December 9th, 2008 / 2:06 am
 Web Hype

Administrative Email to All You Secret Santas

Here’s the email I just sent out to you Secret Santas in case some of you have insane spam filters (if you’re not a Secret Santa, please disregard or something, I don’t know):

Hi Everyone,

Thank you for signing up for our Secret Santa thingy. I have finally gotten all of the Secret Santas assigned. I used a fancy random number sorting system in Excel. I typed random numbers very quickly into a column and then sorted everyone’s names by those random numbers in an ascending order and then pasted that list against the master list.

I will begin sending out those assignments later tonight.

So, the purpose of this email is to go over a few things. I will try to keep it as clear as possible.

1) Because the main idea behind this exchange was to support independent presses/journals/authors/etc, we strongly encourage you to choose a gift from that ‘world.’ If you’re unfamiliar with the small press world, then have a look at the links over at Newpages.com or check the HTMLGIANT archives for various presses/journals that we’ve spotlighted. Many of these presses/journals are also running holiday specials at this time. We’ll try to spotlight more of these in the coming weeks. Also, feel free to email me back (SECRET SANTA ??? in the subject field) if you have a question.

2) We suggest that you spend between $15 and $25 on your Secret Santa purchase. We certainly don’t want to limit you if you’d like to go beyond that, but we’d at least like to keep things relatively even. If you’re comfortable spending more than the recommended price range while simultaneously receiving a gift worth less in return, then by all means go for it. We like to see that kind of reckless spirit.

3) And of course, please don’t recycle an old book through the gift exchange. Instead, buy a nice new book or subscription. We’d like to be able to say that all of you Secret Santas drummed up such and such amount of money this holiday season for independent literature. If you do have an old indie book/journal you’d like to swap around, watch our site for a Used Book Marketplace of some sort in the future, on which you might be able to score a trade.

4) And finally, please don’t wait too long to get these gifts sent out. Once you do make a purchase, send me an email (SECRET SANTA GIFT in the subject) to let me know what you bought for your gift recipient. Then I can post a giant list on Christmas so everyone can learn the identity of their Secret Santa, and so we can see what kinds of goodies everyone else got.

Simple enough?

Okay, have fun with this and please let me know if you have questions.

Thanks again for participating.

Best,
Ryan

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18 Comments

  1. December 9th, 2008 / 6:13 am darby—

      fun!

      A question’s been kind of nagging me though. Is the idea here that the recipient doesn’t know who the present is coming from? So gifters are to deliberately not provide, like, their names or return address info, that sort of thing?

  2. December 9th, 2008 / 2:13 am darby—

      fun!

      A question’s been kind of nagging me though. Is the idea here that the recipient doesn’t know who the present is coming from? So gifters are to deliberately not provide, like, their names or return address info, that sort of thing?

  3. December 9th, 2008 / 6:27 am daniel bailey—

      i thought the same thing as darby.

  4. December 9th, 2008 / 2:27 am daniel bailey—

      i thought the same thing as darby.

  5. December 9th, 2008 / 6:32 am Ryan Call—

      i hadnt even thought about that

      let me check with blake and get back to you?

  6. December 9th, 2008 / 2:32 am Ryan Call—

      i hadnt even thought about that

      let me check with blake and get back to you?

  7. December 9th, 2008 / 6:44 am Ryan Call—

      actually, here’s what we’ll do

      just use my mailing information as the return address on the package (ill send this info out in another mass email right now)

      that way, you can keep things a secret from the gift recipient (all they know is that i organized it), and there’s still some backup built in if the package gets lost or sent to the wrong place or if ive accidentally given you the wrong address. it’ll just come to me and i can resend it.

      thanks for asking about this darby and daniel

  8. December 9th, 2008 / 2:44 am Ryan Call—

      actually, here’s what we’ll do

      just use my mailing information as the return address on the package (ill send this info out in another mass email right now)

      that way, you can keep things a secret from the gift recipient (all they know is that i organized it), and there’s still some backup built in if the package gets lost or sent to the wrong place or if ive accidentally given you the wrong address. it’ll just come to me and i can resend it.

      thanks for asking about this darby and daniel

  9. December 9th, 2008 / 5:27 pm jereme—

      maybe people should put what they would like on their blogs?

      so Ryan is my taker, and i’m the giver of course, i can go to his blog and see what he wants. i don’t know. every one doesn’t have a stupid blog. blogs are stupid.

      i am feeling slightly nervous because maybe this person already has the 3rd season of barnaby jones on dvd and i will feel stupid for buying it a second time for them.

  10. December 9th, 2008 / 1:27 pm jereme—

      maybe people should put what they would like on their blogs?

      so Ryan is my taker, and i’m the giver of course, i can go to his blog and see what he wants. i don’t know. every one doesn’t have a stupid blog. blogs are stupid.

      i am feeling slightly nervous because maybe this person already has the 3rd season of barnaby jones on dvd and i will feel stupid for buying it a second time for them.

  11. December 9th, 2008 / 5:57 pm Alicia—

      oh the excitement! & the wonder! & the anticipation!

  12. December 9th, 2008 / 1:57 pm Alicia—

      oh the excitement! & the wonder! & the anticipation!

  13. December 9th, 2008 / 9:22 pm Ryan Call—

      good idea jereme

      if you have requests, throw those up on your blog if you have a blog
      youre not garuanteed to get them, but yeah

  14. December 9th, 2008 / 5:22 pm Ryan Call—

      good idea jereme

      if you have requests, throw those up on your blog if you have a blog
      youre not garuanteed to get them, but yeah

  15. December 19th, 2008 / 5:20 am Brad Green—

      This has nothing to do with existentialism, but that’s ok. everything is relativistic anyway.

      I’d like to see some postings about writers that have fired the poster up, changed them, influenced them…etc. Certainly that happens. It happens with me. When I was a teenager, it was Delany. Two months ago, it was James Salter. Reading Salter just forced me to write, and to write in new ways. Last month it was Benjamin Percy. Tonight it was Lorrie Moore. I’d like to hear about those types of writers that when you first read them made you mad that you hadn’t read them yet, writers that you cussed out for being so much better than you are.

  16. December 19th, 2008 / 1:20 am Brad Green—

      This has nothing to do with existentialism, but that’s ok. everything is relativistic anyway.

      I’d like to see some postings about writers that have fired the poster up, changed them, influenced them…etc. Certainly that happens. It happens with me. When I was a teenager, it was Delany. Two months ago, it was James Salter. Reading Salter just forced me to write, and to write in new ways. Last month it was Benjamin Percy. Tonight it was Lorrie Moore. I’d like to hear about those types of writers that when you first read them made you mad that you hadn’t read them yet, writers that you cussed out for being so much better than you are.

  17. December 19th, 2008 / 5:21 am Brad Green—

      What the fuck? How did I end up on this? I meant this put this on Jimmy’s Existentialism post. Damn computer.

  18. December 19th, 2008 / 1:21 am Brad Green—

      What the fuck? How did I end up on this? I meant this put this on Jimmy’s Existentialism post. Damn computer.