WEEK 2: Convergence is inevitable

Convergence in journalism involves the marriage of old and new mediums. "Mass media" is no longer enough to describe today's new media. The audience is growing because it is spreading virally through blogs and other social networking services such as YouTube or Flickr. Instead of the old paradigm of "one to many," the convergent media is now a medium of "many to many."

It also has gone "multimedia."

Blogs have allowed anyone to become a "journalist." Mainstream media is now embracing technologies, such as blogs, to deliver news. According to this paper from the University of Essex, titled "Blogging: personal participation in public knowledge building on the web,"

Blogs have emerged from a humble beginning to become a highly networked mass of online knowledge and communication. All kinds of research, from searching for the best price of the latest mobile phone, to more rigorous forms, are conducted through the blog medium.

Blogs or blogging have become "cheaper" and efficient means to publish information on the Internet and deliver news to a bigger audience. This is just example on how convergence has spread so quickly worldwide. Anyone with an Internet connection, a decent computer, and a good command of English can become a journalist. Thus we've seen the rise of citizen journalism, which is now gradually being embraced by MSM.

Convergence is happening in the Philippines. With a growing population of Internet users, a close to 40 million mobile phone users, it is evident that Filipinos want news pushed to them via new mediums. The company I worked with, INQ7.net, now sends breaking news to 20,000 mobile phone subscribers. Everyday, the local news website gets more than one million unique visitors -- that's about three times more than the current readership of our sister firm running the print medium.