The San Francisco Bay Area Independent Media Center, commonly known as Indybay, is the San Francisco Bay Area branch of the Independent Media Center, an all-volunteer organization which operates a community news website, Indybay.org, and in June 2004, began publishing a free news magazine, Fault Lines.
Indybay was established in early 2000; the domain name was registered on March 23, 2000; and by August 23, 2000, the website was online and functional.
Another event that helped pull in many early Indybay volunteers was the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) Conference that took place in September 2000 in San Francisco.
Local labor struggles, forest activism in Northern California and police brutality were quickly a focus of the early site.
Santa Cruz Independent Media Center started as its own separate site, but regionally integrated with Indybay in January 2006 as an autonomous page run by its own collective.