Why can’t a blogger be a journalist?

written in december 2007

Blogs, wikis and discussion boards: User generated content is the new competitor of journalism. Or is this even a new form of journalism? Do journalists need to study journalism to become a member of the “free press”?
A journalist is the creator of a product, he writes about news. This product is also commonly known as the “first draft of history”.
The Tsunami in December 2004 is without doubt a disaster that will go down in history. When the Tsunami arrived at the coast, not a single journalist was on the beach. In the first 24 hours the only videos, pictures and reports came from citizens and tourists. The blogger Geoffrey Huntler from Australia created the website waveofdestruction.org, which had over half a million visitors in the first four days.
Without those eyewitnesses, people all over the world would have not been informed that quickly.
But now “professional” journalists complain about bloggers, who become more and more successful, saying they are not trustworthy. But how trustworthy is a “professional” journalist?
Journalists have a very important role the democratic society. They do not only supply citizens with information, they also act as a watchdog that scrutinizes and observes the government objectively – or better: should do. In that way, journalists are supposed to protect the public from wrong decisions at the election time. But journalists are not always biased.
Media organisations have grown into huge conglomerates. Because of pressure from advertisers the media suppressed information about the dangers of smoking in former times.
Through the high competition in the market, it came to more tabloidization and infotainment in the news lately. And media and politics influence and depend on each other. An example is the non-aggression pact between Tony Blair and Rupert Murdoch in 1996.
Professional journalists are not at all trustworthy.
Journalism is not automatically a profession.
The first university that offered a course in journalism was the University of Missouri in Columbia in 1879. Before that journalists perfected their skills through learning by doing – without a university degree. Bloggers do not do anything else.
The decrease in newspaper readers is alarming. But the fact that people do enjoy reading
blogs proves that this is not about an ignorant society that is not interested in what is going on in the world. It does prove that journalists should rethink the way they write.
The New York Times realised that and acquired blogrunner in 2005 and Trinity Mirror launched an experiment with crowd sourcing.
Maybe, bloggers are the journalists of the future.