CNN launches website for citizen journalists
Will it be the YouTube for news?
Usually, a headline like this is about some
rote attempt to reproduce the Korean model - or a Web 2.something-or-other
utopian virtual
adventure.
I have no idea where this will go and it’s not certain the folks at CNN know, either. It should be an interesting ride.
I have no idea where this will go and it’s not certain the folks at CNN know, either. It should be an interesting ride.
Since CNN embraced the citizen journalist movement
in August 2006 with the launch of its iReport initiative, the news organization has
received nearly 100,000 news-related photos and videos from
viewers.
Yet fewer than 10% of those submissions have appeared on CNN.com or the cable channel.
That’s all about to change. CNN this week will enter YouTube territory with iReport.com, a new site built entirely on user-produced news. And unlike CNN’s own properties — where only iReport submissions that have been handpicked by editors and checked for accuracy ever make it online or on air — the new site will be wide open, allowing users to post whatever content they choose.
Bloggers, of course, will be watching. CNN hopes everyone else will be watching, too.
To include some "localized" comment:
Earlier permutations of the online edition of our local newspaper, the Santa Fe NEW MEXICAN, took a run at citizen journalism. Why it didn't work, then, reflect the context of American online life at the time more than the energy expended by the newspaper's online publisher and editor. The Korean model hasn't proved transplantable. A number of folks have tried.
The model of readers' blogs worked a bit better - though never as expansive as hoped, I believe. Regardless, it didn't require a "palace coup" for the owners of the "palace" to decide the latest permutation of the newspaper's site needn't include independent voices. The readers' blogs have gone the way of citizen journalism in Santa Fe.
Meanwhile, CNN is going to spin their own take on YouTube and build iReports.com. Could be a really interesting journey. Could be how citizen journalism comes to the U.S..
Yet fewer than 10% of those submissions have appeared on CNN.com or the cable channel.
That’s all about to change. CNN this week will enter YouTube territory with iReport.com, a new site built entirely on user-produced news. And unlike CNN’s own properties — where only iReport submissions that have been handpicked by editors and checked for accuracy ever make it online or on air — the new site will be wide open, allowing users to post whatever content they choose.
Bloggers, of course, will be watching. CNN hopes everyone else will be watching, too.
To include some "localized" comment:
Earlier permutations of the online edition of our local newspaper, the Santa Fe NEW MEXICAN, took a run at citizen journalism. Why it didn't work, then, reflect the context of American online life at the time more than the energy expended by the newspaper's online publisher and editor. The Korean model hasn't proved transplantable. A number of folks have tried.
The model of readers' blogs worked a bit better - though never as expansive as hoped, I believe. Regardless, it didn't require a "palace coup" for the owners of the "palace" to decide the latest permutation of the newspaper's site needn't include independent voices. The readers' blogs have gone the way of citizen journalism in Santa Fe.
Meanwhile, CNN is going to spin their own take on YouTube and build iReports.com. Could be a really interesting journey. Could be how citizen journalism comes to the U.S..
Posted: Tue - February 12, 2008 at 05:54 AM