[Imc-lwg-general] Re: [Imc-uk] object to image on Belgium story

[Richard Malter]

Hello Andi and everyone, 

Quoting andi@syndicate.org.uk: 

hi all, 

sorry about this long mail but this is about politics. i'd rather 
not engage with richard in such a silly way but i feel forced to. 
here you have it. 

~ Andi you have publicly twice tried to discredit me and once Toni on Indymedia 
public lists. The last time you did this on tech Blicero told you to make your 
points without abusing. Or not make them at all. *You even went to Toni's home 
and were friendly to him, only later to abuse him publicly*. Note that he did 
not abuse you back.

I will reply to the points you make and ignore your abuse. 

richard said: 
>... how different groups can work together on the UK site 
>hasn't been worked out - but it is going to have to be. 

richard, 

i agree with this sentence. but it's not up to you to decide on your 
own how this is going to happen. i agree it's not solely up to the 
current imc-uk collective either but you *cannot* just simply 
declare the existing imc-uk group redundant. and the way in which 
you bring things forward is absolutist, righteous and exclusive, 
in short: entirely counterproductive. 

~ good we have some agreement. I suggest that you intepret that i am acting the 
way you say and am all these words that you use to describe me because you 
didn't get the point yet: *i am not in your group*, and **as you say it is not 
solely up to your group to decide how to work on a site that is called "IMC-
UK"** [ but you are incorrect to call your group the "existing IMC UK group", 
becuase you miss out the rest of the picture: Bristol, and London working 
group, are also part of that collective now. whether you like or dilike it.] 

~ i do not declare anyone redundant. Your words not mine. I cannot and dont 
literally have any power to - in that sense you are 100% correct. But you have 
to come to terms with what i wrote which you say you agree with: different 
groups have to work out how to work together, the different groups. I am in 
another group now. A group can be two people if it chooses to (at the beginning 
or anytime), and work how it likes. 

i'd love to see *groups* working *together* for the uk site. but the 
only other indymedia group i know of are in bristol and they haven't 
shown any interest yet in collaborating on imc-uk. 

~ You dont accept that London-working group is a valid group. **Point is you do 
not have any right to decide or dismiss any new group within Indymedia** 
[unless you could show that it contradicts a principle on which Indymedia 
stands on]. ***You must accept that point, ****your alternative is to claim 
authority**** *** Actually what you have already done is denied another group's 
existence: you have already declared you assumed authority.

i hope they will. 

~ me too. 

but i think you're just pressing your individual agenda of having a 
big ego and claiming to be oh-so-inclusive. 

~ i am in another group. you misunderstand and so misinterpret. see above. 

do you aim to be a 
functionnaire? if you claim to 'represent' other people, like 'the 
readers of indymedia' then legitimise yourself with some 'roots'. 
who is with you, except toni? 

~ yes, two can form a group and work in a different way to the way you work if 
they want. see above. 

if you're acting as an individual then 
i think you have no right to sidestep a working collective. 

~ no, see above. 

i think 
the basic unit *must* be a collective, not an individual. otherwise 
we just get yet another 'representation' system where the 
'strong-opinioned' individuals assume power. 

~ roughly, if as general political idea, i see this about the same, yes, in 
this context. 

please don't try to tell me that you and toni are a collective or a 
group only because you have created an indymedia email list. 

~ No. We are a group becuase we decided to be one. General volunteer autonomy 
DIY attitude. 

~ We have two lists becuase we (and people who may join) will need 
them. We set this group up becuase of the reasons i wrote in the reply mail to 
Ana - that there were unacknowledged patterns in your group (and) which led to 
very poor function as we saw it. Our view, no judgement, but we chose to act on 
it and see if we could improve. It is an experiment, as all things start. 

~ We are not asking your permission.

congratulations to your third member who subscribed in digest form! 
have you had contact yet? i haven't seen any communication on your 
list except various constitutions by yourself. come back with 
demands when you've established some collaborative working practice. 

