Guardian Local – citizen journalism and beatblogging

The demise of local newspapers has been well documented over the past 12 months, and while most people agree it was inevitable, people find it harder to predict how this will change local journalism.

The Guardian thinks it has the answer. Turning to citizen journalists, they are aiming to go back to the very traditional beat journalism method, only this time with bloggers. The new initiative, being trialled in Leeds, Cardiff and Edinburgh, will be called Guardian Local.

The worry has been that a lack of local reporters and media outlets will mean local issues go unnoticed. Things like council issues and corruption in local politics may slip through the net without local journalists on hand to investigate.

Sarah Hartley, the Guardian Local launch editor, is setting up the new network of citizen journalists. An advert for the jobs has now gone online on the Guardian website so it looks like this new reporting network will be up and running by early next year as planned.

I think this is a great way to plug the gap that local newspapers will leave. By using bloggers and not just trained journalists we should get a good mix of reporting styles and input. Bloggers by nature tend to be passionate about their subject matter, so we should see some great stories and in-depth reporting of local issues.

I’m extremely interested to see how this news model works and how the beatblogging idea works in practice. I’ll keep you posted!