Indy Media Watch

Google News is including Indymedia as a news source once again despite it being a completely unmoderated, totally uncontrolled and frequently vile cesspit.

See that thing flying out the window Google? That's your credibility as an aggregator of quality news services.

Take just a moment and tell Google what you think.

Update: I have been linked to by Little Green Footballs. This has resulted in the following comment on this entry by someone purporting to be an Indymedia moderator:

What's most fascinating is that just after you nutjobs posted this link, a half dozen anti-Jewish posts went up on my local Indymedia.

I wonder how the writer explains this article on his local NYC Indymedia which appeared before the LGF listing. Similarly, how to explain the hundreds of antisemitic posts which appear on Indymedia every other week? Look around this blog for numerous examples of this and other problems which can't be so easily dismissed.

In other words, it's obvious to us at Indymedia at least that right-wing fanatics like you have been posting articles you hope to discredit the site with.

This is just a post from an Indymedia site moderator to let you know that we know what you are doing.

These days, virtually all of the anti-Semitic posts we are forced to delete are linked from right-wing, pro-Israeli trolls.

This is not the first time I have reported on such denial of the problem on Indymedia and shifting the blame onto the victim suggesting Jews are responsible for antisemitsm. It happens all the time on Indymedia. In this post I predicted:

the common response denying genuine anti-Semitism [on Indymedia] exists and probably suggesting the above quotes were in fact posted by Jews looking for sympathy. That is, all articles condemnatory of Jews were actually written by covert Jewish Mossad agents.

As for being "forced to delete" such filth, I suspect the writer thinks he is doing someone a favor. I'm sure he doesn't believe there's any real antisemites on Indymedia... If NYC are deleting them however (albeit begrudgingly), that's a good thing. Looking through their hidden posts suggests they have a pretty small tolerance for conspiratorial rants and they are making more of an effort than most. Denying the original problem however is unhelpful.

Update 2: Numerous comments on this entry suggest there may be more going on at Google than I thought. One links to this site providing examples of controversy reported here regarding political advertising on Google.

As Scott said, Google is now a public corporation and may have to answer to stock holders if this becomes a huge issue.

Update 3: Have a look at some of the other material regarded by Google as a reliable news source . Stock holders pay heed!