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Wire Services Vs. the Instant Net

March 12, 2010 6:40:39.209

I think life is only going to get harder for the wire services like Reuters. Bear in mind that until the internet era, wire services were Twitter-like - they were the first place that news showed up. Now?

Last night, Reuters released their social media policy, which includes instructing journalists to avoid exposing bias online and tells them specifically not to "scoop the wire" by breaking stories on Twitter.

I understand their point, but am not at all sure how they'll accomplish this. When a huge story (like the Chilean earthquake) breaks now, where does the early news flow from? Twitter, uStream, and other similar services. The wire services are in the same position that newspapers were in when the wire services popped up - and they eventually chose to work with the wires.

It'll be harder for the wire services, because they can't work with Twitter (et. al.) exclusively, as the papers were able to do. IMHO, this just heralds more disintermediation.

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posted by James Robertson

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