Should citizen-journalists be paid?

by Albert Milliron | February 17, 2009 at 10:54 pm

400 views | 32 Recommendations | 11 comments

Should citizen-journalists be paid? As sites like NowPublic and other spread their sea legs into the new world of web 2.0, questions begin to arise on paying writers and photographers for content or maintain a since of objectivity to report real news and not tabloid type articles that drive large amounts of traffic to sites just to receive a payout. Here is an article from the Daily Telegraph that asks some of the important questions being raised in Crowd Powered Media and other Citizen journalism sites. Canadian websites are especially stressed as net neutrality is under attack by broadband companies choosing winners and losers in Canadian markets. This may stifle growth to some companies as the provides make choices who gets the band width. This process could even take on a US Fairness doctrine type scheme by providing higher streams to less trafficked companies or to make choice based mearly on content.

Is paying our photographers and reporters against the spirit of citizen-journalism? It's something that we are occasionally challenged on, but we think is emphatically not the case.

Given the success of Wikis, Creative Commons and open-source, it is tempting to see the future of journalism in free-to-edit, unpaid websites. These sites, such as NowPublic, are popular but have been criticized for being opinion-driven and derivative. You can judge for yourself the standard of articles on such sites, but what is undeniable is that only a small minority of stories are based on first-hand new information. Original journalism is in short supply.

In recent years, virtually all major news organizations have incorporated some user-generated content into their publications, programmes and websites. CNN has i-Report, the BBC asks users to Have Your Say, and Reuters has teamed up with Yahoo to feed it citizen-produced content. However, these projects are dependent on photographers giving away their content for free, whether in charity or ignorance. Their business model is based on citizens’ willingness to surrender their copyright.

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Laughing-Samurai (not verified)

at 02:15 on February 18th, 2009

Yes! but only for original material; text/photo/video/ If there are ads on a site then there should be some kind of revenue sharing even for copy and paste!

Vinny

at 05:12 on February 18th, 2009

I agree people should only be paid for original work and not for simply lifting photos and material from news sites. I think sharing news that we find is fine as long as sources are credited by using the highlight tool and entire articles are not copied but this does not deserve payment unless there is a fair amount of original work such as an opinion piece built around a news story included.

On a personal note 99% of what I post is what I find from other sources so I do not feel that I would deserve to be paid.

Uwe Paschen

at 03:41 on February 18th, 2009

For creative, Artistic and Original Material may that be Audio, Video, Art or Text. Original only. I do not agree with Copy and Paste (Highlight) since it is taking some one else's work and using it in part or whole, wish should benefit the original Writer and Photographer or artist but not the one that replicated it. Unless their is a agreement to do so and this has to be shown in the foot notes. Further we need a clear definition of what is what on this issue.

Fripouille

at 12:42 on February 18th, 2009

People should only be paid for original work. (But then again I would say that because I only put up opinion or my own articles!lol)

More seriously, writing reports or opinion takes much more time and thought and research than creating copy-paste post, and good writers are good because they have a talent for writing which should be rewarded. I read and enjoy lots of copy-paste material, it represents valuable input into a site, and it is not to be decried in any way. But it just isn't comparable to creating a text....

René

at 15:18 on February 18th, 2009

Why bother submitting original work? empty promises guarantee no original work. Still, this is a global community, and sometimes many here post highlights of news that the MSM (major media) neglects and that may not be seen by those on the other side of the world.

Though commenters (many anonymous or with anonymous aliases) sometimes get down and dirty, it just shows how passionate many are about their opinions.

Barry ORegan

at 15:28 on February 18th, 2009

I want a million dollars per Op.Ed I write! By saying this publicly on Now Public, I can now strut around and state a parties to all who will listen, Who me? What do I do? I write Op/Ed articles, and "I charge a Million Dollars an article", that should get me some hot babes and better Tables at the Ivanhoe or the Cobalt!

Barry ORegan

at 15:48 on February 18th, 2009

HA!

youngturk

at 21:41 on February 18th, 2009

Heyall yia. Barry should of put that in the stimulus package too. I need some free stuff. Where my free stuff?

Barry ORegan

at 06:51 on February 21st, 2009

I agree Turk, of course charging a million bucks per Op/Ed doesn't necessarily mean I'll get it, but to swagger around and state it, could be impressive~!