Is Mainstream Media Capitalizing on Citizen Journalism?

I blog about it all the time: citizen journalism is on the rise. Meanwhile, newspapers are folding at an ever-increasing rate.

What's the natural next step as these two trends become more and more prevalent? Online news outlets depending on citizen--e.g. unpaid--journalists to provide content while they continue to phase-out real--e.g. paid--journalists. Not only does this make sense financially, but since user-generated content is what readers want anyway, advertisers are becoming increasingly interested in going where the unpaid--and popular--content is.

A concrete step towards this new model will be rolled out this coming Monday--in the form of a blogroll, that is. The New York Times is launching a local blog network that will feature content from the paper’s editors but also rely on user-generated content from locals readers. Jim Schachter, editor for digital initiatives at The New York Times, explained:

We expect to sell ads to local merchants using our telesales and self-serve ad solution. Our two pilot sites are staffed with full-time NYTimes reporters. That’s not cheap. Obviously, it’s also not a sustainable model.

What a dream scenario for newspapers and online news outlets, right? Not only do they not have to pay reporters anymore, but ad revenue will increase.

My question is this: is relying on citizen journalists a sustainable model? As it stands now, playing on citizen journalists' vanity is basically the model: people want to write and have people read it, and they want to be able to say that their stuff is featured on mainstream, high-traffic websites.

But how long will people be willing to put the time and effort into creating high-quality blog or video posts if they're not being compensated? At what point do citizen journalists basically become freelancers working for free? If I had to guess, I'd say right about the time when statistics start to show that websites are generating a bunch of revenue as a result of the content users are providing for free.

Watching Old Media Die, One Tweet At A Time

I've blogged about it before: old media is dying. A few days ago, Brian Solis had a great, statistics-laden post documenting "the looming exit of print newspapers as a primary source of national and international news."

Don't want to take the time to read either one of those posts? Or just don't believe it? Just follow @themediaisdying on Twitter and you'll be able to experience the real-time demise of traditional media.

Scary.

Changing of the Media Guards

A few months ago I posed the question "Will citizen journalism replace traditional journalism?"

I recently came across an article that gives a great example of why the answer is "yes." Roland Legrand, a multimedia newsroom manager for Belgian publisher Mediafin, wrote a great piece for PBS.org's Mediashift, detailing a newspaper's role in bringing a community together. He pretty much sums up the reason why user-generated media is destined to replace traditional media:

"The people formerly known as the readers have now become readers/writers. In the 'good old days' of the print newspaper, we only got a few letters each day. Today, we get hundreds and sometimes thousands of comments on our news articles each day. With the click of a button, readers can easily and instantly post reactions to articles. Furthermore, the readers don't only react to our articles -- they react far more often to each others' comments. The article may start a discussion, but it does not necessarily remain the center of attention."

He likens his paper's new live blog application a soccer game: "One can watch it at home, alone, or experience the magic of being all together with fellow fans in the stadium." He maintains that readers don't want to just read news; they want to discuss it.

I thought about his article when I read my Sunday Washington Post the other day. Front page, above the fold was a story about DC's charter schools. A prominent call-out box to the right of the story pointed out additional features to the story on washingtonpost.com:

• "Interactive Charter Schools Map: Find out how each school measures up on test scores and other data.


• Multimedia: Narrated photo galleries of principals, faculty and students.


• Live Online: Reporters...host a discussion at noon tomorrow."

The thing is this: with newspapers folding like houses of cards lately due to plumeting sales and ad revenue, how long are they going to be able to pay people to generate the same content that's available online in spades online for free? Take this charter school article, for instance; The Post had to pay not only the two authors of the article, but the person/people who created the interactive map and narrated photo gallery--as well as an additional reporter for the live online chat. Not to mention the production and printing costs.

If you search "DC charter schools" on Google blogsearch, you get over 30,000 results--take your pick. Prefer multimedia? Right now, YouTube has almost 50 videos about DC charter schools. Online interaction? Try the DC Charter School Reform group on Yahoo or the "I Love my DC Charter School" group on Facebook.

All I know is this: if traditional media does fall, there's plenty of user-generated content poised and ready to take its place.