There are so many terms for this. Grassroots media. Participatory media. User generated content, or to use the more colloquial term, 'stuff'. In a news context, Citizen journalism, now morphing into Networked journalism. It's still so new that we don't know quite what to call it yet.
But the fundamental point all highlight is that content of all hues is no longer just something created by big companies, distributed through established media channels, 1-way. Consumers, people, those formerly known as the audience, are now getting hands-on and contributing to the content pool. They're commenting, asking questions, making suggestions. They're collecting, collating, making lists. And a small cadre are creating new content, whether it be totally new or an amalgam of existing stuff, and sharing it online.
Advances in digital have been crucial to providing the means - digital cameras / camcorders / mobile phones / broadband and so forth. But they're only part of the story. Even more interesting are the cultural and behavioural shifts that have occurred alongside. Just as it's now normal (at least among teens & 20-somethings) to socialise online, so too is it becoming normal to contribute and share 'stuff' you made. Whether it be outpourings of teen angst on a blog, random photos or videos, we're in the midst of a real blossoming of creativity.
Now, not all creativity leads to good things... but so what. So long as we have filters to help us wade through the dross, who cares? And anyway, who gets to say what's good? What I think is great you might hate and vice versa.
Don't misinterpret what I'm saying as meaning that everyone will be creating stuff. They aren't and won't be. But even if only 10% create something, and only 10% of that attracts a tiny audience, that's still an enormous growth in what's available. Grassroots media is stretching media's Long Tail far far beyond what would otherwise exist.
Grassroots media comes in many familiar guises - prose, audio/video, web-based services and so on. But even though it may share a common format, it is fundamentally different in feel from Mainstream Media (aka MSM in blogging parlance)
---Partly this is down to the channel. MSM is is still dominated by traditional broadcast or print distribution, whereas virtually all grassroots media lives online with only the very best trickling over to your bookstore or TV set.
---Partly this is due to the 'look and feel'. Today, the bulk of grassroots media feels amateurish, but real. It has a resonance of authenticity that reality TV shows can never quite muster. Of course, it's also seldom as polished and engaging in terms of storytelling as MSM. That's not to say it can't be... there are some real gems on YouTube... but overall there's not the same consistency of quality in grassroots media, at least not yet. It'll be interesting to see to what extent the gap closes when today's kids grow up - kids for whom filming/editing skills are something you pick up alongside reading & writing.
---Partly this is due to the economics. Most grassroots media is a hobby, done for fun, to show off, to share, to celebrate and cement friendships. If it makes money, great, but that's seldom the purpose. Almost all MSM, on the other hand, are commercial enterprises and thus must have making money as their top priority... sure, many of them seek to uphold high editorial standards and all the rest, but ultimately they have to make money or they don't survive. [The exception to this, of course, are publically funded organisations such as the BBC].
The rise of Grassroots media gets particularly interesting in the context of news. So interesting that I've let it spill over into it's own page here.
Some other slides:
More info and thoughts that i've not yet put into slides:
"Anyone can submit an article to OhmyNews and about three-quarters of the stories on the site are the work of the network's 40,000 non-professional contributors. The rest come from about 50 in-house writers and editors, who also vet the public material to decide what is printed" - link