Talk:Guerrilla News Network

Archive 1 - October 2006

Closure
Why did GNN close? There is no explanation on the website. Why? Where else can we go to find decent news? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.147.60.238 (talk) 12:33, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

Criticism section
There really should be a section on criticism. GNN spends most of it's time in a constant maelstrom of arguments between it's members, half being an egomanical ruling class of veteran members, the others being anyone else, and anyone with the nerve to criticse in any small part GNN or one of those veteran members publically. The amount of bile and abuse thrown about is really quite staggering. It has less a sense of community than any site I have ever, and I mean EVER, encountered - you'd expect it of Stormfront, but not of a supposedly liberal and social minded site.

So far this article represents none of this. It's not hard to find criticism of GNN - half of all blogs and forum posts consist of nothing but it, followed by torrents of abuse from the establishment. Aggregate the general opinion of those discontent and represent them, that is what wikipedia is for. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 82.7.74.130 (talk) 12:43, 28 December 2006 (UTC).


 * Unfortunately, forum and blog posts are not considered reliable sources, and thus we can't include anything from either source in articles. If you have verifiable sources criticizing GNN, point them out and it's certainly something that could be considered. Tony Fox (arf!) 17:54, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Controversy section
I've taken the new rewrite live with this section removed because of sourcing problems. If someone can come up with a good, non-trivial reliable source for the accusations, this can certainly be moved into the main article - but only with sources.

''In October 2006, a small group of GNN site members posted their beliefs that GNN is in fact an American intelligence disinformation operation. Their statement suggests that editors and producers with the GNN have worked with groups such as the USIA and CIA, as well as with other organizations such as Israeli companies with ties to the military. The critics also stated that funding from the Ford Foundation, which had been tied to the CIA in the past, had been received for "American Blackout." GNN editors have denied the accusations as speculative, and suggest the accusers, most of whom have remained anonymous, are engaging in speculation and may be engaging in personal agendas.''

What's "trivial" about the source of the accusations itself? The article cites most of its sources, and only its conclusions are disputable... Everything else, as far as I have seen, has been acknowledged as being true and accurate by both sides involved in this debate.

This just leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth.

-CurtainCall29


 * Please go and read the pages on verifiability and reliable sources regarding the need for verifiable, non-trivial secondary sources to be included in articles. The sources you provided were primary sources or reprints of the primary source. If/when a news outlet or other reputable outlet covers this item, then we'll have a good reference to use for this section. Tony Fox (arf!) 21:08, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Without going into all the myriad problems associated with these accusations, I think it might be helpful to just focus on the basic logic behind them. First off, they specifically claimed we were CIA. The "evidence" to back that up is that I once had a six week grant from USIA to help Palestinians learn how to shoot video. There is no evidence that I was recruited by the CIA, and if I was I certainly didn't know it. The simple fact that I worked for USIA is pretty weak to state I was recruited by the agency - especially when I've been forthcoming about the job for years. Then there is the accusation that Stephen's Nigerian radio show was allegedly called a CIA front by a former CIA connected dictator. The source for that accusation is Stephen himself, based on a conversation with one of his former partners years after the event. In other words, sketchy at best. Then there is the accusation that Ford is a CIA "front." There is evidence the CIA tried to influence the foreign "democracy" programs of various organizations during the Cold War, but there is no evidence that they are today. Again, these accusations were limited to foreign programs. And why would the CIA support American Blackout anway? It champions one of the agency's most vocal critics. Finally, there is the fact that Ian worked for a company whose CEO used to be in the Mossad. Again, so what? What is the connection? And if there was, where does the CIA come into this? In addition, how do the accusers explain the fact that the CIA is involved in overseas covert operations. The FBI handles domestic programs. So the entire premise, that we are CIA, is illogical. It was literally pulled out of thin air. If anything, we'd be an FBI program. But my intuition is that this sounds less sexy so they decided on the CIA. In other words, the accusers themselves are ill-informed at best, and paranoid fantasists at worst. Finally, what evidence is there to back up the explicit charge that we somehow seek to control people's minds and make them more "moderate"? Well, as I have shown this is plainly false. If you refer back to the previous posts I have provided examples to show how off-base the specific charges concerning 9/11, protests and "illegal action" are. On numerous issues, we simply have tried to show several sides to the story. It's called journalism. The other bizarre implication of the accusations is that we are somehow "pro-Israel," when if you take two seconds to do a search on our site, you'll find exclusively critical articles and blogs about Israel's policies, including exclusive dispatches from Lebanon. Anyway, I hope this helps. I apologize if I'm being repetitive. Please contact me directly if you have any other questions. AL - GNN

