Check Swinburne's subscriptions for full text availabilitySearch Swinburne Research Bank
Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: http://hdl.handle.net/1959.3/33252
- Title
- The limitations of the crowd
- Author(s)
- Simons, Margaret
- Abstract
- Wander the mahogany-veneer rows of most Australian newsrooms over the last five years and you would have heard from various old farts that the internet was nothing to get too excited about. At first it was said to be a passing fad. Once that line ceased to be credible, it was said that it didn’t really matter. What mattered was content, and the credibility of the brand, and most of all good journalism. The method of delivery made no essential difference. That line of argument lives on, although for anyone with their eyes open it is clearly only part of the truth. Bloggers and others interact with newspapers, critique them and, as we saw during the federal election campaign, sometimes do a better job on interpreting facts than the media organisations that 'own' the data. So what exactly are the implications of the internet for the ways in which journalists do their jobs? Opinion is cheap in every sense of the word and can be found on any blog, but what about the reporting of the facts on which opinions are based? Will the internet change, enhance or undermine that underestimated yet essential trade skill of the professional reporter---the ability to find things out. Margaret Simons looks at the results of an experiment in online reporting launched by Jay Rosen. [Introduction]
- Publication type
- Commentary
- Research centre
- Swinburne University of Technology. Faculty of Life and Social Sciences. Institute for Social Research
- Source
- Creative Economy Online, 15 February 2008
- Publication year
- 2008
- Keyword(s)
- Assignment Zero; Australia; Beatblogging; Blogging; Citizen journalism; Crowdsourcing; Journalism; Media; News media; Online reporting; Pro-am relationships; Public journalism; Rosen, Jay, 1956-; Volunteers; Web; Web 2.0
- Publisher
- ARC Centre of Excellence for Creative Industries and Innovation
- Publisher URL
- http://www.creative.org.au/webboard/results.chtml?filename_num=195592
- Copyright
- Copyright © 2008 Margaret Simons.
