Pioneer journalism: Conceptualizing the role of pioneer journalists and pioneer communities in the organizational re-figuration of journalism

Abstract

Recent journalism research often argues that it is high time that we moved beyond the newsroom and begin asking who it is that is stimulating transformation and not what it is, as individual journalists, entrepreneurs, technology firms, and startups assume an increasingly critical role in the development of the field. This article introduces the concept of ‘pioneer journalism’ to provide just such an analysis across different organizational contexts. Pioneer journalism is understood as a particular group of journalists that incorporates new organizational forms and experimental practice in pursuit of redefining the field and its structural foundations. To introduce this concept, the article argues along three stages. First, it develops a theoretical basis on which to pin our understanding of pioneering practice by reviewing previous research into journalism’s transformation beyond the newsroom. Second, it extends the theoretical discussion into the empirical realm by looking at five extreme cases of pioneer journalists through an explorative interview analysis. Third, and to conclude, an integrated concept of pioneer journalism is outlined as a point of departure from which to further consider journalism’s re-figuration more generally.

Hybrid professionalism in journalism: Opportunities and risks of hacker sources

“…In other words: these hacker-journalists may have developed their own professional identity in a hybrid environment. In this sense, they could also be considered as "pioneer journalists" (Hepp & Loosen, 2019), for they act as "intermediaries" (Bourdieu, 2010) between the journalistic field and what hackers have to offer from the outside, pushing for the normalization of the practice within the journalistic field. In the sense, this article showed exactly how journalism is changing, and how new actors are becoming part of its field within the boundaries of the profession.…”

Securing Whistleblowing in the Digital Age: SecureDrop and the Changing Journalistic Practices for Source Protection

“…4. The term "intermediaries", as quoted in Hepp and Loosen (2019) is again taken from Pierre Bourdieu (2010) 5. The Guardian and the New York Times offer two of the most comprehensive of such pages.…”

“…Contrarily, the use of strong encryption-based software is common among privacy-savvy activists, hacktivists, and hackers who base their communication and political strategies on the use of these technologies (Milan and van der Velden 2016). Certainly, encryption-based technologies had some encounters with journalism thanks to the influence and push of various "pioneer journalists" and "pioneer communities" (Hepp and Loosen 2019) that, in the late 1990s and early 2000s explored the potentials of such technologies for reporting purposes. The work of Duncan Campbell, a founding member of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), a computer forensic expert, and one of the first reporters to investigate the role of state surveillance in societies, has to be considered as a milestone in this field (Campbell 2015;Leigh 2019, 86-87, 127-130).…”

“…Information security tools such as SecureDrop are based on technological standards and practices that have generated and found their familiarity in the hacking community 3 and were created by coders or hackers whose affiliation is not necessarily connected with the journalistic field. Recently, information security has found a place in the journalistic field mostly due to the push by organizations and advocacy groups operating in the field of information security or civic technology, which have offered their collaboration to journalists and news organizations as a response to a growing quest for secure communication, especially from "pioneers" in the journalistic field acting as "intermediaries" 4 between journalism and what is past its boundaries (Hepp and Loosen 2019). As Adrienne Russell writes regarding Tor, for instance:…”

Artificial Intelligence and Automated Journalism: Contemporary Challenges and New Opportunities

“…However, we can see that the technological transformations in the field of journalism are inextricably interwoven with the transformation of the media environment [9]. As Postman note, technologieswhich entail communication technologies, from writing to digital media-they generate environments that affect the everyday life of actors using them [10].…”