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Indymedia Watch Censors Comments

TheWatcher | 20.12.2006 04:14 | Indymedia | Repression | World

The self proclaimed watchdog of indymedia sites has disabled comment on his blog in response to comments criticising his hypocritical campaign against the indymedia - criticism which he described as a 'spam attack'.

The comment which obviously struck to close to home can be found in google cache and reads;

"Indy Media Watch is run by a unaccountable elite of one who allows complete lies and fabrication to be posted on the blog or deletes posts without adequate explanation. There seem to be no clear rules and they are applied inconsitantly. People are regularly allowed to post comments while pretending to be many different people yet the owner of the site makes no effort to expose the such dishonesty even though it is within their capabilities. However, the owner is quite happy to trawl through logs to expose the IP address of posters who point this out.

The Indy Media Watch blog is a travesty of inconsistancy and hypocracy - a den of misfits banned from indymedia sites around the world and huddling together like a little self help group for the terminally stupid.

Again and again the blog cherry picks something from the hundreds of posts to indymedia open newsires around the world and tries make them representative of the collectives who admin the sites. The double standards expressed by The Watcher and the rest of the deluded fools posting on this blog as if they are exposing some great travesty, is something to behold.

Yes, welcome to Indy Watch Blog - where disruptive trolls banned from Indymedia come to play."

As if to prove the point, the owner of the Indymedia Watch blog acted out the very act of censorship that he and his cohorts regularly accuse indymedia sites of. The irony is too much to bare and has obviously not been missed by at least one comedian who set up the Indymedia Watch Watch blog - apparently a spoof of the watcher.

While there is no doubt much that could be improved within indymedia, it is farcical that this 'watcher' likes to pretend to be beyond the contradictions inherent in open publishing, only to end up censoring his own site at the first hint of criticism.

TheWatcher

Comments

Hide the following 10 comments

Ha Ha Ha Ha

20.12.2006 07:48

"Indy Media Watch is run by a unaccountable elite of one who allows complete lies and fabrication to be posted on the blog or deletes posts without adequate explanation. There seem to be no clear rules and they are applied inconsitantly"

Should get on fine and Dandy with the indymedia censors then...

Try looking in the "view all posts" pages and see how 'consistently' the 'rules' are applied here.

Sure some crud is hidden.... but..... if you upset their mates, you get removed.... go have a look and tell me its not true..........

Silent Bob


What a funny guy

20.12.2006 08:21

What on earth are you babbling on about? You write:

"Indy Media Watch is run by a unaccountable elite of one "

Ha ha ha ha ha! You are funny :-) Indymediawatch is a *private* blog, and as such the owner can allow or disallow any comment or article he wishes. Read any blog on the internet and you'll see the same thing in action.

However, Indymedia on the other hand is supposed to be an "open" or "unmoderated" newswire, so if it censors comments it definitely IS being hypocritical, especially as only comments with certain - let us say pro-Israel, pro-America, pro-West, are the ones that are censored whereas comments with antisemitic, racist and Nazi-like views are allowed.

Secondly, please learn to spell. You are an embarassment to your parents and your teachers.

ex-Brit


nod is as-good-as a wink to a blind bat

20.12.2006 09:05

I've never even looked at Indymedia watch - sounds like a necessary thing in view of mine and others past experiences with IM.

This rant, however, is painfully feebleminded and moronic.

3rd eye


hidden message

20.12.2006 11:39

You can post anonymously on any site under a fake IP address using sites such as www.anonymizer.com . Every site censors, it is just more ironic when they claim not to, sites have been shut down due to slanderous posts. Indymedia 'hiding' comments is far less censorial than most sites which do just delete comments and I say that as someone whose posts are often hidden. Basically, if you are posting on a website you aren't helping to maintain, then you should respect the guidelines of that website or post somewhere else.
You can add ?c=all to the end of any url here to see which comments have been hidden, or all hidden articles here  http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/viewallposts.html

dan


Thats funny

20.12.2006 12:41

There are a bunch of hidden comments claiming to have gone a checked out the blog and saying how great it is. OnIy problem, the site is currently offline as google switches it over to the latest release of their blogger software. The hidden posts are all lies from one person. Ha ha ha, nice try!!

rofl


bloody hell

20.12.2006 12:46

bunch of nobs

tit


This thread should be hidden

20.12.2006 13:17

This is all bollocks and not news. It should be hidden so as not to waste peoples time.

However, to the person who says that Indymediawatch is a private blog and so the owner is allowed to censor whatever he likes while Indymedia is meant to be an unmoderated newswire and therefore hypocritical when it hides stuff - take a look at the mission statement and editorial guidelines and you will see that Indymedia is quite clear about it's political bias and policy on moderating. It would appear to be fair comment to compare the behavior of the Indymedia Watch owner to that of Indymedia collectives rather than other private bloggers and call him hypocritical since the stated purpose of the blog is to hold to account Indymedia for either hiding things or not hiding things.

Oh, finally, you should spell embarrassment with two R's so have a word with your parents and teachers before you try throwing that particular stone again.

Tony


Indy Media Watch is Temporarily Down

20.12.2006 14:22

Indy Media Watch (  http://indymediawatch.blogspot.com ) is migrating to the new Blogger beta system, largely in the hope it has more sophisticated anti-spam systems to prevent repeats of the unfortunate acts which led to the present situation.

During this migration, the site will be down for period unknown and beyond our control. I hope to see it restored in the next few hours, just in time to mention if this comment is hidden.

Indy Media Watch
- Homepage: http://indymediawatch.blogspot.com


All hidden comments on this thread

20.12.2006 19:33

to date are the work of one poster - now he wants to know why they're hidden.

Tis a pity that Indy Media Botch is down - cos this discussion really should be taken there, especially as most of the comments are from its own right wing commenteers.

The Wotcha will leave all comments up - unless he doesn't like them.

*sigh*

troll droppings


They're all crying now

20.12.2006 23:49

Over on Indy Media Botch, the Wotcha has done some brilliant detective work.

In his "When Idiots attack" masterpiece he notes:

"No, it can't be found in any Google Cache at the time of posting, and the author of the UK Indymedia piece is a liar and obviously the spammer, with access to a local copy that was used in the attack."

 http://masl.to/?S5F02186E



also heard it before