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CITIZEN JOURNALISM
EARNINGS and INFLUENCE
From our readings for our
Strategic Communication and Emerging Media class this week one of the topics
was “Social News, Citizen Journalism and
Democracy.” The reading can be found at the following site:
The article describes research into “the democratic
implications of citizen journalism and social news. The article calls for a
broad conception of ‘citizen journalism’ which is (1) not an exclusively online
phenomenon, (2) not confined to explicitly ‘alternative’ news sources, and (3)
includes ‘metajournalism’ as well as the practices of journalism itself.”
The article makes a strong
case for citizen journalism’s democratization of news. No longer can gatekeepers control the agenda
or the process of newsmaking. However,
the creation of a whole class of citizen journalists raises the question of
“what kinds of status differentials emerge within citizen journalism and
metajournalism networks”, and, more importantly, how do these “status
differentials…impact on (the) processes of newsmaking and agenda-setting?”
The article was written in
2009.
First a definition is in
order. Just what is a “status
differential?” A quick google search led
me to a research paper that sought to answer that very question, albeit,
instead of ‘status differential’ the term described is ‘status
differentiation’. Here is the website
for the research paper, which was published in 2007:
http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0022022107302311
JOURNAL OF CROSS-CULTURAL PSYCHOLOGY, Vol. 38 No. 4, July
2007 413-431 DOI: 10.1177/0022022107302311
Written in the Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology,
researcher David Matsumoto of San
Francisco State University
Humans are social animals, and
people of all cultures live, work, and play in groups. Groups are dependent on
key characteristics for their efficiency, productivity, and survival, including
in-group loyalty, cooperation, identification, sanctions for noncooperation,
and the like. Because individuals are members of multiple social groups, and
because human social networks can be large and complex, these characteristics
are especially important to human social life. One characteristic of most
groups is the existence of hierarchies. Hierarchies are important because the
stratification of leaders and followers is essential for group efficiency.
Groups with too many leaders and too few followers, or vice versa, are not as
efficient as groups with identified leaders and followers and clear lines of
authority. All groups, human and nonhuman, in fact, spend much time and energy
on establishing these lines of authority—dominance in a hierarchy—to clarify
these social roles. The existence of a hierarchy and differential behaviors of
members in the group according to the hierarchy are universal aspects of human
life and of all social animals.
Equating status with hierarchy, we can reword and somewhat
simplify the question of status differentials.
The question then becomes what manifestations of hierarchy do we see
“emerging within citizen journalism networks.” We know the status quo (pun
intended) of traditional journalists hierarchical structure.
That structure follows many of the same structures of other
business organizations. Top down
leadership structure is the status quo in business. Citizen journalist, however, often operate
outside of the normal business structure.
Some work independently. For some
it is the independence that gives their voice authority, because they are their
own gatekeeper, their own filter. After
all, in traditional journalism, status is determined by economics, that is,
advertising revenue, circulation, and the demographics of an area usually based
on geographic boundaries and the socio economics of the geographic area. Citizen journalists often operate both in the
traditional journalist’s realm of limiting geography, and in the digital cyber
world that spans the globe.
Since citizen journalists usually operate as independent
contractors/newspersons, they do not operate within the status stratification setup
usually assigned to those in traditional journalism. It still comes down to economics,
however. Hierarchy among citizen
journalist is determined by advertising revenue, and circulation. How much money are they making (usually from
advertising revenue on the internet) and how many people are reading,
commenting on, sharing, and otherwise interacting with what they post on the internet. Those who are making a lot of money and are
widely read often become celebrities.
Those who make little or no money remain in virtual (no pun intended)
obscurity. Those who make big money, because they have huge followings, also
are in the position to affect the agenda and help to set it, and/or redirect
it. Such citizen journalism stars also
impact what news is made, through their contributions, and the conversation
that is created around their contributions.
Therefore, citizen journalism is not restricted to the internet.
