“The life span of alternative media in a hybrid configuration” Fadma Aït Mous &

Scientific Paper

The life span of alternative media in a hybrid configuration. The cases of Lakome and Mamfakinch in

Fadma Aït Mous Université Hassan II, Associate Researcher (EGE) Driss Ksikes

Director of Cesem, HEM research centree

1 “The life span of alternative media in a hybrid configuration” Fadma Aït Mous & Driss Ksikes

Introduction When the SAHWA Survey was launched in 2015, major transformations had already occurred in “alternative media” in Morocco. This didn’t prevent young people from developing alternative uses of social media and different political strategies than the dominant ones. But a melancholic attitude emerges from our research, showing that the youth were very sceptical about the media’s capacity to mirror their aspirations, and when connected (10.5%), they were more likely to surf on foreign websites.1 But if youth defiance towards political representations and mainstream media is obvious, the weak capacity of the alternative media to survive, while supposed to partly fulfil these youth expectations in terms of freedom of expression and access to information, needs to be fully understood.

There is a need for a theoretical framework to encompass this paradox. Political hybridity looks like a convenient one.2 Actually, the fact that political regimes such as the Moroccan one shift arbitrarily from liberalism to repression depending on the rulers’ mood or the political and economic forces at stake has raised a lot of questions in political science literature about the advent of full-fledged public spheres.3 Press freedom and practice is at the heart of this dilemma. So, how does the political context, considered semi-autocratic, semi-liberal or hybrid, affect the use of digital media? What are the hurdles citizen journalists are confronted by in such a configuration?

Alternative media, born out of a mix of the globalisation of protest and cyber activism, look even more precarious in such a configuration. Still, mainly during the turmoil leading to 2011’s insurrections a combination of journalists and activists in Morocco chose to launch a new generation of online media in which there is a mix of anti-system information and marginal opinions. They consider these new spaces to be alternatives or even havens of freedom of expression distinct from the discredited traditional media, which is highly controlled and the victim of self-censorship. When we look at the life span of this digital activist media, we realise that they didn’t manage to overcome economic pressures and political repression. That’s why we decided in this paper to focus on the life cycles of two examples of alternative media (Lakome and Mamfakinch) and how they interact with the political and economic powers.

2 “The life span of alternative media in a hybrid configuration” Fadma Aït Mous & Driss Ksikes

It is striking that both media websites we decided to scrutinise were created as side phenomena related to the so-called “Arab Spring”, which was hurriedly labelled a “social media revolution”. It is also noteworthy that both projects took their editorial orientation from the fact that citizens’ journalism could represent an alternative source of information and an echo for dissidence. The main difference between them is that one is led by professional journalists rejecting the paper media model and the other was created by activists and young political science students. Considering the nuances of each website, we’ll tackle each experience by itself and then compare the outcomes of both. Meanwhile, we’ll engage with the concept of “alternative media” and its different variations and see the extent to which they fit with these outlets. The method we used in order to describe and analyse these two cases is based mainly on online ethnography and interviews with the concerned actors.

The main questions that will help us structure our analysis concern four main areas. First, how do alternative media editors and journalists deal with paradoxical laws and regulations in the national/territorial space and the international/extraterritorial/digital framework? Secondly, how do they manage interactions between professionalism and activism? Third, what are the manifestations of control, repression and self-limitation in their daily practices? Lastly, how do these media actors behave before, during and after the analysed experiences?

Concepts and context Let’s first try to understand where we are when it comes to the terms and concepts used, the historical context in which actors interact and the local setting (Morocco) in which these media try to act. Sharing news online has long been a civil action, since before digital media were developed by professionals. The first symbolic act of what was then coined “alternative media” took place in 1999 in Seattle in reaction to the World Trade Organization’s annual conference. Alter-globalisation NGOs were the initiators of one of the first public websites dedicated to producing (thanks to activists and parallel networks) pieces of information that were rarely if at all shared by mainstream media outlets. Known, since then, as the Independent Media Center or Indymedia, it is defined by its founders as “a network of collectively run

3 “The life span of alternative media in a hybrid configuration” Fadma Aït Mous & Driss Ksikes media outlets for the creation of radical, accurate, and passionate tellings of the truth”.4

Alternative media is described as being produced “by and for citizens, with civic content” (Hadl, 2004), and the literature on it is quite prolific. Various labels are used to name such media: from “radical media” (Downing, 2001) to “citizens’ media” (Rodriguez, 2001) and from “critical media” (Fuchs, 2010) to “social movement media” (Atton, 2003). The researchers tackle the different aspects of these media in three premises, which Benjamin Ferron (2012: 137) has summarised:

“First, alternative media producers and promoters are analyzed as challengers of the status quo, ‘heterodox’ agents producing and circulating media outside – or against – the ‘mainstream’ institutions, including, in particular, the state apparatus, the capitalist market, and the dominant media (heterodoxy/autonomy premise). Second, the organizations that promote these media are generally considered as representatives of ‘civil society’, working hand in hand to promote progressive social change (unity/cooperation premise). Third, alternative media are assumed to be produced ‘democratically’ by marginal, subaltern, minority groups of citizens, in order to ‘give voice to the voiceless’ in the public space and ‘empower’ counter- publics (democratic/grassroots premise)”.

