Online News: Journalism and the Internet

“If the promises of online news are to be fulfilled, books like this deserve the widest possible readership”

Paul Bradshaw, University of Central England, UK

In this exciting and timely book Stuart Allan provides a wide-ranging analysis of online news. He offers important insights into key debates concerning the ways in which journalism is evolving on the internet, devoting particular attention to the factors influencing its development. Using a diverse range of examples, he shows how the forms, practices and epistemologies of online news are gradually becoming conventionalized, and assesses the implications for journalism’s future.

The rise of online news is examined with regard to the reporting of a series of major news events. Topics include coverage of the Oklahoma City bombing, the Clinton-Lewinsky affair, the September 11 attacks, election campaigns, and the war in Iraq. The emergence of blogging is traced with an eye to its impact on journalism as a profession. The participatory journalism of news sites such as Indymedia, OhmyNews, and Wikinews is explored, as is the citizen journalist reporting of the South Asian tsunami, London bombings and Hurricane Katrina. In each instance, the uses of new technologies – from digital cameras to mobile telephones and beyond – are shown to shape journalistic innovation, often in surprising ways.

This book is essential reading for students, researchers and journalists.