The BBC has reported that its interactive newsroom received more user generated images of snow scenes than any other news story. A whopping 43,000 photos were delivered electronically via mobile phones and other means in the last few days.
The huge volume of user generated content coming from Mumbai on places like Twitter and other networks highlights the increasing dilution of the mainstream media.
Gone are the days when it was a journalist, photographer or cameraman who was on the scene and first to capture the first news picture story. Now it is every man to his own. Armed with his own technology - mobile, video, camera – it is the citizen who is marching out to be first deliver on-the-spot action and picture exclusives to broadcasters and news editors.
The appeal from the celebrity-culture users’ perspective is that, for the cost of a phone call or text, they can see their name and news on national TV. Fame at last (without the fortune).
From the media’s side, newsrooms are actively encouraging citizen journalism. A picture exclusive will still sell papers or increase viewers and if they can get the (usually free) material before their competitors there is a commercial advantage. In spite of having to trawl through thousands of images (video clips, text and email messages), the BBC were still saying last night that they wanted more. And, to entice the punters, some fairly dreadful, poor quality, video clips were shown (“yes, we do broadcast your material” - however dull it is). It seems anything goes.
The news media arena is changing all the time and impacting on traditional processes. Citizen journalism is undoubtedly contributing to the perception of value. With so many images circulating, and with more and more people thinking they are the professional, the value of photographs is diminishing all the time. After all, if you don’t need to pay for your news material or send your news team to cover stories, you don’t need quality staff on the ground.
There are talented people being shown the door throughout the media world at the moment - the kind of people who have the experience to produce top rate quality images and footage of news stories in difficult circumstances. So where do they go? Probably to the interactive newsrooms where it seems the people who have jobs are those who are being employed as production line factory workers who sift through the glut of mediocre user generated content on anything and everything.
Is the promotion and processing of user generated content on this scale ethical or is it like supporting the development of a factory farm – lure them in, pile them high, sell them at any price and don’t worry about the consequences?