Mobile phone creates ‘new world’ of media

The citizen journalism, citizen media is the sum of the public distributors of news and information: the newspapers, magazines, television and radio broadcasting. To this have been added more recently the Internet, podcasting, blogging and mobile phone. All of these citizen media have better informed the general public of what is going on in the world today.

Many traditional journalists are turning to these new areas to reach more people or much easier and quicker. These many ways reach a greater number of people faster than the traditional media. Such things as podcasting, blogging and mobile phone give people an opportunity to express themselves in ways that can only done with such ways.

Mobile phone creates new pathways for content generation and broadcasting. For the last few years there has been quite a bit of talk about mobile phone reporting in the world. Mobile phone for reporting has emerged as a powerful form of citizen journalism and it is redefining citizen journalism. How is mobile phone becoming a platform for the delivery of news and information? Currently mobile phone can include a camera, camcorder, audio recorder and mobile Internet access. Mobile phone is cheaper, smaller and much handier than other digital devices such as laptop, camcorders and digital camera.

Mobile phone reporting is possible with the help of SMS (short messaging service) which allows text messaging exchanges, and MMS (multimedia messaging service) which allows media exchanges such as images, video and audio. This has all been made possibly by technological breakthroughs and immediacy of connected mobile devices and it is becoming increasingly possible for journalists to replace their pens.

Despite some of the criticisms advanced against citizen journalism through the new media, such as Internet, podcasting, blogging and mobile phone, it has greatly enhanced the development of the media in that the journalists and the public are now interacting. Most especially, the increase in the number of using mobile phone for reporting has not only open up the flow of information but also the active participation of the audience on what goes around. It is therefore necessary that journalists include citizen journalism in practicing their profession.

Mobileactive08: Mobiles and News Gathering at Al Jazeera

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2W9q3q SVZI

Straits Times online, multimedia and print (stomp.com.sg)

Actually, I have never heard STOMP website before. But when I finished reading this week’s reading, I just got to know what it is and what they do exactly. STOMP, which stands for Straits Times Online Mobile Print, is the popular interactive website, integrating content and activities in the three platforms of print, online and mobile to deliver user-generated content by citizen reporters. What I have got is that STOMP has the power for citizen journalism. STOMP offers the platform for Singapore citizens to report by blogs, photos and videos via email, SMS, MMS and even web site.

Like OhmyNews website in South Korea, in STOMP, the main idea and the motto of citizen journalism is the same: “Everybody can be a reporter, photographer, publisher and writer,” something that couldn’t be done through traditional media such as printed newspapers. I strongly believe blogs are personal media and traditional media such as newspaper, magazine, television and radio are mass media, but STOMP is the middle of this.

Over the last few years, I think one of the most interesting developments on the Internet is the continued evolution of citizen journalism. The ability to go online news website and find just about anything people need in seconds is a brand new phenomenon. The fact that we can talk to people, easily, in far away places- make new connections, share news and stories, exchange ideas, debate and argue, well beyond our local community- is all simply amazing.

Besides, right now many people are creating the unbelievable number of their blogs a day using everything from MySpace.com to Blogger.com. The STOMP gives us the same opportunity to open their doors to their web site and let us in.

Then how can we not be optimistic and excited when we look back at how far we’ve come in such a short time and think about how much further we can go?

Then, what future is there for journalism? Believe me, a very good future. The future for journalism should be exciting, even if the process of change is hard. No matter what others say, there is just one thing to remember- good journalism in the 21^st century is good information from whatever source available. That’s the key point!

More tools for reporting

There is little doubt that new tools for reporting such as Wikis, RSS feeds, Skype, Twitter, blogging, and Delicious etc will change the way news is reported. Granted, this fact isn’t new, but it’s interesting, at least to me.

The new tools for reporting became a channel for breaking news for both professional reporter and citizen journalists and they offer a new channel to both of them, because of its immediacy and network effects, for example, it’s very quick to publish and easy to spread a news story to thousands of people. Apparently, this appeals to mainstream media as a distribution channel.

However, the new tools for reporting don’t wait for standard journalistic practices like fact-checking. They try to turn out to be correct, but I wonder if this will have harmful effect on future news reporting.

Nevertheless, are they still good? In my opinion, yes! They are good. It’s very good for news reporting. I think it’s great that citizen journalism and the new tools for reporting exist and that they provide such a great publishing platform for it. But I think we need to apply the trust to the new tools for reporting. If that’s the case, then citizen journalism won. If not, we have a problem.

