As recently as six months ago I was a disinterested consumer. I had chosen not to vote all of my life, and I generally accepted what the evening news said as true.

Then I discovered the Independent Media, and have been overwhelmed with how professional and well organized the group is. Radio, TV, Internet, it seems the IMC has all of the bases covered and is a real resource to a politically interested community. (You're not just talking to yourselves here guys, you're bringing in new people, I can vouch for that)

Then, following the painful end to the Philly RNC demonstrations I've begun to see a rash of fake posts and editing problems from the IMC. It's not impossible to tell a fake post from a legit one, but they help to discredit the organization as a whole.

I propose that all IMC groups adopt the system used by the Philadelphia IMC site, and provide an Editorial and News section to seperate the fact from the opinion. Further, readers must bother to rate stories that do show up based on the sources the author cites and the credibility they create. Should a story be submitted to news that is out-and-out fact-less opinion, it should be sent to where it belongs.

The IMC may just be too busy for all of this. If so, let me be the first to volunteer with this process. No one will be silenced, but the printing of obvious undefendable lies as news is intolerable.

Thanks for reading!

If you create an account on Phillyimc.org, and set your story browsing preferences to a certain level (I would recommend 5.00 or higher), you'll pretty much cut out all the crap that is getting posted.

Of course, this still confuses people just coming to the site. Maybe we can make 5.00+ a basic threshold for anonymous browsing.

On the other hand, while cops and wingnuts are posting ridiculous made-up crap, as long as we respond intelligently and remind them (politely) that they're assholes, it only makes them look worse... So far, that seems to be working pretty well...

Statistical processes like ratings have their own problems. There's a risk that some issues will drop off the list, simply because the article is not written well, or because it's considered a non-issue by a majority of people. Rhetoric, important as it is, is not the ultimate purpose of journalism -- it's all about being the eyes and ears for the reader, helping her to be better able to make decisions. It's political.

Since I'm doing some of the programming for LA IMC, I might be able to put in a rudimentary ratings system for articles. Implementing a full system, in my opinion, would allow users to filter in articles recommended by specific editors and written by specific people. That would require a bit more time, and IMC may not be the venue for this development -- it requires sufficient usership to debug and refine.

One suggestion on editing out the junk on this site is for people to make use of the ratings. I've little experience with the L.A. site, but the biggest weakness I've seen on the Philly site is the ratings. Neither the ratings nor the comments by the few people giving ratings are indicative of the worthiness of an article.

If you see a lie, maybe the best thing to do is to write a comment letting people know it's a lie. That may be more valuable than upfront censorship.

Jim Shackelford

I had an idea where you could implement a 'popular banishment' system where if 50 or 100 bad content votes were garnished, the article would be placed in a 'voted out content' section, which would also be accessible, if someone was curious to see what was there.

I'm not sure what the potential abuses or ramifications of this would be, but I think it would solve the problem that most people are complaining about : lack of ability to do anything about chucking a ridiculously fake post off the main page sidebar.

Matthew

from what i know about the "editorial collective" and the ranking system at philly-imc, there is no censorship involved. it is merely that higher rated stories get better "prominence" on the page. nothing was deleted and every submission is archived on the chronological "newswire" --- regardless of its rating. the big problem that i noticed with their system was that there were only a few people taking an interest in rating the contributions --- even though the editorial collective had open enrollment. a sincere interest in democratizing the organization of the information presented in this space is necessary for an idea like collective rating to have any success in shaping the layout. as for jarheads and reactionaries --- indeed, it seems the best solution is to allow them access (just like everyone else). the more non-sensical and emotionally charged the sentiment, the more it serves to undermine itself and the less it requires responsive commentary from the more constructive imc users in the community. with regard to outright lies: this is where posting a well-documented reply is the best course of action --- it seems critical that the imc community remain dedicated not only to the independence of its operations but also to its democratic access structure. our cause relates to fascilitating the expression of marginalized perspectives AND to a refutation of the rhetoric that underlies institutional injustices. in terms of the achievement of the second of these two goals, reactionary submissions serve as a constant source of examples of such rhetoric. it should be of little difficulty for the intelligent and motivated people in the imc community to treat these right-leaning rhetorical posts (that are not completely ridiculous on face value) as the starting points of dialogues in which the myths of the media culture are systematically deconstructed. i think that this type of behavior is more indicative of the values that the bulk of the current non-corporate media movement espouses, namely: that the presence of a free and independent media forums is essential to the promotion of global democracy and justice; that the exclusion of voices from the public forum is the first step down the slippery-slope of differential access structures and authoritarian entrenchment; and, most importantly, that we believe the power of our concerns to be such that no person of conscience could ignore their implications if only exposed to the injustices from which those concerns rise. if we honestly believe that our stances are the most appropriate to the causes of justice and democratic access, then we should not be afraid to express these stances in the context of dissenting commentary. i do not, however, think that the examples of activist submitted ad hominem which frequently follow reactionary submissions are helpful in promoting sympathy or support. i've seen some commentary --- which i did not find particularly "reactionary" --- on the philly imc that points to the exclusiveness of the current activist circles. now we all know that our doors are open to anyone interested in democracy and non-corporate media who is willing to put forth a small bit of personal initiative in order to tailor the nature of their own involvement in the project, but appearances are another thing altogether. remember that there has been a major effort to vilify the current wave of activism in the major media and law enforcement agencies. this works to obscure notice of the actual issues --- any use of personal criticism (especially the more "impolite" forms) in defence of our positions will likely only serve to exacerbate this problem. hopefully, the issue can be resolved through the inability of the bulk of the reactionary voices to expand their analyses beyond the superficial opening rhetoric of their orignal submissions. the preponderance of research and reflection on the relevant issues has likely been undertaken by the activist community --- in any civilized discussions that extend to any non-superfical depth, this distinction will begin to become clear and the effect of this clarity is likely to be instrumental in securing victories in the realm of sympathy, support and enlightenment.

hi, i'm also with imc-la. anyone else following this issue - i have been standing up for no censorship of the people's posts since i joined in march - noticing that these are scripted, with no specific instances cited? i have 20+ years of digital activism, i have followed, since the early days of online community, 'valid' posts versus posts from the authorities, & the plea for the 'leaders' of the community to please have 'your people' act reasonable & sensible is an oldie but a goodie that i have been expecting. the authorities are going to be far more subtle online than police on the street, they will have many sensible arguments as to why the people shouldn't be allowed to act as our own "editorial filters", to actually exercise our own rights & responsibilities & think for ourselves. anyone else listening to the reports about the firestone tire recall? it is an example of corporate globalization preventing the people from having information - firestone had reports of these tires failing for the last 6 years, esp. in south america, yet they continued to sell them until enough americans 'lied' about this dangerous product & firestone's pr spin could no longer hold up against the 'lies'. there's a recall in us, what about the rest of the world?