Editorial policy and Summer break
Apologies for missing the promised publication date.
I said I’d publish the Editorial Policy of "From Bath to Cork with Baby Grace" at the start of every month. The June deadline was missed, for reasons I forget. The editor goes on holiday to Lahinch tomorrow. There might be no blog for two weeks. No publication is promised. Anything from County Clare will be a bonus.
Another result of reading Andrew Keen: I think it even more important to have an editorial policy, and to be open to scrutiny by readers.
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Omaniblog Editorial Policy and Rationale:
1. This is “From Bath to Cork with Baby Grace” otherwise know as “Omaniblog“. The editor is known as Omani. (The editor is not a citizen of Oman. His recent ancestors were from Cork but he was born in Limerick, Ireland.)
2. The editor is responsible for content. Listens to all readers and wants Comments, please. (The Comment function on here is not simple enough. Please persist. All comments are moderated: this takes time. No Spam, or unfunny abuse, will be published.)
3. The blog is published Monday to Friday, except Irish Bank Holidays,. (If this blog is forced to take a break, readers will be offered recommended alternatives by the editor.)
4. The first aim was to publish before 10am. (From now on any time will do.)
5. This is a "Personal" Blog. (Primary inspiration will be the life, experience, thoughts, worries, feelings, fantasies, art and spiritual life of Omani. Everything said about anyone else is a projection by the author. Political opinions and rants, reports about the lives of others - especially Baby Grace and Omaniblog family - and miscellaneous posts are written in a spirit of experimental writing.
6. The inspiring genius for this Personal Blog is the poetry of Walt Whitman, especially the first edition of “Leaves of Grass” (1855). The lines “… I dote on myself…. there is that lot of me, and all so lucious, Each moment and whatever happens thrills me with joy.” convey the sense of working from the personal to the artistic, from the individual to the whole, that has sustained the editor.
7. There are other inspiring geniuses, like Abraham Lincoln & Cesar Manrique & Albert Einstein, and others that remain to be discovered. (Einstein is a recent discovery.)
8. This blog is written for Grace, daughter of the author. Everything published must be able to be given to her later, without the slightest trace of shame or guilt. The shame and guilt of the author will be laid in front of her without shame or guilt.
9. Posts will be as short as possible. When the editor is rushed, the post will be long-winded. Each month, there will be a good number of really short posts, about the length of Nietzsche’s average aphorism. This is a continuing aspiration.
10. For 2007, the main topic will be Depression.
11. Omaniblog welcomes Guest Bloggers but cannot afford to pay for posts. This is a platform for fresh ideas. (To be published here, all you need to do is write a Post in the form of a Comment; make it clear that you would like it published, and Bob’s your uncle.
12. The monthly report of Performance against Aspiration has been a complete disaster. The promise to produce it is withdrawn. (The person responsible for writing it has been sacked, not paid off.)
There will never be more than 12 editorial guidelines. All such guidelines are there to be challenged and celebrated.
Thank you very much for reading this.
