Tuesday, August 30, 2005
Democratic, lazy, or just a great money-spinner?
The summer's bombings in London obviously attracted massive press attention, but the coverage itself has also come under scrutiny. The use of pictures from mobile phones (still and video) was both dramatic and an excellent example you could use in your exam to demonstrate how new media technologies are changing production practices. It's understandable that TV news channels in particular will use the 'citizen content', particularly in the absence of professionally captured material. It's also a way of making the news more immediate and responsive; no longer is it necessary to wait for a news crew to get to an incident when ever person there (give or take) has a mobile phone, enabling them to communicate images, video and sound almost instantly. The Tsunami of last Christmas was another event that was reported using amateur footage. The rise of the amateur is newsgathering is one trend you should research further; it fits into the pattern of many NMTs and the role they play in allowing everyone the chance to contribute to all aspects of the media. This is refered to as the democratisation of the media. (Wired had some excellent material on the subject in its July edition.)
All of this is a good thing, you might think, but is it really? The day after the first London bombings Radio 4's The Message (sadly not archived) had a lively discussion about the use of amateur material such as mobile phone photographs. There is surely weight in the argument that if it's impossible to respond instantly with professional crews, why bother? Why not let the 'citizen journalists' do the hard work, saving the costs involved in news gathering. Given the amount of news often needed to fill 24 hours of broadcasting, why not rely on the potentially limitless material that can be provided? To many, this is a dangerous viewpoint, eroding the professionalism of the industry; really sharp knives are widespread, but we're not all surgeons. To rely on such material is further evidence that news is becoming more reactionary, often failing to seek out stories because it's cheaper not to.
Your viewpoint on this issue may be swayed by the promise of cash, however.
All of this is a good thing, you might think, but is it really? The day after the first London bombings Radio 4's The Message (sadly not archived) had a lively discussion about the use of amateur material such as mobile phone photographs. There is surely weight in the argument that if it's impossible to respond instantly with professional crews, why bother? Why not let the 'citizen journalists' do the hard work, saving the costs involved in news gathering. Given the amount of news often needed to fill 24 hours of broadcasting, why not rely on the potentially limitless material that can be provided? To many, this is a dangerous viewpoint, eroding the professionalism of the industry; really sharp knives are widespread, but we're not all surgeons. To rely on such material is further evidence that news is becoming more reactionary, often failing to seek out stories because it's cheaper not to.
Your viewpoint on this issue may be swayed by the promise of cash, however.
// posted by Gavin Luhrs @ 8:11 pm 
Comments:
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There was quite an interesting piece on this topic the other day (I can't remember where though) which pointed out how dangerous it could be to rely on what eye witnesses claim to have seen.
Referring to the shooting of the innocent Brazilian man at Stockwell, the piece mentioned how an eye witness had claimed to see him jump over the ticket barrier and run away from police, while CCTV images apparently confirm that he had a ticket and walked through.
It seems really dangerous to me to assume that members of teh public have the same professional skills as journalists or even that their mobile phone pictures tell us some kind of truth - after all, a picture can be used to say anything if it's anchored in the right way.
The problem with rolling news programmes seems to be that they need constant sources of new news and the public are feeding that need with such images. However, we're losing sight of accuracy and analysis as a result.
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Referring to the shooting of the innocent Brazilian man at Stockwell, the piece mentioned how an eye witness had claimed to see him jump over the ticket barrier and run away from police, while CCTV images apparently confirm that he had a ticket and walked through.
It seems really dangerous to me to assume that members of teh public have the same professional skills as journalists or even that their mobile phone pictures tell us some kind of truth - after all, a picture can be used to say anything if it's anchored in the right way.
The problem with rolling news programmes seems to be that they need constant sources of new news and the public are feeding that need with such images. However, we're losing sight of accuracy and analysis as a result.
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