A group of independent filmmakers, radio producers, writers and others hope to provide an alternative to what they call corporate media by following a growing worldwide trend towards the creation of independent media centers.
The New Mexico Independent Media Center, which held its opening ceremony Sunday, joins about 60 similar organizations around the world linking low budget, independently produced radio, newspapers, television and Internet sites as one, decentralized support network, an organizer said. About 100 people gathered at a local church for the event.
James Ficklin, a video producer from California, attended the event as part of a nationwide tour to promote his recent film about activists who sit in trees to protest the timber industry. He said the Independent Media Center, or IMC, movement reflects a growing distrust of mainstream media.
"It's mainly a way for people to get their voices heard without the filter of the corporate media," he said. "There's this myth of free press, but media owned by corporations don't want to offend advertisers or owners. For instance, we don't see anything about nuclear issues on NBC because they're owned by General Electric."
A small core group of roughly 20 people are involved with the New Mexico branch, which is run under the auspices of the Seattle-based Independent Media Center. The Seattle group got its start about two years ago during the protests against the World Trade Organization.
"We knew the media would be pro-WTO, so the commentary of the people on the street would be ignored," Ficklin said.
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Though the IMC system allows collaboration among various types of media, perhaps its most visible presence is the Web site developed by each local organization. Anyone can post video, audio, text and pictures to the site, and readers can comment on, or criticize, each item, said Guilherme Roschke, one of the local organizers. The local Web site is at www.nm.indymedia.org.
"It takes a central role because it facilitates a lot of coordination between people," he said.
Roschke, who has previously worked with IMCs in Philadelphia and Prague, Czechoslovakia, said the local group formed to provide more coverage of community issues and protests.
"People are realizing that they can take community ideas into their own hands," he said. "They're tired of what they see and read. The information might be out there, but it's not broadcast."
Melissa Pfeffer, a UNM graduate student who also is one of the group's organizers, agreed, adding that IMCs are not just protest media, as some critics have suggested because of their relationship to the anti-globalization movement.
"There are a lot of really well researched articles," she said. "When people submit questionable content it's barraged with counterpoints."
Pfeffer said anyone can submit material to the Web site.
"We don't need to cut off the left or the right wing," she said.
Pfeffer also is a host of a national and international news program on Ditch Radio 96.9-FM, a low-frequency radio station that broadcasts news, music and interviews one night a week. The radio station is one of several media in existence or planned as part of the New Mexico Independent Media Center network.
Larry Hertz and his wife Martha Dominguez both volunteer in the organization and said they hope to have the first issue of their newspaper, World Voices, out by November. Hertz said the newspaper will cover everything from national to international issues.
"We will try to present all points of view, but really try to get those you don't see in the corporate media," he said.
Hertz said the notion of objectivity in mainstream media is a pretense, and that World Voices would strive to cover the other sides of issues like the war in Afghanistan.
"The media is in lock-step with the government," he said.
Submissions will come from people across the country, he said, and the paper will be supported by non-corporate advertisers he hopes to attract with the initial issue.
The group will eventually hold regular meetings at its recently-opened office at 414 Central SE.
