[New-imc] Myths and Realities About SF Indymedia

[gekked at blackflag.net]

Again, this is gek sending a letter on behalf of the entire SF
Indymedia group.

We are again saddened and confused that SFBAY has decided to send this
email of rumors, half-truths, assumptions, unfounded accusations to
this list, instead of resolving the mediation agreement like they said
they would. 

SF Indymedia would like to continue doing our Indymedia work. We have
a lot of stuff to do right now. We do not want to play a "he said/she
said" game. However, this email is so one-sided, and so violates the
mediation agreement that we all agreed to, that we feel we must have
some response. After this, we again assert that SFBAY has a
responsibility to uphold their end of the mediation agreement.

This issue must be resolved locally. If not, global IMC will be
disrupted for a long time, because we have a lot of serious grievances
against the SFBAY group. 

We hope that this is the end of it in global IMC.

MYTHS & REALITIES: A RESPONSE TO SFBAY'S "OPEN LETTER TO GLOBAL
INDYMEDIA"

> Open Letter to the Global Indymedia Network from SF Bay Area IMC
> Introduction
> 
> It is with much sadness and urgency that we inform the greater 
> indymedia community about the ongoing crisis within the San Francisco 
> Bay Area IMC.
> 
> Previously, we had attempted to resolve internal conflicts among group 
> members by engaging in formal mediation, which ultimately resulted in 
> an official split of the group into two and a list of specific actions 
> upon which each side agreed. This letter is being sent out only after 
> these agreements have not been respected by the new SF IMC collective 
> that has split from us.

SFBAY MYTH:
SFBAY attempted to resolve this matter, SFBAY has met all its
requirements in the split, SFBAY are victims.

REALITY:
In fact, there are outstanding items on BOTH sides of the mediation
agreement. SF Indymedia has attempted to communicate with SFBAY on
these matters, but they refuse to reply to our email. Instead, they
drafted this "open letter," filled with half-truths, rumors and
unfounded accusation. SF Indymedia urges SFBAY to fulfill its
requirements per the mediation and let us get back to work rather than
continue squabbling with them.



> As many of you know, the SF Bay Area IMC had been using both 
> sf.indymedia.org and indybay.org since its inception. The SF Bay Area 
> IMC website had been hosted on a linefeed.org server which was operated 
> by the tech members of our collective.
> 
> Conflict
> Our IMC has now split into two groups. When a few of the tech members 
> began to have personal problems with other members of the collective, 
> these tech members demanded a split of the collective. The resulting 
> dynamics within the group continued to worsen. It created an 
> environment that made it difficult to continue working together and 
> also discouraged potential new people from joining the collective. 
> While most members of the collective opposed any kind of split, the 
> aforementioned tech members insisted that they would split anyway, 
> because they wanted to and because they could.

SFBAY MYTH:
We are the majority versus "a few of the tech members."

REALITY:
There was an even split, number-wise, amongst IMC participants in the
Bay Area. SF Indymedia is a diverse group including many people who do
not participate in the tech collective.


> The tech members who wanted the split also had convinced the rest of 
> the group to agree to move the site to the linefeed.org server. They 
> claimed that this was merely a technical issue which would enable the 
> site to run faster.

SFBAY MYTH:
A few tech members moved the site claiming it would be faster.

REALITY:
The entire SF-IMC collective consensed to move the site from a
donation we had in Oakland. A few imc-sf-tech participants took on
this project, developed several plans, proposed them to the entire
imc-sf-tech collective, one plan was consensed on, and it was
implemented. All of this is available to see by anyone in the
imc-sf-tech mailing list archives.



> The members of the splitting group also began making viscious and false 
> accusations about other members of the collective. This even went as 
> far as accusing some members of being security risks and/or police 
> informants.

SFBAY MYTH:
"Members of the splitting group" made "fabricated accusations" and
called SFBAY members cops.

