Jeff Jarvis of Buzz Machine is reporting that the International Herald Tribune will be running headlines from Oh My News. From The Guardian:
A spokesman for the International Herald Tribune was unavailable for comment yesterday, but the company confirmed that an initial deal would see headlines pulled from OhMyNews on to the Tribune’s website.
It is not yet clear whether such articles will be treated in a similar manner to those from established news agencies such as Reuters and the Associated Press, but sources close to the negotiations believe it is likely that the newspaper itself could run such stories in the near future.
Such a move is likely to be seen as a sign of the growing legitimacy of citizen reporting, which has been much heralded in recent years, particularly in the wake of major news events like the July 7 bombings or the Buncefield depot explosion. But it has not secured the kind of mainstream recognition that its advocates demand.
OhmyNews pioneered a more organised form of citizen journalism when it was founded in 2000 as a corrective to the otherwise state-influenced press in Seoul. Since then a number of agencies and organisations have tried a similar model.
“This endorsement means a lot to us, and we are now driving to have similar links with other news organisations,” said Hong Eun-Taek, editor in chief of OhmyNews International. “We are growing fast, the pace is quickening and we are publishing more stories. I think we can match expectations.”
The company now has more than 40,000 contributors, the vast majority of whom are based in South Korea, but its English-language operation has correspondents around the globe. Earlier this year OhmyNews drew more than $11m (£6m) in funding from Japanese investor Softbank, which has resulted in the opening of a bureau in Tokyo. The entire network plans to have about 100,000 correspondents worldwide by 2010.
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