EOTO #2: Citizen Journalism

 Citizen Journalism

Citizen journalism used to be praised for many different reasons. Some of the best photos of an investigation have been developed from citizen journalism due to sometimes-accidental captures. Not every shot is accidental, but many are captured from a person videoing and photographing something completely unrelated but having the investigation evidence right there in the back corner of their shot. There are many examples of this that I can get into, but first, what is citizen journalism exactly? 

The definition given by tate.org states that it is “the collection, dissemination, and analysis of news and information by the general public, especially by means of the internet”. In shorter, less-complex terms, this is a form of journalism where any person walking along a road at any given time who is able to capture a moment on their mobile device is a data journalist. 

One of the first times that data journalism was used as an entire news source was in South Korea. This site was called "OhMyNews". This was a place where the sources were people who were actually present on the scene of the crime each time as opposed to having a professional come in and write the story as a secondary person. This platform was where someone could not only be a reader of the content, but could be a creator of content.  There were so many positives to having this type of news around such as some additional components of each story, up-close-and-personal stories, and much more. This was not only positive, though. As one can imagine, when anyone can develop a story and post what they would like to, it is not guaranteed that all users will be considered credible. This is a huge issue where people will take their “power” to post and post things that were either reworded from the truth or maybe a photo was posted that got edited to look a certain way that it was not in real life.  Another negative was that this was too good of an opportunity for too many people. Meaning, citizen journalism was a scary form of media for the government because they lost a sense of power over what information got out into the public. The security of themselves and other people was jeopardized more than it had ever been before. This was also a way for professional journalists to get pushed aside and ultimately start losing their occupation because “anyone could do it”. 

There are millions of examples where citizen journalists were the ones who found the “dirt” on a very large investigation through their photographs, but there is one in particular that stands out when I look at the impact that occurred due to the story/photo. The footage that I find the most fascinating is from JFK's assassination.  To the right is the photograph taken at his rally that was sent straight  to investigators. Though this was a blurry photo that was “inexpert", this singular photograph brought a whole new level of evidence into the investigation of what happened.

That is the beauty of citizen journalism, the blurriest, simplest photo could end up being the evidence investigators need to solve a case.