technoculture203-09

A form of interactive communication in today's media is citizen journalism. The pros and cons of citizen journalism will be shown in the following.

An example that highlights this is from the tsunami that hit Samoa. Two videos from the New Zealand Herald website show the contrast from professional journalism to citizen journalism. This video portrays professional journalism. The quality is high and it's more focused on giving data, with the use of some amateur footage to back up the narrative. It focuses more on the outcomings of the event as opposed to the event itself. Contrasting the professional video, this video is representative of citizen or amateur journalism. It is of lower quality, and not so focused on the overall data of the event. Instead the video focuses on the event itself as it is a first hand resource. This gives a more emotive feel as there is less mediation, with no editing or voice-overs.

I feel both forms of journalism are needed to gain wider knowledge on more than one level. Through new technologies, we are now able to access and share information collected on an amateur level, such as the second video. Yet along with the emotive side, we still need the important data and information surrounding the event, making professional journalism also very important.

After speaking up in class about how I didn't like Twitter, I was intrigued by all the hype and caved in and signed up to an account. Intially it was boring, but as began following more people, mostly celebrities, magazines or corporate organizations such as record companies I began to enjoy it more.

Source: Earthquake in UK? News broken on Twitter

With the expansion of digital technology, the availability of news has also expanded. Yet there are different places that newsworthy events are documented and discussed.

SNS have become a sort of news carrier, although relatively biased dependent on who you are exposed to. Sites such as Facebook often reflect topical issues as people post information on these issues and/or discuss them. For example, last year after National was elected, my news feed was completely filled with comments about the outcome, also people joining groups for or against particular politicians/parties. With the development of statuses and creating groups, Facebook enables the community to put their view across on topical issues, furthered in Facebook polls. Recently, one could vote on the Facebook poll for or against the smacking bill, another topical issue.

These current events also display entertainment news. The death of superstars are mentioned (e.g Michael Jackson), and 'scandals' are discussed. An example of this is the recent music awards where Kanye West interrupted Taylor Swift's speech as she received the award for best solo female music video. Although I do not follow these musicians, Facebook made sure I didn't miss out. Members of Facebook are even able to Vote for 'Team Taylor' or 'Team Kanye' on a poll, and quizzes such as 'When will Kanye interrupt you?' were set up. This reflects how SNS can be news carriers of our generation (although limited).