Citizen Journalism has become immensely popular over the past few years. When I say ‘citizen journalism’ I mean private individuals doing essentially what professional reporters do – report information. But enough of boring definitions, let’s focus on real life examples!
Let me introduce you to Josh Lynagh, a Mount Gambier resident and a founder of Limestone Community News Facebook page with its 11,000 likes. It is more than 40% of Mount Gambier’s population. Mr. Lynagh describes the page popularity as ‘mind-blowing’. The idea was to comply and publish news from SA police Limestone Coast public news site and emergency services. He soon started receiving messages from locals about community events. He then realized how powerful social media is these days and has begun to post about anything relevant to Limestone Coast Community.
Along with positive feedback, he admits he has fielded heavy criticism from people saying ‘you’re not a journalist’. Dr Vincent O’Donnell, a Media Commentator from Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, says the page ‘has the presentation of a legitimate news site but was presenting gossip, not news’. He also claims that ‘the danger of social media pages such as Limestone Coast Community News, is there is no way the reader is able to cross-check for unsubstantiated information’. Fair enough, Dr O’Donell, but isn’t that we, ordinary people, decide what we want to believe in? Isn’t it up to us what we consider to be ‘credible sources’? Doesn’t we have the right to be citizen journalists, especially in our own communities? Josh Lynagh has an authority among Mount Gambier residents and somebody else will be an authority for another community – this is how the world works today.
Communications and Convergent Media 