1) ‘citizen journalism’ still has a ways to go for unpaid sources to become trusted. That’s not to say they aren’t, but accuracy and even accountability are still in a very nascent phase.

2) SM communities tend to be self regulating in a ‘natural selection’ type way. This does mean, however, that there will be content to be filtered out by the reader and when we’re becoming increasing overwhelmed by content overload.

3) Much of the SM space depends on users being proactive in their search for info. Yet for the foreseeable future (i.e. at least a couple of generations) the majority of the population won’t want to ‘hunt and peck’ for news, but will turn to aggregation sites (likely to be the re-incarnation of the traditional media simply using a SM vehicle instead of ‘hard copy’). Furthermore, many of these people will be willing to buy subscriptions to these (whether payment will be $$ or voluntary sharing of info to the sites and therefore their advertisers).

4) The complete ‘loss’ of the hard copy intimates ubiquitous use of ‘smart phones’ and their ilk. However, the majority of the population does not yet have these devices (recently I heard that smart phones made up only around 15% of the cell phone market in Canada). At most they can only access online (including SM) content from a home or work computer. Eventually there will be a tipping point, but we’re not there yet.

The vehicles that the traditional media have used are changing. Of that there is no doubt. But the media – and the requisite journalism/editorial/analysis/commentary that comes with it – will soldier on. At least those ‘outlets’ willing to change with the times will.

Saying people get their news “from the Internet” begs the question of the caliber of information they’re finding–the good, the bad and the really, really wrong are all posted there by someone, with or without a judicious editorial eye.

That editorial function still adds value, which concerns me as newspapers die. This study doesn’t address local news, which is where daily papers really added value all along, and that concerns me even more. How will citizens know what government, business, and nonprofits in their region are doing if they’re reliant on the perspectives of volunteer part-time bloggers?

For those of us doing public relations, we’re distributing directly to the public now. I still get occasional contacts on news releases that are over 5 years old. It changes the role in media relations from being someone who works with the media to being someone who works directly with the media-consuming public, as well as with reporters.

That direct consumption is great for me as a public information officer helping get my institution’s work out to the public–less great for me as a consumer, awash in information put out by people motivated to sell me something.

@BarbChamberlain