Citizen Journalism critique

Citizen Journalism, or CJreport is a very easy and accessible tool for those interested in giving their point in the news today. The site provides easy ways to post your news and your opinions with the "Create a news story link" on the left hand corner, which encourages for the visitors of the website to post their true opinions and under an anonymous name. The easy access and the invitation of all who are able to type does call for a variety of voices and interesting point of views.
While CJreport allows amateur journalists to post news stories which could be news that would relate to them locally and personally, I found that most of the news were nationally concerned dealing with international news, celebrity gossip, and political attitudes. A lot of the information was accurate and was centered around a central story which would, in turn, lead up to their final conclusion and assumption.
The news stories I found were all concerning national news, so the relevance of the story could be seen by anyone who visited the site. The stories could draw in plenty of readers because the stories that these novice journalists reported on can connect with all. CJreport, in an attempt to be interactive, also allows for the readers to comment on the opinions of the authors, and also to revise their stories. The participation encouraged by this website is phenomenal because not only do the prospective authors have a place, but also the readers who may have a comment, or may notice a mistake in the writing of the passage.
The organization is messy. In this citizen journalism publication, all of the stories are organized according to date published rather than importance. At the top of the website one can pick the category they would like to read such as World, Business, Technology, or Entertainment, but it is the author who categorizes their article in these places, which could allow a person to publish their post anywhere they want. This could lead to a story like "China deploys 25,000 security personnel" as the leading story in the Sports section. It should be the monitoring host which categorizes the stories, to be sure it is done correctly. Putting this much control in the hands of the public, I believe, is absurd because it makes it difficult to actually find the types of story you are looking for if the author categorizes their story in the wrong places.
You can see the effects of the novice production in this non-traditional series of writings when you notice the impressions and persuasions of the author coming through in the articles. One problem that may arise in the posting of citizen journalists is their failure to post more than their point of view, which in turn could cause their stories to appear biased, or one-sided.
In the article "Barack Obama, I Have a Dream... but NOT of You" the passage posted by an anonymous individual in the Middle East was a call to the attention of the Muslim people that their are more deserving heroes in their culture than Barack Obama. The first half of the article was a constant bash of Obama and how he handled the attacks in the Gaza, when Israeli soldiers "butchered" Palestinians. The second half was dedicated to the Muslim people and how the good guys are condemned terrorists.
While the article was an excellent tool for the author to express himself, there was no opposing opinions in the blog. All of the voices in the article belonged to the author and they all agreed with each other.
So, while CJreporter is an excellent tool or aspiring writers it can be one sided. One should tread carefully on the articles knowing that what they read will be the author's blatant opinions all their own.