However, increasingly, citizen journalists are working on
multiple platforms, broadcasting, print, and the internet.
CITIZEN JOURNALISM
DEFINED
Citizen Journalism – “Within this
mode, independent news content is generated, and produced by a non-professional
individual or organization that is not paid staff. Examples of citizen
journalism include blogs, independent news websites, community radio stations,
or newspapers.”
Amani Channel, Gatekeeping and Citizen Journalism A
Qualitative Examination of Participatory Newsgathering, (2010) Retrieved from
http://cjms.fims.uwo.ca/issues/06-01/jack.pdf
Canadian Journal of Media Studies, Vol. 6(1)
The “press tools” certainly are enabling the citizen
journalist to achieve status, and the most influential citizen journalists,
those who achieve state, tend to be those who know how to use the press tools
to their advantage.
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Check out the following
website for a listing of the top ten bloggers (2014) based on earnings.
You can see that the earnings and influence go together. These bloggers represent the top in the
status hierarchy of citizen journalists.
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Check out the following
website for a listing of the top ten Youtube Stars (2016) based on earnings:
http://www.businessinsider.com/youtube-stars-who-make-the-most-money-in-2016-2016-12/#no-9-tie-colleen-ballinger-5-million-1
A citizen journalist is often a blogger, a tweeter, or
someone who posts videos to Youtube.
Since the first blogs in 1999, and the start of Youtube Feb. 14, 2005,
citizen journalism has taken off. At
first little money could be made through tweeting, blogging, or Youtube
videos. The first blogs were diaries and
journals, mostly of a personal nature.
As the internet expanded, mobile applications became
available, and smart phones got smarter. Citizen journalism became a profitable
venture. But who is making the money in
citizen journalism? My opinion is that the
money, most of it, goes to only to a few citizen journalists, while the vast majority
makes nothing. Check out the stats below from lifehacker.com:
http://lifehacker.com/can-i-really-make-a-living-by-blogging-1537783554
EARNINGS and INFLUENCE
I think that:
The status of a citizen journalist is based on
earnings. The earnings come because of
the influence and the influence brings the earnings. Therefore the earnings are directly
proportional to the influence and vice versa.
Earnings are quantifiable, while influence is a matter of opinion, and
as is therefore qualitative information or data. My view is that the higher the earnings, the
higher the influence. A research study
could be done to measure the influence, based on surveys of the readers of blogs,
and viewers of Youtube videos, and then by comparing the rated influence with
the earnings reports that rank blogs and Youtube videos by income. After the influence research is done a
correlation could be established between the earnings and the rated influence
to substantiate my view that the earnings from citizen journalists correlate
directly to the influence of citizen journalists. The math formula for what I just said reads
as follows where earnings is X and influence is Y:
EARNINGS Corr(X,Y) INFLUENCE
The math formula for the above is
Corr(X,Y) correlation of random
variables X and Y
I think that:
Citizen journalists enter into a symbiotic
relationship with their publics. this
relationship involves earnings, determining the status of the citizen journalist, and impact, determining
the influence on the process
of newsmaking and agenda-setting.
FYI:
About
YouTube
Launched in May 2005, YouTube allows billions of people to
discover, watch and share originally-created videos. YouTube provides a forum
for people to connect, inform, and inspire others across the globe and acts as
a distribution platform for original content creators and advertisers large and
small.
Check out the following research study and the quote from it
below:
In the five years since blogging
software opened this form of journaling to nontechnical writers, blogs have
exploded on the Web’s landscape. In the process, bloggers are influencing the
world outside of the blogosphere, as measured by audience reach, media adoption
and political necessity. Attempts to mathematically determine which blogs are
the most influential are currently characterized by the shortcoming of just
counting blogs and links. This methodology is not unlike asking “who is the
most influential scientist in the world” and then counting citations to
determine the answer: neither process measures influence within genres, such as
politics, cooking or technology.
http://www.uvm.edu/pdodds/files/papers/others/everything/gill2004a.pdf
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