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The article discusses the notion of public journalism in Colombia, focusing on a critical reading of the work of Colombian researcher Ana María Miralles of the Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana in Medellin (Colombia). The author discusses how Miralles emphasizes the role of mass media in Latin American democratic regimes and the reality-constructing effect of news production and publishing. She also considers her criticism of traditional journalism and points out the distinction made by Miralles between civic and public journalism.

The article discusses online journalistic media formats with an emphasis on blogs. It asserts that the Internet has expanded the ways in which people can participate in journalism. Blogs, wikis, online social networks, forums, chat rooms, instant messaging, and news groups represent what has come to be known as social media, the article says. Social media have led to so-called citizen or participatory journalism, in which the power of public communication, circulation of information, and the setting of agendas has been devolved from traditional media entities to citizens, the article adds. Blogs as a journalistic medium are examined in detail.

The article focuses on the relationship between online publishing and citizen participation. The journalistic shift from print to digital publishing, the incidence of high-speed Internet access on user demand for content, and the effect of Web 2.0 technologies on user participation and content creation are noted. Citing researcher Steve Outing's 2005 article "The 11 Layers of Citizen Journalism," several types of user involvement are considered including reader comments, the journalistic use of blogs, and reader-created content. The author explores how these different levels of user involvement are present in independent online news site Soitu.es.

The article reports on efforts by Steffen Leidel and Elena Ern to improve the quality of content on Latin American blogs and related forms of on-line citizen journalism through "blog re-visto" (www.revisto.de), a project of the German entity Deutsche Welle Akademie. It distinguishes between citizen news gathering and professional journalism, noting that news presented according to journalistic principles carries the highest quality, credibility, and overall value. Finding that Internet connectivity is increasing and improving in Latin America, the article describes the greatest challenge to citizen reporting as ensuring content quality.