Melanie Coulson on Muck Rack

Melanie Coulson

Ottawa
As seen in: Medium, Wiley Online Library, Ottawa Citizen, Current, Ottawa Business Journal
Digital storyteller, corporate content and social media strategist. Rower, skier, news junkie, 80s girl.
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Articles by Melanie Coulson

Real‐time feedback in question‐based collaborative learning

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By Tom Rayner, Melanie Coulson, Amir Sam
| Wiley Online Library Verified
1 WHAT PROBLEMS WERE ADDRESSED? We introduced question-based collaborative learning (QBCL) to empower medical students to constructively align their experiential learning with the learning outcomes of the curriculum, to familiarise them with assessment writing processes and to encourage teamworking.
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Ottawa Changemakers: Enfematic founder believes natural products are a right, not a privilege

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By Melanie Coulson
| Ottawa Business Journal
During the upheaval of a global pandemic in 2020, Junique Gooden transformed her Ottawa apartment into a small-scale laboratory that was home to a big dream. That dream resulted in Enfematic, a skincare line that has grown into a range of affordable natural beauty products, from body butters to lip balms, as well as candles. The name Enfematic derives from the word emphatic, while the abbreviation “fem” denotes a woman-owned business.
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Ottawa Changemakers: Talking Stick lets Indigenous communities discuss shared challenges

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By Melanie Coulson
| Ottawa Business Journal
Providing a platform that allows people to talk to someone anonymously about shared challenges is proving a successful business model for Ottawa-based TryCycle. With more than 10,000 conversations lasting an average of 23.5 minutes in its first 12 months, TryCycle’s Talking Stick has become the platform that many of Canada’s Indigenous communities turn to for culture-based support.
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Beyond Admiring the Problem: Changing the Future of Public Radio

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By Melanie Coulson, Ellen Guettler
| greaterpublic.org
In July of this year, Greater Public, SRG, and PRPD released two decisive reports: Public Radio Meta-Analysis: A Curation of Insights and Best Practices Concerning the Landscape of Public Radio and Public Radio Playbook: Tactics and Strategies based on Recent Research and a Research Curriculum for the Future of Public Radio. The Meta-Analysis is a collaborative summary of findings from public radio research studies commissioned between 2019 and 2023.
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Bright Side of (Downtown) Business: The scoop on Moo Shu Ice Cream as a socially-conscious business

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By Melanie Coulson
| Ottawa Business Journal
Born as a ByWard Market stand in 2015, Moo Shu Ice Cream & Kitchen has flourished to become a permanent downtown Bank Street fixture known for its inventive flavours, such as its popular Hong Kong Milk Tea or its local strawberry ice cream. At the same time, Liz Mok, the visionary owner behind Moo Shu, has created a business that values both its employees and the community it serves.
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Bright Side of (Downtown) Business: Free Form Fitness doubles down in the core

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By Melanie Coulson
| Ottawa Business Journal
Transformation stories are nothing new for Free Form Fitness. In fact, helping clients reach their health goals is a large part of the reason why CEO Ashley Lawrie loves running the business. But lately, she has been working more on transforming Free Form itself and keeping its five locations — including one on Albert Street and another in the ByWard Market — humming. The approach at Free Form is a little different than most big-box gyms.
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Ottawa Changemakers: Ottawa’s Lenz Films amplifies underrepresented voices

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By Melanie Coulson
| Ottawa Business Journal
A unique company in Ottawa is carving out space for stories that are often overlooked in Canada’s film industry. In the heart of Ottawa, Fitch Jean and Weggon Allen, the dynamic duo behind Lenz Films, are pioneering change by recognizing the underrepresentation of diverse narratives in mainstream media and helping BIPOC content creators voice their unique stories. This venture is not only a film production company; it’s a sanctuary where BIPOC stories are nurtured, celebrated and brought to life.
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The time to prioritize digital revenues and engagement is now

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By Melanie Coulson, Mike Janssen Verified
| Current Verified
At Greater Public, we connect individuals who are working on similar problems at different organizations within the public media system. We believe that when these folks share support and knowledge, we all gain insights about our industry as a whole because the challenges we face are rarely unique. By applying this philosophy to research and testing of digital fundraising, we’ve concluded that public media’s digital fundraising practices need urgent attention and prioritization.
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Grow your business in new markets with the Canada brand advantage

