[Imc-web] Policy on Announcements in Features

[Mike Lehman]

Hi Everyone,
Well, I'm still up for having a web meeting at some point, as was 
discussed recently. And I have an agenda item for it.

One of the things I've been wishing to talk about for some time has been 
the issue of posting announcements to the Feature section. A comment to 
this Feature today reminded me of this:
http://www.ucimc.org/feature/display/13734/index.php

I wonder if this was pulled for syndication on the global Indymedia site 
and that is where the visitor found it? I can understand his/her 
perplexity in some ways.

Although we have always made an effort to cover the arts, as well as 
hard news, my concerns about the issue of putting announcements into 
Features actually transcend the particular subject matter of this 
example. A number of announcements for events, political or art-wise, 
have been given Feature status. I am not necessarily wanting to say that 
we should not ever do Features on announcements, but I would like to see 
a more restrictive policy. Here's why.

Doing an announcement is something done for events that really is not 
yet news. I believe that, in general, we should limit announcements to 
the Local Newswire. Then, if those attending or participating in the 
event want do an actual news story, then that should be considered for 
Features. This would be intended to promote the coverage of local news 
and events, rather than to have Features used for promotional purposes, 
something which has been occurring with more frequency of late.

I can see reasons to make exceptions to this rule, so it doesn't need to 
be hard and fast. First, IMC fundraisers would be legitimate reasons for 
a Feature announcement, like the recent IMCFest. Second, events in 
response to an ongoing news story may also qualify for a Feature 
announcement, such as the mass march at the beginning of the latest Iraq 
war. These sort of things have mass community interest and go directly 
to our mission to serve the activist community.

However, I think Features have been overused for the purpose of 
promoting events. I believe that the Local Newswire does an adequate job 
of this and that having a policy such as the one I've proposed will 
encourage more news coverage of local events, including ones that may 
not even be announced in advance on IMC.

Note that I don't have any issue with the coverage by Ben Grosser or the 
particular event itself. It falls within our past usage of Features. But 
with these stories now being syndicated to global (and perhaps soon, to 
a US IMC), I think we should take a look at focusing our policy a little 
better to suit the way in which the Feature section is used, often 
beyond our own IMC, while encouraging more news stories that are more 
compelling because they actually cover events, rather than simply 
serving promotional purposes.

I would like to hear what others have to say about this in any case.
Mike Lehman