REALITY:
SF Indymedia has never called anyone "cops," although many of us do
believe that the blatant security culture violations, failure to
maintain confidentiality for direct action groups, publicly painting
people as "black bloc" protesters, and so on are serious security
matters which jeopardize the mission of Indymedia in SF and around the
world, and many of us will be more than happy to explain this in full
detail if requested.



> The splitting group began to take control of the linefeed.org server 
> that the SF Bay Area IMC website had been hosted on by kicking off all 
> other IMC members from access to it. At the same time, they also cut 

SFBAY MYTH:
They took over the server.

REALITY:
The server they are talking about has shared admin access amongst many
techs throughout the world, including people in South America, Europe,
and throughout the U.S. Many more people have direct, daily contact
with the admins of this box. Decisions made by the sf-active group
throughout the last year were made to further democratize the admin of
this box.



> off access to other local activist websites (such as the Food Not Bombs 
> News website, liberationradio.net and passionbomb.com) that were being 
> hosted on their linefeed.org server. These other websites were 
> affiliated, to greater or lesser degrees, with members of SF Bay Area 
> IMC with whom the splitting group members were in conflict.

SFBAY MYTH:
They locked people out because of spite!

REALITY:
None of these websites were hosted in Indymedia space, although they
were on the same server. Linefeed, a group which shares admin access
to a webserver used by Indymedia, were/are responsible for those
websites. Two of those websites were maintained by Mark B. of SFBAY.
He committed to maintaining those sites and then flaked on them.
Finally, in the heat of the conflict, Linefeed removed Mark's access
to these non-Indymedia websites. Linefeed hosts websites for many
activist groups who require intense security, and based on Mark's
actions, Linefeed decided that he could not be trusted to have access
to our box while still guaranteeing security to other people hosted
there. Linefeed had contact with both of these websites and tried to
help them the best ways possible, given other existing
responsibilities, including giving them database backups, updating
their sites, trying to find them new hosting, etc. As for
passionbomb.com, the owner of this site told Linefeed he could handle
almost everything because he "knew what he was doing," but then
emailed daily, over and over, requesting Linefeed to do things for
him. When Linefeed could not keep up with his demands, he moved his
DNS one day. None of these incidents have anything to do with
Indymedia or the split nor is there any malicious intent involved 
here, besides SFBAY's desire to take random occurrences and use 
them to smear people's names.



> When it was clear that this internal conflict had reached a stalemate, 
> a neutral professional mediator was hired to conduct a series of 
> mediation meetings.

REALITY:
This paragraph is actually true!


> The mediation agreement was officially finalized on November 13th, 
> 2003. Since that time, members of the new sf.indymedia group have 
> backtracked on their agreement in multiple ways. The indybay.org DNS 
> was supposed to have been handed over by the Monday following the final 
> mediation meeting, November 17th. But this did not occur until over a 
> month later, in mid-December. And although this "handing over" has 
> resulted in indybay.org now pointing to the correct site, they continue 
> to refuse to hand over the indybay.org domain ownership, which they 
> still control. Also, immediately after the mediation, they locked out 
> the group that was now sfbay.indymedia.org (indybay.org) from access to 
> sf.indymedia.org. In combination, these actions left the rest of the 
> group without a website for over a month.

SFBAY MYTH:
We are innocent victims and all we want is ownership of a domain that
doesn't belong to us or Indymedia.

REALITY:
Transferring DNS to SFBAY was discussed and agreed upon in mediation.
Giving SFBAY ownership of the domain was not decided. Furthermore,
SFBAY has failed to uphold many more items they agreed to: allowing us
access to our space, giving us our equipment back, giving us any press
passes in our name, a commitment to work out the mediation with us and
not go to global imc, a commitment to not spread negative propaganda
about the other imc, etc etc etc. SF Indymedia insists that SFBAY at
least *acknowledge* our problems before we finalize the mediation.



> During this period, the new sf.indymedia group has been hiding posts of 
> news stories to the sf.indymedia.org newswire (such as an announcement 
> about a live streaming coverage of the recent mayoral election by Enemy 
> Combatant Radio) made by members of the indybay.org group, effectively 
> censoring the indybay.org group.

