Citizen Journalists, User-Generated Stories and Content: Annoying or Helpful?

Wow, you take amazing photographs of *insert interesting subject here* with your iPhone, you are a talented photographer!

Your blog post about *insert random relevant news article here* was fantastic, you would make an amazing journalist!

That interview with *insert important person’s name here* that you uploaded to YouTube was so interesting, you should do more of those!

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Sound familiar?

Digital tools, in particular, smart phones, have made user-generated news-like content a lot more accessible. Practically everyone has a smartphone, so when a hard hitting news story breaks, you can guarantee that someone is going to film, photograph and write about (sometimes even live-tweet) the event. 

The citizens are taking over the news with their home footage, their use of hashtags and their camera phone photographs. The public is swaying the news agenda, with news programs struggling to keep a distracted audience entertained.

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I don’t watch the news on the television anymore. Primarily because the news is no longer about what is happening in the world, it’s about what is happening that is entertaining in the world.

I want to know about technological advancements that are happening overseas, not the advancement of Kim Kardashian’s pregnancy.

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I want to know about what was happening in Ferguson MI last year, not about what the latest viral video is.

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But citizen journalists do have their pros. The more people who have access to press tools means that the more we hear, see and watch when a major event happens. Even though my local news channels were showing viral cat videos while everyone was protesting in Ferguson MI, I could still log onto the internet to catch up with the latest citizen live stream to see what was happening.

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The rise of social media is allowing more user-generated content to reach the airwaves. Images, videos and interviews done by citizens are being broadcast on our televisions, bombarded to us on Facebook, hashtagged on Twitter. 

Are Free Photographers The Best Photographers: Cutting Costs to Keep Up with Digital Technology

I’m an avid photographer. I take my camera almost everywhere, hoping to get that shot. You know, the one that captures something truly amazing that rockets me into photography stardom. 

I’ve always been into photojournalism. I love the way a photograph can tell a story without a single word uttered. I like the fact that photographs are static, they are frozen in time, preserving a memory or a moment that someone else might miss.

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Photography is a fine art. It takes skill to capture something in such a way that it is powerful enough to stand on its own. That’s why, I was deeply saddened when Fairfax Media decided to cull many of their senior photographers in 2014.

At first I couldn’t understand it. Why would they sacrifice a job that is so important? There’s a photograph complementing most stories in a newspaper or an article online.

However, as I thought about it more, I realised that there was something better than a photographer. A free photographer. Twitter has revolutionised the way we receive news. It encourages 24/7 updates and has also birthed the citizen journalist. Why would a newspaper pay for photographers, when they could leverage the media people were sharing online everyday for free?

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Of course, the quality isn’t the same, the subject may not be composed a well, but if it’s free, is it better? 

In a world where the future of printed bulletins is uncertain, news corporations are looking to cut costs anywhere they can, but is photography the best place to cut corners? Fairfax seems to think so. 

Missed the 6pm News? Don't Worry!

I can remember being entirely envious of my best friend’s hot pink Motorola Razor. It was so cool. You could flip the phone shut and take a photograph using the small front-facing screen, you could create your own ringtones, film videos and, (if you had an enormous amount of money) you could connect to the internet.

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That was eight years ago.

It’s hard to believe just how far technology and more specifically, mobile technology has become. Using a phone like the Motorola Razor now, would be akin to powering up a computer running the very first OS of Microsoft: slow and dated.

We’re now so used to have literally the world in our pockets that it is hard to imagine ever living without 24/7 access to Google, or Siri’s inappropriate, yet sassy jokes. 

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The digital age has revolutionised many industries. Journalism is (obviously) one of them. My parents are still in the mindset that, if they miss the six o’clock news, they will not have another chance to catch the daily bulletin. Of course, we know, that we are able to get live updates from news applications, Twitter or blogs throughout the day.

News-ception?

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Alas, the 24/7 demand for news has meant that many journalists are no longer just writers, but curators, photographers and even their own camera crew. The role of the journalist is changing, which also means that the way in which news is presented and consumed is changing. 

Is it for the better? I guess we will just have to wait and see!

What We Can Learn From The Celebrity Nude Photo Scandal: Sexting, Security & Representation (video & critical reflection)

My Youtube video focuses on sexting and pornographic material and the issue of trying to adapt the law to encompass new digital technology as well as ensuring proper security for important data online. I discuss this in relation to the recent celebrity nude photo scandal that occurred at the beginning of September. To create this text, I adopted my previously acquired knowledge about the celebrity nude photo scandal in conjunction with scholarly research and news articles to create a well rounded text. I tried to liken my video to other topical based channels such as Last Week Tonight with John Oliver.

