Chris from NYC Indymedia writes on his blog about citizen journalism a lot. The other day he wrote about the idea that citizen journalism is really still quite a priveleged activity, and that even a lot of people who can do it just are not going to do it. He quotes lots of bloggers and also Subcommandante Marcos saying in 1997:
The world of contemporary news is a world that exists for the VIP's-- the very important people," Marcos said. "Their everyday lives are what is important: if they get married, if they divorce, if they eat, what clothes they wear, or what if they clothes they take off-- these major movie stars and big politicians. But common people only appear for a moment-- when they kill someone, or when they die." One of the original hopes of Indymedia was that it would empower the very people who were being increasingly ignored by the corporate press to cover themselves, to "be their own media." And while, as Josh Breitbart notes, the citizen's media revolution has succeeded, the poor and marginalized are still being left behind.