CIA/DoD/DHS Connections
There has been some talk and speculation about the connectiosn of GNN with US government organizations, I just want to add, as someone who is VERY familiar with such programs, that there is a great deal of validity to this. The GNN was (possibly still is) a monitoring point for the US government. If you are not aware of what DARPA means i suggest you look it up. The government was, and does, keep a running list of ISPs that visit GNN via the Information Awarness Office (now called the Terrorism Information Awarness Program); The NSA wiretaping and so forth was part of that program. the lists of watched individuals is divided between DoD and NSA (more specifically department of intelligence) sources so that no one group can claim jurisdiction--when DoD wants a list they say it is part of national intell, when intell comes they say it is DoD eyes only. Basically, there is a well maintained database of who visits and if you do anything else bad, well they have a compelling case against you in the DARPA/DHS files. Use software that hides your IP if you must. You can put this in the article if you want. This post is true, although i cannot link you to a 'source' so to say, you will have to take my word for it. Pleas believe me, i do know what i am talking about. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.210.221.242 (talk) 01:46, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Notability
This was tagged with notability; I've added several book sources which discuss its significance or otherwise list it - I think they are sufficient to show this site has been of interest to scholars of social movements/indie media, etc. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 06:16, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

Proposed Overhaul Summer 2017
First of all, it seems a bit absurd to compare GNN's "Guerrillas" to Che Guevara's. What up with that link? It smacks of trolling. I hope you will forgive me, I took it out. The naming convention was part of a gamification scheme and a very successful one it was too.

As someone famous once said, "it's a metaphor".

I suggest we take the following approach to putting The G on the official record for posterity:

Does it make sense to split the article into three sections? Then, if we can agree on the proposed edits and come up with the copy and working citations, it would probably make sense to move the "history" section to the introductory section and get more ambitious with the content.

1. GNN Productions (?)
 * The films were separate from the GNN.TV portal - at least that was the impression I got (as a two time Commandant) - and each one of the films deserves their own paragraph, at least, if not a wiki entry of their own.

2. Guerilla Journalism Fund
 * That's new to me. I, for one, would like to know more about it.

3. GNN.tv

3.1 Information Architecture
 * This is important because it was really well done and deserves to be imitated. We've only got half a buried sentence here. There was a big difference between the Editor's Choice "featured" articles, the user submitted articles/voting system, the forum and the blogs. They all deserve honorable mention. A sentence, if not a subtitle. Also worth mentioning are the versions. There was a black version and a white version. Both were the product of a LOT of work and skill. Exact dates of release and details about the upgrade are definitely called for.

3.2 Gamification
 * Again, a prize-winning implementation of gamification for driving user engagement. More than half a sentence is needed, definitely. At the very least we should mention that a Conscript only had the power to reward two points, while a Commandant. . . was it 20, or 40? But the articles that got voted up in that system were not the same as the featured articles. The "guerrilla" part of the system was the little introductory paragraph that users had to craft before submitting an article, found in the wild -- anywhere on the web -- that they felt was important for the user community -- complete with thoughtful explanation. How many articles got promoted a day? It was very fast paced. And, if I recall correctly, there were articles stuck in the cue for ages because people kept "rewarding" doofus entries with negative points. Just the opposite of the wiki, in fact, "original research" was required.


 * That being said, Wikipedians will be glad to know that Wikipedia was an important tool for Gs. It did a lot of explaining, so we didn't have to. Of course there was some Wikipedia bashing, but they were in the minority. And it seems like they shut up once people realized how well the system worked. Or maybe not. What do other "random GNNers" recall?

3.3 Code
 * Was it coded, single-handedly, by one guy, in Perl? The site was wicked complex and wicked fast. It could be time for a Renaissance. This too, must not go quietly into the night.

3.5 Traffic
 * I can't remember. Was it 25,000 uniques a day? How many of those were arguably bots? What was the percentage of lurkers to engaged users? I personally went from Conscript to Commandant two and half times. It was VERY motivating. I'd love to see some back office data on the big picture - what was the maximum amount of Commandants we had running around, at the same time, bumping people up, or not? For a while there, people were juggling multiple anonymized avatars, until a policy was made to limit users to one. That's interesting, in a Real Identity 2.0 web world where everyone limits themselves to trivial topics, just to be safe.

Maybe the secret, going forward, is a Film Studies "new school", designed to curate films, casts and crews like Gook's, for example. Certainly the creds are rockin'. . . . the barriers to entry probably need to be a little higher.

3.6 Ads
 * Did we ever have more than just that MEAT ad? Did that effort not just flop on its head? Frankly, no ads was one of the things that made the site so great. People thinking about web 3.0 should definitely be headed in that direction.

3.7 Sponsors
 * People who want to try their hand at something similar will surely want to know how it has been done before.

4. Controversy
 * It's important to have a sense of humor, after all. Especially given how so much effort has already been put into "writing" it.

For The Next Book
 * If there's going to be a book (or two, or three), which there certainly should be (not necessarily by a G), at least a paragraph should be dedicated to the importance of curating trolls. They are, I found at least, an important learning experience - and good practice for real life.

In closing: what up with not mentioning AL at ALL in the article? He was the ONLY Responsible Adult in the place. Kids got hurt saying things on the web that got taken in the wrong way. AL made sure it didn't happen to a G. I had thought for sure he was a founder. What was his relationship exactly?

Is that Shore guy Cinis?

Fb2ts (talk) 22:36, 28 July 2017 (UTC)

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