After nine months on Gloria's Forum - for which I can never thank her enough - I'd like to clarify some things about the 'coverage' I try to provide in this Forum of the Pope's activities and pronouncements:
1.
I try to be as comprehensive as I can be, in which, of course, my obvious limitation is that I am unable to survey regularly (i.e., daily) all possible sources of news and commentary about the Pope in English, Italian, French, German, Spanish and Portuguese - the languages I can manage. However, generally, the primary Italian and English sources online account for 90 percent of all the news available on the Pope, so I am confident that I would rarely miss anything major.
2.
I try to provide a full translation of every papal text as soon as possible because I believe that it is the best way to present what he says.
This way, the Pope's words are unfiltered by the editorial selection that journalists inevitably exercise when they write news stories about what the Pope said, which a) generally resorts to inadequate sound bites, not uncommonly misrepresented and out of context, and do not therefore do full justice to what the Pope says; and b) for practical reasons, pick out only one or two themes, or significant points, out of several that are usually contained in a papal text.
Therefore, I only post news items
reporting what the Pope says for any one of three reasons: 1) if the item also includes some useful background; 2) if the full text is not immediately available, and I use these items as a stopgap (e.g., the reports of VIS or AsiaNews); and 3) if the item, usually by a major news agency, is such a flagrant distortion of what the Pope said that it needs to be fisked and set straight.
3. I believe
it is more convenient for a Forum visitor to get all the news and timely commentary on Benedict XVI in a single thread, rather than have to consult several threads. News is news, whatever its nature, serious or light.
I therefore use the secondary threads about the Holy Father only for special compilations, such as the various trips, of
reports that are first posted on this main thread; or for 'timeless' items that are not pegged to current news, such as the Magisterium thread and the one on Joseph Ratzinger texts - both of which I can only occasionally fill, as I come across suitable texts, and that I wish I could regularly fill with what is out there online abundantly, but which necessarily get less priority than 'new' items.
4. Lella's blog provides me throughout the day with a quick survey of what's in the Italian media, and it is a very convenient time-saving aid for which I am very thankful. Out of habit from my journalist days, I do go back to the primary source whenever possible. Only in a few cases is that not possible. Likewise, Beatrice's site leads me to material from the French media that I would otherwise not come across as promptly as she does.
5. Having worked in TV news which is basically a 'show and tell' way of reporting, and on newspaper and magazine layouts, I do cultivate a certain visual look for my posts, with banners and devices that immediately peg the topic, as well as with any useful supplementary visual material that I can glean online (along with facts that help to explain and appreciate the story better). I only regret that I haven't found the time to learn how to maximize the formatting possibilities of our posting boxes, nor to move on to a more sophisticated graphic program than the primitive 'Paint' that I use with Powerpoint for convenient resizing, cropping, etc.
And obviously,
my policy about the newsphotos concerning the Pope is to try and post everything available from the major newsphoto sources, and anything else I can find from Gloria's posts or from some of the blogs.
I had always hoped, even in the PRF, that someone would volunteer to do nothing but look through the Vatican and Foto Felici photos daily - which are largely untapped because no one has the time to go through those dozens of photos - but I know that would take at least a few hours each day.
6. I am sorry I cannot be as comprehensive with the other main threads here - but I do try to make sure I do not miss anything really important.
7. Finally, I would welcome any Forum reader contributing anything that is informative, interesting and even provocative.
Thank you all for your interest.
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 03/03/2010 22:49]