ONLY INDEPENDENCE CAN SAVE US NOW We made this magazine because we’re always looking for new ideas. We made this magazine because we love to share the people, places and innovations from around the world which inspire us. We made this magazine because we like to create things that real people want to spend time with. We made this magazine because we thought you’d find it more interesting than an email newsletter. We made this magazine because we like to market ourselves in the way we’d like to market you. We made this magazine because we believe in independence. INDEPENDENCE. Issue Number 1 of an occasional series ISSUE 1 Created, written and designed by Independents United with the help of some of our more independent friends and partners around the world. Four things struck us putting together this first issue of Independence: Speak to us at +44 (0)20 7748 5208 | Find us at iu-hq.com The first is how much independent creatives and business owners seem to enjoy what they do. In all our interviews – Printed on Cyclus Offset (made from 100% post-consumer waste paper) by Principal Colour in Kent [email protected] whether with the founders of Peppersmith or Sipsmith in our Independent People section starting on p.26, the owners of independent coffee bars featured on p.22, or the music people featured from p.42 – no one mentioned the recession © Independents United Ltd 2010 once, even though these are largely small businesses. The point is not that any of these people are unambitious about the financial success of what they do, it’s just that they have other motivations too, which keep you going even when times are tough. The second is that independence isn’t the same as a desire to be alone. A constant refrain – for example from the very in demand art director Kate Moross on p.40 – is the difference between working with people and working for people. That desire to collaborate and be in an environment of like-minded people has fuelled the extraordinary growth of the creative IDEAS > EXPERIENCES > CONTENT iu-hq.com industries, and art and music in particular, in Berlin. We profile the city with contributions from music producer and label head Mark Reeder, who moved there from Manchester, and the city’s own governing mayor, on p.10. And crowdsourcing (p.19) is developing to create platforms which move beyond a network of individuals to facilitating the kind of group collaboration in which independent people thrive. Businesses need independent thinking – finding innovations which break free of the assumptions upon which their current success was built, and finding more sustainable models. On p.16 we profile some of the companies finding sustainable solutions to the world’s problems, and – the third point to strike us – uncovering profitable opportunities along the way. And the final thing – with which we lead off this issue – is commitment. Independence is more than just a positioning, it’s a belief system and something to fight for. Among those fighting for it – and risking their lives for it – are the staff of The Zimbabwean, a remarkable newspaper edited in London, printed in South Africa and trucked into its target market in Harare. Its editor shares his story overleaf. CONTINUE THE CONVERSATION AT INDEPENDENCEMAG.TUMBLR.COM “It is very important to be INDEPENDENT. It means that you are only responsible to yourself. With The Zimbabwean we are FREE OF ALL POLITICAL PRESSURE WE ARE FREE OF ECONOMIC INTERESTS. We do not have advertisers who impose their will on us. We’re also free of investors, which is another area where there can be conflict between the editorial and the financial interests of people looking for a return on investment above the interests of news reporting. WE ARE FREE OF ALL OF THESE. We own the newspaper ourselves, andWE we don’t PUBLISH have to compromise FOR ANY INTERESTS AT ALL.” Wilf Mbanga, editor of The Zimbabwean 5 Wilf Mbanga is the founder, editor and publisher After realising that his old friend had turned into of independent newspaper The Zimbabwean. a ‘tyrant’, he became a founding member of the opposition Daily News, which was bombed shut He runs it from the UK because he was exiled by the dictator in 2003. Since then he has fought for his anti-government voice by Robert Mugabe ever more for freedom of press and freedom of – the very same Robert Mugabe who was a information for his fellow Zimbabweans, as an close friend of Wilf’s in the 1970s, who gave him alternative to the forced diet of ‘government exclusive interviews and who made him editor of propaganda’. the state-run news agency. The Zimbabwean is created in the UK, printed in South Africa, then trucked to Harare and distributed in the city three times a week. How important is freedom of independent thought? How powerful can words be? Although you’re based in UK, your words are heard in Zimbabwe three times a It’s something that I’m prepared to fight for. It’s the best thing you can have in life – to be week. independent of other people and their influences. You can think for yourself and express yourself We have been able to carry stories that no other newspaper would normally carry. We’re also very fully. To be able to make up my mind on information I have received, and then make a choice. That is strong on human rights issues. We are lucky enough and unique to highlight human rights abuses, why it is so important for me to inform the people of Zimbabwe, because they cannot make up their we talk about good governance and we highlight cases of corruption. Now people expect us to tell minds unless they have been informed. them the stories that they would not be able to read in the other Zimbabwean newspapers. We have recently been highlighting the corruption that the government have been allowing hunting in Do you think people in the ‘west’ take freedom of information and press for granted? the [protected] National Parks, and I have been told that some of the elephants have become very I think they do. In the UK there is a whole array of newspapers every single day, which gives different aggressive because they now associate cars with guns. We had an incredible impact with that story, viewpoints. This is fantastic and healthy for the nation. Whereas in Zimbabwe they didn’t have we had somebody at the National Parks who was disgruntled with what was going on and they that ‘til we came along. The people are fed a diet of government propaganda. Nobody is allowed fed us very accurate information – we had names of people and vehicle numbers, dates and places to have a private TV or radio station, it is all government owned. The government owns the three and they could not deny it. After that story, one South African hunter went to America for a hunting national daily newspapers, and five national weeklies. So there is an overbearance of government convention and he was challenged and kicked out of that meeting as a result of what we had written. information and propaganda. There are only two independent newspaper groups that publish He came back and threatened to sue us, which I was fine with as I had the information. In the end he weekly. None of us publish daily. The government make it difficult for anyone to start a daily started begging us, because we had destroyed his hunting business. We said if he stopped hunting newspaper there. The Zimbawean comes out Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. The government in the National Parks, we’d stop writing about him. still try and disrupt our operations. They have been arresting the distributors in Harare. In the past four weeks, they’ve been arrested four times. 7 How do you fact check and make sure your stories are accurate? What do you think will happen to the country when Robert Mugabe eventually stands down – be it through We’ve got about 14 reporters, they write their stories, and they double-check. It is very difficult for death or ill health? them, as the government does not talk to them. We also employ, clandestinely, some reporters who It depends how he goes. If he were to have a heart attack and die, or someone was to take a pot shot work for government media who use pseudonyms. It is the only way for us to get some stories, as at him, then that could cause a serious problem. I can see bloodshed under those circumstances. we can’t go openly to press conferences, for example. We let the government employees go and There are three factions within his party, and they hate each other as much as they hate the MPC, then they write their piece for their employer and send another story to us. Sometimes they write if not more. The problem there is that each of those factions is backed by men with guns. So there it, send it to me and then I will ring the officials concerned and ask for comment. Sometimes that could be warfare for a while they sort out who comes out on top. If he hands over power to someone forces them to speak. in his party or it changes in an election, then I can see peace. But then, he could hand over to one of his acolytes, [such as] Joice Mujuru, who is really just a front for her husband, who is very corrupt, Your history is well documented and is a very interesting story.