Will citizen Journalism replace professional journalism?

The emergence of social networks shows that new sources of information are available on the internet. People can access internet to create blogs, websites and profiles to discuss and update anything about the world. For example, social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter and blogging are tools that can publish articles or news. These social networking sites are the platforms to express opinions and thought of the citizen journalists to public. The advancement of technology has allowed anyone with a camera mobile phone and a laptop to be a citizen journalist.

As all of us know that everyone can access to internet to get the information and news immediately by scrolling their smartphone, switching on their laptop or checking their mobile devices rather than watching the television, listening to radio and reading newspaper.

What is Citizen Journalist

According to Goode (2009), citizen journalism is related to the internet. Internet is used by citizens not only to receive information but also is a way to transmit information (Mecano, 2015). According to Mecano (2015), citizen journalists are non-professional who collect, write, edit and distribute the information to public. Citizen journalist is when ordinary people do basically what professional reporters do – report information which is in the forms of text, video, pictures and audio (What Is Citizen Journalism,2015). The information that published by citizen journalism can be found on their blogs. However, citizen journalism does not always stay in online. We can find the news that written by citizen journalism in the print media which provides some columns for citizen journalism which is called soapbox features (Goode, 2009).

Who is the professional journalism?

Professional journalists are being employed in a press company and being trained as a journalist (CitizenJournalism, 2012). Journalists are considered as a job with its rules and ethics. Professional journalists have the knowledge and they are trained in writing news in the right format. For example journalists will write the news based on inverted pyramid structure which is the most important information on top of story and the least important at the bottom (The Newswriting Format, 2015). Besides that, one-sentence lead of no more than 40 to 45 words that summarizes the most newsworthy and important aspect of the story (The Newswriting Format, 2015).

People should be wary of citizen journalism

A citizen journalist can actually captures news worthy events as it is happening and shares it with the rest of the world. The scope of the citizen journalist is not limited to breaking news events. However, citizen journalist is also someone who can simply comments, reposts or tags pictures on particular websites. Hence, sometimes citizen journalist reports inaccurate information (What Is Citizen Journalism, 2015). 

Citizen journalists have no formal training in reporting and writing the news such as editing news in an inverted pyramid like what professional journalists do. This may cause the credibility of news difficult to verify and lack of objectivity. For example, rumors about the deaths of famous celebrities are often made until spreading false information via online can cause negative impact to ownself and themselves. Citizen reporters do not have any ethics of being a professional reporter. For example, what exactly do a reporter define a news? What kind of news is considered important and has the new value? Besides that, citizen journalists are not trained on the libel law. They do not have the knowledge about what they can or cannot say in a news story. Citizen journalists tend to be bias. Everything about what he or she thinks will straight away publish on internet.

According to Stverak (2010), thousands of traditional journalists had been fired and the readers, viewer and listeners had fled. As all of us know that, today is the age of technologies, traditional or professional journalism should follow up the trend and culture of sharing in internet. If not, more long times, professional journalists will be replaced by citizen journalists one day.

What do you think about citizen journalism? Do you think it is less valuable than professional journalism? What information sources do you trust most?

References

Citizen journalism. (2012). Retrieved from http://www.freebase.com/m/02hpjd.

Goode, L. (2009). Social news, citizen journalism and democracy. New Media and Society, 11(8), 1287-1305.

Mecano, T. (2015). Citizen journalism. Retrieved from http://www.academia.edu/8478508/Citizen_Journalism.

Stverak. (2010). The pros and pros of citizen journalism. Retrieved from http://franklincenterhq.org/1352/the-pros-and-pros-of-citizen-journalism/.

The newswriting format. (2015). Retrieved from http://journalism.about.com/od/citizenjournalism/a/whatiscitizen.htm.

What is citizen journalism. (2015). Retrieved from http://journalism.about.com/od/citizenjournalism/a/whatiscitizen.htm.

Are you a tech addict?

Results of a simple survey for technology addiction

A total of 117 respondents responded towards our survey form that were distributed in order to know how addicted users are towards technology. Most of them were females, with the age range of 18-25 years old. 84.4% of them find themselves clung to the internet, realizing that the amount of time spent on digital devices and internet had been increasing. Most of them have at least two digital devices in hand. People rate themselves average from the scale 1-5 anticipating to go online, feeling uncomfortable for leaving out their devices or unable to connect to the internet (Wieland, 2005). In 2005, 9-15 million people in United States used the internet every day. Every three months the rate of use increases by 25%.  

"As of March 2014, there were 176 million addicts, up from 79 million in the same period last year. Females accounted for 52 percent of addicts, while the rest were males. It comes as no surprise that teens and college students are part of this group as their youth has coincided with the mobile revolution" (Harjani, 2014).

It is obvious that the generation now is getting attached to digital devices, and this lead them to include the need of Wi-Fi into their hierarchy of needs. However, technology helps in many ways. As for university students living far away from home, technology is the only hope to keep in touch, to carry on research, to complete assignments and for entertainment purposes. People evolve with time, slowly changing to cope with the pace of the society. We improve with technology. Technology yes indeed has its pros and cons. Cons is the addiction towards technology can be dangerous just like phubbing when you no longer see people's face because all they are facing is their mobile phone. No matter how much addicted you are, no doubt that technology bring us together. Be in control with what you use and who you are.  

References

Harjani, A. (2014). Mobile addiction growing at alarming rate. Retrieved from http://www.cnbc.com/id/101608691

Wieland, D. M. (2005), Computer Addiction: Implications for Nursing Psychotherapy Practice. Perspectives in Psychiatric Care, 41: 153–161. doi: 10.1111/j.1744-6163.2005.00038.x

Lets Speak Internet, No Longer English.

As in the title, this blog is going to discuss about internet language used nowadays,

but before we do so, let's talk about some evolution of mobile devices.

Watch This To Have Some Idea

The Evolution Of Mobile Phones

The first mobile phone that was introduced to the public back in 1983 by Motorola Company which used analog technology that was much less reliable than the digital technology we used today. They were very large in size and were very inconvenient. However, after a more than 30 years evolution process, the mobile phone today which had took over the whole society are completely different. The purpose of a mobile device, from simply calling and connected with people, has been extended to much more function including messages, social life, educational purpose and entertainments.

The average time consumption on mobile device for an adult is around 3 hours a day, according to a survey done by BI Intelligence on Flurry data.

The Average Time Spend On Mobile Devices

As the mobile device nowadays became more and more convenient: small in size, easy to carry, sensitive touch screen, finger friendly, people tend to send text messages rather than make calls.

According to a record from the famous mobile apps "WhatsApp", this app now has more than 430 million monthly users and sees more than 50 billion messages cross its servers each day. Under this circumstances, a new language, or so call "Internet Slang" is born.

Rather than using proper English, people on the internet, mostly the teenagers, prefer to use internet slang. What is an Internet slang? It refers to a variety of slang languages used by different people on Internet. It is difficult to provide a standardized definition of Internet Slang due to the constant changes made to its nature.

Watch this " How to Speak Internet "

Why is this internet slang being used? It is because using abbreviations and acronyms to communicate and chat with others helps those who are familiar and good with technology to chat faster while saving times. Due to the constant feed of media, news, and technology to keep up with daily, those who are familiar with internet slang are capable of easily multitasking without taking too much time to send a formal letter, email, message, or chat reply.