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By Melanie Coulson
| cira.ca
Do you remember Molson’s iconic ‘proclamation’ ad from the year 2000? Against the warm and fuzzy backdrop of our favourite cultural images and a matching music track, ‘Joe’ passionately debunked common stereotypes of Canadians and our values before proudly proclaiming: I am Canadian. While the goal of the ‘rant’ was to sell beer by making viewers feel good about themselves and their country, it also defined Canada as a brand, leaving no doubt as to who we are and what we stand for.
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9 leaders share advice to help women entrepreneurs take their business global

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By Melanie Coulson, Jennifer Grant
| edc.ca
No matter your gender, building a business depends on sound advice from the people who have been there. But the road to success can be especially hard for women entrepreneurs who want to grow their business internationally through exporting their products or services. For those who hope to take their business to an international level, market entry and business development remain a huge challenge.
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UPDATED: Freelancers write open letter to OpenFile for payment, Dinnick responds

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By Melanie Coulson
| melcoulson.com
UPDATE: Further down this post, you will read how OpenFile’s CEO Wilf Dinnick says in a note to freelancers that a J-Source article about his organization ceasing operations was “incorrect on many counts.” I asked the writer of this article, Kelly Toughill, Director of the School of Journalism at University of King’s College in Halifax about this. She responded: Wilf has not asked for a correction or clarification from me or from anyone at J-Source.
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How I plan to examine/research/submerge myself in community newsrooms

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By Melanie Coulson
| melcoulson.com
Soon I’ll find myself out of a newsroom as I head for university life, spending the next four months in academia. In June, I was awarded the first-ever Michener-Deacon Fellowship for journalism education. As part of that fellowship, I’ll be a journalist-in-residence at Carleton University, and teaching a multimedia class to third-year journalism students. Another part of that fellowship involves a research project, and in my proposal I outlined how I’d like to examine community newsrooms.
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Melanie Coulson's open cover letter for the Sun News Network job - JSource

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By Melanie Coulson
| J-Source Verified
Melanie Coulson is a senior online editor for The Ottawa Citizen and a journalism instructor at Carleton University, but Sun News Network's latest job posting caught her eye. Here is her open cover letter to the network. To whom it may concern: Wow! Your ad looking for new members for your Sun News Team really caught my attention. Especially this part: No need to have a journalism degree (in fact, we’ll view it with a healthy dose of skepticism).
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Four lessons from losing a journalism job

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By Melanie Coulson
| J-Source Verified
It is two years to the day since I ‘lost’ my job in media. I don’t mark it, but it’s hard to forget. It was three days before Valentine’s Day, 2014. It hit me like a truck. It was completely unexpected. So unexpected in fact, the first thought as the envelope detailing my layoff/termination package slid across a desk towards me was, ‘Man, why did I stay up so late last night working on the content strategy for that mobile app?’ A lot of my former newsroom colleagues are now fearing their own layoffs.
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Four Lessons from Losing a Journalism Job

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By Melanie Coulson
| Medium
It is two years to the day since I ‘lost’ my job in media. I don’t mark it, but it’s hard to forget. It was three days before Valentine’s Day, 2014. It hit me like a truck. It was completely unexpected. So unexpected in fact, the first thought as the envelope detailing my layoff/termination package slid across a desk towards me was, ‘Man, why did I stay up so late last night working on the content strategy for that mobile app?’ Ah, regret.
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Redefining the Way We Do Membership

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By Melanie Coulson, Ellen Guettler
| greaterpublic.org
The problem she wants to solve is not new, but it’s growing in urgency: how to harness support from people who deeply love public media, but who access content in ways that increasingly evade our membership models. It’s a problem she’ll tackle for two months this summer as a Visiting Nieman Fellow at Harvard University. The fellowship is awarded to mid-career professionals whose projects are aimed at advancing journalism. Kramer is technically mid-career.
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5 fundamentals you must understand about Twitter

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By Melanie Coulson
| journomel.com
Such a lovely, silly name for such an important social media tool. In my last post, I wrote the five fundamental things you must know about Facebook. In it, I called Twitter a ‘sexy flirt.’ Some of my Twitter followers took offence to that, and pointed out how often I’m on the social media tool. It’s true – I tweet a lot.
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5 fundamental things you must understand about Facebook

