About

Castlemaine Independent was founded in early 2010. Since then many people have connected and contributed, spreading news and widening our points of view.

What is news? Is it the hourly litany of crime, politics and football results?  Does news have to be redolent of ink and the rustle of paper? Worse, is it just the ‘filler’ in-between ads?

Did newspapers originally co-opt  an exchange of views within a community? Our stories and mythology? Now the power of the printing press is diffused through the electronic ether, where is news? Where are our stories?

As skilled at agenda sifting as we have become, do we find a community online that is in harmony with our views? Is that news and are these our stories?

There are probably more questions than answers, but if we are searching for change there are plenty of avenues. CI offers one, and many.

“Once social change begins, it cannot be reversed … we have seen the future, and the future is ours.” – César Chávez Estrada.

And someone also said you can’t fix a problem with the same thinking that caused the problem in the first place.

We are burdened with illiteracy, mental illness, stress, auto immune diseases, over-consumption, a toxic environment, and we’ve all been waiting for politicians to lead us to a more progressive, greener, safer, happier place. But we’re realising that the power lies not with politicians and bureaucrats, but with us and our communities.

We’ve all observed public figures lie (but not about ‘core promises’). Politicians never lie so exquisitely as in the field of war, but they lie in other fields too. At the beginning of the 21st century it’s so prevalent it’s become a comedy. How can you satirise people who readily admit they don’t tell the truth?

In that case, what can we do but trust and develop our own communities, our neighbours, our own networks, our own stories?

An older and very respected editor I once worked with said news is something somebody doesn’t want you to know about it. We’re working hard at finding those stories.

We have a new medium now – and we’re testing the boundaries to see if it’s a need to test if it’s a reality accessible to everyone, and an agent of change, or just an illusion of change.

The Internet has given us all power. An airline can smash a musician’s guitar, refuse him compensation, and then when he posts a song about it on YouTube – and eight million viewers watch it – the previously indifferent airline comes running back to him offering compensation.

That older and a respected editor also said newspapers were about reflecting back to the community what is happening in that community. True enough, but newspapers have always been beholden to business interests. In C21 the ownership of traditional news organisations has become increasingly concentrated in the hands of a few. More and more traditional newspapers are toothless, unquestioning purveyors of government press releases and worse, so is it any surprise they’re losing their relevance and readership?

It’s well past the time to let those chasing profits to the bottom set the agenda.

Castlemaine Independent is beholden to nothing and no one but common decency and the laws of libel. The power is with us.

We hope you read Castlemaine Independent, enjoy it, contribute, and tell everyone you know about it.

Editor: Andrew McKenna: 0423 934 192, andrew@castlemaineindependent.org

Design: Green Graphics, 5472 5300

A note on our editorial policy

We do not publish ‘advertorials’ ie, advertising copy, paid for, dressed up as news. Some newspapers in this region do that, but we don’t.

What you read on CI is news, not cash for comments.

We do not publish articles about businesses for the sake of promoting the business. If you wish to promote your business you are welcome to advertise with us.

We may occasionally run an article on a local business if we think they are doing something extraordinary.