Indeed, a revolution of great magnitude is developing today, but at the molecular or microscopic level... Molecular revolution develops in relatively unknown areas.
—Felix Guattari

The articles in this volume chart movements and tactics and question the various ways we work as activists, media-makers and people who want to make change. They are report-backs on some of the supremely diverse range of idea-tools people are currently using for this purpose. Not all of them agree with each other, just like we in the collective sometimes don't; we think this is a positive and vital element of encouraging what Felix Guattari calls a 'molecular revolution'. We are all engaged in different, autonomous sites of struggle. Each has value.

It feels important to give a short history of the moment into which Rogue States erupts. A week ago, three activists in Gothenburg, Sweden, were shot during demonstrations against the European Union meeting. This is the first time we've seen police fire on so-called 'anti-globalisation' protestors. We are at a point where the usefulness of 'summit-hopping' is being questioned from both inside and outside the movement. It seems clear that continued mass mobilisations are still important for a variety of reasons, not least the social bonding and exchange of ideas that results from so many geographically dispersed groups converging on the same point at the same time. They have also acted as one catalyst for the growth of independent media outlets. But they are not the only forms of resistance available.

'Media' itself is now almost indistinguishable from the entire gamut of resistance tactics: from spraycan interventions on city walls, to indigenous uprisings in Mexico and Brazil, to 'art', to the simple act of conversation. But we need to think about whether these tactics need to be heading towards approximately the same space, and if so, what that space would be. It might seem obvious that our goal is a more sustainable planet where the people are responsible for their own affairs, where the livelihood and well-being of all the people—no matter where they come from—takes priority over the profits of a few. But if one thing has become clear, it's that 'the obvious' is no longer a reliable tool of thought, if it ever was. This is one of the many points on which members of the collective have disagreed.

As everyone 'becomes' the media, we still need to watch constantly where the power flows, who has it, and whether what we're doing is useful. When everything we do is at risk of constant commodification and misrepresentation by the corporate machine, it's even more important to interrogate and openly articulate who 'we' are. Rogue States is one such attempt.

Welcome to Rogue States, the Media Circus 2001 Reader. In the following pages you will find how-to guides, contacts for groups, articles, essays and a program guide for Media Circus 2001.

So, who are we then? And how did Rogue States come about?

A small collective of volunteers has organised Media Circus and Rogue States. We are interested in fostering a strong progressive and critical media culture and come from various places but are currently based in Melbourne. Our past and current involvements cover a broad range of media and cultural practice and activism, including melbourne.indymedia, S11 protests, National Young Writers Festival, exploring the sociology of activism, investigating surveillance, organising screenings and events, and facilitating email lists. We are students, academics, media makers, writers and people wanting to create a more sustainable future. Some of us do stuff with SKA TV, Voiceworks, Radio 3CR, Friends of the Earth and The Paper. Some of our names are Nik Beuret, Marni Cordell, Sam de Silva, Aizura Hankin, Alex Kelly, Rachel Maher, Lachlan Simpson, Shane McGrath and Karen Eliot.

We began the process of making this publication about eight weeks ago in a meeting, when someone said, 'What about the Media Circus program?' At first it was just an A5 booklet, maybe 20 pages. Then, suddenly, we were emailing everyone we knew (and lots of people we didn't) to ask for submissions, and it had grown exponentially into what you see here.

Selection of articles was managed through loose consensus; we read everything and the pieces that more or less everyone liked, or that a few people felt strongly about, got in. We also tried to solicit articles; but in a time frame of four weeks from calling for submissions to beginning editing, what we ended up with was what we published. The point is, anyone can do this—and you should. Some of us have previous experience in editing print media; some of us don't. All of us have learnt a lot in eight weeks.

We hope you like it.