Traditional media will continue to feel pressure from the new tools, as they are scooped by the new tools such as Wikis, RSS feeds, Skype, Twitter, blogging, and Delicious etc. What remains to be seen is how we handle it.

So, what do you think? Do people put too much trust in citizen journalism and the new tools for reporting, or do you think the traditional media have the right amount of skepticism to make it work? How should mainstream media react to the trend? These questions aren’t so boring after all! Instead, it’s a lesson worth thinking carefully.

BearBlogging.org-<http://beatblogging.org/2009/02/11/screencast-how-to-use-twitter-for-reporting/>

If you watch this, you will be quickly understood what is going on. According to this website, this video goes over: – Why I use Twitter for reporting – The importance of a good profile – The value of search.twitter.com – Desktop clients like TweetDeck – How to get an RSS feed of a search term – And more.

New tools for reporting

I am surprised at what this reading’s saying. And I find this reading very interesting. Numerous traditional journalists are unconcerned and indifferent of bloggers, describing them as egotism (self-interested) or unskilled and untrained amateurs. On the other hand, many bloggers look upon the new tools for reporting such as RSS (Really Simple Syndication), Blogs, Moblogs, Podcasting, or Video blogs has arrived. And they see this trend is the mainstream media lately.

I think that these new tools for reporting should not be considered in isolation but as part of an emerging new media. They expand the media universe. They are a new media form and they add something new to our mix, something valuable and something that couldn’t have existed before.

There are just so many interesting things happening in our lives that would make great reporting. And there are people and events all around us that are meaningful and that people would love to watch.

I believe that we need to move beyond the increasingly old and worn-out debate of whether the new tools for reporting are or aren’t journalism and celebrate the new tools’ pace in the media ecosystem. Instead of looking at the new tools for reporting and traditional journalism as rivals for readers’ eyeballs, we should recognize that we’re entering an era in which they harmonize each other. They have contributed to news organizations becoming a bit more accessible, although newsrooms still have a long, long way to go.

Journalism is undergoing a quiet revolution, whether is knows it or not. Readers will always turn to traditional journalism as dependable, trusted and reliable sources of news and information and that won’t change in a certain way. But the walls are breaking. The new tools for reporting won’t replace traditional journalism and its news media, but they will complement them in important ways.

OhmyNews in South Korea

Citizen journalism, which includes participatory journalism, has gained popularity across the world including South Korea when they launched OhmyNews.com.

I enjoyed reading this week’s reading. I am with this week’s reading on that point: “Every Citizen is a Reporter.” Yes, the readers can be equal to professional reporters in news production because in my definition, a reporter is not some special person. The ordinary person, anyone, can be a reporter. They have his or her own news stories and they can deliver it.

Some people are the elite such as doctors, lawyers, or professors etc and they are usually more skilled and specialized than reporters, with more expert knowledge. As compared with the last decade, more than half the population in the world has graduated from university. We are living in the intellectual society, and every individual citizen is concerned about what’s going on our society. They want to get information and news and then they want to make our society and our world different, much better.

Most citizens’ desire to express themselves greatly increased. While I was studying in my country, South Korea, I continuously thought about things like how I could change the world. Well, it seemed that I thought and talked impudently and some people might think that I was immature in my way of thinking at that time. And they could say, “You can’t change the world in your own way. That’s not possible.” Yes, that’s right. There’s a certain degree of truth in what they say. But I was. I really was. I took this thought seriously.

Anyway, I thought of the idea for more than 10 years. There was no Internet at that time and there was no such concept as the Internet. However, the Internet came out eventually and I thought, “Ah, I could do it through this space. I could make it!”

So, when I finished reading this week’s reading, I am thrilled that they are writing news stories to change the world, our society, not to earn money. This is what I wanted to do.

Then, can citizen journalism really change the world? Many pessimists still doubt it can even change the news industry, and still question, in despite of much evidence, whether ordinary citizens can really serve as journalists. But why not?

Everybody is a photographer, publisher, reporter and writer. Now, we can see that people are changing the world. That’s the main point. No another word! This is just great. Yes, it really is!

