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Monday 14 September 2015

An Overview of Digital Journalism



Digital journalism is about the news created through the means of digital media. It is gradually being integrated into broadcast journalism and traditional print. Nowadays, a lot of newspapers publish their own online version, and several television stations have their own interactive sites that provide news headlines, podcasts, complete stories, plus a wide range of features. More and more people are relying on the news offered on the Internet. This is why this form of journalism, which continues to grow each day, has a negative effect on some forms of traditional media, like the standard print media.
Digital journalism is not only offered by reputable and respected news sources, but also by individuals, as well as groups with a distinct slant. In fact, online users navigate to many websites, depending on what can be printed. Given that any person that has an Internet connection can actually write or publish his/her own news story, the thought of hiding or leaving any piece of information behind is no longer possible. Whatever a person says or does can now be captured by means of a video cam and shown on YouTube, or written on any website. In a way, digital journalism has allowed millions of prospective journalists to get some exposure on the web for free.
Digital journalism news sites that continue to remain traditional in nature pay their staff to write articles, and they are usually regarded as reliable news sources. On the other hand, there are news sites that are not too careful about the news they gather with regards to their truth value. They look at opinions as researched materials. This often results to having some credibility, or can result to a total lack of credibility of these sites. There are, indeed, credible sites that may be linked to or separated from real life newspapers. A regular viewer may not be able to distinguish one from the other, and this can cause a continuous increase in speculations and misinformation.
Digital journalism surfaced in the '90s, and during this time, it was foreseen that traditional journalism jobs would decline. Now that this prediction has become a reality due to the closure of printing publications and the reduction of newspaper staff, a lot of writers are wondering if they can still get hired as digital journalists. If they have good journalism credentials and impressive communications, they can work for reputable websites, write as freelancers for news sources, or create news blogs and earn an income with the help of advertisement revenues. This may either be rewarding, or not too profitable at all. Contributions are not always paid, even by respected sites, while some websites come with citizen journalist positions. At times, public news commentaries are even integrated into television news.
Since the introduction of high-tech gadgets, it has been easier to create and obtain news, particularly in free press states. Now, you can record events, write a short blog about some news, or exchange emails with news sources by using your smartphone. This just means that anyone can share or provide information/misinformation about what is happening worldwide, and this can be exciting for most people even when they do not earn any income.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/9126456