Tearing a corner from a page out of the Post Secret handbook, Popletters provides “the web's first open letter community.” The concept is clever in its simplicity: anyone can post an open letter to anyone else. Unlike the secret part of the Post Secret set up, the authors on Popletters can choose their level of anonymity. With that veil of protection in place (or not), community members are going to town, ranting and raving about all manner of things.
In the "So what if I'm weird/lacking normalcy?” post to the world, an anonymous writer proclaimed, “Just because I'm not a hardened bitch all the time like so many girls are, just because I am polite, just because I like all of these different things doesn't mean I'm beneath you.”
User Bumblebee issued a casting call with “Seeking the cutest creatures on the internet to make me feel better about politics.” On the top of Bumblebee's list of distractingly adorable critters was “the panda cub. How can you not say, 'awww'? You look so pettable and sweet and innocent. You'd never dream of cutting off unemployment checks for suffering American families. Never.”
A cute young panda tries to evade another cub. Photo credit: Kevin McGill. Used under Creative Commons license.
One fellow named Tim needed a place to vent about his neighbor Charles. With his “My neighbor is a dickhead” letter, Tim explained how Charles has long complained that Tim's 40-year-old redwood fence encroached upon his property by three inches.
In “Ugh, seriously. Your child isn't an angel,” KittyPflaum wrote, “I'm a pre-school teacher of a major corporate daycare. Because of this we as teachers need to follow corporate rules such as: we can not say 'no' to a child, we can not discipline a child, and we can not express concern about a child's health to a parent. Basically we are creating a world of sociopaths with unresolved problems.”
Some authors speak up in order to make broader social points as in the post to Consumers titled “Stuff” by Deebo: “You don't own stuff, stuff owns you. … The moral of the story is that there is a certain limit to how many things a person should have. Once you go beyond that these things don't take away stress but add stress. Figure out what your limit is and stay within it.”
Along with the requisite landlords, parents, and cheaters, a handful of celebrities – including William Shatner, Charlie Sheen, and Lindsay Lohan – all take some hits in the name of public point making. If you need a forum in which to clear some air or spew some vitriol, Popletters is the place.
