Week Six: New Tools For Reporting
The main aim of this reading is to explain the different ways that journalists can access information. This can be done by looking at blogs, moblogs (mobile blogs), vlogs (video blogs) and podcasting, all of which we have already been introduced to throughout the course.
The article also lists several new sites that we haven’t really seen much of yet in class, such as Twitter and CoverItLive (super fast blogging via mobiles and laptops), and a Wiki search tool. We are also introduced to a new site called del.icio.us, which allows you to store all your web bookmarks in one location so you can access them anywhere. This tool also gives you the opportunity to look at other people’s bookmarks and see what they are interested in.
The reading provides ways to check the accuracy or quality of the information found on websites. It lists several websites including http://whois.ausregistry.com.au/ which can provide the registration details of the website. This may or may not be helpful in working out whether the site is genuine or not.
There is no true way of being able to determine the accuracy or quality of internet-published information. The only ways that journalists can even come close are to use the tools provided and their gut instinct. If the information doesn’t seem reliable or plausible, and the writing has spelling and grammatical errors then it’s probably not genuine and therefore not worth pursuing as a journalist.
Week Five: OhmyNews
Quinn, S (2008) Chapter 7: ‘OhmyNews in South Korea’ in Asia’s Media Innovators, Konrad Adenaueur Foundation, Singapore.
There’s also an audio ‘video’ on Youtube about this- see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PaVzMA8-pcI
This article begins by listing vital information about Korea’s population and a brief history on its media and internet usage and growth. These facts are then interlinked with the main point of the story- the citizen-journalist based website called OhmyNews (http://english.ohmynews.com/).
Quinn explains that the website was originally formed out of an idea that founder and CEO Oh Yeon-ho had, regarding news and its distribution around Korea. Oh believes that “every citizen is a reporter” and got frustrated ‘while trying to access major news sources’. It wasn’t until after finishing a postgraduate journalism degree in America that he decided to enlist the help of several businessmen and put his dream onto the main media stage. Originally starting with a staff of four and 727 citizen journalists in 2002, OhmyNews has grown immensely and now has over 60,000 citizen journalists in Korea alone (not to mention the thousands that come from other countries around the world). The site also attracts more than 700,000 repeat visitors each day, according to Quinn, and is proving to be a strong and influential competitor against over major Korean newsgroups, ranking as high as sixth on the Sisa Journal’s Most Influential Media Outlet list since 2003.
This just goes to show that the appeal of citizen journalism is on the rise, and this should serve as a warning to media outlets that if they don’t provide ways for their readers/viewers to interact, they may face even tougher challenges from competitors in the near future.
Uncategorized | Comment (0)Week Four: Money, Money, Money
Anderson, C (2008) ‘Free! Why $0.00 is the future of business’ in Wired Magazine Online- see http://www.wired.com/techbiz/it/magazine/16-03/ff_free
Wilson, F (2008) ‘Make money around free content’ in Wired Magazine Online- see http://howto.wired.com/wiki/Make_Money_Around_Free_Content
This week we looked at not just one, but two different readings, although the second couldn’t really be classified as a reading- it was a list that labelled all the different ways that websites can make money from their users. I’m not going to go through the list but if you want to see it, just visit the second website written above. It’s interesting stuff…
In the other reading by Anderson, King Gillette is used as an example for the way that business on the internet works. In an effort to get his disposable razor business underway, Gillette basically gave his razors away for free and then charged for the blades. Anderson compared Gillette’s method with the ones commonly used by companies today. He uses examples such as phone companies that give away the mobile phone for free and then put you on an expensive plan to pay for those costs. He also mentions that the internet costs barely anything for the average user (with broadband prices becoming cheaper due to competition, as well as more accessible to people in rural areas) and that it’s practically free. He says, ‘In the digital realm, as we’ve seen, the main feedstocks of the information economy — storage, processing power, and bandwidth — are getting cheaper by the day’.
In some cases, like with Yahoo, users get email with infinite storage capacity for free, and this is becoming more and more common with other websites. As a result, more people use the web and the various sites on it because they know they won’t be charged for it, and the websites can capitalise (through advertising, cross-subsidies, etc) as more and more people visit the page. In his article, Anderson mentions the different ways that website owners can make money from this zero-dollar idea- including giving away free music CDs to promote a concert, or offering free trial demos of computer programs while selling the full version programs to the people that want them. In all, Anderson sums it up nicely when he writes: ‘The winners made their stuff free first’.
Uncategorized | Comment (0)Week Three: User-Generated Content And The Changing News Cycle
This week’s reading, written by Stephen Quinn and Deirdre Quinn-Allan, explores the various ways and methods that the average citizen can contribute to the news ‘cycle’.
The article looks at different forms of technology that not only can help ‘citizen journalism’ to thrive, but can assist journalists in reaching wider audiences. These include the use of mobile phones to transmit photos and video to newsrooms via the internet, as well as the production of blogs, moblogs (blogs designed to work with mobile phones), v-logs (video blogs), wikis (collaborated pages of information on internet site Wikipedia), and podcasts.
The London bombings of 2005 and the Boxing Day Tsunami in 2004 were pivotal moments in the interest of ‘citizen journalism’ and the content that was produced by people that just happened to be in the right place at the right time (or the wrong place in the wrong time when you really think about the situations that occurred). According to the article, the BBC and other news organizations were inundated with messages, photos, film footage, information and real-life accounts after the tragedies, leading the newsroom to create a special position for three journalists (later eight) to deal with the thousands of news items that were sent in daily.
Of course with this are issues of authenticity but that’s only to be expected. It’s up to the journalists to sift through the information received and find the real story. Unfortunately, because of time-constraints, some journalists may sometimes overlook or not double-check all the facts, carrying over the mistake onto their publication. This is just one of the drawbacks of allowing user-generated content into the news.
However, it seems that user-generated content will continue to be a strong addition to news-gathering in the media playground. As technology gets greater and more accessible, citizen journalism will only continue to grow.
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Week Two: Why And How Convergence Is Emerging
Quinn, S. (2005). Chapter 2: “Why and how convergence is emerging” in Convergent Journalism: The fundamentals of multi-media reporting New York: Peter Lang. Available in Deakin library as an e-reading.
This chapter looked at the various components involved when creating a convergent journalism environment, such as the need for strong communication between different media platforms, the increasing fragmentation of the audience and the introduction of new technologies. Throughout this extremely long reading (25 pages!) Quinn explained that many media organizations have decided to integrate, not only for the economic and financial benefits, or to encourage journalists to do more work, but mostly as ‘a way to serve the community’ (2005).
By allowing different media forms such as print, radio, television and online to merge, the audience is able to locate the news or information that they want, and access the information at their convenience- with many opting to get their news online for free (the chapter covered in much detail the reasons why more people are turning to the internet for news- mostly to do with accessibility and people’s ‘disposable time’ (or lack of free time)). This availability of information would otherwise be impossible if convergence didn’t exist and the audience had to rely on one medium (for example, the evening television news) to provide the information.
The chapter also looks to the editors of newspapers and websites to reinforce the views that convergent journalism is the key to the future of journalism.
As the chief editor of a newspaper in Hong Kong, Paul Cheung, stated: ‘The integrated newsroom is the newsroom of the future’ (2005). Quinn explores this thoroughly in the chapter, with his close analysis of the different techniques and technologies that newsrooms are introducing to cope with such a dramatic change. Journalists need to adopt and embrace these new ways of dealing with newsgathering and sharing information if they want to survive in the new era of media convergence.
