Participative Journalism

Fig.1 Citizen Journalism (2014)

We currently live in a new digital era where news is now broadcast almost everywhere, on the radio, in newspapers, magazines, online via articles and discussion groups, on social networking sites and many more. This has led to a growth in participative journalism, "when the people formerly known as the audience employ the press tools they have in their possession to inform one another." (Rosen, 2008). 

The audience can now be producers as well as consumers of the news. "When major events occur, the public can offer us as much new information as we are able to broadcast to them. From now on, news coverage is a partnership." (Sambrook, 2013). Citizen Journalism makes up a crucial part of the news, many refer to it as the 'first draft' of the story because often citizens can get to the news story before camera crews and real journalists. 

In a 2009 TED Talk Clay Shirky talks about Bill Cheswick's map of the internet. Unlike phones that have a 'one to one' pattern, and radio and television that have a 'one to many' pattern, the world wide web has a 'many to many' pattern. Nowadays the internet is the "motive carriage for all other media" as every medium is accessible online and right next door to each other, the internet allows consumers to 'gather round and talk to each other'. The power of the internet gives anybody the opportunity to capture and distribute news online. 

Whilst researching I came across the CNN iReport Facebook page, "Sharing the news through your eyes. Go to CNNiReport.com or use the CNN app to upload your photos, videos and personal essays". The page has over 300,000 fans. CNN has provided a place for the general public to voice their opinions and become story tellers, they have given users a platform to express themselves. "Digital Storytelling has been a flagship project. It takes the tools of digital media production into communities and enables people to tell their stories in their own way." (Rosen, 2008). However can these stories be trusted? As I researched further I came across an article discussing the trustworthiness of citizen journalism; in 2008 a post was written on iReport by an ordinary citizen about the hospitalisation of Steve Jobs, numerous news stations then picked up this story and took it viral. In the end it was found that the story was faked and the news stations had to issue formal apologies. "The problem with this seemingly efficient and enhanced news system lies in how much credibility to afford the citizens' contributions" (Leibowits, 2014).

Fig.2 Top-Down V Bottom-Up News (2003)

Participatory journalism is a 'bottom-up' phenomenon, as you can see from figure 2, compared to broadcast media it is not interfered with before it is released. Civilian news is often regarded as 'raw' and 'uncut' as no organisation has disrupted the publishing, the news has not been twisted by the media to show us just what they want us to see. “The new interactive medium both threatens the status quo and promises an exciting new way of learning about the world” (Fuller, 1996), Fuller says that participative journalism is changing the news, as essentially everybody is 'a journalist' now. It is an exciting time, as people who might not have had a platform to do so before can now publish their views and opinions to an audience.

Bibliography

Figure 1. 'Citizen Journalism' (2014) [photograph of graffiti] At: http://sharahmak.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/we-are-citizen-journalism.jpg [Accessed 9 Nov. 2014]

Figure 2. 'Top-Down V Bottom-Up News' (2003) [Diagram of news model] At: http://www.hypergene.net/wemedia/weblog.php?id=P36 [Accessed 9 Nov. 2014]

Sambrook, R. (2013). Citizen Journalism and the BBC. 1st ed. [ebook] Available at: http://www.encoreleaders.org+Nieman-Reports-_-Citizen-Journalism-and-the-BBC.pdf [Accessed 9 Nov. 2014].

Rosen,  J. (2008). PressThink: A Most Useful Definition of Citizen Journalism. [online] Available at: http://archive.pressthink.org/2008/07/14/a_most_useful_d_p.html [Accessed 9 Nov. 2014]. 

Leibowitz, M. (2014). Drawbacks of Citizen Journalism. [online] Salzburg.umd.edu. Available at: http://www.salzburg.umd.edu/lessons/citizen-journalism [Accessed 9 Nov. 2014].

Fuller, J. (1996). News values. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Bowman, S. and Willis, C. (2003). How audiences are shaping the future of news and information. 1st ed.

Shirky, C. (2009). Clay Shirky: How social media can make history [Video File]. Retrived from: http://www.ted.com/talks/clay_shirky_how_cellphones_twitter_facebook_can_make_history?language=en