Welcome aboard!

Hi to you all.

Please feel at home, and join in.

I've been debating about this move for a while. I used to be vehemently anti-blogs, thinking that the power of expression, especially with regards to philosophical / halachic / general opinions, should be given to those that are worthy of it, ie those that have passed a type of 'smicha' ordination that allows for their ideas to be widely spread. I also believed in censorship, where not every 'narisheh' thought by every 'narisheh' person could be published.

In some ways, I still do believe in all the above.

I think the music world has gone chaotic, because every shnook feels the right to record his 'beautiful' voice or musical talent. I think the book world is also out of control. Here's an interesting statistic i found recently:
"One of the surprise critical hits of 2003 was "So Many Books" by the Mexican critic Gabriel Zaid. As devoted a book lover as Birkerts, Zaid celebrates rather than mourns. Fifty years after the introduction of television, he writes, the number of titles published worldwide each year has increased fourfold from 250,000 to 1 million - from 100 books for every million humans to 167. A book is published somewhere in the world every 30 seconds."

In my opinion, it's a disgrace!

And so, what does this leave for me?

Well, firstly, I'm as human as anyone else, and tend to believe that my opinions, although not always correct, are sometimes interesting and worthwhile sharing.

Secondly, in line with the saying "live with the times" (R' S Z of Liadi), todays procedure of communication and socialising happens to occur on the platforms of blogs and the like.

Thirdly, and yes I know this will sound quire cliche' to anyone who has attended Farbrengens, I thought of using this blog as more of a formal arena to have discussions with myself, where my daily thoughts and change of opinion can be jotted down and recorded neatly.

Anyhow, I'm not sure if these reasons fully justify my move, and perhaps over time I'll have a clearer opinion. For the moment, it should be Their only exuse to burn me up there!

Rightio. Enough for a beginning.

Shalom