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Date: Sun, 13 Mar 2011 00:17:53 +0100
From: Leil Zahra <i-mad@riseup.net>
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To: Mostafa Youssef <mostafayoussef@me.com>
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Subject: Re: Indymedia Cairo Preliminary Meeting
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Dear all,

In preparation for the meeting tomorrow at 6 p.m. at the commune, if you 
have time take a look at the following things that are important. If you 
don´t have time, it is o.k. I will bring them printed tomorrow.

But first a quick update, I talked to the New-IMC list and the tech list 
and both are excited to have us with them. We still didn´t get official 
approval because we have to fill some forms (which I´m including below 
and bringing them with me tomorrow for those who don´t have time to 
check them online)

I also solicited a working group e-mail list for us to use and spare 
ourselves the multiple email addresses in every correspondence. The list 
will be hosted on the IMC server and it will be archived so we can 
always log in and read old emails. This will help us have minutes of our 
discussions without having to worry where and how to save them. It was 
supposed to await approval by the New-IMC first, but the IMC-List people 
jumped the rules and created one for us and we have it. I just sent you 
all invitations to join. If you are interested in joining the project 
please accept the invitation and we can start discussing there as soon 
as everyone has joined. (Yaaaay :) it seems we started getting people to 
jump the rules just for us :)) the list is imc-cairo@lists.indymedia.org

If you are using hotmail or other capitalist email hosts, please check 
your spam folder for the invitation. Those thugs tend to block emails 
from rise-up and other alternative email hosts.

Lobna, I have included you in the last email I sent to the New-IMC list. 
I will send you a private email explaining how to join the list.

I also wrote to many geek friends who can set-up pages and we are 
discussing possible platforms. We believe Wordpress (which seems to be 
the most familiar one to the majority in our group) could be a valid 
choice. Keep your fingers crossed. Hopefully tomorrow I will have more 
information.

I also contacted people abroad who might be interested in doing 
translation work for us. I have some confirmations already. So once we 
have the website approved, we will create a translators list and put 
everyone to work for us :)

Suggested points to be added on the agenda of tomorrow´s meeting

1- We to decide on at least two people to administrate the list, which 
is basically accepting emails of those who are NOT on our list and not 
from our group but want to ask us something. This is to avoid spam and 
unrelated information.
2- Language used in email discussion, choosing a language that everyone 
is comfortable using.
3- Agree on some Indymedia documents (general principles and codes)
    a) IMC Principles of Unity (they can be read on this link 
https://docs.indymedia.org/view/Global/PrinciplesOfUnity ) (scroll down 
for the English text)
    b) IMC membership criteris (on the following link, also scroll down 
for English) https://docs.indymedia.org/view/Global/MembershipCriteria
    c) NIMC mission statement 
https://docs.indymedia.org/Global/MissionStatement
4- If we have time and energy then maybe we can start preparing our own 
mission statement and editorial policy. For this maybe it would be a 
good idea to take a look at those of Indymedia Beirut. You can read it 
here: http://beirut.indymedia.org/static/about_ar.shtml
5- I´m not sure if everyone is familiar with the Consensus Decision 
Making Process, but it is an important tool for IMCs worldwide, so maybe 
it would be good going over it unless we are all clear on it (anyone can 
prepare for a small presentation about it just in case we need it?).

I´m sorry if this sounds too much, usually this is done with time, but 
as we all said we want to have this as soon as possible. And 
"bureaucracy" is always boring, but once all is done we don´t need to 
worry about such things. It will be like blogging as we said. Checking 
all this information is also important to learn a bit about what 
Indymedia and why it became and important tool for change. Not just as a 
news portal, but also as a way of doing political activism

Please feel free to froward this to trusted people who might be 
interested, and invite them to the meeting. Hope you are still excited 
after this long email :)

See you all tomorrow,
Leil-Zahra


Mostafa Youssef escribió:
> + CORRECTION OF ATTACHED EMAIL LIST + PLEASE USE THIS EMAIL LIST IN 
> REPLIES AND DISCUSSIONS +
> -------------------------------
>
>
> Dear All,
> We met with Leil from Lebanon/Barcelona at the commune today the 11th 
> of March. to discuss the start of an Indymedia chapter in Cairo. This 
> email is sent to you because you were either in the meeting or 
> interested in participating in the project.
>
> A meeting on Sunday 6pm is scheduled at the commune to set up a team 
> and work mechanism for the Indymedia Cairo chapter.
> Meanwhile and until then
> The following are brief minutes for what was discussed at the meeting:
>
> ====
> Leil started by giving a brief introduction of how Indymedia.org 
> started out in 1999: during the Seattle events, many activists were 
> furious about the media coverage and they decided to work on what they 
> called: don't hate the media, be the media. and they created Indymedia. 
>
> Since then it has had many chapters around the world, in the Arab 
> world there was two: Indymedia Beirut which Leil was active in but 
> ended due to the absence of active members, and Indymedia Jerusalem 
> which was split over internal Palestinian quarrels!
>
> They had tried to start up one in Iraq, but they couldn't get a full 
> agreement on the Indymedia core principles in the Iraqi group so it 
> never made it.
>
> The core principles are: no censorship except on racist or sexist 
> issues, to be completely open to people's entries and reports.
> These principles along with Indymedia's big presence attracts Trolls 
> (fake news distributors!) `so they created mechanisms in the page to 
> deal with trolls and to have an editorial team which leads the reporting.
>
> Amr raised a question of having already a hub of reporting news from 
> Egypt to the outside world which is Global Voices Online. This opened 
> a discussion on GlobalVoices Online vs Indymedia.  It was decided IM 
> is a better preference because GV has two main issues: central 
> control, and liberal choices overriding truth of reporting.
>
> Leil also discussed using webstreaming on minipimer.tv 
> <http://minipimer.tv/> which is open source software for streaming, 
> either to embed it, if technically possible, or to set it up somewhere 
> else and advertise it on Indymedia.
>
> Group agrees to attempt at setting up Indymedia, Leil says he already 
> sent Indymedia.org asking to set up a local chapter. We briefly 
> discuss whether egypt chapter or cairo chapter, then decide on Cairo 
> because most of our focus will be local, and it allows other groups to 
> set up other cities on their own, also you can always report about 
> other cities from cairo.
>
> Agreed on cairo.indymedia.com <http://cairo.indymedia.com/> and as we 
> wait for Indymedia.org's response we need to choose a team! so we 
> decide on a Meeting on Sunday 6pm to take more direct steps.
>
> Lastly, Leil asks for another person to coordinate with him 
> correspondence with indymedia.org, we decide it will be Lobna.
> ====
>
> Best, Mostafa