citizen journalism.
Citizen journalism is the concept of members of the public "playing an active role in the process of collecting, reporting, analyzing and disseminating news and information." Professional journalists are not the only ones who can gather and report news now that the general public has access to cameras, to gather, and the Internet, to distribute news stories. New media such as mobile phones are now being explored in the realm of public journalism; mobile phones have the potential to place the power of reporting in the hands of the public at a low cost. In many cases, citizen journalism is even more effective than professional journalism due to the lack of commercial interests on the side of the public. This allows the people to run whatever story they come across that might grab someone's attention. In a few recent cases, citizen journalism made possible my mobile phones gave stories to the major news media companies and cast light on a story that the public would otherwise be ignorant of.
iranian election.
After the 2009 Presidential elections in Iran, protests broke out across the country. Iran began censoring the news media and all coverage of the riots. Foreign news reporters were banned from leaving their offices and many were arrested and deported. The government also shut off all Internet access. The only way any footage escaped the country was through videos caught on mobile phones by the public. This shows the impact that the mobile phone can have on citizen journalism, which, in turn, can have an even great impact on the world.
bart shooting.
In an Oakland, California BART station, unarmed civilian Oscar Grant was shot and killed by a police officer, Johannes Mehserle. While Mehserle was restraining Grant, along with others, who were allegedly resisting arrest, he fired his gun shooting Grant once in the back. The incident was caught on multiple cell phone camcorders and released to various news stations and posted online. These videos led to many violent and nonviolent protests, as well as helped to get the truth out to the public.