[imc-oxford-features] posting UG530 on ImcUK

[owen at riseup.net]

Hello,

You (or someone pretending to be you) posted this article on indymedia:
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/regions/oxford/2010/12/471001.html

When it was originally posted, both 'Oxford' and 'Sheffield' were ticked.
This means that the article appears on Oxford indymedia and Sheffield
indymedia as well as UK indymedia.

Most of these local indymedias only accept news which has some link to
their local area. Sheffield appears to be an exception:
http://sheffield.indymedia.org.uk/static/editorial.html
...but that aside, I'm writing as someone involved in Oxford indymedia,
and we certainly do have that criteria:
http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/regions/oxford/static/editorial.html

Having read the summary, that article/audio doesn't seem to have any
particular link or relevance to Oxford, so I've unticked Oxford on it. It
still appears on UK indymedia and Sheffield indymedia.

-----**********-----
I'm writing to ask you not to tick unrelated regions in future. It creates
extra work for indymedia volunteers trying to maintain a locally-relevant
newswire and personally, I see it as an abuse of the site.
-----**********-----

The obvious exception is the one or two regions like Sheffield who have
decided to include non-local news; if in doubt, check the editorial
guidelines of the region you are posting to.

I imagine it was an honest mistake; people often misunderstand how the
regions system works. However, now that I've explained why it's a problem,
if future editions of UG appeared with unrelated regions ticked I would
interpret that as delibrate region spamming, and hide the article outright
(UK guideline: Disruptive). It's nothing personal against you; I'm simply
fed up of region spamming because of the extra workload it generates for
us.

Cheers,

Owen the weekend hibernator
(an Oxford IMC volunteer)