The Role of Citizen Journalism in Society

Journalism ethics refers to the symbols of morality that journalists are expected to respect. These include a commitment to revealing the truth objectively rather than subjectively motivated by self-interest; source privacy; and crediting what is said to the appropriate source. The media has the ability to develop agendas that can have a positive or harmful impact on society. Beyond creating agendas, the media can and do serve as agents of checks and balances for other societal powers. The power of social media has greatly increased the power of the media, resulting in what has been dubbed the 'fifth estate,' also known as citizen journalism, whose power has resulted in events such as the creation and propagation of the Arab Spring, terrorism, and unprecedented citizen participation in the politics of world democracies. In Nigeria, citizen journalism has become a huge phenomenon. Given how citizen journalists have democratized the media, this is a wonderful trend. As a result, Nigerians no longer rely solely on the mainstream media for news and information. Citizen journalists have done a fantastic job using social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. As appealing as this may appear, there is an ethical dimension to citizen journalism in Nigeria. Most citizen journalists, it is feared, do not adhere to the standards or ethical principles of journalism.

Concept of Citizen Journalism

Citizen journalism has been referred to as 'public,' 'participatory,' 'democratic,' 'guerrilla,' and 'street' journalism. Citizen journalism is defined as 'the act of a citizen, or group of citizens, participating actively in the process of gathering, reporting, analyzing, and disseminating news and information,' with the goal of 'providing independent, reliable, accurate, wide-ranging, and relevant information that a democracy requires.'

In the definition of citizen journalism, Studies captures the spirit and essence of the concept as 'an alternative and activist form of newsgathering and reporting that functions outside mainstream media institutions, often as a respite from shortfalls in the professional journalistic field, that uses similar journalistic practices but is driven by different objectives and ideals and relies on citizen participation.'

Citizen journalism is the polar opposite of the mainstream media's suffocating, near-unidirectional top-down communication paradigm. “Participatory journalism is a bottom-up, emergent phenomena in which there is little or no editorial oversight or conventional journalistic process dictating a staff's decisions,” according to scholars. Instead, it's the outcome of a slew of concurrent, dispersed dialogues that either flourish or fade away in the Web's social network.” They notice that 'the fluidity of this method places a greater focus on information publishing rather than filtering.' Conversations take place in public places where everyone may see them. Traditional news organizations, on the other hand, are set up to filter information before it is published.” Citizen journalism, in its purest form, leaves no place for gatekeeping. In this type of journalism, raw, 'naked,' and undiluted information is delivered to members of the public who are directly participating in content development.

Despite the widespread misunderstanding, citizen journalism is just a new type of journalism in which the content is user-generated, unfiltered, uncensored, and delivered in real time. Professor Jay Rosen's description of citizen journalism is as follows: 'citizen journalism is when persons formerly known as the audience use the press tools they have in their possession to inform one another.' As a result, it is clear that becoming a citizen journalist does not necessitate prior expertise in journalism, especially in this era of social media's remarkable ubiquity. To join the expanding citizen journalism movement, all that is required is a basic understanding of how social media works and how it may be used.

Benefits of Citizen Journalism

There are several benefits of citizen journalism: Watches the watchdog (a case of check and balance); reduces influence of ownership of main stream media houses advertisers, government interference in the news professional journalists disseminate; and provides eye-witness account as they are usually very close to news sources.

Gates came down; gate-keeping functions of the media provide reason for editors to pick and choose news that is important to them, but citizen journalists can provide the information the editors do not want to provide. Citizen journalism democratized the media, anybody with internet connection and a smart phone becomes a citizen journalist.

The Alternative: The lack of engagement in mainstream journalism is supporting the growth of citizen journalism and there is a belief that independent community journalists are in an ideal position to offer audiences a real alternative by applying a more appropriate framework for making sense of the world. It is an opportunity to improve journalism, making it more transparent and democratic as the audience can check the facts presented and easily correct or add to the original article. Eye witness reports from ordinary people provide a variety of personal points of view, at times contradicting official statements. In repressive countries, eye witness reports and images taken by ordinary citizens are often the only testimony available and can help influence international politics. Citizen journalism is a more transparent and democratic form of journalism. Pipers without tunes: The case of he who pays the piper dictates the tune does not come into play with citizen journalists.

Ethics of Journalism

Scholars have definded Journalism Ethics as, 'A species of applied ethics that examines what journalists and news organizations should do, given their role in society.' The International Federation of Journalists gives twenty-six codes of ethics for journalists which may have influenced the code of ethics of Nigerian Press Council. In order to maintain a high level of standard for the media profession in Nigeria, the Nigerian Press Council gives a comprehensive code of ethics for the Nigerian journalists and these are the highlights: editorial independence; accuracy and fairness; privacy; privilegednondisclosure by observing and not disclosing the source of information obtained in confidence; decency; avoid discrimination; journalists should not receive reward and gratification to suppress or publish information; journalists should not report acts of violence and crime in a manner that glorifies such acts; the names and pictures of children and minors involved in cases concerning sexual offences, crimes and rituals or witchcraft either as victims, witnesses or defendants and these children should also not be interviewed should not be identified; journalists should employ open and honest means in sourcing for their information (except in cases that the interest of the public is at stake); reportage should be in the public interest; social responsibility; avoid plagiarism; and should enhance press freedom at all times.

