Citizen Journalism

Can you find any examples where "citizen journalists" have failed miserably to report accurate news? And if you do find examples (you should), does this make the concept of amateur journalism a bad thing? Why or why not?

After reading the article by Glaser on citizen journalists I wasn't sure if I thought it was a good idea or bad idea to have so much information out there for people to present as truth. On one hand I am pretty liberal about freedom of speech and think that citizens taking the initiative to give opinions and facts about whats going on is a positive thing. On the other hand, I understand that not all people have good intentions and many people use this power to post false information. I think that allowing the public to have outlets to voice their opinions is a great thing that many countries don't provide. However, the examples I found where "citizen journalists" have provided false information makes me question the positivity of that because many of these people avoid consequences for providing false information.

The first example I found was Google cutting back on employee perks. Apparently, Google is well-known for their outstanding employee perks and treatment of their employees. The owners of Google made a decision to provide free food to employees three times a day to promote health and happiness (and in return productivity). Apparently an unconfirmed rumor was floating around through gossip websites that said Google was cutting out employee perks. Although this is a simple rumor and not terribly awful for the company, it is still something that is unconfirmed that millions of people read. It is bad PR for Google (especially those who are involved with the company).

A more serious rumor that was spread was about Lucent facing bankruptcy. Apparently, this rumor was completely false and held no truth. The spokesperson for the company denied all rumors that the company was going bankrupt, but still many people were buzzing about the news. Stories like this don't do much but instill fear in some and gossip for others.

While these rumors may have been proven false or denied, the fact is that millions of people read these stories and start talking about them. This is bad for public relations and the people involved with these businesses. I don't know if it makes the concept of "citizen journalism" a bad thing. I think it just means people need to be careful what they listen to. I think even when you get your news from a news station you need to be careful. Many news stations or columns are bias. Before you believe what you read or hear you should know where the information is coming from. It is not necessarily just the "journalists" that are at fault. While they are at fault for writing false information, the public is at fault for feeding into the rumors without any evidence.