Social journalism

Social journalism is a media model consisting of a hybrid of professional journalism, contributor and reader content.^[1] The format relies on community involvement, audience engagement, social newsgathering and verification, data and analytics, and relationship-building.^[2] Social journalism takes place on some open publishing platforms, like Twitter and WordPress.com, but can also involve professional journalists, who created and/or screen the content. CNN's now-defunct iReport was an example of a social journalism collaboration between professionals and citizens; other examples include Forbes.com, infoStraight.com, Medium, BuzzFeed, Soapbox and Gawker. The model, which in some instances has generated monthly audiences in the tens of millions, has been discussed as one way for professional journalism to thrive despite a marked decline in the audience for traditional journalism.^[1]