how now brownpau
Raul Roco may have gained pogi points with his delicadeza-precipitated resignation from the DepEd., but as Max Soliven points out, political fortunes are fickle, and Roco’s past of deserted alliances may yet come back to haunt him. Does the Filipino political landscape have any good guys at all?
(If your answer to that last question was Erap, put your fingers on your keyboard and press Ctrl-Alt-Del repeatedly to win the secret prize.)
Since Brianna has done an excellent job of summing up the situation and providing a refreshing response, I hereby declare the “Manifesto Issue” concluded and closed. Great work, everyone; handshakes all around, be sure to help clean up the crumbs and paper cups on your way out. The End.
Freedom to link [non-maliciously] is inherent to the nature of the web, even to or from sites which you may not agree with; so I don’t think this JesusJournal.com controversy is really a question of linking policies or permissions. Not to me, anyway.
Rather, the problem is this concept of JesusJournal.com’s attempting to bring order to the Christian “manifesto” or “association” to oversee Christian bloggers. It’s akin to butting in to moderate a conversation in which they were not originally taking part. The whole medium of blogging simply does not give itself to the kind of regulation that they want to establish, and the monolithic corporate ambience surrounding the JesusJournal.com outfit stands in sharp contrast to what personal publishing is supposed to be about.
So I don’t mind them linking me, any more than I would mind Americans for Purity linking to me. (Well, if bandwidth became an issue, I would start to mind.) But I will not submit to their manifestos or committees. This is the internet, not a local church or established Christian organization. Community in the blogosphere is different from community in real life worship, which in turn is significantly different from community in an institutionalized Christian ministry. Boardroom hierarchies and bureaucracies simply will not work for the world of blogging — Christian or otherwise. My advice to Mr. Hughes is to participate in the sphere on our level, with his own personal blog. Then he will be in more of a position to understand how interaction among bloggers works.
(Oh, and unsolicited bulk mail is the other part of the problem. That was annoying.)
Aight?
I’ve been wondering all day about that HBO logo. It’s a classic cable ID that we’ve all seen for years: the one where the p.o.v. flies over houses and streets into space, and a giant computer-generated HBO logo comes out of the stars, with a melodramatic sci-fi theme blaring over the whole scene. But since when did it become such a cult classic that people start dancing to it at a public movie screening?
A quick Google search turned up this brief but funny profile, which in turn turned up the composer, Ferdinand J. Smith. That search result leads you to pages where you can actually download his triumphant “HBO In Space” anthem. (Which I’ve been humming to myself all day. Curse you, HBO!)
All this talk about sliced bread makes me hungry. How about some Lava-Cooked Chicken?
Promising presidentiable Raul Roco quits his post as Education Secretary, after the president who put him there suddenly endorses a graft investigation against him.
Bad, bad move on the president’s part, especially so soon after finding that Roco is ahead of her in the 2004 presidentiable surveys. More commentary from Soliven and Teddy Benigno. This move would have lost GMA any respect I had left for her, if only there had been any left.
Benigno’s column also follows the latest missteps in the uncharmed love life of Kris Aquino. What’s going on with that girl, anyway? Since when did she fall into the mudpit with Joey Marquez? Wait, is she coming here to the US? AAAHH!!!
(Update: Lia filled me in on the details of the latest Kris tsismis. I’m underwhelmed and unsympathetic.)
Screen on the Green last night was fun; we joined thousands of people on the grass by the Washington Monument to watch Elvis in Viva Las Vegas. Silly, shallow, classic movie fun. What really cracked me up was how some people actually danced for the “HBO in Space” logo.
On the down side, I overdosed on Krispy Kremes and kiamoy. Bleh.
When Nic Ruffy came over to DC two months ago, he showed his appreciation for my being a tour guide by presenting me with a bag of kiamoy from Aji Ichiban. Since then, I’ve had great fun introducing my friends to the startling wonders of this Chinese snack. The bag is still half-full to this day, and I’m taking it to Screen on the Green tonight. (Yes, two months later, the kiamoy is still edible. What with all the preservatives, this stuff lasts practically forever.)
(Kiamoy: Dried preserved plums coated in salt, sugar, and licorice powder. Intensely salty and sweet and sour all at once. NIBBLE ONLY. DO NOT POP IN MOUTH WHOLE. The seeds are still in the plum, and the flavor is VERY intense. Great prank food. ;)
I had originally chalked up The Dane’s rant on “Christian blogs” to mild intellectual snobbery, but I’m now rethinking that after seeing later developments in the world of faith-based blogging. “Manifesto? Code of conduct?” Sorry, but I think that such a tact can only add to the veneer of mediocrity which faith-oriented forms of media have come to be associated with. Far better to form a community of mutual links than to artlessly throw manifestos at a crowd which will only dismiss you as ingenuous at best.
I certainly don’t want to antagonize our misguided but well-meaning brothers and sisters in Christ at Jesus Journal, but what do you all think of this; what causes this “visceral” response, as Bene Diction calls it? Is it because of the grasp of a potentially legalistic religious fist, or is it just indignance at the presumptuousness of this outsider and newcomer to the faith-based blogosphere? Josh Claybourn has links to more feedback. (Update: So does Bene Diction, eh?)
In any case, thanks, but no thanks, Jesus Journal. Please stop spamming me, and don’t try to arbitrate how I blog my faith.
