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Mobile technology is part and parcel of the news today, perhaps to such a degree that it is hard to imagine news without it. This technology has affected those platforms on which news is being produced, for example, but also the array of actors that are involved in its manufacturing through mobile technology, thereby illustrating news as an ongoing information construction process in which professionals and other participants join hands. Stemming from a socio-technical emphasis in journalism this paper addresses the interplay between mobile news technology and social actors by focusing on three leading Israeli WhatsApp news groups ("People of Silence", "Field Security" and "Reports from the Ground") and the daily supply of materials delivered via these groups from their participating members. Based on a thematic analysis of in-depth interviews with the groups' founders, supported by the groups' materials and messages data, findings show how these groups perform as unique pseudo-professional news groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past decade, data journalism has received considerable attention among scholars, pointing to novel forms of investigative reporting as well as new daily practices of news production. This study contributes to existing scholarship by conceptualizing data journalism through distinctions between hard and soft news in relation to service journalism. We analyze news produced by specialized data desks in Swedish public service organizations over a 5-year period (2015–2019) and propose a model for how service journalism attributes can be used as a bridge between the binary categories of hard and soft in data journalism. With this model, we point to how data journalism in public service organizations challenges established notions of soft and hard news and how hybrid production practices open up new research trajectories concerning the societal significance of news in the digital age. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social networks are becoming a site of unprecedented diffusion of fake news and misinformation in Morocco. This fact does not only affect people as individuals but also undermines social order and cohesion in general. To fight back, a number of journalists and researchers have engaged in fact-checking processes to verify claims and information. In this regard, this study considers fact-checking as an emerging journalistic brand that has the potential to promote healthier public debate in the contemporary media environment in Morocco. For this reason, a qualitative approach is adopted to explore the nature of a group of Moroccan online fact checkers to understand their motivations, practices, process of production, and the impact they have made in the public sphere. The significance of this research resides in the fact that it tracks a trend in Moroccan media landscape and investigates its importance in creating communities of interest. Also, exploring this new online trend will help in providing a different perspective on the richness and diversity of content, and change how people think about the online media environment in Morocco. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As an interdisciplinary field, data-driven journalism integrates the intellectual origins of investigative journalism, computer-assisted reporting, and the emerging paradigm of computational social science. Studies of news production have revealed, however, that news professionals are reinforcing existing power structures via an interpretive community, where homophily-evoked social interactions—even in the social media context—create echo chambers and discussion fragmentation. Is the representation of data-driven journalism in the electronic public sphere breaking boundaries among people from different domains or does it resemble the existing power structure? This study adopts a network analytics approach and constructs a representational network among actors who joined the public discussion of data-driven journalism in the Twittersphere—the co-retweeted network—such that two accounts are connected if their tweets are retweeted by the same user. Public tweets containing search queries related to data-driven journalism published from February 2017 to February 2018 were collected with Twitter real-time streaming application programming interface (API). A co-retweeted network with 1,148 accounts was derived from verified accounts' retweeting posts. Results found that several communities emerged, and news organizations, nongovernmental and nonprofit professional organizations, and academic institutions were in the crucial positions of the network. The exponential random graph models (ERGMs) based on this network revealed the extent to which gender, geographical location, and institutional type of the users were associated with the tie-formation. This study documents the major actors who are discussing the subject of data-driven journalism and raises critical reflections toward the interdisciplinary collaboration in the production of public knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article draws on the case of La Gordiloca, a Facebook-based journalist from Laredo, TX, to interrogate the increasing role of social media within news-making processes. Applauded by The New York Times as a paragon of twenty-first century journalism and under scrutiny from local businesses and law enforcement for defamation and misuse of official information, she occupies a space between digital journalist and social media celebrity. Combining a content analysis with focus groups of Laredo residents, we argue that her work reflects a constitutive paradox unique to social media journalism: Whereas new technologies expand opportunities for citizens to participate in the process of news production, they also enable the corrosion of norms/practices that oriented previous forms of news production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Citizen journalism is increasingly practiced worldwide due to the expansion of the Internet, new media technologies, and social media platforms. This study investigated Malaysia's citizen journalism through young journalist’s perspective by understanding the concepts and roles of citizen journalists. The analysis demonstrated that young citizen journalists view opportunities and empowerment from a new angle. The results illustrated that citizen journalism in Malaysia provides a potential prospect for citizen journalists as well as a role in inspiring young people. Based on the present paper, it is suggested that future research should explore the guidelines to distinguish Malaysian citizen journalists from the conventional keyboard warriors and cyber troopers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses that the U.S., nonprofits and foundations have stepped up to fill some gaps and provide short-term relief. Topics discussed include the reasons why market-based innovations in journalism fail and continue to fail are complex and deserve their own detailed explanation; and the public goes along with this system of accountability because scientists produce beneficial results over the long run and because neither politicians nor typical citizens.

