"The working parts of journalism are exposed. Open publishing assumes the reader is smart and creative and might want to be a writer and an editor and a distributor and even a software programmer. Open publishing assumes that the reader can tell a crappy story from a good one. That the reader can find what they're after, and might help other readers looking for the same trail.

We trust the audience and it seems that the audience trusts us in return.

Open publishing is playing at the opposite end of the trust spectrum to the corporate media.

We are not working to convince people that this is a good way to do things. We are providing a space in which people might decide themselves if this is a good way to do things."

1. have "people" decided yet?

2. if we want "the working parts of journalism... exposed" then shouldn't minutes from la-imc meetings be posted publicly on the la-imc website? comparable notes from kpfk are usually posted publicly on the goodlight board. shouldn't la-imc be at least as committed to transparency as that institution?

3. what does it mean to "trust" us. what do you really trust me to do - that any number of corporate internet forums don't trust me to do?

4. if you assume "that the reader can tell a crappy story from a good one. That the reader can find what they're after, and might help other readers looking for the same trail", then why do you haphazardly delete posts and ignore the efforts of users to develop cooperative systems?






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anticrisis

will LA-IMC devote some of its front page to transparent discussion of LA-IMC vision, process and structure in hopes of creating a more effective medium for the comunications of complex decentralized movements and communities?

posting the notes of LA-IMC meetings could be an effective way to start.

< that would be a welcome step in the right direction, in my opinion.>

so here we are....
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Because no one's doing the work of translation..... and it's obviously tied into a community outreach problem.....which is also tied to a labor problem. There's not enough of either.

< most of you imc people are simply too high and mighty to slosh around in the sewage pits of your own forums.>

Easy to say, but I don't agree. There is a vast opp available at LA-Indymedia for folks willing to join the collective and roll up their sleeves.

And while someone may want to make it their priority to interact with the message boards, it does not follow that having open software that allows people to express their opinions to eachother publicly should therefore mandate each of us in the collective to interact with those opinions. Some do, and some don't. I don't. I don't have time.

BTW, one solution to deal with the highly organized assholes who try to disrupt the forums EVERY DAY, is to start using some form of anon password/id scenario, and if folks are in it for disruption, they're gone. It's just one idea, and maybe someone has a better idea.



IMHO, you're confusing open publishing with nascent decentralized network building. We are a baby network, less than 4 years old, with global and local process lists that are endless and exhausting.

Just figuring out, let's say, how to develop collaborative resources with/for the resource-challenged global south is taking years of discussion/ proposal/revision, and that's one of a couple of hundred participatory lists with in some cases hundreds of participants each!!!



Good criticism.....note taking happens, but rarely, we are not as organized as we should be, not even close.........

Butif you think there's any transparency at KPFK right now, well, I don't. But that's another topic.

http://la.indymedia.org/comment_latest.php ). some humility is very much in order i think.>

Agreed, I find the comment forums abominable, and dominated by right wing assholes...and unless we come up with a solution like a password/id, I'd much rather look after my daughter then engage in those spaces. But that's just my opinion.

And you might be right... I'm not that familiar with the webitorial groups current position on hiding posts, the only censorial one I'm aware of was the decision to ban Bush Admirer, but that to me seemed like a fools errand, as he/she can just post under another name, address, etc.



It's a legitimate criticism, but my best response is to suggest joining the collective and giving labor to transparency and diversity, you might be surprised at how little resistance you'll find. On a personal note, I'm a new parent and wayyyyy overwhelmed by lack of time.

http://la.indymedia.org/news/2002/12/23562_comment.php>

This is a great thread, and thanks for pointing it out.

http://la.indymedia.org/news/2003/01/26309_comment.php - zero concern for transparency...>

Yeah, if I recall correctly, that happened when the server was relocated....

cool.

(for the beginning of this exchange go to kpfklisteners.net)

s.,
i'm not sure what the problem is here. if you agree, as you now seem to, with my criticisms, then why not just take it to the rest of your group and advocate for the solutions?

