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Topic: Reader-generated content
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| snappiness | Posted – 5/29/2008 10:58:53 AM | show profile This trend is totally freaking me out. Time's issue of "This Old House" that was entirely reader-generated; Huffington Post that relies just as much on reader response as content to boost readership; blogs and the "publish first" model; an acquaintance who is doing a book of entirely reader-generated travelogue; my editor who keeps inserting more and more reader response into the magazine. Are we journalists destined to become simply content aggregators? I'm thinking editors won't see much reason to pay a trained journalist when they can get content for free from all those eager-to-contribute readers. Maybe non-researched and inaccurate content, sure, but readers (and editors) don't seem to care. I'm beginning to wonder if my future lies in becoming an online content editor. Or maybe just writing books (yeah, like *that* is a thriving industry). |
| beenthere | Posted – 5/29/2008 11:26:36 AM | show profile Editors do care -- it's easier to edit a *talented* writer than an amateur. Less work. But free, low-cost seems to be the norm. I was wondering about the use of free labor, such as internships. It seems most of the newbies who post here have at last three internships, if not more. Have these affected the number of entry-level positions available? Are newbies canibalizing themselves out of paying jobs? |
| Brena | Posted – 5/29/2008 12:34:19 PM | show profile I guess it's about the interactive experience that it gives readers to have their content seen for all. It certainly creates a connection. As far as the value of what users have to say. Well, that's yet to be seen. |
| Scottie | Posted – 5/29/2008 1:43:02 PM | show profile I do a lot of work with user generated content (UGC). It works well for certain things but not others. I do think the journalist's role will involve more aggregation going forward, but we'll be aggregating the work of pros too. Even though news models and products are changing, the world will always need people who can write, dig out facts and tell stories. We just have to figure out who's going to pay them. Read the fabulous Publishing 2,0 if you're interested in following this stuff. |
| dribbledrive1 | Posted – 5/29/2008 1:54:36 PM | show profile Increasingly in the future, journalism will be more participatory with readers. That scares and frustrates a lot of journalism. Traditionally, the journalist has been a lecturer; now the lecture is turning into a discussion. |
| salsera | Posted – 5/29/2008 2:33:22 PM | show profile Well... it is more democratic. On the other hand, the readers aren't trained journalists. I recently helped fact-check some material for a reader-generated issue of a magazine, and it wasn't all well reported. The editors there also told me that it had been a lot more work to edit the material, and they had to get special permissions from all the readers who contributed to the magazine. In other words, it ended up being a TON more work than a regular issue of the publication. One could argue that it isn't *necessarily* cheaper for them to produce a magazine this way. Also, I suppose it's possible that the public will get tired of this trend. |
| foodlit | Posted – 5/29/2008 4:59:41 PM | show profile I don't think the public is getting tired of this trend, if anything I see it picking up more steam. I think it varies depending on the medium though, if you're looking at an online delivery of content, then it make sense to incorporate user-generated material because that will increase revenue as the users return more often and stick around to participate, it increases traffic. A print mag though, no I wouldn't expect or want to have user generated content when I'm paying for it, that's where I'd want to see professionally written stories. However, the net is largely free, and interactive. I read recently on problogger that often his posts become more memorable by the great content generated by user comments. Also read that a great story written by a journalist on how He has some great ideas there, the gist of it is that he uses user generated content such as a tweet on twitter to break new stories that he then sells online. |
| foodlit | Posted – 5/29/2008 5:00:59 PM | show profile Weird glitch on that last post, but the link works...it's to an article by a new media writer called How Twitter Pays My Rent |
