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Citizen Journalism
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Add to FavoritesCitizen Journalism vs. Professional Journalism: Agendas for Everyone
"Don't believe everything you read," reads the traditional reader's proverb.
Certainly, readers must weigh the content of anything they consume, be it daily newspapers, online articles, television news reports or even classic literature. Public gullibility can be contagious, particularly with the popularity of self publishing and social networking sites. Readers may spot a story somewhere. Clicking a few keys, they may find the same information confirmed many times over by others.
Today, anyone can be a blogger, and a single post can become a viral rumor in an instant.
On the other hand, public trust of large-scale news outlets may be at an all-time low. People tend to distrust organized media. Political conservatives tag the media too liberal. Liberals claim certain media outlets are too conservative.
Citizen journalism has flourished in this wary climate.
What is citizen journalism?
Basically, citizen journalism began as a cottage industry, as online publishing communities invited lay writers to produce content and publish online. Sites such as Helium and Associated Content quickly grew into valid contenders for online readership.
The traditional publishing community quickly took notice. Some shunned citizen journalism as shared ignorance. Others immediately seized upon the seemingly unlimited resource of content that citizen writers might produce in their areas of personal interest and professional expertise.
Of course, the quality of citizen journalism can vary greatly, from slipshod posting to carefully researched and fact-checked reporting.
Many citizen journalists are also professional journalists.
In truth, many professional journalists have participated in citizen journalism opportunities. Even full-time professional journalists may freelance as citizen journalists, as a route towards beefing up professional publication portfolios, gaining additional exposure, building a web presence and earning additional income.
Some seasoned writers have adopted pseudonyms, or pen names, for their citizen journalism pursuits. Others have simply used their professional names.
Careful readers can quickly spot a well-written article, and they can also pick out an opinionated tirade. Usually, in time, the best material is rated well, recommended by readers and optimized by online search engines.
Whom can readers trust?
If the proverbial pen is truly mightier than the sword, then it surely is essential for readers to discern truth from myth or mere ranting. Should readers trust citizen journalists or professional journalists more?
A citizen journalist will certainly write from his own point of reference. Based on this vantage, the citizen journalist's work will likely reflect his own biases, opinions and personal experiences. Most often, a citizen journalist enjoys the liberty to develop his own topics of interest or, at least, to select which writing assignments to accept.
A professional journalist, on the other hand, may be somewhat bound by the ideologies of his employer. The professional journalist generally must cover the topics assigned by his editor or publisher. And the professional journalist's content may be lightly or heavily edited by the organization that employs him.
In either case, journalism may be a valuable source of public information, but readers must be judicious about adopting printed words (online, on paper or on the air) as Gospel truth. A careful reader, who measures multiple reputable sources against one another, is a well-informed reader.
Learn more about this author, Linda Ann Nickerson.
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No
Show me a "citizen journalist" and I will show you somebody who is either pushing a personal agenda or just writing for the fun of it. The first type of writer champions every rumor that agrees with his or her big idea; the second kind is a butterfly, skipping from topic to topic and sipping the nectar of ideas without ever getting to the root of any issue.
How could anybody believe that this kind of writer is more to be trusted than a professional journalist?
Oh, I know: we are all aware of the pressures journalists come under from their editors, their managements and their advertisers. Those pressures are real and can lead to distortions in the way that news is presented, but does that mean that people writing with no pressure on them at all are automatically being fair and balanced? Of course not. Journalists do at least have a professional and moral obligation to be fair and balanced in reporting events, "citizen journalists" are under no obligation at all.
And ask yourself this: how many real "citizen journalists" are there? How many people are researching and reporting the big social and political issues of the day (and by "researching" I do not mean reading a couple of on-line articles and then rehashing them?). There are hardly any.
The few bloggers who have made a real contribution to understanding events - people like "Riverbend" in Baghdad or Salman Pax in Belgrade - have been unfortunate enough to have history ripping lives apart all around them. They had access to events and communities that were beyond the reach of traditional journalists. They are the exceptions, not the rule and, again, they were writing about things that were very close to their hearts.
Among the advantages that professional journalists have, the things that make their work more credible and trustworthy than that of bloggers, is the fact that they are paid to investigate events that are often of no personal interest to them. Their job is to find out as much as possible, assess the information and present it in a way that is fair to both sides.
A journalist has to be careful, because if he tells lies he and his newspaper or broadcaster are liable to get sued. He may also be the subject of complaints to his editor that could put his job and livelihood at risk. When a blogger lies, he has no boss that you can complain to and it is unlikely to be worth suing.
Journalists are meant to check their facts to ensure the information they print is reliable. If their stories repeatedly fall short, they will find themselves out of work. Bloggers can publish the latest rumor that they heard in a bar as absolute fact and nobody will complain about it, they may even persuade people it is true.
One function of the traditional media has been to divide fact from fiction and publish only the facts. Oh, I know, there are plenty of times it hasn't worked, but there is still more truth in the newspapers than there is in barroom chatter, and barroom chatter is what the blogosphere is all about. How many half-baked conspiracy theories about 9-11 have surfaced on the Internet? How many continue to be repeated and rehashed even after they have been comprehensively disproved? And how much time have experts had to waste rebutting theories based on half-understood "science", such as the "proof" that the twin towers were demolished by explosives because puffs of smoke could be seen coming from between the floors as it fell?
I've been a journalist most of my working life and I've met a few colleagues who were no more reliable than the average conspiracy theorist. However, I haven't seen many blogs that could match even an average, honest run-of-the-mill reporter for accuracy and the uncovering of new facts, let alone match the achievements of the best of the investigative breed.
So let's not kid ourselves: citizen journalism is all about being able to spout your opinions about things you happen to be interested in and has very little to do with the real work of journalism, which records the history of our lives, hunts out abuses and seeks to help to protect the weaker members of society from abuses by the strong.
After all, professional journalists all started out as young people with at least as many ideals as the next citizen; maybe more, as journalism isn't calculated to make you rich, but it does allow you to contribute to society. Some journalists lose their ideals, but a surprising number cleave to them throughout their lives and even risk and sometimes suffer death in pursuit of the principle of the public's right to know. How many bloggers would do as much?
Learn more about this author, Paul Cowan.
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