Landert, D., Miscione, G. (2017). Narrating the stories of leaked data: The changing role of journalists after Wikileaks and Snowden.

From Digital Culture & Society

Landert, D., & Miscione, G. (2017). Narrating the stories of leaked data: The changing role of journalists after WikiLeaks and Snowden. Discourse, Context & Media, 19, 13-21. Retrieved from [https://journals.scholarsportal.info/pdf/22116958/v19icomplete/13_ntsoldojawas.xml ]

Alissa Reid

The article Narrating the stories of leaked data: The changing role of journalists after WikiLeaks and Snowden, provides insight into an important area of the ever-changing public sphere: journalism regarding leaked data pertaining to national security. It is clear that technology is constantly changing and evolving, as do the surveillance tactics involved. As a result, national security bodies have changed their methods, which many do not approve of. This has led to a recent trend of whistleblowers deeming it necessary to make these ethically-challenged practices become well-known. Obviously these whistleblowers have an important decision to make in relation to how this information should be made public knowledge. Some deicide to use mediums such as WikiLeaks, which allows for “…maximizing public access to data” (p. 15), as opposed to providing information to investigative journalists working at major publications, such as The Guardian. The authors compare these two mediums and the impact different forms of storytelling, especially about national security, have on the public sphere. As the use of public data collected by governments for surveillance use is such a controversial topic, this research helps to provide better information and insight into an important topic.

Landert and Miscione discuss the ever-changing landscape of journalism, in an era where information is easily accessed online, without the need of it having to be reported. As a result of this changed media landscape, reporting is being conducted in entirely new ways, and the researchers developed a question: How do contemporary forms of online whistleblowing change the role of journalists as intermediaries between data and the general public? In order to answer this question, coverage provided by The Guardian is examined, through the use of contrasting their coverage on Manning’s leaks where they collaborated with WikiLeaks, as opposed to Snowden’s leaks where The Guardian was the only medium who posted his leaked information. These two cases are contrasted, as journalists have entirely different roles in them, due to being the ones who had to make a narrative from the mass publicized data, contrasted to being the only ones with access to the information and having the opportunity to shape the entire narrative. The authors state “…these two cases engender two approaches to information management, one more closely derived from the original culture of the internet, the other more sensitive to the broadly legitimized function of journalism” (p. 15). As these cases both publicized very sensitive and potentially dangerous information, the authors investigate the tensions between journalists and those who simply use WikiLeaks, which allows for complete transparency, rather than the ability for information to be condensed and analyzed by journalists. The researchers found, “…journalists may no longer be needed to publish leaked data and guard the distinction between stage and backstage…still needed to accompany the readers and to tell the stories of leaked data” (p. 19). Journalists roles have adapted in order to better serve the public, which is illustrated by journalism now being considered data management as opposed to gatekeeping.

A strength of this article is the authors providing a new perspective on an issue. Obviously the process of data collecting changes, as does the needs/abilities of journalists, but Landert and Miscione provide a new perspective on this issue of whistleblowing and the publishing of data. There is research on the implications of whistleblowing and why it is conducted, especially in this technologically advanced era, but no research on the perspective of the journalists who rely on these events to have a job and inform the public. These authors illustrate the change that has occurred due to massive whistleblowing events, such as Snowden’s revelations, and how journalists are no longer the gatekeepers of information. They have the major task of managing data, especially due to the ease of which information can be posted online. Rather than sometimes having to investigate for information, journalists now have to examine data already provided and make it into a clear narrative for readers to easily understand. Landert and Miscione do an excellent job at explaining why this has happened, and the impact it has on both journalism, and informing the public sphere.

Another strength of this article is the extensive literature review. In order to conduct quality research, the authors must extensively research the topic in order to understand it entirely, be aware of what has already been researched, and to demonstrate to readers that this is an important area to study. Literature reviews allow for the realization that there is a research gap, which Landert and Miscione noticed was the perspective of journalists. This literature review includes research on open participation and media bias, in addition to a section on whistleblowers and journalists. Conducting research on media bias and open participation is essential for understanding how journalism works, the different forms of reporting, and the impact the internet has had on the industry. The section on the connection between whistleblowing and journalism is also essential, due to providing insight into why both parties need each other in order to be successful, and how the existing research only focuses on ethical questions. Conducting the literature review illustrated to the authors that research needed to be conducted on news writing, and how this type of data affects the content and structure of journalism. This literature review clearly illustrates what has been researched previously, and why this research was required in order to better understand the topic of journalism and whistleblowing.

A weakness of the research is too much explanation of the two cases, and not enough elaboration on the importance of the comparison. As this research paper is relatively short, the authors should have made this research condensed and elaborated properly on the most important aspects. There are very thorough explanations of the two cases, but the actual comparison and explanation is not long enough. The research question is not mentioned again until near the end, with very little elaboration on the answer as the authors answer it by stating, “In a nutshell, the answer is that journalists…” (p. 19). The discussion and conclusion section mentions a lot of important aspects to be considered, but there is not enough elaboration on them for this to be considered a quality answer to the importance of the topic. Landert and Miscione also do not state any limitations within their study, which would be a good way of better understanding their complete process, while also providing more validity to the research.