Guardian's Open Journalism approach to collaboration goes beyond Canadian experience
By Robert Washburn
The Guardian’s launch of its Open Journalism approach this week with the innovative, witty Three Pigs advertisement also ushers in a powerful endorsement of the collaborative approach to producing news.
Certainly, there are major Canadian newsrooms taking on aspects of collaborative journalism: the CBC community, submitted photos and video features on numerous newsroom websites, Twitter accounts for every journalist, live blogs and so forth. There is no question aspects of audience interaction exist. And these platforms and tools are a growing part of the Canadian news landscape.
None of these initiatives are as comprehensive or as bold as the Guardian. The Open Journalism page on its website is filled with engaging features. The Newsdesk live section is a space where the national news team breaks down the news, explains why a particular story or stories were chosen for coverage. Rarely is this kind of transparency seen elsewhere. It invites participation in a section called Reality Check, where people can suggest stories on specific investigative stories, offering ideas where the journalists can improve the coverage. This is not the same as the usual “send-us-your-story-ideas” link. It is specific and provokes a response, mainly because the subject matter is provocative.
There are numerous examples of places where people can participate ranging from submitting music favourites to discussion on sports to listing pet peeves and so on.
However, it is the MP expenses story where you see the boldness of this concept. When the British parliament released its expense reports containing thousands of pages, the Guardian set up a widget allowing people to take a portion of the report and file information back to the newsroom. Call it citizen journalism or pro/am journalism or whatever moniker fits, but it was a unique approach practiced on a very large scale. It is hard to imagine major Canadian newsroom taking this kind of approach. With some large newspapers considering the installation of paywalls in the upcoming months, it is hard to think they are creating a culture of engagement.
Yet, it is this kind of innovative approach that truly capitalizes strengths of journalism online. It acknowledges the advances in software and hardware to consume and distribute news on new platforms. It also appreciate the new culture of this environment where information is provided and people take part in the process of journalism, as editor Alan Rusbridger says. It places journalists in partnership with the audience, no longer the elite purveyors of news. The invisible power relationships are gone.
Journalism in the 20th century was based mainly on models where a journalist’s job was to inform, explain and interpret. It has changed. For now and in the future, a journalist should educate, engage and empower people, just as the Guardian has chosen to do.
Related: VIDEO: The Three Little Pigs as told in modern news: The Guardian
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Comments
In a response to recent blog on the significance of the Guardian Open Journalism initiative, one critic says the not-for-profit status of the publication distorts the innovation being brought to table.
There will always be those who measure the success of innovation by monetary gains. Limited by a vision based on traditional business models, any experimentation is placed against the yardstick of fiscal viability. And, with a big harrumph, a finger is wagged.
Journalist Bill Doskoch waded into a debate with a post on his own blog, saying a major point was missed because the article does not acknowledge the Guardian is operated as a trust without a mandate to be profitable and its losses are subsidized.
Open Journalism is about overhauling traditional models. It wants to change relationships, rethink roles, redefine an struggling industry and so forth. To say whether it is profitable or not is impossible at this time. It will take a while for everything to sort itself out. And, if it ends up creating losses, thank god the Guardian has a way out.
Innovation is about risk.
The Guardian has taken a huge leap forward as a leader in the industry. Many of the practices it is using have already been done elsewhere but on a much smaller scale. To see a respected news organization of the size and influence of the Guardian taking such bold steps is welcomed. As argued in the article, it means a fundamental redefinition regarding how journalists do their job, challenging a paradigm that has existed since Walter Lippmann outlined the first building blocks for modern journalism nearly a century ago. It has captured the transition of journalistic principles from inform, explain and interpret to the new model of educate, engage and empower.
No one ever forgets journalism is a business. And critics like Bill will ensure this. As stated before, it remains to be seen if it will be a profitable one under the Open Journalism model. If a point needs to be made regarding the business model of the Guardian, it should be simple: we should be grateful these kinds of news organizations exist so they can take chances, push boundaries and continue to stretch our imaginations so we can be innovative as we search to redefine the future of journalism.