Brian asked this question on the BBC World Have Your Say and I wanted to address it, “There is a feeling that the conference is possibly widening the gap between mainstream media and bloggers/citizen journalists” Others will follow.
The perceived “widening of the gap” has to do with the defensiveness — the fear — that is obvious to me from comments like, “I am a reporter, journalist, broadcaster, and I resent your saying that I don’t have passion for what I do.” That is a comment made out of fear: aggressive and defensive.
Yes, that man might be passionate about his job and the “noble” profession of being a pedigreed journalist-of-stature (and should be above these comments), and he might be passionate about his beat, but he is also able to get axed, made redundant, and is beholden (more than he may realize) to his six-figure lifestyle and sensibilities.
Profit motive versus passion motive. Bloggers (or citizen journalists) who are not paid completely through passion and have other masters (or a passing interest) never last very long. Of the 50 million bloggers world-wide, fewer than 100 are “essential reading” and fewer than 500 “influence the influencers.” in a real way every day. Many more — but only thousands — bubble up through those influential 100/500 blogs.
RSS syndicated feeds and the decontextualization of these “news stories” further blurs the line.