~ 1) we are just beginning. Like you we have our own pace. 2) If we remain just 
two then that is fine too. 3) The communication on the list has been open as 
you say, so we believe we have already improved on your group's practice 
of making decisions in a way that renders you _in effect_ unaccountable and 
secretive. You can know what we are thinking of becuase you can read it while 
we are working on it, not after a decision is made. I encourage you to do the 
same. 3) we have functional working practices on which the group is based: read 
the constitution of the group. 4) Remember too that when months ago we decided 
on editorial guidelines on the UK site we got a mass of protest and 
misunderstanding from other parts of the network; point is new 
things/ideas/implementations usually cause 'conflicts' at the beginning. 
Hopefully we'll get through it and get working.
 

oh, and why do you think that you can write a constitution for
decision-making in imc-uk by yourself? 

~ Again you have misunderstood. We have written a constitution for *our group 
only*.  You have no need to be unhappy about this.

the only real political
document of imc-uk was the mission statement over which a great
number of people debated for months. you took part in it, you
accepted the final wording, and you accepted the idea that in a
collective you can't have it your way all of the time. 

~ yes, it took a lot of discussion to agree on the final wording which we 
argued on down to each word if you remember. I quote from the Mission 
Statement:-
"The Indymedia UK collective is an expanding group of DIY media workers which 
operates within a network of radical UK media groups, individual contributors 
and IMC supporters."

The "Indymedia UK collective" refers to the group i was in and you are still in 
now which you have recently described on imc-tech as "the London-based 
collective"; the mission statement says that that group is **within** a network 
of other groups etc. No, London-wg did not exist then as it does now. The point 
is that **we all accepted at the time that the london-based collective was one 
part of a larger whole - namely Indymedia UK.** You (and the group you are in)
are acting as if you are the sole Indmedia UK part, despite that you accept 
that this is not the case above. That is the point for me about the mission 
statement.

~ about "can't have your way all the time", i agree: see constitution of London-
wg: "we believe in rough consensus and running code" is our motto. 

but then you
and toni leave the collective and start a campaign against this
group, claiming to be the sole holders of 'the truth'. 

~ your words not mine or ours. Go over the mails, the pattern has been that we 
make points, argue strongly as we can; you (and others) have abused, attempted 
to discredit, and most importantly - until your mail on imc-tech when you mixed 
abuse with debate - *not actually addressed the points made*. You have done 
eevrything but that. Youre group writes off things as 'personality clashes'. I 
think you have to admitt that that could be an easy option for someone who 
doesn't and/or won't  address issues (or can't see them )- especially ones that 
break habitual ways of doing things or are at first contact disagreeable. 

~ And abuse is even easier. And you and others have done that readily.

i hope you
will not just implement your ideas on what and how to change on
imc-uk. 

~ we have to work together if that is what you mean. We do not need to ask your 
permission - you do not own the IMC-UK website- if that is what you mean.

you cannot just create a to-do list for two people claiming
responsibility for working practices for the whole uk and even 
ireland... as outlined in your 'constitution' on
http://lists.indymedia.org/mailman/public/imc-london-wg-general/2001-Decemb
er/000004.html

~ see above for your misunderstanding. The constitution (which by the way is 
free to be copied in whole or part and/or developed/tested) is for our group 
only. Please get that point now.

i bet you want to legitimise yourself with the fact that you have
engaged on global lists like process, editorial and new-imc. 

~ no. see above.

good
you did manage to keep up with the amount of traffic there and i'm
sure you've made many new friends via email and chat. but please
note that this gives you no right to impose anything on the people
who have worked more locally - the less so as you have never
reported back anything to the 'lower echelons'.

~ i have made good friends, yes. I have no wish to impose anything on anyone; 
except generally agreed (by rough consensus) principles for and by the whole 
Indymedia network - but this is not the case here. As for reporting back: 
everything i jhave done, even to the last word on logs of IRC chats are 
archived and published publicly. I am fully open and accountable. Your group is 
neither of these two things - secret in fact in the first case, and _in effect_ 
not the later.

the global lists goes work through a mechanism which a smart person
has dubbed "volunteerarchy": there is a number of people involved in
global lists who have a lot of technical knowledge, and/or the means
and the time to be online a lot, and/or a loud enough voice or way
of writing, and/or simply enough stamina to bore others to death; so
some 'supervolunteers' steer the debates more than others.
everything is being talked about only in english, to the extend that
people from brazil have announced nearly a year ago that thay will
disengage with global lists as they are monopolised by traffic of
mainly americans and english.