The normative aspect of such premises is obvious since scholars and social scientists are either close to these media activists or to their democratic aspirations. But such an implication hides the complexity of the phenomenon. During the last decade in Morocco, this activist model has not been reproduced as such. Actually, three main trends could sum up the emergence of online media in the Moroccan context. The first, from 2005 onwards, was first characterised by personal blogging then by social media mobilisation content. Both were produced by young activists pointing out corruption, clientelism and rent-seeking attitudes.

Some of these citizen journalists would become frontline activists within the February 20th movement,5 but also the founding bloggers united under the flag of the pioneer Arab-speaking pure play, , launched in 2007. The second trend illustrates the enforced shift, starting in 2009, of independent journalists and editors

4 “The life span of alternative media in a hybrid configuration” Fadma Aït Mous & Driss Ksikes from paper to online media by launching their own new outlets. This is the epitome of a crisis of independent journalism, which stopped an unprecedented era of free press (1997–2007) through repression, unfair trials, economic pressure and then self- censorship. Finally, the third path that stems from both is a mitigated one, where professional and citizen journalists engage together with cyber activists on a common experience.

Their motto is to broaden sources of information, produce anti-establishment narratives and reveal uncovered stories. How do they proceed? What are the hurdles they are confronted with? How do they manage to survive (or not) in a hybrid regime? Through lengthy interviews with the main stakeholders, the sociology of the actors and analysis of the historical, economic and political configuration in which they operate, this paper aims at understanding what is at stake for these alternative media during their endeavour to exist or survive.

Lakome, a contested “refuge” Let’s first tackle the case of the news website Lakome. Quite interestingly, the label’s name refers both to “la com” (communication), and to the public, as the expression Lakoum in means “to you”, to the people. The baseline says “from here starts freedom”, which reveals the site’s main editorial orientation, considered by its initiators to be “independent” and by officials to be “dissident” or “oppositional”. It actually expresses what the site’s founder, the journalist , considers his ethical position: “to be free from any institutional or financial constraints”.6 The statement is definitely close to the Indymedia narrative, which defines itself as an alternative media outlet willing to “inspire people who continue to work for a better world, despite corporate media’s distortions and unwillingness to cover the efforts to free humanity”.7

Lakome was launched in December 2010, seventeen days exactly before Bouazizi’s immolation. The main founder, Ali Anouzla, and his peer, Aboubakr Jamaï – who helped a few months later create Lakome’s French version – are both renowned editors of newspapers (Le journal, Assahifa Al Oukhra, etc.), which they were forced to shut or sell after a series of political, legal and economic pressures. Moreover, they

5 “The life span of alternative media in a hybrid configuration” Fadma Aït Mous & Driss Ksikes just had a common experience as founding members of media professionals’ corporate, at the weekly newspaper, Al Jarida , in 2009–2010. But this experience unfortunately came to an end because of stakeholders’ inability to keep a coherent and independent editorial line due to divergent interests.

Hence, their digital conversion through Lakome aimed mainly at “displaying uncensored news of public interest, to create a well-informed public opinion”.8 In this sense, the online media for them represents a “refuge” from what Ali Anouzla calls “the Establishment hegemony on information”.9 He believes, in this context, that keeping it small, poorly funded and only surrounded by highly involved professionals is the best guarantee of independence. Economically, the model is based on a 100,000 DH initial investment by the two founders, working on the side as free-lancers and consultants, Google advertising profits that reached 500,000 DH in 2012, quite rare advertisements, some volunteering of activists and modestly paid professionals. The aim was to keep “independent” from financial dominance. As the American media scholar Henry Jenkins puts it, “it’s only by keeping small [that] converging media could preserve participative culture”.10

Quite interestingly, the income standards of French and Arab-speaking journalists being quite different, the two-version site will need extra funding. Thanks to Aboubakr Jamai’s connections, IMS (International Media Support) subsidised the publishing company through banner ads (of Mandela, Gandhi, etc.) to avoid legislative restrictions on direct international funding of the media. Reliance on international support is a constant in Lakome’s breakthrough. Even when the chairman of the leading insurance group Saham, Moulay Hafed Alami (also magnate of a scattered press group), suggested a capital boost for Lakome, Anouzla didn’t accept for fear of losing his “free will”.

In this regard, Lakome’s editors – of both versions – decide from the beginning to rely on three main assets: a politically liberal and openly critical op-ed position, the democratisation of free speech, a network of whistle-blowers, activists as alternative sources of information and enlargement of the media spectrum, including blogs and social media icons, videos and news.

