Michel Dumais, technology columnist for Le Devoir, a newspaper in Quebec, interviewed me by e-mail over the weekend on the subject of what he calls citizen journalism and what I call participatory journalism.
He writes a journalism blog in conjunction with his newspaper column, and posted part one of our interview here, in French Canadian. And here is Dumais’s column in Le Devoir. I recognize some familiar names in this graf:
Trois journalistes amcains, Dan Gillmor chroniqueur rite au SanJose Mercury News, Doc Searls, journaliste et co-auteur du Cluetrain Manifesto et JD Lasica, rcteur au Online Journalism Review, constatent eux aussi que cette crise est bien palpable et, selon Gillmor, celle-ci ira en s’amplifiant.
The interview covered online ethics, credibility, personal reporting and whether open-source journalism and traditional journalism can co-exist. I’ll post it in full below … in English.
Do you think there’s a credibility crisis with the institutional media vs. Mr. Joe Public?
There’s a growing credibility gap between what the news media report and what the public believes. The explosion in the number of media sources over recent years has alerted people to the fact that what they read in the newspaper or see on television does not always reflect reality as they know it. The rise of what I call ‘personal media’ — weblogs, independent niche news sites, and other forms of amateur journalism — gives people the ability to ferret out the truth for themselves. New technologies allow ordinary people to become creators and producers of news instead of couch potatoes who passively absorb whatever institutional media funnel our way.
Do you think weblogs are a new form of journalism?
Few bloggers fancy themselves journalists, but many acknowledge that their blogs take on some of the trappings of journalism: They take part in the editorial function of selecting newsworthy and interesting topics, they add analysis, insight and commentary, and occasionally they provide a first-person report about an event, a trend, a subject. Over time, bloggers build up a publishing track record, much as any news publication does when it starts out.
Not all weblogs engage in journalism. But some clearly do. However, it is a journalism of a different sort, one not tightly confined by the profession’s traditions and values.
If yes, what do you think it will bring to our profession? To the public?
Blogs bring fresh voices and alternative points of view to the public discourse. By making the news process more open, transparent and democratic, blogging also has a positive effect on the craft of journalism, although newsrooms still have a long, long way to go.
Have you published stories on your blog that you haven’t check before? Why?
I’ve published a few stories on my blog that I haven’t been able to verify, but always with a caveat saying that I don’t know whether this is true. As a journalist, you get a sense of whether something passes ‘the smell test.’ Because I don’t receive any income from my weblog, I don’t have the means to make long-distance phone calls and spend hours tracking down the accuracy of a report. Instead, I rely on my audience to serve that authentication function.
For instance, after Sept. 11, I received an unmarked e-mail that contained an amazing story about the hospitality of a town in Newfoundland that served as a waystation for airliners diverted from the United States because of the terrorist attacks. I posted the story on my weblog because it read like a true first-person account by the co-pilot of one of the diverted planes. I asked my readers whether anyone could verify the account. Within days, several readers pointed to corroborating evidence. Several journalists also contacted me, asking for additional information. And one Canadian journalist finally tracked down the author of the piece and informed me that his name was misspelled but otherwise the account was accurate.
In Gander, the hospitality of perfect strangers
A blog is sometimes a ‘raw unedited feed.’ Do you think there is a danger for the ‘editor’ of a blog to publish a story without validating it first?
I believe all bloggers have a responsibility to state whether they know if a story they publish is true or is just an unverified report. But the main responsibility lies with the reader. I’m always amazed at the credulity of people who tend to believe something just because they read it on the Internet. We need to fine-tune our bullshit meters by expressing skepticism each time we come across a far-out story from an unverified source.
Almost every week a relative or friend sends me an e-mail saying they had ‘heard this on the Internet’ and wondered if it was true. I finally put up a Web page to steer people to sites that debunk Internet rumors. We should trust blogs and other Internet sources only to the extent that they have earned our trust.
