What advantages and disadvantages do citizen journalists pose for mainstream media?

The creation of new technologies including blog sites, social networks, and the use of smart phones with cameras, allow members of the public without any journalistic training to participate in debates and publish their own point of view about a range of subjects. Articles written by citizen journalists may contain anything within the news, however there have been debates as to whether this type of journalism is good or bad for mainstream media?

Some advantages of citizen journalists are that members of public are able to alert the media to news stories that they may not already know about, or that professional journalists have not got the ability to cover. Citizen journalists can be a massive help by providing written reports in addition to photographs and videos in real time. For example many stories regarding the Arab Spring have been covered by citizen journalists when mainstream media were unable to reach areas of conflict or a media blackout was in place. Smaller newspapers often need to rely on citizen journalists for the latest updates, due to their low staff count.

Some disadvantages are that as journalists your views are suppose to be non-biased and balanced, however citizen journalists will generally only put their view across, which effectively could give the article an unfair outcome. Many professional journalists believe that the quality of an article from a citizen journalist is often of a poor standard, and lack content. As a British citizen you have freedom of speech, therefore as a citizen journalist, you have the power to say what you like, however this can sometimes be dangerous resulting in the possibility of libel claim. During the past year a number of people have been charged for statements they have published via social networks or online blogs due to them being offensive or untrue. Professional journalists have rules to abide by albeit these are under review following recent scandals.

Through my own experience of posting on social networks I see citizen journalists as complementing mainstream media by providing speedier reports and information from a range of sources that allow mainstream media reports to be better balanced and factually more accurate.