Terry Heaton’s PoMo Blog

So YouTube has announced the hiring of a news manager and the launch of a citizen journalism channel. Don’t be fooled by the raw nature of this, folks, because you may be looking at not only future hires in your community but also future styles in presenting video news. This is an unorganized group with YouTube (Google) playing its typical support and distribution role in sidestepping traditional media companies to present a form of journalism that most professionals deem far beneath them.

The news manager is no novice when it comes to citizen journalism. Olivia Ma recently graduated from Harvard and was a regular contributor to Dan Gillmor’s Center for Citizen Media blog.

Gillmor, author of what is widely considered the original manifesto of the citizen journalism movement, We, the Media, told me via email this morning that the YouTube project is another worthwhile experiment, and “I’m looking forward to seeing how it works.”

“But as they monetize this,” he added, “I hope they’re going to find a way to reward the people who are doing the work. I’m not a fan of business models that say ‘You do all the work and we’ll take all the money, thank you very much.’ I also hope they’ll give people a way to post using Creative Commons licenses, which are all about sharing information, as opposed to the currently restrictive terms of service.”

I agree with Dan on the above, and his message is relevant for all media companies trying to “monetize” user-generated content.

But beyond that, this move by YouTube demands our attention for its assumption that anybody can “do news” and distribute their work for free. The pamphleteers of journalism’s past would’ve loved it.

(Originally posted in AR&D’s Media 2.0 Intel newsletter)

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 22nd, 2008 at 3:04 pm and is filed under Journalism, Disruptions, Citizens Media, YouTube. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.