What's the Matter with Indymedia?

Conceived initially to allow everybody to 'be the media,' Indymedia is plagued by everything from fascist messages to paralyzing ideology to good old fashioned laziness.

Conceived initially to allow everybody to 'be the media,' Indymedia is
plagued by everything from fascist messages to paralyzing ideology to
good old fashioned laziness.

What's the Matter with Indymedia?

By Jennifer Whitney
LiP Magazine
July 26, 2005.

In the last week of November 1999, a news website run entirely by
volunteers was launched. "Don't hate the media; be the media" was the
battle cry of hundreds of people who converged in Seattle to bring
about the birth of the Independent Media Center (IMC, or Indymedia).
The project promised the democratization of the media, and more:
"Imperfect, insurgent, sleepless and beautiful, we directly experienced
the success of the first IMC in Seattle and saw that the common dream
of 'a world in which many worlds fit' is possible," wrote media
activist and Seven Stories Press editor Greg Ruggiero. The idea was
contagious. Almost 6 years on, there are 149 Indymedia websites in
about 45 countries on 6 continents.

The newborn IMC provided the most in-depth and broad-spectrum coverage
of the historic direct actions against the World Trade Organization
that fall. Despite having no advertising budget, no brand recognition,
no corporate sponsorship, and no celebrity reporters, it received 1.5
million hits in its first week--more than CNN got in the same time. Its
innovative "open publishing" newswire meant that anyone with computer
access could be a reporter. The user-friendly software allowed people
to publish directly online, and since more than 450 people got IMC
press passes (and scores more reported from their homes), they provided
coverage of the historic protests from every block of downtown Seattle.
Audio, video, photos, and articles were uploaded at a breathtaking
pace. The site embraced the do-it-yourself ethic completely, meaning
that there were no restrictive site managers, editors, or word-count
limits. At the time, such restrictions seemed dictatorial,
oppressive--counterrevolutionary, even. Now, I find them rather
appealing.

The open publishing newswire, once filled with breaking stories and
photographic evidence refuting government lies, now contains more spam
than an old email account. On many sites, it's difficult to find
original reporting among the right-wing diatribes and rants about
chemtrails poisoning the atmosphere. Coverage of local protests often
consists of little more than a few blurry photos of cops doing nothing
in particular, without a single line of text explaining the context,
the issues, or the goals of the protest. And forget about analysis or
investigative reporting. They tend to be as rare on Indymedia as they
are on Fox News.

This isn't to suggest that I've avoided Indymedia as a journalist, or
that I disagree with its mission--neither are true. I've worked with
various IMCs over the years during big protests, mostly as a reporter,
and mostly secondarily to the various actions I was involved with. In
1999, I met early on with some of the founders of the first IMC, who
wanted an outside perspective on what they were cooking up. In 2001, I
covered the Zapatista caravan for the Chiapas, UK, and Seattle sites;
later that year I worked in the IMC during the protests against the G8
summit in Genoa, taking phoned-in reports from the streets, confirming
them, plotting movements on maps, and posting the news. In Cancún I did
support work in the IMC during the 2003 WTO actions, as well as some
reporting. In Miami, during the Free Trade Area of the Americas
protests that same year, I reported for the short-lived paper and the
website. And last summer in El Alto, Bolivia, I worked with locals on
covering an important federal election.

On the anniversary of the Iraq invasion earlier this year, I was in
Mexico, trying to get information about antiwar protests around the
United States. I looked at IMC sites based in cities where I knew there
were actions, and found nothing. Eventually, I found what I was looking
for--on the BBC. The experience, unfortunately, is not uncommon. Each
time I try and find news among the Indymedia drivel, I ask myself the
same question: What happens when--in our attempts not to hate the media
but to be it--we end up hating the media we've become?

