On the heels of the publication of Andrew Keen’s provocative book on the internet’s devastating impact on the traditional press — as well as on political and civic discourse (see earlier posts here and here) — comes a new thoughtful volume by Scott Gant, “We’re All Journalist Now.” Unlike Keen, Gant says the seeds of current problems were planted well before the attack by the internet’s army of citizen journalists.
The increasing public distrust of the media, corporate focus on profits, the shift to celebrity and entertainment news programming, proliferation of cable TV programming, along with an accompanying decrease interest by the public in serious news – all have contributed to the present woes of traditional journalism. Because of these forces, the notion of journalism as a public service has “vanished” with the traditional press frequently failing to do its job as the publics’ watchdog. It is “in this deepening void” observes Gant, that “citizen journalism has emerged – in big way.”
Gant, an attorney, goes directly to the question of ‘who is a journalist?’ In this new context of nonprofessionals and nontraditional journalists (including many bloggers) becoming significant force in defining and distributing the news, do old definitions still hold? Apparently not. So Gant wants us to re-think just what a journalist is. He argues that journalism is an activity not a status or an institution; that it’s an activity specific to the intent of an individual to disseminate news, ideas, opinions or analysis to the public.
By examining the constitutional backdrop to the “freedom of the press”, Gant reminds us that the freedom of the press is a personal right and not one confined to media organizations. And that “the Constitution does not confer on ‘the press’ any right of access to information greater than the right of the general public.” It is in this battle space that Gant fights for the reexamination of all the rights and privileges traditional journalists are afforded but are not available to citizen journalists.
Keen and Gant come from opposite directions on the impact of the net on journalism and culture. But in the end both eventually arrive at a call for balance and the integration of what is best in from the two worlds. Neither wants to turn the clock back nor, of course, could they.
One fault of both books, as I have mentioned before, is that they do not have a view of world beyond the U.S. and the West. This electronic revolution in journalism is having radically different political and cultural effects — from promoting democracy to jihad — depending on the national and international contexts through which it is viewed. “Citizen journalism” as a globalization phenomenon is where we really have to go next if we want to understand how to cope with all that it will bring to the political table.
