By Nisha Anandani

Journalism is a means by which we connect with the masses through genuine facts and information - the activity of gathering, assessing, creating, and presenting news. Journalism can be distinguished from other forms of communication by identifiable characteristics and practices, and these elements are what make it indispensable to democratic societies: history reveals that the more democratic a society, the more news and information it tends to have.

Citizen journalism vs traditional journalism

There is a very thin line between citizen journalism and journalism. Citizen journalism is a platform where you yourself act as a medium to awaken people about what is going on across the world. It is the simple reporting of facts and news that are largely ignored by large media companies, and it spreads easily through personal websites, blogs, microblogs, and social media. Some types of citizen journalism also act as a check on the reporting of larger news outlets by providing alternative analysis.

Why it matters

A reporter cannot reach everywhere - not every nook and corner of a country, let alone internationally. Journalists need to be assisted by people to provide reliable information, and citizen journalism brings out the news that media houses hesitate to notify the public about. New media technology - social networking and media-sharing websites, along with the increasing prevalence of cellular telephones - has made citizen journalism accessible to people worldwide, and citizens can often report breaking news more quickly than traditional media reporters.

A real example

Consider the incident of 25 July 2021, when multiple landslides triggered by rainfall collapsed a bridge and damaged vehicles on the Batseri-Sangla road. A viral video showed boulders rolling downhill, causing the bridge to collapse. In such cases, we need locals who are present at that moment to take a snap or shoot a video to circulate the current information.

Citizen journalism is more local, so when the news is regional it reaches a wide population whose target audience is obvious. People in India communicate in many languages, which makes citizen journalism even more important: when regional people create the news, it feels more connected to the people living in that region. Social media plays a major role too, spreading the news not only within a region but worldwide - individuals get information from any part of the world through the power of the internet.

Benefits over traditional journalism

• Reaches a larger audience
• Being spoken in a regional language, people feel more connected
• Anyone can be a citizen journalist, thereby creating awareness