The final practical change that occurs in online journalism takes away one of the key claims to authority that journalists have: the idea that they are experts in the dissemination information (Tumber 2006). News organisations have always been able to set agendas and decide what they think others need to know (i.e., what is the news of the day) (Singer 2006). In an online environment a lot of
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these walls are being broken down. Due to low barrier entries, a multitude of choices for the audience and the immediacy with which news is filtered through the Web, control is much harder to come by.
The definition of ‗gatekeeper‘ was first introduced by David Manning White (1950), who studied one news editor to try and find out why certain stories were chosen and others discarded. He noted that he ‗began to understand how highly subjective, how reliant on value-judgments…news really is‘ (White 1950:68). Pamela Shoemaker (1991) continued this study of gatekeeping, trying to understand all the forces that led to the gatekeeper making the decisions that ultimately determined the news. Her study analysed the complex amount of issues the gatekeeper faces which ultimately shape the message that is produced.
Researcher Axel Bruns (2005) likens the journalist‘s role online to a gatewatcher instead of a gatekeeper. According to Bruns: ‗…gatekeeping at the input stage has become ineffectual since what information is rejected by one news
organisation may now be accepted by another of the increasing number of publishers, or made available directly by the news source without entering the journalistic processes at all‘ (2005:13). In the new role of gatewatcher journalists ‗observe what material is available and interesting, and identify useful new information with a view to channelling this material into structured and up-to- date news reports which may include guides to relevant content and excerpts from the selected material‘ (18).
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The idea of a journalist‘s job shifting from content sender to context giver is echoed by researcher Jo Bardoel. ‗More than ever, the task of journalism will lie in filtering relevant issues from an increasing supply of information in a crowded public domain and its fragmented segments. Journalism evolves from the
provision of facts to the provision of meaning. In the new ocean of information navigation is desperately needed‘ (1996:297). Online news done by both parentage sites and net native sites are increasingly becoming navigational as most of the traffic to the news stories comes from other websites and not the home page of the website (Totty 2008).
The purpose of journalism, from the perspective of some online journalists, appears to be shifting (Brannon 2008). In a study of German and American online journalists (Quandt et. al 2006) their self-perceived role was one of ‗neutral disseminator of news and interpreter‘ rather than watch dog or public service (180). Similarly, in a study of online journalists in the Netherlands (Deuze and Dimoudi 2002), online journalists saw themselves as having two key roles: that of disseminating information quickly as possible and focusing that news on the widest possible audience (93). This study also found that seventy eight percent of journalists surveyed felt strongly that online journalism is a new, distinct professional type of journalism (95).
One of the most recent telling studies (Robinson 2007) interviewed those involved in online journalism (mostly parentage sites) in the United States. The premise of the research began by stating that journalism is an authoritative political institution (a fourth estate) and those interviewed seemed to agree with
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this statement. The author then went on to deconstruct the online newsmaking process. She found four key things: (1) purpose of news stories are different online-people need to experience news: (2) the online processes of news production have fundamentally changed the creation of news narrative: (3) creates a new relationship with the audience: (4) journalists claimed a better authenticity, transparency and audience experience. This led Robinson to conclude that ‗in producing news the way they are the industry is undermining its own role as a societal institution‘ (2007:317). It is in essence, sharing its authoritative space.
2.4 CONCLUSION
The strength of the radical theory in journalism research for many years was due to its recognition of external elements that went into explaining how news was made. The focus on the power relationship between sources and journalists provided a strong case for much of journalistic output being held by those who wanted to define it. Additionally, the economic and political situations under which these news organizations existed constrained and shaped much of what journalists did, giving further strength to the radical theorists studies. The claim by liberal pluralists to journalistic autonomy had strength when looking at individual journalists but lacked a cohesive body of strong research when it came to looking at news gathering organisations as a whole.
Ultimately, this thesis is seeking to not only move beyond the control versus liberal pluralism debate that has been a pervasive feature of much of journalism
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theory to date but also to test the cultural chaos paradigm of Brian McNair (2006) on a micro-level. The cultural chaos approach brings into the fold much of the practical changes that have affected journalism in its online form. These changes will be described in detail in the next chapter and ultimately shape much of what we see constructed and disseminated online.
Much has now shifted in an online environment including the above processes that defined journalism for so long and theorists must take that into account. Cultural chaos brings together all of these competing interests online and argues for news emerging rather than being controlled or constructed.
