Professional ethics? But we have seen traditional journalists working for traditional media outlets breached code of ethics Professional Training? But the First Amendement in US protects everyone’s right to publish, not only those who graduate from journalism schools or work for news organizations The content itself? It is a more proper definition. Is the content verifiable? Does it provide factual, reliable, timely and meaningful information? Bloggers are considered journalists if their content fulfill these criterion From the legal perspective, in 2006, there was a legal case in California, in which bloggers won the recognition as journalists as in they are protected under the Califiornia state shield law. The court ruled that the blogger did not need to diclose his sources.
http://www.stateofthemedia.org/2010/online_audience.php#online_mostpopular According to a study in the U.S., 5% of people say that Bloggers’ sites are their favorite type of news site.
Among the top 15 news website in 2009 in the U.S., we can see most of them are either news aggregators like Yahoo News and Google News and also traditional news outlets like the CNN.com or NYTimes.com. However what I want you to take note of is TheHufftingtonPost.com which is ranked the 11th, with more than 9 million unique audience. The HuffingtonPost is an American news website which has over 3,000 bloggers—from politicians and celebrities to academics and policy experts—who contribute in real-time on a wide-range of topics. Contributors include President Obama, Hillary Clinton, Madonna, etc. The HufftingtonPost was named 2nd among the 25 best blogs by Time Magazine in 2009.
Niche expertise - while newspapers cover everything in the world, a blogger can be an expert in a particular area and have deep knowledge on a specific topic Transparency in motives - Bloggers are not constrained by the institutional framework so they can have more freedom to speak from their heart and be upfront about their subjective approach Transparency in progress - Bloggers link to sources, supporting evidence to build their credibility. Traditional news production are more of a top-down approach. Forthrightness about mistakes - Credible bloggers take responsibility for their mistakes. They post corrected information alongside their original post. However, not many newspaper will do the same. Of course, there are many bloggers who do not blog ethically.
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