Pope Bene­dict An­nounces Vat­i­can Youtube Channel

Pope Benedict
It might be that many peo­ple be­came aware of web 2.0 and so­cial me­dia for the very first time when Barack Obama cre­ated a world wide buzz with his bril­liantly ex­e­cuted so­cial me­dia campaign.

2 Days ago, on Fri­day Jan­u­ary 29 2009, an­other im­por­tant fig­ure of pub­lic life em­braced web 2.0.

Pope Pope Bene­dict XVI com­mented on ben­e­fits and dan­gers of so­cial me­dia and an­nounced the new vat­i­can chan­nel on youtube. 


Here’s an ex­cerpt of his remarks:

… the new tech­nolo­gies which have made the in­ter­net a re­source of ut­most im­por­tance, es­pe­cially for the so-called „dig­i­tal generation”.

Un­doubt­edly, wise use of com­mu­ni­ca­tions tech­nol­ogy en­ables com­mu­ni­ties to be formed in ways that pro­mote the search for the true, the good and the beau­ti­ful, tran­scend­ing ge­o­graph­i­cal bound­aries and eth­nic divisions.

To this end, the Vat­i­can has launched a new ini­tia­tive which will make in­for­ma­tion and news from the Holy See more read­ily ac­ces­si­ble on the world wide web.

It is my hope that this ini­tia­tive will en­rich a wide range of peo­ple in­clud­ing those who have yet to find a re­sponse to their spir­i­tual yearn­ing through the knowl­edge and love of Je­sus Christ whose mes­sage of Good News the Church bears to the ends of the earth.

Vat­i­can’s youtube channel.
https://www.youtube.com/vaticanit

The source for the Pope’s quote is here: https://www.vatican.va/news_services/or/or_eng/text.html#3

Also in­ter­est­ing: The Me­dia: At the Cross­roads be­tween Self-Pro­­mo­­tion and Ser­vice. Search­ing for the Truth in or­der to Share it with Others.
https://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/messages/communications/documents/hf_ben-xvi_mes_20080124_42nd-world-communications-day_en.html

The Pope On Youtube? Why Is It Important?

I’m amazed how fast the in­ter­net changes the world.

When I was in school. …

  • The in­ter­net was­n’t even there.
  • There was no iPod, nor an iPhone to watch youtube videos. Even Sony’s Walk­man (the right­ful pre­de­ces­sor of any ‘carry with you’ de­vice)  was­n’t invented.
  • And of course there was no such thing as a ‘Per­sonal Com­puter’ to be found in any household.

Then the in­ter­net came and peo­ple had no idea how fast it would grow into our every­day lives.

Round­about 5 years ago we in­ter­net geeks started to em­brace the idea of web 2.0 as we pub­lished our first blogs. They were ugly and for geeks only.

  • Who would have thought 5 years ago a pres­i­den­tial elec­tion would be de­cided by so­cial me­dia sites?
  • Who would have thought 2 years ago the Pope would de­liver his gospel through youtube?

So­cial me­dia is no longer for geeks only.

The peo­ple and the lead­ers of the world em­brace it and we can’t even be­gin to imag­ine the con­se­quences this will bring.

Through so­cial me­dia we will see dra­matic changes in:

  1. How peo­ple ed­u­cate themselves.
  2. How they cre­ate re­la­tion­ships and mas­ter­mind groups, evolv­ing much faster than ever pos­si­ble offline.
  3. How they build their opin­ion on po­lit­i­cal, eco­nom­i­cal and eth­i­cal topics.
  4. How lead­ers will use the in­ter­net to in­flu­ence (ma­nip­u­late?) the masses.
  5. How cam­paigns and pro­pa­ganda sweep the planet across board­ers - not only when de­liv­ered by lead­ers, but by any in­di­vid­ual who puts his mind to it.

The geek in me is happy. I’m an early adopter and I love to find the  new stuff be­fore it hits the mainstream.

There’s tons and tons of op­por­tu­ni­ties wait­ing for us in­ter­net mar­keters, and through new tech­nol­ogy and new ideas our ‘uni­verse’ is ex­pand­ing each day.

I’m ex­cited about it.

How about you?