Historical Perspective of Citizen Journalism

Historical Perspectives of Citizen Journalism The concept of citizen journalism has a long history. Communication researchers have tried to tell the story of the origin of citizen journalism from their respective angles. Scholars write that “the roots of citizen journalism lie in the program of civic journalism, which developed as a reform movement among journalists in the United States. Facing the readership crises of the US newspaper industry in the late 1970s, some newspaper executives, journalists, and intellectuals tried to improve the relationship between the press and the public by developing new ways of listening to citizens.” Studies reveal that the first so-called public or civic journalists acted as advocates for ordinary citizens. They organized public meetings and put specific problems of the local community on the agenda. The citizens contributed to the news process as interview partners and members of focus groups or by raising their voice at public meetings. The reporters tried to learn from the community and to move local issues to the center of news coverage. Scholarly works added that, “towards the end of the 1990s, more and more intellectuals and social movement activists entered the field of media activism and developed the idea of citizen journalism.” Contemporary citizen journalism’s history and popularity can be directly linked to the advent and currency of the Internet and its ancillary technologies. “The growth of citizen journalism is tied to the growth of interactivity on the Internet. When physicist Tim Berners-Lee launched the world’s first website http:info.cern.ch back in 1991, his site offered audiences very limited interactivity. Internet technology was limited in this regard. Over the coming years, a variety of new features and functions on the Internet made it easy for audiences to interact with other audiences or with website publishers.” The real change in news reporting occasioned by citizen journalism did not come until 2004 when Web 2.0 features started appearing on websites. “Web 2.0 features enabled consumers or ordinary people to publish their own websites or weblogs, or feed content into the mainstream media among many other features. WordPress and BlogSpot are examples of such platforms.” The web 2.0 on which the citizen journalism operations are based has some peculiar features. “Some of the characteristics often noted as descriptive of Web 2.0 include blogging, RSS-generated syndication, social networking sites like YouTube, Facebook, mash-ups, wikis like Wikipaedia and other collaborative applications and interactive encyclopedias and dictionaries. The social media, with the help of web 2.0 technologies, have enabled citizens to be active participants in the processes of news gathering and distribution. Since the invention of the web 2.0 in 2004, journalism has ceased to be the exclusive preserve of professional journalists. The styles of news gathering and reporting have drastically changed. This development has ended the era in which news consumers only participated in news generation through irregular letters to the editors, the lordly gate-keepers who decided which letter to publish, in which form and at what time. Following its advent, the power of the citizen brand of journalism has been tested in different places and situations. “The 2004 Indonesian Boxing Day Tsunami, the July 2005 London Bombing and the 2007 Virginia Tech disasters are cited in many research studies as examples where audiences on the ground took photographs, text and voice messages and eye witness accounts which told the ‘story’ in ways that almost eclipsed the traditional way of reporting news” Other instances that quickly come to mind are the Arab Spring, the Occupy Wall Street Movement, the 2013 military takeover of power in Egypt and the attendant protests, 2012 elections in the United States and Ghana, just to mention a few. In each of the instances, ordinary citizens gathered information, including action pictures from scenes of incidents, and uploaded to the Internet for global consumption, within split seconds.

Attributes of Citizen Journalism

The difficulty involved in determining who a citizen journalist is makes it imperative to state the attributes of citizen journalists. Some of the following are attributes of citizen journalists

• They are usually unpaid for the journalism work they try to do
• They are not employed by the mainstream media outfit
• They are not professionally trained
• They publish unedited contents
• They use informal language
• They could be biased in their story selection and news judgment
• They could be called, 'open source journalists' • They are too quick to report stories or bring out issues

Pros and Cons of Citizen Journalism

Citizen journalism has been trailed by mixed reactions over the years. While some commentators have spoken so glowingly about the benefits of this brand of journalism, others have almost over-emphasized its downsides. There is, therefore, a need to strike a balance through a dispassionate assessment of the pros and the cons of citizen journalism. It has already been noted that citizen journalism offers professional and nonprofessional journalists alike opportunities to be active participants in news content creation. With it, members of the public are no longer helpless passive consumers of news. They are now content creators. Citizen journalism has broken the hitherto seemingly endless monopoly of the mainstream media. As such, journalism is today democratic and participatory. Research shows that, by granting access to just anyone to cover the news, citizen journalism presents a more personal, nuanced view of events and has the potential to cultivate communities of people with a common interest. Through blogs, citizen journalists have broken stories about political corruption, police brutality, and other issues of concern to local and national communities. Another rather amazing benefit of citizen journalism is that it delivers news almost at the speed of lightning. It has surpassed the immediacy of the broadcast media (radio and television). Citizen journalism, via the social media, spreads news like wild harmattan fire just in split seconds, apparently because the news does not need to wait for any editor to process it. Feedback is also immediate. The audience has the opportunity to react to the news instantly, and even add to the content. This is why citizen journalism has been called “We Media.” In fact, we can simplify it by calling it “Our Media.” This is because the content of this brand of journalism is what we make it. The foregoing benefits of citizen journalism notwithstanding, it has some downsides. One of such challenges is the question about the veracity of its content. Some commentators have criticized citizen journalism as a new way of spreading falsehood and other unethical practices in the name of journalism. Potential false news reports are just one of the many possible ramifications of sourcing news from anonymous sources. The news could be factually correct, but have flaws like blatant disregard of ethics, lack of objectivity, impartiality and balance. It could also be a hidden agenda or opinion sugarcoated as fact or a libelous or defamatory statement that puts subjects in the story in bad light. In mainstream media, a process of verification and checks called gate-keeping can weed out any such inaccuracies and biases. Gate keeping, so it’s called, is done by experienced and trained journalists and editors, using tools and skills like knowledge of the law and in house or commercial stylebooks such as the Associated Press Stylebook.