Independent Media Center
Indymedia logo
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| Type | Open publishing |
|---|---|
| Format | Online |
| Owner(s) | None |
| Founded | November 24, 1999 |
| Political alignment | Anti-corporate |
| Language | English, Spanish, Greek French, Italian, German, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Finnish, Russian, Polish, Romanian, Hebrew and Arabic |
| Headquarters | Various |
| Website | Indymedia.org |
The Independent Media Center (also known as Indymedia or IMC) is a global open publishing network of journalist collectives that report on political and social issues. It originated during the Seattle anti-WTO protests worldwide in 1999 and remains closely associated with the global justice movement, which criticizes neo-liberalism and its associated institutions. Indymedia uses democratic media process that allows anybody to contribute.
According to the umbrella homepage, "Indymedia is a collective of independent media organizations and hundreds of journalists offering grassroots, non-corporate coverage." It aims to be an alternative to government and corporate media, and seeks to facilitate people being able to publish their media as directly as possible.
The origins of Indymedia can be traced to the global justice protest Carnival Against Capitalism, which took place in over forty countries on June 18, 1999. Activists had networked globally using the internet, and had seen its publishing potential. Events could be reported as they happened, unmediated and without the need for the traditional news outlets. Plans came together for an Independent Media Centre to cover the upcoming Seattle WTO protests in November. The open publishing software used by the centre was developed from that used to report the carnival in Sydney.
In late November 1999, the first Indymedia project was ready to cover the protests against the WTO meeting in Seattle, Washington. It acted as an alternative news source publishing up-to-the-minute reports on the protest days. Additionally it produced a newspaper and five documentaries.
After Seattle the idea and network spread rapidly. By 2002, there were 89 Indymedia websites in 31 countries (including Palestine), growing to over 150 by January 2006, not all of them currently active. The number of active centres grew from 142, in 2004, to 175 in 2010.
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