I know I'm not alone in my frustration with IMCs. "I haven't looked at
Indymedia in over a year," says the editor of a nationally distributed
radical magazine. "Indymedia? It's completely irrelevant," a talented
documentary filmmaker tells me. "I let the IMC use my photos but I
don't ever read it," says a freelance photojournalist. More and more,
independent media makers (even those who occasionally publish on or are
affiliated with an IMC) don't even bother looking for news on
Indymedia. And for good reason: Indymedia news "coverage" is often
lifted from corporate media websites, with occasional editorial remarks
added. Some IMC sites limit this type of reporting to a specific
section, and there it can lead to informative discussion and criticism.
But most seem to rely on it to fill column space in the newswire. This
isn't making media, it's cutting and pasting--relying on so-called
experts and professionals to do what you are, evidently, too lazy or
busy to do yourself. The few original articles are frequently riddled
with unsubstantiated claims, rumors, dubious anonymous sources, bad
writing, and/or plagiarism. Rarely is anything edited--and I don't mean
by the collective that runs the site. Users themselves aren't editing
their own work, but instead are posting 18 blurry, almost identically
bad photographs, or thesis-length uninformed opinion pieces that
weren't even spell checked. Verified facts are an endangered species on
Indymedia, and arguments in support of fact-checking are often met with
cries of "Censorship!" To make matters worse, Indymedia articles are
usually posted anonymously (and therefore unaccountably), with no way
to offer feedback other than the flame-ridden fray of the comments
section. If the goal of Indymedia is, as its mission statement says,
"the creation of radical, accurate, and passionate tellings of the
truth," we are clearly falling short.

Perhaps it's useful to ask what constitutes effective communication. By
any remotely sane definition, both telling and receiving are necessary.
But the burden to communicate effectively belongs to the active
party--the teller--not the audience. This is as true in one-on-one
settings as it is in mass media. But the Indymedia mission doesn't
mention audience. Instead it's all about the creation and the telling.
Maybe this is, in part, where the problem lies. With the focus placed
so strongly on the "tellings of the truth," the reader/watcher/listener
is left to fend for herself. And if we have so little respect or
concern for our audience, what on earth are we doing working in a
medium based entirely in communication?

It's also a question of intent. I want my work to contribute to social
change. And I sometimes end up a perfectionist, knowing that the better
my work is, the greater an impact it will have. People don't read
sloppy, unedited, or disorganized stories; they don't look at bad
photographs or videos. And so the potential to have an impact is
greatly diminished. This isn't a philosophical question about whether
trees make sounds when falling in forests. Simply put, an unread
article changes nothing.

And if we change nothing, not only have we failed in our responsibility
to our audience, we have failed our subject as well. If I'm writing
about a social movement, I am accountable to the people who trust me
with their stories. I want my article to help them, not hurt them. When
I'm writing about a particular issue, I want to inform and inspire
others to get involved in learning more and maybe working on that issue
also. Making media is a bit like scattering seeds, in that we never
know where our work will end up--if it will germinate, take root, and
spread; if it will survive fire or drought; if others will notice and
propagate it. We should put out the hardiest and healthiest seeds that
we can, so the information stored within will have a better chance at
survival.

While all IMC collectives across the global network are individual and
autonomous, there are certain commonalities that hold them together.
The website layout and navigation tends to be quite similar, the
process of uploading material tends to work the same way, and most use
the same software. There are a few that stand out in various ways--some
have more intensive editing, a few publish newspapers or have radio
stations, and some are deeply linked to the communities they serve.
Most people I've spoken with agree that the Portland, Oregon, site
stands out a lot. Portland is known worldwide for getting technical
resources and website security to other collectives in the network. In
addition to their own site, they also generously host the US national
site. And they have other policies that set them apart as well--but in
quite different ways.

In many IMC collectives, the editing vs. free speech dichotomy is
argued as hotly as abortion is debated by members of congregations and
Congress. It's a debate that I imagine any group with open publishing
would have to face. Many sites have explicit policies about what sorts
of material will remain visible on their sites. Chicago has a policy of
editing or hiding posts that are "racist, sexist, homophobic, or that
clearly fly in the face of our mission to serve as a space for the
exchange of news, dialogue and opinion that advances economic and
social justice. Posts that serve as commercials for for-profit
companies will be removed." They then go on to explain the reason for
this: Right-wing and fascist organizations have a history of targeting
Indymedia sites, despite having plenty of their own forums in which to
post. Chicago's policy is clear, and they seem to stick to it. And they
are not an exception--it's quite common across the network to hide such
posts rapidly. (Hidden posts do not appear in the newswire but are
available for the curious through a link.)

Portland has a similar policy in writing, but it sometimes seems more a
formality than a reflection of practices. In the 1980s the city was a
mecca for fascists and neonazis who beat an Ethiopian immigrant to
death in 1988, and were subsequently driven out of town or underground.
When I lived there in 2001, they briefly reemerged, and began using the
Indymedia site to post recruitment messages for Volksfront--a
white-supremacist, neonazi organization--as well as announcements of an
upcoming meeting and concert featuring White Aryan Resistance leader
Tom Metzger. Several antifascist organizers contacted the editorial
group in an effort to have the posts hidden. Our requests were denied;
we were told that we were undermining free speech by requesting
censorship, and were invited to post messages in response to the
fascists' recruitment efforts. To us, this was inadequate. Let the ACLU
protect neonazis' free speech rights--they were using a community
resource to spread their hate-based propaganda, and we wanted it
stopped immediately.

