Citizen Paine | Citizen Journalism

When you capture breaking news, who ya gonna call?

Paul Grabowicz and Steve Outing, both posting on Poynter Online's E-Media Tidbits last week, note that it's not just the news media asking citizens to send in their eyewitness images: Law enforcement is doing the same.

Of course, it's nothing new for the police to ask citizens to provide information. What's different in the two examples cited here is that law enforcement is setting up web sites specifically for this purpose.

After the second London bombings, British police solicited citizen photos and videos, and in Malaysia, the government wants people who witness traffic offenders to post to a Hall of Shame web site.

Outing writes:

In this blog we focus on media, where grassroots-media/citizen-journalism activity is high right now. It's interesting to see how the concept can apply to other sectors of society.

Responding to Outing's post, Brendan Watson questions whether that term should be applied to what the police are seeking:

Citizen snitching, perhaps. Community watch, perhaps. But journalism? We usually call people who do this type of work either police (or in the case of citizens assisting in police work informants). Aren't you concerned that we're throwing this term around way too much to the point that it will soon be absolutely meaningless? Perhaps better term to sum up this current digital movement is personal media. ...

Another debate over terminology. In each case, citizens are being asked to report what they observe. The difference, as Watson says in the rest of his comment:

But journalism seems to envoke an intent to communicate with a mass audience, a committment to public service, and hopefully to some basic journalistic values that aren't present in much of what is currently being called citizen journalism.

What the citizen eyewitness does with the image will be much more interesting than what we call it. It won't matter much for events with multiple witnesses with cameras; some will submit to police, others to citizen journalism web sites. But what happens when one person has the key photo or video? Does he or she post to a personal blog, submit it to large media web site, go through a middleman like Scoopt, or send it to the police? My guess is that we'll see all of the above, though if citizens come to expect payment for high-demand images -- and why wouldn't they? -- the police may wind up near the bottom of the list.

Surveillance vs. citizen cameras: checks and balances

Writing about the proliferation of camera phones and security cameras, Washington Post columnist Sebastian Mallaby, in Looking Back at Big Brother, says the technology may not be making us much safer but it is creating new forms of checks and balances:

In the future, when a government accuses someone of wrongdoing on the basis of footage from surveillance cameras, that government better get it right. Chances are the same incident will have been captured by private citizens on camera phones, whose manufacturers expect to sell 186 million units this year.

The proliferation of electronic eyes is probably inevitable, but that's no reason to despair. Governments will watch citizens, but citizens will watch back. More likely than not, the balance of power will shift in favor of the citizens, the inverse of Orwell's prophecy.

Link props: The Open Society Paradox

Nashville TV station trains amateur bloggers

When a news web site educates citizen journalists it has a two-fold benefit: The amateurs will improve their skills, and they're likely to think of submitting to the site that trained them when they create content worth publishing. So, kudos to WKRN-TV for the Video 101 session it conducted Saturday. (Link props to Buzz Machine.)

Brittney, posting on the Nashville is Talking blog, said:

The purpose was to give "citizen journalists" some tips on how to best shoot video for stories they want to tell. Whether it is your son's baseball game or a tornado or some sort of disaster. ... I learned a lot as they talked about how to steady your shots, how to take static pictures a viewer can comfortably watch.

Participant Rex Hammock wrote:

Here is what you should do if you want to get video on TV:
1. Hold the camera still.
2. Don't move the camera around.
3. Don't narrate the video with comments like, "this is a tornado hitting a cow."

More at timmorgan.com and Chasing the Dragon's Tale.

About 20 local bloggers signed up to participate, according to Terry Heaton, a WKRN consultant.

More:
Education and training
Video

Vlogs as CJ and tool for politicos

AlterNet has a good piece on videoblogs, discussing their potential for citizen journalism and for local political candidates.

