PDD Shop Talk Posts

Perfect Duluth Day NE IPA

Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen had a toothpaste. The World Wrestling Federation had ice cream bars. Now Perfect Duluth Day has a beer.

Monthly Grovel: June 2019 Edition

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In the past year — from June 2018 through May 2019 — the PDD Calendar published 8,016 Duluth-area events. Each one was edited by a human being before the “publish” button was pushed. We intend to keep up the good work, but (believe it or not) we could do better. There are still events we are missing. And we have a few assistants standing by who jump into action when donations roll in to pay for their future carpal tunnel surgeries.

So that’s why once a month we set our dignity aside and remind readers how much we appreciate their financial support.

Monthly Grovel: So many events, so little time

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In the past year — from May 2018 through April 2019 — the PDD Calendar published 7,925 Duluth-area events. Each one was edited by a human being before the “publish” button was pushed. We intend to keep up the good work, but (believe it or not) we could do better. There are still events we are missing. And we have a few assistants standing by who jump into action when donations roll in to pay for their future carpal tunnel surgeries.

So that’s why once a month we set our dignity aside and remind readers how much we appreciate their financial support.

Homegrown photo banners

Once again, we’re looking for Homegrown Music Festival photo banners to rotate at the top of pages on Perfect Duluth Day. Photos of bands, friends, events or general shenanigans. Keep in mind, the photos get cropped to extreme horizontal proportions. If you want to crop ’em yourself (1135 pixels wide by 197 pixels high) and send them, super dooper. Or you can send them uncropped and I’ll do my best to make them fit.

Click here for complete submission guidelines, but the basics are: 1135 pixels wide by 197 pixels high, e-mail them to [email protected]. We’ll get them in the rotation during the Homegrown Music Festival, starting this weekend.

Monthly Grovel: Bonus tip about PDD Calendar map view

Before delving into this month’s pitch for donations to keep the PDD Calendar chugging along, we’re taking a moment to offer a little tip on a different way to use it.

There are numerous ways to sort, filter, view and search events on the PDD Calendar. By default the calendar shows a list view in chronological order. That’s obviously the best way to look at what’s happening in the moment and scroll to the future. But there are three other view options — day, map and photo. We’ve never taken time to explain that before, because it’s always seemed obvious to us that list view is the best option. But our traffic statistics are starting to show more and more people using map view, so perhaps it’s time to mention it.

Saturday Essay and Selective Focus Programming Note

Like a bunch of old timers stuck in some newspaper-era, schedule-oriented, deadline-consumed mindset, the brain trust at Perfect Duluth has been locked for several years in the notion that every Friday we need to publish our Selective Focus feature and every Saturday we need to publish our Saturday Essay. No more. It was fine for a while, but we’re done with that rigid scheduling.

Monthly Grovel: Time to tip your servers

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It takes a lot of geek hours to keep this website going strong. So once a month we set our dignity aside and remind readers how much we appreciate their financial support.

Mayor Larson knows a perfect Duluth day when she sees one

Minneapolis Southwest Journal: “Klobuchar launches 2020 campaign from Boom Island

A parade of local Democratic officials emphasized that grit as they took turns at the podium in the lead-up Klobuchar’s speech. That included a trio of Minnesota mayors: Jacob Frey of Minneapolis, Johnathan Judd of Moorhead and Duluth Mayor Emily Larson, who described the weather conditions — temperatures in the teens under falling snow — as “a perfect Duluth day.”

Also, from WDIO-TV Eyewitness News: “Klobuchar appears on Good Morning America

One of the supporters who spoke at the announcement was Emily Larson, mayor of Duluth. “We call this a perfect Duluth Day! Or spring, or summer,” Larson joked with the large crowd.

Monthly Grovel: PDD Calendar holds out its hand again

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An important message from Perfect Duluth Day’s Redundant Department of Redundancy:

It takes a lot of geek hours to keep this website going strong. So once a month we set our dignity aside and remind readers how much we appreciate their financial support.

Duluth’s Best Website

In 2011 Perfect Duluth Day chose as its official slogan “Duluth’s Duluthiest Website.” It was a statement we felt pretty confident making. Maybe other Duluth websites are better, but certainly none are Duluthier.

But this week we’ve been wondering if PDD truly is Duluth’s best website. This line of thinking was prompted by the Duluth Reader weekly newspaper conducting a poll and ultimately publishing in its Jan. 31 “Best of the Northland” issue that PDD won the title of “Best Local Website.”

Ten Years of Perfect Duluth Day on WordPress

Hunkered down at PDD World Headquarters, problem solving the switch to WordPress in 2009: Cory Fechner, Scott Lunt, Paul Lundgren and Barrett Chase.

Ten years ago — Jan. 30, 2009 — Perfect Duluth Day made the big leap to the WordPress publishing platform. Specifically, the upgrade was from Movable Type version 3.2 to WordPress version 2.8. These days PDD is on WordPress version 4.9.9. But enough nerdspeak.

Monthly Grovel: PDD Calendar accepting donations

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Happy 2019, Perfect Duluth Day readers! It’s been almost ten years since PDD began selling sidebar advertising to support the development of the content you read here, and it’s been more than seven years since the PDD Calendar was launched. Over those spans of time, two things have become abundantly clear: 1) There is a strong demand for the content on PDD. 2) Advertising revenue doesn’t come close to paying for the human resources necessary to produce it.

So back in September we quietly put a donation bar on the page where event organizers submit PDD Calendar listings. Bits of funding began trickling in … $5 here, $30 there … and it’s been a big help. Now we’re reaching out to readers.

PDD Job Opening: Sell square boxes for fun and profit

Two seasoned professionals are about to leave the Perfect Duluth Day Media Empire. Brianna Hall-Nelson is moving to Denver to further her education; Brian Timm is giving up his PDD side-hustle to focus more on his work as a kitchen and bath designer.

That means Duluth’s Duluthiest website is looking for a new person to join its crew selling the advertisements that so handsomely stack on the right column of pages on this website (or in between the content if you are looking at PDD on a smartphone).

Click here to read the full job description and find out how to apply.

Brianna has been with PDD for three years, and Brian for eight. We’ll miss having them on the precipice of our tabernacle, tickling our 50 and sharing in other inside jokes that make no sense outside the PDD siblinghood. And we look forward to meeting the newbie and developing a whole new “slanguage.”

“Where in Duluth?” PDD 15th Anniversary Challenge Recap

 

Here’s a storymap that sums up the “Where in Duluth?” PDD 15th Anniversary Challenge and the winners.

PDD Job Opening: Assistant to the Calendar Editor

How does Perfect Duluth Day publish 800 events per month in its online events calendar? Through the hard work of Tony Bennett, Jessica Morgan and the occasional intern, that’s how. Sadly, Jessica will be leaving Duluth soon, and if someone new isn’t quickly found to help Tony he’ll collapse on his laptop and weep uncontrollably.

So here’s another rare opportunity to get inside the PDD media empire and earn slightly above minimum wage with no benefits while working in pajamas. Read the full job description on the PDD employment page.