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Table of Contents:

Urgent Things To Do

1. Publicize the 28 Feb meeting. See the SactoMeetingToDoList for suggestions.
2. We could really use a "Indymedia in a Nutshell" 1-page flyer, with general information about Indymedia, how to subscribe to imc-sac, URL's for the Central Valley page, the mailing list, this wiki, etc.
3. Re-organize this page. It's getting a bit too big, needs to be broken into sub-pages. One of the sections should be "Publicity", including any submitted PSA's, articles, media contacts' names, phones, email addresses, etc. so that people don't have to create these from scratch when needed.

IMC Formation and Links

The indybay (San Francisco) IMC has offered to host the Central California IMC content until we can get our IMC off the ground. Our sincere thanks to all the indybay folks for making this possible!

We have an email list for discussion of the IMC itself. Please do not post news or general information to the list! Instead, use the IMC page. Information about the mailing list is here.

Obviously you have found this wiki site. Please help us keep this document alive! See the instructions at the top or bottom of this page for more information.

We are forming an editorial group. The list info page is up and running. Go there to add yourself to the list. Note that you must have received training on the editorial software from the indybay editorial group before you can become an editor. Please contact them at mailto:sfbay-editorial@indymedia.org to arrange for training. -- JimVanderveen - 28 Jan 2004

Seth asked for a 100-200 word article on how to publish a story on the Central California page for Because People Matter. As soon as possible, I'll post it here: CentralCalHowToPublish

Sacramento, California (in process)

Originally, this was proposed as a Sacramento IMC. Over time, it has grown to include all of the Central Valley. Our proposed coverage area extends from Fresno to Chico, between the Coast Range and the Sierra.

We should consider changing the name, from Sacramento to:

• Central California

I prefer this, because it is indicative of the coverage area, while also being globally meaningful. (What does "Central Valley" mean to somebody from Europe, or even Pennsylvania for that matter?) -- JimVanderveen - 14 Jan 2004

• Central Valley
• Sacramento

The excludes an incredible amound of the proposed coverage area. -- JimVanderveen - 14 Jan 2004

• Other suggestions? (Use the same format as above, including comments.)

Central California IMC meetings

Upcoming meetings, temporal order (i.e. soonest first):

Sacramento, 24 Jul 2004

Saturday morning, 24 Jul 2004, 10:00-12:00 Coloma Community Center Access Sacramento Mariposa Room 4623 T Street Sacramento, CA 95819

Steve will lead a "posting party" on Saturday, July 24 from 10:00 am to 12:00 at Access Sacramento in the media lab. This will be a hands-on demonstration of how to post a story, video, audio, etc. Please bring a story you would like to post. This could be an announcement of an upcoming action, audio or video footage of an event, or whatever you're interested in. You can use a webmail account, such as Yahoo or Hotmail, if you want to do something simple like cutting-and-pasting an email announcement.

Sacramento, 6 Aug 2004

Friday evening, August 6 from 6:00-8:00 pm. Coloma Community Center Access Sacramento Mariposa Room 4623 T Street Sacramento, CA 95819

Jim will lead a posting party on Friday, August 6 from 6:00 to 8:00 pm at Access Sacramento in the media lab. This will be a hands-on demonstration of how to post a story, video, audio, etc. Please bring a story you would like to post. This could be an announcement of an upcoming action, audio or video footage of an event, or whatever you're interested in. You can use a webmail account, such as Yahoo or Hotmail, if you want to do something simple like cutting-and-pasting an email announcement.

Bakersfield?

Stockton?

Sierra/Lake Tahoe?

Chico?

Visalia

According to an email from Don Manro, there isn't enough interest in the Visalia area to hold a meeting at this time. -- JimVanderveen - 26 Jan 2004

Meetings that have already been held, with notes where available:

Sacramento, 14 Jul 2004

Wednesday evening, 14 Jul 2004, 7:00 pm Coloma Community Center Mariposa Room Access Sacramento 4623 T Street Sacramento, CA 95819

There also will be an orientation for the community cable facilities that Access Sacramento provides, starting at 6:00 pm.

SactoAgenda20040714

Notes

We got started a few minutes after 7:00 pm. About a dozen people showed up for the meeting.

