Citizen participation in online news media. An overview of current developments in four European countries and the United States

Abstract

With the continuing diffusion of the Internet, with the changing media-consumption patterns and with the impact of the Web 2.0 phenomenon, there seems to be widespread optimism regarding democratic participation and active citizenship through online media. Authors such as Bowman and Willis (2003) and Dan Gillmor (2004) describe how, on the Internet, the people themselves have become the media. In contrast to traditional media, blogs and other community-driven media are characterised by a fundamental convergence of the roles of content producers and consumers because every user has the opportunity to both consume and create content. Axel Bruns (2005) has coined the term ‘produsage’ to refer to this blurring line, while Gillmor (2004: 136) and Rosen (2006) speak of the “former audience” to stress that the public should no longer be regarded as a passive group of receivers. Some authors regard this as being part of a larger societal development toward a participatory culture, something that Hartley also has called a “redactional society” (Hartley, 2000). There are some doubts about the foundations of such a development though. Some authors question the idea of a “hyperactive audience” (Schönbach, 1997; see also Hanitzsch, 2006). They claim that only institutionalized forms of journalism guarantee quality through organizational structures and professional work routines and that they offer society a shared meaning in the form of content that reaches mass audiences.