The technological world is changing, fast moving, more phones are in our hands, more cameras on the streets. Therefore it only makes sense that journalism must keep pace with this progression and be open to what the average citizen on the street has to deliver, whether it be an opinion, an image/description or a video.
There is an argument and one many see as correct, in suggesting that this new wave of user generated content (UGC) is lazy journalism. With UGC growing from a slow trickle into a steady torrent in the last eight years, some people have images of paid journalist, sitting back in the newsroom waiting for the stories to come to them from this new wave of citizen journalism.
But, is it lazy or does the citizen at the scene, with their own opinion and images, add a new dimension to a story that has been told or that is developing?
I have always viewed the profession of journalism of looking at something simple, something that affects people in everyday life, not just from one angle or view point, but from as many as possible. To deliver something objective, something that will open the mind, an opinion or stance that will create debate. Or an image or video that will help conclusiveness on whether a story is true or false.
Journalism now more than ever before has the tools to deliver this and it’s not from the newsroom but from you. People living the everyday life that is the setting for where these stories that are reported on take place. Barriers have been broken and reduced with citizen journalism. We now want to hear what people say more than ever before. And we should too! If we don’t have the opinions and views of others, we might as well settle into a cocoon.
The negativity is that there is a danger of hoaxes and people exaggerating and evening lying in order to deliver their opinion or get their images into the media. Cases of defamation may well rise due to greater interactivity of blogging and the topic and views that are sent into the World Wide Web. However, as long as journalists are sensible and continue to have their wits (something anyone in the profession should have and never lose), then we shouldn’t fear or retreat from citizen journalism or UGC, it should be embraced to help develop stories and be an aid of deliverance from a different angle.
I have attached a very sad news story from New York as an example of citizen journalism and how it has added to this piece. Without the UGC images that accompany this story, only words would have been able to describe what happened at the time as it is my understanding that the media were kept back. The images I think help show the viewing public what happened and how the police were in the wrong in the actions they took.
Please note video has since been removed for breaching terms of violation.
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