9 neighbors

9 neighbors is a website dedicated to the people who live in and around the hub. It is site that is devoted to bringing up to date information on the news around Boston. Everything from traffic and train schedules, to pot hole maps and current Red Sox information. This site has it all. 9 Neighbors is journalism because well it covers the news, has an audience and because it's truthful information. Sometimes there is an opinion or two, but mainly it is truthful information. 9 Neighbors is not journalism because it is unregulated, it is hard to verify all the facts on it (if they are facts at all), and most would argue since it just takes links from other sites and does very little of its own reporting it isn't really journalism. However I would need to argue that even though most of the information is provided by other sources and links, somebody has to find it and compile it, so that makes it journalism. There is a role for professional journalists everywhere so their is definitely one on 9 Neighbors. A professional journalist could do some original reporting, they could help fact check and they could help better the reputation of the site by being a part of it. Mainstream sites should definitely use sites like 9 Neighbors because since it's citizen journalism, the citizens are going to read it. This helps their readership and it makes them feel more at home with citizens and less like the big media machine that a lot of sites and news organizations are viewed as. I think that 9 Neighbors pulls of the citizen journalism part of their site very well. However I think they need to add more meat to their reporting, all it is, is a few sentences explaining the link. They should put some more into their blurbs. All in all I think 9 Neighbors is a very good site.