'NewsHour' on New Media

The NewsHour had an interesting segment (mp3) last night on media trends, with some discussion of citizen journalism toward the end of the segment.

Nicholas Lemann, dean of the Columbia J-School, who's been embroiled in debate over the value of citizen media following his New Yorker essay on the topic last summer (see Rebecca McKinnon's blog posting for reaction to his piece), had this to say on the PBS program: "There's nothing wrong with citizen journalism at all and a lot of it is a healthy development. ... However, what I haven't seen citizen journalism do yet is really provide an ongoing, regular report that monitors the activities of government and business and so on. It's a kind wonderful add-on and corrective to flaws in the conversation, but it doesn't conduct the conversation, and that's the value of traditional media."

But just to cite one example, wouldn't the Sunlight Foundation projects on earmarks and congressional family business be exactly the kind of ongoing, regular report he says is missing? And aren't the many hyperlocal citJ sites that are covering what no local or regional news organization is covering an example of conducting the conversation?"

-- A. Adam Glenn