The difference between professional and amateur journalists

Professional journalists, I think you’re great. But you’re starting to sound like lawyers, doctors, and CPAs.

It’s just kind of tiring, all the whining, which goes something like this: “We’re extremely important, and no one else is qualified to do what we do. And we’re out of work, and no one will hire us, and I might have to take a job in PR, FFS!!!“ 

While I agree that “serious journalism” is important, I disagree that non-professional journalists can’t do what professionals do. I agree that not all amateurs DO do what professional journalists do, but I think there’s one major reason for that. But first, more whining from professional journalists….  

 This story in particular is pathetic: The Future of News

Will citizen journalists ever replace their traditional counterparts? “No,” said Howe, bluntly, since they lack “a deep network of sources,” editing staff, legal services, and the fine points of reporting know-how, such as filing information requests under the Freedom of Information Act.

But “some successes” are possible, he said, and there are signs of “a great process of professionalization going on.”

Sproul acknowledged that the future of the news “is an inclusive one,” with media organizations acting as final “curators” of reportage.

Baron said citizen journalists will never replace in-depth newsgathering, but they can be useful in supplementing the act of reporting. They might supply “one photo, one fact, one opinion,” he said, but “journalism is more than that.”

 Here’s the only thing different between a professional journalist and an amateur one: A salary.

And I don’t mean that in the tritest way. I mean it like this: If you’re getting paid a salary to interview, hunt down facts, file Freedom of Information Act requests, and do all the hard work it takes to put together a story worth a shit, then you don’t have to worry about doing something else to pay your bills. Amateur journalists don’t do all that because they don’t have the time… they have to go to work.

One reason I say this is because I have worked alongside many professional journalists who went to professional journalist schools and got their professional journalist degrees… and I would say less than half of them cared to meet all the professional journalist criteria, as defined by the aforementioned article.

And the more I do editing, writing, assigning, and – I’m just going to say it – journalism…. sometimes for great pay but most of the time for little-to-no pay, the more I see what it all comes down to, and that’s time. I would love to spend all day working on a single story… or better, like some magazines, a couple of months working on a single story. But like a lot of freelancers/amateur journalists… I have to produce content to get paid. And I don’t get paid unless I produce content.

And maybe that’s what drives me nuts about the whining. It’s the same whining we heard from pro journalists when we asked them to blog or at least create some content for the Web site. Boy, did they whine! Yet they had time to write a foot-long e-mail message about how they don’t have time to contribute to the blog. Interesting.

Here’s a business model that’s going to revolutionize journalism: From now on, professional journalists, you get paid for every piece of content you produce. Online, on Twitter, on a blog, on paper, as a speaker, in a video, in a podcast… you get paid by the piece. And probably not that well.

Professional journalists, you are all now freelancers.