These are some of the example of Internet Slang:

1. OOTD  : Outfit Of The Day
2. POTD   : Picture Of The Day
3. WOLO  : We Only Live Once
4. YOLO   : You Only Live Once
5. OOH     : Out Of Here
6. GEEZ   : Jesus
7. AIUI     : As I Understand It
8. HCIT    : How Cool Is That
9. NBTW  : Now Back To Work
10. IMMD   : It Made My Day
11. 4EVA    : Forever
12. ONNA   : Oh No, Not Again
13. YUM     : Said when something tastes good or is attractive
14. WUWU : What's Up With You?
15. <4          : More than love (<3)
16. BBAM  : Be Back After Meal
17. WAY     : Where Are You?
18. HDYDT : How Do You Do That?
19. IDK        : I Don't Know
20. OMGD   : Oh My God Dude

Why is it important to understand internet slang today? If you are a parent or even your working environment is technology related industry, understanding internet slang is essential to keep up with modern times in society and methods of communication. Understanding more about internet slang is a way to know whether or not your child may be receiving threats or even using inappropriate languages themselves. As a university student, a certain level of internet slang usage is unavoidable, but still we need to manage our grammar and only using it for informal purposes.

Learning Internet Slang is like a self-advancing process, technology evolution is a one direction flow, you can't against the flow, but only keep it up whatever you can.

References:

Gantt, C. (2014, January 20). WhatsApp sees 50 billion messages per day, more than all SMS combined. Retrieved from TweakTown.com: http://www.tweaktown.com/news/34968/whatsapp-sees-50-billion-messages-per-day-more-than-all-sms-combined/index.html

InternetSlang.com. (n.d.). Trending Web Abbreviations. Retrieved from InternetSlang.com: http://www.internetslang.com/trending.asp

Khalaf, S. (2014, November 18). Flurry from Yahoo. Retrieved from Mobile to Television: We interrupt this broadcast (Again): http://www.flurry.com/blog/flurry-insights/mobile-television-we-interrupt-broadcast-again#.VR0hltKUfcT

NoBullying.com. (2014, September 27). Understand Internet Slang Today. Retrieved from NoBullying.com: http://nobullying.com/internet-slang/

Journalism in the 21st Century

With the evolution and changing nature of technology, mobile journalism which is also known as "Mojo" has taken great place in the field of journalism. So, what is the meaning of "Mojo"? Mojo is actually a new form of new media storytelling in which the journalists or reporters use mobile devices especially portable devices and smartphones with internet connection to edit, gather and distribute news. Compare with last few decades, the job of reporting news has become easier as the news production team needs not to bring along their large, heavy and impractical camera to the scenes anymore. 

These are the examples of mobile reporting tools:

According to Marrouch (2014), "Mojo" can be categorized into three which are user generated content, citizen journalists content and professional journalists content. The meaning of user generated content is unedited materials that are sent by witnesses directly to the broadcast station or press company (Marrouch, 2014). On the other hand, citizen journalists are citizens that play active roles in collecting, analyzing and distributing news through social media. Besides that, they are the one who often report breaking news faster than traditional media due to the availability of the technology (Citizen Journalism, 2012). On the other hand, professional journalists are journalists that being trained and they are usually being employed in a press company or broadcast station. In short, everyone can be a journalist in this 21st century.

Thanks to technology, journalists (or everyone) nowadays can update breaking news as fast as possible by using smartphones and share through social media such as Facebook and Twitter. They do not need to wait anyone. At the same time, technology benefits the citizens as they can know what is happening in their country or around the world. Freedom of speech is available too.

However, everything has its pros and cons.

According to Tia (2014), the quality of the video and picture taken by smartphones may not be that good compare to cameras which have set aperture. In addition, some irresponsible people would like to spread fake news through social media. One very good example is after the tragedy of MH 370, a lot of fake photos and videos spread on Facebook and Twitter that caused confusion of others.

So, what do you think of mobile journalism? Does it make our lives easier? Or it causes us many inconvenience? 

Reference:

Citizen journalism. (2012). Retrieved from http://www.freebase.com/m/02hpjd.

Marrouch, R. (2014). How mobile phones are changing journalism practice in the 21st century. Retrieved from https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/news/how-mobile-phones-are-changing-journalism-practice-21st-century.

