Can CJ reporting be used by mainstream news TV?

Ira Basen has written about the trust worthiness of CJ generated news in an article on Maison Neuve, (Citizen Uprising). Traditional reporting has certain axioms such as “In the end, the discipline of verification is what separates journalism from entertainment, propaganda, fiction, or art.”

So what happens when main stream news broadcasts CJ news coverage of major events with out that important verification?

This quote is related to the recent uprising in Teharan...

Back in the US, the talking head on CNN was excited. Working at breakneck speed and in run-on sentences, he realized the technology that allowed the images he was seeing—fires in the street, stones hurled at helmeted police, tear gas—was a very big deal, almost as big as the story itself.

… and we’re going to keep following these things and pretty much before I pop on air we grab things that have come on literally within seconds, grab them, put them into a format that you can see them and share them with you on air because the Twitter universe I’ll tell you, is playing an historic and amazing role in what’s been going on …

If that anchor had gone to journalism school, he probably would have read a textbook called The Elements of Journalism, by Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel. And he probably would have been told to pay special attention to this sentence: “In the end, the discipline of verification is what separates journalism from entertainment, propaganda, fiction, or art.”

Can citizen journalism play a part in main stream news gathering?

Posted by Bob Toovey on 08 October 2009
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Small town bloggers doing it better than newspapers?

Newsweek has an interesting article about how small town bloggers are covering news before the local newspapers can get a chance. In the town of Millburn (N.J. USA), blogger Jennifer Connic covers everything, even minor traffic accidents.

From the article, Post-Newspaper Media Wars:Small-town news blogs

Then Jennifer Connic arrived in town. Connic, 32, is the editor of a Web site called Millburn.Patch.com, part of a chain of local sites called Patch.com, and since February she's been covering mundane events in this suburban town of 20,000 residents with a zeal most journalists re-serve for a big scoop. Connic shows up at so many auto accidents that for a time Millburn Fire Chief Michael Roberts began going too, just so he could deal with Connic's questions while his firefighters worked. At Millburn town hall, town administrator Timothy Gordon often spends part of his week alerting the Millburn Township Committee about what news Connic is likely to break next—so they hear it from him, not from her blog. For decades the locals got their news from a sleepy weekly newspaper, but now, with Connic, rival bloggers, and the "citizen journalists" they recruit walking the Millburn beat 24/7, Gordon sometimes has trouble staying abreast of town controversies. "They can come across problems before [town officials] know about them," Gordon says.

Posted by Bob Toovey on 07 October 2009
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CJ videos making it in to local press

Citizen Eye, who I have reported on before, is making headway in getting Citizen Journalism in to local press. They are now providing videos to go with stories in the Leicester based newspaper, This is Leicestershire.

Here is the link to the story (Protesters in action to save historic bridge) and the video is below.

 

Posted by Bob Toovey on 05 October 2009
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UK Government restrictions on photography, is too much?

The UK Governments decision to restrict photography in public is being seen as an over reaction. Limiting how citizen journalism can report on police and the military. Basheera Khan reports on this on the Telegraph technology blog...

This bit of derrière-cloaking opacity begs some awkward questions. Does the British government accept citizen journalism as “a reasonable excuse” for photographing police and other armed forces members covered by this Act?

Will the police round up anyone carrying a camera or cameraphone and demand to see proof of their status as “an innocent tourist”?

From Downing Street smacks down citizen journalism

Posted by Bob Toovey on 01 October 2009
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Survey of digital audiences offers Amazon reward

I have been contacted by Lyra McKee who doing research on digital news audiences. She has created a two part survey and for inspiration, she is offering a £30 Amazon certificate. Complete the survey and you will automatically entered in to the draw.

Lyra has assured me that all information will be kept confidential.

Survey part one and part two

Posted by Bob Toovey on 21 September 2009
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Is Obama a US citizen? A really simple question for congresspeople

Huffington Post, possibly the most well know Citizen Journalist site, sent Mike Stark to ask congresspeople a simple question. Do they believe that President Obama is a citizen of the United States. One managed to answer the question in full, others choose to walk away, run away or just ignore the reporter altogether.

Found via BoingBoing (Birther congresspeople run from Huffington Post video reporter)...

