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Post by penjam on Aug 22, 2017 7:31:36 GMT
Hi everyone, This is Warren. I would like to tell you about a letter writing event I just launched, as well as an update on the penpal app idea I shared here a while ago. I would love to hear your thoughts on this event! Our event "Letter to the World" is created to introduce letter writing to the general public. We invite people with interesting stories to write a handwritten letter on a topic they care about. We then provide a channel for readers to write back and express their thoughts/feelings on the feature topic and writer. At the end of the event, I will deliver the letter bundle to the writer and share them online as a letter collection. You can read the current (and the very first!) feature letter and write back at lettertotheworld.pensoapp.com. It is a letter written by a student inventor and her topic is "Time". The goal is to provide a letter writing experience for people who might want to try writing their first handwritten letters, but are not sure where to start and what to write. You can think of the feature letter writer's story and topic as a writing prompt. Hopefully this event could help more people discover the joy of letter writing and move on to start writing to a penpal! With this project I also created a simple penpal matching application, so that current letter writers and beginners who want to try "penpalling" after this event would have a channel to look for penpals. I really appreciate the feedback from this forum during the design phase of the app. And I'm glad to tell you that this app is now live with the help of two friends (a small community of letter writer is already using it!). I will try to write about it in more detail here when I have time. In the meantime, check out pensoapp.com for more information. If this is something you would like to support, I would love to invite you to: 1) share with me your thoughts here, especially ideas on how we can reach out to more people who might be interested in this event. 2) take part in this event and write a response letter to the feature writer at lettertotheworld.pensoapp.com! Questions and feedback are welcome. Thanks everyone!
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Post by joy52 on Aug 22, 2017 9:46:07 GMT
Warren this is GREAT! You have been busy! I think you guys have done a great job.
I definitely plan on writing to Ann....what a clever young woman she is!
Keep up the good work!
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Post by penjam on Aug 22, 2017 11:49:13 GMT
Warren this is GREAT! You have been busy! I think you guys have done a great job. I definitely plan on writing to Ann....what a clever young woman she is! Keep up the good work! Yes we have been quite busy indeed managing work and this project at the same time! Thank you Joy, this is the best kind of support for us! A good turnout this very first time will definitely be very helpful in terms of continuing this event (i.e. inviting more people in different domains to write letters and help promote writing among their audience)
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Post by Mia on Aug 22, 2017 23:50:18 GMT
I haven't taken part in a penpal-match service since I was a child, but those connections were not long lasting (teenagers find other distractions and have exams, etc.). Some of my current penfriendships were started just through having an address, and maybe a little bit about them. Sometimes it is hard to know what to write, especially for the first letter, that's one reason for the Five Questions challenge (five questions not necessarily important or serious, but hopefully enjoyable to answer - penpalling / letter writing should be fun). I intend to cover "What to write" in an audio podcast this autumn. Perhaps themes could be an idea; I've seen swaps on Swap-bot for letters about a particular subject.
I welcome almost anything that encourages letter writing. Some say it is a dying art.
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Post by radellaf on Aug 23, 2017 13:50:56 GMT
Looks interesting. I tried to set up a profile on Penso, but it wants to send your email to new matches. Don't really care to hand that out first thing. Also, while you can set your profile to inactive, doesn't look like you can delete it.
I think the letter to the world event doesn't require a profile.
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Post by Mia on Aug 23, 2017 16:28:04 GMT
Looks interesting. I tried to set up a profile on Penso, but it wants to send your email to new matches. Don't really care to hand that out first thing. Also, while you can set your profile to inactive, doesn't look like you can delete it. I think the letter to the world event doesn't require a profile. I have more than one email address. I use different ones for forum and newsletters and things. I don't give out my personal email address anymore.
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Post by radellaf on Aug 24, 2017 0:17:01 GMT
I have a few alts, and can probably set up temporary aliases on my ISP account. Maybe after I get more than halfway through the letters from March that I'm replying to...
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Post by penjam on Aug 24, 2017 3:26:12 GMT
Looks interesting. I tried to set up a profile on Penso, but it wants to send your email to new matches. Don't really care to hand that out first thing. Also, while you can set your profile to inactive, doesn't look like you can delete it. I think the letter to the world event doesn't require a profile. I have more than one email address. I use different ones for forum and newsletters and things. I don't give out my personal email address anymore. Hi radellaf, Thanks for trying it out. 1) Yes, the Letter to the World event doesn't require a Penso profile. The idea is to let people who ain't interested in using the app to take part in this event easily. 2) For contact emails, I use the approach Mia described. I even have an email account just for penpal-related purposes (subscribing to penpal websites and forums etc.). 3) Good point on removing a profile. The way it currently works is we delete a profile when we receive an email of request from a user. I agree that a "delete button" within the app could be more convenient for users. I have made a note of it!
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Post by penjam on Aug 24, 2017 3:56:50 GMT
I haven't taken part in a penpal-match service since I was a child, but those connections were not long lasting (teenagers find other distractions and have exams, etc.). Some of my current penfriendships were started just through having an address, and maybe a little bit about them. Sometimes it is hard to know what to write, especially for the first letter, that's one reason for the Five Questions challenge (five questions not necessarily important or serious, but hopefully enjoyable to answer - penpalling / letter writing should be fun). I intend to cover "What to write" in an audio podcast this autumn. Perhaps themes could be an idea; I've seen swaps on Swap-bot for letters about a particular subject. I welcome almost anything that encourages letter writing. Some say it is a dying art. Mia, Yes, when I ask my non-penfriend what stops them from starting, "not knowing what to write" is a common response I get. The idea of letter to the world is to provide a theme (the feature writer with the selected subject), so hopefully people will find it easier to write the first letter. Let's see how this turns out. Will your audio podcast be publicly available online? I would love to listen to it!
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Post by radellaf on Aug 24, 2017 5:38:21 GMT
Thanks for listening to the suggestions, & sorry for being a curmudgeon about your new software. Seriously, thanks for putting in the effort to write it!
IDK if letting potentials contact me through facebook messenger would be better than an email, but something to consider if the API lets you easily do something like that.
I have three emails I use with any frequency, but when they start proliferating it can get hard to keep track of. Not so much for this, but when your login on some site uses one and you can't remember which...
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Post by Mia on Aug 24, 2017 11:01:25 GMT
I haven't taken part in a penpal-match service since I was a child, but those connections were not long lasting (teenagers find other distractions and have exams, etc.). Some of my current penfriendships were started just through having an address, and maybe a little bit about them. Sometimes it is hard to know what to write, especially for the first letter, that's one reason for the Five Questions challenge (five questions not necessarily important or serious, but hopefully enjoyable to answer - penpalling / letter writing should be fun). I intend to cover "What to write" in an audio podcast this autumn. Perhaps themes could be an idea; I've seen swaps on Swap-bot for letters about a particular subject. I welcome almost anything that encourages letter writing. Some say it is a dying art. Mia, Yes, when I ask my non-penfriend what stops them from starting, "not knowing what to write" is a common response I get. The idea of letter to the world is to provide a theme (the feature writer with the selected subject), so hopefully people will find it easier to write the first letter. Let's see how this turns out. Will your audio podcast be publicly available online? I would love to listen to it! Yes, when I actually finish it. I am planning to upload to youtube. There are a couple of very short audio clips on Instagram earlier this year.
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