Can there be such a thing as open-source current affairs?
My gut is telling me on quality and accuracy the answer is no (but please feel free to correct me.) Currently, journalists go through a lot of training and education (at great expense) and then once they've qualified and begun work they still need folding stuff to be able to live.
We talk about "citizen reporting," non-qualified reporters with rudimentary pictures from camera phones, video pieces from camera phones and articles in locations such as, well, here. And the Five's "Gadget Show" even devoted a section to equipment suitable for such reporting. But what faith and reliance can we put in it in a world of demand for facts and reliability? And could the Press Complaints Commission, the gatekeepers of decency in our media police the non-professionals in the same way that it does the established media institutions?
And are we at risk of a two tier information society where there are those who pay for professional news articles, and those who have to rely on citizen reporting? With our society turning more to television on demand and even away from the television altogether, the internet is becoming the primary source of information of a generation.
There is a reason behind my mentality of this entry - one R. Murdoch.
At the World Media Summit in China he's turned his focus from the BBC to rattling the sabre at the likes of Google and Yahoo who re-publish news articles currently for free. He wants them to start paying for it, just like he wants everyone who accesses news sites directly to begin paying.
And a spokesman from AP (of whom I should imagine Murdoch is a very good customer) we had this little soundbite: We will no longer tolerate the disconnect between people who devote themselves - at great human and economic cost - to gathering news of public interest and those who profit from it without supporting it
Seems reasonable, but every cynical bone in my body is telling me that the timing - halfway through a recession with newspaper sales dwindling - is a little convenient. Also, it should be pointed out that if the article is accessed on a search engines "news" section then the provider can't put their ads up so there is potentially lost revenue there as well.
If you believe that open source news can work then please put your ideas here I'd love to hear them.
In the mean time, a warning to the media outlets.
The music industry completely underestimated the effect that the internet would have on sales and copyright. You need to make sure that whatever you do to carry on generating revenue that - it is accepted - you need to carry on news gathering, it needs to be properly thought out and implement otherwise it will fail and simply make matters worse.
10 years on the music industry still hasn't figured out the internet, don't become another casualty of it.