Do you think traditional media will have to rely more and more on weblogs as a source of information? How will you judge the credibility of a story published on a blog?
Many bloggers have staked out a legitimate claim as experts in subjects as diverse as wireless networking, copyright infringement, sonnet poetry and much more. Their blogs are written with a high degree of insight and sophistication. I know of many readers who now turn to gifted amateurs or impassioned experts with a deep understanding of niche subjects, rather than to journalists who are generalists and cover topics a mile wide but an inch deep.
Can traditional journalism and this new ‘citizen journalism’ co-exist? Do you think weblogs can offer something different to journalism?
Blogging will not replace traditional media or drive news organizations out of business. But citizen journalism will provide a valuable supplement to traditional media. When a major news event unfolds, most readers will continue to turn to institutional media for their news fix. But the story doesn’t stop there. On almost any major story, the weblog community adds depth, analysis, alternative perspectives, foreign views, and occasionally first-person accounts that contravene reports in the mainstream press.
Journalists should not see blogs as a threat. For readers, it’s not a binary, either-or choice. Instead of looking at blogging and traditional journalism as rivals, we should recognize that they complement each other, intersect with each other, play off one another.
Weblogs do offer new opportunities to journalists. Journalists who blog are doing things that they can’t do in their traditional roles. On their blogs they ask readers for expert input, post the complete text of interviews alongside the published story, expose the raw material of their stories-in-progress, and write follow-up stories based on readers’ tips and suggestions. Giving readers a voice in the editorial process — by letting them provide meaningful feedback or suggesting story leads — increases loyalty and understanding.
Do you think that a lot of journalists react negatively to blogs, comments from their readers and new technology because they don’t want to accept the facts that sometimes readers know more than you?
I think journalists are often slow to adapt to change. We have been trained to think of ourselves as a special elite who report, filter and interpret the news for lay people. And it’s hard to accept the notion that ordinary folks can use the tools of our trade to engage in journalism.
But I find that as journalists learn more about blogging, they accept this as an interesting new form of information and a good alternative source of expertise.
Where do you think we’re going with ‘citizen journalism’ or ‘open source journalism’?
We’re heading to a more open and democratic media ecosystem where people at all rungs of society get to participate in a dialogue about news. Take three examples from recent months:
* During the peace demonstrations in February, Lisa Rein took to the streets of San Francisco and Oakland, camcorder in hand, and taped video footage of the marchers and speakers, such as congresswoman Barbara Lee, actor Harry Belafonte and antiwar activist Ron Kovic. She posted the video on her weblog, complete with color commentary, providing much deeper coverage of the events than a viewer would get by watching the local news.
* At technology and media conferences, such as PopTech, South by Southwest and Digital Hollywood, bloggers in the audience have reported conference events in real time, posting photographs, speaker transcripts, and summaries and analysis of key points a full day before readers could see comparable stories in the daily newspaper.
* On July 16, 2003, blogger Andy Baio reported on the tragedy in which an elderly driver plowed through the Santa Monica Farmers Market just outside Baio’s office window. He had been walking down that street 20 minutes before. Baio described “the dead and dying” lying in the street and relayed first-hand reports from office co-workers who were eyewitnesses. He also posted a map of the accident scene, laid out a detailed chronology of events, and pointed to media coverage and photographs of the bloody scene.
What do you think of this statement: Weblogs will replace those big analyst houses that normally you consult when you need a source of niche expertise?
Blogs won’t completely replace the traditional analysts found in journalists’ Rolodexes. But blogs will become an increasingly important supplemental source of expert analysis. That’s a welcome development. As media become more diverse, so will our sources of expert advice and commentary.
Do you think webloggers have less integrity than journalists?
No. Bloggers write chiefly out of passion. They want to share their views with others — they’re not in it for a paycheck. There are far more bloggers than journalists — at last count, there are more than 700,000 active blogs — and yet it’s the journalism profession that produces scandals about fabricated stories, conflicts of interest, and other unethical behavior. Not all bloggers are honest, but those who betray their readers’ trust are quickly found out by the blogosphere’s fact-checking machinery.
