[New-imc] Update on NY's new-imc "orphans"

[Bill Huston]

Arc, et. al.,

There is plenty of energy here in Binghamton, I assure you. But first
I want to say that some of *my* energy has been diverted by those who
have placed unreasonable rules upon us, before allowing us to enter the
collective, and deciding a priori that we should fail. Arc, I feel
you personally have done us a disservice, and convey an air of  
controlling and subversion instead of benevolence and cooperation.
I hope we can get beyond this.

Existing IMCs should offer support to new-IMCs, should desire them to
succeed (and work in this regard) and not imagine that they should
fail (due to "lack of sustaining energy" or any other reason), and
should not impose rules upon them which are difficult to acheive due
to vagueness, rules on number of participants (why can't a town with
a single progressive be able to create an IMC?), rules *requiring*
travel to nearby IMCs (wait, doesn't the "I" stand for Independant?),
Rules requiring deaf members to attend meetings with hearing-only people
(i.e., no common language, when email "meetings" can be more effective
in this case), etc.

The spirit and definition of the IMC network is "a collective of
autonomous units" but it seems IMC Binghamton is NOT being given the
autonomomy to do things as we see fit. Let US decide how our IMC should
be run, please, and offer us your support as friends and comrades. This
is NOT what has occured.

I assume we will eventually get beyond all this, and IMC Binghamton will
eventually enter the collective, so I now move on to our actual status:

Local Media Groups
------------------

The reason I have delayed our first meeting is because I am trying to
start several media groups, all with slightly different goals, and I am
struggling on how to reconcile and organize it all:

   Group: IMC Binghamton
   Mission: Progressive, activist journalism/opinion
   Medium: Web (now), perhaps future TV projects and a high-power community radio station

   Group: Binghamton Public Access Coalition
   Mission: advocate/education of Public Access TV, create 501c3 orginization to hold assets 
   Medium: cable television 

   Group: local chapter, Citizens for Independent Public Broadcasting (CIPB)
   Mission: Activist; compel local PBS/NPR affiliate to balance conservitave 
       bias, and provide more local news and local public affairs programming
   Medium: non-publishing

   Group: Binghamton Peacenet Media Access committee
   Mission: Media awareness education and tactical planning for local peace groups
   Medium: non-publishing

Editorial conflict of groups:
----------------------------

IMC's are NOT free speech forums, and censorship must occur.  Believe me,
I love the vibe of IMC news, but I'm just stating a fact that in order
to get this progressive vibe, there must be progressive editorializing
occuring.

Public Access TV OTOH, must *by law* be complete free speech, first come,
first served, non-discrimitory access. This means that even hate-mongering
right-wingers must get access.

Organizational Questions
-------------------------

This indicates to me that these eventually must become distinct groups,
and perhaps seperate 501c3s. Ugh. Tedious government paperwork. But how
can we seek grants, and fund projects without this "offical" non-profit
corporate status? Either way risks government meddling, it seems. 

Meeting
-------

I feel we are close to having our first meeting. We have a mailing list
with 22 members, from these various groups w/various interests. (This
list for the time being is being hosted on my server, due to some
privacy issues)

So, I am trying to find a meeting place now, and should have our first
meeting in a couple weeks. I figure we can brainstorm as a collective
and resolve these issues.

Regards,
Bill Huston