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- Title
Can WikiLeaks Save Journalism and Democracy?
- Authors
Rosner, Josh
- Abstract
If WikiLeaks survives there can be little doubt that it will be a useful tool for investigative journalists. While the cost-per-word of investigative journalism is high, WikiLeaks reduces the time journalists must spend uncovering information and also removes the threat of litigation from the publisher, consequently reducing the cost of journalism. The founder of WikiLeaks, Australian Julian Assange, has explained that he started the website for journalists who were "sick of being censored themselves … and having primary source material they couldn't publish for legal reasons or space reasons." In the Financial Times, Tim Bradshaw has argued that WikiLeaks is following an Internet tradition "dating back to the 1998 allegations about President Clinton's liaison with Monica Lewinsky first published on the Drudge Report." WikiLeaks' emphasis on fact-checking, verification and protection of its sources has a long journalistic lineage. This paper undertakes an examination of how WikiLeaks' rise to prominence has come as the industry's capacity to invest in investigative journalism has been impaired by falling circulation and difficulties in making money from the web. WikiLeaks has the potential, in the face of eroding readership and the arguable decline of public discourse, to empower journalism, and I argue that journalism's contribution to democracy and citizenship may collapse without such sites.
- Publication
Global Media Journal: Australian Edition, 2011, Vol 5, Issue 1, p1
- ISSN
1835-2340
- Publication type
Academic Journal