Blogging is a great way to express personal interests and opinions, and I do believe they have the power to take over traditional news sources. In Tony Rogers’s article “Why Bloggers Can’t Replace the Work of Professional Journalists”, he explains that both outlets produce different content. He brings up a valid argument that bloggers are simply commenting on news stories already out there. Roberts also explains that bloggers “vent their opinions” while news outlets report facts. This statement can be somewhat controversial considering many news outlets like CNN and Fox News can be said to state their own options and show bias to certain political agendas. Which bring up Benjamin Carlson’s article “The Rise of the Professional Blogger”. Carlson explains that blogging has lowered the Barries to self-publication, and has evolved into a more traditional form of news reporting. Many of these self-made bloggers have even gone to work for networks such as CBS, ABC, and NBC.
It’s also important to note that Twitter and microblogging, should not be considered a form of reliable news. As the Ubiquity paper explains, Twitter is a quick and easy way to put opinions and ideas out into the world. However, what went into creating these tweets, and should we really be relying so heavily on social media to get news? I think it’s all about balance and doing your own research. People are way too quick to believe everything they see online, after all, do we use Twitter as a source to cite scholarly papers?
I firmly believe that you do not need a degree to do what you’re passionate about and if that’s news reporting then all the power to you. As mentioned before, many news outlets cannot even be seen as reliable, as they all propose some sort of propaganda. Journalism is all about telling a story from ALL sides and reporting FACTS. But let’s all keep in mind it’s important for each of us to do some of that digging ourselves if we really want to find out the truth, then judge for ourselves.