flamesong: indymedia censored

It can be confirmed with absolute certainty that IndyMedia UK or an element within it are currently operating systematic censorship by the banning of certain IP addresses from posting articles or comments. Experiments with some fixed IP addresses and dial-up (dynamic IP addresses) prove that whilst dynamic IP addresses will permit posting, some fixed IPs are permitted whilst others will not.
So much for independence and free speech!

The hiding of articles which offend the IndyMedia UK agenda continues. It has been observed that (perhaps to disprove the allegations made here) that the 'visibility' of some articles is being adjusted (with curious anomalies) so it is perhaps necessary to state quite categorically that at the time of inclusion here, all these articles were censored with the IndyMedia UK statement ' This post contradicts the Editorial Guidelines and has been hidden from the newswire'. None which had been removed for repetition have ever been included - though clumsy attempts by one or more people within IndyMedia UK to rewrite history might suggest that they have.

Whilst these pages have received wide linkage from other sites it needs to be stated categorically that this site has no association with and does not endorse in any way the comments or opinions of Tony Gosling or any of his websites.

The inclusion of any article does not imply its endorsement, just an acknowledgement that it has been unreasonably censored by IndyMedia UK. Older articles will be added as time allows. Because the issue now demands comment a separate page has been allocated to the censored posts. Please click below.

IndyMedia UK Censored Posts

IndyMedia UK comment
This is a copy of an e-mail which was forwarded by a third party to Flamesong. Note, it was not sent to Flamesong.

Hi,

(right to reply... on flamesong, suicide and funding)

yep flamesong makes a nice song and dance about chemtrail info and illuminati / new world order texts being hidden from the newswire, and archiving the site owners hidden rants at indymedia. but it also spreads disinfo, such as seriously accusing indy of censoring action posts such as one about farnborough delegate dinner from disarm dsei campaign:

QUOTE: http://www.flamesong.com/imuk/index.html
"This article is possibly the first case of IndyMedia UK's censorship policy having a visible effect:
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2004/07/295259.html
It can be seen from the following link that (unless it has since been modified) the original article publicising this action was censored by IndyMedia UK.
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/viewallposts1859.html
I would be interested to know what kind of police presence there was at Farnborough. Perhaps they had too many prior commitments today and needed help from their colleagues elsewhere!"

EXPLANATION: the viewallposts page has the following under the title of the article "This post contradicts the Editorial Guidelines and has been hidden from the newswire" - it is a standard default phrase indicating that the post was hidden from the frontpage newswire. it was hidden cos it was a duplicate post, ie the same info had been posted several times.

this was discussed on the indymedia mail lists after the person running this flamesong website wrote in and accused indymedia of censoring these farnborough posts - the duplicate post explanation was given along with supporting URLs and a discussion entered into - yet the accusations remain on the flamesong website - great.

If you have a look thru the list on flamesong, yes quite a lot is crackpotty, but others are duplicates like the traveller film night and others are just short rants.

BTW the RFID chips thing is not quite true either - there's been features about RFID chips (reports, actions, campaigns and analysis) in the middle column, the posts that were hidden were either duplicates, or of the type that say 80 million americans have tracking chips in the fillings of their teeth.

Re Blair daughter story, there was a lot of discussion over this one esp on the indy email lists, which mostly centred around the argument that many indymedia people had a big problem with publicising the personal troubles of a 16yr old girl - it was about the girl, her situation and vulnerability, and not the fact that her dad happens to be PM. As i'm sure we are all aware there are guidelines over reporting suicide and attempted suicide, and it must have been a blue moon cos many indy people found themselves agreeing with the general NUJ position on this. You can cry censorship, press cover up, counter-spin and conspiracy all you like, but you should at least reference the reasons given in the discussions over hiding the article. If anyone's interested there's a good resource page on reporting suicide here: http://www.presswise.org.uk/display_page.php?id=166

As to the funding stuff - this was about soros foundation and mainly the huge cash that seattle got in the early days. Lots of stuff has been pointed out to flamesong, including chumbawamba money to global imc and corporatewatch from that FORD TV ad music cash, as well as the fact that indy uk has seen none of that or the initial funding.

To be honest i don't think that all this shows "somethings going quite badly wrong" at all. In fact if you want to criticise indy there's a hundred and one more important things to look at, like the content that should be there and isn't, like more progressive solutions based potitive stuff and real community news that isnt just direct action / demo focussed etc

Anyway, that's right to reply done. Don't want to start a debate, just wanted to provide a comment on the flamsong post.

ciao,
Dave

Flamesong Response:

Hi,

I have sent this to every remotely relevant IndyMedia UK list because I have no idea where the e-mail which was forwarded to me originated.

An e-mail which originated from somebody at IndyMedia UK was forwarded to me. It was NOT sent to me.