~ tell you what, this is going into another 'subject' (roughly), if you want to 
discuss this seperately on another thread then OK. But i am also limited like 
you on the tiome i can spend typing these long mails. So i will not give you my 
take on things here.

i acknowledge that many (especially the techies) actually *do*
things. i acknowledge that *some* decisions can be made via email
but not the fundamental ones. for questions like "open newswire"
there was thankfully an acknowledgement that local collectives
should have the last say. this is needed to counter the informal
power structure of the professionals and the techies. reading what
you propose in your email list i fear that your vision is as
exclusive as it gets, even if your rhetorics are the opposite. 

~ mostly the same thing, lets discuss separately if you wish on another thread. 
Just requote what you write and i will give you my thoughts if you want them. 
~as far as my "vision": 1) you can only piece it together from the different 
work i do, and 2) you may not like it (especially if it is different to yours 
or your immediate peers), 3) you may not understand it 4) it has nothing to do 
with being exclusive - again you misunderstand and misinterpret. The 
constitution is almost apolitical: it based as it says on functional 
principles. have a read again carefully with an open mind and compare your 
experience within your group and you might understand better, is my suggestion.

if
indymedia is going to become 'professionalised' it will just be
another green party and i'm out of it. 

~ i am guessing that you might mean as part of that: 'efficient'. I 
like 'efficiency' on the basis that i very much dislike human frustration, 
which i see as a waste of human energy. long discussion .. . 

the only strenght we have is
being do-it-yourself, having an open posting system, solidarity, and
not the least to share the knowledge on how to maintain the system.

~ agree. but not only strength. there are others: like different _underlying_ 
principles to mainstream media, Open publishing is one. Not having a small 
group of people editorializing for a large group of people is another. I think 
your group has not grasped this.


but it starts to get problematic if the social system tries to copy
the open source techie practices too literally - they are fantastic,
but they are still hierarchically organised as the enlightened king
linus has to give his placet in the end to include something in a
new release. it works for software and has immense merits but such a
model *cannot* just be a model for *every* aspect of social group
interaction or taken as a model for self-organised social systems.
i think you are too much on that abstract trip.

~ OK, i see what you mean, and see your opinion about 'abstract trip' regarding 
me individually. who knows? I am thinking as best i can, and not being stuck in 
any one way or confortable way of doing things (habits), i am drawing from as 
much and varied reading (different fields) as i can and incorporating what i 
think is useful and relevant and disregarding what is not. I recommend the same 
process to anyone.

i acknowledge that you have *done* things 

~ Yes, and it is like that without you acknowledging it; other things too. (You 
might tell Andrew though, i take it he guesses otherwise. )


and i do acknowledge that
imc-uk could be far more collaborative over regions and with many
more people. 

~ yes, it could.

you need to acknowledge that we *are* holding public
meetings (half of the members currently active came to imc-uk
through such a meeting). we are working hard on outreach and i want
you to respect this. 

1) I do respect this, Andi. 
2) You told Toni that you did not know why from all the people that had come to 
public meetings you held only a few then volunteered. Toni offered you 
explanations - like very poor way of working effectively, people 
knowing/feeling/realizing that they don't have access to your private meetings; 
you rejected them. OK, but you have not come up with alternative explantions. I 
think it is a disgrace that so many people have volunteered and they have been 
so poorly either let go or not got involved. And i think your group is the 
reason. No judgement, just explanation. You have set ways/patterns of doing 
things that are not acknowledged - how do you expect someone who doesn't (want 
to) fit in with them get involved? It was what i wrote a long time ago now 
about there being "many different kinds of activist": you all in your group 
have certain things in common, *but these things are not necessarily common to 
many other people who would otherwise get involved*. I know that a number of 
many (not I or Toni) very able media people in London have not got involved 
becuase they cannot work the way your group operates. (and when i once told 
this to someone in your group, they just shrugged their shoulders - so i gave 
up making this point). You can either see this or not see it. Up to you.

and please respect that this group has chosen
to work on a face-to-face approach for decision making. 

~ i respect this.

you can not
just change this by setting up an 'alternative' imcuk email list and
declaring us as 'exclusive club', 'abusing', 'unaccountable' etc.

