I still have my hair - even though there's a lot more grey than when I joined the list in about 2003.
Thanks for keeping us going, Doug. Very much appreciated. Cheers Brian ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Brian Walters Western Sydney Australia http://lyons-ryan.org/southernlight/ https://500px.com/supera1000/galleries > On 02 January 2021 at 15:43 Bill <[email protected]> wrote: > > > Those were the days, I'll tell you. > Whowhowho can forget mafud, or greene, or how many other aliases did he > have? > I even still had some hair back then. > > bill > > > On 02-Jan-21 12:26 AM, Doug Brewer wrote: > >> sort of. > >> > >> During the Christmas season of 2000, while I worked on a museum > >> project for a local university, I got a call from Don Nelson, a friend > >> and Pentax sales guy some of you will remember from GFM. He told me > >> that Pentax USA, which carried the PAML and PDML on its website, was > >> looking to get out of the email list game because of potential > >> liability issues arising from unsanctioned and borderline dangerously > >> irresponsible technical and repair advice getting posted to the PDML. > >> > >> Don then asked if I knew anyone who could take it over. I thought > >> about a few members I knew at the time, even reached out to one or > >> two, who pretty much laughed, and I reported back to Don that there > >> didn't seem to be much interest. He said ok. > >> > >> A couple days later, a nice woman from the marketing department at > >> Pentax called to tell me she had heard from Don that I would like to > >> be considered for the role of List Guy. After a long pause, followed > >> by some muttering and me repeating "wait, what?" a few times, the nice > >> woman in marketing assured me that Don said I was very interested. > >> > >> That was Don, as those of you who knew him would agree. > >> > >> I told the nice woman that I was not a list guy by any stretch of the > >> imagination. I wasn't a software guy, didn't know anything about how > >> to run an email list, was in all things comprehensively incompetent > >> and liked it that way, and so on. > >> > >> The nice woman in marketing was unimpressed, so it was decided. I > >> begrudgingly agreed that I would download some list software packages > >> and see if I could make any sense of them. After that, I said, I'd get > >> back to her in a week or so with my decision. The nice woman in > >> marketing rang off. > >> > >> That afternoon I found and downloaded some software, installed it, and > >> poked around for a few minutes until I had to do something with my > >> actual job. The only thing I had really discerned from my brief time > >> with the software was that I was out of my depth and needed some > >> serious hours with it before I could even begin to think about whether > >> or not I would take over the PDML. > >> > >> Some time that night the PDML broke. > >> > >> The next day, the nice woman in marketing called to tell me that the > >> guy who worked at the advertising agency that handled the Pentax USA > >> website and was the only one there who knew the list software and how > >> it interfaced with the website was off on Christmas vacation and the > >> server was down and hey, she would email me a list of everyone who was > >> subscribed to the PDML. Good luck and godspeed, it was now my baby. > >> > >> I still can't tell you how I got it going, but here we are, and I'm > >> grateful for it. > >> > >> Happy New Year, kids. > >> > > > > > > > -- > PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List > [email protected] > http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow > the directions. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