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The fact that Tunisia’s so-called “Jasmine Revolution” started less than a month after Lakome’s launch was a stimulating factor. The website not only gave more echo to popular demonstrations but also to nascent digital activism. The coincidence gave an extraordinary boost to what looked then like a totally new media outlet in Morocco. After the first month, it quickly reached more than 40,000 visitors per day.11 Later, its reports made in collaboration with the daily Akhbar Al Yaoum in Tunisia and Egypt, and its role as the closest media to the February 20th movement in Morocco clearly positioned the site as the amplifier of rebel youth voices. Editors tried to strike the balance between opinion and information, but its main source of differentiation and flow of visitors came from a mixture of profiles in the newsroom: juniors with less than two-year experience in print journalism, and active members of the movement who were very well connected online (mainly Najib Chaouki, and Aziz Yacoubi).

Does all this mean that Lakome functions as alternative media? In the long run, compared with more mainstream Arab-speaking pure plays like Hespress, Febrayer.com and Al Yaoum 24, it is quite difficult to determine in day-to-day practices what makes it so different. In fact, the mix of short informative articles, reporting videos and the list of bloggers seems technically to be a pattern common to all of these outlets. One of the differentiating characteristics of Lakome as alternative media is the profile of its desk journalists. At its most representative the team is composed of a pro-Amazigh militant, a member of the MALI movement,12 a February 20th activist and an Islamist engineer, which corresponds to Anouzla’s wish to create a people’s advocacy media”.13 So, in order to better define this conception of journalism, let’s focus on Lakome’s treatment of a specific case: the Daniel Galván affair.

If a media organisation were to be gauged on any criterion, it would be that of “social influence”. And in the case of the Spanish-Iraqi secret agent sentenced in Morocco to 30 years in prison for paedophilia, pardoned along with 47 other Spanish prisoners by King Mohammed VI, it is very interesting to look in detail on how Lakome played a double role in publicising what was called in August 2013 “the biggest royal error”.

7 “The life span of alternative media in a hybrid configuration” Fadma Aït Mous & Driss Ksikes

Every year the royal palace institution publicly announces the number of prisoners the king will pardon, either to be released or to be given a reduced sentence. Before the crown’s annual celebration in July 2013, the ex-King of , Juan Carlos II, asked the authorities, while visiting his Moroccan host, for a favour for Spanish residents in custody. The media never publicises names, just figures, when it comes to royal decrees of pardon. This time, on a fundamentalist website a lawyer and human rights activist published the name of Daniel Galván and his record as a dangerous paedophile, recalling the fact that his 30-year sentence was applauded as a first by children rights’ advocates.

This piece of information could have remained unnoticed, only accessible to fundamentalists and NGO members, if Lakome cyber activist, renowned February 20th movement member and journalist, Hamza Mahfoud, had not decided to check it professionally and display it on a larger scale. Not only he did produce a news document on the website but also engineered, from his desk in Lakome, Facebook and Twitter pages meant to mobilise people in the street against the royal pardon. This actually proved that February 20th movement’s spirit – against corruption and arbitrariness – was still alive. Later, the demonstrations took place, were severely repressed, but the king reacted in an unexpected way by stepping back, withdrawing his own decision and receiving the victim’s families in order to publicly express his empathy.

In no other online media in Morocco, then, was there such an intricate relationship between journalism and activism. After less than two months, Lakome had to face the most critical moment in its life span: the trial of its liberal founder and publisher Ali Anouzla for “apology for terrorism”. He is the first renowned journalist and editor working online to be convicted and put into custody. So far, the only online content producers to be persecuted are bloggers or citizen journalists, not professionals. He is also the second influential journalist, after , editor of Demain, in 2005, to be judged under the anti-terrorist law.

What was he charged with? Here are the facts. Lakome shared a video produced by AQIM (Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb), initially posted on the Al Andalus website and publicised on his blog by the Spanish journalist and El Pais

8 “The life span of alternative media in a hybrid configuration” Fadma Aït Mous & Driss Ksikes correspondent in the Maghreb, Ignacio Cembrero. It said, while being critical of royal power, “Al Qaeda invites Moroccan youth to immigrate towards Allah, not in boats.”14 The Moroccan pure play edited the post pinpointing it as “a propaganda video”.

While prosecuted, the convicted editor will be described in a press release launched by the main parliamentary parties as “a fifth column”. In parallel, an international campaign led by Anouzla’s advocates convinced the Washington Post to write a highly critical editorial entitled “Morocco should drop absurd charges against a journalist”.15 While Anouzla was detained in prison for more than a month, the public telecommunication regulator (ANRT) decided to close access to Lakome.com, even if the digital address was located abroad.

