street they live on.
What real need is there for 'snail mail' anymore?

My other half's father collects old postcards. Not the 'wish you were here' type from abroad, but black and white, tea-stained, local communication tools.

The best ones, I've learned, are the ones that have been written on, a voyeuristic peep into life decades ago when carriages rattled down cobbled streets and local bobbies wore hats which teetered skywards.

From the small town of Newquay a good deal of these postcards were sent upcountry from holiday-makers in the very tropical holiday destination of Cornwall.

But a good fair few are even more fascinating. "See you at 5pm for supper" sent at 10am that day from a neighbouring village. A little investigation throws up that post used to go not once, not twice (even I remember those days) but three or four times a day.

A local card could be posted in the morning and be happily at its destination not long after lunch. I still have daydreams of finding one which says something like 'Darling, waters have broken, meet me at hospital" - not impossible in a time when you more-than-likely not only knew your postman's name but the names of his wife and children (who probably went to school with yours).

It was a more romantic age, that's for sure. Love letters, letters from abroad, pictures of family additions, parcels at birthdays.

All replaced by a back-lit screen and an Amazon voucher. It's certainly change, but not necessarily progress.

The conundrum of pinterest

I joined as a bona fide member this week. Months after pouring over delicious recomendations and inspirational 'pins' from other people I was free to do it myself.

Pin, pin, pin. Over 50 of the things in fewer than 24 hours.

That was before I read a little part of the pinterest site called 'etiquette'.

I wasn't forwarded to this part of the site on joining. I was emailed with basic instructions, how to download a pin button on Firefox, and merrily nudged to steer clear of posting nudity (shudder at the thought).

But now I've done my research. In fact, right down there in the small print pinterest asks that the pinners are exclusive owners of the content they are referring. Or at least credits source.

That hasn't been my experience, either in browsing or pinning. In fact, the very idea of a 'pin' button encourages the recommendation of content while you are 'out and about' in the web-esphere, hitting the button whenever you come across something worth sharing.

I fear I've broken 'the rules' 50 times over (although the pins still link to the original source -is that 'credit' enough?).

However, if I was exclusive owner of everything I pinned, surely that would just be an image bank of my own blog (pretty boring and not all-encompassing of everything that inspires me - far from it)?

Even more confusingly it then asks that you don't self-promote. These seem to be at total juxtaposition to each other.

Does pinterest obscure the *actual* terms of use in order that we use it as we have been, accepting that websites against will embed the coding which restricts people from pinning?

Or should I just give myself up now? It's a fair cop...

Taking on Twitter. And Nigella

It's easy to get sucked into arguments on Twitter. I do try to avoid them.

Celebrities who've never so much as jostled bottoms past each other on the red carpet have an opinion on each others extra-marital activities, on their clothing, on their partners of choice.
But generally it's left there.

On hearing culinary goddess Nigella Lawson being called a 'tubby old trout', however, I had to draw the line. I did what I know, as an online editor, one must never, ever do - feed the troll.


A few back and forth’ings with a tweeter using a pseudonym and fake avatar I realised what I already knew. It wasn't worth it.

Posting as a fictional 78 year old grouchy man the tweeter was indeed just in existence to stir trouble and bitch at other users.

All my tweets served to do was lather them in more fame than even their retweet by Nigella herself had done (and Nigella said she was taking 'immense pleasure' from his insult).

The torrent of reply to this twitter troll, however, is testament to how far the online community has come.

No longer do we, as visitors to an online public space, turn and blush when someone is getting an unprovoked lashing from someone not even courageous enough to post as himself.
Oh no.

We use 160 characters to shout them down. Power to the people. Twitter troll himself admitted 'Well my dear, you certainly stirred a bees nest up with your RT.' And for that alone, I think I'm grateful I did it.

I wonder how much time someone must have on their hands to be bothered with such a pass-time, but who am I to judge?

I think we all just ended up feeling a bit sorry for the person who took on Nigella on twitter. And lost.

The digital revolution from a generation above

I got a Kindle for Christmas, yes I did.

Smuggins here downloaded 10 weightless volumes to take on a fortnight holiday. Man, I was pleased with myself when I was 4 kg under baggage weight. Four whole kilos.

My little device connected directly to Amazon the moment I switched the little blighter on. I spent a small fortune buying e-books from the site, which I will read once and will then be consigned to the archive forever more.

Hey presto, I was e-reading to my heart's content.

Enter stage left mother.

This women devours books. Three a week as well as a full-time job and that's a bad week.

One of those mysterious people who consumes fiction quicker than you or I eat crackers.

In the same team as my old boss who once read Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix in a weekend.

This is *inexplicable* reading power.

And as we know, with great power comes great responsibility.

And so it began - mother decides it's time for an e-reader.

She's not one of those who just consumes with the crowd. Yes, Amazon are good, she says, but are they the best?

Hours of configuring, reconfiguring, changing font and line spacing on my Kindle later, she is not convinced. ('I need something in the middle').

She starts surfing forums. Actual web research is taking place.

I remember when I used to do such a thing and feel slightly ashamed I no longer bother - I simply assume Amazon will deliver to me The Best

It is learned that Amazon doesn't offer book rental.

Now, Mum has actually read the entire contents of Battle library in three years, so this poses a significant problem - she doesn't want to pay a fiver every time she wants to put her super-power to use.

She wants to rent off Google (when she explains this to me my brain actually explodes - how can she know more about this than me?).

She investigates the Sony e-book but is soon turned off by online reviews, eventually settling for a KoBo which she sets up independently of me and downloads the first of her rented books to.

One of these days, I realise, she's going to stop needing me.