| dribbledrive1 | Posted – 5/29/2008 5:01:40 PM | show profile For the most part, reader-generated content will be a thing on online media rather than print. It will augment journalistic efforts rather than replace them. User-generated content rarely is a substitute for reporting; it tends more heavily to opinion. So those who are hurt most are the likes of movie critics, since users can do what do just as well. You're not going to see much user-generated investigative stories. --Well... it is more democratic. On the other hand, the readers aren't trained journalists. I recently helped fact-check some material for a reader-generated issue of a magazine, and it wasn't all well reported. The editors there also told me that it had been a lot more work to edit the material, and they had to get special permissions from all the readers who contributed to the magazine. In other words, it ended up being a TON more work than a regular issue of the publication. One could argue that it isn't *necessarily* cheaper for them to produce a magazine this way. Also, I suppose it's possible that the public will get tired of this trend.-- |
| snappiness | Posted – 5/29/2008 6:06:57 PM | show profile Well, doesn't print seem to be migrating online? If truly "print is dead" then so are investigative journalists. |
| Seafarer | Posted – 5/30/2008 11:10:09 AM | show profile | email poster This is a wake-up call and you should listen Maybe this confluence of reader/user-generated magazine issues is the wake-up call to folks who haven't clearly understood the new media landscape. It's a two-way conversation. I'm mildly irritated these days when there's no way to press a button and comment on something that I read online. Yes, I'm 47, I know how to write a letter to the editor and I've done so, but I'm not interested in doing it now, in 2008, and neither is anyone else I know. I don't think magazines are doing these sorts of issues because it's cheaper; I think they're doing it because they desperately need to find ways to make a direct connection to readers, to foster loyalty to the magazine's brand. It's a way to try to bring to paper what we do every day already online; have a conversation with those who care about what we write. Certainly there will always be a need for the ones who can communicate with descriptive prose, who can sift through myriad facts and figures and people and craft a compelling story that enlightens readers. But that ain't enough, anymore. Just broadcasting your beauteous writing craftsmanship doesn't cut it today, so you must figure out how to make it work in a two-way world. These magazines are trying to do that. Just a few days ago, I wrote about the June 2008 "Budget Travel" reader issue on my Family Travel blog (and one of the BT editors dropped by to comment:) Why would a magazine have YOU write their articles? It was provoked by a similar discussion about this going on over at the Travelwriters.com BBS. I came late to journalism and communications (I was a career Navy officer) so I don't have such an emotional dog in this fight as others who have been in media from the beginning, but I can see this happening so clearly and I'm flummoxed that the "pros" are so slow to figure it out. I guess that for once, it's an advantage to be a n00b. My mother is a career journalist, and she calls bloggers and most online specialists "Riff-raff....except for you, dear, of course!" Mom, I AM one of the ones that you snub and fear. ------ My Web site Family Travel blog NHRA drag racing on Fast Machines |
| dribbledrive1 | Posted – 5/30/2008 12:03:19 PM | show profile The problem with this opinion, to me, is that you are looking at things in a black and white world. You're suggesting that the online can only be one thing and print has to only be one thing, and whatever they are now will be how they have to be forever. Some people will always have an appetitie for news, and in-depth coverage. And the reality is, investigative journalism, as we think of it, has never been a big part of journalism. --Well, doesn't print seem to be migrating online? If truly "print is dead" then so are investigative journalists.-- |
| astrahook | Posted – 5/30/2008 12:18:38 PM | show profile "some people" is not enough to fuel the machine that is big media. Its all about the buck at the end of the day. Newspapers are already running lean, you can only trim so much fat. |
| snappiness | Posted – 5/30/2008 12:21:20 PM | show profile Yeah, maybe I'm looking at all this as an "or" when it's really an "and." Maybe it's like when radio came out and everyone thought it would be the death of live and recorded music, but instead it drove a larger audience to those two media. I guess that being able to identify and tell a narrative, collate research into clear prose and interview and vet sources are decent skills that will always serve somehow. |
| noname1234 | Posted – 5/30/2008 12:41:11 PM | show profile Also don't forget that digital media opens up whole new ways to tell stories, including investigated stories. You can incorporate video and audio, link to full-text documents and related information, etc., and generally experiment with formats other than just a straight linear narrative. Digital media is a really exciting development for investigative journalism -- and other kinds of journalism, too. For a really radical example of this, check out Jonathan Harris' account of a whale hunt: http://thewhalehunt.org/ |