Though that level of fascist material has not been seen on the site
recently, it is unclear if this is due to the nazis going back
underground or due to a policy shift at Portland Indymedia. To my
knowledge, there hasn't been anything like the Volksfront postings;
however, in the last 13 months, the Portland IMC has hosted at least 7
articles by or in support of antisemitic cult leader Lyndon LaRouche,
the most recent from April of this year. This, combined with the
frequency of conspiracy theories about 9/11, mixed in with the
occasional nostalgic ode to Kurt Cobain or oddball spoof on the
fundamentalist-Rapturist Left Behind book series, seriously undermines
the Portland site's usefulness.

Another Portland anomaly that detracts from its utility is the
reorganization of links to other cities' Indymedia sites. Whereas most
Indymedia sites list the links alphabetically by continent and country,
Portland has come up with some geography- and logic-defying categories
that make it absurdly difficult to find things. According to their
creative cartography, St. Louis is in the "Mississippi Delta," despite
the fact that the actual delta is confined to the southernmost tip of
Louisiana, and the nearest Indymedia site is based over 80 miles away
in New Orleans. The "Great North Woods" is not where my intuition tells
me to look for New York City, and inexplicably, Tijuana is listed not
with Mexico, but with the "South West" area of "Turtle Island"--
described by Portland Indymedia as an indigenous term for North
America. San Francisco is also in the southwest. But not Arizona. If
you click on "why this cities list," you'll find an explanation of the
rationale behind the restructuring process (capitalization is in the
original): "The cities list has been broken up heavily to make it
easier to know where a particular imc is in the world.... The basic
idea was to make the categories more defining of an area and ultimately
align indymedias that would be working through similar regional issues,
instead of continuing the socio-political lines that have always
defined the cities list." Later on, the (anonymous) authors proudly
state that they spent 15 hours working on the list. Fifteen hours,
apparently without consulting a map.

There are certain etiquettes established by the very nature of
Indymedia. Because so much of the work is online, collectives are able
to network with other groups all across the planet, wherever there are
internet connections and, when necessary, translators. While this is
obviously a great strength, it can also be one of the most debilitating
weaknesses, as people often act differently online than when they are
face-to-face.

Ana Nogueira, who works with US Indymedia, grew weary of this dynamic.
"After four years of working on this stuff I got really frustrated and
burnt out by the lack of accountability. The spontaneity of the IMC
could be held back by some stranger blocking a proposal from somewhere,
anonymously. I originally proposed [the creation of] the US site [in
order to allow the Global site to be more balanced, and less
US-centric] two years ago, and it was blocked and blocked. You have to
be really determined to see something through; you can't be too
sensitive. People can be really curt and obnoxious on email, because
they don't have to see you in person."

This may be a factor in some tensions in Mexico City between the IMC
collective and other radical independent media groups. The Mexico City
IMC has a policy of having meetings only online, never face-to-face.
And they have acted in ways that seem territorial, even competitive,
with another local media collective, Informative Action in Resistance
(AIRE, in its Spanish acronym), that has worked closely with Indymedia
centers in Monterrey, Cancún, and Guadalajara during actions. AIRE has
received unsigned nasty emails from Indymedia Mexico City, in one case
accusing AIRE of being "pseudo-activists playing with electronic toys."

"It's no good launching attacks on each other and using the tools of
the right wing when we're trying to make a new form of communication,"
says María Martínez of AIRE. "There are so many independent radio
projects and media projects in this huge city. We want to work with
everybody, but not when they attack us like this." Earlier this year,
AIRE sent some of its members to Brazil for the World Social Forum,
where they met with some Brazil IMC folks. When word got back to Mexico
City Indymedia, they were angry, apparently claiming that AIRE had no
right to connect with the Indymedia network. This kind of territorial
behavior can be more destructive than any of the outside forces and
challenges we face. This is particularly true in the monstropolis of
Mexico City, where radical organizations are already atomized due to
geography and time constraints, and where sharing resources isn't only
philosophically principled, but absolutely essential.