About campaigns, the article, by Zack Pelta-Heller, says:

Two local politicians who have recently started vlogging are Boston city councilor John Tobin and New York resident Andrew Rasiej, who is running for Public Advocate in New York City. Even if you have no idea who either candidate is, their vlogs will provide voters with a fast, effective way to engage in the political process. Watching Rasiej head down to New York's city hall on the subway to speak out at a city council hearing for the city to receive a wireless internet connection is far more compelling than simply reading a summary of the hearing's minutes.

The article also quotes Senator John Edwards, who launched a vlog last month, touting it as a way to get around the filters of mainstream media:

Sen. Edwards is well aware of the impact that vlogs could have on the future of politics and journalism, commenting: "I think [vlogging] will be hugely important because it's a way to directly talk to people without someone else editing what you say or taking it out of context. ..."

Scoopt: Our target is the guy with the cameraphone

Scoopt's Kyle MacRae responds via email to my post this week about the new service, which offers to sell your photos or videos to a publisher for a 50-50 split and a six-month exclusive license.

Here are Kyle's comments:

With reference to the initial Scoopt six-month exclusive license, you said:

That's quite a commitment to make to a new player, and I'm not sure many citizen journalists will go for it. I suppose if you're a prolific photographer, you might take a chance on Scoopt. If they do good by you, then that six-month term might not seem so stiff.

I think it's important that we draw a clear distinction here between professional photographers, aspiring professional photographers -- and somebody with a cameraphone who just happens to be in the right place at the right time and snaps a newsworthy event. Scoopt was set up specifically and exclusively to represent this last group.

My contention is that the true amateur doesn't know or care about photographic licensing -- and, further, nor should they care. Scoopt is not for people making a living or seeking to make a living from photography; Scoopt is for somebody who realises that one day he just might take a great picture and could get some money for it. The true amateur with a cameraphone doesn't want to phone a picture desk editor and haggle or auction a photo.

Indeed, the true amateur probably doesn't know what a picture desk editor is, or how to approach one. But he does know that newspapers and magazines buy pictures if the picture is strong enough. Scoopt helps him make that sale.

Scoopt also protects the rights of our members. What happens when an amateur with a hot photo phones up a newspaper? Chances are he'll (unwittingly) sign away universal rights in exchange for the price of a hot dinner. The paper will then sub-license the photo around the world and the photographer will receive not a further penny. But with Scoopt, the photographer always retains copyright. We will license the photo for publication on his behalf, potentially time and time again -- and the photographer will ALWAYS get 50% of the fee.

We need an exclusive license for the reasons given, and which you quoted.

Basically, we must be able to guarantee to a publisher that we can deliver what we promise -- for instance, a one-day-only exclusive right to publish a photo on the front page. The easiest approach for us would undoubtedly be to demand assignation of copyright from our members. In other words, when a member submits a photo, we would automatically own that photo and could do whatever we want with it. (This is what our lawyers advised!) However, we simply feel that this is unfair on the photographer. It is, we believe, right and proper that even a complete amateur with no interest in or knowledge of copyright and licensing should retain copyright to his own works, always. The six-month exclusive license is a compromise that gives us the security we need to trade on his behalf without stripping the photographer of his rights.

In summary, if Scoopt was a traditional photo agency pitching to traditional pro or pro-am photographers trying to make a living from photography, I'd agree with you and we'd offer a range of (complicated) licensing agreements.

But Scoopt is different. We represent the true amateur who gets a scoop snap of a newsworthy event and wants a) the best possible price and b) an easy life.

Scoopt aims to be middleman for UK citizen photos and videos

Scoopt is a new service that tries to connect UK citizen photojournalists with publishers. You take a picture or video, send it to Scoopt and they sell it. In exchange, Scoopt gets 50 percent of what the publisher pays. That part of the deal may seem reasonable to many amateurs, but Scoopt's six-month exclusive license may not.

During that time, you can't do anything with the photo. "In short, you agree not to publish the photo in any way, shape or form, either directly or indirectly, for six months," Scoopt says.