1. la-imc should make clear that it understands that lack of transparency is a problem and that la-imc is presently not adequately transparent. la-imc should post minutes or notes or journalistic accounts of regular la-imc meetings in some very visible place on the front page of the site.

2. la-imc should publicly post explanations of significant or total losses of funtcion as soon as possible after the lapses occur. when explanations are unavailable for any reason, that should also be posted. these notices should tell imc users how they can help. all this info should be highly visible.

3. la-imc should make clear on the front page that it understands that anglo-centrism is a problem and that la-imc is presently and has always been anglocentric and la-imc should publicly seek help fixing this problem. if la-imc is not in consensus on this matter, some prominent space on the front page should be devoted to publicly discuss this important issue.

(it's kind of strange that these kinds of points even need to be pressed at any grassroots organization)

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the one big disagreement that we do seem to have is about the potential for constructive and unmoderated discussions on the website. i see a lot of potential. you don't support it.

but maybe somebody else will read this and be interested. the simplest description i can think of is here: http://la.indymedia.org/news/2002/12/23562_comment.php

that model would work and not be very hard to create according to a friend of mine who knows more about programming. i would add some simple familiar features that i think would improve it.

what would it look/work like? sort of like a combination between a discussion board, like the k goodlight board, for example, and the existing newswire in conjunction with the latest comments page.

here's how.....
you know that little grey box of comments at the bottom of newswire articles - that we copied from sf.imc? it would help to configure that box to function and look like a goodlight-type discussion board, a staggered arrangement of subject links. sorry, i don't have the right terminology - "threaded" or whatever.

then.... when you click on one of the stories in the grey box, it opens up a vertical stack of chronological comments.. BUT, it doesn't necessarily open up EVERY comment - as it presently does - and THIS is the key to the so-called "troll" problem as far as i can tell. instead of every comment link opening the same totality of all comments on that article, clicking on a comment link would open up a stack of comments SELECTED from the available previous comments BY THE COMMENTER. that's the key - people decide for themselves what comments will be displayed in full stacked above THEIR comment.

presently this is impossible and if you think about it this is what makes the la-imc discussions LESS FREE than discussions at your average party. being able to define for ourselves who our interlocutors are and are not is correctly understood by normal people to be a right, not a privilege. nor is it censorship - it is just the right to say 'no, thanks'. la-imc has not made this possible and i think that is why there is almost NO CONSTRUCTIVE DISCUSSION happening publicly through the la-imc website. normal people know better than to subject themselves to unnecessary abuse. the same dynamic is neutralizing the potential of other imcs of course.

the funny thing is.... the solution is SO SIMPLE. the reason it isn't happening is NOT because there is anything complicated about making it work. i guess that's true for most problems. solutions are everywhere. the problem is the elite group.

one last point: several dedicated people i know have worked hard to make KPFK LAB mtg. notes and aPC mtg notes and lots of other documentation of K processes public, often on the goodlight board. these people deserve credit and instead they are routinely taken for granted by KPFK elites and evidently by the la-imc elites as well. but no analogous work is being done around la-imc. if i am wrong please show the goods.

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anticrisis

Please guy. You're boring me to tears.

thanks s.,
speaking of transparency....
any explanation of the latest loss of functionality (most of today)?

your mysterious breakdown
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anticrisis

latest comments

i am sick of the banner at the top of this website - the palm treetop, the sweaty angry guy holding the red mic to his mouth. please can this banner change more often?!! i often change the "theme" setting to "chicago" just to avoid the top banner, but that is sort of a nuisance.

i miss the old picture of the toxic sunset over the dark city and the black silhouette of a child in mid-leap against that purple sky and a helicopter in the distance. does anybody have it saved anywhere? if so, please post it.

1. palm trees are a symbol of what's wrong with L.A. - people pretending that desert chaparral is really Miami. what a dumb fantasy!! a FAKE tropical world of sunny days kept alive by a billion sprinklers piping water from, well.... "for one thing, they have diverted the entire Colorado River from its natural purposes". maybe the palm treetop is supposed to be ironic? i don't think so because....

