Can 'Citizen Journalists' Really Produce Readable Content? Answer: Yes, if editors work hard to attract and nurture it. Here are some ideas on how to get high quality content from your 'citJ' contributors.
By
Steve Outing
(October 26, 2005) -- Since "citizen journalism" is such a hot topic these days, it's worth pondering the quality of what's being published on "citJ" Web sites. After all, with a growing number of news organizations debuting citJ initiatives, the onus is on them to recruit content that's interesting if they want to make a business of this.
A significant problem would be if people who start to visit such Web sites find little to interest them, and the quality of what's published is so poor that they don't become repeat visitors. What if we (news organizations) build it, they come, but they don't come back again?
Proponents of the citJ concept say that what's been submitted in these early days is surprisingly good. And I'll agree with some of that contention, but there's also a lot of stuff appearing on citJ sites that is ... well, pretty dull, and not of the quality to attract those repeat visitors.
If a news organization (or entrepreneur, for that matter) is to have a citJ initiative succeed, there are some steps to be taken to ensure adequate quantity of citizen-submitted content, as well as quality. This column will offer some ideas on how to get high quality content from your citJ contributors.
The harsh reality As an (admittedly anecdotal) test of the quality of citizen submissions to citJ sites, I took a look at the Boulder (Colorado) section of Yourhub.com, a new network of micro-local citJ news Web sites created by Denver's daily newspapers. Since I live in Boulder, some of this content should be of interest to me. Here are the top five highlighted stories submitted by citizens at this writing:
Now, that list is about as dull as I could imagine, even to a Boulderite. Indeed, looking over the citizen news entries for my town on Yourhub.com, I find that most of them are of the press-release variety. They don't make me want to visit the site often.
READER FEEDBACK In an attempt to foster an ongoing conversation, E&P is posting letters in response to this column. To have your voice heard, simply e-mail us. So far, we've heard from the following:
Chris Luth notes that Wikinews is a "great way to allow members of the public to contribute their observations and knowledge of news events."
Trish Gannon, Publisher of The River Journal, says: "There are two big concerns with "citizen reporting" that haven't been adequately addressed -- reliability and liability."
John Temple, editor of Rocky Mountain News, defends YourHub.com.
Jack Driscoll, editor-in-residence at MIT's Media Labratory, addresses the idea of training citizen journalists.
It's not always that way with citJ sites' content, and within Yourhub.com are some interesting things. Mark Potts, co-founder of Backfence.com, an independent citJ company that's so far built three micro-local citJ news Web sites in suburban Washington, D.C., and northern Virginia, says, "We're getting very good content from the community on Backfence, almost uniformly, and some of it is great." (And you can probably consider Potts as a credible judge of quality; he's a long-time journalist and was one of the first employees of Washingtonpost.com.)
He cites examples of community members submitting some quality content, such as: detailed coverage of a local girls softball team's performance in the Little League World Series (they won) written by the Little League commissioner; and a thorough financial analysis of a plan to sell a local highway to a private ownership group (which Potts says was more detailed than even the Washington Post had). Of the several "best" stories that he highlighted from his sites, Potts says none of them were solicited; they all came in "organically and spontaneously."
Potts adds, "Of course, these are the highlights, but even the more mundane postings on the site have been generally interesting, well written, and informative. Are they all in the King's English? No. Does it matter? Only to a hardened copy editor."
OK, so I think it's safe to say that among citJ content, there's a mix of quality. Perusing a sampling of citJ sites in preparation for writing this column, I found that mix -- but frankly, I saw much more writing that only a mother could love. (Citizen photography was, in my opinion, better than the writing.) The best citJ sites will identify the best citizen content and highlight it -- so that a list of the top five items on a homepage will be interesting and not deadly dull.
Plan for good submissions "If you don't have a well-developed strategy to populate the site with content of interest to people, you will end up with a site full of junk," says Rich Gordon, an associate professor of journalism at Northwestern University and the faculty advisor behind the school's GoSkokie.com, citJ Web site. "Hard as it is to get people to visit a citizen journalism site for the first time, you don't want them to come and decide it's not worth coming back."
Gordon recommends that citJ site editors start by approaching people associated with local institutions and organizations: church pastors, coordinators of youth sports leagues, civic groups, non-profits, etc. These are people who consider it their responsibility to get the word out about what they are doing; they already may be sending press releases to local media outlets. These people will start to fill a citJ site with content.
Alas, there's big problem with this approach: "A site filled with institutional press releases isn't going to be very welcoming for a real average citizen, not affiliated with one of these institutions, who wants to share his concerns with others," says Gordon. Follow only this approach and you get what I found on my sample visit to Yourhub.com's Boulder pages.
Gordon urges citJ site managers to take this first step, but also to initiate a larger outreach to non-affiliated community members. It's important to quickly get past the mostly-press-releases stage, or your citJ site could die from lack of interest before getting out of infancy.
Here's a great tip from Gordon along those lines: Look on sites where individuals from your community are already posting -- like Yahoo!'s Flickr, a photo-sharing site -- and approach those people with invitations to post on your citJ site. Citizen photographers already posting to Flickr could be enticed to begin publishing on your site as well as a way to get a wider local audience. That's a low-cost approach that even those citJ sites with limited budgets could afford to do.
