The next iteration of news transformation

"If contemporary American journalism is a lecture, what it is evolving into is something that incorporates a conversation and seminar." - Dan Gillmore

[Gillmor, Dan. (Fall 2003) Moving toward participatory journalism. Nieman Reports 57.3: 79(2).]

The Internet is a transformative technology, one which has the ability to take existing forms of communication and culture and to take them to entirely new levels. One of the best examples of this is the evolution of news reporting since the inception of the Internet. Now not only do news agencies have their own website, but bloggers across the world have in the past ten years begun to comment on the news. The next iteration of news transformation, then, incorporates these two aspects of the news into one coherent whole that not only provides more information to the viewer at the stroke of a couple keys, but additionally makes the news interactive, a forum for learning rather than a static medium for information. This not only allows the consumers of the end product of news to become part of the process, but brings every aspect of the process – the event, the reporter, the reporting medium and the consumer - into a generative cycle that provides a more integrated approach to journalism.

No comments: