Updated: The buzz about nowpublic today

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Updated: The buzz about nowpublic today

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Here's a compendium of what the media world is saying about our partnership with AP:

Editor & Publisher: AP Joins Partner in New "Citizen Journalism" Project

NEW YORK The Associated Press and NowPublic.com said Friday they had agreed to a partnership to let AP to use photographs, video and news from "citizen journalists" in its newsgathering operation.

The company is part of a growing citizen-journalism movement, comprised of blogs and news sites that rely on small armies of amateur reporters and eyewitnesses with cell phone cameras to deliver news online.

OhMyNews.com: Associated Press Connects with Citizen Content

There is no information yet on how contributors may be paid for content used by AP but presumably the arrangement will help to build the structures around NowPublic. AP bureaus will soon work with NowPublic communities in selected locations on ways to enhance regional news coverage. Later AP news desks also may tap the network in breaking news situations where citizen contributors may capture critical information and images.

Middle East Times: Internet Users Transformed into News Reporters

NowPublic and YouWitnessNews have formed alliances with traditional international news wire services and provide them with photos or other worthy content.

NowPublic takes the deal a step further, promising to swiftly pinpoint for wire service reporters potential witnesses or contributors close to the scenes of breaking news.

"If a bomb went off in Budapest and you wanted to connect with someone within a mile [1.6 kilometers] of the scene, we find them for you," Brody said.

Vancouver-based NowPublic has been doubling in size every three months.

"I think that the whole citizen journalism phenomenon is a nascent trend," Scott Moore, head of Yahoo News, said. "It is really technology that has created the opportunity. You have tens of millions of people around the world with cell phones with cameras connected to providers. It is like having an army of stringers out."

International Herald Tribune

NEW YORK: The Associated Press and NowPublic.com said Friday they had agreed to a partnership to let AP use photographs, video and news from "citizen journalists" in its newsgathering operation.

NowPublic.com, a Vancouver, Canada-based startup, posts citizens' images and news accounts on its Web site, along with links to mainstream news organizations.

The company is part of a growing citizen-journalism movement, comprised of blogs and news sites that rely on small armies of amateur reporters and eyewitnesses with cell phone cameras to deliver news online.

The AP said that in the first phase of the partnership, news and photo editors on its national news desks in New York will have the option of using selected content from NowPublic.com to supplement the work of AP journalists.

AP editors will work with NowPublic.com staff and contributors to ensure the content is real and accurate, said Jim Kennedy, AP's vice president and director of strategic planning.

Chicago Sun-Times

The Associated Press and NowPublic.com said Friday they had agreed to a partnership to let AP use photographs, video and news from ''citizen journalists'' in its newsgathering operation. NowPublic.com is a Vancouver, Canada-based startup.

Media Shift

Tippett had one of the more important announcements to come out of We Media, with his citizen journalism hub NowPublic making a deal with the Associated Press to supply photos, text and video shot by average folks to the august news service. Tippett told me the AP would be paying citizen journalists if they used their material, with part of the fee going to NowPublic. I’ll have more on this deal and other wire service moves in upcoming posts on MediaShift.

 

The partnership has an added twist as coverage will include virtual communities. In a comment to the PaidContent post written by Staci Kramer, NowPublic’s “actual news guy,” Mark Schneider, said the company is actively looking to open a bureau in SecondLife. I guess all worlds deserve coverage, huh?

Matthew Ingram (tech reporter for The Globe and Mail):

Some pretty big developments at Vancouver-based NowPublic, the “citizen
journalism” or “participatory media” site, or whatever your preferred
term is. One of them is that PaidContent says the company, whose site
just underwent a redesign and relaunch, has signed a partnership
arrangement with the Associated Press newswire. The two are going to
collaborate on news coverage, although there aren’t really a whole lot
of details — either in the PaidContent item or in the news release from the wire service.

SplashCast

I heard a story recently that illustrates how powerful the NowPublic “fresh, crowd-powered” model really works. Last fall, a plane crashed into a buiding in New York. A NowPublic contributor took a photo of the plane crash from a building across the street.

NowPublic was the first to report the news. That’s crowd sourcing at work.

Have a look at the SplashCast about Nowpublic here. The following was a comment posted to this article:

Mark Evans Says:
February 10th, 2007 at 12:57 pm

In theory, the idea of citizen journalists supporting traditional media organizations makes a lot of sense, especially as newsrooms shrink as they look to reduce costs. Just wondering why you think these kind of AP-NowPublic relationships haven taken off yet?

Vancouver-based NowPublic.com is on a roll—first, a relaunch combined with news that Merrill Brown has joined the company as chairman of the board, and now the announcement of “an innovative initiative designed to bring citizen content into AP newsgathering, and to explore ways to involve NowPublic’s on-the-ground network of news contributors in AP’s breaking news coverage.” NowPublic bills itself as “the world’s largest participatory news network” with more than 60,000 contributors from 140 countries. Details are a little sketchy beyond that. According to the release, the two will collaborate on ways for NowPublic to contribute and to give NowPublic’s contributors a chance for higher visibility.

It’s good to pay attention to Dries Buytaert’s blog:

 

Today the Associated Press (AP) and NowPublic announced that they have agreed to a deal that will bring NowPublic's citizen content into AP's news gathering network. According to the press release, the two companies will work together to explore ways of involving NowPublic's on-the-ground network of news contributors with AP's breaking news coverage – increasing the worlds access to news as it happens.

To put this into perspective, on any given day, more than half the world's population sees news from AP – so this is an unparalleled distribution opportunity for citizen created content and contributors to NowPublic. And of course, as NowPublic is built on Drupal, it's good news for Drupal too.

Merrill Brown, former EIC of MSNBC.com, will be Chairman of the Board of NowPublic, a Drupal-driven crowd sourced website. This is quite a big deal, needless to say! Congratulations!

Source: community.nebraska.edu

From YahooNews


NowPublic is a crowd-sourced, participatory news network which mobilizes an army of reporters to cover the events that define our world. In 12 short months, the company has become the largest news organization of its kind with over 60,000 reporters in over 140 countries. This year The Guardian named NowPublic one of the top 5 most useful news sites on the Web. The company has received funding from Brightspark, New York Angels and GrowthWorks.

Source: community.nebraska.edu

NowPublic - I never quite understood NowPublic’s take on the user-generated news market, but the releases coming out of the company suggest good things. Earlier this week we got a release that said Merrill Brown had joined the company as chairman of the board, and today we’re told the participatory news network is partnering with the Associated Press.

Source: mashable.com