[CIMC-work] Fw: [Imc-communication] Re: Seattle's IMC closes office [?]

Sat Dec 6 23:31:49 PST 2003

----- Original Message -----
From: "Luis" <luis at riseup.net>
To: <Imc-communication at lists.indymedia.org>
Cc: <imc-bristol at lists.indymedia.org>; "Tony Gosling" <tony at gaia.org>
Sent: Friday, December 05, 2003 8:39 PM
Subject: [Imc-communication] Re: Seattle's IMC closes office [?]


> Long-time member reflects on what's going on at the [Seattle] IMC
> http://seattle.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=36723&group=webcast
>
> "Articles of our recent death and demise are premature; the last time we
> checked we were still alive--buried, it's true--under a ton of work." --
a3m
>
> --
> Luis,
> CMI Brasil.
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Tony Gosling"
> To: Imc-communication; imc-bristol
> Sent: Friday, December 05, 2003 3:11 PM
> Subject: [Imc-communication] Seattle's IMC closes office
>
>
> >
> > Endymedia
> >
> > Here it was born and here it has died, but elsewhere Indymedia.org lives
> on.
> >
> > by Geov Parrish
> >
> > http://www.seattleweekly.com/features/0349/031203_news_geovparrish.php
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > AFTER MONTHS OF rumored trouble, it's official: Seattle's
> > Independent Media Center (IMC) is closing. The downtown
> > alternative-media storefront, opened to organize
> > independent coverage of 1999's anti-WTO demonstrations,
> > spawned a network of Web sites and media collectives
> > worldwide that today includes 123 locally managed IMCs in
> > at least 45 countries. But it never quite made it here.
> > The idea of independent media producers pooling their
> > content in one place while covering a major protest was
> > not new, of course. There was the temporary media site
> > established to report on protests at the Chicago
> > Democratic Party convention in 1996. But Seattle's effort
> > three years later was very much in the right place at the
> > right time.
> >
> > Beyond the enormity of the World Trade Organization
> > protests, the Internet was just coming into its own as a
> > tool to convey breaking news inexpensively. And there was
> > a growing audience aware that network news coverage of
> > such protests was likely to tell markedly different
> > stories than protesters themselves would tell. Moreover,
> > Seattle had?and still has?a remarkably diverse and
> > talented pool of alternative print, radio, cable TV, and
> > Web media outlets. Live Web accounts of the mayhem in
> > Seattle's streets during WTO drew more than a million hits
> > a day.
> >
> > At subsequent "summit" demonstrations in North America and
> > Europe, the indymedia.org movement found its first niche,
> > providing real-time coverage of the demonstrations and
> > encouraging the establishment of new IMCs wherever the
> > protests occurred?and in the hometowns of the protesters
> > upon their return.
> >
> > IN THE PAST two years, blogs came into their own, and
> > post-9/11 American foreign policy raised interest in
> > alternative sources for global news. Now, almost
> > two-thirds of the IMCs, including some of the most active
> > and well run, are outside the U.S. There's still plenty of
> > protest politics, but, especially in Third World
> > countries, local IMCs have become a way for media
> > activists to spread to the rest of the world news from
> > points of view not reflected in Associated Press and
> > Reuters dispatches. In October, for example,
> > www.bolivia.indymedia.org was an invaluable multilingual
> > source of accounts of the movement that forced Bolivia's
> > government into exile. Impoverished Bolivia has few
> > Internet users; the audience was readers in other
> > countries.
> >
> > Meanwhile, back in Seattle, the original IMC was crashing
> > and burning. The storefront on Third Avenue near Union
> > Street was chosen because it would be in the heart of the
> > WTO protest action, and it was. But the need to
> > continually raise money for rent for the expensive
> > location has been a drain for four years. This month, the
> > IMC defaulted on its lease; it will close by the end of
> > the year.
> >
> > MONEY HASN'T BEEN the only problem. The post-WTO decision
> > to keep the expensive storefront was based on a dream of
> > the IMC becoming an activist community center of sorts,
> > where groups could hold events, use computer and video
> > equipment, and collaborate on media projects. It rarely
> > happened. Many of the city's existing, left-leaning
> > political media projects?newspapers like the Washington
> > Free Press, Real Change, and Eat the State!, radio and
> > cable producers, and Web projects?worked with the IMC
> > sparingly or not at all. Efforts by the IMC to launch its
> > own print publication fizzled. A number of media activists
> > complained that the core group running the IMC was
> > cliquish and inaccessible; at one point, nonwhite media
> > activists discussed starting their own competing local
> > IMC. In the end, core members were clashing over
> > personalities, vision, and what to do about the debt.
> >
> > FOR SOME readers and would-be supporters, content has also
> > been a problem. The Seattle IMC Web site aspired to be a
> > credible local news source, but in practice it was open
> > publishing, meaning that anyone could send in a story and
> > it would run untouched. The policy was, in theory, the
> > ultimate in media democracy. But it also left readers to
> > sort out for themselves the solid, well-researched,
> > well-presented stories from the jargon-laden, factually
> > incorrect anarco-leftist rants. There were plenty of each.
> > But as more and more people started their own blogs or Web
> > sites, the site's local content deteriorated.
> >
> > Maybe existing or new IMC activists will try to save
> > seattle.indymedia.org. In any event, the impact of the
> > project has been phenomenal. Locally, the IMC trained a
> > new generation of media makers, and there are more good
> > alternative media projects in town than ever. More
> > important, as the technology of media has changed, the
> > idea that spread from Seattle has evolved to inspire
> > writers, producers, and artists on six continents.
> >
> > Globally, as in the U.S., control of much of the world's
> > major media is in a handful of conglomerates. The Internet
> > has proven to be the most powerful medium we have for
> > breaking that monopoly. So far, the world's biggest
> > grassroots effort to that end began in downtown Seattle,
> > next door to Bruno's Pizza. Long live Indymedia.
> >
> >
> >
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> --
> > ----
> >
> > gparrish at seattleweekly.com
> >
> > http://www.seattleweekly.com/features/0349/031203_news_geovparrish.php
> > --
> > Visit Things From Another World for the best
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> >
> >
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> > --
> > Tony Gosling - +44 117 944 6219 - mobile +44 7786 952037
> > "Capitalism is institutionalised bribery" [TG]
> >
> > All emails are 'cleartext' to the NSA.
> > http://www.nsa.gov
> >
> > Familiarise yourself with Jesus of Nazareth's exit strategy.
> > http://www.bilderberg.org/trib.htm
> >
> > All facts, no theory. Proofs of a conspiracy.
> > http://www.bilderberg.org/lucis.htm
> >
> > My monthly e-bulletin
> > Check it http://www.bilderberg.org/pepis03.htm
> > Join it http://www.bilderberg.org/bilder.htm#pepis
> >
> > "Tony Gosling" <tony at gaia.org> +44 117 944 6219
> > http://www.tlio.org.uk
> > http://www.bilderberg.org
> > http://www.cultureshop.org
> > http://www.videonetwork.org
> > http://www.public-interest.co.uk/bbc/
> > http://europe.ecovillage.org/uk/network/index.htm
> >
> >
> >
>
>
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