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Wish you were here

postcard

So, ya, I took a train up the coast for a work seminar today. Archivists and the law, mainly copyright law. It turned out to be not very applicable, not least because most of the documents we handle are very, very old.

And also because my main interest was working out if we could reuse some of our old photos and artwork as postcards. And since the time I started wondering, the bottom has totally fallen out of the postcard trade.

Seriously, we can’t give them away. Britain’s oldest postcard manufacturer has just gone tits up. And the murderer is: the selfie.

Well, the selfie, plus Instagram plus the cost of postage. Thanks, Royal Mail. We still sell some folding cards — you can tuck a fiver in there and a note and it’s nice and private in an envelope and it doesn’t cost any more in postage. But only the terribly old buy postcards, and they mostly buy them for souvenirs.

And that’s it for a tuckered weasel tonight. Have a good weekend, all!

Comments


Comment from Uncle Badger
Time: October 13, 2017, 8:47 pm

I thought fellow minions might like to know that Stoatie is the one of the left.


Comment from Brother Cavil, dolphin brain in a jar
Time: October 13, 2017, 8:55 pm

Really? I’d never have guessed. That hat just doesn’t seem like her at all…


Comment from Durnedyankee
Time: October 13, 2017, 8:56 pm

Wait, wait, wait

the camera’s left?

I thought she was taller!
Shorter?
looked less like the queen?

Or did you mean the slinky babe walking next to the nanny with the pram?

And do I get any points at all for using the proper colloquial terms like…

slinky and babe?


Comment from Monty James
Time: October 13, 2017, 9:10 pm

Postcards will make a comeback. Whoever comes up with some wrinkle of technology to make them desirable again will make a pile of money.

The first thing that comes to mind would be a postcard with a little space on the back to seal in a Micro SD card, so you could mail image and video files back to your loved ones. Loved ones love it when you send them pictures and videos of you having a good time. That you don’t necessarily want intercepted.


Comment from Uncle Badger
Time: October 13, 2017, 9:50 pm

I did read, just this week, that Polaroid is making a comeback and that the sweet young things are becoming mesmerised by pictures on paper.

They’ll be dancing the Charleston next, you mark my words!


Comment from Pupster
Time: October 13, 2017, 10:58 pm

For those of you who like to petition your elected officials, I have heard from multiple sources that postcards are most likely to be read and will make the biggest impact.


Comment from Deborah HH
Time: October 14, 2017, 3:09 am

@pupster. I have been mailing postcards to my elected officials since the Carter administration. The limited space forces me to be clear and succinct, and eliminates the need for all those honorifics. And since postcards don’t have to be opened, they pass through the security system faster and get read sooner.


Comment from Mrs. Peel
Time: October 14, 2017, 12:43 pm

I dance the Charleston all the time. Pro tip: Little boys think the Flying Charleston is the funniest thing ever.


Comment from Veeshir
Time: October 15, 2017, 4:44 pm

I always got postcards as souvenirs. Especially at museumy places.
Someone should make postcards intended to be souvenirs instead of mailed. With recorded messages or even a cheap vid screen or something.

Maybe have people dancing the Charleston?


Comment from Ric Fan
Time: October 15, 2017, 9:05 pm

Yesterday, 951 years ago, was the Norman Conquest. Is it something that is celebrated or no? With all the killing I say no. But is is what makes England England, tho they were Norse/French. They say those wit french surnames are the wealthiest in the UK, today.


Comment from Niña
Time: October 16, 2017, 3:02 am

I like to send post cards, too, but yeah…with the cost of postage these days I don’t do it so often. Pity.


Comment from Anonymous
Time: October 16, 2017, 12:10 pm

When the Muslim Vikings living in Normandy conquered old Blighty.
Ah, good times, good times.
Here’s to the Flemish Muslim men at arms they hired so I didn’t have to grow tulips, make stinky cheese, or build windmills for a living 951 years later.

Oh, and is that uncle B there in the middle?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/video/news/video-1555229/Curious-badgers-captured-sneaking-man-s-garden.html


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: October 16, 2017, 5:53 pm

Not surprisingly, they celebrate it in Battle, Ric Fan. With a big re-enactment.

Uncle B and I blew through town one day and wondered why it was chock full of people in Norman and Saxon armor. Oh. Right.


Comment from Ric Fan
Time: October 16, 2017, 6:13 pm

They need to do round table discussions like: What if King Harold Godwinson had B-52s and armored divisions?


Comment from Durnedyankee
Time: October 16, 2017, 9:38 pm

I’m cheap.

The budget for Harold Godwinson covers –
1 M2HB Browning .50 caliber machine gun,
10000 rounds of .50 caliber ball ammo,
2000 rounds of .50 tracer
1 weeks training for a crew of 3.

that should be enough to, uh, well, wipe William, his army, his mama, and all her bridge playing friends off the face of the earth.

And will probably result in John Moses Browning not being born.

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