Crowdsourcing or Mob Rule?

In March of 1991, video footage of Rodney King being beaten by Los Angeles police shocked the world. Widely recognized as the first viral video, the footage ______________ the LA riots of the following year. And it was shot by a passerby with a camcorder, not by a news reporter. Arguably, this video was a ________________ in the way we consume media. We are no longer just ____________ of the news; we are ________________.

Citizen journalism is loosely defined as any ______________ participation in the news process, which includes gathering, reporting, analysis, and circulation. The rise of social media has provided ________________ outlets like YouTube and Facebook, allowing the public to not only gather news, but ___________ it immediately and directly, __________________ mainstream media in speed and efficiency—if not skill and accuracy.

It’s important to ___________________ between types of citizen journalism, as they have not enjoyed equal success. Photo and video journalism stand out in this regard. This is in part because the ______________ of recording devices has far ________________ mainstream media’s ability to gather visual content, to the point where news teams now search social media sites for footage. Some organizations now “crowdsource” news images and employ _______________ for the public to upload digital content directly. These include CNN’s iReport, which ___ ____ 2015 had 1.3 million contributors—up 600 percent since its 2008 launch. Other news organizations have been _______________ _________, with some commentators noting ________ to do so often directs Web traffic to user-content sites like YouTube and LiveLeak. With news organizations relying more and more on Web advertising for ___________, none can afford to ignore traffic trends. The Arab Spring and conflicts in Syria and Iraq are good examples of issues that could not possibly have been covered as effectively with traditional methods— in terms of visual evidence, anyway. It’s still _______________ upon reputable news organizations to monitor the sea of information and check for _____________. But by and large, mainstream media has accepted the importance of the ___________ camera as fact.

Reporting and analysis have been less _____________, for reasons that support points raised by skeptical professional journalists. One prominent journalist was speaking for many of his colleagues when he commented, “I would trust citizen journalism as much as I would trust citizen _____________.” Maybe some journalists are worried about their job security. But there are also _________________ concerns about core ________________ of good journalism: professionalism, objectivity, and ethics. Professional reporters represent the integrity of the organizations that employ them and are held ______________ for errors of fact and judgment. Individual Internet users are _______________ to no one.

This ________________ in standards was clearly demonstrated in the aftermath of the terrorist bombing in Boston in April 2013. Two men planted bombs near the finish line at the Boston Marathon, killing three and _________________over 250. The bombers escaped but were spotted in security photos of the crowd, and as authorities began trying to hunt them down, the city’s residents were _____________ by both outrage and fear. They were also equipped with laptops and iPhones.

The result was a low _____________ for citizen journalism. The Internet exploded with ______________ sightings of the bombers all over town, ________________ the atmosphere of terror. Then some citizen journalists “reported” that a local teenager was a suspect in the bombing, _____________ a photo of the boy standing in the crowd at the marathon. Internet users quickly _____________ the teenager. They began _______________ the rumor that he was being sought by the authorities, pulling photos from his Facebook page and ____________ them widely. The New York Post picked up the story, even publishing the teenager’s picture on its front page as the prime suspect in a _________________ terrorist act. That same day, the newspaper was forced to _______________ the story—authorities confirmed that the young man was entirely innocent. And while the Post apologized for not __________________ its facts, none of the amateur ____________________ journalists ever did.

Crowdsourcing has become an invaluable tool for professional journalists and is not going away anytime soon. But stories like this one raise questions about journalistic standards. In the future, will citizen reporters create informed citizens or ____________________ mobs?