Unfettered 'citizen journalism' too risky (Dinosaur Media DeathWatch™)

It ranges from the CNN YouTube debates to political blogs to cellphone video of that sniper who opened fire at an Omaha Mall. These are all examples of so called "citizen journalism," the hot new extension of the news business where the audience becomes the reporter.

Supporters of "citizen journalism" argue it provides independent, accurate, reliable information that the traditional media don't provide. While it has its place, the reality is it really isn't journalism at all, and it opens up information flow to the strong probability of fraud and abuse. The news industry should find some way to monitor and regulate this new trend.

The premise of citizen journalism is that regular people can now collect information and pictures with video cameras and cellphones, and distribute words and images over the Internet. Advocates argue that the acts of collecting and distributing makes these people "journalists." This is like saying someone who carries a scalpel is a "citizen surgeon" or someone who can read a law book is a "citizen lawyer." Tools are merely that. Education, skill and standards are really what make people into trusted professionals. Information without journalistic standards is called gossip.

But unlike those other professions, journalism — at least in the United States — has never adopted uniform self-regulating standards. There are commonly accepted ethical principals — two source confirmation of controversial information or the balanced reporting of both sides of a story, for example, but adhering to the principals is voluntary. There is no licensing, testing, mandatory education or boards of review. Most other professions do a poor job of self-regulation, but at least they have mechanisms to regulate themselves. Journalists do not.

Pinging for reply op-ed column published today.

http://www.ajc.com/opinion/content/opinion/stories/2007/12/13/witted_1214.html

Citizen journalists: They don’t need to be regulated

By LEONARD WITT
Published on: 12/14/07
As the owner of the URL CitizenJournalism.org, I feel obligated to respond to David Hazinski’s opinion piece Thursday about citizen journalism, in which he wrote: “The news industry should find some way to monitor and regulate this new trend” (”Unfettered ‘citizen journalism’ too risky, @issue).

He doesn’t think the formerly passive news media audience members are very trustworthy. He adds: “Journalism schools such as mine at the University of Georgia should add courses to certify citizen journalists in proper ethics and procedures, much as volunteer teachers, paramedics and sheriff’s auxiliaries are trained and certified.”

I agree with him that journalism schools should offer training for citizens interested in the news media. In fact, the Department of Communication at Kennesaw State University, in which I teach, is about to introduce a new concentration entitled Journalism and Citizen Media. Although we might offer a Citizen Media certificate, I am far more interested in helping future journalists understand the power of citizen media involvement. I am totally opposed to “monitoring and regulating this new trend.”

For example, mainstream media have been guilty of what Mercedes Lynn de Uriarte of the University of Texas calls “censorship by omission.” The voices of the poor, the disenfranchised and minority groups often go unheard. Now citizen participation is an opportunity to get the disenfranchised heard. Who is going to certify which of those voices is most trustworthy? Will it be the members of the journalism profession, who are 86 percent white and almost 100 percent middle class? I hope not.

snip

http://citmedia.org/blog/2007/12/13/needed-regulation-to-prevent-journalists-turned-professors-from-embarrassing-themselves/

Needed: Regulation to Prevent Journalists-Turned-Professors from Embarrassing Themselves
December 13th, 2007 by Dan Gillmor
It’s hard to know where to begin in responding to David Hazinski’s “Unfettered ‘citizen journalism’ too risky,” an op-ed in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, where he calls for regulation of citizen journalism:

Supporters of “citizen journalism” argue it provides independent, accurate, reliable information that the traditional media don’t provide. While it has its place, the reality is it really isn’t journalism at all, and it opens up information flow to the strong probability of fraud and abuse. The news industry should find some way to monitor and regulate this new trend.

It is false, of course, that anyone who’s serious about this field argues that it’s entirely accurate or reliable (though it is often independent, and often covers what traditional media can’t or won’t spend time on). In fact, as many of us have been noting for years, accuracy ane reliability are key areas for improvement.

Then, having kindly allowed that this new media “has its place” — use the servant’s entrance, please — Hazinski removes it entirely from the realm of journalism, which is literally absurd.

And then, with the kind of hubris that sounds like a lampoon of a Big Media guy turned professor, he demands that the news industry regulate it all. (Could they first turn some of that regulatory sternness on themselves? More on that in a minute.)

Let’s note the one sound point in his generally bizarre piece: To the extent that traditional media organizations are going to bring their audiences into their journalism processes, they should insist doing things in an honorable and journalistically sound way. If he’d left it at that, Hazinski would have had a reasonable argument. But with dismaying lapses in fact and logic, he goes much further.

For example, consider this:

The premise of citizen journalism is that regular people can now collect information and pictures with video cameras and cellphones, and distribute words and images over the Internet. Advocates argue that the acts of collecting and distributing makes these people “journalists.” This is like saying someone who carries a scalpel is a “citizen surgeon” or someone who can read a law book is a “citizen lawyer.” Tools are merely that. Education, skill and standards are really what make people into trusted professionals. Information without journalistic standards is called gossip.

The bogus logic is standard-issue for the naysayers. Unpacking it:

snip

Once upon a time, journalism WAS an honorable profession, especially as practiced at highly reputable newspapers like the Atlanta Constitution and (believe it or not) the New York Times. Then there were the great reporters on the television networks, as exemplified by Edward R Murrow.

