Sunday, January 31, 2010

#6 Refined List of Research Topics

1. Citizen Journalism

Citizen Journalism is when people without professional journalism training go out into the field to report, write, and disseminate stories. For example, an event or incident could be happening and an individual could take a picture with his or her camera. The person could then send this picture to a news organization to use in their story covering the event. Citizen journalism has definitely become more popular as a result of modern technology, especially the Internet. Another example could be sending a story you wrote on a topic to a news organization for them to publish. Citizen journalism allows the public to take part in reporting, or gathering information for the story.

2. Social Media/Social Networking Websites

Social media websites allow individuals to distribute information between one another. Twitter and Facebook are extremely popular social networking websites that are not only used by teenagers, but used by journalists and professionals as well. Journalists use these websites to disseminate small chunks of information to the public. These small chunks of information are easier to read then a long newspaper article. Social media tools are continuing to advance to better provide important news stories to the public. Many newspapers and television programs use social media tools, especially Twitter and Facebook, to work in sync with their programs. Social media sites have also recently been helpful in solving crimes and gathering information to write news stories.

3. Online Journalism/The Rise of Internet Publications

Newspapers have increasingly been adding an online version of the publications as the use of the Internet continues in its popularity. People are craving the interactivity and personalization that is provided in online newspapers. The multimedia elements, like pictures, video and audio, of a story published online allow a reader a front seat into the story. Online stories can be published and updated almost instantly, while their print counterparts have to wait for the printing press to print the publication and then disseminate the information to the public. Online publications are written in a manner that is much easier to skim than print publications. They utilize bullet points, bold text and links, for example. This saves a lot of time for today’s busy individual. Currently, most online newspapers are free unlike print newspapers, but there has been talk about charging for online publications.

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