UnNews:New media journalists embracing Omegle
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| New media journalists embracing Omegle | 
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25 May 2009
SOME SERVER, The Intarnet -- The never-ending list of newspaper shutdowns and bankruptcies has caused reporters to turn to the newest Web-based citizen journalism craze: Omegle.
Touted by professionals as "the next big thing in new media" and "the reporting method of the future," the site allows reporters to conduct interviews with anybody in the world in mere seconds with just a few clicks.
"It's awesome," said Stranger 1, who claimed to be a former New York Times editor. "Just log onto the site and you've got all the man on the street you'll ever need. Plus some woman on the street. I couldn't really tell. She wouldn't give me pics."
Journalists love the site because it's got a clean interface, reader appeal, and it's free. And the site's not just for newspapers and blogs. It's trickling into academia, too.
"We just really want to push the envelope with the Web," said Stranger 2, who claimed to be a renowned online journalism professor. "It's 2009. Times are changing. Do you seriously think kids are going to read a 140-character Twitter update? Get real."
Stranger 2, whose academic credits include "Never Gonna Tell a Lie: The Rickroll as Journalism Maxim" and "OMG! NO WAI? Abbrevs in Journostyle," said he was incorporating Omegle study sessions into his courses' syllabi. And his students are embracing it.
"Yeah its cool DISREGARD THAT," said Stranger 3, who claimed to be a well-endowed public relations student.
But the journalism world is already one step ahead of the schools. More and more reporters are coming up with new and creative ways to use the site.
"So I've got this plan where we're gonna start up 100 browser tabs and ask people what's going on," Stranger 1 said. "And even if 80 of them give me furry porn, which kind of happens a lot, it's still the most cutting-edge way of breaking news out there."
Other plans in the works, he said, included profiles on Omegle chatters and investigative reports based on Omegle tips.
Not everybody is sold, of course. "Tarnation," said Elridge P. Hufflebottom, 85, a retired reporter. "People these days with their Big Macs and their eye clods and their information superhighwaymen. Whatever happened to the good old days of scribbling a bunch of stuff you can't read hours later on notepads that get lost?"
Omegle founder Leif K-Brooks was unavailable for comment. The writer of this article hopes to reach him within the next ten refreshes.
Sources[edit]
- New media "Omegle". Independent citizen reporters, May 23, 2009