Prior to filming, I sat down and decided what I wanted to say about my topic. I sourced public opinion examples from Twitter accounts and comments from online websites such a Reddit, however these didn’t end up in the final cut of my video. I then began viewing other people’s Youtube videos that contained a similar style to what I was hoping to achieve with my video for inspiration. Some of these accounts included Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, Feminist Frequency, VlogBrothers, CrashCourse and Marques Brownlee. These channels didn’t particularly cover the type of content I was planning to discuss in my video, but their presentation and editing was inspiring to me for someone who has never really edited or created a vlogging style Youtube video before. I used my digital SLR to capture my video as it has HD video capabilities; something I’ve found to be very important for Youtube videos. Although I didn’t have access to a microphone, I knew that the built-in audio mic on my camera was capable enough to capture my voice, compared to using my computer for audio. I utilised a tripod to keep the camera stabilised. After recording my vlog, I imported the video clips into iMovie and began to edit my video. I created images in Photoshop to indicate the different sections of my video and to display any quotations that I used. I used these images, along with my various video clips to cut down and edit my film to fit the required time as best as I could. 

I used my required readings as a base for initially exploring my themes further as well as a basis for finding potential sources. The scholarly resources that I used in my video, help to explain the law and our obsession, as a society, with celebrity culture. As the example I was using was primarily a news story, I felt that it was also important to include a source from a newspaper article. I chose The Guardian because of its reputation with providing a very balanced and unbiased view on all news whilst also covering topics extremely in depth and from a variety of angles. I also included a reference to the website, Buzzfeed as most other news articles referred back to the Buzzfeed website, so I thought best to utilise the source of the information. 

One thing I now know for certain is that it is extremely difficult to make a Youtube video. I had to dramatically cut back my video, resulting in a very blunt ending. In hindsight, I should have made a contingency with the information I wanted to cover, coming up with an alternative ending and utilising my information differently to wrap up my video nicely. My biggest challenge by far was my fear of being in front of the camera rather than behind it as well as having to edit my face and voice for hours on end. 

References:

Gay, R 2014, 'The Great 2014 Celebrity Nude Photos Leak is only the beginning', The Guardian, 4 September 2014, p.1, retrieved 5th September 2014, <http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/01/celebrity-naked-photo-leak-2014-nude-women >.

Mercer, J 2013, ‘Introduction: sex and the celebrity, Celebrity Studies’, vol. 4, no. 1, pp. 1–3, DOI: 10.1080/19392397.2013.750086.

Muneramiley 2014, ‘My One Year Of Being A Devoted Miley Cyrus Fan', Untitled, Tumblr, 19 June, retrieved 7 September 2014, <http://muneramiley.tumblr.com/post/89296308683/my-1-year-of-being-a-devoted-miley-cyrus-fan >.

Parliament Victoria 2013, ‘Inquiry into Sexting', Law Reform Committee, retrieved 5th September 2014, <http://www.parliament.vic.gov.au/file_uploads/LRC_Sexting_Final_Report_0c0rvqP5.pdf/>.

Zarrell, R 2014, 'Jennifer Lawrence, Victoria Justice, Other Celebs Victims Of More Leaks, Apple Denies Breach.', Buzzfeed, 1 September 2014, p.1, retrieved 5th September 2014, <http://www.buzzfeed.com/rachelzarrell/jennifer-lawrence-ariana-grande-picture-leak#4bu6pkc>.

I used to be a Myspace Scene kid but now I'm just your average Facebooker

I’ve expressed myself through different identities on the internet since the beginning of my obsession with the online world. It began with crafting the perfect MSN Messenger display name, selectively choosing the correct emoticons that were both cool and mysterious. Shortly after, I faked my age to be a ninety-nine year-old woman and signed up for a Myspace account and my passion for creating a self-idealised social identity grew. However, that all changed when I signed up for a Facebook account and while I was utilising similar tools to construct my online identity, I kept my information accurate representational of my offline self. Affordances govern our behaviour online, they are the unspoken rules of the internet that everyone seems to follow. When I was customising my Myspace profile or uploading a cover photo to Facebook, I was abiding by these rules to create a representation of myself. When we analyse self representation, we must pay attention to the self as an effect of representation, focusing on the affordances, strategies, techniques, and intended audiences (Poletti, Rak 2013 p. 6).

In a psychological study conducted by the University of Texas, Austin (2009), absolutely no evidence of self-idealisation was found on the Facebook profiles of university students aged between seventeen and twenty-two. When I look at my own Facebook profile this immediately seems to be true. I keep a level of professionalism on Facebook as it is linked to my photography business; I am both an artist but I’m also personal. My wall updates consist of photographs I’ve taken, photographs I find interesting and any important life updates or funny mishaps that go on in my life. Essentially, my Facebook wall is a highlights reel for my life. Now that’s not to say that what I post isn’t true, but it is the exaggerated good parts of my life that are shared publicly amongst my friends, not the depressing parts in-between the everyday mundane. 

Juxtaposed to this is my Myspace profile from 2008. As a fourteen year old, my priorities weren’t focused on self advertising or sharing my content, they were solely focused on having an enviable pimped up profile, a friends list in the hundreds and thousands of picture comments. Would I have used Myspace differently had I been older? Probably not. The whole idea of Myspace was centred around it’s ability to be like a teenager’s bedroom (and just as messy). As Boyd states (2007, p. 129) ‘A Myspace profile can be seen as a form of digital body where individuals must write themselves into being’. In other words, the appeal of Myspace was the fact that you could represent yourself as anyone and anything with a few simple tweaks of HTML coding and a killer profile picture. 

