Citizen journalism in political reporting creates more questions

During Marc Cooper’s discussion of citizen journalism today, he asked, “Why aren’t mainstream newspapers taking advantage of citizen journalists or cyber sourcing for national political stories?” To many newspaper professionals, his question may have sounded like, “Hey, why not get free labor to help your reporting team?” This statement prompted a discussion that was cut short. Yet, it made me think about a couple of things. If newspapers hire free writers to cover political campaigns, where does that leave staff reporters? And if stories from citizen journalists like Mayhill Fowler of HuffingtonPost.com’s Off the Bus (who broke the story about Obama’s use of the word “bitter” and more) become more popular, do you have to be a “professional” journalist to have a “credible” story? Hey, by the way, what part does credibility play in this new and evolving world of modern journalism? I thought we were going to get some answers to this shifting online media world not more questions. Interested in provoking yourself even more? Cooper reminded the audience to take a look at Jay Rosen’s blog entry on ”The Unchartered”