Though international pressure led to the release of Anouzla, his trial is still pending. And even if the website reopens, since 2014 it has lost its large audience and influence, ceased to publish its French-speaking sister site and became a minor producer of news online, ranking far behind the most widely visited pure plays (Hespress, Goud, Al Yaoum 24, le 360, etc.). Meanwhile, Ali Anouzla, currently in residence in Berlin, goes on publishing on a less regular basis, mainly analytical papers and mainly abroad – on the Deutsche Welle website and the London-based online news magazine Alaraby.co.uk. Except Najib Chaouki, all the other journalists and activists who made Lakome well known have since moved elsewhere. Hamza Mahfoud, for example, is in Marseille studying for a Master’s in Sociology, while Aziz Yacoubi is still in , working at Reuters press agency. Lakome no longer plays the role it had for more than three years as a free space open to public opinion and debate. Its representation as a “contested refuge” and the fragile status of its founder as a case pending judgement mean it now survives in the shadow of its reputation.

Mamfakinch, hacked hope Mamfakinch.com is an information portal launched on February 17th 2011 by a collective of bloggers and net activists. “Mamfakinch” is a word derived from a Moroccan colloquial expression which can be translated into English as “We will not give up”, “We will not let go” or “No concessions”. The website was created on the

9 “The life span of alternative media in a hybrid configuration” Fadma Aït Mous & Driss Ksikes margins of the call for demonstrations on February 20th 2011 launched by the homonym movement (M20F), calling for broad political and socioeconomic reforms (reform of the constitution, dissolution of parliament, dismissal of the government, separation of powers, a parliamentary monarchy, social justice, etc.).

This slogan-name is not new in the Moroccan political lexicon. It was overtly borrowed from the expression used by Mohamed Bougrine,16 17 a human rights activist and political prisoner during the creation of the Equity and Reconciliation Commission, who refused to claim the financial compensation the commission granted to the victims of the “lead years”.18 With the Forum for Truth and Justice, an association created in 1999 to defend the rights of the victims of the , Bougrine had replied to the commission with the expression “mamfakinch” to demonstrate his refusal to claim financial compensation and signify that such compensation could not compensate for the long past of human rights abuses in Morocco. In 2009, the same title was proclaimed as the slogan of the Forum for Truth and Justice for its 3rd congress, held on December 11th 2009 to signify that the association will not give up and will not derogate from its overall objective of the quest for truth and the naming of those responsible for the abuses.19

Mamfakinch.com, created on the eve of the February 20th demonstrations, covered all the demonstrations of the protest movement in Morocco during the busy year of 2011.20 The site provided a large amount of information about the events (multimedia information in the form of videos of weekly events, testimonies of various victims of repression and corruption, press articles on the M20F and Moroccan news, etc.). These different materials were shared in Arabic, French and English. The site has played an undeniable role in relaying the mobilisation movement in the virtual sphere: covering the demonstrations of the M20F by serving as a bond between the virtual and the real spheres. In a short time, it has become a space for the exchange of information on political developments in Morocco. For a number of Moroccan internet users, it is perceived as the media instrument of the M20F, but the Mamfakinch team refutes such a label, as Hisham Almiraat, cofounder and spokesperson of the website says: “That is not what we are pretending. Some of us are members of February 20th movement, while others are not. We represent Mamfakinch collective group, nothing more”.21

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The introduction to the website announces: “Though we have to different political tendencies, we all share the values of democracy, freedom and respect for human rights. Mamfakinch.com does not claim to be a newspaper. It is citizens’ media which believes in the right of access to information. We mean the information that is often ignored if not distorted by official media”.22 The website’s ambition was thus to become a “news agency of the people”.

Structured around the sections of “news”, “mobilisation and activism” (petitions, live reports and releases), “points of view” and “comments”, Mamfakinch aims to alert citizens. Through its YouTube channel23 it releases films like “My Makhzen & Me!” made on the M20F by the activist-director Nadir Bouhmouch.24 “Open Makhzen” refers to a Facebook page created on October 20th 2011, the purpose of which, publicised by Mamfakinch, is to publish “links, videos, information, reports and documents on corruption in Morocco in order to alert public opinion on the importance of this Phenomenon and to reflect on possible means and actions in order to combat this scourge”.25

The intervention of audiences is made possible throughout the links “Publishing on Mamfakinch” and the “Comments”. But internet users are not free to use these two options, since their participation is moderated by the people responsible and the hosts of the website. To publish, the user is directed to a small form to fill out (mandatory name, mandatory email, subject and message). This setting allows webmasters to control the users’ posts. Likewise, the function of leaving comments is governed by a series of rules with the same control. This means that Mamfakinch does not work on the principle of open publishing but that its team filters the content.

