From what I can see, people are getting confused. Now, more than ever, it’s all about being able to ‘digest’ all the facts and make a sense out of it.

The big question for me is how journalists can continue making a living if most of their work is published online and for free. I agree with Jenny T that citizen journalists don’t have the resources or the cash to do major, long-term reporting…but it could soon be the case that even the NYT won’t have the means to pay for great investigative journalism. Then what will happen? Why should a publication pay a reporter’s airfare, salary, hotel, meals etc when they could just get a story done by someone already there on the ground?

It’s true that new technology has democratized journalism in the sense that it’s no longer only established reporters doing all the reporting. More people can report on more varied topics than before and without constraints like deadlines etc. But that has also lead to all kinds of crap stories like Fuzzy the cat being stuck up in the tree for 7 hours being considered “citizen journalism.” What could become a great thing in the future of journalism – if the weak quality of most “citizen journalism” is any guide – is that serious talent could really stand out. Those who in the past for whatever reasons didn’t take to journalism school or working for local papers but who can instinctively use technology and combine it with good writing and reporting could really prosper in the future.

That article cost the NY Times $400,000 to report as the reporters worked several years on the piece There is absolutely no way that “citizen journalists” could have done that work. They don’t have the vast funding necessary, they don’t have fact checkers and editors pushing them to do better.The fact that traditional journalistic outlet can’t find funding is huge. It undermines, potentially, our democracy.

What we mostly see on the internet are “citizen journalists” giving their opinions of what the actual journalists have uncovered. And that’s in the best case scenarios. When it comes to travel journalism, what you’re often seeing are small-time hacks being bought off by marketing and PR firms to go on unpaid junkets and then report on the products displayed to them for their blog followers. This exercise has no relationship to real journalism at all. It’s actually “Citizen PR”.

I know a few people who don’t want to “get their hands dirty” and see who online apps like Twitter and Stumbleupon as superficial and wholly useless wastes of time. They’re wrong. (Well, on *average *they’re wrong).

Traditional journalism is in flux, and online new media is in flux. They’re educating each other and finding a middle ground, but it’ll be chaos for a while: gluts of spammy blogging, for example, and relatively low pay rates for online work. But in a way that’s good too: low pay means online journalists apply pressure to make things on an equal footing…and spammy rubbish makes the good stuff shine out like a floodlit Tinkerbell.

Rebirth, aye. Not yet – but very soon.

All the best,
king

Citizen Journalist came in to feel the void that we couldn’t find a way to. The people had to produce the stories while we tried to find a way to harness what the internet was capable of. I think things have come along somewhat, but like you said people have to be willing to use these avenues. The ones that are not willing to use the internet are going to get phased out in order to keep journalism alive.