Although there were a lot of options to choose from, the most interesting examples of Citizen Journalism were BALTILEAKS and Baltimore Slumlord Watch. These were the first two sites that appeared when I conducted my search. BALTILEAKS is an interesting site. It consists of information that is of public value. Some documents include reports prepared by private organizations or datasets that have value to the public. One article I read was titled, “Correcting The Baltimore Sun’s Faulty Polling Analysis”. This is an example of citizen journalism because it allows for the public to gain information that news reporters tend to report. Baltimore Slumlord Watch is truly fascinating. The site consists of vacant properties available in Baltimore City. These homes were either owned by drug dealers or the owners could not afford the rent.  This is a great example of a blog. Pictures are posted throughout the site in order for the viewer to see the home that is available. I found this site to be creepy but I am sure some residents of Baltimore find it to be helpful.  One last blog is the Baltimore Chop. The Baltimore Chop is a blog created by one writer who describes the Baltimore he lives in. From entertainment to sports, the writer describes his nights out on the town. This is a great site for people who want to learn about the city’s culture.

by Vincent LaGuardia

After rummaging through a plethora of news sources, blogs, and information websites relating to my hometown of Wyckoff, New Jersey, I discovered some of things we have previously discussed in class. There were multiple occurrences of citizen journalism that debated some issues in the town and nearby areas such as the building of a new supermarket in the township and the updating of a previously abandoned shopping mall. I even found a few blogs on the town recreational sports and some of the town politics occurring at the present time. I observed a large example of participatory journalism where I saw pictures and videos of local students earning awards, local sports teams winning their championships, or even pictures of some of the townspeople’s nightlife from weekend to weekend. There were even a few cases where there were moderated user forums that people of town and surrounding areas can communicate and weigh in on the popular and rising issues of Wyckoff.

Overall, I saw a lot of stuff that I would never have been able to break down into specific categories before we discussed it in class. Most of the articles and content I discovered was due to contributions from the citizens of the town and not professional journalists. This isn’t always a bad thing when you are looking for the inside scoop and news from somehow is immersed in the same environment and local area as yourself.

By Sarah Fleming

In 2011, the Occupy movement seemed to be taking over school campuses and city sidewalks throughout the nation: the city of Boston was no exception. Protestors set up camp (literally) on the streets of Beantown armed with iPhones, capturing moments that only those on the front lines had access to. As news helicopters circled overhead and anxious reporters attempted to get a story from the outside looking in, it was the citizens on the street, with signs in one hand and iPhones or cameras in the other, who became the most effective news sources. This fact did not escape station managers WBUR, Boston's NPR news station. Through the WBUR website, station managers called on citizen journalists to send in pictures, videos, and reports of anything they saw, heard, or felt about the Occupy movement coming to Boston. The picture below was sent into WBUR by a woman named Laura.

With social media sites like Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, and other blogging sites, regular citizens have so many outlets to express their opinions. I believe their are many advantages of citizen journalism such as the dissemination of raw, uncensored footage in times of crisis. For example, the rebellions that took place in Egypt this past year would not have been possible without sites like Facebook and Twitter, where young protestors drummed up support and enthusiasm locally and globally. However, this evolution in journalism because of new technology has blurred the line between citizen and professional journalism, perhaps threatening some of the fundamental values of traditional journalism, like objectivity. DigBoston, an online site that covers everything and anything having to do with Boston, published a great article by Media Farm that points out this new phenomenon taking place in the world of journalism. The article paints the following picture of the Occupy Boston movement:

"Monday night, Media Farm found themselves in the thick of the circus. #OccupyBoston, the movement which had been holed up on the Greenway for over two weeks, was coming face-to-face with a reckoning from hundreds from the Boston Police Department, but the media was there … also in the hundreds. Television cameras from the big four stations were mainly positioned on side streets, their telescoping antennae reaching to the stars. Field reporters stood by, ties loosened (perhaps showing solidarity?) while the younger citizens/alternative journalists were in the mix with iPhones, Twitter, Flickr galleries and YouTube ready to fire."

Citizen journalism, in my opinion, is often more entertaining than professional journalism because citizens are able to offer their opinion without having to hold back for the sake of objectivity. As a result, citizen journalism becomes more passionate and raw. On a night like the one Media Farm described above, when professional reporters are moved to show "solidarity" with those they are reporting about, could professional journalism lose objectivity as well? After all, professional reporters are also citizens with their own Twitter and Facebook accounts. In the article, Media Farm gives the example of a young reporter for the Boston Phoenix, Liz Pelly, who went to the Occupy Boston protest Monday night to cover the events and tweeted the following the next morning:

"woke up with no voice from screaming all day yesterday &the number of the occupy lawyer’s guild scrawled on both of my arms in black sharpie"

Pelly, like many other young reporters that night, seemed to cross the very small, very blurred line from objective journalist to passionate protester. With the constantly increasing influence social media seems to be having in our world, it seems that we will all have to wait and see what the future has in store for journalism. I, for one, think the direction it seems to be heading is less threatening than it is inspiring.