Behind the creation of Mamfakinch.com, there are half a dozen Moroccan bloggers, mostly living abroad.26 Their links with Tunisian bloggers played an important role in the emergence of the idea of the website. This is how its co-founder and spokesperson, Hisham Almiraat, presented the origin of the project: “I have been working for Global Voices for three years,27 and this platform allowed me to work with Sami Ben Gharbi, co-founder of the Tunisian site Nawaat.org”.28

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The Tunisian site Nawaat.org played a central role in the events in Tunisia as it was the only independent media organ to relay the actions of the anti-Ben Ali protest movement.29 Creating the Moroccan equivalent of this “dissident” platform was the ambition of Hisham and his friends. The call to demonstrate on February 20th 2011, launched by young via social networks, was the occasion to inaugurate Mamfakinch. Hisham returns to this founding moment: “The site was born on February 17th, three days before the start of the pro-democratic demonstrations in Morocco [...] We started from the observation that the Moroccan activists who called to protest against the regime were the victims of a campaign of disinformation by the local media. We therefore created Mamfakinch.com in a context of disinformation and propaganda because we felt the urgency of being able to offer an alternative media using the technologies accessible to all”.30

The founders of Mamfakinch borrowed Nawaat’s principle of functioning, namely, that of continuously circulating a flood of information about the contestation. Later, this information is picked up by other foreign media in most cases (for example, Al Jazeera) and finally it reaches the average citizen. Hisham explains this virtuous circle with three sequences as follows: “What Facebook and Twitter are doing is dissemination. They amplify the voice of ordinary people and citizens. Then there is a second level: that of the platforms on which the information is cross-referenced and is filtered like Nawaat and Mamfakinch, which are “popular news agencies”. Finally, there is a third level: that of traditional media such as Al Jazeera, which played a very important role. We start from the citizen: there is a lot of information circulating, rumors, lies, propaganda. Then we come to the level of the “people's news agencies” that filter information and also make their own propaganda because we all have our political opinions and therefore tend to ignore some information and give more credit to others. Finally, there is the traditional media that pick up all that and spread it to the general public. And it is this information disseminated by Al Jazeera that returns inside the countries confronted with protest movements and which is seen by a very wide audience that somehow closes this virtuous circle”.31

Only a few weeks after its launch, Mamfakinch registered half a million visitors, proof that the site was filling a void where the so-called traditional media practiced self-censorship. This success is explained by the vigour of sociopolitical

12 “The life span of alternative media in a hybrid configuration” Fadma Aït Mous & Driss Ksikes criticism and the format of enunciation (testimony, denunciation, emotional expressions of the victims, radical nature of the words, etc.) adopted by the site. Except that with the entanglement and the excess of information offered, the risk of opacity is great. And the risk in this kind of media is of seeing the public reduced to a narrow circle of individuals armed with high sociocultural capital, thereby enabling them both to have a certain interest in politics and minimum level of control over telematics. Such risks raise big questions about the democracy of the web and the democratic pretences of such platforms.

Linked to the social and political demonstrations, which were at the heart of its raison d’être, Mamfakinch was abruptly closed in 2014. Today, it remains open as an online archive of the dynamics of 2011, as in the alternative framing of its founders and users. In the official testimony of one of its founders, we can find some explanations: “Mamfakinch was an innovative phenomenon within the context of Moroccan media crisis. This assessment is no longer valid today (in 2014), at least in my personal opinion. The site has been monotonous since late 2012 and has been made several errors before, (…) It is time for the outlet to stop publishing the absurd, which dominated the content in the past year, the crew will purge the site of some of the publications that we see contrary to the professionalism launched by Mamfakinch, and return in a new form corrects the errors mentioned and recalls the technical and media creativity that characterized from the rest of the media when it starts”.32

Since 2012, a year after the starting of the February 20th Movement, Mamfakinch started struggling to keep the audience’s attention. As Hisham (2015: 17) explained this downfall process: “We felt that we did not interest people anymore because everyone had gone back to their normal lives. They did not want to hear about revolutions any longer because things started looking horrendous in Syria and we saw the first refugees arriving ... The dominant mood in the Arab world is resignation: ‘between the Islamists on one side and dictatorships on the other, I’d rather stay home and do nothing.’ It impacted people’s perception and it was difficult for us to remain popular but we kept on calling for radical reforms”.

The unofficial reasons are more linked to the uncertainty of the political context and the controlling nature of the hybrid regime. In 2012, the editorial team

13 “The life span of alternative media in a hybrid configuration” Fadma Aït Mous & Driss Ksikes members of Mamfakinch were targeted with spyware. It is paradoxical to note that such control happened when the popularity of the outlet was seriously decreasing. For Hisham (2015: 19), “Hacking Team must be held at least partly responsible: “They poisoned this wonderful technology that allowed us to express ourselves anonymously and fearlessly. They killed this. People started thinking ‘the rules have changed. I am not going to take any more risks’.”

Since the spyware hacking attack in 2012, the Mamfakinch editorial members have followed different paths. Outraged by such repression which, in some cases extended to intimidating the family members of these media activists, some decided to abandon activism. Yassir Kazar, a former lecturer in business intelligence at Université Paris Descartes, who decided to change his job and start a business in computer security. But some of them continue their activism, such as Samia Errazouki, who is working as a journalist and preparing her PhD dissertation on recent Moroccan history – challenging the repression mechanisms on both sides.

