Greetings,
A Santa-sized thank you to Judith Costello for making my dream come true of having an original holiday poem in this issue of Web Words. She is amazing as you will see when you read the verses and her story below.
Because we really, really want you to pass this work around, we've changed our copyright practice beginning with this issue. Web Tips will tell you more.
We had a record number of emails about the November issue. Keep those cards and letters coming. Oops, sorry wrong century.
Best wishes for a cheerful holiday season and a happy and prosperous New Year.
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A Visit from (Virtual) St. Nicholas, or Susanna's Vision
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by Judith M. Costello
(with the usual apologies to Clement C. Moore)
'Twas the night before Christmas at Shawenon House,
The computer was logged off, including the mouse;
The monitor glowed in the deepening night
And provided a warm and a comforting light.
Susanna was nestled all snug in her bed,
While visions of newsletters danced in her head:
For the interested reader, the e-zine subscriber,
She dreamt of advice she could send out in cyber.
When up on the screen there appeared such a view,
Susanna just had to go see what was new!
Away to the laptop she crept like a sleuth,
Logged on with her password, and turned on Bluetooth.
Then what to her terrified eyes should appear
But a screen-saver image: six tiny reindeer,
And a little old driver in high pixellation
Who appeared to have had Christmas Eve celebration!
In mere nanoseconds his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name:
"Now Google! Now Yahoo! Now WiFi and Twitter!
On MySpace! On Web Words! Get out there and glitter!
To the LinkedIn and Flash! To the Web and the blog!
Let's see if Susanna will give us eggnog!"
As virtual snow whirls around on the screen,
And email connects us with people unseen,
So out of the monitor leapt all the deer
With a sleigh full of iPhones and other cool gear.
The reindeer and Santa - how droll, how entrancing,
Especially when all of the deer started dancing!
(A rollicking YouTube to forward to folk
Who are Grinches and Scrooges, and don't get the joke.)
Susanna by now had got over her fright,
And she knew that old Santa was not going to byte!
He ROFL'd and winked, a right jolly old elf,
And she LOL'd when she saw him in spite of herself.
Santa placed on her desk a tall stack of CDs
(Which, as everyone knows, are quite certain to please.)
He pointed, and said, "Oh Susanna! Just looky!
I've left you some presents. Now give me a cookie!"
Then he turned to the screen and re-entered the portal,
This virtual Santa, or virtual mortal,
And he called out this line, ere he faded from sight,
"Constant Contact to all, and to all a good night!"
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About the Author
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 I first met Judith Costello 30 years ago this month. The ex-wife of my then boyfriend, she initiated our long friendship by playing Happy Birthday to me on a comb!
When I got the idea to do a parody of "The Night before Christmas" for the December issue of Web Words, I knew one thing right off. I wasn't the right person for the job. I'm good at writing on-point, pithy business copy, but poetry--forgetaboutit. And worse still, stuff that rhymes.
So I considered who might have the required skills. It didn't take me long to think of Judith. When I decided to name my business Shawenon, I called on her to find a word that would help people with the pronunciation. Shawenon--rhymes with Audubon was her solution.
Judith doesn't do this stuff for a living. In fact, she is a 20-year veteran of the Canadian Consulate General in Atlanta, GA. There she serves as Political Advocacy and Academic Relations Officer and is responsible for communicating Canada's key advocacy messages throughout the southeastern US to government agencies, schools and the media. Before this, she worked for NPR as a music director, producer and on-air announcer.
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| Web Tips |
 Scroll down to the bottom of this issue of Web Words and you'll see a new form of copyright notice. It's sanctioned by Creative Commons and is designed to find the sweet spot between rigid copyright protection and the sharing spirit of the Web.
Click on the buttons and you'll see that we've chosen a license that invites you to freely share the contents of this newsletter unaltered and with attribution. That's a long way from the traditional "all rights reserved" stance.
According to the Creative Commons Web site, "Like the free software and open-source movements, our ends are cooperative and community-minded, but our means are voluntary and libertarian. We work to offer creators a best-of-both-worlds way to protect their works while encouraging certain uses of them--to declare "some rights reserved."
You might want to consider this 21st century copyright for your own intellectual property.
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And Finally . . .
Shawenon Communications collaborates with small businesses, solopreneurs, professionals and not-for-profits to get their messages across in the written word.
We specialize in electronic communications, including e-zines and other forms of email marketing, and Web site content. We also ghostwrite articles and other business communications. As a business partner, we resell Constant Contact's email marketing service.
Thanks for reading. If you liked this issue, please click on the Forward email button below to share this newsletter with others.
You're also welcome to reprint material in this newsletter as long as it is unaltered and credited to the author. Be sure to send us a copy, too. If being reproduced electronically, the following link must also be included:
www.shawenon.com
Sincerely,
Susanna Opper
Shawenon Communications
413-528-6494
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Happy Holidays
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Season's Greetings from Rockefeller Center in New York City where we'll be visiting again at the end of the month.
If you enjoyed this issue, please pass it on to friends and colleagues.
See you in 2009.
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