Another challenge inherent in the Indymedia form is that participation,
as well as passive consumption, requires not only patience and a thick
skin, but also internet access. Certain local groups have breached the
digital divide, even if only for a brief spell. Seattle set a strong
precedent during the week of the WTO protests by printing 2,000 copies
of the daily paper The Blind Spot and distributing them on the streets
during the actions. The paper was also available online, and was
downloaded in Brussels, where 8,000 more copies were distributed. The
Seattle IMC also streamed a radio broadcast that was picked up by Radio
Havana and broadcast across Cuba. Additionally, they produced a nightly
program that ran on public access television. Many other IMCs have
followed suit during actions; what's more challenging is maintaining a
presence when there isn't the momentum, surge of volunteers, and extra
cash flow that an action can bring.

And cash flow is a huge issue. Many collectives, from London to
Bolivia, have produced short-lived newspapers. But print is not cheap,
and fundraising isn't one of the sexier parts of independent
journalism. We're always short on money, and then when we do have any,
it tends to come with controversy. "We have a larger budget than most,"
says John Tarleton of The Indypendent, the New York City IMC newspaper.
"We've had a paid staff for the last few years, so it has been possible
for us to do more. We weren't the first newspaper to take
advertisements, but it was a really controversial decision. People
often have a fear that money will corrupt everything, and that's
certainly something to be mindful of, but having no money is also
really debilitating."

Because Indymedia is such a broad and diffuse network, decision making
across the planet can be tediously slow and sometimes results in
painful and frustrating situations. A few years ago, the Ford
Foundation awarded Indymedia a grant of $50,000 to fund a global
Indymedia conference. But there were some in the network who didn't
want to accept the corporate money, and ultimately the grant had to be
declined.

There's also the very real factor of laziness. It's a lot easier to
block decisions than to resolve a conflict, find a compromise, let go
of our precious ideologies and opinions in favor of the group's
effectiveness, and move the fuck forward. It's much easier to critique
new ideas than to take on a task and complete it on a deadline. Anyone
who's done radical organizing or independent media has almost certainly
dealt with people who attach themselves to already existing projects or
works in progress, contribute nothing themselves, and then exercise a
veto over anything that comes up. If our goal is to make powerful,
transformative, effective media, we have to learn to neutralize these
problem people--even by voting them out of the collective, if
necessary. Our effectiveness and sustainability depend on resolving
such conflicts and forging ahead. As Luis Gómez of the Narco News
website says, "A good journalist doesn't create problems, but rather,
solves them." And sometimes Indymedia just seems to lack enough good
journalists.

Perhaps this has something to do with the word journalist. After all,
one of the points of Indymedia is to show that anyone can be a
journalist, that anyone can tell a story, and that anyone can create
media. But is that really true? Sure, digital video and still cameras
get cheaper and easier to use all the time. And with the widespread
availability of the internet, more Americans than ever are writing. But
ease of use does not equal quality product. I don't mean that every
comment on every article should be carefully crafted and edited
(although I do believe that every computer does have, somewhere within
its hard drive, some form of spellchecking software). And I don't mean
that an article shouldn't be published if it doesn't have a gripping
lead, an explicit nut graf, and a zinger of an ending, or if it doesn't
conform to AP pyramid style. It isn't the lack of journalistic style or
convention that irks me. It's the lack of journalistic principles, and
the laziness. People seem to forget that writing and photography are
skills that people develop over many years. They are not unattainable,
they are not rocket science--but it's the worst sort of arrogance to
think that your very first article, unedited, should make it to the
front page. And it's laziness that keeps people perpetually posting
without ever making an effort to develop their skills.

New York Indymedia is one collective that teaches people to become good
journalists. "We've had lots of community reporting workshops," says
Tarleton, "and people have come in off the street with little or no
experience, but burning with a story they want to tell. Sometimes it
takes them several months to write their first story, but they stick it
out. We do a lot of skill sharing--people who want to communicate their
ideas can get better at it. Anyone who sticks it out for six months or
so can be writing regular news stories. The bottom line is that
articles have to be well-written, accurate, fairly nonrhetorical, and
convey radical ideas through quality writing and research. If half are
good and half are shit, the crappy stories discredit everything else."

The Indypendent got a lot of criticism for its rigorous selection and
editing process, with many people believing that the paper should
publish any submission it receives. But as Tarleton says, "We're not
doing the paper to boost the ego of our writers. It's for our readers--
to give them the best possible information within our limited ability
and resources."