Funny video of congresspeople running away from a Huffington Post reporter because they don't want to answer the question, "Is Barack Obama is an American?" If they say yes, they will offend their birther wingnut base. If they say no, they will be seen as birther winguts. So, they run.

Huffington Post article by Mike Stark.

Posted by Bob Toovey on 28 July 2009
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The Blog Paper aims to take blogging to print

A new UK based citizen Journalism website called 'The Blog Paper' is trying to break in to paper publishing by printing what is regarded as top news from their site. Kind of bringing the Internet to those who still want to read the printed word. An interesting way to spread citizen journalism to the non connected public.

I fired off some questions to one of the guys behind the site, Anton von Waldburg

What was the main reason behind the site/project?

Offer citizen journalists a platform to publish their work online and in print:

Our ultimate goal is to create a freesheet which we want to publish in London. It will contain a review of the best content that has been submitted to our online communtiy theblogpaper.co.uk. We believe that there are vast amounts of quality content online, which seem to be getting far too little attention. We want to offer cititzen journalists, bloggers and other "content creators" the possibilty to be published in print and possibly reach out to a new readership, increase thier profile and hopefully redirect attention (traffic) back to thier personal blogs.

Highest rated and most discussed articles are being promoted to print:

Another important thing about The Blog Paper, is that we implemented a rating system which allows the community to "decide" what content is worth printing and read by others through the printed version of the blog paper. The community therefore "becomes" the editor of the Blog Paper (printed version). We believe that could enhance the quality of the actual content of the newspaper, and deliver a higher reader experience for the readership of the blog paper.

Several advantages for readers, bloggers and advertisers:

We believe that publishing "the best content" (as voted and discussed by the community) could create a distinctive character for the Blog Paper. Readers get a quick summary (in form of a newspaper) of quality content, or at least content that has been declared "quality content" by a community rather that a few editors. On the other hand advertisers are going to associate the content of their adverts only with the best content of the "Internet world" which we hope could make advertising in our sheet interesting. (at least we hope:))

What is the current membership level?

about 400 members

How long have you been online?

Only three weeks thats why we don't have that many users yet. Obviously we need to generate a substantial amount of users until we publish the first issue of the Blog Paper (which we plan to print by the end of September 2009) to get quantity as well as quality content posted on our site.

Have you any financial backing to help with costs?

We have several advantages to traditional news organizations one being that we can cut our editorial costs due to our self - regulatory system. We are currently negotiating with several angels and investors who are very interested, but we won't accept any offers until we don't know how the blogging community responds to The Blog Paper. We don't want to waste any money and until we print our costs are minimal.

 

Thanks to Anton for answering my questions and I wish him the best of luck for the new site.

Posted by Bob Toovey on 15 July 2009
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Update on Demotix Iran coverage

I recently recieved an update from Demotix with regard to their coverage of the unrest in Iran.

It proved to be a huge breakthrough for Demotix. We had two New York Times front pages, and were published by over 100 news outlets around the world, including the International Herald Tribune, the Times, NBC, BBC, El País and elsewhere. Demotix’ role in reporting the uprising became a story in its own right and was covered all over the world; the BBC interviewed Turi nine times (!), and we were featured by everyone from CNBC and Reuters to Le Monde and the Toronto Star.

There is more information on how traditional media reacted to Demotix on their blog. Good to see a CJ site do so well.

Posted by Bob Toovey on 12 July 2009
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Has internet journalism come of age? Interesting debate on video

The BBC published an interview on Wednesday hosted by Jeremy Paxman of Newsnight (UK TV) with Arianna Huffington of the Huffington Post and Anne McElvoy of the Evening Standard. The video lasts 5.32 minutes and contains some interesting stuff.

The questions debated is, has Internet journalism come of age?

Posted by Bob Toovey on 02 July 2009
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YouTube launches new service to aid journalists

YouTube has launched a new service to help and educated budding citizen journalists. The Reporters' Center features videos recorded by top journalists giving helpful advice. Katie Couric (CBS News) explaining how to conduct a good interview and Bob Woodward (Washington Post) on how to be an investigative reporter.

Posted by Bob Toovey on 30 June 2009
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