Interactive journalism, "Journalism without journalists"?

Résumé du document

Commentators, including journalists themselves, regularly talk about the crisis that journalism, especially the printed press, has been facing for a few years. Newspapers seem to be 'an endangered species', as plenty of local ones have shut since the beginning of 2008. Yet the plight of the news industry doesn't really presage its end, for years, despite its difficulties in traditional media, journalism is thriving on the internet.

Extraits

[...] Interactive journalism's criticisms Indeed, interactive journalism, for all its assets, has also some disadvantages. The degree of details and of accuracy that the closeness between the writer and the field of its news allows to reach is only theoretical. The reality is very different: most of the news produced by interactive journalism are of rather low quality, only a little part of these really competes with traditional journalism in term of quality. It can be explained by the fact that interactive journalism contributors, though experts or fanatics of what they write about, lack the objectivity which is the traditional goal of journalism, they are often biased. [...]

[...] The first one could be the fact that through this new kind of journalism, articles can be fare more detailed, accurate and even reliable than articles by true journalists. Indeed, when experts in their professional fields write contents, they know better the subject they are dealing with than journalists, given that they are part of it. They also gather news faster for the same reasons. Globally, they are closer to the news, what enables them to be more accurate. Generally speaking, a trader seems abler to talk about the financial crisis than a journalist. [...]

[...] Most traditional newspapers have already acknowledged that. They now include many interactive elements in their organization: their reporters are available to readers' questions, these readers can write commentaries, star-rating systems of articles have been created. Some newspapers even organize online debates, interviews by internet users, or host blogs, as do the New York Times. As a conclusion, interactive journalism isn't likely to replace traditional journalism, but it appears as a complement, as a way for the news industry to reverse the negative trend it is facing. [...]

[...] A thriving business As a consequence of all these benefits, interactive journalism is now a thriving business. In 2006, there were 12 million bloggers in the United-States, and a third of them considered blogging as a form of journalism. We can assume that, given the trend, there are now far more bloggers in America. Interactive journalism has even interested journalism schools, and some institutes promote it, as J-Lab, the Institute for Interactive Journalism. Citizen journalism has even its model: Ohmy news, a South Korean online newspaper, which features articles written in English by contributors from all over the globe, but not by professional journalists. [...]

[...] Interactive journalism, a revolution in the culture of news production? A. What exactly is interactive journalism? So interactive journalism is a new type of journalism, which allows individuals who were until now only the audience of newspapers to take part in the whole online news production process. It begins with the news and pictures gathering. The rise of the internet and the spread of digital cameras has indeed enabled ordinary people to share content or to provide online newspapers with it. [...]