Mobile Sourcing: A Case Study of Journalistic Norms and Chat Apps Usage

• In Event: Rules, Norms, and Expectations for Mobile Communication Practices

Abstract

Since 2011, mobile chat applications have gained significant popularity worldwide and the leading chat apps have surpassed social networking platforms in user numbers. These apps have become the hosts for everyday communication among a wide variety of users, and (thanks to the functionalities of certain chat apps) have taken on significance in reporting. Especially in Asia, journalists have turned to those apps to complement face-to-face interactions to gather the news. Drawing on in-depth interviews with foreign correspondents based in China and Hong Kong, this article examines journalistic sourcing practices on mobile chat applications in contexts of surveillance and censorship. In light of theories of journalistic norms, this paper discusses three approaches journalists have taken when sourcing on chat apps: trust, master, or abandon the network. By studying journalistic practices using these three prisms, this paper provides an understanding of how journalists have constructed journalistic trust with sources using chat apps. This paper offers an exploratory study of how foreign correspondents socially constructed mobile chat apps as tools of reportage and as essential links in journalists’ networks of information.

Authors

• Valerie Belair-Gagnon, U of Minnesota - Twin Cities

• Colin Agur, U of Minnesota