Are broadcasters out of a job?

Today Sarah Radford spoke to us about Newburytoday.co.uk - an online version of the weekly paper Newbury Weekly News. It appears that the online paper has live hourly bulletins, does video packages and gets amongst the people with vox pops. Surely this is the fodder of the broadcast journalist? It soon became apparent that rather than the normal course of events - Newspaper students voicing their concerns about the prevalence of online news - it was now the turn of us broadcasters started to feel a little insecure. I can now see that the lines of media really are blurred and it does affect me.

But as one student rightly pointed out; does this mean that the online journalist will become a 'Jack of all trades and master of none?' It seems that Sarah agrees. In trying to cover all the bases online journalists have too much to do and not enough time to do it in. Hopefully then quality will shine out over quantity. Maybe I should just be happy that broadcasters now have the option to move into a market that would have previously been closed to us.

*Feature Plans

I have been having a little think about what I want to concentrate my feature on and have decided on the topic of citizen media. What with UGC being the visiting speakers 'buzz word' and my very own brush with a semi newsworthy event I though this would be appropriate.

I'm interested in issues surrounding how important the user is and to what extent they are changing/setting the news agenda and for this I intend to look at website Digg. Here users put forward their choices for what is newsworthy and others rate it. I'll explore how the site works and how its managed to build a community where thousands of users contribute every day. I'll look at whether Digg is all its cracked up to be - whether editorial control exists despite the fact the site purports to be all about the user's choices. I'll further explore the limitations of socially driven news and will consider whether the site is exploiting its users.

My awakening to UGC

I have listened with interest over the last few weeks as speakers have talked about UGC but it was only last night in the wee hours that the point of it hit home. I awoke at 2am to hear the news that the police had closed our road. Four people had been arrested for burglary but 1 man had managed to escape arrest and had climbed onto next door's roof. He proceeded to throw slates off the roof and threatened to throw himself off also. It took 2 negotiators 2 hours to convince the man to come down and we all took to our beds around 4am but not without taking pictures of the scene.

Now, I know that this event doesn’t have the same magnitude or importance of events like 9/11, 7/7 or Buncefield but to be a thrust into a story literally on your own doorstep was quite something - especially if your training to be a journalist. I started to understand the mindset of someone who would submit content. Even though this was a local story, I still felt that there was a point in taking those shots - they would be instrumental in telling the story to an online audience even if it would only be of regional interest.

Death of the Newspaper?

It seems that not a week goes by without one student or another - generally from the newspaper option - asking the speaker whether the success of having news online means that the newspaper will become obsolete. Our speakers have presented both sides argument. On the one hand, the newspaper offers quality, reputable editorial comment and the all-important physical presense. On the other, the newspaper is redundant; online media can present the news quicker and more effectively.

I saw this post - 2 very different views for the future of newspapers - on Word Blog and it made me realise that it's not just us small fish pondering this very question.

Peter Clifton

One of the key points from this week's speaker Peter Clifton - Head of BBC News Interactive - touched issues surrounding user generated content. Now, while we get a sense of the power of UGC from many of the speakers we hear about each week I was interested to hear about the BBC's UGC hub. When users get in touch to submit content their details are held in a database so that even if their stuff isnt used immediatly they can be contacted so that it can be used in future programmes. They effectively then have a huge stockpile of users content just waiting to be shown - I got the sense that if we think UGC is big now it can only mushroom and be given greater prominance in the months and years ahead.

I thought his comments about the 'most popular' stories section of the BBC news online site were quite apt. The fact that a quirky or humourous story is sometimes read more which is considered to be 'hard' or 'proper' news goes to back up why a site like Digg is so popular. They are the stories that people are interested in regardless of their inherent newsvalue. Its just that on the BBC one has to search for those types of stories while Digg catalogues it in a user friendly way.

The ethics of paying for UGC...

Five News and The Sun have cottoned onto the power of the user and are calling for their audiences to contribute content. In the digital age, this may not be surprising but for me the fact that Five is prepared to offer up to £100 and give credit for a video clip, story idea or picture raises certain ethical issues.

I appreciate that members of the public already submit content and revel in their role as 'citizen journalists' but by offering cash surely this moves the goalposts? For some, the lengths that users will go to get a good picture or piece of footage is already too far. Fran Unsworth - head of Newsgathering at the BBC - has admitted to being concerned by the footage that was sent in from last years Buncefield gas explosion. Currently, the BBC does not offer money for any content that is submitted for fear of legal action - they cant be seen to be encouraging users to put their lives in danger. Although, according to Fran they do daily - often providing the best pictures of the day but only by getting closer than a BBC camera crew would dare to.

I think that offering money can only lead to heroics on the part of the public, wont there be some who will push themselves to get a better/more shocking/in greater detail shot? I pose the question: is £100 really worth a life?

Digital Storytelling

I thought that Dr Daniel Meddows lecture on digital storytelling and the project Capture Wales was engaging. I appreciated the fact that he took a different way to get across issues about user generated content.

I suppose that his standpoint is slightly different to those of previous speakers. Instead of commenting on the way in which users travel around sites and how online editors try to keep them there as long as possible, Daniel Meddows' job is to encourage those who wouldn't normally enter the digital world to tell their stories. With films on subjects as ecletic as a discarded teddy, an obsessive shoe collector and an old lady with alzheimers its clear that there is an arguement for the school of thought that says everyone has a story to tell.

However, in my opinion, Daniel then unravelled his own arguement by pointing out that it is not a democratized media. There are blogs are created every second while, on the same planet, there are millions of people who have never used a phone. In which case, what is the point? Do we only write a blog to feel important? Perhaps blogging a Western privilege that should be treated as such - only blog if you've got something worth blogging about.

New good stuff to check out!

Check my updated links! Yay!

After listening to numerous speakers detail how important the users are to the online world - user generated content/citizen journalism etc etc - I was really interested to discover Digg. As the site will tell you, all the articles are submitted by users and are ranked by other members of the Digg community depending on how important and interesting they think they are. This means that the user is the editor - the news agenda is set by them. Order the stories into 'Top Today' and you'll get Donald Rumsfeld giving a Kansas Student the finger ranked next to an article on the best Grand Theft Auto stunt ever! Love that! I think this serves as a good example of everything we have so far learnt so far: the user is powerful. They want news in a different format and they exercise their right to have it that way. It doesnt matter that the stories wouldnt link in a proper bulletin only that they are of interest.

Also, during my perusal of the internet I came across J. Singh-Sohal's blog. He is a young broadcast journalist who has not long qualified from City University. His posts as far as I can see vary from politics, favourite movies and his background. I had a chuckle when i read it - it made me realise that us Cardiffians are not the only ones crazy to persue this career. The screen shots of him practising ITV central raised a smile too.

*The 'Heat' generation

In a lecture that completely contradicted Iain Dale’s point of view - Richard Burton ex editor of telegraph.co.uk said that a blog was not for everyone. Rather than 'empowering the little guy' he said that all too often blogs give people who don’t have much to say a chance to drone on about nothing at all. More interesting to the public at large – apparently - are the views of vacuous celebrities who are a 'known quantity'. I think the idea of the musings of someone from Big Brother having more weight may have rankled with some of my fellow budding journalists. Although...I think I agree with him. People do generally want to read about things which are new, exciting and outside their frame of reference somewhat. Blogs are a way of getting inside someone’s head for a while and see how the world is from their perspective. On his recommendation, I checked out Peter Foster's blog which allowed me to do just that.