What happened after huge turnout in January? Jim got extremely busy with work, which has been tapering off since June. There was some miscommunication regarding location of a subsequent meeting, so that meeting didn't go well. After this problem, we apparently lost momentum for a few months.

Ron from Access Sacramento offered the services and facilities of Access for use by the Indymedia Central Valley/Sacramento for future meetings and/or audio or video work. Access has a media lab with about 15 computers, video projection system, and Internet access, including wireless. Contact Ron Cooper at Access Sacramento in order to schedule the facility.

Steve and Jim gave a brief history and status of the Sacramento/Central Valley Indymedia effort. Steve gave a brief demonstration of publishing as well as IRC (Internet Relay Chat). The publishing demonstration was very well-received.

Ron suggested that we (IMC-Central Valley) do outreach and education for organizations such as Common Cause, Sac-Yolo Peace Action, Zapatista Solidarity Coalition, KPFA listeners group, Access Sacramento, etc. We should contact these organizations and schedule demonstrations of how to post stories to the Central Valley site. We should also do publishing demo's for general public.

Steve will lead a "posting party" on Saturday, July 24 from 10:00 am to 12:00 at Access Sacramento.

Jim will lead a posting party on Friday, August 6 from 6:00 to 8:00 pm at Access Sacramento.

Subsequent meetings will be scheduled later. Jim suggested scheduling meetings 3-4 weeks in advance. This allows enough time to publicize the meetings, get public service announcements out, etc.

Meeting adjourned at about 8:45 pm.

Sacramento, 28 Feb 2004

Saturday, 28 Feb 2004, 3:00-5:00 pm at the Zapatista Coalition's conference room, 909 12th St. map According to Rick, parking is troublesome at the ZSC. Fortunately, the 12th & I light rail station is right in front of their building, so take the train or ride your bike if you can!

SactoAgenda20040228

Notes? Did this meeting happen?

Sacramento meeting notes, 7 Feb 2004

Meeting held on Saturday, 7 Feb 2004, 3:00-5:00 pm in the SEIU hall, 1911 F St, downtown Sacramento. map

SactoAgenda20040207

About 12 people attended. We discussed our progress with the new-IMC process, and decided to try to get through the end of step 7 of the new-IMC process by the end of Feb 2004. We did not have enough attendees to discuss decision making, so that was tabled until the next meeting.

Action items
Volunteer	Due	Action	Status
JimVanderveen	13 Feb 2004	IMC Sac/Central Calif "entry" in Contact DB.	TBD
JimVanderveen	13 Feb 2004	Join imc-process as IMC Sac/Central Calif liaison.	TBD
JimVanderveen	13 Feb 2004	Join imc-tech as IMC Sac/Central Calif liaison.	Done
Emily	20 Feb 2004	Draft/boiler-plate mission statement, email to imc-sac.	TBD
Shontae	20 Feb 2004	Draft/boiler-plate editorial policy, email to imc-sac.	TBD

We still need liaisons for the imc-finance (global) list and the imc-us-process (regional) list. It would also be helpful if we had somebody in addition to Jim as imc-tech liaison. Any volunteers?

FYI, liaison duties are to join the assigned list, read the list traffic, and act as our IMC's representative on that list.

Sacramento meeting notes, 24 Jan 2004

A meeting was held on Saturday, 24 Jan 2004 at 16:00 in the SEIU hall, 1911 F St, downtown Sacramento. map

Approximately 50 people attended, 90% of whom were from the Sacramento area. A story was posted to the Central Valley and Indymedia sections of the indybay IMC. The group was in favor of forming a new IMC, but realized that in the short-term we should continue using the Central Valley page of the sfbay site. Advantages of this approach:

• More exposure, since many people are already reading the sfbay site.
• Allows time for collection of Central Valley stories, so we don't start out with an "empty" site.

• Nurtures new Central Valley indy journalists.
• Provides a focus and collection point for all the existing independent media organizations in the area, such as Because People Matter, ACCESS Sacramento (public access cable), Sacramento News & Review, KVMR radio, etc. (Please add to this list, including links to homepages if you have them. If the list grows very large, perhaps we could create a new page for existing independent media producers. -- JimVanderveen - 28 Jan 2004)

Disadvantages of this approach are that we have only one "Central Valley" page, instead of a page each for Fresno, Sacramento, Modesto, etc. We will have to work out a fair way to balance the coverage in the center page.

