1. Stage 2: New Media and Journalism
Group 1
New Media Trending
We have discovered that we have simply not had enough time to realistically follow any
trends in the emerging new media spaces. Although in a historical sense these changes
are occurring incredibly fast, they are still unobservable over such a short time span.
What we have identified:
In print journalism: the emergence of new ways to check data has lead to the old “he said
she said” model of journalism style falling out of vogue. Most of the new “journalism” by
these new sources is simply analysis and commentary on news which was reported by
mainstream journalists. In broadcast journalism technologies like YouTube and CNN’s
iReport have lead to increasing amounts of citizen journalism. Mass media moving into
online spaces have failed to effectively monetize on new media.
Concerns:
One of the major concerns with the emergence of the citizen journalist is a lack of
credibility. Another major problem with the idea of citizen journalism is the lack of the
average citizen’s ability to cover topics which require a large investment of time and
energy.
Positives:
There are some good things about the emergence of mass reporting:
The multitude of eyes on any one news source and the easy ability to do fact finding
online has added another check on journalistic accuracy. Those without a voice in the
traditional mass media now have a way to share their views.

2. Research Tools:
In order to collaborate effectively despite our distance from one another in both a
physical and temporal sense, we have used several new technologies including:
The Class wiki: we found that the class wiki was an effective way to share information
gathered from multiple sources. Twitter: we found twitter helped to lead us to issues
being talked about; however it proved ineffective in observing these trends over time.
Diigo: we did not find Diigo effectual for sharing information, mainly because we had
already been using the class wiki to share data.
Sources of Interest:
Sean Donahue: he is known as the manic marketer and has been proven to be a very
successful entrepreneur, especially in the social media and technology fields. Along with
his own business website, which is targeted at online bloggers, online business owners
and ecommerce, he provides a very informational blog containing useful information on
the latest trends, strategies and success tips for marketers and other online businessmen.
Donahue’s main objective is to share useful knowledge and provide advice and other
useful business information in order for all types of people to make money using the
Internet.
Peter Cashmore is the CEO of Mashable, a site that aggregates news both from and about
new media sources. He continuously updates his twitter and effectively uses it to draw
traffic to Mashable. His site is especially useful for seeing what is being written about
new media.
Jay Rosen: a professor at NYU, Rosen writes in depth and in an educated way about the
changes occurring in journalism on www.pressthink.com. Although he has a wealth of

3. data stored on his site, he did not update his blog during the class, so he was of little use
for tracking the trend.
Conclusions:
Journalism is undoubtedly going through a cataclysmic transition from an “all-pro”
system which favors the deep pockets of the mass media to a “pro-am” system; in which
there is an uneasy peace of sorts between those who are paid and those who are not. The
much ballyhooed “downfall of the newspapers” is perhaps a bit overblown. While the
new mediascape has certainly reduced the numbers and scope of newspapers, they
continue to exist as an important source of news. As with any trend, there are early
adopters and there are laggards, however adopting the techs early has not necessarily lead
to increased profits, however it has lead to a favorable market position.