"Ander Nieuws Net" (ANN) translates into something like "Other/Alternative News Network". ANN isn't a new medium, it's a network and platform of independent media and media makers. We will promote cooperation, coordination, the exchange of media material and the development of tools, facilities and education.
The main aim is to improve the visability of the many independend media and to establish them as an alternative besides the commercial media.

Many idea's for this project are based on experiences with international 'media experiments', but at this moment ANN will be limited to the Dutch language. Making ANN work on this scale will be difficult enough. As many media initiatives, ANN suffers from the general lack of 'techies' and programmers, working on media tools and facilities. So ANN is also trying to find funds to get things done.
ANN will share its accomplishments. The (free, open source) tools we want to build, will be developed for international use from the start.

Of course there are already many nice initiatives working on independent media: web sites, mailing lists, radio's, magazines, video groups, media workshops, etc. But the audiences are small and there is little cooperation with other media, which means that many good efforts get lost in the 'information noise'.
Sometimes it is the competitive attitude that people associate with 'making news', which gets in the way. Often it is only due to lack of time, lack of money and lack of tools and skills. Many are already too busy doing their own thing.

That is a pitty. Independent media are about news, outreach and responsibility, not competition. And cooperation does not mean: losing your independence and identity.
Cooperation can mean: being more efficient than the corporate media, which are in fierce competition. Cooperation can mean: saving costs, more material to choose from, more channels to distribute your output.
In short: more quality and outreach for everyone.

In several phases we will work on the establishment of:

• A network of media facilities in the Netherlands, where media makers can edit and distribute material, after covering an event (see 'Mediawerkplekken').
• A network of correspondents in the Netherlands, who can cover events in their region, publish news from their organization or can comment on subjects as specialists.
• Integrating news production and planned coverage into the new version of the 'Aktie Agenda', our national online social agenda. (Media makers can plan and announce their input and agenda users will be able to see which media will cover an event).
• A 'mediapool' where media makers can share their (raw) digital material and where editors, webmasters, radio people etc. can browse and download the material for use in their medium (Mediapool.nl).
• Building support for independent media among consumers, NGO's, politicians and business.
• Workshops, training, coordination, etc.

On September 11 and 12 2004 a conference was organized to really start up the network. Several working groups were formed. AnderNieuws.net will also develop a 'code' for media and correspondents and will issue a ANN press card.

Many ideas for AnderNieuws.Net grew out off various experiments with organizing (international) coverage of events by the independent media beforehand, such as the worldwide protests against the war in Iraq.
We also experimented with a new media tool we hope to develop: the 'Media Pool & News Portal'. The first (very limited) version was the 'Joburg Media' platform (on the UN WSSD 'Johannesburg Summit 2002'), which clearly showed the possibilities of the model. Next stop should have been 'Cancun Media', covering the WTO meeting in Cancun, Mexico, in september 2003. Alas this did not work out, due to lack of money and manpower. Major issue is that the Media Pool & News Portal model needs special software, for which we need (hard to find) programmers.

AnderNieuws.Net is a project started by (and hosted by) the dDH foundation, a non-profit NGO, founded in 1994. dDH runs a selfsupporting Independent Internet Platform (own server), which hosts many web sites and mailing lists. dDH is build by volunteers and funded by its participants. In the future AnderNieuws.Net may well become a seperate NGO, run by its participants.

• The 'Media Pool & News Portal' model
  a new tool, helping to built independent media
• The first experiment: Joburgmedia.net
• Why Cancunmedia.net did not work
• dDH foundation