Originally written by Lauren Kee | Revised & Updated by Carina Claassens | Further updates by Mari Morrison

Gone are the days when our news was carefully dictated by the media industry giants. You got your news when they wanted and how they wanted. But all that has changed over the last decade. The rapid rise of the Internet, social media and content marketing has caused a shift in information power. There is a mammoth amount of content readily available whenever we want it. Anyone, whether with a journalism degree or not, can publish material online. 

We live in exciting times as only a few years ago we could not have imagined how accessible information is today. We are constantly connected to the world around us through use of mobile phones, tablets and so forth. 

The Extent of Social Media

1. More than 3 million companies have LinkedIn Company Pages.
2. Google’s social media arm Google+ has seen rapid growth pace as there are 20 million unique mobile users on Google+ every month.
3. 75 Million people use Instagram on a daily basis.
4. Social media is the #1 activity on the web.
5. An astonishing 100 hour of video is uploaded to YouTube every minute.
6. 80% of the time, mobile app usage dominates mobile browser usage.

What About the Rest?

Let’s not forget blogs, emails, chat forums and smart messaging. Information is able to spread fast - faster than it ever could through traditional media. In a world where every citizen is a potential journalist, it certainly brings new meaning to the phrase “as it happens, when it happens”.  

This being said, everyone can now easily share news and updates, but where does credibility come into the equation? Sure, anyone can write a blog and update their social media feeds but if the information is irrelevant or incorrect they won’t be considered as credible. 

With all the content available on the web, mediocre writing doesn’t really have a place. Amazing journalism still stands out from the sea of poorly written and inapt content. Everyone might be a journalist but there’s no room for poor journalism. Content is as important as ever and good content even more so. 

Citizen Journalism

Media critic, Jay Rosen, defies the citizen journalist as the former audience member who is no longer stuck in the pattern of one-way communication, but now contributes to the discussion. Social media has had such an impact on reporting, that citizen (or public) journalism has started to become the norm for many companies in the media industry. Many go-between companies who deal with image and footage syndication will accept amateur submissions from non-officials whether it regards news worthy stories or even a celebrity sighting. Although this is not the norm just yet, social networking sites and blogs are giving anyone with an account the chance to be a citizen journalist and in real-time, contribute to the pool of information. Naturally this causes a flux of poor reporting, but at the same time the trend inspired those in the media fields to up their game when it comes to quality content.

There is no better time than now to write well.

Sound Idea Digital is a full digital marketing agency. For more information, contact 012 66 44 227 or email to info@soundidea.co.za

Mari Morrison is a Digital Journalist and Content Editor for Sound Idea Digital l mari@soundidea.co.za l @SoundIdea l www.soundidea.co.za