citizen journalism

One of the main concepts behind citizen journalism is that mainstream media reporters and producers are not the exclusive centers of knowledge on a subject. Sometimes the audience collectively know more than the reporter alone. There would be some issues important to the public, which they have witnessed or noticed but have eluded reporters. Websites such as STOMP and newpaper often encourage public contributions and participation.

STOMP is a branch out from the Singapore Straits Times and is Asia's leading citizen journalism website. It attributes its success to its ability to connect, engage and interact with Singaporeans in a style and approach that is different from conventional news websites. Its strong growth reflects not only its popularity but its resonance with Singaporeans. STOMP won the WAN-IFRA 2008 award for Best in Online Media, although it was up against more established news websites like Australia's Sydney Morning Herald, South China Morning Post, Taiwan's Apple Daily and the Philippine Inquirer, and I guess that proves its better ability to connect with readers.

Now, many Big commercial mass media outlets are recognizing this and are trying to harness the knowledge of their audience either through comments at the end of stories they post online or by creating citizen journalist databases of contributors or sources for stories. The development of blogs have also opened opportunities for ordinary people to participate in reporting and disseminating news, and in addition offer their views on the subject. Perhaps the reason why this appeals so much to the public is because people want less formal and filtered information which is often shown on newspapers and television. I personally like both ideas. Although blogs and citizen journalists do provide more witty and creative, in-your-face opinions on some matters, but sometimes, I do find the issues reported are somewhat gossipy and full of unimportant and sometimes minute details. Which leads to the question, is citizen journalism really improving reporting and information dissemination or devaluing it into gutter journalism instead?