On Wed, 14 Sep 2005, Aaron Cannon wrote:
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Wow! I just read the news letter for this week. It's been a few months since last time. How long has it been this way? When did it go from the news of Project Gutenberg to the blog of Michael Hart? How are quotes on politics relevant to the work of PG? Whether you agree with his politics or not, there are obviously going to be a lot of people who don't.
What could have possibly made that seem like a good idea? Injecting such hot-button issues into the official Project Gutenberg newsletter gives the impression that we are a political organization and that we as volunteers support those views. Some volunteers might not be all that fond of that idea.
What is our mission here? To give away books, or to give Michael Hart a platform from which to vent his non-ebook related political views?
I have no problem with Michael Hart publishing his politics. I do have a problem with him publishing them on PG stationary.
None of these are my views, none written by me, or at my instigation. Our readers send me various articles, synopses, URLs, etc., and I usually just put them in exactly as I receive them, and sometimes I ask our CEO if something should be included. I am not a political person, I am apolitical to the point of anti-political, and I don't have any political agenda, other than to stay pretty much as far away from politics as I can get, as many people are aware. If you don't like something from one of those articles, the URL is usually there, and you are more than encouraged to send letters to the editors, and we will be only too glad to post any such letters that are published, and perhaps even some that haven't been [I'll probably ask our CEO first]. As for any changes in the last few months, none that I know of, we just cut the old Newsletter into two portions, but didn't change the content. If you read all the Newsletters over the years, you'll find a very smooth evolution from issue to issue, with the obvious changes when we switched from Monthly to Weekly, and then subdivided when we had volunteers to do the new versions. As you can see, most of the Newsletter is automated, or could/should be, and most of the rest is simply cut and pasted. All of the "hot button" issues are simply taken from the lower echelon media coverage to point out how much they have been hidden, which is the primary point, not the actual content. However, if you have issues with the actual content, perhaps a letter to this Newsletter, as well as to the original media source would engender a conversation. Again, I would have to run this by our CEO. Please note that no mention was made of the political events of Michael Brown, Judge Roberts, etc., or similar political "hot buttons." If you have certain topics you would like to have covered, or, perhaps even NOT covered, just let us know, and perhaps we can make adjustments. We've been quoting Edupage and/or Newsscan for years without any mention from a single one of our readers, other than to correct typos in their copy that was cut and pasted. A minimal number of scientific articles have also been referenced, but I presume those were not considered to be "hot button" issues. Your feedback is appreciated, Thanks!!! Michael