Tia, J. (2014). Mobile journalism: Using your iPhone for multimedia. Retrieved from https://tiajames.wordpress.com/2014/11/01/mobile-journalism-using-your-iphone-for-multimedia/.

1. 
   

Globalization and New Media

Apa itu Globalisasi?

Pada masa kini, pasti ramai yang meletakkan diri mereka sebagai manusia yang hidup pada era modenisasi. Bola bumi yang berputar dapat dirasakan betapa cepatnya waktu berlalu dan perubahan kehidupan manusia juga rancak seiring peredaran zaman. Meskipun begitu, terdapat beberapa bilangan individu yang masih lagi tidak tahu tentang makna perkataan ‘Globalisasi’ malah, tidak kira tua atau muda, tahu membaca atau tidak. Semua golongan individu yang mendiami muka bumi ini telah mengalami ‘Globalisasi’ dan harus mengambil tahu akan konsep sebalik perkataan tersebut. Oleh disebabkan itu, saya ingin berkongsi maklumat dengan pembaca luar sana apa itu Globalisasi?

                                           

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJ0nFD19eT8

            Mengikut pemahaman saya, globalisasi adalah satu proses yang meletakkan manusia tinggal dalam satu rumah atau bumbung dan tidak mengira bangsa, agama, dan negara. Ataupun dengan lebih jelas lagi iaitu sebuah keluarga yang tinggal sebumbung bersama. Menurut Kamus Dewan, globalisasi dapat didefinisikan sebagai fenomena yang menjadikan dunia mengecil dari segi perhubungan manusia disebabkan kepantasan perkembangan teknologi maklumat. Manakala, para cendekiawan Barat pula berpendapat bahawa globalisasi merupakan satu proses kehidupan manusia yang serba luas dan infiniti yang merangkumi segala aspek kehidupan termasuklah politik, sosial dan ekonomi. Hal ini jelas bahawa segala benda yang terdapat di muka bumi ini adalah menjadi milik bersama dalam konsep dunia tanpa sempadan.

            Selain itu, globalisasi juga merujuk kepada cara kita berfikir dan bertindak dari satu negara ke negara yang lain. Seperti yang dikatakan oleh pemikir Barat iaitu Lodge (1993) berkata bahawa

“... a process forced by global flows of people, information, trade and capital. It is accelerated by technology which is driven by only a few hundred multinational corporations and may be harmful to the environment. Therein lies the conundrum of whether it is wise to leave globalization in the hands of these few corporations, or might it not make more sense to seek greater involvement from the global community”.

            Banyak contoh aspek yang boleh dilihat corak kehidupan kita dalam bentuk globalisasi. Salah satu contoh ialah budaya makan. Kalau dulu zaman nenek moyang hanya dapat makan makanan ruji seperti nasi, namun kini kita berpeluang untuk makan makanan ruji negara orang dengan mudah sahaja. Sebagai contoh, makanan popular budaya Amerika iaitu Mc Donald di mana mempunyai anggaran premis restoran sebanyak 10, 500  di 50 buah negara di merata dunia. Malah, orang Amerika juga dapat makan makanan kita yang terdapat di Malaysia dengan kemudahan teknologi dan maklumat. Mudahkan?

            Namun begitu, proses globalisasi yang diamalkan di seluruh negara juga mempunyai kesan buruk kepada masyarakat. Antara kesan buruk yang dapat dilihat ialah gaya hidup bebas yang semakin menular dalam kalangan remaja kini. Sebagai contoh, kes pembuangan bayi yang semakin meningkat yang disumbangkan oleh ramai golongan remaja yang terlanjur. Hal ini disebabkan komunikasi yang tidak sihat antara remaja lelaki dan perempuan. Di samping itu juga, kesan lain yang jelas kita lihat dalam kalangan masyarakat kini ialah sikap cenderung mementingkan diri sendiri iaitu tidak mempedulikan masalah yang dihadapi oleh orang lain. Malah, masyarakat yang hanya tahu untuk menjaga hal keperibadian masing-masing.