| dribbledrive1 | Posted – 5/30/2008 1:35:09 PM | show profile Those skills are necessary. It may just be that the skills willl be exercise in more diverse ways. In the future, a reporters job may not just be to interview people, write a story, and file it and be done. He may be more involved in planning how to presenr the info -- some in text, some in charts, some in audio, some in video. After the story is filed, he might find himself monitoring a discussion group about the story. Readers won't replace reporters. But they might augment what reporters do and become bigger participants in the process. --Yeah, maybe I'm looking at all this as an "or" when it's really an "and." Maybe it's like when radio came out and everyone thought it would be the death of live and recorded music, but instead it drove a larger audience to those two media. I guess that being able to identify and tell a narrative, collate research into clear prose and interview and vet sources are decent skills that will always serve somehow.-- |
| Gedarov | Posted – 5/30/2008 4:23:44 PM | show profile 20 years from now journos will still have thier jobs, but thier roles will evolve. as many people have said already in this thread, people welcome the 2 way communication/interaction that the new media avenues provide. one of the best examples of this is the iReporting on CNN.com - the site allows users to post thier own videos of news happenings. some of it is insipid crap (re: not news, or nothing that anyone cares about except the person who uploaded it), but there are plenty of cases where these "iReporters" (average joes with a camera) are on the scene when an important developing story is taking place (crimes, disasters, etc.) and thier pictures and experiences are very relevant. |
| dribbledrive1 | Posted – 5/30/2008 9:47:00 PM | show profile I don't think that's the type of thing most people here are concerned about. Anyone can show up at a car crash and luck into a good snippet of film. That's a lot different than being able to gather and disseminate news. Most user generated content will fall into the stuff people luck into or personal opinion. --one of the best examples of this is the iReporting on CNN.com - the site allows users to post thier own videos of news happenings. some of it is insipid crap (re: not news, or nothing that anyone cares about except the person who uploaded it), but there are plenty of cases where these "iReporters" (average joes with a camera) are on the scene when an important developing story is taking place (crimes, disasters, etc.) and thier pictures and experiences are very relevant.-- |
| WordyBird | Posted – 5/31/2008 4:07:32 PM | show profile "Are we journalists destined to become simply content aggregators? " Yes. |
| WordyBird | Posted – 6/2/2008 2:02:05 AM | show profile "My mother is a career journalist, and she calls bloggers and most online specialists 'Riff-raff....except for you, dear, of course!'" Seafarer, that's funny! But yes, there is a bit of a war here. Your insight is refreshing, but to old salts, the whole topic of "reader-generated content" is a touchy one indeed. In fact, after I read Snappiness's original post, I felt myself getting irritated--not at Snappiness, but at the mainstream media's kowtowing to, dare I say it? People who get mildly irritated at not having the instant gratification of pushing a button and commenting on what they just read. Don't get me wrong--feedback is great--but sorry, if anyone thinks editors sit around and actually pore through those comments, they're sadly mistaken. In my experience, a lot of them just have some poor intern or low-level person tally the pros and cons and scan for pithy responses, so writing tomes in comment boxes is almost a waste of time. As for bloggers, I don't begrudge them so much. Sometimes they break stories the mainstream media doesn't have the doodads to go after because they're afraid they'll lose access or tick off an advertiser. BUT, I will maintain that the ability to type and code does not make one a writer or a journalist, and that relying heavily on "reader-generated content" in a nation with a seventh-grade reading level (on average) is going to dilute the industry even further than it already is. Call me an elitist snob if you must, but I feel like Robert DeNiro at the end of Casino, when he's lamenting the death of elegance and the Disneyfication of Las Vegas, and they show the sweatpanted slobs coming through the casino doors in slow motion. Someone at an agency recently said I've pigeon-holed myself by sticking to health writing and not getting into ad copywriting. I maintain that actually, health writing might very well be the last journalistic bastion where training will count. As Mark Twain once said, be careful when reading health texts--you may die of a misprint. |
