Today when half of the world’s population is equipped with a smartphone, information travels faster and reaches the audience in a zippy. In such a scenario, citizen journalism (act of reporting, analyzing and disseminating news by non-journalists) can really impact the way news is consumed by common people.
The emergence of this kind of journalism in Arunachal Pradesh has been drastically welcomed by the netizens of the state. More and more people have started doing blogs and vlogs often taking up the regional issues that are not the prime focus of the mainstream media.
Despite of its proliferating popularity, citizen journalism is not without its drawbacks. A person with no journalistic professionalism reporting on an event often invites errors to take place. The information disseminated is not always true to the facts. Citizen journalism is a powerful weapon that can either be used to call attention to maltreatment and injustice or it can be a bell ringing in the cap of a jester trying to gain attention.
Through this topic, we invite citizens to provide their views, opinions and feedback on how citizen journalism has challenged the traditional media outlets and transformed the public perspective on journalism in the state of Arunachal Pradesh. And what might be the possible solutions that can tackle the drawbacks of citizen journalism?
Yang Nangki Siram 2 years 10 months ago
The result of citizen journalism are stories that are incomplete, sensationalized, unnecessarily skewed or just wrong at times. To the extent that the public makes no distinction between professional reporting and amateurs with a camera, there are risks that people will act on information they believe to be fully reported but really isn't. It is an untrained, unprofessional person doing the job meant for someone who plays by the rules with ethics and expertise.