Autonogram 8: Autonomedia and 9/11

[anna balint]

Greetings --
On September 11, I made it over to Autonomedia Headquarters at about 10 in 
the morning. Our building is about two blocks from the East River on the 
Brooklyn side, and one wall of windows gives a view of lower Manhattan that 
was sometimes described as "stunning." There were a lot of other words for 
it that morning, and as we watched both towers come tumbling down, we 
continually asked each other "what can this mean?" and "what's going to 
happen now?" An interesting aspect of that morning was that almost no 
mainstream media outlets were able to broadcast, as their transmitters were 
downed, and the one TV station we COULD get was necessarily improvising -- 
there were no animated graphics or catchphrases yet, no Ground Zero or 
Infinite Justice to shape our consciousness of this day's events. There was 
not yet any meaning to any of it, just images and intensely lived time. 
That long moment of weird purity would end soon enough, of course, and 
since then the struggle for an autonomous media has felt even more vitally 
important.
The "Forum" part of the Autonomedia web site, the Interactivist Info 
Exchange (a joint project with ABC No Rio and the InterActivist Network), 
is a dynamic clearinghouse of articles and discussion posted by its 
registered users and random guests, and has become an immensely valuable 
resource in these last weeks. Dissident voices haven't had an easy time of 
it, but so far over 270 articles have been published to our site, some of 
which have stirred up lively discussion within the site. If you haven't 
explored the Info Exchange yet, please take a few minutes to browse its 
contents, and register if you feel so inspired. Registration isn't required 
to read articles or leave comments, but is necessary to post full articles; 
also, it's free, and the information won't be used for anything slimey.
Here's a list of a few articles posted in the last three weeks:
An Anti-Authoritarian Response to the War Efforts
http://slash.autonomedia.org/article.pl?sid=01/09/22/1756209
Interview with Afghani Left Revolutionary
http://slash.autonomedia.org/article.pl?sid=01/09/28/1537215
Chomsky Responds to Hitchens & Further Questions on U.S. Politics
http://slash.autonomedia.org/article.pl?sid=01/09/30/1239252
Three Political Websites Downed After Government "Homeland Security" Threat
http://slash.autonomedia.org/article.pl?sid=01/09/30/1859212
The Anti-Globalization Movement after 9/11 by George Caffentzis of Midnight 
Notes
http://slash.autonomedia.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/01/164256
Short Comment from Michael Hardt, Co-Author of 'Empire', on September 11th
http://slash.autonomedia.org/article.pl?sid=01/09/26/1250203
Post WTC Review of Hardt and Negri's "Empire" from the London Review of Books
http://slash.autonomedia.org/article.pl?sid=01/10/01/1137233
One Hundred Raids on Italian Radicals, Sixty Detained, Numerous Firebombings
http://slash.autonomedia.org/article.pl?sid=01/09/20/1541210
and the first post on the topic, with some very interesting replies,
World Trade crater
http://slash.autonomedia.org/article.pl?sid=01/09/11/1720252

So, have a look, register if you like, and help keep free and autonomous 
media healthy and vital.
bests,
Ben at Autonomedia
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