2. the angry sweaty guy looks latino/chicano/indigena - what does this mean when you go look at the people who are really active in la-imc? what does this mean when there is practically no Spanish on the site. irony? whatever it means i'm sick of it and i think it's awkward. la-imc needs to involve L.A. in a more real way - not pretend. it can happen. by the way, most imcs have no individualized person on their top banner. that works well for a lot of reasons.

3. as far as i can tell, women deserve the credit for a lot of la-imc's accomplishments. a less testosteroni banner at the top of the site would make more sense.

4. right now we are supposed to switch the "theme" if we prefer to see a black woman with a bullhorn. umm.. obviously the real theme here is supposed to be "projecting the voices of people of color". unfortunately this does not reflect the reality of the la-imc.

5. banners should change more often and users should be involved in designing and picking new banners.... more interaction. in fact, la-imc users should be treated a thousand times better in general! the attitude right now is more like you're nothing unless you go the meetings. but the political effectiveness of the site itself is very much connected with the attitude the collective has about actually using the site. as the collective retreats to listservs and meetings, the site becomes almost totally irrelevant to the radical grassroots. the collective needs to get back to basics and use the site.

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1. maybe the more that members of IMC collectives use the public IMC newswires both generally and specifically to propose , discuss, and debate developments in IMC structure, the better the IMC will be.

2. maybe improvements in the quality of interaction on the IMC website will be ongoing, hopefully for many years, through a continual process of adjustments rather than a sudden transition to a perfect solution.

3. maybe problems arising from public participation in the site will in the long run be solved by giving people more options, not fewer.

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Ward Churchill on L.A.:

"Look at LA: twenty million people where there ought to be maybe a few thousand. How do they accomplish this? Well, for one thing, they have diverted the entire Colorado River from its natural purposes. They are siphoning off the Columbia River and piping it south. They have even got a project underway to divert the Yukon River all the way down from Alaska to support southwestern urban growth and to irrigate a proposed U.S. agribusiness penetration of northern Sonora and Chihuahua. Whole regions of our ecosphere are being destabilized in the process.

Okay, in the scenario I have described, the entire Colorado watershed would be in Indian Country, under Indian control. So would the source of the Columbia. And diversion of the Yukon would have to go right through Indian Country. Now, here’s the deal. No more use of water to fill swimming pools and sprinkle golf courses in Phoenix and LA. No more watering Kentucky bluegrass lawns out on the yucca flats. No more drive-thru car washes in Tucumcari. No more “Big Surf” amusement parks in the middle of the desert. Drinking water and such for the whole population, yes.

Indians should deliver that. But water for this other insanity? No way. I guarantee that will stop the inflow of population cold. Hell, I will guarantee it will start a pretty substantial outflow. Most of these folks never wanted to live in the desert anyway. That’s why they keep trying to make it look like Florida (another delicate ecosystem which is buckling under the weight of population increases)."

anticrisis
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lynx
latest comments

i am pasting this excerpt here because it is very relevant to LA-IMC. i found it at NYC-IMC in the middle of a very constructive thread about the national debate about Pacifica bylaws.

....its so ironic... the Indypendent reporting on "democratizing" a media outlet. Certain individuals at this supposedly "community based participatory" IMC newspaper have behaved in a very UN-democratic manner a number of times in past years.

The indymedia network is a great development with respect to free speech and the dissemination of ideas.... but certain people at the Indypendent see their paper as their own private pet project and not truly as an OPEN, diverse, forum as indymedia was originally intended to be.

Jaggi Singh once criticized "liberal institutions with an anarchist gloss..' (One could substitute 'democratic facade') and this characterization fits the Indypendent.

All those indymedia slogans about free speech, free press, radical media, etc.... have to actually mean something... something other than an opportunity for resume building privleged white liberals to build their careers on the backs of the oppressed and downtrodden. These are people who claim to want to "bypass the corporate filter" yet create and impose their own political filters in the news they deem "fit to print."

see also:
about the way our IMC sites work
an attempt at LA-IMC/KPFK discussion
kpfk's new schedule - what do you think?

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anticrisis

lynx

latest comments