Ever since 9/11 took citizen journalism, ordinary people
on the street giving their side of the stories dominating the
headlines, to the next level, the desire for the genre has grown.
From the Iraq war, and the current race for the White House,
people everywhere are having their say.
Web video, along with sites such as Twitter, is playing a big
part in this, with vlogging becoming more popular every day.
YouTube Takes It Mainstream
YouTube
recently introduced an entire channel for citizen journalism and
reporters, causing many to applaud it for its foresight. While I agree
that a channel devoted to citizen journalism on a mainstream site like
YouTube is a good thing, citizen journalists don’t need the approval of
a mainstream web site to be heard.
We are already attuned to their
message – we hear them loud and clear.
There are already powerful citizen journalists showcasing
their work and getting their message out all over the web.
Citizen Journalists Already Out There
From Collateral
on BlipTV to the individual bloggers
and Twitter users
who broadcast the news as they see it happen every day on up to Michael
Moore,
who made a big career out of the citizen journalist style of
reporting.. they are already on the internet, on your television
screen, at the movies… in your face.
That said, how can being indexed into channels on a more
mainstream internet site like YouTube
help citizen journalism as a whole? It gives the voices of the few one
more place to be heard to the many, for one thing.
Also, the
unfortunate truth is that the more mainstream the site, the more
everyday people accept the videos as news, as opposed to seeing them as
the rantings of a few internet kooks.
Vloggers = Journalists?
Are all vloggers and bloggers citizen journalists? No, I don’t
think
so, but they all have the potential to be. Are all citizen journalism
vlogs completely factual and devoid, no, but these days neither are
many mainstream news outlets like Fox News, quite frankly.
Citizen
journalism simply offers one more viewpoint on breaking news, allowing
another way for the average citizen to educate themselves about what is
really happening in the world around them.
Here To Stay?
Is citizen journalism here to stay? It should be, but if we
aren’t vigilant about issues like network neutrality
and recent attempts to monitor, throttle and otherwise control our
internet use, those voices could be silenced. That would be a loss for
all of us.
This article is based on a Profy post written by Leslie Poston.