Perhaps this is obvious, but it's still worth emphasizing in case there are people in the news business who view citizen journalism as the sort of thing where you can set up a Web site and then stand back and watch as people spontaneously submit more and more content. Nearly everyone I interviewed for this article emphasized that getting people to submit content to citJ sites requires lots of outreach and marketing. There's no such thing as "build it and they will come."
The segregation issue One problem that I think early citJ sites have -- especially those affiliated with newspapers -- is that their content is separated and often walled off from what's produced by a newspaper's professional journalists. This approach of treating community contributors as "second-class citizens" perhaps breeds inferior content by discouraging those who would produce some of the best citizen content from participating.
Amy Gahran, who co-writes a blog about citizen journalism called IReporter.org (with Adam Glenn), says that recognition can be a powerful motivator for citizen journalists. She thinks that being willing to highlight the best citJ contributions prominently -- and not treating it as a less valuable or valid form of news -- can go a long way in increasing the quality of citizen content.
For instance, a newspaper with a citJ Web site occasionally might play up outstanding contributions on the front page of the print edition. "If people feel like they're really contributing to the news, that their efforts aren't being dismissed or buried, they'll be more motivated to participate," says Gahran.
I think that's a great idea. The only caveat would be to be completely transparent about it -- making it clear that a highlighted citizen-journalist report is not vetted in the way a normal staff report would be, and including a brief profile of the citizen author.
A related approach can be seen elsewhere. When terrorist bombs struck London's subways this summer, BBC News made pleas to the public to supply photos and videos from digital cameras and cell phones. It led its newscasts with some of that citizen news content. Meanwhile, "during Hurricane Katrina, many big news sites like CNN and the New York Times [also] made pleas to 'citizen journalists' for content -- but did little with those submissions but segregate them from the main stories," says Chris Willis, who co-authored a comprehensive report about citizen journalism called "We Media."
Willis says the BBC approach is more authentic, and likely will garner more and better citizen journalism the next time a major disaster strikes.
Another example of integration can be found at Bluffton Today, a community news site serving Bluffton, South Carolina. As you can see on the "Top Stories" page, the list of articles (presented in blog format) is a mix of staff and citizen-submitted content (but predominantly staff).
Bluffton Today represents a new model of community-journalism presentation where it's not just the professional journalists who are covering the town. It may be that by elevating the stature of Bluffton's citizen journalists in this way, the quality of submissions could be better than what segregated sites attract. That will be interesting to watch.
To train or not to train Should you try to "train" citizen journalists, as a way to get better submissions? I can't help but think that that's a good idea. Consider holding public seminars that educate community members about your citJ site and how they can contribute, and offer up some editors to give advice about producing good-quality content. Maybe have a staff photographer present some tips for photographing news events, and/or talk about photo ethics. Give away T-shirts with the citJ web site's URL printed on them. It couldn't hurt.
But Backfence's Potts has a different point of view. "I'd argue that the notion that people have to be somehow 'trained' to create citizens' media is journalist-think, and even a little arrogant," he says. "Not everybody's a great writer or storyteller. But that's not what we're about. If you make it easy for people to come online and give them a place to say whatever they have to say, you're on your way."
We Media's Willis concurs: "There is little hard evidence to suggest that your average citizen is interested in being a journalist in the traditional sense."
So perhaps we really want to train community members to use our citJ sites to "share their experiences," not pretend to be journalists. (Some even argue against the label "citizen journalism," a phrase I've never been entirely comfortable with. I use it because it's a term that most people understand.)
Motivated by money What about money or compensation? Can citizen submissions to citJ initiatives be improved by paying people? I think so, if you can afford it. The pioneering Korean citJ Web site Ohmynews pays modestly for the best citizen-contributed content it publishes, and is reportedly profitable. I once corresponded with a professional journalist in South America who was writing travel articles for Ohmynews as a side hobby. She professed to be motivated by the small checks she received for her articles and photos.
There's also the notion of awarding prizes for the best content. Giving away stuff for the best photo of the week, for instance, could be a good way to encourage quality photo submissions. And keep in mind, compensation doesn't need to be in cash.
"To get the best content," says Willis, "I do believe people will have to be compensated. News companies had a chance to get a lot of participation for free, but as blog networks begin to get bought up by the likes of AOL, the New York Times or News Corp., a value for influential online voices is being set. That's a genie that won't be going back into the bottle anytime soon."
Northwestern's Gordon suggests that when a citJ site identifies a strong community voice willing to participate, "it makes sense to offer them some kind of compensation to contribute something regularly."
But not everyone buys into that notion. Potts says Backfence currently has no plans to compensate its citizen contributors. "People like being able to show that they know something about a topic and they like to be recognized for sharing that knowledge with the community. Historically, that's motivation enough." And, "nobody's asked us to [pay them]."
Does your site need help? Whenever I'm asked about citizen journalism, I always say that we're so early into this game that the rules aren't yet set and the success stories haven't been told yet. If today's early citJ sites are less than perfect, that's understandable.
But if you're running a citJ site and you're not thrilled with the level of quality received from the public, perhaps it's time to heed some of the advice above. Steve Outing
(steve@poynter.org)
has covered the online news industry for E&P since August 1995. He is also senior editor at the Poynter Institute for Media Studies.
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Can 'Citizen Journalists' Really Produce Readable Content?