Main findings and discussion The comparison of both media organisations, one based on citizen volunteers and the other on a hybrid model of mediactivists is undoubtedly enlightening.33 It first tells us that these media organisations assert their alternativeness on the grounds of their suspicion towards the traditional media. As stated on Mamfakinch’s front page, the website defines itself as “citizens’ media that believes in the right of access to information. We mean the information that is often ignored if not distorted by official media”.

The image of the traditional media all over the world is negative because of the allegiance of press companies to the politico-economic world. It is precisely this tarnished image that is retained by the public and which consequently urges them to become their own source of information by creating alternative media. And it is this perception and mistrust of the classical media, practicing self-censorship and deprived of “the audacity to tackle certain sensitive subjects” which was at the origin of the creation of both Lakome and Mamfakinch. In this regard, they respond to youth hankering for uncensored truth. Since the virtual reader “... chooses his readings

14 “The life span of alternative media in a hybrid configuration” Fadma Aït Mous & Driss Ksikes knowingly, where he feels that the traditional media try to bluff or blur the cards”. By taking this supposedly pure stance, the alternative media are, by the same token, represented as marginal.

Secondly, we notice that, created in a semi-autocratic context, these media outlets are bound to a “liberal” moment perceived by the actors as a favourable political opportunity, unable to go further and forced towards death or self-limitation when the political tension is lower or public attention elsewhere. Interestingly enough, while their motivation is the expansion of freedom of speech, their demise signals the scope of tolerance in their country. In this sense, they play the role of barometers of hybrid regimes, indicating shifts from permissiveness to arbitrariness.

Thirdly, it would be misleading to believe that being “citizens” would mean these media are morally “good”. Despite – and maybe because – of being based on values of participation, these media are also ethically biased by the urge to share more and more information, while sometimes deprived of professional backgrounds and know-how. This is mainly true of Mamfakinch whose founders started by creating a blog, where all the information was dumped in bulk. They later confessed that they made mistakes, namely publishing erroneous information without checking it as professionals would.

In both these online media organisations, the mix of would be, supposed and experienced journalists and activists sometimes led to publishing erroneous or raw, insufficiently cross-checked information. In that sense, “citizen” could also mean “common” media, sometimes displaying news of lesser quality. It could cease to practise citizens’ journalism when it comes to filtering opinions and forums of discussion. This is partly an indicator of their belonging to “hybrid” contexts but also a proof that the promotion of one’s own opinion and propaganda is also a corollary of the citizens’ media. In that sense, these media outlets are not “neutral” and “objective” but militant and committed.

One of the main paradoxes we could discern in the cases of these media websites is that the more they strive to depart from classical media models and restrictions, the more they look for classical media recognition or at least reproduction

15 “The life span of alternative media in a hybrid configuration” Fadma Aït Mous & Driss Ksikes to gain more visibility. That is exactly what happened in both cases, when internationally renowned media like Al Jazeera, Le Courrier international or El Pais quoted them or re-published some articles. But this classical media recognition also becomes a source of trouble since the limitations and pressures they receive happen every time later. As if being alternative condemns them to targeting only a minority. And that’s where their paradox lies. Alternativeness brings reputation, which brings, in turn, surveillance and control.

Of course, this tragic circle is made inevitable because of the scarcity of financial support and the precarious state of these media structures and their human resources. The business model of both alternative media outlets we studied, when not based on volunteering, relies at best on low salaries and international unofficial NGO subsidies, which makes them vulnerable.

Finally, it looks like the hybridity framework helps understand how the political economy configuration in which the alternative media are born makes them even more fragile. This doesn’t exclude actors’ interventions and interactions. It encompasses them. But the arbitrary status of these political contexts doesn’t seem to leave enough space for risk-taking in public spheres, which makes younger generations indifferent, frustrated, struggling for voice or looking elsewhere.34