What can journalists (and traditional media) learn from ‘amateur journalists’?
They can learn that personal voice — an important hallmark of blogs — still attracts a wide following. Institutional journalism too often drains the blood from colorful writing.
They can learn that there are alternative perspectives outside the sometimes narrow purview allowed by traditional media.
And they can discover the value of transparency. Letting readers know that journalists are talented, creative individuals who hold opinions on a variety of subjects can only help to repersonalize journalism and make journalists more human in their readers’ eyes.
How can the bloggers will deal with problems related to trust, ethics, accuracy? And the law? Do you think that, when we’ll see the first lawsuit against a blogger, the ‘chilling effect’ will force bloggers to autoregulate themselves?
I think it’s readers who have to maintain a skeptical eye when reading anything on the Internet, including blogs.
I don’t think the law will have much impact on where blogging is going. The ‘gossipy’ nature of blogging will always be with us, because informal communication is part of human nature.
With all those tools, (weblogs, moblogs, cellular phones, SMS, photophones, webcam, etc…) that enable anybody to be an editor or…. a victim (ref.: Trent Lott) of those ‘new journalists’, and now that the medias, the political advisors, the business men, etc., are becoming more aware of their impacts, do you think that we’ll see people becoming more and more politically correct, afraid of what they say or do, will be 5 minutes later published on the Web? A plain jane vanilla society?
On the contrary, I see political leaders taking up the weblog form themselves to engage the public directly and to correct misimpressions fostered by traditional media. In mid-July, presidential candidate Howard Dean guest-blogged on Larry Lessig’s weblog:
This week, presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich will do the same. Last week, Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle began a weblog.
Yes, weblogs will hold political figures more accountable for their words and actions. That’s a positive development.
What do you think of anonymity? Do you think that a weblogger, to have a minimum of credibility, should clearly identify himself? What can we believe? What can we trust?
Yes! I do not read anonymous weblogs, and I don’t know why anyone would. The first thing I look for when I trip across an unfamiliar weblog is a link to the person’s bio or background. How can we be expected to trust a person’s observations or reports if we don’t know who he is?
That’s not to say that bloggers need professional credentials in order to blog. Anyone should be able to pick up the democratic tools of blogging. But the first rule ought to be, tell us about yourself.
Let’s get back to moblogs and photophones. What about obtaining a permission? In some countries, like Canada, you need a permission before publishing a picture. What about reputation?
In Canada you need permission before publishing a photo taken in a public place? Certainly that can’t be true of news photojournalists. Moblogging will force a reevaluation of traditional cultural mores and expectations. As the tools of personal media allow us all to become publishers, we’ll be taking photos of friends, public speakers, protestors, street scenes and interesting-looking strangers, and e-mailing them to acquaintances and publishing them to photo blogs. That kind of free exchange of information and ideas — that increase in openness and transparency — will lead to some diminution of privacy, just as cell phones have increased our connectedness at the expense of our privacy.
Reputations won’t be ruined by moblogging. But perhaps carefully cultivated (and misleading) manufactured images will be punctured by the moblog paparazzi.
We’ve seen recently a new kind of site, RedPaper (www.redpaper.com) , where, as they say, RedPaper is the world’s first collaborative Newspaper filled with articles for sale written by people from around the world. RedPaper’s goal to is create an alternative to traditional media outlets by providing individuals with the capacity to publish valuable content on every matter of interest. What do you think of that new approach?
I hope they succeed, but I don’t know if they can sustain their business model over the long haul. We’re surrounded by so much free media today that getting people to pay money for editorial content is a real challenge.
JD Lasica, founder of Inside Social Media, is also a fiction author and the co-founder of the cruise discovery engine Cruiseable. See his About page, contact JD or follow him on Twitter.
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