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On Sat, 10 Jun 2006 10:56:48 +0200 Patrick Lauer <patrick@g.o> |
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wrote: |
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| > I also believe that when posting an article or interview, a copy |
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| > should be sent to the relevant people to ensure that they are ok |
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| > with what is being posted (my dev of the week interview, for |
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| > example, was rather screwed up and misrepresentative). |
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| My fault. |
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Good start. Now, are you going to post corrections? |
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|
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| > When someone contacts GWN to have |
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| > something corrected, it would be appreciated were the GWN staff to |
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| > at least deign to acknowledge receipt, even if for some reason they |
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| > choose not to honour the corrections or post a retraction (although |
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| > refusing to publish corrections is extremely insulting to those |
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| > wronged). |
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| The reason for that is that the GWN is mostly sent out by mail. This |
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| makes corrections a bit more difficult, but I think having a sane |
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| policy for that would be helpful. |
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|
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Publish a 'corrections' section in the next edition? |
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|
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| > Having read through the archives, I notice that there was once a |
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| > time when the GWN was a great publication, and I would like to |
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| > think that it could become great yet again; in its current state, |
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| > though, it is doing more harm than good. |
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| |
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| Agreed. |
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|
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Given that it is doing more harm than good, should it be discontinued |
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until a solution is found? |
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|
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| > Another complaint is that the GWN rejects any writing style which |
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| > has any degree of character or levity. Any attempt at dececnt |
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| > writing (the kind that would make it into publication in English |
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| > newspapers or magazines, for example), is met with the claim that |
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| > "the GWN is not a humorous publication". |
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| |
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| Blame the flamefests of the past. Whenever attempts were made to give |
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| the GWN more dynamic it was flamed down (because ze german humor is |
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| not funny! Nein! ;-) ) |
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| So the consensus was to keep the silly jokes out of the GWN since |
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| always someone misunderstands or complains. I'd like to have it a bit |
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| more open, funny, enjoyable ... but there's only so much I can do. |
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|
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Christel did not talk about "silly jokes". She spoke about "decent |
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writing (the kind that would make it into publication in newspapers or |
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magazines, for example)". There's a rather large difference (well, if |
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you assume she means *respectable* newspapers and magazines -- good |
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examples for anyone wanting examples are the Times, the Guardian or the |
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Scotsman). I'd imagine the distinction could be not too obvious for |
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some non-native speakers, but it is a large and very important |
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distinction. |
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|
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You don't have to be silly or boring to be considered respectable. Take |
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Jeremy Clarkson, for example. He's frequently rather outrageous, very |
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very funny, prone to using extremely colourful metaphors and writes for |
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the highly respectable Sunday Times, which has such a good reputation |
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not despite having such writers but because of it. |
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|
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-- |
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Ciaran McCreesh |
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Mail : ciaran dot mccreesh at blueyonder.co.uk |
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-- |
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