Citizen Journalism and the power of free thought

Citizen journalism definitely has its benefits, as well as disadvantages. It is no surprise that many Journalists have criticized the concept, especially in its early days. Many of these criticisms were based around ideas that the information produced by amateurs was not of high standards, yet it was probably more of a fear of losing an audience. Yet the web has proved a success for traditional news companies as well and CNN and the BBC are among the leaders in embracing the technology of the internet. A common feature of news websites now includes blogging, so in fact journalists are welcoming web 2.0 and so they should. It could be argued that the news has become more user friendly with the internet and it has even saved the industry through its ability to spread information at a fast pace and interact with younger generations of audiences.

One of the facts about citizen journalism is that it enables anyone to give their point of view without having to worry about gatekeeping. This means that virtually any topic can be raised with all points of view covered somewhere on the web. The web is therefore a portal for free thought. Though without search engines to guide users to this free thought it is a lot more difficult to access because of the fact that there is so much content on the web. Which makes it hard to believe that so much more content is added everyday. Yet Google is one example of the expansive array of content on the web. This search engine has expanded with the internet, adding videos, images and maps to name a few of the added capabilities the company has created. And with more web 2.0 applications being tested and tried, more is available to create on the web. And that brings another issue of whether citizen journalism will still be relevant in the future. It is possible that blogs and whatever invention improves on this technology may mean that people do not want to just report on issues, they may feel that social writing is more relevant than a standard article. And web 2.0 allows some sort of freedom on this level which means that citizen journalists can update or add to their public writings. OhmyNews obviously believes in the power of citizens to create credible news, with money incentives giving the public more reason to communicate through the web.

One recent claim surrounding content on the web, particularly scholarly information, is that the web does not support this type of information, rather the web is catering to Wikipedia style information that cannot be relied upon for its accuracy. The idea is that there is a need for more scholarly based content, from written work to video lectures and interviews, so companies, including Google, are making plans on providing this content. Mahalo is a search engine that claims to find quality information, while Big Think is basically a You Tube specializing in the creation and publicity of ideas. Similarly, Google's Knol is an abbreviation for knowledge. Yet take SlideShare, for example, a powerpoint presentation sharing website and here is information sharing working at its best, providing resources, including those from academics for the rest of the world to share, if they choose to set their sharing to public. It seems that the future for university knowledge is perhaps to provide it through the internet, possibly even for free?