adventures with freedom of information

Lo these many years ago (April 2016, good grief) I acquired for Adam, from King's Cross, a poster depicting a rabbit contoured in brightly-coloured Tube-map-style lines on a black background (Google image search result and blog post showing much of the rest of the series; scroll for rabbit). We finally managed to get it hung in January 2023 (according to my tadas, thank you tada posts and Dreamwidth search), and then in January 2024 I found the poster Come out at Easter, which I decided I wanted to obtain a copy of as a companion piece.

(Today I actually got as far as clicking on the Rabbits category on the LTM online collection. I do not think any of the others are, for our purposes, as good.)

Alas the LTM shop did not and does not offer posters in the appropriate size off-the-rack. I e-mailed them to ask if there was any chance they could do me a custom print, got back a "... we'll ask our supplier", and have heard nothing else since. Somewhere in the year elapsed between then and now I found someone on the internet cheerfully explaining that if you submitted a freedom of information request to TFL they'd usually provide you with print-quality PDFs.

Just under three weeks ago, in a bit of an "oh no I haven't got A anything for his birthday???" panic, I... submitted a FOI to TfL.

A few days after his birthday, I got a response: as I was clearly aware, this design was available for sale from the LTM so they weren't going to give me the PDF because it would be prejudicial to the commercial interests (or something). Here, they said, was the information on how to appeal.

I looked at this response. I grudgingly conceded that it seemed fair enough. I contemplated the likely results of attempting a formal appeal. And then, at 1.03 a.m. on the 11th, I sent an e-mail that was in no way shape or form a reasonable FoI request or follow-up, but that I judged was most likely to achieve my desired outcome. (Had it been less far past my bedtime I might have written a slightly more polished e-mail, but such is life.)

( Read more... )

... so er yes today I got a reply that radiated "... you GIANT NERD" off the screen, but which boils down to "okay fine you're actually not taking the piss as much as we thought, so I've asked the LTM if they can do you your special custom print you NERD".

WATCH THIS SPACE, etc.