            Mata pena semakin haus menelaah konsep apa itu globalisasi? Diharap perkongsian maklumat ini dapat lagi disebarkan untuk kebaikan bersama J

References:

Vaagan, R. (Ed)(2008). New Media, Mediated Communication and Globalization. Intercultural Communication Studies, 17(3)(184).
Kamus Dewan Edisi Baru(1993). Kuala Lumpur:Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka.

Blog berita

1. Dunia ICT pada masa kini telah banyak membawa perubahan dalam pelbagai bentuk sehinggalah wujud pelbagai blog yang mengandungi berita-berita semasa. Ia telah merubah cara kita berkomunikasi, berinteraksi dan cara kita untuk mendapatkan berita atau hiburan. Terdapat pelbagai berita dan maklumat yang terkandung dalam blog berita ini sama seperti laman web yang biasa bermula dengan tajuk muka hadapan dan terdapat berita-berita terkini bagi setiap segmen. Sebagai contoh, terdapat beberapa blog yang banyak berkongsikan berita sebagai bahan tambahan dalam blog mereka untuk dikongsikan kepada pembaca iaitu BBC, CNN, Harianblog.com dan banyak lagi.

Kelebihan yang terdapat dalam blog berita ini adalah maklumat boleh disebarkan dengan lebih pantas dan secara meluas melalui internet. Pembaca akan dapat memperoleh berita secara terus menerus dengan menggunakan telefon pintar atau komputer. Pembaca juga boleh memberikan komen dalam setiap blog berita yang dikunjungi kerana setiap blog berita menyediakan ruang komen dan maklum balas kepada pembaca blog tersebut. Ruang komen dan maklum balas ini disediakan untuk memudahkan pembaca untuk menyuarakan pendapat masing-masing. Jika dibandingkan dengan berita online yang lain, ruangan komen itu adalah terhad kerana sesiapa sahaja tidak boleh untuk memberikan komen yang berlebihan kerana masih terletak dibawah undang-undang yang ditetapkan oleh kerajaan Negara kita. Berbeza dengan blog berita ini, sesiapa sahaja bebas dan boleh memberikan komen kerana ia adalah terbuka.

Walaupun terdapat banyak kelebihan yang diperoleh melalui blog berita online ini, tetapi kita mungkin masih tidak berpuas hati terhadap maklumat yang diberikan itu ada yang kurang jelas dan kelihatan kabur tanpa penjelasan yang lebih spesifik. Walaubagaimanapun, blog berita ini tidak boleh dipercayai sepenuhnya. Hal ini kerana kebanyakan maklumat dan berita yang disampaikan itu kurang tepat dan tidak ada kesahihannya. Selain itu, blog berita ini kebiasaannya tidak mempunyai sumber yang boleh dipercayai kerana ia hanya berdasarkan pendapat pengguna blog itu sendiri.

Blog berita BBC

2. Dalam blog berita online ini, pembaca bebas untuk memberikan komen dan pendapat masing-masing mengenai sesuatu isu dan berita yang dikeluarkan dalam blog tersebut. Sebagai contoh, blog berita online iaitu BBC ini menyediakan ruang komen untuk pembaca memberi respon terhadap berita yang dipaparkan oleh mereka. Setiap pembaca bebas untuk menyuarakan pendapat mereka terhadap sesuatu perkara kerana mereka juga mempunyai hak untuk bersuara. Tetapi,  komen yang diberikan itu hendaklah berpatutan dan tidak digalakkan untuk menyentuh sensitiviti orang lain sehingga membawa kepada komen yang berbaur hasutan.

