When the moon hits you eye like a big pizza pie

December 1, 2012 1:33 PM

My Dearest Barack: A collection of letters that student Dylan Hansen-Fliedner wrote back to the Obama campaign, in response to donation requests.
posted by growabrain (16 comments total)

And now Dylan's trying to sell me a booklet containing the Obama campaign's solicitations for money and responses he cribbed from love letter websites. That's pretty meta, dude.
posted by anewnadir at 1:48 PM on December 1, 2012 [7 favorites]

"Good Artists Borrow, Great Artists Steal."
posted by oneswellfoop at 1:51 PM on December 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

Gee, guys, why the cynicism? The first one was a flash of inspiration, the next ones were funny, and after a while it built up flesh & the concept bobbled up, and eventually it became a whole 'thing'. What's wrong with a Lulu book? If he sells 300 copies at 20 or 40% profit, he'll make $1,500. So what? Is this idea not worth it?
posted by growabrain at 2:02 PM on December 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

growabrain: " So what? Is this idea not worth it?"

Nope.
posted by ShawnStruck at 2:03 PM on December 1, 2012 [9 favorites]

Being fundamentally unoriginal, I suppose I'm not in a position to criticize. That said, I don't think it's entirely unreasonable to resent people's increased willingness to convert every instance of fleeting wit into a Kickstarter project.
posted by anewnadir at 2:20 PM on December 1, 2012 [10 favorites]

Is this idea not worth it?

If he'd spent more than half a second on the book cover, maybe. Instead I'm getting flashbacks of clients sending postage-stamp sized JPEGs to use in a video and then complaining that their logo looks all blurry.
posted by dumbland at 2:39 PM on December 1, 2012 [2 favorites]

I, hm.

Considering my performance in a recent thread I'm a little afeared to say this but: I guess I didn't like it very much.

I think the fundamental lack, for me, is that the letters generally don't feel particularly matched to each other. Like a big part of why I love ATIAC is that the pictures and the captions are generally tailored to one another. The ideal is when you're looking at the owl on the punch bowl and just how much it looks exactly as if it's stunned to find an old flame at the party (or whatever).

This concept doesn't really seem to be doing that, as far as I can tell.
posted by kavasa at 2:40 PM on December 1, 2012 [3 favorites]

I would also like to inform everyone here that I am now taking donations for a compilation of my snarky Metafilter comments; it will be bound in human skin, and people who donate over $200 will get a supplemental list of hyperlinks that will enable donors to see the threads my comments are located in, thus providing essential context to my snarkiness.
posted by anewnadir at 3:01 PM on December 1, 2012 [5 favorites]

I think the fundamental lack, for me, is that the letters generally don't feel particularly matched to each other.

Yeah, this. I was actually excited by the idea and then when I clicked and read I was like "... oh."

I think I would have liked something like: a writer charmed by the President's continued communications, becoming somewhat flattered, ultimately enamored, and trying with increasing desperation to gain his attention without seeming too clingy.

I wanted someone playing the part of not understanding that these were mass emails, I guess. Maybe that's what I was secretly hoping when I clicked the link rather than seemingly random and somewhat irrelevant replies.
posted by six-or-six-thirty at 3:09 PM on December 1, 2012 [6 favorites]

I thought I might like the concept but the execution underwhelmed. Thurber, this ain't. I don't wish him ill; this is already about ten times as creative with a quotidian frustration as I could ever be.
posted by dhartung at 3:27 PM on December 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

I didn't believe in the relationship between these two characters and felt like that their hearts weren't really in it. Interesting concept, but Dylan needs to apply himself. "C" for this semester.
posted by arcticseal at 3:35 PM on December 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

this is already about ten times as creative with a quotidian frustration as I could ever be.

Dude. Your mefi comments alone belie this bit of modesty by a factor of like infinity.
posted by George_Spiggott at 5:31 PM on December 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

I have a very hard time understanding people who gave the Obama campaign money one time, yet seem to not appreciate the justification for the campaign to ask them for money again.
posted by Apropos of Something at 7:25 PM on December 1, 2012

I have a very hard time understanding people who gave the Obama campaign money one time, yet seem to not appreciate the justification for the campaign to ask them for money again.

The problem isn't that the campaign asked for money again - it was that they asked TWO or THREE times a day repeatedly for weeks on end. I made a decent contribution to Obama's 2012 campaign and was relatively happy to do so. Getting emails every day from: President Obama, Michelle Obama, Obama's campaign manager, the CA state campaign manager, etc. is what got annoying.
posted by hapax_legomenon at 8:12 PM on December 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

This just in: political ads and fund raising efforts quickly become annoying.
posted by spock at 9:43 PM on December 1, 2012

The problem isn't that the campaign asked for money again - it was that they asked TWO or THREE times a day repeatedly for weeks on end.

That's what email filters are for.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 3:52 AM on December 2, 2012 [1 favorite]