SFBAY MYTH:
They are censoring us!

REALITY:
Lots of people have access to editorial control on both sides, and
during heated arguments, both sides have censored each other here or
there.



> The new sf.indymedia group has also refused to place on their website a 
> link with an explanation about the split, as both groups agreed to do 
> as part of the mediation agreement. Nevertheless, the indybay.org group 
> put up the explanation and link immediately after the site was up, 
> after the DNS switch.

SFBAY MYTH:
We don't know why they aren't putting a link up to us!

REALITY:
SF Indymedia has informed SFBAY that we are waiting for them to
acknowledge the parts of the mediation agreement they have not lived
up on. SFBAY has refused to answer our email on this or communicate in
any way.



> Also, members of the new sf.indymedia group have been engaging in 
> tactics of doublespeak by accusing members of indybay.org of precisely 
> the kinds of acts that they themselves have been responsible for, such 
> as lying, manipulating, and threatening.

SFBAY MYTH:
When we lie or threaten people, it is actually the liar lying about us
lying!

REALITY:
Now, *that* is doublespeak.



> In sf.indymedia.org's recent application for status as a new imc that 
> they submitted to the New IMC Working Group, they stated that their 
> "supporting groups were too numerous to mention." While we didn't speak 
> up then, since we had agreed in good faith during mediation not to stop 
> their new IMC process, we now feel, in light of their actions, that 
> they should be asked why they failed to list those groups and to show 
> who really aligns with them. As far as we know, local activists and 
> groups and members of other IMCs who are finding out about the split do 
> not support them nor their actions.

SFBAY MYTH:
SF Indymedia aren't activists, and we have more friends than they do!

REALITY:
There is an enormous depth of contacts, affiliations and support
within SF Indymedia. At least two of us have been activists since the
60s. Several of us are lifelong residents of San Francisco, coming
from activist families. Many others have at least a decade of activist
networking experience in California, across the U.S., South America
and the Middle East. SFBAY's personal attacks are uncalled for.



> List of violations of the mediation agreement by the new 
> sf.indymedia.org group:
> 
> 1. The sf.indymedia.org group has refused to put up a blurb and links 
> about the split as agreed to during mediation.

SFBAY MYTH:
SF Indymedia should meet all the terms of the mediation even though we
won't even acknowledge the terms we haven't met.

REALITY:
SFBAY needs to acknowledge and negotiate the terms of the mediation
they have violated.



> 2. The sf.indymedia.org group failed to switch the DNS for indybay.org 
> until over a month after the mediation agreement.

SFBAY MYTH:
They didn't give indybay DNS to SFBAY fast enough.

REALITY:
SFBAY needs to acknowledge and negotiate the terms of the mediation
they have violated.



> 3. Before the indybay.org DNS was eventually switched over, a member of 
> sf.indymedia.org pointed indybay.org to a non-existent IP address, 
> causing many people to stop using indybay.org.
> 
> 3. Immediately after the mediation was over, a member of 
> sf.indymedia.org withdrew half of the money from the imc checking 
> account, and then refused to negotiate the price for stickers and 
> t-shirts advertising the sf.indymedia.org web site address. According 
> to the agreement, the groups would split the money in the bank account 
> after sfbay was reimbursed for the mutually agreed upon price for the 
> stickers and t-shirts, and sf.indymedia was reimbursed for pieces of 
> equipment that sfbay wanted to purchase.

SFBAY MYTH:
Only SFBAY should get things out of the split.

REALITY:
SFBAY needs to acknowledge and negotiate the terms of the mediation
they have violated.


> 4. The sf.indymedia.org group has deleted the SF-IMC email list and the 
> Enemy Combatant Radio (ECR) email list without warning, before anyone 
> had the chance to back up three and a half years of work and contacts 
> contained in the lists' archives.

SFBAY MYTH:
They deleted our archives without warning.

