But hey, what do we know? We're the corporate media.

April 23, 2003 1:24 PM

But hey, what do we know? We're the corporate media.Independent Media is thought of as an important source to obtain news on events that are glossed over, or not covered at all, by Corporate Media. But how effective is it at that task, and is Independent Media as clean nosed as it intends to be?
posted by mnology (4 comments total)

In a word: Yes. "Independent media" has bias too, sometimes much more so than "corporate media."
posted by Bag Man at 1:29 PM on April 23, 2003

I've always been impressed and curious about the Indymedia network as an experiment in alternative media, but I've also always taken issue with the claim of being independent.

They certainly provide a different view, but there's no question, nor any attempt to hide, that the overall organization (such as it is) is strongly biased in favor of one side of an issue than the other. This is not independence, nor really what I'd be comfortable calling journalism.

I tried to get involved with my local IMC, hoping it could be a semi-legitimate outlet for news, not just views. But much as I might have personally agreed with some of the political leanings of the group, the fact that articles with headlines like "Bush is the new Hitler!" were regularly posted alongside other slightly less hysterical and biased content (say, environmental pieces) was too much to take.

As one example, the local group - not surprisingly - was consistent only in its flat opposition to anything the state administration did. They're "The Man," after all, right? So even though our new governor campaigned and won by supporting causes and issues that were very nearly the polar opposite of her predecessor, it was concluded that she sucked... after her first week in office.

I also took issue with their coopting of one corner of the Native Hawaiian independence movement, indignantly presenting it as the only "real," deserving, unheralded perspective, despite the fact that the community is no less diverse and occasionally contradictory than any other.

I don't know if Indymedia will collapse under its own weight -- either by evolving a bureaucracy that becomes too cumbersome, or by becoming too splintered and contradictory to be taken seriously by any side (some Indymedia centers have essentially been taken over by a single, tunnel-visioned special interest group) -- or continue to grow into something different and interesting.

I hope it's the latter, but as it is, it's not for me.
posted by pzarquon at 1:41 PM on April 23, 2003

deva's response to the WW article
posted by foot at 2:31 PM on April 23, 2003

Summing up deva's response:

No, I didn't.

Don't report that because we're fixing it.

Other people post here.

He didn't write the story I would have written.

Suppression isn't censorship if it's not complete.

We're developing a secretive system of editorial collusion that'll fix the problems with openness and censorship.

Hey, they published my picture. No fair!

posted by NortonDC at 12:21 PM on April 24, 2003