Citizen Journalism

Welcome back to EIR~

So what's the hype about citizen journalism? Apparently, in this day and age where a camera is just a flip away, everyday people are using their freedom of speech (or technology use) to good...or maybe not so good. Depends on how you judge it.

With the technology of camera phone and the fact that almost everyone nowdays own a camera phone, people are using their power and their phone to capture and post whatever they feel is news-worthy. Whether its the public's bad habits or behaviour, or queer observations, everyday people are finding some sort of joy in posting on the internet what they want others to see. Speaking of which, this could as be seen as society reflecting upon itself, whether its seeing the ugly truth about society or the beauty of society.

We discussed as a class about what we think citizen journalism means. And Ms Faridah concluded that our answers could fit under 3 big umbrellas:

i) Freedom of speech
ii) Contribution of info/user generated content
iii) People's viewpoint

We also discussed in groups about effectiveness of the Stomp website for ctizen journalism. Stomp provides everyday people who wants to post something on it more political freedom. Each and every user is free to post and comment on it. With this freedom, it is important that users know their responsibilities and post and comment responsibly. Sensitive issues such as race and religion should be handled carefully and tactfully so as to not offend others. Although there is much freedom in citizen journalism, as responsible and mature citizens, people must know how to comment in a critical and fact-based manner. People should not comment and post according to their emotions and judge without analysing a certain topic from a few angles. It also boils down to the education of the users on the site. With wide knowledge and understanding of a certain topic, people are more likely to post or comment something that is relevant and constructive, instead of just rambling whatever is on their mind.

In conclusion, I find this week's activity rather refreshing. Being an international student here in Singapore, I have not taken note of how famous this Stomp website is among the citizens. It is a place where people observe people and more comment on the topic. There are good sides and bad sides of it, but if put to effective use, the website could be useful in publishing up-to-date news with the views from the local people themselves. It was quite an eye-opener and I realised that this website will truly help foreigners see and analyse certain topic through the eyes and mind of the locals, if its true potential is reached.