Wednesday, April 18, 2012

we're here because ...

The Foo Betterment Association profile (FooBA4U) was originally founded as a public service , to provide an information resource system for the membership. It was created in a happier , more hopeful time , that I believe is now returning. I did not start it for personal gain , self-aggrandizement , attention , or for any other reason than to try to give back to a site that brought - and with luck will bring again - so much pleasure to me , in the spirit of helping others share that joy.

One Swell Foop , our house "FoosPaper", was born out of FooPoo and was intended to be a lighthearted little affair carrying news of the site and a certain amount of horseplay. Like another publication that I started back in the 80's , that was destined to change , rapidly and drastically. This was neither planned , sought , or welcomed - it was simply the way things went. The site began to change , for the worse in many people's minds , and like my previous venture into private journalism , my little effort became a lightning rod for those opposed to what they - and I - saw as alterations deleterious to FooPets in practice and in spirit.

In the long run , it would seem that we have been vindicated . . . but that is not the point. I never asked to be in an adversarial position with management - this happened when my love for the site and the pets was placed in direct opposition with changes in operations and policy. I saw something wonderful dying - more properly , being murdered - and elected to speak out. Mea culpa . . . and i'd do it again in a heartbeat. Knock wood , I will never again need to.

I have also indulged in "speculation" (still not sure why this has been used like it's a dirty word - it's standard journalistic procedure) when facts were not made available by the site , and went looking for information elsewhere. For what it's worth , to the best of my knowledge I have never printed speculation as fact , never printed anything inaccurate without publishing a retraction and correction , and have withheld from publication anything learned privately if requested to do so by the sender or if in my judgement the information would have done more harm than good. And should the situation warrant , I'll do so again.

Events have forced me to treat the Foop like a "real" paper , and to follow time-honored journalistic protocols. I will continue to do so. And the Comments - my "Op-Ed" section , more or less - will continue to be uncensored and open to all posters and all viewpoints. (should something genuinely unprintable be posted - foul language and so forth - i will copy the post out , edit the problem words , and repost the cleaned-up version in its place. I trust I will never actually need to do that) I would ask - er, critics - to bear in mind that the Foop is its posts , primarily , and not its commentary thread , though frequently that has a great deal of important content as well.

"I", by the way , am variously known as FooBA4U , Born2CanaanCatHaven , singingbadger , singingbadgerclan , SafeForever , SistersKittens , and a number of other Foonames - all but the first 3 of which are presently dormant , but may return. At various points I have been chastised for getting absentminded and chiming in from whatever profile I happened to be on at the time. Personally , I think that if I have to pay for every profile I deserve a say from every profile , but that's neither here nor there - besides, the lion's share of people familiar with FooBA4U and the Foop know who I am no matter what hat I happen to be wearing at the time - but in the interest of keeping the peace and reducing unnecessary conflict , I have found a way to gimmick my email addresses so that no matter where "I" am the response will come from GoldRush/FooBA4U. I also tend to follow the practice of using the editorial "we", though this has become less consistent.