With all due respect, that sounds exactly like a fairy tale. And I don't mean only the "Once upon a time" part.
In reality, journalism in the founding era was more like a modern local weekly rag than anything else. Most newspapers were weeklies, and some had no deadline at all and simply went to press when the printer was good and ready. And like the modern local weekly, the founding era newspaper printer took for granted that its readers would have heard the latest news by the time they ever got around to reading a week-old newspaper. Hamilton and Jefferson sponsored competing newspapers in which they waged their partisan battles against each other; I see that as the embryonic stage of political parties in America.
And then came the high speed printing press, and the telegraph and the Associated Press. The high speed printing press was hungry for content to fill its new bandwidth, and the telegraph was just the ticket for providing it. The Associated Press aggressively worked to attain and maintain a monopoly on the telegraphic transmission of commercial news. All very efficient. It was of course noticed at the time that the Associated Press was potentially a centralized propaganda operation, and questions were raised about it. But the AP defended itself by pointing out that its component newspapers were of all different sorts and persuasions, and asserted that it was "objective."
The reality is that journalism is a special interest, the business of persuading the public to pay attention to itself and its advertisers on the basis that journalism - with its "wire" - has information that the public does not yet know. But the reality is also that the information which fits that category is inherently superficial. The newswire tells you in lavish detail about the house that burned down yesterday, but it doesn't mention all the work contractors did on houses yesterday. Consequently after a few years of the papers telling you only that houses are burning down, you may wake up one morning and realize that an entire city has been built.
Journalism is an artificial reality in which journalists are heroes and the people who produce and distribute the food, fuel, security, and other goods and services you depend on are suspects or villains. In the real world Theodore Roosevelt is correct that
"It is not the critic who counts . . . the credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena - Theodore Roosevelt
In the artificial reality of journalism, it is just the opposite. In JournalismWorld, people who second guess are heroes who should be in charge of everything. The planted axiom of JournalismWorld is socialism.
In the real world the correct definition of subjective should be, "having a belief in one's own objectivity." There never was a golden age of objective journalism, only a golden age of propaganda success of the newswire monopoly which I like to call Big Journalism. If you read Ann Coulter's Treason, you will come to understand that the term "McCarthyism" is simply a smear of a patriot (albeit not necessarily a more perfect person than, say, yourself).
Dan Rather's behavior during and since the "Killian memo" flap is inexplicable unless you understand that it is simply the standard operating procedure of "objective" journalism. The only reason it didn't work - the only reason Rather is not Cronkite, and John Kerry is not POTUS - is that the Internet and Talk Radio have broken down the walls between you and me and the sources of news. Cronkite could count on the support of the rest of Big Journalism to prevent a critical mass of knowledge of the truth from developing in the general public which would have made a wide public aware of journalism's tendentiousness. Rather counted on the same thing, and his fellow gatekeepers at NBC, ABC, The New York Times, et al did not let him down but followed right where he was leading. The only trouble was, gatekeepers are irrelevant when the walls are down. Some people - a lot of people, actually - are still restricting themselves to the gates, out of habit. But others have the sense to realize what the gatekeepers have been up to, and go through the hole in the wall instead.
Rather's Ruin and the Rise of the Pajamahadeen
The Market for Conservative-Based News

It ranges from the CNN YouTube debates to political blogs to cellphone video of that sniper who opened fire at an Omaha Mall. These are all examples of so called "citizen journalism," the hot new extension of the news business where the audience becomes the reporter. . . .

CNN's last YouTube Republican debate included a question from a retired general who is on Hillary Clinton's lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender steering committee.

Whenever you see prerecorded interviews broadcast, you might as well be seeing the journalist talking to a ventriloquist's dummy for all the difference it makes; who knows how many interviews they did before they got one that they liked?
The YouTube questions were on the Internet, all right - but, being prerecorded, they were selected by CNN and not by random people at large. The CNN YouTube "debates" were a perfect example of Old Media Journalism.

"A bump to you Landru, for spotting bill's best-of-the-bunch!"

Was good, wasn't it.
Bill's a genuine treasure trove of wisdom here at FR, but this time he outdid himself.
Wished he got [as] angry more often. ;^)

"It's been a long time since anyone cared about our Detroit newspapers..."

Or from what I hear Detroit, for that matter. {g}

"~ I remember sometime back when detnews.com announced they were going to try to be more honest in the future! That one still cracks me up!"

How very *comforting*. :o)
Funny stuff, couldn't possibly make it up.

"They, the 'detroit news' recently changed their website - it is actually better. But I've been waiting for the chance to tell you all, - it seems like they fired all the editors."

Hallelujah!
A MAJOR "house cleaning" of Liberal-Socialists infesting the newspaper industry as a whole is precisely what it's going to take to save the newspaper industry; IF, it can be saved at this point, a'tall.

Don't think for an instant the *publishers* (in most cases, save for the NYSlimes) and/or stockholders aren't keenly aware of the one-'n-only remedy for the predicament risking their entire investment.

"I browse the frontpage & sports almost daily and can't believe the glaring errors in punctuation & grammar a 3rd grader armed with spell check wouldn't miss."

Amen, longtime poster "B-chan" pointed out the very thing within the first sentence of the brainstem's article.
Though I gotta say a "spell checker" won't catch stupidity or most other oddities of/in the English language.
Only the educated can catch [that] stuff; unfortunately, the republic's been up to their alligators --for years-- with a sickness called, "Form without substance" which permits the shoddy, half-assed crap passing for *journalism* we see these days.
So be it.

"Competing with "professionals" like this, it's no wonder newspapers are falling to citizen journalists in droves. It won't be long till they really are all gone, but they're more to blame than anyone else."

Amen, nicely said. ;^)

The *free market* is as we correspond finishing off the entire industry and those responsible never will figure out the reason they failed.

BUT, those responsible?

...will never completely go away, either. ;^)

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