3. Blog berita online yang sesuai untuk dijadikan sumber informasi yang baik untuk pembaca adalah British Boardcasting Coperation (BBC). Kandungan berita dalam blog BBC ini amat baik dan mempunyai nilai dan ciri-ciri berita yang sahih serta boleh dipercayai. Blog berita online ini amat memudahkan kita sebagai pembaca untuk mengakses setiap berita yang baru dan lama yang telah dikeluarkan. Tetapi perlu berhati-hati dalam memilih blog berita yang dibaca kerana terdapat beberapa blog yang sering memutar belitkan berita sehingga berita itu menjadi sesuatu yang tidak benar. Bagi saya, saya akan memilih untuk membaca akhbar yang bercetak berbanding blog berita online kerana sesetangah blog pada masa kini banyak menyiarkan berita yang tidak tepat dan hanya membuat andaian sendiri tanpa membuat sumber rujukan. Sebagai pembaca, kita hendaklah bijak dalam meneliti kesahihan berita yang dikeluarkan oleh mana-mana pihak berdasarkan sumber-sumber yang boleh dipercayai.

Rujukan

http://arifict.dapat.com/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/aboutthebbc/entries/5499e3e1-9ad1-4ad1-bcc1-188cfeba511d

PorNoGraphy please?

As mass media consumption is increasing in this technology flooded era, its function has obviously changed from to bring human conveniences to a sense of need in daily life. Thus, there’s a modified basic human needs for this new tech-flooded society, derived for people in this 21^st century from Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, with internet as the most basic needs despite physiological needs. (This hierarchy has actually shown in previous post).

(Image adapted from: http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/experts-warn-schools-to-brace-for-next-generation-of-tech-savvy-children/story-e6frf7kx-1226448337277)

However, this phenomenon does not seem to bring human its conveniences as it supposed to, where it is up to certain circumstances only. Wondering why do I create such statement? The invention of internet indeed has brought human being more conveniences than the past, however, because it is too easy to access to, thus people have started to ‘utilize’ it not for the sake of conveniences anymore, but for ‘entertainment’. A study conducted by a British professor in year 1995 has found that internet has the most view search for pornography. As we know, internet is now being regarded as a global electronic village. A village may consist of young kids as well; the community is not only made up from those technology-literate adults and teenagers.

(Image adapted from: http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/experts-warn-schools-to-brace-for-next-generation-of-tech-savvy-children/story-e6frf7kx-1226448337277)

It is normal to see children in supermarket whom sitting in trolley or baby stroller with a mobile phone or a tablet in their hand, swiping their fingers all over across the screen and look professional in devices. Parents are intentionally in giving their phone or tablet to kids to make sure kids will not make any messes in their shopping. Imagine, these kids are contacted with digital devices in their very young age, they are still innocent to go online, surfing on net for information; while we adults are streaming pornography with full of enjoyment. 

As the population of children usage on internet is getting greater, although they surf more for gaming at this moment, they might soon get affected by such porn viewing behavior by the adults. According to poll survey on kids’ usage behavior pattern by KidSay, reported by e-Marketer in U.S. for the year 2014, some kids are streaming for videos as well and it is the second activity they did, despite playing online games, on internet. Hence, kids might indirectly and gradually expose to the high risk of viewing pornography accidentally and unintentionally.

(Image adapted from: http://www.emarketer.com/Article/Most-US-Children-Use-Internet-Least-Daily/1010789)

Hence, we as a matured adult, shouldn’t we create a safer environment in web for our younger generations? Otherwise, we should have kept them educated and by their side as guardian for the time they are on internet. 

(Image adapted from: http://www.kindynews.com/blog/archives/11-2012)

References

Most US Children use the internet at least daily. (2014). Retrieved from http://www.emarketer.com/Article/Most-US-Children-Use-Internet-Least-Daily/1010789

Pornography most popular subject for Internet searches Internet becomes a haunt of the dirty-mac brigade. (1995). Retrieved from http://www.independent.co.uk/news/pornography-most-popular-subject-for-internet-searches-internet-becomes-a-haunt-of-the-dirtymac-brigade-1600801.html