[Imc] the future of the imc website

[Paul Riismandel]

This little treatise ended up being longer than I first intended when I 
started writing it. But I think it successfully encapsulates my thinking on 
the subject. I hope you'll take some time to read it and consider the 
issues at hand.  Perhaps you'll disagree with all or part of it.  If so, 
please offer thoughts, ideas and arguments.  Thanks.
----
Tonight the IMC Tech Group decided to do a test installation of the website 
software that the Philly IMC (http://www.phillyimc.org) uses, we call it 
PhillySlash, which seems to be more stable code that is easier to work with.

This code offers several features and advantages over the current website 
software (Active), but the one that interests me most is that it allows for 
a categorized newswire.  This categorization feature interests me because I 
think it might help us resolve some of our problems and controversies over 
postings on our newswire.

The Problems:
Currently our website's newswire is just one big stack of stories in 
reverse chronological posting order.  There is no priority or 
sorting.  This means that a repost of a story from the Nation gets stacked 
in with a locally written story by an IMCista about labor troubles in 
Decatur.  It also means that stories by so-called IMC "spammers," who post 
their stories to many or all IMC websites, also share this space.  This 
latter type of poster has been the impetus for much discussion at the 
steering group lately and was the reason why the IMC's Website Appropriate 
Use Policy (http://urbana.indymedia.org/website_policy.php3) and Abuse 
Abatement Policy (http://urbana.indymedia.org/abuse_policy.php3) were 
written and passed.  However, even with such policies in place, there is 
still not consensus on how to deal with different posters/"spammers."

Part of the problems with the "spammers" comes from the fact that their 
postings tend towards proselytizing and conspiracy theories, which some 
people fear gives some website visitors (especially those less familar with 
the IMC concept) the impression that the IMC website is filled with 
not-so-credible information.  When there are many of these posts with a 
given time frame then they can take up a lot of space on the newswire on 
the front page, which has the potential to dilute the impact of the stories 
posted by local IMCistas, or give the impression that the IMC is mostly 
about conspiracy theories about the pope and aliens.

This problem is exacerbated by the fact that "spammers" tend not to be 
local, and frequently don't leave e-mail addresses or they use 
aliases.  This means that there is very little way for us to dialogue with 
them and reach some kind of cooperative solution.  The fact that most 
spammers are not local and do not post information of specifically local 
interest or topics leads to the argument that people who have little 
interest, involvement or investment in our IMC or community are unfairly 
exploiting our resources. The fact that these "spammers" post the same 
message to many or all of the local IMC sites--often with no regard for 
local languages (see 
http://www.mexico.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=1489)--only further 
demonstrates an apparent disregard for the volunteers who keep those local 
IMCs going.

When these posts stack up and move content produced locally off the front 
page newswire column, then it seems like local authors are being done a 
disservice as their work gets buried in the newswire.  There is the fear 
that as the spamming problem worsens it will become a significant 
disincentive for local citizen-journalists to bother posting to the 
newswire, since such posts will just get buried anyway.

And yet the problem is not necessarily just with "spammers."  A lot of 
"syndicated" or "republished" content from major progressive sources gets 
put on our newswire too.  The names, like Molly Ivins and Ralph Nader, and 
sources, like commondreams.org, are more well-known and respected than the 
"spammers" but yet the postings nonetheless have a similar effect.  They 
take up space that might otherwise be used for stories by common 
citizen-journalists who don't already have columns in national magazines.

As someone who frequently checks our website, I can say that I am often 
frustrated to see a sea of republished content of all stripes and little or 
no local stories.  While I can see the value in spreading well-written 
progressive content around the web, frankly I can go to commondreams myself 
to see their articles. But where else can I go to see the grassroots news 
for Champaign-Urbana?

Our Present Solution -- Not so Effective:
Right now we primarily deal with the big problem cases -- those "spammers" 
who post very frequently and sometimes very offensively. The only thing we 
can do is either "hide" their posts in a hidden section of the newswire, or 
delete them altogether.  Appropriately, these tactics are reserved for only 
the most blatant abuses, and still many folks are reticent to apply 
them.  The debate over this approach brings up very core and controversial 
issues of censorship and control, cooperation and sharing, and 
democracy.  I don't doubt that the very semantics of it -- the HIDING  of 
posts sure sounds like censorship-- adds fuel to the fire.

And yet, the problem is barely solved at all.  Check the newswire on the 
front page right now and tell me how many stories you can identify that 
seem to have anything to do with Urbana, or even Illinois, or are by 
identifiably local authors.  At this moment I count 4 out of 20 -- just 20%.

But are we to hide the other 16 posts?  Gosh, I hope not.

A Possible Solution -- Categorization:
I've given a lot of thought about this problem lately and how it might be 
tackled.  I've tried to listen hard to the discussions had in the Steering 
Group about it, and pay close attention to the objections raised against 
"hiding" posts. Talking with Ellen I think we've come up with a simple 
system that might help make the site more usable and yet limit how much 
anyone needs to be hidden.

