Posted by Prakruthi L. S on April 29, 2008 at 05:47:59:
In Reply to: Anita Ratnam's letter to City Express posted by Rasika on April 14, 2008 at 10:14:40:
Dear Anita Madam,
After reading the thread of discussions, one tends to go back to the basic difference between a review and an opinion. The former, in my humble opinion, has three key implicit connotations to it -
a) An authority– A credibility established by expertise in the field rather than self-proclamation.
b) A responsibility - Towards both the person/object of review in terms of offering advice/constructive criticism and towards the audience who may base their opinions, judgments and decisions on the review.
c) An Objectivity - The maturity to steer clear of double entendres / repartees, to avoid generalizations and to be unbiased by personal impressions or prior experiences. I guess a review where verbiage takes precedence over objectivity is reflective of lack of credibility of the reviewer and stems from the insecurities of the reviewer.
In a nutshell, while there are good and bad reviewers in this world, an opinion masquerading as a review (irrespective of whether it is blemishing or blandishing) is unforgivable since it is equally demeaning to the creation and damaging for the conceiver of any piece of creativity.
Regards,
Prakruthi L.S,
Bangalore.