Being an active member in citizen journalism would seem like a piece of cake. Provide reports on anything you want, whenever you want, and whenever you can, right? With evidence from the Neda [1] case it seems as though anyone could “report” on an event, whether it be a blog posting, a mobile phone upload, or even a mass text to a group of friends. However…
Nothing. It’s pretty much exactly as it seems. There don’t seem to be many legal issues involving the “reporter” (protected by section 107 of 1976 Copyright Act[2]). The only real downside could be credibility, and even that is balancing out between “reliable” news sources and citizen journalism. With all the propaganda about the corrupt news media, I find more often people rely on homemade reports because there seems to be less chance of media alteration (such as cutting and pasting). How often do you find yourself searching youtube for a video of the latest news story? We seem to want to crop out what other people have to say about it and just focus on the video itself to make our own judgements.
It doesn’t seem difficult to imagine a world without our “traditional” sense of media (i.e. Newspaper, Television, Radio, etc). After all, was television not a “new” form of communication in the time of the newpaper? And yet now TV has become the number one source of news for Americans[3] (second being the internet!). With more and more people owning portable media devices, mobile phones, and information and news being “pushed” to these devices, it is not hard to imagine the day where newspapers are no longer being printed, and instead, people subscribe to a news service, capable of scrolling through pictures, videos, and more importantly, sources.
[1] For Neda. Dir. Anthony Thomas. HBO, 2010. Documentary.
[2] U.S. Library of Congress. Copyright Law of the United States, Section 107. http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92appa.pdf . Jan 2011
[3]Purcell, Kristen. “Understanding the Participatory News Consumer”. 1 Mar 2010. Web. Jan 2011
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