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Through a content analysis of 571 videos posted on the self-generated YouTube channels of five international news channels, this study examines whether user-generated content is a significant part of today’s international journalism. The study includes international news channels Al Jazeera English, France 24 English, Russia Today, CNN International, and Al Arabiya. Exploring the implications for gatekeeping theory, the study looked at how these international news channels incorporate user-generated content in their daily news coverage. Results show that the international news channels are generally not using user-generated content—both work produced by citizen journalists and various measures of ‘interactivity’—to its full potential and that user-generated content is not disruptive to the conventional application of gatekeeping theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study compares Gulf Coast journalists and Twitter users’ coverage of the BP oil spill. In addition to examining authors’ attitudes toward and coverage of the BP oil spill, the study examines community-level variables that shaped attitudes and coverage. The community structure literature has suggested that news media in smaller, more homogeneous communities, which are economically dependent on a polluting industry (as are many communities along the Gulf Coast), are more reticent to be critical in their coverage of pollution. Scholars have suggested, though, that the Internet transcends local geography and that the Internet is more open to alternative perspectives. This study suggests, though, that while the distribution of online content may make local geography less relevant, its production is still rooted in local communities. As a result, Tweets about the oil spill were shaped by many of the same social and economic forces that shaped journalists’ coverage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an experiment comparing traditional news reporting to citizen blogs, university students rated traditional journalism as more credible than citizen journalism. Also, participants assessed straight news articles as more credible than opinionated reports of the same news. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the increase in citizen-generated news, the need to understand how individual predispositions interact with news sources to influence perceptions of news credibility becomes increasingly important. Using a web-based experiment, this study examines the influences individual predispositions toward the media and politics have on perceived credibility of mainstream and citizen journalism. Analyzing data drawn from a representative sample of the U.S. adult population, results indicate that media skepticism and political cynicism interact, such that cynics and skeptics perceive citizen journalism as more credible, while non-cynics and non-skeptics think mainstream journalism is more credible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author comments on the the challenges emerged in Syria as part of the Arab Spring as domestic and foreign journalists are target by the regime of Bashar al-Assad. The author says that foreign journalists have been forced to take an approach to tell story in Syria, while local journalists are repressed by the government. She cites Syrian man Hasan Ali Akleh who drenched himself with gasoline and lit a match in protest of the oppressive governance of al-Assad in late January 2011.

The article examines the perceived credibility of citizen-produced news among young adults, with particular focus on internet news web sites "The Huffington Post," "CNN.com" and "Patch.com." The authors present a study in which they survey college students on news credibility. Their research findings include that the students did not differentiate between news articles that were written by professional journalists or an untrained citizen, that readers usually do not care about the professional norms that go into writing a news article, and that students who trust the mainstream media assigned higher credibility to news content.

Using time series analysis to gauge intermedia agenda setting in a sample of eighteen U.S. political blogs, two elite traditional news entities, and their eleven political newsroom blogs across three issues in 2007, this study reveals that traditional media were unable to set political blog agendas. Ideologically diverse political blog networks were also able to set traditional media's online news agenda, and, to a lesser extent, their newsroom blog agenda. Findings point to a dilution of traditional media's singular agenda-setting influence and to greater interdependence between traditional media and political blogs than suggested by hyperlink studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A content analysis of 86 citizen blog sites, 53 citizen news sites and 63 daily newspaper sites indicated that citizen journalism sites, including both news and blog sites, differed significantly from newspaper sites. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates the emergence of innovations in the social movement sector by exploring citizen journalism in South Korea. The findings show that the innovation resulted from brokerage activities among journalists, labour and unification activists, and progressive intellectuals. Despite different cultural visions and interests, these groups succeeded in building coalitions and constituted a sociocultural milieu that promoted reciprocal learning by allowing actors to realize new ideas and to exchange experiences. The empirical part of the study is based on a social network analysis of social movement groups and alternative media organizations active in South Korea between 1995 and 2002. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bloggers claim to be crucial providers of information in American elections and -policy debates, usurping the role of mainstream media. This study coded more than 2,000 hypertext links to different sources on six widely read political blogs during seven consecutive days. Less than 15% of hyperlinks were to primary sources. Almost half were to mainstream media reports. Thus, political blogs may be comparable to a newspaper comprised of only op-ed pages and opinion columnists. The findings call into question the role of political blogging and raise concerns about how blog readers are learning about public policy and political debates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A statewide survey of community newspaper editors found editors rated the importance of professional journalists' roles higher than they rated citizen journalists' roles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Queering and transgendering practices have been visible across the Internet since the time of multiuser domains (MUDs), MUD object oriented domains (MOOs), e-mail lists, and Web bulletins. This article maps some themes of queering in the Indian digital diaspora through an intergenerational lens, produced in the acts of online and offline coauthoring, weblogging, and reading of instances of such online queering relationally. By way of a dialogic encounter on their own blogs and employing performative writing that simulates the blogsphere, the authors look at the interplay of codes of identity through the employment of themes, language, symbols, and cultural influences in their writing. Examining the themes emerging from the specific blogs they study, the authors ask how power is shifted and relayered in these articulations and what the inviting interactional features of their writer-audience communities are that allow for certain kinds of self-expression while also shaping their performance of sexuality in these spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For 18 years, Joseph Lieberman has represented the State of Connecticut in the U.S. Senate, gaining seniority and becoming popular enough in his state and party to be nominated for the Vice Presidency in 2000. However, due to his perceived closeness to President George W. Bush and his support for the war in Iraq, Lieberman faced an unexpected challenge in the Democratic Primary and ultimately lost the party's nomination to political upstart Ned Lamont. A multimillionaire who could finance his own campaign, Lamont was aided in his insurgency by a host of bloggers in Connecticut and across the nation who took it as their mission to defeat Lieberman. This article will examine the role bloggers played in Ned Lamont's primary campaign as sources of financial support, logistical assistance, and as a place for likeminded individuals to find a community to support his candidacy. In this way, blogs became a "virtual political party" for Lamont who was able to create a support system for his candidacy when the entire Democratic establishment was backing Lieberman. This campaign could provide a template for future candidates challenging party establishments and demonstrates that many of the traditional party functions can be replaced by the Internet. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyzes the role of the media during the two months of postelection crisis in 2008 in Kenya. We discuss how people exchanged information during and after the media ban and analyze online discussions and media coverage. Particular emphasis is given to the role of the social media, such as Web 2.0 communication tools and services, which enable citizens to interact or share content online. Our analysis shows that during the crisis, the social media functioned as an alternative medium for citizen communication or participatory journalism. This experience has important implications for the process of democratization in Kenya. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]