The newly found interactivity between the user and producer of news creates a feedback loop that rarely existed in pre-Internet days. It brings a new voice into the construction of the news that adds another layer to those competing for control of the news agenda. The reconfigured process of making news has changed as sources now have much more power and access to the public. The once privileged place journalism had in societies does not hold as much weight online. Additionally the journalist no longer has to take into account the deadline or space limitations that exist offline. The selection of news stories was always seen as a primary means of controlling the news agenda but online there is no limitation therefore, many more actors are competing for a voice in the unlimited media space.
The multi-platform nature of the Web creates a new space for numerous types of journalistic content. The way this is approached by newsmaking organisations
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varies not only with different levels of technical skills but also with different levels of enthusiasm for the technology. Finally, the lack of control for newsmakers is all part of a new landscape that is being created around
journalism. There is less ability for journalists to be gatekeepers and their role is now shifting to gatewatcher. The lack of control over the agenda and the sharing of authoritative space clearly show the decline of the control paradigm in
looking at news production and ultimately the idea of control itself.
How these changes look in actuality within a news organisation is one of the things this study seeks to highlight and is weaved throughout the various data chapters. These changes also highlight how the chaos paradigm (McNair 2006) is the best way to explain the inner workings of the field.
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Chapter 3-Methodology
The journalistic environment, far from being controlled by dominant elites, is more like the weather (McNair 2006). Although we can discern patterns and make predictions it is rare that we can fully predict which stories will blow through and which will have legs. In coming to an understanding of the cultural chaos model, the complete environmental factors that go into news production are crucial to understanding how news is produced. The central question this thesis is trying to answer is how creating online news has changed the job of the journalist. As the cultural chaos theory is routed in the natural sciences, a
qualitative approach to understanding the entire natural setting is going to provide the most descriptive results (Jankowski and Wester 1991).
The mixed methods case study gives the most complete picture how this shift in journalism is occurring. A case study gives ‗prominence to what is and what is not the case. What is happening and deemed important within those boundaries is considered vital and usually determines what the study is about…‘(Stake 2000:23). The two case studies will provide these boundaries and as well as a contrast in two ways of going about doing online journalism. The latimes.com is part of one of the largest United States news gathering operations and has seen one of the biggest growths of any newspaper parentage site for 2008 (Saba 2009). Salon.com is an established net native news website that has survived the dot com bust of the late nineties and continued to see its audience and influence grow in 2008 as well. If the goal is trying to see how journalists work together to create online news then the case study provides the best example available and
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looking at two established web organisations brings a further validity to the study.
Most research done on the topic of online journalists and journalism thus far has done either across the board surveys or in-depth interviews with journalists whose work, at least partially, rests online but little in analysis of production with the exception of a collection of online ethnographic research from Chris Paterson and David Domingo (2008). Some newer studies of journalists have begun to look at the newsroom or news centre of online operation in an
ethnographic manor although these types of studies are more the exception than the rule. The most referenced work to come out of the study of journalists and journalism as it is practiced online is ‗Digitizing the News‘ by Pablo
Boczkowski (2004). He looked at three different types of news operations online and combined elements of content analysis, interviews and participant
observation to give a very complete picture of the changing online environment.
Additionally, most of the work done has been on websites that are parentage in nature. These sites and consequently journalists working for these sites deal with trying to appease two different types of journalism output. Looking at these sites is a great way to understand what is changing in journalism but does not provide a complete picture of the constraints and capabilities of working on the Web that this study will show.
Of the over twenty online journalism studies analysed for this study, most either looked at journalists who worked at parentage sites or profiled websites that
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existed offline as well. Some of these studies also looked at net native journalists and websites, however the majority focus was on the parentage. The net native site is rarely looked at solely by itself or in contrast to the parentage site. Some of the problem may be due to the fact that there are fewer examples of successful net native websites to pool from12 but researchers‘ lack of clarification between the two leaves a hole in the literature.
The best exception to this was a study by David Domingo of four Catalan newsrooms (2008). He made a clear distinction between the two newspaper parentage sites, the broadcast parentage site and the net native site. Throughout the text he points out the distinct differences between the net native and
parentage sites which provided an excellent contrast to what and how things were being done differently.
For the purposes of this study there are four research questions that I am seeking answers to. The framework of the mixed methods case studies as well as the interview questions specifically are all designed to answer them.
1. Does Brian McNair‘s Cultural Chaos theory apply to the environment created in online newsmaking?
2. How are the relationships in creating online journalism new or different from what came before?
12 The most successful online news sites by far are parentage sites with a strong offline presence and name recognition. Nielsen/Net Ratings provides the best numbers for comparison.
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3. Are there marked differences between parentage news websites and net native news websites in the construction of a news story and its output on the Web?
4. To what extent (and on what levels) can we conclude that the journalism that exists online is different from its offline counterparts?