Reporter fired after Conservative MP refuses to deal with newspaper

Wow. I thought I was beyond being shocked by Harper's thugs. We should ask this woman to write about her experience for rabble, if she is willing.

Unionist wrote:

Wow. I thought I was beyond being shocked by Harper's thugs. We should ask this woman to write about her experience for rabble, if she is willing.

So your suggestion is she should go from selling her work to more or less giving it away? I'd love to read her story especially if as a journalist she was being paid as a professional.

Yes I expect her to tell her story for free.  When I have a hard luck story I tell it for free, what makes her anything special.  As far as a career move, going around telling your story is often a great way to also find your next job.

I have my doubts about babble paying more than a full time job at a newspaper, even a rural one!  :)

In any case, you have a point about citizen journalism.  Telling her story somewhere in order to get the word out wouldn't necessarily have to be a paid gig - most reporters don't report on themselves as "the story". Citizen journalism has been blurring the lines between professional and non-professional reporting as mainstream journalism has been having to share more and more eyeballs with the alt media sites.  And most professional journalists have been adapting to the new reality by becoming more like citizen journalists - interactive with their readers through social media. 

So the mainstream professionals have the best of both worlds - they are using social media now in the same way alt media uses it to promote themselves, their writing, and their mainstream publications.  Alt media had to do it that way all along out of necessity to spread the word about themselves since they had no budget to advertise any other way than word of mouth through social media.  This has made citizen journalism very popular.  But the mainstream journalists have realized that they have to act like citizen journalists to some degree too, by chatting with their audience, etc.  The difference, of course, is that the mainstream professionals have good salaries and major media dollars backing them, so they can afford to chase down stories and do the kind of investigative reporting that requires you to not have another day job to support you.  You can't do investigative reporting for love unless you're independently wealthy.

Citizen journalism is about reporting from within the story.  As a citizen journalist, you report on what's happening around you, the idea being that there are millions of citizen journalists around the world reporting from where they are, from the standpoint of people experiencing the story.  And everyone reads everyone else's reporting in order to know what's really happening, as opposed to supposed "objective reporting" from corporate, mainstream media.  People who get involved in alternative media generally don't do it for the pay (or, if they do, they must be very disappointed!).  They do it as a form of activism, and maybe if they're lucky, they get paid an honourarium, or small stipend of some kind.

I'm not saying that's a good thing - just saying that's how it is.  A place like rabble would fold in about half a minute if they paid their staff what mainstream media (even small town mainstream media) paid its journalists.  I have no idea what the solution is or should be, or what funding model would provide enough money for journalists to be paid proper professional wages for their work in alt media. 

Great!

Yeah, we were scooped. Hopefully Unionist isn't too disappointed (unless he tipped them off too...)