If you look at the Philly IMC you'll see that there are two newswires on 
the right hand side of the page.  One is labeled "top news" and the other 
is labeled "top editorials," which arguably makes it a little easier to 
find what you're looking for.  I don't actually recommend using these two 
categories.  There are very legitimate disagreements and debates over what 
constitutes "news" vs. "editorials," or whether there in fact is a 
difference between them, and if the IMC mov't wants to perpetuate this 
division.  I personally don't think we have much to gain by having this debate.

However, I do strongly recommend the use of categories. I think we can use 
categories that get at the heart of the problems cites.  I'm not talking 
about subject categories like "Arts," "Politics" or 
"Entertainment."  Rather, if we look at the content which we want to 
somehow privilege it has less to do with the specific content, but rather 
how it arrives at our site.  It's about local vs.not-local, original vs. 
republished.  It's not mere "local news," but stories that are posted by 
people in our community -- especially stories that wouldn't gain nearly so 
much exposure without the U-C IMC website.

So, instead of hiding posts, what if we had two newswires, each with its 
own space on the front page, with the amount of space defined by 
priority.  To start, I suggest the headings to be "stories from our 
community" and "republished stories" -- I'd argue that most of the 
non-local content is actually republished, either from other sites, or from 
other IMCs (though this could stand testing).  There are currently 20 
spaces for stories on the front page.  As a matter of prioirty I'd give 15 
to "community" stories and 5 to republished stories.  Of course anyone 
interested in exploring either category further could click through to the 
appropriate newswire that would take up the whole page.

We could add categories from there, though I'd argue for keeping the number 
of categories under five, since with more than that things get more complex 
rather than simpler.  I'd add two categories: "from the IMC network" and 
"uncategorized."  the "IMC network" category is for stuff that gets posted 
by members of other IMCs (who identify themselves as such) or get posted by 
one of the global collectives (such as the "IMC Newsblast" collective).  I 
think these posts deserve some priority over content from commondreams or 
Gary Larrabee, but below local stuff.  The uncategorized category is 
exactly that -- some items won't clearly be from the community, but aren't 
clearly anything else, either.  With these four categories I'd argue for 
the following space on the front page:  12 slots for "community," and 2 
each for the others, each with their own full newswire that one can click to.

How to Categorize?
The Philly IMC solves this problem by requiring all posts to be moderated 
before appearing on the newswire.  Personally, I oppose this "gatekeeper" 
approach.  The immediate posting of stories is the real strength of the 
newswire, especially during big news events like the FTAA or SOA.  Instead, 
I think the poster should be asked to categorize her story when she posts 
it.  While I'm certain not everyone will comply, I'd hope that a majority 
of users would be respectful.

But given that some mistakes will be made and that a small few posters will 
be purposely misleading, there should also be some "editing" of the site by 
IMC volunteers who can put stories into appropriate categories.  This might 
even be to a particular poster's advantage if she selected "uncategorized" 
but a reviewer thinks it's a "community" post.

Yes, this would be a little more work than is currently expended on the 
website (mostly by me), but it also opens up an opportunity for more people 
to have a hand in it, which can only benefit the IMC and be more consistent 
with the way we want to do things. I also think the result would be worth it.

Under this approach a possible "spammer" can still post to our website, but 
he has to fight for space with the likes of Molly Ivins and "Between the 
Lines," but doesn't take away valuable front page space from Peter 
Miller.  If a particular spammer is a real problem we still have our 
Appropriate Use policy to back us up.  And still, good republished content 
can still make it onto our site, exposing our visitors to progressive 
voices that they might not have read--how much of the local population do 
you think has never even heard of The Progressive?

Importantly, website visitors will be immediately exposed to more of the 
stories and content that WE spend most of our time and effort to producing 
and facilitating -- stories by local citizen-journalists covering the 
events, ideas and thoughts that got left out at the News-Gazzette, Daily 
Illini, WCIA, etc, etc.  Can you think of a better incentive to a new 
citizen-reporter than to see your story immediately published and STAY 
THERE, in good company with other citizen-journalists' stories?

What To Do?
These are all suggestions--an outline for a plan, but not a full 
proposal.  There needs to be thoughtful inclusive discussion about the 
future of the U-C IMC website.

For better or worse our website was put on line with little discussion or 
debate about how it should run, what it's goals are, and such.  We've been 
lucky in that it actually runs pretty well and have had few controversies 
over it, especially compared to other IMCs.  But as more apparent problems 
face us we do need to be more decisive in determining the site's future.

I think this discussion is too important to simply be left to the Steering 
Group.  Minimally it should be opened up to the entire IMC membership... 
and beyond.  We all need to think about how openness and democracy can be 
sustained in our little corner of cyberspace if we actually expect it to be 
there.

The IMC-Tech group will attempt to foster discussion, deliberation and 
debate on this, but cannot and should not be singularly responsible for the 
outcome.  We need thoughts and ideas for how this should happen. Please 
consider this my invitation to anyone who cares to contribute.