Online Citizen Journalism Now Undeniably Mainstream
It's interesting to see how the techniques and technologies of amateur, citizen journalists are adopted, co-opted, and integrated by the mainstream media. Take blogs, for example, which earlier in this decade seemed like just an outlet for amateur web publishers. Fast forward a few years and you'll be hard pressed to find any mainstream news source that doesn't embrace blogging in some way -- CyberJournalist.net lists 245 blogs run by mainstream news sites.
Earlier this week Nokia and Reteurs announced that they had partnered to create the 'Mobile Journalism Toolkit,' which teams a Nokia N95 cell phone with a keyboard, small tripod, and solar charger -- technologies often used by amateurs to capture local news. The toolkit has been deployed to select Reuters journalists to help them file stories from the field and use the cell phone's camera to take photos and videos of news events. "By running on handheld devices, rather than on bulkier laptop computers, the mobile journalism application enables us to create complete stories and file them for distribution, without leaving the scene," said Nic Fulton, Chief Scientist at Reuters.
For now, the toolkit is aimed at professional journalists, however Nokia acknowledged that citizen journalists themselves, not just their techniques, are being more often relied upon by mainstream news outlets. "'Citizen journalism' is beginning to embrace a wide range of public engagement with the media," said Timo Koskinen, project manager with Nokia Research Center, "from groups of contributors organized around subject or geographic areas to the casual participation of observers who are lucky - or unlucky - enough to be at the scene of a newsworthy event."
Current events in California have made the emerging symbiotic relationship between citizen journalists and the mainstream news media quite apparent. In order to report on the fires ravaging that part of the United States, many news outlets have solicited, and subsequently used, submissions from people capturing news with cell phone cameras and on blogs (and Twitter, Flickr, YouTube, etc.). Multimedia platform Veeker, which last week signed a deal with NBC to handle viewer uploads in 10 major cities, said that NBC San Diego recieved over 2000 submissions of pictures and video related to the wildfires. CNN's I-Reports section reportedly received about the same number of fire-related submissions (up dramatically from the number of submissions it received about the Virginia Tech shootings or the Missouri bridge collapse earlier this year). Note: Veeker has an interesting analysis about what they think made the citizen journalism efforts of NBC San Diego so successful on their blog.
"The real contribution of citizen journalists in a story like this, where whole areas of land are closed off and the fields of greatest danger keep shifting, is in having more eyes on the ground," Thomas Hollihan, a professor of media at the Annenberg School of Communication at the University of Southern California, told the Baltimore Sun. "Citizen journalists are swapping information back and forth - reporting where the flames are now headed or showing images on their cell phones of the fire. And with so much happening so quickly, that kind of information can be really powerful - if it is accurate."
Perhaps the biggest development in the citizen journalism space this year was the acquisition of Newsvine by MSNBC earlier this month. The news network framed the deal in terms of adding social features to MSNBC properties ("Coming together allows us to take advantage of the tremendous market opportunity to expand social media and community features across all of our brands," said MSNBC Interactive News President Charlie Tillinghast in a press release), but what it really gives the company is access to citizen journalists. The mainstream media clearly sees the value in tapping into the general populace to access a more extensive coverage network. When your viewers are your reporters, you can have the news covered wherever it breaks.
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Great article! CNN has a number of high-quality, eyewitness photos of the California wildfires submitted by local residents. It really helped paint an accurate picture of what was happening.
However, I'm under the impression the term journalism mainly refers to writing. This post focuses on the submission of user photos and video. While one can probably describe this as photo or video journalism, user submissions described here seem more like reporting. Or maybe simply the act of submitting photos and video for news sites supplement their own reports with. Does citizen journalism refer to something else?
Regardless of the technical definition, this user-submitted content was a great addition to larger news sites in covering the California Wildfires.
I think this idea is the one really important thing to come out of this whole Web 2.0 space. The idea that everyone, not just professional newsmakers, should be involved in the process is a huge step forward for mainstream media.
I really hope that this added technological boost is embraced by arm-chair journalists and helps them get on more even footing with their professional counterparts.
Interesting article. There are some concerns that I have not only with 'web' journalism but print journalism as well.
Oft times the author(s) posit a position or theory or new technology, etc. without listing the sources or backup addendum to support their story.
I fear we too often read something and take it for gospel. We then turn around and spread this "gossip" and the beat goes on.
We need to hold ourselves as well as others accountable for the "news" we all spread.
Journalism refers to a set of principles ascribed by news-gatherers, public or professionally. While much of the blog arena has migrated into traditional news sources (video contributions, social interaction, a breezier writing style), many of the keystones of traditional journalism (fact-checking, sourcing and style) are much slower to move to blogs. (I'm aware R/W/W has hired professional journalists; bravo for that.)
But the main point: journalism is more than technology.
A good point Ed but I guess I believe that we may need to take a measured look at what we really mean by "journalism". I would say that the vast majority of bloggers are not blogging full time.
As a result, they are neither paid enough nor incentived in the same way that professional journalists are. Can we really expect these people to go through the same process as someone who has the luxury of spending their days dealing with the news?
The answer to the question isn't as important as this next one. Even without fact checking and sourcing (though I would argue that one a bit), do bloggers in aggregate produce useful content? If the answer is yes, maybe we might want to relax our definitions of what journalism means. If no, then the point is moot.
Steve: True, only a fraction of the multi-million blogs created have a goal of journalism. The majority of blogs are opinion soapboxes with a limited audience. Holding that group to a higher standard is impractical.
However, the thought-leaders, the oft-quoted and sourced blogs can be counted on two hands. Additionally, they hold a trifecta: massive audience, media goals, and money. Small steps are being made toward adopting journalistic standards at these sites and that initial movement must continue.
In aggregate, blogs are not so much producers of journalistic content as pools of potential leades for journalists. One example: Slash.dot's user comments are a great way for beat reporters to stay in touch with what's perculating in the tech community.
I agree that sometimes the definition of journalism is too tightly written. What once involved seeing an event and describing it, has evolved into a near priesthood of professionalism. We can strip away some of the vestments without degrading the end product.
Great article. Putting the journalism debate aside, I'm interested as to why more audio blogging, aka podcasting, isn't done by the mainstream media. It seems their idea to embrace podcasting is to simply re-purpose audio from their television broadcasts.
Think, just as platforms like Veeker are capturing images and video, perhaps toll-free lines where witnesses call in on-the-scene reports would be effective.
I find it reassuring knowing that as citizens, we'll see the real story, despite how terrible it may be; and isn't that the purpose of journalism?
Good job. It is nice to see more and more live footage of real news than staged news by reporters who already plan out what they want to say ahead of time. What we need more is news from outside of America to show Americans the sheltered life they live.
1st Citizen Journalism News Portal in India
Merinews is a common platform to share news and debate over views and opinions. It is India’s first news portal based on the concept of Citizen Journalism where every citizen can be a prospective reporter. It takes essentials from both media – the Internet and conventional journalism – and tries to dissolve the hierarchical line between the journalist and the reader. The Internet operates with a higher degree of heterogeneity than a lot of other mediums. People have heard such concepts earlier, even when its potential to sustain multiplicity of opinions for a long time is questioned. It may not be the ideal and perpetual technology of multiculturalism, but reality is that the believers of democracy and free speech advocates have taken to it much more effectively than their critics, who keep coming back with a vengeance in conventional spaces.
Citizen Journalism is another name for gossip and tabloids.
Just like Wikipedia is not an authentic reliable source (close to reliable maybe), Citizen Journalism should be taken with lots of salt. And some sugar maybe.