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Endnotes 1. When asked whether they connected to social media, 210 out of 2000 said that they did, but not using Moroccan websites. 2. Academic literature on transition paradigms, or what is commonly known as transitology, tend to be evolutionist, believing in the possible “progress” and in changes which accompany any unavoidable “democratic transition”. The notion of hybridity – a mixture of institutional features which are typical of a democracy with other institutions typical of an autocracy – is equally promoted by certain analysts (Diamond, 2002; Belghazi, 2005; Chadwick, 2013) as an alternative means of interpretation, as it could enable us to study the way various national political systems work in countries such as Morocco. 3. Hillgers, Mathieu. Espaces publics liminaires en contextes semi-autoritaire. http://sens- public.org (June 2014). 4. https://www.indymedia.org. 5. The movement’s initial page on Facebook was originally set up by cyber activists, but the choice of date was preceded by political debates among activists and political militants. 6. Personal interview with Ali Anouzla by Driss Ksikes, Dominique Marchetti and Abdelfattah Benchenna (March 2016) in a research project on “Political economy of press companies in Morocco”. 7. https://www.indymedia.org. 8. https://www.lakome.com. 9. Personal interview with Ali Anouzla by Driss Ksikes, Dominique Marchetti and Abdelfattah Benchenna (March 2016). 10. Henry Jenkins, Convergence culture, where and old and new media collide; (ed.) New York University Press, 2006. 11. Personal interview with Ali Anouzla by Driss Ksikes, Dominique Marchetti and Abdelfattah Benchenna (March 2016). 12. Acronym for the Mouvement Alternatif des Libertés Inividuelles (Alternative Movement for Individual Liberties), known since 2009 for its political events in the public sphere. 13. http://www.slateafrique.com/1047/lakome-petit-wikileaks-maroc. 14. On Ignacio Cembrero’s blog in El Pais (now removed). 15. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/morocco-should-drop-absurd-charges-against- a-journalist/2014/05/18/668b8f46-dd0c-11e3-bda1- 9b46b2066796_story.html?utm_term=.530c12268bf0. 16. This loan is considered a “lesson” for the founders of the site. Here is the video of Bougrine posted on the site: http://24.mamfakinch.com/video-70866. His photo-symbol with the slogan of mamfakinch (in Arabic), which is at the bottom right of the site: https://www.mamfakinch.com. 17. Mohamed Bougrine (1935–2010), is known by the title of “political prisoner of the three kings” because he was imprisoned under Mohammed V in 1960 for having participated in an armed revolt in Tadla Azilal. Then again under Hassan II (1973 and 1983). And in 2007 under the current king, Mohammed VI. He is also known to be the “oldest political prisoner in Morocco”, having spent 16 years of his life in prison. URL: http://www.bladi.net/mohamed-bougrine-mort.html (page accessed July 15th 2012). 18. The IER is a “National Commission for Truth, Equity and Reconciliation”, created by the king in 2004. Its mission is to shed light on what has been commonly called “the years of lead in Morocco”. That is to say, state crimes, specifically forced disappearances and arbitrary detentions between 1956 and 1999. 19. “La recherche de toute la vérité, la détermination des responsabilités, la poursuite judiciaire des responsables qui ont trempé dans les exactions du passé et la poursuite du travail de l’IER, “entaché de lacunes”, selon les dirigeants du Forum Vérité et Justice”. Mdidech, Jaouad. “Forum vérité et justice: dix ans après, “mamfakkinche”” in La Vie éco, 14/12/ 2009. 20. After three weeks of protests, the king made a speech on March 9th 2011 announcing his willingness to reform the constitution. His gesture was not a response to the M20F

17 “The life span of alternative media in a hybrid configuration” Fadma Aït Mous & Driss Ksikes

protests. Rather, the constitutional reform continued the projects the king had already begun after his accession to the throne, especially when implementing regionalisation processes. The day after his speech, the king appointed a constitutional reform commission (CCRC). This commission’s mission was to hear the various players on the Moroccan political and social scene (political parties, trade unions and non-government organisations from civil society; the M20F had been invited, but refused to be auditioned). On the basis of these auditions and the players’ memorandums, the commission developed the project of the new constitution. The draft was submitted to the king who presented it in his speech made on June 17th 2011 launching the referendum campaign. After a referendum campaign chequered by mobilisations and counter- mobilisations of the protesters in favour of a “yes’’ vote and the M20F in favour of a boycott, the project was widely adopted through the ballot box on July 1st 2011 (98.5% “yes” votes). Following this, early elections were held on November 25th. The party of Justice and Development, a so-called moderate Islamist party, emerged victorious. 21. Aïcha Akalay, “Mamfakinch. Arme de communication massive”, Telquel Magazine, no.479. URL: http://www.telquel-online.com/archives/479/mag1_479.shtml (accessed July 2nd 2012). 22. URL: https://www.mamfakinch.com/a-propos/. 23. http://24.mamfakinch.com/pages/my-makhzen-me-film. 24. http://www.youtube.com/Mamfakinch. 25. https://www.facebook.com/OpenMakhzen/info (accessed Sept 12th 2012). 26. The Mamfakinch collective, the name adopted by the site’s team, is made up of young people between aged between 21 and 44. They are human rights activists, cyber activists without political affiliation. Highly educated, they are mastering the web resources. In terms of funding, the collective does not receive any. One member said: “We do not receive any funding. Mamfakinch costs us practically nothing at all”. The values advocated by Mamfakinch are democracy, freedom, respect for human rights and above all the right of access to information – “Information often ignored or even distorted by other more or less official media” site. Aïcha Akalay, “Mamfakinch. Arme de communication massive”, Telquel Magazine, no.479. URL: http://www.telquel- online.com/archives/479/mag1_479.shtml. 27. Global voices is a non-profit foundation of bloggers and/or translators from around the world, founded in 2004. Its mission is to “promote global dialogue on the Web by selecting, translating and publishing information published on blogs and networks of Social media from around the world to provide new insights into places, events and people who are little covered by traditional media”. URL: http://globalvoicesonline.org. 28. Aïcha Akalay, “Mamfakinch. Arme de communication massive” in Telquel Magazine, no. 479. URL: http://www.telquel-online.com/archives/479/mag1_479.shtml (accessed July 2nd 2012). 29. Romain Lecomte, “Internet et la reconfiguration de l’espace public tunisien: le rôle de la diaspora”, tic&société [Online], vol. 3, no 1–2, 2009, uploaded January 12th 2010. 30. “Maroc: La révolution est-elle en marche? Le point de vue d'un jeune militant”. URL: http://voicesofyouth.org/posts/maroc-la-r%C3%A9volution-est-elle-en-marche-le-point- de-vue-dun-jeune-militant. 31. Aïcha Akalay, “Mamfakinch. Arme de communication massive” in Telquel Magazine, no.479. URL : http://www.telquel-online.com/archives/479/mag1_479.shtml. 32. https://www.mamfakinch.com/%d9%85%d8%a7%d9%85%d9%81%d8%a7%d9%83%d 9%8a%d9%86%d8%b4-%d9%81%d9%83%d8%b1%d8%a9- %d9%85%d8%a8%d 8%af%d8%b9%d8%a9-%d8%b3%d9%86%d8%a9-2011-%d9%84%d9%85- %d8%aa%d8%b9%d8%af-%d9%83%d8%b0%d9%84%d9%83-%d9%81/#more-10428. 33. Cardon, Dominique and Fabien Granjon, Médiactivistes, Les Presses de Sciences Po, 2013. 34. Hirschman, 1970.

