UI Journalist Day shines spotlight on citizen journalism

Prita Nur Aini ,  Student of University of Indonesia   |  Sun, 05/17/2009 1:37 PM  |  Discover

In just a decade, the typewriter, camera and Dictaphone have been discarded as journalisms tools of the trade.

"Today, with the rise of technology, by using a BlackBerry smart phone we can write, take a picture or footage, record, and upload the news to the Internet. It is real time news that makes citizen journalism exist," said Donny BU of the Detik news portal.

He was one of the speakers at a seminar on citizen journalism held at the Economic School of the University of Indonesia (FE-UI) in Depok, West Java, on May 4.

The seminar was a part of Journalist Day 2009, organized by the Badan Otonom Ekonomica student body of FE-UI.

The student body held a blog competition for UI students from March 16 to April 23 as well as exhibition entitled "Kotaku di Ponselku" (My City on My Cell Phone), which was the result of a contest organized by Warta Kota from April 27 to May 2.

Donny described citizen journalism as anything that included add-on reporting, blogging, online forums and anything else open to public commentary.

"News sources can come from anywhere and anyone. The increasing number of Facebook users in Indonesia, about 3.2 million now, indicates the rise of citizen journalism, where users make notes or update and comment on the present status of each other."

Some news portals like Detik and Kaskus have forums for readers to upload the latest news or just voice their opinion of public services.

Chief marketing officer of Kaskus, Danny Wirianto, said that such citizen journalism has a ripple effect on the media, including by influencing news reports, what is discussed on talk shows and what other readers and even reporters follow-up on.

"The beauty of citizen journalism is that it can reveal hidden facts media reporters had yet to cover or had no access to," he said.

"Everyone can be a journalist," added Raymond Kaya, producer of SCTV's news program Liputan 6. "As an example, the video of the tsunami that struck Aceh in 2004, recorded by a resident, became a valid news source. The video is valued around Rp 100 million to Rp 250 million for copyright."

Noted blogger Enda Nasution said the mainstream media, especially newsprint, has been forced to change direction. Internet use has increased by 49 percent in the past decade and 13 percent of these users are active bloggers.

"The media has now become more personal and social. Social networking sites such as Facebook, Friendster, Wordpress, Kaskus and Twitter provide a tool to citizen journalist to report any events they see, a compliment to what the mainstream media is lacking; sharing expression and a room for amateur journalist," he said.

"There are so many sides to every story, so citizen journalism is needed," said Wimar Witular, a media expert.

"Citizen journalism can give access to people world wide, everyone can speak their rights; it gives the voice of the common people."

As their last event, Badan Otonom held a news competition and an excursion to SCTV and Indo Pos daily which included a training session.

Blogger Litia Pratiningrum, a UI student majoring in psychology, came to the realization that she too is a citizen journalist.

"The seminar, the training and the excursion opened my eyes on how the media works," she said.

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