OhmyNotSoGreatNews

South Korea’s news Web site, OhmyNews.com, was once heralded as the model for the future of media. The venture was a pioneer in “citizen journalism,” encouraging regular folk to submit original reporting about what was happening in their communities, subject to vetting by professional journalists at headquarters. But now, according to a story in today’s Los Angeles Times, the site has lost its heat: 

After making a big splash during South Korea’s 2002 presidential elections, the company lost money last year on revenue of about $6 million, most of it from ads. Its readership, as measured by page views on the Internet, has fallen to about 1.5 million a day, from a peak of 20 million five years ago. … It has faced questions of credibility, partly because of its liberal bent and its army of nonprofessional reporters. In one instance, an advertising agent and citizen reporter wrote a story promoting a company that, it was later discovered, was one of his clients.

We love the LA Times, but we could have told you this six months ago. In fact, we did. In our January/February 2007 issue, writer Jennifer Veale told the story of how OhmyNews was not all it was cracked up to be. Check out “Seoul Searching” right here.