Oh my… Financial trouble for citizen journalism site?
Posted by
Martin Stabe
on 6 November 2006 at 19:02
Tags: Journalism, OhmyNews
With its 40,000 non-journalist contributors and professionally edited content, Korea’s OhMyNews if often highlighted as the most significant example of citizen journalism.
The question that has always plagued the site, however, is whether a national citizen journalism project can be replicated anywhere elese in the the world. Some have long suspected that a unique set of conditions that existed only in Korea — high broadband penetration and popular discontent with the established media, in particular — had made possible the rise of the citizen journalism site.
In February, Ohmynews secured an $11 million investment from Japan’s Softbank to fund its international expansion, and founder Oh Yeonho gave a bullish interview to Press Gazette several months later as the Japanese version was set to launch.
But according to a story published in BusinessWeek, Ohmynews’ Japanese edition has not yet made much of an impact.
What’s worse, OhmyNews’ already modest profits have been declining. An increasingly competitive online advertising market in Korea is putting the squeeze on the site. According to BusinessWeek, OhmyNews could end its financial year in the red.
Tags: Journalism, OhmyNews
