Week 4 - is Citizen Journalism really necessary?

Whenever someone poses the question of a journalist's credibility to me, I tend to jump right onto the side of fence where a billboard reads, "A journalist must be trained with the proper technique in order to bring out the best story."

However, after going through 2 years in journalism school and unwittingly 24 years in a 'uniquely-Singaporean' journalistic setup, I've come to realize that being a journalist doesn't require one to be trained in techniques such as writing in the Inverted Pyramid format or remembering the 5Ws and 1Hs when formulating the perfect news story.

Ok, maybe the 5Ws and 1H is essentially crucial for anything to be considered a news story, what's more important in a proper piece of journalism is....cue drum roll....the truth,

In a lot of places, the mainstream news outlets don't always carry the full picture of a certain situation or story. Take the recent General Elections in Sngapore for example and it's hard to ignore the rise to prominence of alternative-opinionated website The Temasek Review.

Journalism came into importance due to its role as a public guardian and informant - protecting the common folks from corrupt government officials while at the same time informing them of significant happenings, events and issues.

As such, outlets such as The Temasek Review and Ohmynews provides a platform for usually-unannounced events and happenings, thus painting a complete picture for the public.

Another reason why citizen journalism should not be ignored is the timeliness it can provide for breaking news. Events such as the London bus bombing in 2005 and the 2007 political crisis in Burma were fine examples of citizen journalism at its best - members of the public providing pictures in the form of self-taken photos and videos on their mobile phone.

No one can predict the timing of an unfortunate event happening so it'll be unfair to expect mainstream news outlets to be at the scene of every disaster or riot immediately upon happening.

Yes there are drawbacks to allowing citizen journalism to flourish, such as the lack of credibility in the news story or the abuse of such a system that turns it into an outlet of rants and complaints (as like how Singapore's very own citizen journalism site, STOMP, has turned out to be)

In spite of this, it is almost impossible to disregard the impact that Citizen Journalism has now made on society. Giving a new meaning to Media Pluralism, Citizen Journalism can be, in itself, a strong catalyst for Cosmopolitanism. By offering the chance for one and all to not only debate current issues but also to give voice to new ones, Citizen Journalism has rode well on the wave of technological advancement and can only portray more of its potential in the years to come.

Week 3 - The future of journalism

The state of journalism is changing - no more is the reliance just on the newspapers we read or the journalists that write them.

With the advancement of technology, the consumers of news have been exposed to a situation where sources of information need not be confined to the timeframe or the outlets of exposure. Through the Internet, consumers will be able to grab any news they desire at the speed of a snap of their fingers (ok, maybe not that fast but you get my notion ;))

Putting this scenario in a local context, an event that was suppose to write an entirely new chapter in the history books of Singapore did more than just that – it heralded a new source of news-gathering.

The 2011 General Elections in Singapore was earmarked as a watershed election due to the potential that the various opposition parliamentary parties were displaying in the contest against the ruling party in Singapore, the People’s Action Party. That, and the go-ahead for the various parties vying for a spot in parliament to engage its supporters and voters through social media, ensured a whole new experience and story for the citizens of Singapore. While the elections did yield a few surprises, the real prize in this election is the rise of social media.

Not only did Singaporeans throw out the assumption that they were a politically-apathetic lot – the Prime Minister of Singapore acknowledged himself that the ruling party can do more to engage its citizens through the Internet – they also dealt a blow to the respectable news outlet in Singapore. On the aftermath of Polling Day, as Singaporeans gathered in front of their televisions to await the televised results as past generations did too, it appeared that the local television stations were relatively slow in releasing the results.

With the telecast of the polling results slated for 11pm but the Returning Officer only coming out to officially declare the results around the 12.30am – 1am mark, many viewers who were connected to the local Twitter community were left disappointed and angry that they actually found out about the results online a lot earlier than the usual media outlets.

This saga even prompted an apology, and explanation, from Mediacorp that they were only able to released official results from the Returning Officer and releasing unofficial results like that on Twitter were against their practices.

As exemplified above, the future of journalism has seen the focus shifted slightly from the official media sources to alternate ones like social media. Social Media has shown itself to be a very current tool that the official news outlets can learn to embrace itself. However, as shown by Mediacorp’s handling of the above situation, there is still a need to stick to the proper ethics of newsreporting for fear of information misrepresentation.

(Picture from http://www.markevanstech.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/social-media-consultant.jpg)