Sunday, October 19, 2008

I Can Be a Journalist !!

Social News??
Social Publishing??
I first heard about "Social News" this week through Sixdegrees, so I tried to find out what is social news. I visited many social news website such as "digg" "reddit" and "newsvine". According to "A Beginner's Guide to Social News Websites", there is good definition about social news.
Social News websites are communities which allow its users to submit news stories, articles and media (videos/pictures) and share them with other users or the general public. Some of these articles will be given more visibility, depending on various factors such as the number of user votes for each item.
But I didn't understand the meaning clearly.
When I first visited those websites, I don't know why people try to update already posted news in other news sites, because we can read the news on official news site like CNN, Washington Post.

But...soon I fall in love with "digg". People can see the number of other's digg so readers can recognize what is the most popular to others and other people's interest. I think this happens because people always want to know about other's feedback. That is, Social Networking.

I found that "newsvine" is very different from other websites. Users can create their own news. Anyone can be a reporter and write their opinions or news. This is really good for people to get as much as information, however, I think it would be also dangerous tools because anyone can get power through articles.

In Korea, one of the famous model / actress "Byun Jung Soo" was the victim of social news.
One college girl write a article that she die from car accident. It was definitely lie. That college girl faked the name of famous reporter, and she make the article like one of Korea's official news website. This faked news spread through internet and blogs, so many people believe the news and felt sorry to her.
But soon she's alive!! She came up to TV and said she still alive.

She was really shocked about her death rumor news, but she forgave that college girl because she thought she was young girl, and she did it just for fun not knowing how much the article would be problem.
Anyway..In this web2.0 age, we can be anything we want such as journalist, doctor, singer and photographer without having professional sense. We can choose anything but use our power in good way.

1 comment:

Song said...

Wow I am glad to you dealt with same subject as mine. It was really shocking news though right?
I cant forget that issue. In addition I think it represents the fail of citizen journalism. so we have to cautious about what we writing and what we read.