| URL | OhmyNews.com |
|---|---|
| Slogan | Every Citizen is a Reporter |
| Commercial? | Yes |
| Registration | Required |
| Available language(s) | Korean |
| Owner | Oh Yeon Ho |
| Launched | February 22, 2001 |
| Revenue | USD 70,000 |
| Current status | Online |
OhmyNews (Hangul: 오마이뉴스) is a South Korean online newspaper website with the motto "Every Citizen is a Reporter". It was founded by Oh Yeon Ho on February 22, 2000.
It is the first of its kind in the world to accept, edit and publish articles from its readers, in an open source style of news reporting. About 20% of the site's content is written by the 55-person staff, while most of the articles are written by other freelance contributors who are mostly ordinary citizens.
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OhmyNews was influential in determining the outcome of the South Korean presidential election, 2002. After being elected, President Roh Moo-hyun granted his first interview to OhmyNews.
OhmyNews International is an English language online newspaper that features "citizen reporter" articles written by contributors from all over the globe. Its content is almost 100% citizen reporter.
On February 22, 2006, OhmyNews and Japanese firm Softbank signed an investment contract valued at US$11 million. In 2006 OhmyNews started to build a Japan-based citizen-participatory journalism site called OhmyNews Japan, launched on August 28 with a famous Japanese journalist and 22 other employees working under ten reporters. These journalists' articles were the object of much criticism; on November 17, 2006, the newspaper ended the citizen-participation aspect of the paper. The South Korean newspaper admitted that OhmyNews Japan had failed.[1] In July 2008, all staff of OhmyNews Japan were dismissed, and by the end of August operations had ceased on the site.
The 2nd Citizen Reporters' Forum was held by OhmyNews in Seoul, Korea from July 12–15, 2006.[2] The 3rd International Citizen Reporters Forum was held by OhmyNews in Seoul from June 27 to 29, 2007.
On November 24, 2007, OhmyNews opened a "citizen journalism school" to serve as a "collaborative knowledge center" for classes in journalism, digital cameras and photojournalism. It is located 90 minutes from Seoul in the refurbished building of an elementary school. The faculty will include OhmyNews editors and other journalists from print, radio and television. There is in-school lodging and dining capacity for 50 guests.
On July 8, 2009, Oh Yeon-ho revealed that Ohmynews was losing up to 700 m won yearly, and appealed to website users to join a voluntary subscription scheme.[3]
Critics argue that Ohmynews is losing original features as alternative–independent media in financial independence. Oh Yeon-ho said, “70 to 80 percent of our revenue came from corporate advertising and sponsorships. In contrast, contributions from readers only totaled five percent of total revenue.” Oh also argued, “We have not received a cent from Lee Myungbak government for central government advertising.”[4]
However a government report to National Assembly in 2009 revealed that Ohmynews received 120 m won(approximately 100,000 dollars) for government advertising from February 2008 to July 2009.[5]
An Ohmynews report said they had received about 870 m won(approximately 900,000 dollars) for government advertising from 2003 to 2007 by introducing government official reports to National Assembly.[6]
An alternative medium Pressian reported Oh's comments, "I respect Samsung as major business partner," and introduced about 20 percent of the total advertising and cooperation revenue of Ohmynews is coming from Samsung for years, the biggest business corporate of Korea.[7]
On August 1, 2010, OhMyNews of South Korea announced a change in its format from an "edited citizen journalist news site" to a "blog dedicated to covering and discussing the world of citizen journalism itself," starting the following month. The new URL is http://international.ohmynews.com
Simply, OmN had become a victim of its own success; their paid editorial staff no longer felt that they could verify facts in stories that poured in from all over the world—roughly 225 articles/day from a pool of 70,000 citizen journalists.
OhMyNews asks, "How are regular people making and changing the news?" OmN gave its writers these pieces of advice: (1)"Write for the citizen journalism site in your country or create your own blog. (2) Tell us what you are writing about, and give us a feed to include in our aggregator." (3) OmN is eager to hear from us and hopes we'll stay active in citizen journalism. http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/295823
OhMyNews International now has a group of curators—a much smaller pool. According to OmN, what is a Curator and how are they chosen?
"Curators use their sources to find news about citizen journalism and bring it to OMNI. Each curator is a specialist in a certain subject or region. They are entrusted to find credible sources and put them together in a logical fashion for our readers."
"Curators are important to our operation. They are given a great deal of trust. In order to maintain credibility amongst our team members, new curators come join through recommendations of existing curators. And even amongst the curators we have different levels depending on their experience and contributions. This is to maintain a steady level of quality and credibility with our readers." http://international.ohmynews.com/about Joe McPherson regularly sends emails on advice to curators for story topics.