BBC "Have Your Say"

I came across "Have Your Say" from the BBC today. It seems to be a really good effort to encourage citizen journalism and find out what really interests readers.

Readers submit their own topics and start debates, and many of the suggestions are even taken and get their own story, written by a BBC reporter.

Users can comment and add to the debates, most of which are fully monitored by the site. I always think that moderating the comments and debates on news sites is a good idea, because it helps to keep the discussion relevant and prevents it from getting out of hand and filled with spam, irrational arguments and incoherent babbling. Each Have Your Say story, such as this one on binge drinking, has a Debate Status table on the right of the story, that tells the viewer how many comments have been submitted in total, how many were accepted, how many were rejected, and how many are still awaiting approval. I think it's especially cool that they show the number of rejected comments.

Have Your Say also encourages readers to submit their own photos or videos to the site. They provide detailed information about how to do submit, and what they are looking for. I think this is always a good approach for news organizations to have, (similar to the approach of Crosscut, the online-only newspaper for the Pacific Northwest which I showed in class.) because it shows that they are not afraid of their readers as citizen journalists. Here is an example of a submitted photo:

There are also a number of stories, such as this one about Fidel Castro's retirement, that allow users to comment in a way that to me seems more like columns than "reader comments." I think that having the users add their pictures is also a nice touch.

I hope that more major news organizations will continue to take this approach. People get bored just reading articles and not being able to participate in any way. It seems to me that having a really interactive site and encouraging participation from readers is the way to go.