Seems that a small picture story on Sunday has stirred a hornet’s nest of opinions – about events  and how they are covered by ODN.

Oliver Daily News tries to cover the events, stories, happenings, views of our area (OK Falls to Osoyoos – and sometimes further afield). It is not a journal, it is not a newspaper – it comes out of the mind of one person who has a lot of friends and contributors. Thank God for the latter.

BUT – please think of it as the Internet – a commodity somewhere between a message board/a chat room and an old time “party-line”. It can be funny, it can be serious, it can be what you make of it.

If you have an opinion – put your full name to it. If you have strong opinions be prepared to take some reaction to those views that you might not like.

If you are fair in your criticism it will appear fair – as it does for hundreds and hundreds of comments.

Should ODN, which is growing in readership, change the way it does business  – switch gears because of some statements about professional journalism etc.? – Don’t think so.

The picture of a group of people on motorcycles and a picture of a sign was a statement from my mind as I drove along a highway. It was not a story – it was not great photography. It was a statement that some people at the Falls and in Oliver have taken exception to. The picture story is gone as is my prerogative.

Did I learn a lesson? Yes.  Will I change the way to operate ODN? No.

I urge you not to take what you read here or anywhere else with so much seriousness. It’s part of life – and your opinions and mine are just a fleeting moment in our own inner “ether”.

Have a good day.

Jack Bennest