When Internet users turn into news reporters

When camera phones and handheld camcorders became so popular, the media turned to "recruit" Internet users around the globe to make news reporters live.

Last December, Yahoo Web portal launched YouWitnessNews, a website that publishes content sent by users, after going through the page, the faces of professional editors.

Founded nearly 2 years ago, NowPublic.com news website also allows people to post images, video clips and online commentaries. NowPublic now gathers more than 60,000 "reporters" under its distribution in more than 140 different countries, promising to publish the hottest, latest, most scandalous information, from terrorist attacks, natural disasters until other shocking news as soon as they are / are happening.

" We have become the world's largest" contribution "network," said NowPublic CEO Leonard Brody. "We have everything, from 100% amateur reporters to 100% master reporters ."

" In the future, news will be generated from collective gray matter, and we are building that army. "

Both NowPublic and YouWitnessNews are allied with other traditional news services. They are willing to provide valuable images or content to their partners. Even Now Public goes a step further, promising to provide witnesses and related documents quickly to professional reporters on the scene.

When technology opens up opportunities

" If a bomb explodes in Budapest and you want to contact someone living in a radius of 1 mile (1.6 km) around the explosion scene, we will find you ," Brody said. He added that NowPublic members doubled every three months.

" I think citizen journalism is strengthening into a trend ," said Scott Moore, director of Yahoo News. " In this case, it is technology that opens up the opportunity. You have tens of millions of people around the world ready for mobile phones and cameras in your hands. Just like you have an army of reporters on duty besides ".

In fact, YouWitnessNews came into being after hard-working Yahoo News editors searched for photos of the bloody bombing at London subway station in July 2005, Moore recalls. Within 30 minutes of the disaster, the editorial staff found many amateur photos, posted on websites like Flickr. And a few days later, the number of images of this type has now reached thousands.

Unlike traditional news agencies, websites like NowPublic can keep an eye on "tiny" events that few people care about, like a school football game. The content on NowPublic is 100% user-supplied, with half the original story and the other half being links to other news.

Volunteer editors will filter out inappropriate content and notify the "sender of the news" about what their story is missing, incorrect, or untrue.

Trong Cam