What are the differences between gatekeeping and gatewatching?

Gatewatching is a term to describe the new form of news sharing in citizen journalism. It lies in contrast to gatekeeping, a commonly known term among professional journalists. The underlying theme of gatekeeping in journalism is a process of selection of what can be seen by an audience through the editing department of a news outlet (Hartley 2005, 94). Whereas with gatewatching, the only way of influencing ones opinions on a written piece is to comment on citizens blogs and websites. It does not restrict content, rather commenting allows for further socialising with people of similar interests, and well as building on research.

MySpace, up until now, is one website which could almost be described as a form of gatekeeping. This is a result of its closed network environment, where people could only interact with one another through the social website itself. Of course it is not really a journalistic approach, yet the same reasoning applies. Basically, the information written by users on the site could not be shared or added to any other website. However, MySpace is now interested in networking between websites and collaborating information, creating a user friendly environment where everything can be linked. MySpace has even joined in on the Data Portability Project and is therefore leading the way in the social networking domain. This is a key feature of gatewatching, where information (that users create) is free to be shared among the internet instead of being controlled by a centralised corporate organisation that owns the website containing the content. This example proves that gatewatching is not limited to any type of internet content. Gatekeeping however, exists where corporate business has the power to control (their) content.

Due to the pace of the internet, "gatewatching is iterative: the material passing through the output gates of news blogs is further watched as potential source material by other gatewatchers" (Bruns 2006, 16). Therefore, in allowing material to be accessed by anyone on the internet, you are basically publishing content that is open for feedback, that in some cases will be critical. You are opening a conversation through the digital medium, however some may see it as knowledge, whether it is fact or not. That is obviously why Wikipedia has received criticism for its unreliable output of information. Particularly its use of 'pedia', inferring that it is an encyclopedia, when traditional encyclopedias were published in book volumes and did have the editing process of gatekeeping involved. In turn, probably the biggest difference between gatekeeping and gatewatching is that gatekeeping is a formal, trusted practice and gatewatching is purely informal as well as being more common in the digital environment.

References

Bruns, A. 2006. The Practice of News Blogging. In Uses of Blogs, ed. A. Bruns and J. Jacobs, 11-22, New York: Peter Lang Publishing.

Hartley, J. 2005. Communication, Cultural and Media Studies. 3rd ed. London: Routledge.