On-Line Or Cyber Journalism

The World Wide Web has spawned the newest medium for journalism, on-line or Cyber journalism. The speed at which news can be disseminated on the web, and the profound penetration to anyone with a computer and web browser, have greatly increased the quantity and variety of news reports available to the average web user.

The bulk of on-line journalism has been the extension of existing print and broadcast media into the web via web versions of their primary products. News reports that were set to be released at expected times can now be published as soon as they are written and edited, increasing the deadline pressure and fear of being scooped which many journalists must deal with.

The digitalization of news production and the diffusion capabilities of the Internet are challenging the traditional journalistic professional culture. The concept of participatory or (citizen journalism) proposes that amateur reporters can actually produce their own stories either inside or outside professional media outlets.

Most news websites are free to their users — one notable exception being the Wall Street Journal website, for which a subscription is required to view its contents — but some outlets, such as the New York Times website, offer current news free, but archived reports and access to opinion columnists and other non-news sections for a periodic fee. Attempts to start unique web publications, such as Slate and Salon, have met with limited success, in part because they do or did charge subscription fees.

Many newspapers are branching into new mediums because of the Internet. Their websites may now include video, pod casts, blogs and slide shows. Story chat, where readers may post comments on an article, has changed the dialogue newspapers foster. Traditionally kept to the confines of the opinion section as letters to the editor, story chat has allowed readers to express opinions without the time delay of a letter or the approval of an editor.

The growth of blogs as a source of news and especially opinion on the news has changed journalism forever. Blogs now can create news as well as report it, and blur the dividing line between news and opinion. The debate about whether blogging is really journalism rages on.