Newspapers have been affected by a progressive loss of readership over the last decade, especially among those under 24 years old. This group continues to stay informed about topics of their interest, but through social networks. For this reason, the press has incorporated a playful, immersive, and participatory journalism based on technologies such as virtual reality or 360 videos. Through quantitative and qualitative analysis of data obtained from eye tracking, and by subsequently performing semi-structured interviews, this research verifies the attention paid by Spanish and Portuguese university students to violent, immersive, journalistic content. Students' understanding and awareness of this informative material with violent events is analyzed. The capability of immersive journalism to capture the attention of the public under 24 years old and to raise awareness about social problems based on visualization of violent content is highlighted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work aims store search participation by the public from the use of the WhatsApp in the telejournal of Rede Globo affiliate, Bom Dia MS in Campo Grande, MS. Content analysis was used as a methodology to understand how this application has been used as a tool for participative journalism in a regional and local dimension. A total of 43 programs of 1h20 each were analyzed, and open face-to-face interviews were conducted with the TV news presenters. The study discusses the use of mobile digital technologies in journalism and public participation in this scenario. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ISBN: 9781526119988 Reviewer: Niamh Kirk (University College Dublin, Ireland) Resilient Reporting is an examination of election news coverage in Ireland since the midtwentieth century, revealing a shift in the approach to electoral and political journalism. This underlines the theme carried in the title of the book, that Irish political election news is resilient to the potential detrimental effects of profound changes within and outside of the Irish media system. Furthermore, it examines the extent to which exogenous factors, such as changes in the media system, professional norms and technology, have reshaped election reporting in Ireland. [Extracted from the article]

This article analyses Internet users' participation and the ways in which it is framed by journalists, with a particular focus on the Live Blog format. It provides a case study of the online media coverage of Dominique Strauss-Kahn's arrest in New York in May 2011, by the highly respected media Le Monde.fr. A lexicometric (statistical) and discourse (qualitative) analysis of two sets of corpora (Corpus 1 being composed of all the comments submitted by Internet users throughout the live blogging process and Corpus 2 of the few which were finally published on the Live Blog) will highlight the nature and the various forms of audience participation as well as the ways in which they are framed by journalists. The article aims to investigate the representativeness of the published messages and the participative audience profile which journalists foreground within this media space of multiple voices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While previous research has considered patterns of homogeneity and heterogeneity in the journalistic field, existing literature has largely ignored the factors that contribute to the growth and contraction of the field. Using citizen journalism (CJ) as a case study, we examine how four forces – organizational population dynamics, technological innovations, exogenous political events, and endogenous disruptions elsewhere in the field – shaped the growth of CJ over time and, consequently, the journalistic field. Using a snowball sampling method, we collected a “near-population” of U.S.-based, English-language CJ sites (n = 1829) to measure yearly density and rates of foundings and mortalities. The population of CJ sites increased through most of the period, foundings declined after a spike in 2005, and mortalities rose dramatically after 2010. The results provide evidence that organizational population and technological change affected the size of the population of CJ sites, while political upheaval and disruptions within professional journalism held less sway. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Crowdsourcing and crowdmapping tools such Ushahidi (testimony or witness in Swahili) give value to the communication chain. They allow individuals, institutions, and journalistic organizations to take advantage of the flow of information provided by the users, although the process is not without some difficulties. Ushahidi, based on free software, offers a broad range of applications to be used in media contexts. First, Ushahidi focuses on data through a participatory map of georeferenced information and then it addresses the verification of the information provided by the citizens. From the analysis of the bibliography and some study cases, we describe a specific area of collaboration between professional journalists and citizen journalists in the creation, distribution, and verification of content. International media which have used Ushahidi include The guardian, BBC, Al jazeera and Huffington post. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The perceptions of journalists who work in traditional media with an online version and journalists working in online native media about the advantages and disadvantages of digital journalism in realtion to conventional one are compared. Citizen participation in the informative processes is analyzed, as well as some ethical and deontological journalism principles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Much attention has been paid to the role of the audience in online news production. However, very little research has addressed how the audience understands this participation. Using the theories of affect and fandom, this paper will investigate the most popular form of online participation – comments. Based on a case study of Australian alternative journalism site, New Matilda, it will argue for a broader understanding of participation online, one that incorporates those who ‘internalise’ their participation and in particular the role emotion plays in audience engagement. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Public journalism is viewed by many as a solution to the decreasing media presence and public involvement in regional news media. Core values in this approach are public deliberation, participation, and connectedness. This study investigates the added value of a citizen-centred approach to journalism routines and news content in a collaborative regional media project in the Netherlands. Data were gathered using observations, interviews, and content analyses. Results show that even in a newly created news environment, existing journalistic routines largely prevent incorporation of a bottom-up approach in daily news production. Furthermore, active citizenship does not seem to be common: citizens did not participate readily in news production. While news content shows a greater focus on local communities and citizen sources, citizen sources were overwhelmingly used in vox pops rather than more active roles in which their expertise, experience, or specific knowledge was relevant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this article is to examine the way readers who participate in the comments section of online sports newspapers produce hate speech toward the medium. The research focuses on the Marca sport-based online community in Spain, in the context of the Real Madrid vs. FC Barcelona rivalry. The article explores the medium's quandary between allowing the free speech of his readers and therefore promoting the audience's engagement and the protection of its brand image, threatened by comments containing hate speech. Although only a small part of the readers addressed the medium through their comments, almost 75 per cent of them contained hate speech, accounting for a very violent discussion environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Marca Community is arguably one of the most popular online sports communities in Spain with over 400,000 members. In its forum, users can comment on the news published by the sport-based newspapers Marca while interacting with other members. Drawing on the existing literature on virtual communities, this study empirically examines the engagement in online discussion in order to determine the degree of “community building" promoted by the members. We propose a methodological approach taking under consideration the singularities of the sports fans and of the online conversation. A structural analysis focusing on the user interaction was conducted over the members (N=4,967) who posted comments in 8 selected articles. The findings suggest that Marca Community is a non-hierarchical liquid network wherein members participate in an equal footing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Web-based civic participation in democracies, especially in the sprawling domain of alternative politics, continues to grow. In this paper I explore the intersection of two trajectories of such participation: one that takes the form of journalism (broadly understood) and the other that is transnational in character. Participatory journalism unavoidably evokes normative issues that professional journalism has always grappled with. Global activism, in turn, can be analytically framed by the theme of civic cosmopolitanism. My aim is to highlight and juxtapose these two sets of ideals, two normative frameworks for guiding practice in regard to journalism. In the first section I survey the Web environment from the standpoint of its enhanced capacity to enable citizens to engage with their societies and the world. Journalistic activity has become a part of this kind of online engagement, and thus normative issues about these practices quickly arise. In the second section, I sketch some of the relevant contours of cosmopolitanism, underscoring the normative themes that it raises. The final section comprises an interface with horizons of civic cosmopolitanism and those of a dilemma-ridden professional journalism; I try to pull the strands together by elucidating the implications that ensue. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Considered by some authors (Gilmor, 2005; Rosen, 2008) as one of the traditional journalism greatest challenges, the so called "citizen journalism" is far from delivering its original promises. Regardless of their location and dimension, some of the most promising online media projects developed by citizens or created with this aim, lost their initial dynamic or closed down completely. In Portugal, the online versions of the major daily newspapers also created sections for citizens participation, some of them using the word "journalism" or "reporter" in their denomination. But can we consider "journalism" the texts published on these spaces? To answer this and other questions, an analysis of contents published by readers in the specific sections of four Portuguese daily newspapers was carried out. The main goal is to verify if there are characteristic elements in journalistic practice, i.e. if citizens do journalism in the spaces denominated as "citizen's journalism". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents a comparative study about the evolution of the use of blogs in Spanish regional press to analyse if the performance of blogs has changed significantly on the basis of the content and the level of updating in recent years. A first analysis was conducted in 2006 when the boom of this phenomenon. Following a new analysis in 2009, this work carries out a comparison of the evolution of the same performance parameters in both years. It can be stated that no clear evolution patterns exist, that the number of blogs has no relation with the updating of these in either of the periods (the beginning period or the establishment period) and that the main difference detected is that in 2006 more attention was paid to the personal contents that provided blogs with the indisputable character of a tool for personal expression, while in 2009 bloggers appeared to be more interested in what is local and current. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the assumption that user-generated content in mass media websites gives audiences greater power over influencing news making. Employing a content analysis of readers' comments in various Greek online mass media, the study examines whether commenters assume any of the core journalistic functions regarding news production, in terms of setting the agenda, providing original information, and airing oppositional views on reported issues. From a public sphere perspective, it also examines the degree of diversity of users' opinions within media outlets. The results suggest that whereas users challenge journalistic viewpoints to some extent, this type of audience participation is not likely to render audiences co-producers of news content in significant ways or offer opportunities for cross-cutting political exchanges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years the digital media have opened their doors to so-called citizen journalism. Nevertheless, far from some declarations that present the reader as another journalist, the reality is very different. This article compares the sections of informative participation in four digital editions of printed newspapers from 2009 to nowadays in order to analyze two aspects: whether the media frankly trust the readers, beyond inviting them to play at being journalists; and what is the reader's response. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper provides a review of research on user generated content in the Israeli online journalism landscape. Findings reveal that scholarly attention has been focused primarily on user comments, with initial insight on the role of blogs and citizen journalism in the Israeli journalism landscape. Methodologically, research is derived primarily from interviews with newsroom staff and case study content analyses. The review suggests that future research should complement current data with user based inquiry about orientations and use of UGC, and examine the role of Israeli culture in the practice of UGC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research about online journalism has been dominated by a discourse of technological innovation. The 'success' of online journalism is often measured by the extent to which it utilizes technological assets like interactivity, multimedia and hypertext. This paper critically examines the technologically oriented research about online journalism in the second decade of its existence. The aim is twofold. First, to investigate to what degree online journalism, as it is portrayed in empirical research, utilizes new technology more than previously. Second, the paper points to the limitations of technologically oriented research and suggests alternative research approaches that might be more effective in explaining why online journalism develops as it does. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research note begins by pointing to the forms of geographical and political enclosure that have resulted from the current Sri Lankan government's effective regulation of parts of the national media, as well as its mediation of knowledge produced about Sri Lanka more generally. It argues that a rather draconian and unbreachable geography of inside and outside is instantiated by the political regime's insularizing regulation of the country's media(tion). The research note then points to new virtual spaces in the Sri Lankan context that are reconfiguring this sticky geography of inside and outside. In particular, it argues that Sri Lanka's burgeoning blogosphere and online citizen journalism provide new, participatory spaces for dissent, debate and the free flow of information that have much potential to assist in the production of a more robust and critical civil society. The emergence of these spaces points to the importance of geography and spatiality in manufacturing an effective critical politics in contemporary Sri Lanka. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Television networks in many European countries have launched web participation channels in recent years, so that viewers can send a variety of news content. For some authors, they are a new form of "citizen journalism"; a more proper term for this concept, it is argued, seems to be "user generated content". This article deals with the essential aspects of this kind of participatory journalism in television websites, by analysing the initiatives of several television networks in Spain, Great Britain and France. It examines the nature of user generated content in those television websites case studies, and it enquires to what extent these initiatives can be regarded as "citizen journalism" and what kind of content they promote. Finally, it explores the challenges and opportunities posed by citizen journalism and user generated content to professional online television news. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The presence of a diversity of information offers citizens access to a range of ideas, expertise and topics. In this study, a measure of content diversity was created to determine whether online citizen journalism and online newspaper publications were serving this function in the USA. Based on the findings from a quantitative content analysis (n = 962), online citizen journalism articles were more likely to feature a greater diversity of topics, information from outside sources and multimedia and interactive features. The findings suggest online citizen journalism content adds to the diversity of information available in the marketplace. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The conceptual relationships between what has been called citizen journalism, participatory journalism and crowdsourcing journalism in the context of the evolution of user-generated content (UGC) in the media are examined. The research on user participation in the media, since the first studies of interactivity to the most recent work addressing specific issues such as quality or control, is also reviewed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The contribution of professional journalism to democratic citizenship is well-established, but the proliferation of online user-generated news begs the question of whether citizen journalism plays a similar role. Use and trust of both professional and citizen journalism were investigated for their associations with political knowledge and participation. User-generated journalism was negatively related with knowledge of national political figures, but strongly and positively associated with higher levels of online and offline participation; professional news media produced gains in knowledge and offline participation. Trust in user-generated news amplified the link between citizen journalism and online participation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examined whether information about a writer and hyperlinks on a citizen journalism Web site affected the perceived credibility of stories. Participants read stories from a popular citizen journalism Web site and rated the stories in terms of perceived credibility. Results show that hyperlinks and information about the writer do enhance perceived story credibility. Credibility is enhanced most greatly when both hyperlink and writer information are included and, to a lesser extent, when just hyperlink or writer information is present. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wikinews is a news website which allows anyone with internet access to publish and edit journalistic content directly on its site without prior authorization or registration. This article examines the way in which Wikinews contributors negotiate its 'neutral point of view' policy, which differs from the traditional sense of journalistic objectivity in the way that it is both defined and implemented. The study encompasses a detailed review of 2332 news articles and their associated 'talk pages', published in the period from November 2004 to July 2005. Close textual analysis is used to conduct a qualitative study of a selection of these Wikinews articles, their documented editorial history and referenced sources, so as to offer a thorough critique of the 'neutral point of view' policy, as assessment is made of the importance of the Wikinews model for online journalism more widely. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A systematic study of day-to-day practices of citizen reporters, compared to their mainstream counterparts, suggests that ordinary citizens can serve as a vital complement to mainstream journalism, however not as its substitute. The paper develops a version of the “news access” theory, which sees citizen journalists as hindered by their inferior access to news sources, unlike mainstream journalism, where the problem is seen as the superior access of some of their sources to extensive and favored coverage. There are several symptoms for citizen reporters' limited news access: their modest use of human sources; the high proportion of one-source items; their reluctance to interactively negotiate versions with sources; and their contacts with sources tend to be ad hoc exchanges, rather than long-term role relationships. On the other hand, citizen reporters have adopted several mechanisms that help them make up for their comparably limited access. They are much more likely to pursue stories at their own initiative. They tend to predicate their stories on firsthand witnessing, technical sources (mainly Internet), personal acquaintances, and on their own experience. Data were gleaned from a series of interviews in which reporters from Israeli citizen and mainstream news websites explained how they formulated their sampled items. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Citizen participation in online political debate and the Internet's effect on Chinese society have become an important research field. However, few studies so far have examined the use of interactive functions by Chinese newspaper websites to facilitate online discussion of civil issues, or the quality of public debate on the websites of Chinese online newspapers. Using the concept of the public sphere as its theoretical framework, this article aims to advance this line of inquiry through content analysis of the Guangzhou Daily website—Dayoo.com—to explore both the potential and the limits of the Internet in fostering civic engagement. Key variables measured include the quantity of posts and participants, topicality, nature of the argument (i.e. justification, complexity and civility), and responsiveness and homogeneity of contributions. Findings suggest that a political public sphere in Chinese cyberspace is emerging at the incipient stage, where the quality of discourse has reached a certain level but is not yet mature in terms of the complexity of dialogue and the exposure to disagreement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the comparison of user and professionally developed online content, readers did not consider the source as significant when they assessed the fairness, believability or quality of an opinion piece. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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 mainstream online news media face accusations of being slow to respond to so-called 'grassroots' or 'citizen journalism', which uses the world wide web, and in particular blogs and wikis, to publish and promote independent news-related content. This article argues that the adaptation of established news websites to the increasing demand from readers for space to express their views is driven as much by local organizational and technical conditions as it is by any attachment to traditional editorial practices. The article uses qualitative research interviews with the editors and managing editors of nine major British news websites to reveal the debates journalists are having about their changing roles, the challenges of meeting commercial expectations and legal obligations, and the innovations taking place in online newsrooms. It provides journalism and interactive media scholars with case studies on the changes taking place in journalism's relationship with its consumers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the new forms of audience participation in journalism with regard to their possibility in achieving the goals of public journalism.2 A typology of five models of audience connections is proposed: (1) traditional journalism, (2) public journalism, (3) interactive journalism, (4) participatory journalism, and (5) citizen journalism. Identifying the higher goal of public journalism as engaging the people as citizens and helping public deliberation, I argue that the new forms of audience participation could further these goals only by infusing the value from and learning the techniques of public journalism. The concept of community, of public deliberation, past research on the Internet, and data obtained from my field study is drawn upon. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reflects upon the conditions and developmental trends of public journalism in the United States as of 2004. Discussion is given noting ways in which the rise of public or civic journalism has effected the sector and are continuing to change due to the advent of blogs, multi-media communications and the Internet. Questions are raised regarding whether or not the public conception of journalism will remain as a specialized field or transition into a political activity done by the public at large.