First of all the e-mail says:
this was discussed on the indymedia mail lists after the person running this flamesong website wrote in and accused indymedia of censoring these farnborough posts - the duplicate post explanation was given along with supporting URLs and a discussion entered into - yet the accusations remain on the flamesong website - great.

Nobody, I repeat NOBODY from IndyMedia UK has ever contacted me with any such information. NEVER! There has NEVER been any discussion. NEVER. I have had a couple of e-mails from people who have generally supported what I have done but there has not been any discussion about the subject of censorship. This is a f*cking lie! (my censorship!). I have e-mailed the list a dozen times without response.

And it is pretty obvious that you are now trying to pull a fast one. How do I know? Well, whoever has been going back and unhiding the posts has made a cock-up. Because the first post now says 'This repeated post has been hidden from the newswire.':

http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2004/07/294600.html - posted at 09-07-2004 09:59

Yet the second post which was originally marked ' This post contradicts the Editorial Guidelines and has been hidden from the newswire.' is now visible.

http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2004/07/294610.html - posted at 09.07.2004 14:46
Furthermore it has two censorship complaints on it asking why it is hidden (?!!?) and a comment to me (which I have only just read).

You must think I am f*cking stupid! I don't often boast about it but I have an IQ of 155 - so don't try to pull the wool over my eyes! I have time-stamped screenshots which verify the visibility of these posts.

What is more whilst IndyMedia UK were at the epicentre of the DSEi action in Docklands - I know, I was there for two days - I was hundreds of miles from home and my Mac and wanted to give you some footage of a guy getting beaten up by the police but I was told like a naughty boy to wait outside because you were going to have a meeting! - there were apparently only two people at Farnborough (see other posts) and I think that the removal of the article was a direct cause of this. Somebody removed it and somebody has put it back. Somebody is lying.

Secondly, when a repeated post is removed from the newswire it normally says, 'This repeated post has been hidden from the newswire'. I have only sought to draw attention to posts which were removed with the comment,'This post contradicts the Editorial Guidelines and has been hidden from the newswire' when there is no clear breach of the guidelines. If the removal had been done correctly this would not have been highlighted. I have NEVER posted links on the IndyMedia UK censored page to articles which were marked, 'This repeated post has been hidden from the newswire' if you make subsequent changes and I don't know about it - that ain't my fault. Until such time as you configure a system whereby an actual reason for removal AND some means of making the censor accountable, I see no reason why I should not continue to post the articles which you hide. And to unhide them weeks after they have fallen off the bottom of the newswire is not acceptable.

Thirdly, the Blair's daughter's suicide bid was only included after some consideration. I didn't want to include it but as it was brought to my attention by Tony Gosling and I thought it would be hypocritical of me to exclude it. Incidentally, I don't post all censored articles. I have my own limitations.

The e-mail goes on to say:
As to the funding stuff - this was about soros foundation and mainly the huge cash that seattle got in the early days. Lots of stuff has been pointed out to flamesong, including chumbawamba money to global imc and corporatewatch from that FORD TV ad music cash, as well as the fact that indy uk has seen none of that or the initial funding.

When did you point this out to me? When? I have never, again I must repeat this word so that you fully understand, NEVER received any such information.

Finally, I am still the subject of your ultimate censorship. That is to say that my IP address is banned from posting articles - a fact which is easily proven. For that reason I do not currently engaged with IndyMedia UK when I cannot take an active part.

Until somebody can prove to me otherwise directly, I stand by every word I have written and the facts (until you change them) bear this out. But while you are shuffling the cards behind your back and inventing 'discussions' with me you are digging a deeper hole.

Update to the above.
The forwarded e-mail was received on August 2nd 2004. A response was sent to several IndyMedia UK lists within a couple of hours. To date nobody from IndyMedia UK has commented directly (or indirectly - to my knowledge). Recent face to face encounters with several IndyMedia UK administrators seem to suggest that most of them were unaware of this situation and that they were largely perplexed by the actions taken.

It has also been highlighted that there is a section of the IndyMedia UK site which deals with the reasoning behind the censorship. It is neither easy to find nor accessible in terms of finding the comments on particular articles. It was intended to post a link to it but the link route to it has been lost.

DSEi Action at the Farnborough Air Show
This article is possibly the first case of IndyMedia UK's censorship policy having a visible effect:

Where Were You ????????????????
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2004/07/295259.html

It can be seen from the following link that (unless it has since been modified) the original article publicising this action was censored by IndyMedia UK.

http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/viewallposts1859.html

I would be interested to know what kind of police presence there was at Farnborough. Perhaps they had too many prior commitments today and needed help from their colleagues elsewhere! Unfortunately, due to the ongoing IP address ban it isn't possible to post any questions to the writer of this article.