Some (often anonymous) folks tend to accuse independent journalists of
having "sold out" if we publish in corporate outlets, make money as
journalists, take ads in our publications, or demand high quality or
even rewrites of submissions. But that means media in which talent and
skill are punished, mediocrity rules, and we all hold hands and
congratulate each other for "telling it like it is," even when few can
understand the telling. Is that really the kind of media we want?

This sort of self-congratulatory, self-important attitude alienates
almost everyone outside of the proverbial "activist ghetto," (and
plenty of us inside it, too). It manifests itself not only in the style
and phrasing of reporters' posts, but also in the very nature of what
gets reported on IMCs. Direct actions make up an overwhelming amount of
the content, sometimes to the exclusion of almost everything else. But
if most of us think of Indymedia as being useful only for mass
actions--or worse, our own private way of getting updates on what our
friends are doing halfway around the planet--it may never grow to be
much more than that.

Some Indymedia sites have proven to be valuable community resources way
beyond the activist scene, simply by being in the right place at the
right time. According to Joshua Breitbart of Global Indymedia, "What we
saw in Argentina in 2002 and New York after September 11 was that
people decided to make Indymedia a community possession. When these
unplanned conflicts came to the community, the IMC was ready and able
to contain a huge increase in activity in a way that most organizations
can't. What do you do when 50 people show up at your office and want
something to do? In New York we gave them newspapers to distribute.
What do you do when your whole government melts and you have to find
your own ways of making decisions about city services and having
meetings? Well, an open publishing newswire like Argentina's IMC comes
in pretty handy." In such instances, Indymedia became a community
service almost as essential as trash collection, sewage treatment, and
medical services. People depended on it during crises, and used it
effectively as an organizing tool and information source. But we
shouldn't have to wait for an act of terrorism or a government meltdown
to spur us into action. We all, at least in the US, have access to that
same resource--and yet we vastly under-utilize it.

The blame for this is diffuse--I am complicit by not volunteering with
IMCs over longer periods of time, by getting frustrated and walking
away from disagreements rather than sticking it out and working toward
resolutions, and by not publishing my work on the websites all that
often. The blame also lies on all of us who have gotten sick of
Indymedia and just stopped using it rather than trying to change it,
or, for those of us who are less patient, starting something new.

"Indymedia's biggest problem is that it is unique," says Breitbart.
"People want it to solve every problem, to be all things to all people,
and it just can't do everything. Some of the practices and tools that
we've developed can be taken out and put into other struggles and
communities where they can gain new relevance--be experimented on in
new ways. We should be thinking about how to make it no longer unique,
so it's not so valuable, because we have other independent media
available."

I want to challenge independent media makers of all sorts, from the
folks who volunteer most of their free time to keep the Indymedia sites
and collectives up and running, to the people posting angry 3:00 am
rants against union organizers and engaging in endless flame wars. I
hope to provoke people to live up to another IMC slogan: "Make media,
make trouble." I want to see our work become more accountable, better
networked, more effective, and ultimately, more threatening. The best
journalists are the ones who provoke, who pose a real threat to the
status quo. But by tolerating low standards, forgetting our audience,
and getting fetishistically bogged down in process and ideology, we
succeed only in making trouble for ourselves.

Writer's note: My research was limited to IMC sites whose dominant
languages are English, Spanish, Portuguese, or French. This included
sites in Europe and the Americas as well as in Manila, India,
Palestine, and South Africa.

*****

Exemplary IMCs, in no particular order, that make me proud to be an occasional Indymedia reporter:

Bolivia: Many collective members are involved in the day-to-day
struggles of the region and have earned the trust of social movements.
They broadcast a weekly radio news program in association with
community-run Radio Wayna Tambo in El Alto, and provided all-day live
coverage of last year's national referendum on natural gas, with around
15 reporters calling in with updates and interviews from 7 cities
across the country. They also host video screenings. I went to one that
was attended by about 80 people, 95 percent of whom were indigenous
Aymara. Before the screening, the IMC organizers poured several pounds
of coca leaf on a table--much appreciated by the audience. In addition,
they are working to get donations of computers from the United States,
not for their own use, but in a true act of solidarity, to give to an
Aymara community on the Altiplano that requested them. http://bolivia.indymedia.org

India: An interesting site, though not frequently updated, and with a
fairly low level of participation. Certainly, internet access is a
luxury on the subcontinent, and only 60 percent of the over-15
population is literate. Content is almost exclusively in English, also
a luxury. So though I don't think that the site accurately represents
what's happening in India and who is making it happen (a
near-impossible feat for any one site to do), it still has good
writing, generally constructive engagement in comments sections, and
information I would be hard pressed to find elsewhere. http://india.indymedia.org