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By Melanie Coulson
| journomel.com
I’m not denying that Twitter is sexy. Something about those 140 characters is so alluring. Perhaps it’s the challenge of displaying wit and intellect in a soundbite. But I also find it interesting that during conversations I’ve had with people (journalists, politicos, public relations/communications professionals) about social media, they think Twitter first. There’s no doubt that there are some key influencers on Twitter.
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We need to keep experimenting in journalism

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By Melanie Coulson
| journomel.com
Any good scientist will tell you that not all experiments succeed, but it’s important to keep at it. It’s sad to hear that Digital First Media in the U.S. is closing its Thunderdome shop and selling some of its papers. There were a lot of quality journalists working on the team to centralize news for all DFM news properties. Steve Buttry, one Thunderdome’s many talented journalists, has written this completely honest post on the demise of the project.
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Learn new things, flex that journalism muscle

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By Melanie Coulson
| journomel.com
Journalism is an art that requires practice. I tell students it is a muscle, and like athletes they are training. Yes, this means endless writing, but it also means feeding the curiosity that comes so naturally to all journalists. You wake up with questions, ask more questions throughout the day and even when you drag your sorry self to bed… still, more questions. Learning more about where you live, and the people who make up your city is a way to start answering these questions.
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Why humans are better than computers at social media analytics

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By Melanie Coulson
| journomel.com
When it comes to understanding what is being said about you/your company/your product via social media – and whether it’s positive or negative – humans have the edge. Or, at least it’s possible for those who can understand context, inflection and emphasis. Shocker. See that? Sarcasm. It’s the bane of online communication. I couldn’t tell you how many times I’ve written an email or blasted out a sarcastic tweet that was misunderstood.
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How to cultivate journalistaphobia

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By Melanie Coulson
| journomel.com
Really, we’re friendly – and just calling with a few questions…. Any journalist who has tried to contact a federal government researcher/scientist/source  can tell you how frustrating an exercise it can be. There are delays, referrals to communications and then days can pass before a response. Today, the government of Canada sent this pamphlet out to all public servants. Really, it makes media calls seem as fearful an experience as contracting ebola.
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Now this is a cool experiment on story form

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By Melanie Coulson
| journomel.com
The BBC conducted an interesting experiment in story form yesterday:  A quick video report it labelled the #Instafax on its Instagram account. This is smart in many ways, but mostly because it’s using the social network to share the report, and that it offers a quick news bite for those with short attention spans.
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Great multimedia journalism of 2013

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By Melanie Coulson
| journomel.com
We’ve come a long way since Snowfall, baby. The New York Times’ massive multimedia project went live in December, 2012 and set the tone for an amazing 12 months of online journalism. Yes, I know, we’re about a week into 2014, but it’s worth looking at some of the great multimedia journalism from 2013. Looking at some of these amazing examples of online journalism, it’s exciting to think about the continued evolution of online storytelling.
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The perfect response to a student who asks ‘Did I miss anything?’

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By Melanie Coulson
| journomel.com
How to answer a student who asks this after missing a class? I was recently asked this question, and was flummoxed. Where to begin? Anyone who teaches – at any level – can tell you that courses and lesson plans are carefully planned. The ‘Did I miss anything’ question is absurd. A fantastic professor at Carleton University passed along this response by Tom Wayman, a poet and professor  who teaches creative writing and contemporary literature at the University of Calgary.
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#AskJustin and the ladies

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By Melanie Coulson
| storify.com
1. It has at least two women in it. 2. The women talk to each other. 3. The subject of their conversation is something besides a man. CTV's Colin Horgan raised the Bechdel Test, named after an American cartoonist Alison Bechdel. In her comic Dykes to watch out for, an unnamed female character said she would only watch a movie if it satisfies these requirements:
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Ingram: What journalists must do when information is everywhere

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By Melanie Coulson
| journomel.com
Journalists need to embrace their changing role as a trusted curator and aggregator of news, Mathew Ingram said at a recent Third Tuesday event in Ottawa. Ingram said the theme of his talk on online journalism ‘what’s different? What’s the  same’ was really “the Good, the Bad, the Ugly.” He wanted to start with the bad because… well… the bad is pretty bad.
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Multimedia journalism is like sex in junior high: Garcia

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By Melanie Coulson
| journomel.com
Media consultant Mario Garcia was at the Ottawa Citizen today to share his thoughts on a new wave in storytelling, in which four platforms (mobile, tablet, web and print) are considered at the conception of a story.
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At least five dead during deadly Ottawa commute