REALITY:
SF Indymedia informed Mark B. of SFBAY that we would be moving ahead
with terms of the mediation, including deleting imc-sf-ecr, and he
said that would be fine. SFBAY's internal communication and lack of
process is causing problems, but they would rather blame it on SF
Indymedia.



> 5. The sf.indymedia.org group has gone against the agreement by 
> redirecting aliases to their new email addresses.

REALITY:
???- no idea what this is even about, never heard it before


> List of actions by the new sf.indymedia.org group that violates the 
> indymedia Principles of Unity
> 
> 1. Members of the linefeed.org server (which now hosts 
> sf.indymedia.org, other IMCs and activist websites) have sabotaged 
> local activist websites hosted by them that were connected to 
> indybay.org.

SFBAY MYTH:
They are locking people out of servers with malicious intent.

REALITY:
See above for the truth.


> 2. The sf.indymedia.org group has been repeatedly hiding and deleting 
> legitimate posts to their newswire by local activists whom they see as 
> being connected to indybay.org.

SFBAY MYTH:
They hid things we want to post!

REALITY:
SF-IMC has hidden posts by SFBAY that announce legitimate events but
the author line is "SF-IMC are dicks," etc etc. Again, this kind of
childish behavior has happened on both sides and it is embarrassing to
even talk about it.


> The end result of all of this is that techies with positions of power, 
> and a personal vendetta within an IMC collective, have effectively 
> hijacked complete control of the website from the rest of the 
> collective.
> 
> We believe that the behaviors displayed by the members of the new 
> sf.indymedia group/linefeed.org are offensive and unacceptable, and 
> that they have abused their powers as tech people within the IMC 
> network to manipulate and bully others to get their way.

SFBAY MYTH:
They were mean to us and people who aren't involved should do
something bad to SF Indymedia.

REALITY:
SFBAY has engaged in a months-long campaign of threats, intimidation,
violence, and process violations that eventually led half of SF-IMC to
say "we have to get away from you." One person engaged in a campaign
of "revenge through Indymedia" because another person in the group
wouldn't date her. Another person spread lies and misinformation about
local direct action groups, black bloc groups, etc in order to "get
back" at other people. The misery goes on and on, which is why the
sensible members of SF-IMC decided to split away rather than continue
to fight with SFBAY members. SF Indymedia is fully prepared to provide
complete explanations and documentation of these incidents if
necessary. We hope it won't be.


> Proposed Resolution
> 
> We, the undersigned, request the following from the global tech working 
> group and other IMCs in the network:
> 
> 1. The ownership of the indybay.org domain should be handed over to the 
> current members of indybay.org immediately, and
> 
> 2. sf.indymedia.org should immediately put up texts and links about the 
> split on their website as they should have already done as part of the 
> agreement.
> 
> If both of the above requests are not met immediately, then we ask that:
> 
> 1. The new sf.indymedia.org's status as an IMC should be revoked, and
> 
> 2. The current members of the new sf.indymedia.org should be denied 
> access and control to the sf.indymedia.org domain, and
> 
> 3. in the event that the new sf.indymedia.org group should lose control 
> of their domain, that it be handed over to the current members of 
> indybay.org instead of being destroyed, since it is an established 
> community resource, and
> 
> 4. the money that paid for the mediation should be refunded to the 
> current members of indybay.org.
> 
> We also request that all IMC websites update their links to the San 
> Francisco Bay Area as http://www.indybay.org.
> 
> We are hereby challenging the legitimacy of the new sf.indymedia.org 
> group for violating its own Principles of Unity by their abusive and 
> intimidating behaviors.

REALITY:
The new-imc process, the imc-process approval of what happened, and so
on, are not revokable after the fact because SFBAY decides so. SFBAY
has to live up to its own commitments in the mediation agreement.
Until that happens, they have no right to further violate the
mediation agreement by bringing this to Global IMC. We reject SFBAY's
claims to a link or the indybay.org domain name until they meet their
terms of the mediation.

- SF Indymedia