Further meetings will be held in Sacramento to continue the discussion. Meetings will be announced on the imc-sac email list as well as on the Central Valley indymedia page.

For historical purposes (and cut-and-paste use!), I have left the meeting announcement and to-do list here: SactoMeetingAnnouncement SactoMeetingToDoList

Fresno meeting notes

A meeting was held in Fresno on Thursday evening, Jan. 22, 2004. Participants agreed that a Central Valley IMC would be advantageous, but there is not enough support to run an IMC in Fresno alone. However, with the support of other Central Valley communities it may be feasible to create a valley-wide IMC.

Fresno meeting story

Modesto meeting notes

A meeting was held Friday September 26th at 7:30pm in the Modesto Peace and Life Center, 13th St. between G and H St.

Does anybody have notes from this meeting? If so, please post them here.
Attending the Modesto meeting .
Nicholas , Michael , Mimi , Joe , Mike , Brad , Doug
ModestoBrad ( jhill_81@yahoo.com ) has sign up sheet with emails and phone #'s

Modesto meeting story is near the top of the page.

Regional IMC's (proposed, in process, or active)

Other regional IMC's are (nearest to farthest, by state):

• Modesto appears to actually have content! (You rock, Modesto!)
• possibly ImcFresno
• San Francisco wiki and IMC
• Santa Cruz (no TWiki page, but online here)
• Califonia north coast. There is a mailinglist for northern coastal counties of California, but there appears to have been no significant traffic in the list archive since March 2002. -- JimVanderveen - 08 Dec 2003
• Los Angeles IMC
• San Diego wiki and IMC
• Nevada? (I couldn't find anything. -- JimVanderveen - 08 Dec 2003)
• Southern Oregon wiki and IMC
• Portland wiki and IMC
• Arizona IMC

Status

(NEW 2004-02-25) Supporting organizations (for the new-IMC application) are listed on CentralCalSupporters.

(NEW 2004-01-09) An editorial group is forming. We will be meeting with the SF editorial group at their next regular meeting on Sunday, Jan 11th at 5 pm in the IMC space in SF (2940 16th Street, suite 216, map). The meetings usually run about 90 minutes. For more info email and/or subscribe to sfbay-editorial@lists.indymedia.org

(NEW 2004-01-05) There is a Central Valley area on the SF indymedia site. Thanks for pointing this out, Mike!

We currently have no policy, no server, no money, but we do have a mailing list (imc-sac@indymedia.org)! Please only use the list for discussions related to care and feeding of the IMC. If you have information that you feel is vital for the community, please post it on the Central Valley area on the SF indymedia site.

Supporting Groups and Organizations

CentralCalSupporters

The new-IMC process

NewImcHowTo details the process for starting up a new IMC. There is some confusion as to where we are in this process (as of 14 Mar 2003). For example, we have a mailing list (step 4), but we don't appear to have completed step 3.

1. Pre-organizing: the first step is to talk with people in your community and try to get the sense if there is interest in forming an IMC.
   • Done. Sacramento has an interest, also some interest in Fresno, Modesto, and Visalia.
2. Look at the documents linked at this site (NewImcHowTo).
3. When you think you're really ready to do some good organizing, fill out the form at the bottom of the http://newimc.indymedia.org page. The person filling out the form and the person written as contact will receive a password for updating the http://www.indymedia.org/contact database. Please keep this password carefully.
   • According to Mark Burdett (IMC contact maintainer?), "we don't have any contacts, nor an application in the database". Mark's message
4. Open a mailing list: http://newlist.indymedia.org (If there are problems you can try emailing http://lists.indymedia.org/mailman/listinfo/listwork .)
   • Done. Here is the list.
5. O - R - G - A - N - I - Z - E !!!!
6. With your forming collective, write
   • (6a) an updated mission statement and
   • (6b) an editorial policy
   • and maybe contact mailto:imc-tech@indymedia.org at this stage.
7. When you're really ready, and only when you're ready, reply to each of the Membership Criteria points one by one, and send to mailto:new-imc@indymedia.org .
8. Your new-imc contact proposes your site
   • internally to new-imc, if no one blocks within 3 days, this is passed to
   • globally to http://lists.indymedia.org/mailman/listinfo/imc-process/ and http://lists.indymedia.org/mailman/listinfo/imc-communication and if no one blocks there within 7 days, then...
   • you become part of the network. Once your web site is ready, your contact who received a password at step 3 should update http://www.indymedia.org/contact/ so that you automatically are put on the http://www.indymedia.org/cities.inc list. You can also ask http://lists.indymedia.org/mailman/listinfo/dns for help.
9. The fun begins. Get involved in the global lists and Indymedia discussions and decisions. Offer to work with other IMCs from your area or elsewhere around the world. Do good work.
10. Change the world, for the better of course. We wouldn't expect anything less.

