I’m here in Bowling Green at a public access computer in a dorm after a day of sessions and walking around. I went to two sessions today, one on publishing an indpendent newspaper and one on stencil/graffitti art. After the newspaper session folks who publish indy newspapers got together and hammered out the parameters for a syndication wire based on e-mail and managed to come to consensus on it within about an hour. It was cool to see these people from different cities and different ideas about publishing be able to debate and reach agreement on how to share stories.
The idea came from the folks who publish the Asheville Global Report, which has been publishing weekly in Asheville, NC for three years(!). They’ve got their routine well systematized and do a good job and reporting on global events using a multitude of sources. The idea for the syndication system is that these papers will have a reliable source to turn for independently generated news stories on events from all over the place, so that news and information might be shared between these cities. Indymedia provides something like this, but because the publishing is completely open there can be a high signal-to-noise ratio that makes it difficult to find coherent, reasonably accurate stories ready-for-printing. The advantage of the Indymedia sites is really the ability to get information out quickly to a large audience, especially on breaking news and things that are happening right now. The hope is that a indy newspaper “wire service” will help stories be distributed more quickly (they won’t have to be read in print and then retyped or scanned, then re-printed in a different paper) and more widely, fostering communication between these papers and communities. I have high hopes for it.
There’s kind of an “exhibition hall” where publishers, zinesters and the like are showing their wares. These folks are so cool and eager to talk about their labors. I’ve interviewed a few of them and on minidisc, so the plan is for you to be able to hear from them in the next few weeks on the mediageek radio show.
The bookmobile project is here, but I haven’t had a chance to meet with them yet. They’ll be in my hood next weekend, so it’s going to be a big undergroud/indie/DIY media week.
I love this shit.
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