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By Melanie Coulson
| storify.com
For advanced uses, get the raw code for your story's content in a choice of formats: Select a site to export your story to. Please note that some setups might not support embeds and may be discontinued soon.
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Creative problem-solving key to Ryerson’s innovation workshop

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By Melanie Coulson
| J-Source Verified
It’s no surprise that I agree with Maija Saari’s recent piece on innovation on J-Source. Full disclosure: we graduated from the same UWO journalism class and both took Peter Desbarats’ creative writing course. Apart from allowing us to exercise our imaginations and publish our own short story collection, I will always thank him for introducing us to creative people, notably novelist/journalist Joan Barfoot, and the incomparable Greg Curnoe.
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And now for some shameless self-promotion

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By Melanie Coulson
| journomel.com
Post was not sent - check your email addresses! Email check failed, please try again Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.
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Reaction to Bloc Quebecois booting MP Maria Mourani from the party

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By Melanie Coulson
| storify.com
For advanced uses, get the raw code for your story's content in a choice of formats: Select a site to export your story to. Please note that some setups might not support embeds and may be discontinued soon.
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Loyalist-Trent journalism program unveils its massive new newsroom

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By Melanie Coulson
| J-Source Verified
Trent University and Loyalist College officially launched a news bureau Wednesday as part of a joint journalism program run by the two schools. Jane Harrison, director of special projects and former Dean of Loyalist’s School of Media, Arts and Design talked to J-Source's education editor Melanie Coulson about the new 10,000-square-foot newsroom in Belleville and the program. J-Source: Wow. 10,000-square-feet. If you were to take us on a tour of the place, what would we see?
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Opinion: We Need a Digital-First Curriculum to Teach Modern Journalism

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By Melanie Coulson
| J-Source Verified
At the annual meeting of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication in Washington, D.C., earlier this month, one panel addressed adding programming skills to the curriculum: “Why All Your Students Must Be Programmers.” The inevitable question was posed: What would you cut from existing offerings to make room for these new topics? Some were provocative in their responses, like NPR news application editor Brian Boyer’s declarations: “No print design.
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8 great reads on Bezos’ purchase of The Washington Post

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By Melanie Coulson
| journomel.com
Unless you’ve been under a rock, you’ve heard that Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has bought the Washington Post for a cool $250 million. In his letter to Post employees, Bezos wrote: Media analysts were stunned by this announcement. But they were quick to share their thoughts on the end of the Graham family’s reign on this newspaper empire.
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Canadian thriller mines intrigue of Parliament Hill

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By Melanie Coulson
| Ottawa Citizen Verified
It’s tempting to put the characters in the political thriller Deadline under a microscope, hoping to figure out which Parliament Hill players they are modelled after. Deadline’s author knows the Hill inside and out: Postmedia’s National Affairs reporter Stephen Maher has worked there for nine years. So despite the book’s disclaimer that it’s a work of fiction, one could be forgiven for thinking Maher’s characters must be based on real-life personas at the centre of Canada’s political sphere.
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Did you feel the earth move?

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By Melanie Coulson
| storify.com
For advanced uses, get the raw code for your story's content in a choice of formats: Select a site to export your story to. Please note that some setups might not support embeds and may be discontinued soon.
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image uploaded by @bodybreak (BodyBreak)

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By Melanie Coulson
| ow.ly
View and share this image from @mel_coulson and hosted by Ow.ly
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Boston Marathon bombing coverage by CNN and John King

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By Melanie Coulson
| storify.com
As King and CNN started to question whether a suspect was arrested, or in custody, or questioned, or 'identified as a person of interest.'The viewers weren't buying it.
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image uploaded by @mel_coulson

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By Melanie Coulson
| ow.ly
View and share this image from @mel_coulson and hosted by Ow.ly
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image uploaded by @mel_coulson

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By Melanie Coulson
| ow.ly
View and share this image from @mel_coulson and hosted by Ow.ly
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image uploaded by @mel_coulson

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By Melanie Coulson
| ow.ly
View and share this image from @mel_coulson and hosted by Ow.ly
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image uploaded by @mel_coulson

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By Melanie Coulson
| ow.ly
View and share this image from @mel_coulson and hosted by Ow.ly
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