News and views from the award-winning author of the novels The Skinny Years, America Libre, House Divided and Pancho Land

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Iran coverage: The new face of journalism?

Is the news coverage from Iran a glimpse of journalism in the future? Will Twitter, Facebook and social media redefine journalism and have an impact on politics and governance? Share your views.

3 comments:

Jacek Dudzic said...

We witness the rise of a social journalism. This will be a future of media and a hope for democracy. No one will be able to control the media because we are the media!

Janberk said...

Iranian case is somewhat peculiar I guess because Iranian state has very strict restrictions on spread of news within the country, forcing big news networks rely on social journalism.

Of course for other cases in the future social journalism will hold a place but I don't think it will has as much effect on the presentation of news in big networks and on the course of events as in the Iranian case.

Bill said...

The role twitter played in the Iran Coverage definitely represents a major change in journalism, but the change can be seen as much as a return as a renovation. The citizen journalism made available through blogs, twitter and the like represents a return to the real grass roots level of journalistic sources. The rising importance of individual journalists over and beyond the specific news company they work for, which does seem to be something new, is also probably an improvement for journalism as a whole. There are some great interviews with top journalists about the future of journalism at http://www.ourblook.com/component/option,com_sectionex/Itemid,200076/id,8/view,category/#catid69 which I have found helpful on these subjects.