| Grateful Deadline | Posted – 6/2/2008 11:00:34 AM | show profile Nearly 20 years ago, I wrote a weekly column in a big metro daily. Fortunately, I didn't have to follow anyone's footsteps, so I created the column the way I wanted it to be: with reader participation. About half my columns involved readers, and this wasn't novel for those times -- other papers' columnists also let readers participate. Within a few months, my column got more mail than the regular metro columns and sometimes more than the edit page. There's nothing inherently new or wrong with reader involvement. What is new is blather and spout and 5-minutes-of-fame crapola passing as citizen journalism. However, used well, reader involvement provides insight that reporters can't, especially reporters who don't have access to institutional knowledge now that their longtime colleagues have been bought out and laid off. No longer on staff and more like a typical reader, I find reader contributions to my area's biggest daily to be a true enhancement, because the reporters don't know the various parts of the circulation area anymore -- no time. I predict reader blogs will go out of style as quickly as they came in; that this newborn concept of reader-generated content will mature into something much better than most of it looks today; and that reader-generated content will complement rather that compete with traditional reporting and editing. |
| snappiness | Posted – 6/2/2008 12:25:36 PM | show profile So, it sounds like you're saying more reader interaction could be a more efficient way for the journalist to drill down and find various "experts." That would be good, actually. But based on my own experiences with reader interaction, the signal to noise ratio is very low. Like, for every 20 readers I hear from, maybe one has something useful to say. Honestly, I have to admit that most of the time readers just annoy me. |
| snappiness | Posted – 6/2/2008 12:29:42 PM | show profile I feel I should clarify that. The readers who have nothing useful to contribute irritate me. So the person who says, "Actually, when you write that the aileron was tilted, that was incorrect. It's actually deflected." Yeah, okay, if I were writing a technical manual I'd say that, but I'm writing for Joe Reader so I try to use plain words to explain technical things. But I do appreciate a dialog with a smart reader. |
| seeattleme2 | Posted – 6/2/2008 1:01:58 PM | show profile This Old house is in trouble, and this is a way probably to attempt to reconnect with readers; for those who work in a stuffy Manhattan skyrise to figure out exactly who their reader is anymore, what he/ she thinks, wants, needs, etc. so they can keep the friggin magazine from folding in the fall. Sassy sis reader produced issues every year, and that magazine had a wildly successful reign and relationship with her readers who continued to read it in their 20s and some even keep their old copies and read them as thirty somethings. So Sassy is still teaching journalists how it's done. Most magazines are hopelessly out of touch-- a result of hiring the same people from the same hiring pool for the past twenty years. This is one way magazines can respond to diving numbers. Journalists/ editors would do well to remember that the avaerage reader is not anyone or anything like "you", but are diverse in interests and backgrounds and beliefs and can get their information and entertainment elsewhere, for free, if you don't work hard to give it to them. That means not churing out the same old crap every year, paying attention to your reader mail and feedback, assigning and using writers from diverse places in life (who live in different parts of the country , have different ethnic backgrounds, different lives altogether), and putting different faces and story subjects in their magazines. Not the same old same old tri-state area (convenient for photoshoots) material. |
| dribbledrive1 | Posted – 6/2/2008 2:34:50 PM | show profile I don't think that's it at all. It's more about giving readers the chance to express their opinion on a topic and debate their positions without readers. The notion that a great mass of readers want to be reporters and gather information is dubious. How this trend will really play out is a reporter on a newspaper blog will post a story about foreclosures in a local real estate market and readers will discuss it and argue with each other. It's not going to be much different than the forums here. For the most part, readers will be reacting to the news that is posted, rather than originated the news. --So, it sounds like you're saying more reader interaction could be a more efficient way for the journalist to drill down and find various "experts."-- |
