CITIZEN JOURNALISM

Digital technology and the Internet are changing the face of news gathering. Today, cell phone cameras and other devices are capturing local events long before news crews can arrive: often, personal media on major stories hits the Internet before mainstream media can begin coverage.

This sharing of community news and information content either as text / blogs, digital storytelling, images, audio file, podcasting or video is known as Citizen Journalism. Feedback and discussion on issues raised is received in the same way. Many websites accept videos of up to 30 Megabytes (MB) in size and pictures and audio up to 1 MB. Many people have chosen to use blogging as a way of expressing themselves. This also allows them to raise the issues without the fear of being cut short by the editor. Some journalists have their own blog spots where they receive feedback on their articles. More and more civil society organisations are using this form of communication to talk to their communities. They also raise areas of concern and encourage participation.

One good example is I-Report that is run by Cable News Network (CNN) that offers people around the world the opportunity to submit their stories, video, audio, and pictures to CNN for possible distribution via the network's considerable distribution channels.

Telecentre.org website is a social networking website that gives an online voice to the global Telecentre Community. Wikipedia defines a telecentre as a public place where people can access computers, the Internet, and other digital technologies that enable them to gather information, create, learn, and communicate with others while they develop essential digital skills. Online knowledge sharing is vital as it helps create networks that facilitate information sharing and learning on issues like business planning, fundraising, outreach, and community development. The goal of the Telecentre.org website is to encourage and support telecentre communities.

The free site which is nearly one year old has gained traction, and by this week the English site of the website had 1,660 members signed up. Membership simply means you have a searchable, public profile on the site and can participate in blogs and post content such as events, photos and videos. Basically, the intent is to provide a forum for people with interest in Information Communications Technologies for Development (ICT4D), to help put them together, form partnerships and help create visibility for all the interesting projects, people, companies and organizations within the telecentre community. The English website (other languages available for the site are Spanish, French and Arabic) has over 143 discussions, 1,030 blogs, 3,885 photos, 144 albums, 56 groups and 68 videos.

This year Telecentre.org organised a blog and photo contest for its members. The blog contest ended in June with five winners receiving prizes from telecentre.org. The photo contest is concluding today and just like the blog contest members who posted the top five winning photos will receive prizes from telecentre.org.

The World Wide Web as an easy-to-use interface has enabled even casual users to make use of some of the internet’s enormous resources. Citizen journalism will only grow since access to internet has been made easy through the fibre-optic option which would result in reduced costs for the end-users.