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References Akalay, Aïcha. “Mamfakinch. Arme de communication massive” in Telquel Magazine, no. 479, 2012. URL: http://www.telquel- online.com/archives/479/mag1_479.shtml (accessed 2 July 2012).

Atton, C. “Reshaping social movement media for a new millennium”. Social Movement Studies 2(1), 2003.

Benchenna, Abdelfattah, Ksikes, Driss and Dominique Marchetti. “Press companies in Morocco: a very political economy”. Journal of North African Studies, 2017(forthcoming).

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Datchary, Caroline. “Ce que le web 2.0 fait à l’autonomie journalistique” in: La subjectivité journalistique (ed. Cyril Lemieux), EHESS, 2010

Diamond, Larry Jay. “Thinking about hybrid regimes”, Journal of Democracy, vol. 13, no. 2, April 2002, pp. 21–35, 2002.

Ferron, Benjamin. “Giving Voice to the Voiceless? The Ambivalent Institutionalization of ‘Minorities’ Alternative Media in Mexico and Israel/Palestine” in: Rigoni, Isabelle and Eugénie Saitta (eds.), Mediating Cultural Diversity in a Globalised Public Space. Palgrave MacMillan, 2012.

Fuchs, C. “Alternative Media as Critical Media”. European Journal of Social Theory 13(2): 173–192, 2010.

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Gourdon, Celie. “Le journalisme citoyen sur la toile arabe: l’exemple de Mamfakinch.com”, posted by m1Jlyon2, 30th January 2012. URL: http://horizonsmediatiques.wordpress.com/2012/01/30/le-journalisme-citoyen-sur-la- toile-arabe-lexemple-de-mamfakinch-com/ (accessed 6 July 2012).

Albert O. Hirschman. Exit, Voice, and Loyalty: Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations, and States. Pp. x, 162. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1970

Jenkins, Henry. Convergence culture: Where old and new media collide, N.Y. University Press, 2008.

Lecomte, Romain. “Internet et la reconfiguration de l’espace public tunisien: le rôle de la diaspora”, tic&société (online), vol. 3, no. 1–2, 2009, uploaded 12 January 2010. URL: http://ticetsociete.revues.org/702 (accessed 11 July 2012).

Mdidech, Jaouad. “Forum vérité et justice: dix ans après, “mamfakkinche”” in: La Vieéco, 14/12/ 2009. URL: http://www.lavieeco.com/news/societe/forum-verite-et- justice-dix-ans-apres-mamfakkinche--15320.html (accessed 15 February 2011).

Plenel, Edwy. Le droit de savoir, Seuil (Points), 2013.

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The SAHWA Project (“Researching Arab Mediterranean Youth: Towards a New Social Contract”) is a FP-7 interdisciplinary cooperative research project led by the Barcelona Centre for International Affairs (CIDOB) and funded by the European Commission. It brings together fifteen partners from Europe and Southern and Eastern Mediterranean countries to research youth prospects and perspectives in a context of multiple social, economic and political transitions in five Arab countries (Morocco, , Tunisia, Egypt and Lebanon). The project expands over 2014-2016 and has a total budget of €3.1 million. The thematic axis around which the project will revolve are education, employment and social inclusion, political mobilisation and participation, culture and values, international migration and mobility, gender, comparative experiences in other transition contexts and public policies and international cooperation.

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