During the height of 2008, a stereotype craze called Scene Kids was immensely popular at my school and I wanted to join in with the cool kids who were decorating their Myspace profiles in Hello Kitty backgrounds contrasted with deep and meaningful screamo music (music with lots of rock and electronic beats where the singer will scream lyrics). A recreation of my perfected 2008 Myspace profile can be seen below using the Myspace theme by Sleepless Themes on Tumblr juxtaposed against my current Facebook profile:

Diptych of Facebook and Myspace profiles. #1 Current Facebook profile. #2 Recreated myspace profile (to see a live version of this please click here).

As you can see, the unified, minimal design of Facebook’s profile disallows users to fully customise and visually represent themselves. My personality is shown through what I choose to be my Cover Photo at the moment. In this case, the three main characters from the television show, ‘Bob’s Burgers’ demonstrate my enjoyment and participating in watching the show. In conjunction with my smiley profile picture, it shows that I have interests outside of taking photographs which dominates my wall. Through the use of HTML coding, I am able to customise my Myspace profile to utilise not only text, but images, audio and video to create a self-reflexive online identity (Boyd 2007, p. 129).

Some of the key imagery and cues that are associated with the Scene culture is the use of cutesy cartoon characters contrasted with more gory illustrations and glitter. I have utilised these visual cues through my background image. The use of the Myspace display name was crucial to demonstrating that you belonged to a culture or group publicly. Often, people who identified as scene used alliteration in their display names. For example, because my name starts with a ‘C’ I would choose another word that started with that same letter that had a general theme of rebellion, chaos or something ‘cute’ like a cupcake. I used a variety of names during my scene phase however I favourited ‘CazCatastrophe♥’. Catastrophe hinted to my rebellious side whilst using the love heart still indicated that I had an interest in Hello Kitty and other more ‘girly’ activities. Directly contrasted to this is the use of your name on Facebook. Facebook does not encourage you to be creative with you name, you must have a first and last name. This is because Facebook is actively involved in helping people connect socially and professionally to each other and using real names makes this process easier. My name used on Facebook is my real name because it is directly related to my photography business thus making it easier for fans or potential employers to find me.

When Douglas Rushkoff interviewed (Generation Like, 2014) a group of teenagers as to how and why they used their profile picture, one teenager said, ‘your profile picture is kind of like how you want people to visualise you, you put your best foot forward.’ The epitome of showing that were are a Scene Kid was your profile picture. It had to look a certain way and your physical appearance had to match the societal norms in order for you to seem authentic rather than being a dreaded poser. This included teasing hair, thick black eye makeup, crazy coloured lipstick and eyeshadow and perfect photoshop skills. This is not very different in function to the Facebook profile picture. As stated above, you want people to visualise you from this one photograph so making an impression counts. There is room to be creative with your profile picture on Facebook however there is still an unspoken affordance that you should use a photo that makes you look attractive in some form or another. Below is a recreation of one of my Myspace profile pictures juxtaposed against my current Facebook picture:

Diptych examples of profile pictures. #1: Recreation of typical 'scene kid' Myspace default picture. #2: Current Facebook picture.

Both images vary in style but ultimately present the same message to those who view my profiles; I belong to a group. Non verbal communication is essential here in determining which groups I belong to. In the photo on the left I have adopted certain hair and makeup techniques that align me with the scene kid culture. The angle of the photo is also something that is traditionally associated with Myspace ‘selfies’. In the image on the right, my clothes, hair and makeup also say things about my personality and the types of activities I might be interested in. My clothes are clearly vintage or vintage-styled which is popular amongst the indie/hipster culture. Both cultures have music, fashion and activity related associations with them and it’s plausible that I enjoy these activities based on the groups I have channeled in these two photographs. Whether we like it or not, people will judge you based on your profile picture.

You can express your individuality online in many ways. Facebook is now seen as the hub for someone’s online identity with other social networking sites connecting to your profile to broaden you identity and make it more complex than what can be conveyed on a single, limiting page. Although Myspace is vastly different from Facebook, the similarities lie in the ability to be able to represent ourselves through media other than text.

1311 words not including citations or photo captions. 

References:

Back, M, Egloff, B, Gaddis, S, Gosling, S, Schmulke, S, Stopfer, J, & Vazire, S, 2010, ‘Facebook Profiles Reflect Actual Personality, Not Self-Idealisation’, Psychological Science, originally published online 29 January 2010, doi: 10.1177/0956797609360756 

Boyd, D 2007, ‘Why youth (heart) social network sites: The Role of Networked Publics in Teenage Social Life’, MacArthur Foundation Series on Digital Learning – Youth, Identity, and Digital Media Volume, pp. 119-42, retrieved 28th July 2014, < http://mitpress.mit.edu/books/youth-identity-and-digital-media> 

Generation Like 2014, documentary, Frontline, 24th February, retrieved 28th July 2014, < http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/generation-like/ >.

Poletti, A & Rak, J 2013, Identity Technologies: constructing the self online, University of Wisconsin Press, Madison.