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What Are The Advantages and Disadvantages of Citizen Journalism

Citizen journalism has some advantages and disadvantages. It enables journalists to investigate stories through information shared on social media by citizens. For example, in two cases discussed, tweets and photos from citizens on Twitter and emails helped journalists discover that a man died after being pushed by police at a protest, and another died from restraint by security guards during deportation. However, citizen journalism also risks spreading misinformation, so journalists must verify facts.

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Elvin Namazov
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168 views2 pages

What Are The Advantages and Disadvantages of Citizen Journalism

Citizen journalism has some advantages and disadvantages. It enables journalists to investigate stories through information shared on social media by citizens. For example, in two cases discussed, tweets and photos from citizens on Twitter and emails helped journalists discover that a man died after being pushed by police at a protest, and another died from restraint by security guards during deportation. However, citizen journalism also risks spreading misinformation, so journalists must verify facts.

Uploaded by

Elvin Namazov
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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What are the advantages and disadvantages of citizen journalism?

First of all, if we analyze the video carefully, we could notice that the speaker talks about two cases in
order to give the clarification to the audience about the story behind the incidents. In first case, Lan
Tomlinson, the ordinary newspaper seller died in G20 protests in London because Police officer pushed
him to the ground and they said that he died because of the natural reasons. And in the second case,
Jimmy Mubenga, the political refugee from Angola died on an airplane as security guards placed him in a
dangerous hold during his deportation so that he could not breathe because of the lack of oxygen. But
how the journalist investigated and proved the facts is the main question.

First case: Lan Tomlinson-

the newspaper vendor from London who died at the G20 protests in London who was not a protestor
and trying to go home from the work because police officer Harward with a buton pushed him to the
ground but police did not want to tell the story and they said he died because of natural causes. Twitter
is microblogging cite, an amazing search facility and a social arena in which other people are gathering
which enabled the journalist to send out a short message. People themselves were questioning exactly
what had happened to Lan Tomlinson in his last 30 minutes of life. They started to investigate the
individuals with materials like photographs and evidences which does not show the attack on Lan
Tomlinson but it was enough to investigate further. The information that people share is freely available
to everyone. As long as you subscribe and your news is the right side of paywall, it is free and anybody
can access it. So after six days they found out 20 witnesses with the help of individuals who have
materials in their hand like evidence. But there was not official investigation into his death, but then he
got an email from investment fund manager in New York who had digital camera with himself during the
protest and he had recorded the incident. Now they have the power to decide that Lan Tomlinson was
unlawfully killed and in two days, police will appear before inquest jury in London.

Second case: Jimmy Mubenga, political refugee from Angola who lived in London. And six months ago,
British government decided to return him to Angola and he was a failed asylum seeker and government
booked him a seat on an airline. The official explanation of his death was simply that he had taken ill and
become unwell on the flight. Then he was transferred to hospital and pronounced dead. But actually
three security guards began trying to restrain him on his seat when Mubenga was resisting his
deportation. And he was placed in a dangerous hold where it would lead to positional asphyxia (body is
deprived of oxygen which causes death) and he could not breathe. Then to find out they turned to
internet. Again twitter where an information is spreading like a wind when it is twitted. And Twit has an
uncanny ability to reach their intended destination. The Michael who was on an Angoilian oil field and
who sent the twit to journalist had encountered our stories.

One of the main things is that they have to make sure that the facts they get are correct and Verification
is essential. They could send us their boarding passes and we could investigate further. The
disadvantage for journalists is that they are the victims of hoaxes and there is Deliberate misinformation
fed into the public domain. And also during tsunamis and earthquakes in Japan, citizen journalists took a
photo while houses were lifting and the places were falling. And political earthquake no matter it is in
Syria or Yemen or Libya or Egypt where individuals have managed to overcome repressive restrictions in
those regimes by recording their environment on the internet. Citizen journalism is a new layer of
accountability to our world. Many things which happen in our world go recorded and why not to spread
it as much as possible and they can obtain that information through social media. And that is new for
journalists as the presenter mention that if the stories would have happened 5 or 10 years ago, possibly
they would not be able to investigate it. Witnessing, recording and sharing is journalism.

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