~ see (a lot) above; we have set up an alternative group within Indymedia (UK) -
 is one way you one could put it. 
~I argue that if people cant see how things are decided/done, dont have access 
to the pool of information that makes up the decision-making process while 
decisions are forming, then it is an accurate thing to say that those same 
people have no way of viewing the process and so your group is _in effect_ (if 
not in intention) unaccountable. That's the point that no one has 
yet 'falsified', on global list or on a Uk list. Maybe it is true then. (Argue 
here. . .)
~re an "exclusive club": *i think that in effect you are, yes, definitely*. No 
question in my mind. See above for why in the sentence that begins "2) You told 
Toni that you did not know why []".

oh, and don't implement anything of your to-do list regarding the
imc-uk site without *proposing* it to the collective. 

~ propose, no. tell you first, yes; and then work out together agreement, yes. 
*With the caveat that you (your group) does not assume any a priori authority*.

don't think
you have a right to just implement it anyway. 

~ long discussion about rights. Are you saying that you have a right to that 
website exclusively? Are you saying that you will grant London-wg rights? 
Hopefully you are not saying that; *we have to work out how different groups 
can work together on the countrywide IMC-UK site*. As you said above.  and see 
above.

the fact that you have
a password to change the middle column doesn't give you the right to
unilaterally invent your own rules. 

~ non-applicable, see above. But note, i can invent new rules in a new group 
that i decide to form and work by them.

if you want a working practice
to be changed then you can propose it. 

~ needs to be very clear: the working practices of your group are not the 
working practices of London-wg (or any other group); there is no imposition of 
dogma allowed!

you *are* subscribed to the
features list so why don't you engage there, 

~ see above. We might create a new features group in London-wg and also 
editorialize the middle column. Diversity. Your group only is using the uk 
features list right now - it effectively the london-based collective's 
editorial page discussion. Its a **key** point that you touch on though: 

*********!!!!No one group editorializing a countrywide site!!!**********

Hope very much that you can see that that is a democratic, Indymedia 
****impossibilty**** non sequitor.

or in process in a
concrete way instead of blairing out on global lists, and the
general imc-uk list?

 ~ again you judge and call names. and coincidentally hide the fact that i do 
argue in the most "concrete" way - by (non-abusive) strong backed-up argument 
(which often gets a lot of support and agreement and work done).

Hope that covers it.

Richard






Richard Malter wrote on 12/14/01 11:03 AM:

>Really sorry to provoke peoples' anger.
>
>To explain, the logic applied is that the "London based collective"
>(as Andi described it) - regardless of all the work it does - does
>not 'possess' the countrywide website called "IMC-UK". I am not
>obliged to abide by this collective's agreed protocol (24 hour rule
>or anything else) because i am not in that collective; I am one of
>Indymedia UK though. If i organize within imc- london-working group
>or even independently and decide to put up a feature i can.
>
>I have no wish to impose my views on anyone. But this is not a
>'conflict', it is just that there is no 'monopoly': i am not in
>your group; and you do not control or own any website called
>"IMC-UK".
>
>
>How different groups can work together on the UK site hasn't been
>worked out - but it is going to have to be. For reasons of
>democracy it is unacceptable that one collective has 'possession'
>of a site named "IMC-UK" and what follows dislikes that they aren't
>the sole administators of that site; now and again i fix typos etc
>in the middle column - it's too small to report about it so i don't
>bother - but i already work on the site independently, and
>london-wg has plans to work on the site too - see the published
>TODO list on the list.
>
>I drop the case about the image, it will disappear down the bottom
>anyway, but it is a big turn-off; getting out of the 'activist'
>ghetto factor=0.
>
>Richard 1 of Indymedia UK (london-wg)
>
>
>
>Quoting Maqui <maquis@syndicate.org.uk>:
>
>>President Richard Malter wrote:
>>>objection.
>>>
>>>puerile and obscene. I've taken it off.
>>>
>>>Richard 1 of Indymedia UK (london-wg)
>>
>>Hi all, Well ... since seeing this fucking mail i had some time to
>>cool off. I tried to reply it straight away but i hate to say that
>>it made me so angry, so furious that i don't think i could have
>>managed anything better than 'fuck off Richard'! Now i still mean
>>the same, but i calmed down a bit and i try to say something more
>>that that. Well... shit, in fact i still feel the same negative
>>feeling of uncontrolable anger, but it's more about the fact that
>>someone like Richard can bring me to such a primitive state of
>>mind. Probably this is what he wants; to kind of stalk the
>>Indymedia-UK collective to submission, to submit us to his
>>righteous truth of some vage politics (can i call them that?!!) of
>>openness, participation and political correctness... all in all a
>>massive mental wank from my point of view.
>>
>>Anywhay, ... what is this all about then?  Ok, for those of you in
>>the collective who may not know what i'm talking about, and for
>>anybody else who is out there in this list, President Richard
>>today came down from his heavenly, self-styled, god-like,
>>oh-so-righteous reality and unilateraly decided to CENSOR the
>>indymedia-UK front page.  In his self explanatory mail above, he
>>talks about the picture we had put in the EU-Brussels feature.
>>
>>His Majesty Malter... well now i'm not so sure whether i should
>>call him President or Majesty,... probably a hybrid of both,
>>Majesty for his self-styled rigthness, President for his
>>compulsive control-freakness and authoritarian attitude.  Anyway
>>...Majesty goes... so His Highness has used his powers given by
>>some higher awarenness and political correctness, and decided to
>>take the image off from the Brussels Eu feature in the front page.
>> His Majesty's sensibility was upseted, so off it went.
>>
>>What His Majesty didn't realise, it seems, is that the picture is
>>the official image of the D16 Eu-Summit protests in Laeken,
>>Brussels.  It's the 'logo' that the whole planet (that is the real
>>and phsysical planet His Majesty seems to have left some time ago)
>>use and  has been using for the last three months for the actions
>>against the Laeken Eu-Summit. His Majesty may or may not have
>>realised that the three main websites reporitng and covering the
>>actions (Belgium-IMC, d16.de, bruxxels.org) use or have used this
>>image. The same goes for the german, barcelona and italy
>>imc-sites.
>>
>>So what does His Majesty think we shoul do now?  Should we start
>>one of these global virtual debates about the obscenity and
>>puerility of that image (in irc or email, of course) that His
>>Majesty enjoys so much?  Or maybe better, should we just delete
>>them from all other front pages?  I mean,  His Majesty could stalk
>>these collectives too, until they submit to His vision of right
>>politics.
>>
>>Whether His Majesty likes this image or not, doesn't come near to
>>the point here... whether His Majesty thinks it is puerile and
>>obscene its His fucking bussiness and i don't give a shit (pardon
>>my french here!), ... and wheteher His Majesty thinks that he has
>>got the right to decide if and when to take it down from the page
>>without any notice, discussion or debate ... well i would say that
>>this requieres some serious collective action here.
>>
>>How the fuck His Majesty believes that he can impose his views on
>>a working collective, on his own, from his computer, without never
>>engaging with the alredy existing collective, and still override
>>the work orthers do?  His Majesty is becoming more and more a
>>seriuous pain in the ass, his attitude is increasingly becoming
>>more and more authoritarian, disruptive and fascist, and believe
>>me i don't use this word lightly. I DO call the existing admin
>>collective to stand for our rights to autonomy, decission making
>>and modus operandi.
>>
>>President Mr Richard Malter, you can try it as hard as you want,
>>but you won't submit us.  The picture goes back up. The work on
>>the Indymedia-UK website goes on, the really democratic
>>uk-indymedia project won't put up with this sort of authoritarism.
>>We are stronger than that, we meet, we share, we debate, we
>>engage, we interact, we think and act collectivelly, and that's
>>TOO strong for His Majesty. Those of us that have met His Highness
>>are aware of His inability to operate in a real, non-virtual
>>collective situation;  well i used to be sorry about that, i used
>>to like Richard Malter, but I definitelly dislike His Majesty...
>>could that be anything to do with my republican upbringing??
>>
>>jordi (one of the imc-uk collective) PD. I am NOT interested in a
>>long, pseudo-theoretical debate with His Majesty here, I had
>>enough of it, so I won't engage on one. From my personal pint of
>>view, His rants about who is or who it is not IMC-UK, what is
>>IMC-UK, and his obsession with His own ideas of structure and
>>working practices are extremelly boring, not to say dodgy at
>>times. All in all a bit too liberal and vague for my personal
>>liking.
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