Here's how Scoopt explains its needs for that exclusivity:

To understand this, imagine that all we had was a non-exclusive license. Let's say you take a 'hot' photo and send it to Scoopt. We do our thing and license the Daily Planet to publish the photo on the front cover of tomorrow's edition.

Naturally enough, the Daily Planet wants to keep this scoop all to itself. Indeed, that's precisely what it's paying for. But unless we have an exclusive license, we simply can't guarantee this. If you or somebody acting on your behalf were to go to the Daily Bugle and sells the same photo (or a similar photo, if you took several of the same event), or even if you were to upload it to a photo-sharing site, the Daily Planet would lose its scoop.

We need an exclusive license for six months in order to guarantee that a scoop stays a scoop. This is where the money is to be made. Your money!

That's quite a commitment to make to a new player, and I'm not sure many citizen journalists will go for it. I suppose if you're a prolific photographer, you might take a chance on Scoopt. If they do good by you, then that six-month term might not seem so stiff.

Current TV recently drew some criticism for a three-month exclusivity policy, though it has responded by saying that it may come up with other options.

Scoopt also might want to consider giving contributors some alternatives. Perhaps the percentage split could vary depending on what sort of licensing rights the photographer is willing to give up.

Linkprops to Phototalk.

UPDATE: Scoopt's Kyle MacRae responds.

Current TV: Look for variations on video submission policy

Current TV's Robin Sloan, responding to criticism about a new video submission policy, says the target contributors are "up-and-coming young video producers who aspire to do this for a living."

Look for a different policy aimed for others, Sloan says:

We think there are other kinds of contributors out there, too. Some may be potential citizen journalists who want to participate in different ways, on different terms, with different goals.

We're working on another version of our model that will suit them better, but we're not quite ready to announce it yet.

The harshest criticism I've seen comes from Josh Wolf, who particularly doesn't like the way Current's licensing agreement precludes a contributor from trying to sell a piece anywhere else disseminating the video elsewhere -- even on own's own videoblog -- for three months after submitting it to Current. Wolf is a volunteer organizer for a Current TV Meetup Group, and he says he's been told his criticisms are inappropriate considering his role. He explains here.

More discussion happening at Bayosphere, where Dan Gillmor referred to the submission terms as "Submission, indeed."

TV getting CJ religion

More television stations and cable companies are starting to join the citizen journalism movement:

• New England Cable News Network on July 15 will begin accepting viewer-produced videos to broadcast on its network and to post on its web site, the Boston Globe reports. (Link props to J.D. Lasica at New Media Musings.)
• KRON-TV in San Francisco has launched The Bay Area is Talking, which features a blog by KRON online news manager Brian Shields and aggregates posts from Bay Area bloggers.
• KRON mimics WKRN-TV's Nashville is Talking, which launched in April with Brittney Gilbert doing the blogging and featuring a local blog aggregator.
• KRON and WKRN are moving to a videojournalist model, switching from the usual two-person news crew to one person who does the reporting, camera work and editing. It's a concept that has its doubters.

NECN's announcement on its home page reads:

COMING JULY 15: NECN wants you to join the newsgathering effort. VIDEO NEW ENGLAND is our project to have viewers send in video, directly through our website, for use on air and on the web. All you need is a camcorder and a computer. Join the conversation. Tell us your news. Come back July 15 for VIDEO NEW ENGLAND. In the meantime - get out your video camera and start shooting!

The latter efforts don't make the kind of statement that NECN is making, but they're reminders that it's not just the Lawrence Journal-Worlds that bear watching when we talk about citizen media. Keep an eye, for instance, on Current TV, which recently announced its payment policy for video submissions.

In an ongoing Poynter Online discussion this week, which blogger Tim Porter discussed today, Kathy Gill of the University of Washington Digital Media Master's Degree Program reacted this way when the participants were being too newspaper-centric:

There is no difference, technically, between a newspaper and a TV station. Both use a medium capable of delivering multi-media stories for the news consumer who wants to see-and-hear (v "read").