Infrequent Mailing

No. 61, Thursday, October 15, 2009

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You're receiving this because you signed up at Coudal.com and/or you recently bought something from us or one of our brands, like Jewelboxing or a poster or something else (we're a small creative firm in Chicago and we do a lot of different things). Whatever the case, thanks for signing up. If you'd like to quit getting these occasional missives, just click "unsubscribe" at the bottom. We're really very good about that.

Party Like It’s 1999

Skip, over this whole next thing if you're just looking for breaking news or more likely, a cool offer on Field Notes or a giveaway or contest. All that is at the end.

Dear Reader,

Coudal.com is ten years old this month. We're not an angst-ridden, mouthy teenager quite yet, but we're not the gullible wide-eyed dork we once were either. Hopefully. Ten seems like a good age for us. Not that we have any choice in the matter.

First off, thanks a million for hanging with us all this time. Any relationship that lasts ten years is extraordinary and the fact that you're reading this means we haven't pissed you off or disappointed you often enough to relegate us to that list of ex-es you struggle not to remember. Phew.

When we started the site we were doing nothing but work-for-hire projects. TV spots, identities, naming, radio, outdoor and tons and tons of print collateral. What we weren't doing much of however, was web design. That's why we created coudal.com, as an experiment and a place we could learn and screw around without anybody getting hurt.

These days we don't do very much client work. The experiment has basically taken over the laboratory. More on how we got from there to here can be found in this recent Design Glut interview.

The center column of our site, Fresh Signals, has been a part of the mix from the very beginning, some 35,000 posts worth. We originally were updating Fresh Signals by hand, by adding mark-up to an HTML file several times each day. Not surprisingly those files are lost, as is a pretty big chunk of 2000-2001.

Thems the breaks.

Whether it's actually true or not, we like to think of this as the very first Fresh Signal. It was posted by Kevin and set the tone for a lot of what we've written since.

If you went to the original London premiere of 2001: A Space Odyssey in 1968 you would have been handed this printed program. It's historically significant for Kubrick freaks like ourselves and it's a great piece of design. Make sure to click on "contact sheets" to see the original document.

All those posts are actually a pretty big accomplishment, especially when you consider that, as a group, we didn't learn to read until 2005.

We've had a lot of fun, learned a lot of things and most importantly, made a lot of friends during the last ten years. With the help of a bunch of generous and talented photographers, each weekday during the month we're featuring somebody who we've met, in one way or the other, through publishing this site. The list is not comprehensive by any means but we're sure we're better for knowing these folks, and we think you might be too.

Cheers from Chicago.

Contest: Blast from the Past

We're putting together ten really big prize packages, including Field Notes and Jewelboxing and posters, books, tees and other stuff too. Here's how to win yours. Just send us an email or a fax that might have been sent in October of 1999. What that means is totally up to you. We'll pick the ones that strike us as smartest, funniest or oddest and we'll post them and then send those authors a motherlode of free stuff.

Send your email from the past to:

coudal94@aol.com

Or if your dial-up is too slow you can fax us at (312) 243 1108. The deadline for entry is Friday, October 23rd.

Various and Sundry

We're in post-production on a new film with the working title of The Curators and as you might guess, it's about our Museum of Online Museums. The 3rd Season of live Layer Tennis looks like it's a go, more on that shortly. Our advertising network The Deck, is rocking and if your product or service could benefit from being in front of millions of creative and curious people, give us a shout.

All Hallows’

An October tradition. It's often lost in the candy-coated, super-styled proceedings of the holiday, but Halloween is really all about departed souls and dealing with loss.

Remember It Now

The fourth in our series of seasonal, limited-edition Field Notes Brand memo books is called Mackinaw Autumn. The individual packs sold out in 23 hours but you can still get these, plus a delivery of special Field Notes approximately every three months by buying a COLORS subscription. Field Notes: I'm not writing it down to remember it later. I'm writing it down to remember it now.

Offer: Ten’ll Get You Twenty

Spend $75 or more on anything or any group of things listed in our shop before Monday, October 18th and use the coupon code TENMORE when you check out and you'll save twenty bucks. Bam.

Thanks for the last ten years and thanks most of all for paying attention.

Love,

The Coudal Partners Crew.

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