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Citizen Journalism: Challenges For Nigerian Journalists
By Gbemiga Bamidele
Newsdiaryonline Wed Oct 12,2011
Mr Bamidele
Throughout history, access to news and information has been a
privilege accorded to powerful institutions with authority or
wealth to dominate distribution. Globally, there has been
increasing trend towards mass media conglomeration where
individual or few individuals control the flow and direction of
information through mass media ownership. Most often, this
single or scanty ownership of the mass media lead to the
manufacture and sale of news as a commercial product rather than
a social product.
In
an online article in www.wikiipedia. org, accessed on May 5,
2007 by (Omowale Adelabu (2007), the history of citizen
journalism, also known as citizen media was traced thus:
“Citizen media bloomed at the birth of internet and into the
1990s as a response to traditional mass media’s neglect of
public interest and partisan portrayal of news and world
events”.
Not just only that traditional media neglect public interest,
they often take the reader/audience for granted. According to
Dale Peskin (2003), there are three ways to look at how society
is informed. These are:-
i.
That people are gullible and will read, listen to or watch just
about anything.
ii.
That most people require an informed intermediary to tell them
what is good, important or meaningful, and
iii.
That people are pretty smart; given the means, they can sort
things out for themselves, find their own version of the truth.
The
third point above led to the emergence of citizen journalism
where people with the help of information technology (IT) are
now sorting information and finding their own version of the
truth without necessarily depending on an intermediary
(traditional Journalists) for their news and information.
Citizen Journalism or participatory Journalism grew out of an
attempt by individuals to create, edit and write their own
stories and participate in the dissemination of same.
Citizen Journalism (participatory, civil, we journalists) is
meant to describe the “content and the intent of online
communication that often occurs in collaborative and social
media”.
Citizen Journalism is a bottom-up, emergent phenomenon in which
there is little or no editorial oversight or formal journalistic
workflow dictating the decisions of a staff. The difference
between traditional journalism and citizen journalism is
conversation. While traditional journalism practices have high
degree of control by setting the agenda, choosing who the
participants will be and moderating the conversation through
editorial control, citizen journalism actively encourage free
conversations among participants. Citizen journalism enabled the
audience, rather than traditional journalists to encode,
distribute and decide information through simultaneous
distributed conversations that either blossom or quickly atrophy
in the web’s social network.
Conversation is the mechanism that turns the tables on the
traditional roles of journalism and creates a dynamic,
egalitarian give-and-take. The fluidity of this approach puts
more emphasis on the publishing of information rather than the
filtering through editorial gate-keeping. Conversation happens
in the community for all to see. In contrast, traditional news
organizations are set up to filter information before they
publish it.
Citizen Journalism encourages symbiotic relationship between
traditional journalists and citizen journalists. But most often,
citizen journalism does not necessarily rely on any mediator to
function.
Citizen Journalism is built on participation as active members
of the news community. Citizen journalism advocates that the
people are important in the cycle of news production and
dissemination; hence they should become part of the editorial
process.
The
challenges facing Nigerian Journalist is how to redefined
old-model of journalism which sees the audience as an empty
receptacles waiting to be filled with information selected by
omniscient editorial and consumers whose only interaction with
the media is to buy what is or not, except on few occasions
where the audience had the privilege of writing a letter or
opinion article which must be at the mercy of the editor to
publish or dump in the refuse basket.
Many media organizations in Nigeria are not bracing up for the
challenges posed by internet and multi-media technology, which
have opened up the media space to inject a level of
participation for the audience in shaping the media content. To
this end, Nigerian media organizations must embrace the audience
as collaborators and stakeholders in business of news generation
and distribution. Apart from the fact that many mass media
organization in Nigeria have not developed application to
harness the benefits of citizen journalism, many still believe
that the internet revolution and its associated threat to
traditional journalism are still alien to Nigeria.
The
advent of internet and multi-media technology has changed the
pattern and flow of communication globally and since journalism
is in the business and practice of communication, it has also
been impacted tremendously. Citizen journalism has thrown up
challenges and opportunities for the practice of journalism,
which many Nigerian journalists and their media organization
have not braced. Many Nigerian media organizations have not make
their presence felt on the World Wide Web (www) and where they
exist, their pages are dry and drab, and not user friendly.
Infact, the broadcast media are not better of as many of them do
not have website address at all! Citizen Journalism is about
being close to, or involved in events as they happen and
transmitting pictures to the mass media often ahead of
professional new teams, hence the necessity of a functioning and
reliable website.
Citizen Journalism is both a threat and opportunities for
journalism practice and business especially in Nigeria. The only
organizations that will survive are those that are dynamic and
proactive in redefining their business and practice models in
tune with the audience demand and taste. Citizen journalism is a
healthy trend, however, threading it may be for those whose
roles are changing…… the journalists.
Bamidele, Assistant National
Secretary, 1 of NUJ can be contacted on e-mail:
liftmeahead@yahoo.com,
or +234 8033237973.
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