Urbana-Champaign: After buying a downtown post office and transforming
it into a community center, organizing successfully to prevent the
local police from buying tasers, and playing an instrumental role in
voting out a corrupt mayor, it's exciting to imagine what the folks at
this IMC might do next. Well, actually, next up they are helping launch
a community radio station that should be broadcasting in June. Their
website covers local and global issues, and often features people
signing what seem to be their real names to their work. Overall, they
are truly embedded in their community, and provide valuable resources
in terms of trainings, open debate, and lots of media. http://www. ucimc.org

Global: An excellent overview of the world's Indymedia, this site is
incredibly useful, perhaps in large part because there is no open
publishing--all posts are selected by editors. The editorial collective
is accessible and responsive to stories pitched to them, and they are
in the process of refining this process to make it even easier. With
both Spanish- and English-language features teams, and with the birth
of US Indymedia siphoning off a lot of US-dominant traffic, this site
has truly gone global. http://www.indymedia.org

North Texas: With broad relevance to a diverse population, the site has
everything a good community paper should have--news, book reviews,
opinion pieces. The quality of writing is consistently high but not
academic, using accessible language without lingo or mysterious
acronyms. Coverage is primarily of local events, with a smattering of
regional, national, and international items. It also serves as a
message board, with announcements about such things as community garden
plots available and biodiesel fuel for sale. http://www.ntimc.org

San Francisco Bay Area: With a carefully edited website laden with
news, Enemy Combatant Radio streaming, and the year-old monthly
newspaper Fault Lines, the Indybay IMC is one of the best. The site is
well organized, easy to navigate, and provides broad coverage of
issues. Many collective members are involved in a slew of local
struggles, and it shows. http://www.indybay.org

NYC: Publishes The Indypendent, a biweekly newspaper with a circulation
between 12,000 and 15,000. Its editors are highly skilled and work
closely with writers. Their war coverage has been some of the best in
the country, scooping several stories that even daily papers with
high-salaried staffs missed. The website receives similarly attentive
editing. http://nyc.indymedia.org

Ecuador: Covers a broad range of local, national, and international
news, with minimal reprinting of corporate articles and very little
spam or diatribe. Frequently updated and carrying excellent coverage
and discussion of major issues, such as the recent ousting of President
Gutierrez and the rise of neighborhood assemblies. http://ecuador.indymedia.org

Manila: Very well-written articles predominate on this site, and people
actually sign their names to their work! Lots of radical analysis and
less focus on protests is a welcome change. http://manila.indymedia.org

UK: With a weekly radio program on a community arts station in London,
an erratically published newspaper, the Offline, and frequent video
screenings, the UK (that stands for United Kollektives, by the way)
team is on the case. Web stories range from action coverage to analysis
to announcements and updates, with thorough coverage of national
issues, and a broad smattering of international news. This site often
features the lovely convention of an independently written article
followed by links to corporate media coverage of the same topic, for
folks wanting contrast, more info, or confirmation of facts and data. I
wish others would do this more. They also encourage people to correct
mistakes in the comments section, and, if notified, the editors will
post the correction in the original article when appropriate. The UK
site has also been, since its inception, the place to go for resources
on longer term organizing of mass actions, whether they be local May
Day protests, international days of action in other countries, or the
upcoming G8 summit in Scotland. The writing is excellent, even on the
newswire. Though its vigorous hiding of articles not meeting their
editorial guidelines has been controversial in some circles, could it
be that having the newswire tightly edited may push people to do better
work in order to get published? I find the UK IMC site to be
consistently one of the best. Though I do wish it weren't pink. http ://www.indymedia.org.uk

Argentina: In Buenos Aires, Indymedia set up shop for a while in a
squatted building-formerly a bank and now a community center opened by
the Cid Campeador neighborhood assembly. The association with the
political birth of the squat has meant that participation among the
unemployed, as well as the neighborhood, is high, although the physical
site has shut down. Since the financial collapse in late 2001,
participation on the website has come from a broad sector of the
population, who have used it in their efforts to govern their own
communities. http://argentina.indymedia.org

Brazil: One of the few Indymedias to do proactive investigative
reporting, it's truly a political force in the country, to which
municipal and state governments must occasionally respond. The center
column is translated into three other languages (including, incredibly,
Esperanto). They have a broad network of reporters, translators,
techies, and radio stations spread across the enormous country. http://brazil.indymedia.org