Citizen Journalim- What Is It? (9″50)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58iZpMRclwI

Free! Why $0.00 Is the Future of Business

Well, that’s no wonder that we are living today in the information age, an era when communication media have become central to nearly all that we do. Our tools for transmitting, sending, and receiving information have always occupied an important place in human activity. Today, more than ever before, communication technology has a pervasive impact on our personal and professional lives, our groups and organizations, our own society, and the world community.

As I read this week’s reading, it’s well-known that we can get information from Web for free. For example, it’s said in this week’s reading, Yahoo announced that Yahoo Mail, its free webmail service, would provide unlimited storage. Yes, the Web has become the land of the free.

The use of the Internet and the Web help people to get information. Many web sites have information free for the taking. The information ranges from job ads to real estate listing. We use an enormous variety of software, from games to operating systems, and find virtually anything on the Web. Plus, we can find weather, view movie listings, and even see our bank details and pay bill online, from anywhere in the world, for free.

The Internet is used as an information resource. We are living in the information superhighway. It appears that advance of the Internet have been beneficial to the world and they have brought incredible development. I believe that it is evident that development of the Internet should not be stopped, but it is also important to handle the Internet wisely and reasonably, so that it supports our lives in a positive way.

If I were to ask some people, “What effect has the Internet had on your life?” they might propose the following answer: “I am informed of the Internet, but I am not affected by it.” What do you think? Do you agree with that?

User-generated content and the changing news cycle

It’s really interesting to read this reading. Over the past years, the Web has become an essential tool for journalists. Also, the Internet, as a medium for news, is maturing. Yes, this is true. While news and information can be found quickly and easily using search tools such as Google and Yahoo, the problem is not a lack of content, but rather the large volumes of stale and questionable news and information. Determining the accuracy of search results is a challenge for any Internet user. However, the emergence of a new form of journalism, ‘participatory’ or ‘citizen’ journalism has provided a unique solution- the act of a citizen, or group of citizens, playing an active role in the process of collecting, reporting, analyzing and disseminating news and information.

Yes, there are many ways that the audience is now participating in the journalistic process that especially I want to mention blogs. Blogs as they are commonly known, are the most active and surprising form of this participation. I hope no one is sick of blogs yet, because they’re not a fad that will go away soon. Blogs, it is becoming obvious to me, are where much of the innovation in online content is taking place. And also blogs are in some ways a new form of journalism, open to anyone who can establish and maintain a web site.

There are also other things: Moblogs (mobile blogs) which are typically a photo blogs where an individual or group of people posts images taken with photo phones, plus accompanying text or even audio, V-logs (video blogs) and podcasting.

Moblogging Resources- blogger has some excellent resources for moblogging. Use the links below to learn how to moblog with blogger.

Blogger on the Go- http://www.blogger.com/mobile-start.g

Places to create a Moblog:

EasyMoblog- http://www.easymoblogs.org/

Resources on VideoBlogging

Good VideoBlogs:

Steve Garfield- http://stevegarfield.blogs.com/videoblog/

Rockeboom- http://www.rocketboom.com/

Additional References on Podcasting

Below are some references for creating good podcasts:

Lisa Williams 4 minutes about podcasting- http://www.cadence90.com/wp/?p=3548

O’Reilly’s Ten Tips For Improving Your Podcasting-

http://digitalmedia.oreilly.com/pub/a/oreilly/digitalmedia/2005/08/10/improvingpodcasts.html

Can we change journalism? Yes, we can and we should do. I believe the future for journalism should be exciting, even if the process of change is hard.

Why and How Convergence Is Emerging

What is convergence? And why and how convergence is emerging? When I finished my week’s reading, I gained a better understanding of what the answers are. I’m thrilled to see this reading that convergence is that can be used all forms of media in order to inform a changing audience. I think convergence will open the door to a new open journalism, and I believe that’s a positive change- or can be- depending on how we manage it.

I suspect the journalists we see 10 years from now will be professionalised in ways we can only imagine now. We can accept and embrace change and be part of the forces that shape what journalism evolves into. Or we can dig in our heels and insist that journalism never change, though it has been evolving for centuries. Yes, these are all correct.

But no matter what other people say, my point is that now is the time to learn, adapt and make changes. The emergence of new technology is changing the way journalism is being done and therefore adapting the way journalists need to be educated. Plus, I strongly believe that all journalists should learn multiple sets of skills, such as writing, editing, TV production, digital photography, newspaper design, and web publishing. There is no doubt that convergence is a fact already and it is happening today. The news industries are transforming.

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