Twitter and microblogging at the Media140 conference

Jon Gripton, online news editor at Sky News, discussed his reasons for appointing a Twitter correspondent, saying "it is effectively another news feed. It helps us source eyewitnesses and photos and other people who are on the scene of an event." He went on to compare Twitter to the Press Association, which supplies news wire to both the print and broadcast press in the UK and Ireland.

Gripton's comments, however, were criticised by Techcrunch editor Mike Butcher and technology writer Bill Thompson, with the latter pointing out "Twitter is not about journalism," even if it is used by some to complement it.

Journalistic objectivity

The debate moved onto journalistic integrity and the obvious question: how to maintain standards in a real-time news environment, bearing in mind the increase in time pressures and the reduction in staff numbers? Butcher argued that the expanding community meant that fact-evasion or inaccuracies were no longer possible, although Darren Waters, technology correspondent for the BBC warned of the risks associated with relying on news consumers to fact check the claims made by news reporters.

He also said there was a fine line between using Twitter as a journalistic tool and as a social one. The BBC, which has engaged with Twitter, Facebook and other social media platforms, in some way or another, is still undecided about how it should integrate these tools in a way which is viable long-term, said Waters. "We're still really grappling with the audience in terms of how far we can go. We haven't editorially cracked it yet," he said. "We aren't sure the audience is ready to see a BBC journalist's personal Twitter feed," although editorial employees are allowed to use the service provided they use a disclaimer. Recently, the Wall Street Journal issued a list of rules to staff regarding professional conduct on social networking sites and other papers have been following suit.

Thompson weighed in with a point on how journalistic objectivity could be seen to be compromised by audiences exposed to the Twitter feeds of hacks. "It was like pulling back the curtain and seeing the wizard," he said.

When the audience was invited to ask questions, one individual asked panellists how they saw Twitter profiting in the long-term - a conundrum not yet solved as Twitter execs figure out a viable business model.

Branding

Inevitably, this was followed by a question on how journalists could expect to make a living in the future, as digital innovations force them to rethink their job specs. Butcher argued that branding was a key factor and that this could make or break a journalist. He used Robert Preston, the BBC's business editor as an example, referring to him as a rock star. He said organisations were grooming correspondents in a way so as to attract a large following, noting that the majority of journalists did not have the luxury of being backed by such a huge organisation and, that going forward, individuals would need to engage in what he called "entrepreneurial journalism," by personally developing and pursuing their own brand name. A candidate with relatively less experience, yet who has a blog with a loyal fan base is more likely to succeed over another applicant, with slightly more experience but no following, he said.

The future

The event proved to be a fascinating debate on the future of journalism set against a digital and increasingly time-sensitive context. How will new media, like social networking platforms and microblogging, change the way old media - in the form of newspapers, radio and television - source and report news?

Whilst nobody will be surprised that Twitter talk dominated and dictated the order of the day, wider lessons should be learned from the emerging technologies of recent years. One case in point is Technorati, as Butcher and Thompson observe. Launched in 2002, it was originally lauded as a pioneering search engine for blogs and won a variety of web awards and nominations. Time magazine said: "If Google is the Web's reference library, Technorati is becoming its coffee house." As one Guardian article points out "immense volumes of traffic began to crash his [founder, David L Sifry's] servers and people started offering him money to keep track of their blogs." Yet, although Technorati has continued to do relatively well, it hasn't lived up to the hype, having failed to establish itself as a household name. "It was a reality check that in the web 2.0 world, trends and companies come and go," says the Guardian's Kevin Anderson, blogs editor.

Given the fast-changing nature of digital technologies, therefore, how wise is it for news organisations to not just "overly depend on one platform" - as Waters fears - but to invest so much time, energy and resources on a medium which could soon find itself fall out of favour with the fickle online community?

Perhaps, like journalists, real-time microblogging services must also fight it out by engaging in brand warfare, creating publicity which, in turn, creates a following. After all, the Twitter race to get 1million followers between Hollywood actor Ashton Kutcher and CNN could arguably be labelled as a battle of the brands, in which Kutcher's name came out top.
 
The branding of the journalist seems inevitable, for reasons already outlined, yet while this may safeguard and enhance the career of a reporter, what are the implications on reporting itself, as news hacks overtake the news on the popularity stakes?  Might branding unwittingly lead to a celebrity culture where who said what becomes more important than what was actually said? This is oversimplifying matters and, it is unlikely that this consumes the entire industry, yet even if this is limited to a minority of key players, should these players become the status quo, dictating the news agenda?

In reality, branding is another term for reputation which, although is becoming more of a necessity, is nothing new within the industry, as regular newspaper columns which are often personality-driven by their authors, demonstrate.

In the mean time, social tools will continue to blur the personal and the professional, critics will continue to argue journalistic objectivity is undermined and others will defend this by saying that the benefits of engaging with a public whose trust and confidence grows, is worth the pay off. The future of microblogging technology - and the consequences this will have on journalism - is as exciting as it is uncertain.


Sources: Media140 , Guardian.co.uk (1) , Guardian.co.uk (2) , Guardian.co.uk (3) Journalism.co.uk (1) , Journalism.co.uk (2) , Slideshare , Sky News , Technorati Media , Time.com