With the emergence of technology and its accessibility we now see the birth of a new journalist, the Citizen Journalist. With this fairly new journalist new questions also arise. Just how credible are these journalists and if they are titled correctly?
A few years ago an individual would need to complete their education and earn the title of journalist. Besides the degree, they also needed the hands on experience of writing for a newspaper before even being viewed as a credible journalist.
But now it seems as anyone who reports or discusses and event or idea and posts it on-line is considered a citizen journalist, skipping those years of college education and apprenticeship. This fact leads to the question of their credibility. Are these citizens held to the same guidelines and regulations that a journalist would be? Are sources being checked, are they familiar with AP style, do they remain objective in their work?
A traditional journalist would be defined as a person engaged in writing which is characterized by a direct presentation of facts or description of events without an attempt at interpretation. And a citizen journalist is a member of the public engage in journalism. Are these new citizen journalists really simply reporting facts or are they expressing their views, ideas and opinions? If so how then the objectivity of journalism is lost. Dan Gillmor who wrote, We the Media: Grassroots journalism by the people for the people, suggests that most citizen journalists don’t try to make a living out of writing. Instead they simply want to say what they think and be heard. If this is the case, this sounds more like blogging than the art of journalism.
The traditional journalist works hard to earn the title for just any individual who posts an article on the World Wide Web be handed over the same title. The answer to the question lies in the goal behind the writing. There is no general yes or no answer. It is a question that needs to be asked on a case by case scenario. Depending on what the goal is behind each post and article would one be able to answer is this the art of journalism to just report the facts or is there in underlying personal motive attached to the article and its subjectivity label the article as nothing more than a mere blog.
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