The internet has made out lives easier, faster, and cheaper. The internet has affected the way Americans receive their news. Traditional means of news media, like the newspaper, is being used far less because reading news online is usually free, constantly updated, and you can read many perspectives. The New York Times published an article last month stating the U.S. newspaper circulation fell by 10% since last year. This significant fall is the result of the internet and citizen journalism.
Citizen journalism has grown very popular over the years. Citizen journalism basically means anybody from the public can report and analyze new and information. These journalists create blogs and/or post on forums about topics they care about. Readers have the opportunity to interact with the blog by posting comments to express their opinion. In 2006, a PEW Internet study found that 73% off all internet users stay informed by the internet.
There are positive, as well as negative effects citizen journalism has on our democracy. First, blogging has given the ordinary citizen a platform to express themselves and allows anybody to view it. Some blogs act as a watchdog of the mainstream media by fact-checking their sources. As for negatives, most news blogging is not balanced and only shows one perspective. Also, the internet is not available to every citizen, compared to the accessibility of the newspaper or television.
I think that it’s interesting how you brought up citizen journalism as being a cause of the demise of the newspaper. Silverblatt said that “a general dissatisfaction with the mainstream press has led to the establishment of the citizen journalism movement.” It’s like the two feed off of each other. The mainstream media isn’t doing a satisfactory job, so people start blogging, which causes the mainstream to do worse, which causes more people to turn to blogging.
ReplyDeleteLike you said, virtually anyone can participate in citizen journalism, which makes it very democratic. Another positive of blogging according to Silverblatt is that the content is audience-driven, which is more democratic because the general public can choose what is considered important and what isn’t. But there are also other negatives, like having no blogging standards, which means people can just post anything without being held accountable, which leaves us no better off than we are with the corrupt mainstream.
But just as the tools used for getting the news is evolving, so are the standards for citizen journalism. The Huffington Post, which also hosts a blog, posted some guidelines that bloggers should follow in order to be credible, which could be found at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/04/07/citizen-journalism-publis_n_184075.html
There still aren’t any established regulations and standards for citizen journalism, but this could be a step in the right direction.