A set of posting guidelines for the website is required for
both articles and comments.

The guidelines are used to:

* Make the website a more useful tool for activists in Darwin,
Northern Territory and the rest of Australia
as well as activists abroad interested in local issues.

* Ensure that the website does not become cumbersome with
flame wars, personal attacks and an overabundance of foreign news.

* Protect the members of the editorial and technical
collective from potential defamation and breach of copyright court actions.

* Provide clarity as to which articles can remain on the
website without the collective being accused of censorship. All of us in the
collective are anti-censorship but this policy is open to abuse and thus some
guidelines are required.

The posting guidelines:

=======================

* Arafura IMC is primarily a community news website.
Articles posted on the imc newswire should contain an element of news or
journalistic commentary. Anything posted on the newswire that does not contain
an element of news or journalism is liable to be removed.

* Pornography very rarely contains any journalistic merit
and is liable to be removed as soon as it appears.

* Racism, homophobia, sexism and sectarianism if it is in
the context of a news article will not be removed. However, blatant racism,
homophobia, sexism or sectarianism that appears in comments or articles with no
journalistic merit will result in those articles/comments being removed. The
editorial board believes in the spirit of free speech. However, outright
denigrations against large chunks of humanity are already well covered by the
commercial press. An editor hiding such an article should notify the collective
as outlined below.

* Any threat of personal attack will be removed from the
website: firstly to protect the individual threatened. Secondly, to protect the
collective from threats of legal action. In truth, such attacks rarely contain
any journalistic content.

* Regarding personal attacks, it is much more acceptable to
say "John Howard has racist policies" than to say "John Howard
is a racist". The latter form of personality attack can leave the
collective open to libel cases. It is much more acceptable to say "Phillip
Ruddock is doing an arsehole of a job" than to say "Phillip Ruddock
is an arsehole". We are here to facilitate intelligent debate. An editor
hiding such an article should notify the collective as outlined below.

* Any article that is in definite breach of copyright may be
removed. It is far better to provide a link and commentary about an important
article than to copy it in it's entirety to the Arafura IMC newswire. The
collective will always be in favour of original material and want to hear what
the readership has to say.

* Arafura IMC may be used to promote or announce
upcoming activist and community events, but not for the promotion of commercially sponsored events. It is better to provide a link to promotional material within a related news article.

* If an article is posted more than once, repeat copies will
be removed. If an article is posted by foreign sources across multiple IMC
websites, it may be removed.

* The Arafura IMC website is primarily for Darwin
and Northern Territory activists.
Recurring articles about the evils of particular foreign nations are prone to
being removed. If there is an abundance of news from a particular foreign
source, it will be removed.

Hidden Articles

===============

Any article that is hidden from the Arafura IMC newswire
should state the reason (from the list above), and the editor's name.

The goal here is to have an open transparent independent
media network and the ideal is to be open about all our policies and practices.

We aim to differ from the mainstream and corporate media by
being answerable, open and progressive as well as realistic.

If an article has been hidden and the original poster feels
it fits with the posting guidelines, the poster is invited to contact
[arafura-imc@lists.indymedia.org]  and
raise the issue.

In essence, an editor should only hide an article if they
are almost certain that the collective would agree that it should be hidden.

When an article is hidden because it is controversial, the
editor should mail the collective with "REMOVAL" in the subject
header and a description of what was hidden and the reasons.