Full text of 10-step process

[ ChrisMinnick 15 Mar 2003 ]

Policies

• LocalImcStructure -- some documents on how the very first IMC's formed
• EditorialPolicy
• BestPractices -- currently (14 Mar 2003) only has membership policies
• Specific IMC's policies:
  • ImcHouston
  • ImcLaCollectiveDocs
  • ImcPortlandCollectiveDocs

• CurrentWebDocuments
• ConflictResolution -- consensus decision making, among other things
• PressPasses -- probably not needed unless/until we have production equipment, space, etc.

• ImcSacHistory -- document the formation of this IMC (Be sure to link from LocalImcHistory as well)

Server

• What are our options? (Also give the benefits and disadvantages of each)
  • Use a colocation facility to house our own server
  • Web hosting company (which allows installation of IMC software)
  • Piggyback on another IMC server

How about a table listing our options with benefits and drawbacks? -- JimVanderveen - 17 Mar 2003

Option	Benefits	Drawbacks
Colocation	Complete control over software, operating system, etc.	Cost?
"		Need to provide and maintain hardware
Web hosting	Relatively inexpensive?	Very limited control over software
Piggyback		Not many "slots" available
"		Our use could preclude a truly needy IMC, e.g. third world

This post suggests http://www.i5net.net/ for web hosting. Benefits: it's local (to Sacramento)

This post suggests http://www.dedicatednow.com/?pid=colocation for colocation.

Funding

Chuck has volunteered to pay for the first six months of hosting/colocating service. Thanks, Chuck! -- JimVanderveen - 17 Mar 2003

Unresolved questions

Are Fresno and Sacramento two halves of a Central Valley IMC?

(NEW 2003-12-04) Mike Rhodes has an excellent story (on sf.indymedia, no less!) about forming a Central Valley IMC.

A post from Kenley Neufeld and a post from Mike Rhodes

Possible approaches for ImcSacramento, ImcFresno, and any other Central Valley cities, e.g. Modesto:

1. Each completely separate
2. All cities share a server, but otherwise separate
3. Share people's expertise, but keep separate "cities"
4. Have one mega IMC covering the whole valley

My only hang-up with a single IMC is naming. How are people going to find us? It seems to me that we can have all the benefits of collaborating (shared funding, expertise, etc.), and still maintain separate "cities" to make it easier for people to find (and possibly identify with). -- JimVanderveen - 17 Mar 2003

Should we list other cities in the "coverage area" here, to make it possible to find via web search?

Where is the boundary between San Francisco, Sacramento, http://santacruz.indymedia.org/, etc?

Should it just be sort of fluid, leave it up to individual users to decide if they are part of SF, SC, Sac, Fresno, etc?

Who's here

I thought it might be useful for registered users with an interest in this IMC to list their WikiNames below:

• JimVanderveen - 17 Mar 2003
• ChrisMinnick - 17 Mar 2003
• EdwardHillenbrand - 24 May 2003
• MikeRhodes - 08 Dec 2003
• ModestoBrad - 08 Dec 2003
• MartyWood - 14 Aug 2004
• DennisYoung - 14 Oct 2004

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This is your document, too! Please learn how this works (it's really quick and easy), create an account, and start editing! (Your first edit should be to add your WikiName to the list of Who's here)

-- JimVanderveen - 19 Mar 2003