Technological Tailspinning

Chapter 15 of "Journalism: Theory and Practice" discusses new media in journalism and how it has affected journalism both historically and in the present day.

A supplementary source on the history of journalism and the impact of new media can be found at http://www.masternewmedia.org/news/2006/11/10/new_media_journalism_how_professional.htm
One of it's first points about new media relates to the 'citizen journalism' that has arisen from it, and the credibility and objectivity issues that have arison out of that in turn. In relation to this, the source makes this point:

'The barbarians have entered the gates. Is the empire on the verge of collapse? Nowadays, the word "amateur" is being deployed by media professionals to belittle the media-making efforts of bloggers and others who create media productions outside the journalism guilds. Such reporting is deemed "unreliable", "biased", "subjective"; they are "unaccountable", the facts and the sources "unverifiable".

All of this must be puzzling to historians of the modern mass media. Consider the first newspaper in English, a translation of a Dutch coranto, printed in Amsterdam in December 1620 and exported to England. It began with an apology, a typographical error, a number of lies and disinformation. The apology appeared in the first line of the publication: "The new tydings out of Italie are not yet com"... Verily, a very unprofessional beginning!'

This would suggest that the author supports new media and the citizen journalism it enables.

However, a contradictory argument is also provided: "There's a big misconception among professional journalists that the new media is about news. Wrong. It's about self-expression, it's about participating in defining and shaping the information/communication environments in which we live. The various forms of digital media - blogging, podcasting, social bookmarking and networking, etc. - are merely the means and the channels for achieving this."  Therefore, although new media enables citizen journalism which has the potentional to be just as successful and beneficial as traditional mediums, that does not mean that that is what these mediums are being used for. Food for thought.