Citizen Journalism vs. Traditional Journalism

“Popular newspapers, the mass newspapers, are dying and will die. They have no future whatsoever. I’m sad to see newspapers go. I worked on them for 40 years,” (Greenslade, 2008).

Has citizen journalism killed the need for traditional journalists?

This week in class, we explored public and citizen journalism and how we can benefit from new realms of news reporting.

So, with the move away from one-way media streaming to a focus on two-way communication between the public and the media, why exactly should we reform journalism in Australia? And, if we don’t do something to change it, will traditional journalism and the ‘newsroom’ in fact die?

Some of the benefits of citizen journalism have been identified as:

1.      Diversity of opinion

2.      Quick dissemination of information

3.      Wider range of sources

4.      Powerful coverage i.e. citizens are there, right in the mix of things

This video demonstrates the power of citizen journalism: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySEIK-I8I-Q

But, is citizen journalism just “sloppy technique” (Tapsall & Varley, 2008)? Are people really willing to ‘believe anything these days’?

I think traditional journalism needs to embrace aspects of citizen journalism and public journalism in order to survive and keep the public’s interest and trust. People still have a hunger for journalism but traditionalists need to understand the increasing number of diverse ways to find, capture and tell a story. Audience participation is a large part of this. The key is, people don’t just want to consume anymore. The public wants to be involved in the stories and consequently be a part of the problem solving. In an attempt to re-engage with an increasingly distant public, journalism needs to expand its traditional ways.

But where does this leave journalism as the Fourth Estate?

This outdated notion of journalism as the public’s “watchdog” emerged from the 19^th Century and still today, relies on notions such as “objectivity and professionalism to support this stance” (Tapsall & Varley, 2008).  In doing so, the media have lost the public’s interest and have “alienated” the ‘citizen’, loosing creditability and detaching themselves from the community, all in the name of objectivity.

Tapsall and Varley (2008) state the traditionalist view sees journalists have the maxim: “tell it as it is and let the chips fall as they may”...but perhaps this isn’t good enough anymore. If journalists continue along the path of traditionalism the consequences will affect the media’s profitability and the public’s participation in wider political processes.

So, my advice? Let the public and the citizen have their say but keep the core journalistic structures like the inverted pyramid and codes of ethics and objectivity in place. We don’t need to compromise our beliefs in order to incorporate the public into our work. Whether we like it or not, things will inevitably change and journalism will continue to evolve, with or without our cooperation!

Bibliography:

Greenslade, R. 2008.  ‘Introduction’, The Future of Journalism Summit, May 2008, accessed 12^th August 2010, http://www.thefutureofjournalism.org.au/life-in-the-clickstream/54-introduction

Tapsall, S. & Varley, C. 2008. Journalism Theory in Practice, Oxford University Press: Victoria.

 Youtube. 2010. Katie Couric's Top Citizen Journalism Moments on YouTube, posted 10 May 2010, accessed 11th August 2010, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySEIK-I8I-Q